Sword Art Online Material Edition 22

Augmented Magic (オーグメンテッドマジック), released at COMITIA 119 on February 12, 2017, is the 22nd Material Edition written by Kunori Fumio. It features a conversation between Kirito and Alice in New Aincrad, as well as Kazuto meeting with Kikuoka Seijirou in the real world. The story was later reworked into a foundation for the prologue of the final arc, Unital Ring.

Part 1
On August 21, 2026, fifteen days since he had returned home after rehabilitation, Kirito was doing his homework in ALfheim Online (ALO). Having trouble focusing on the school task, he thought of recent events in his life, including the sudden disappearance of Kikuoka Seijirou or the fact that Koujiro Rinko was now in command of Rath. After a while, he was approached by Alice in her Cait Sith avatar.

While drinking some tea and eating cakes, the two had a casual conversation, during which Alice admitted getting familiar with the notion of the real world and virtual reality. They also reminisced about their recent adventure in ALO when she had helped Silica during an attack by Player Killers.

During the discussion, Kirito recalled logging in to Underworld again with Asuna and Alice three days before. Spending five hours there, they had met and befriended two female Machine Knights, who informed them about the events of the last two hundred years, including Kirito's and Asuna's roles as the Star King and Star Queen of Underworld, as well as their deaths thirty years prior. Since the time in Underworld was now synced to the time in the real world, Kirito already had plans to dive again as soon as possible.

After Alice broke Kirito's train of thought, Kirito apologised for being inattentive, while musing on Alice's little sister, Selka Zuberg, sleeping on the eightieth floor of the Central Cathedral in a state of deep freeze, as well as helping Alice awaken her.

Just as Kirito was about to lose himself in thought again, Alice brought his attention back to her when she informed him that Professor Koujiro had sent him an ambiguous message, which Kirito deciphered as conveying an invitation to a secret meeting with Kikouka Seijirou the following day. Finishing the discussion, the two went on hunting to help Alice raise her skills level, as the girl wanted quickly to acquire the ability to tame and ride flying dragons.

Part 2
The following day, at precisely 2:50 PM, Kazuto (Kirito) went on his bike to the Central Ginza district to see Kikuoka Seijirou. During the meeting, he learnt that all students of the SAO Survivor School would be given a new-type device which utilized FullDive technology to create Augmented Reality, despite not being a FullDive machine. The device was named the Augma.

Trivia

 * The author has confirmed on his Twitter account that Augmented Magic was created to play with the idea of writing a novel version of Ordinal Scale set after Alicization ; however, the author eventually abandoned the idea and confirmed that this Material Edition is non-canon.