Sword Art Online Extra Edition

Sword Art Online Extra Edition (ソードアート・オンライン Extra Edition) is a special episode that aired on December 31, 2013 on Tokyo MX, BS11 and Niconico Douga and streamed worldwide two hours after on Crunchyroll, Daisuki, and other streaming sites. Most of the episode is a recap with some swimsuit scenes mixed in, while the remaining 20 minutes of the episode shows an original new story about the characters' quest in the Undersea Temple of ALfheim Online. This episode features a new ending theme song called Niji no Oto, sung by Aoi Eir.

Plot
The episode begins with Kazuto (Kirito) and Suguha (Leafa) arriving at the SAO Survivor School on his motorbike. After meeting up with Asuna, Rika (Lisbeth) and Keiko (Silica), Kazuto left to attend emergency counseling, while the girls headed off to use the changing rooms to change into their swimsuits.



Kazuto arrived at the office to find the counselor and Kikuoka Seijirou waiting for him, where the latter revealed that the "emergency counseling" was just a ruse to get Kazuto to meet with him. The counselor then left and Kikuouka dumped a pile of snacks, as well as a recorder, onto the table to discuss Kazuto's experience in Sword Art Online in order to determine why Kayaba Akihiko did what he did. Kazuto started explaining at the part when Akihiko first announced that the true nature of Sword Art Online was to create a setting of a «Death Game», and how Kirito later left Klein in Starting City to become a solo player. Meanwhile, in the locker room, the girls compared their swimsuits' respective styles.



At the swimming pool, the girls played in the water, with Suguha getting in with a buoyancy ring, which Rika released the air out of it and teased Suguha about her breasts being able to keep her afloat. However Asuna stopped her and then told Suguha that they would start teaching her how to swim by first having her hold her head underwater. Back at the counselor's office, Kazuto recounted the fight with Illfang the Kobold Lord and the reason as to why he became a solo player and taking on all the hate towards beta players by becoming a «Beater» so that the beta testers would not be discriminated by other players. Seijirou concluded that living a life of a beater should have been painful, but Kazuto assured him that the true pain was losing someone he cared the most about, with a flashback shown of Kirito mourning for Sachi's death.



At the pool, Asuna guided Suguha along the pool as she slowly learned to swim with her head underwater. The girls then took a break, when Suguha asked them how they had all met her brother. Keiko told them how Kirito saved her from Drunk Apes, and then helped her obtain the Pneuma Flower to resurrect Pina. The girls found Kirito's statement that Keiko reminded him of his sister hilarious, prompting Rika to wonder if Kirito really did think Keiko resembled Suguha, teasing that their breasts did not look alike. Rika then proceeded to tell them that her first meeting with Kirito was not as dramatic as Keiko's, starting several flashbacks of where Lisbeth met Kirito in her blacksmith shop, how Kirito had jumped into X'rphan the White Wyrm's nest to save her and later got them out of there, and finally his promise to clear the game for her and everyone. As she finished telling them, both Suguha and Asuna apologized for Kirito's actions, but Rika replied that they were good memories.

At the counselors office, Kazuto explained to Seijirou about boss raids and how dangerous they were to the players, which had him recount the battle with The Gleam Eyes and how he had defeated it with his Dual Blades skill, though he had nearly died in the process. Kazuto then explained about how players were even more dangerous than the monsters, due to them coming up with more ways to kill other players such as the incident where Kuradeel paralyzed Kirito and Godfree, torturing and killing the latter before nearly doing the same with the former. Kazuto then recounted his duel with Heathcliff, and stated that this duel gave him the clue to his true identity.



At the pool, the girls had lunch. Suguha expressed jealousy at Asuna's cooking style, but quickly hid it when questioned and deflected the subject by asking how Asuna met Kirito. Asuna was reluctant, but when Keiko and Rika insisted, she recounted to the girls how she first met Kirito on the 1st Floor after the boss raid meeting, and how he showed her that there was joy in living in Aincrad by convincing her to sleep on Aincrad's nicest season. Rika and Keiko were appalled at Asuna's luck with Kazuto and pressured her into revealing the time they spent together eating Ragout Rabbit's Meat and where she threatened Kirito to party with him again. Keiko then expressed jealousy of Asuna having a daughter, Yui, and wished to bring her happiness later in the day, bringing another flashback of where Kirito and Asuna accepted Yui as their daughter and where she was almost deleted by the Cardinal System. The girls then decided to resume swimming.

Back at the counselor's office, Kazuto told Seijirou about his final battle with Heathcliff and how he defeated him as well as what had happened after he defeated Kayaba Akihiko. After Kazuto finished explaining about his experience in Sword Art Online, he got a message from Asuna which contained a picture of her with Suguha, Rika and Keiko at the pool. This then started a talk about Kazuto joining ALfheim Online to find and rescue Asuna from Sugou Nobuyuki.



As Suguha got better at swimming, she started to miss Kazuto and told the girls how she had joined ALO to see her brother's vision of MMO gaming, and also recounted where she met Kirito in ALO and originally thought he was rude. A flashback then occurred of when Leafa agreed to take Kirito to the World Tree from Swilvane. Asuna thanked Suguha for what she had done, to which Suguha replied that there was no need, as she had fun. Rika then asked her what she thought of Kirito, before knowing that he was her brother, to which she replied by saying that he was quick, strong-willed and that she had faith in him, after knowing he was protecting someone, such as the time where Kirito protected Leafa and refused to abandon her to the Salamanders in the Legrue Corridor as well as his fight with General Eugene to protect the Sylph-Cait Sith alliance. Rika then teased her once again, saying that it was nice that Suguha and Kazuto were so close, but that she was worried that it would become a forbidden love, which caused Suguha to blush and changed the subject to swimming. As the girls went back to swim, Suguha wondered what would have happened had she known Kirito was actually Kazuto before falling in love with him, recounting the day she discovered her brother's avatar's true identity.



Meanwhile, Kazuto explained to Seijirou that he had not defeated the Grand Quest and reached Asuna on his own, he had done it thanks to the help of Leafa, Recon, Sakuya, Alicia Rue and the Cait Sith and Sylph warriors, recounting his two attempts at the Grand Quest. Seijirou brought up Kirito's fight with Oberon and thought that it would be impossible for a mere player to defeat a GM, bringing another flashback of where Oberon tortured Kirito and Asuna before Kayaba Akihiko appeared to help Kirito. Kazuto stated to Seijirou that in a game, a GM is basically a god. However, that power is only granted to them by the system; they did not earn it, nor train for that power. Kazuto then finished the meeting with Seijirou, saying that he knew the rest of the story.



That evening in ALO, Kirito and Klein were sitting on the beach whilst the girls played in the water. As they were going to look at the girls, Agil appeared, startling them. In a flashback, it was shown that Kirito and Asuna recounting their encounter with the The King of Lakes to Yui led to Yui mentioning a whale and that she wished she could see one. As Asuna was telling her about them, Kirito recalled a quest in which it was rumoured that whales appear. Hearing that, Yui said that she wanted to ride one. Thus, after the training at the pool and Kazuto's meeting with Seijirou, the group met up on Thule Island in ALfheim Online before going on the quest to fulfill Yui's wishes. The group then prepared to head out, though Klein was dismayed when he found out that the girls would be in their armor and not their bikinis throughout the whole quest.

After flying out to the open sea, the group discovered a batch of water shimmering. Once Asuna cast «Water Breathing», Kirito led the party underwater while Asuna guided Leafa. As they noticed the temple and a quest NPC, Klein quickly swam over to meet the NPC, thinking that the only people that would need help underwater would be mermaids. However, as Klein began offering his help and looked up at the NPC, he noticed that the NPC, named Nerakk was actually an old man, which caused his jaw to drop in shock and dismay. While Klein was frozen at the turn of events, Kirito initiated the «Deep Sea Plunderers» quest. Nerakk explained that thieves stole a pearl from him and requested the group to get it back, though Leafa became a little suspicious as she found the NPC's name to be very familiar, but she dismissed the idea. In the temple, as the Kirito and Klein were discussing about supporting Leafa due to her lack in expertise in underwater fights, they accidentally walked into a drain trap. As soon as they managed to barely swim out of the trap, an Armachthys swam out of the trap. As everyone was fighting the monster, Leafa remembered everyone helping her and also tried to directly attack the creature, rather than staying behind for support, but the Armachthys became aggravated and countered with a whirlpool, knocking her into the trap. Kirito then jumped into the whirlpool to save Leafa, defeating the Armachthys at the same time. As Kirito saved Leafa, she had a flashback to when she was a young child and had fallen into the water and would have drowned, if it were not for Kazuto saving her.



After proceeding deeper into the dungeon and defeating a large crab monster, the group found the pearl needed to complete the quest and headed back to Nerakk to give it to him. As Kirito was handing the pearl to Nerakk, Lisbeth commented on not seeing the thieves at all during the quest, which caused Asuna to call out to Kirito to stop him from handing Nerakk the "pearl" and, after inspecting which, Asuna discovered it was actually an egg. As the fairies refused to give Nerakk the egg, he then transformed into his true form, Kraken the Abyss Lord, who Yui stated was much stronger than the floor bosses from New Aincrad. Kraken the Abyss Lord effortlessly took down the party, but just as he moved in to finish them off and claim the egg, Leviathan the Sea Lord intervened. After a brief exchange, Kraken the Abyss Lord retreated, warning them that he would eventually be successful. Leviathan then took the egg from Asuna, which caused a Quest Completion box to open up, and the Sea Lord then sent the party up to the surface on the top of a white humpback whale.

In the epilogue, Seijirou once again tries to contact Kazuto.

New Characters

 * Kikuoka Seijirou
 * Counseling teacher

Known Monsters

 * Giant crab
 * Whale

Named Monsters

 * Armachthys

Named Bosses

 * Kraken the Abyss Lord

Named NPCs

 * Nerakk (Kraken's NPC form)
 * Leviathan the Sea Lord

Spells

 * «Water Breathing»
 * Unnamed Buff spell

Locations

 * «SAO Survivor School»
 * «Thule Island»
 * «Yggdrasil City»
 * Undersea Temple

Errors

 * When Kirito accepted the quest from Nerakk, Nerakk's quest icon displayed "Quest Accepted" as "Qest Accepeted" and, after when they listen to Nerakk, "Quest In Progress" was displayed as as "Qest Progress".
 * These errors were fixed in the DVD and Bluray version.
 * Nerakk's quest icon showed a "?" when the quest was not yet accepted and a "!" when the quest was accepted, even though it should have been vice versa.
 * On Kazuto's phone screen, Asuna's name is written as Yuuki Asuna (結城 明日菜) instead of Yuuki Asuna (結城 明日奈).
 * "Leafa" was still written as "Leefa" in ALO's menus in this episode, even though the author has confirmed that «Leafa» is the correct spelling.
 * Suguha's phone is shown as having an earphone jack cap when viewing from the back of the phone, but that is not drawn when viewing from the front of the phone.
 * The ring of words that appeared at the end of Leafa's buff spell only showed "hogg margr illt", instead of the full incantation.

Adaption Notes

 * Adapted from episodes 1-25, with the addition of original content.


 * Kazuto's tandem was Honda's Thailand-made Dash125 in the novel, but it was changed to a Yamaha DT125R at Mr. Kawahara's suggestion. While it is still 125cc, its length is more than 25 cm longer.
 * The original scene where Kirito reacted to the undressing Asuna and told her that she had misunderstood his intentions (near the end of Episode 10) had been cut out of the flashback of whole series of event.

Trivia

 * The reason why there were swimsuits in the episode was because Reki Kawahara misread the original requirement and wrote four times the amount of script as originally intended.

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