Of Mouse and Man

Phase 13

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Original Title: The World Only God Knows / 神のみぞ知るセカイ & Sword Art Online(ソードアート・オンライン)

Original Concept by: Tamiki Wakiki & Kawahara Reki

written by: wrathie

Author's Notes: A Crossover where Keima was not approached by the Weiss Capturing Squad and the Events of the Goddess Arc is non-existent.

Author's Notes: Surprised? Thank you, Renascent for the beta - sorry for taking quite some time to release it.

Aincrad - Floor 25

Keima and Argo was uncertain to what to expect when an elderly 'player' entered the meeting room in the Nezumi headquarters. It was almost impossible to schedule a meeting with one of the two guild leaders of Nezumi, and it was unheard of since the fifth floor to get the two of them to attend a meeting that they did not chair together.

It took a direct petition by around a thousand players that was submitted to Nezumi a month back for them to relent and to set their schedules free to meet with a representative of the player group who had petitioned to discuss the health of the players in Aincrad. It was a topic that could lead to many different topics by itself – and as the player group did not provide further details, the two of them did not know what to expect.

Actually that was a lie – the two of them knew of the agenda – the group that petitioned the meeting with Nezumi wanted to address the mental health and associated problems like work stress, depression and any other mental problems that would result due to the radical changes that SAO has brought on all the ten thousand players stuck in SAO.

Humans were an adaptable species, and when pushed against a wall, no other species could adapt as well to change and stress as they could. It was proven when against all odds – against all common sense that the players had been brought up with, the players had successfully cleared more than twenty floors within three months of the game launch. It was even more incredible for them to do so when one considered the many causalities of the clearing effort.

Players, do not die as often or easily now – through the efforts of the three great support guilds, accidental deaths were the majority of the recorded deaths of players. They had just surpassed a happy twenty day of having no updates on the 'Memorial Stone', a major morale booster.

The player group that had petitioned to meet with them wished to address that, but what Nezumi could not find out was what they wish to do, and what assistance would they require from Nezumi.

The elderly player who entered coughed slightly before introducing himself.

'Ah, good afternoon, my name is Francis, Dr. Braun Francis. But my player name is simply 'Fr ncis'. Please do call me Dr. Francis.'

Francis introduced himself before beaming at the two of them as they stood up. He nodded to their secretary, a twenty something year old player named Charlotte that was simply amazing at her job – her professional occupation was that of a secretary to a multinational groups' owner. She had been one of those players who had stubbornly refused to leave the starting city till Argo had recruited her and placed her in this job.

Having a job did help Charlotte and she did a great job in keeping track of the two guild leader's schedule – but she did bitterly comment once that her job now was more challenging than her real job at the real world.

'It is a real pleasure to meet the two leaders of Nezumi face to face, and like the rumors say – the two of you are remarkable young... Only, this … yes, it is an avatar. The rumors are true that the two of you did not use the 'mirror' key item after all.'

Dr. Francis commented while inviting the two of them to sit before him, it was a position that the two of the were unsure of.

'It pays to be genre savvy, Dr. Francis.' Argo replied with a smirk while shooting glances at Keima.

The two of them were guild leaders, and even if Keima had tried hard to not let the status and fame get to Argo's head, and their close associates had done the same – it was still a little confusing and jarring to be treated like who they were, teenagers by a senior.

It had been quiet some time too – the majority of the front-line players were in their 20s or 30s, but the most influential players were barely in their twenties. That was the generational gap of the players – and it was something that was the norm even up till now. There were hardly any front-line players that were above the age of 40 – or at least they did not look the part to give them that particular feeling. In summary – Keima and Argo found themselves unsure how to act. They were in the presence of a senior, but at the same time, their relative position made it difficult for them to show them the respect that they rightly should deserve.

In the working world – it would be akin to the first ever meet and greet session between a young CEO and a senior employee who had been in the organisation for decades. What do they do in this situation?

Argo – who had the most social etiquette between the two of them recovered first and she instead offered a seat to Dr. Francis as well before calling Charlotte to serve them some tea.

..

'Please have a seat, we insist, Dr. Francis, it took a while for the two of us to free our schedule today. We only have a short time before we have to attend to other issues for Nezumi, I am sure you understand our difficulty.'

Argo was being uncharacteristically polite – she could tell that the elderly player in front of them was one that demanded respect even in his position. That meant two possible things right off the top of her head– 1) He was an important person outside of SAO, thus making him feel entitled to his position, and 2) He was an excellent negotiator and was chosen to try and force the two of them to accept their demands.

Either way, Argo called his bluff and was hinting to him that no matter his position outside or otherwise, the two of them were in the position of power and not him. They could leave at any time after all.

'Dr. Francis, please take a seat.' Keima added on as well and he waited till Francis started sitting down before he too followed, this was to show respect to him while not giving him a chance to pounce on any signs of weaknesses. Perhaps he shouldn't have bothered, but Argo kept up the pressure when Charlotte pushed a cup of tea to him. Although Nezumi was a powerful guild with many connections and support from the player base, all it would take was one negative rumour before the others could try to exploit it. Nezumi was resilient, Keima and Argo had ensured of it – but if they wanted to continue Meizun's legacy of protecting the players – they would have to handle all potential threats delicately but efficiently.

'Now, Dr. Francis. Would you explain to us the reason you have asked for our presence here, we assure you that we would consider your proposal and our options before giving you a reply.'

Keima started the ball rolling after the three of them had a sip of tea, and he opened with a brave salvo that stated his position over Francis as well as his right to dismiss all of his claims. A fine opening move, but like earlier, perhaps he need not have bothered as Francis cleared his throat before starting his piece.

'It is a relief to see that the two of you are well versed in the arts of politicking. I would have been appalled if the two of them had been unable to defend your turf, but the reputation of the leaders of Nezumi is worthy indeed. I guess the new generation always surpass the old one, yes?'

Francis chuckled to himself before clearing his throat again, coughing a little before taking a sip of the tea.

'I got sidetracked, yes, I do apologize. As the two of you have discovered – we are here to put forward a petition for assistance from Nezumi to set up a counselling service for the players.'

'A... counselling service?'

Argo asked in curiosity while Keima considered the proposal. It was something unorthodox, but was it necessary?

'Yes – a counselling service. We propose having all the front-line players be interviewed and their current mental state be evaluated by trained professionals. I myself is an practitioner in the field of psychologist. There are quite a number of us in SAO, we were sent by the National Health Commission of Japan to evaluate the effects the Nervegear have on humans before we too were trapped here.'

..

The player 'Fr ncis' was not amongst the list of players that were registered by Nezumi or any of the other guilds. That much was ascertained when Charlotte had sent a private PM to her stating as much. She was sure that Keima had received a similar one.

Francis's story seemed reasonable enough at least for now.

'It is fascinating to see the players, all ten thousand of you able to fight against adversity and each other to form a cohesive society amongst Aincrad. I am certain that the bulk of the credit would have to go to the two of you. The two of you established the ground rules of trade, set up a power structure not unlike an organisation would – and through that influence and power, establish the ground rules of society within Aincrad. The two of you are the ones responsible for Aincrad being the way it is right now – ruled by rules mirroring society. It is an amazing study up till now, and we would be honored if you would allow us to interview you at a later date.'

Dr. Francis smiled at the two guild leaders who simply nodded their heads. Keima was behind all the grand plans while Argo set it into motion and over time, the two of them had started being more than just partners, they were the face and image of this way of life, whether they liked it or not.

'The research paper that we would publish would feature the two engineers of the society within Aincrad, and for the two of you to be more than willing to make it a democratic and civilized society with a view of equality makes it even more amazing. But enough about that – I am going out of topic again, yes, out of topic.'

Francis cleared his throat again and continued, much to the two guild's leader's exasperation at how the older man kept getting distracted and confused.

'We believe an immediate psychiatric evaluation of their mental state and stress levels would be beneficial to all the front-line players. As you all know, stress would contribute to fatigue, especially mental stress. It would accumulate over time, and it might and would lead to disaster if a player breaks in a crucial and high tense moment. Right now, morale is high due to the lack of player deaths and the efforts of all the players working as one. However that situation might change – all we are asking for is your assistance in persuading the front-line players to attend an interview by the members of the medical committee in SAO.'

So that was the proposal – and it was quite a good one in the opinion of Keima, the Captring God. Their reasoning makes sense, and there were many recorded cases where a female heroine had gone berserk and crazy due to pent up stress. It's more relevant here in SAO where players goes through stress like it was free candy.

Keima himself had experienced that first hand, although he rarely goes to the fields any more due to this status and job as a guild leader. He misses the times he had with his heroines, but he made a promise, and he would keep it.

The only issue was...

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'How can we trust you... We are not experts on the field, and... how do we know whether this is another one of your experiments. You haven't been really trying to hide that all of you are treating this as an experiment. We have guys half your age there fighting for their lives. How can we be sure that we can trust you – and you aren't just trying to get more data for... other research.'

Argo asked quietly while Keima nodded his head before speaking as well.

'Your intent is good and sound, Dr. Francis, the issue at hand is that we are unable to determine whether you could back up your claim to be a true member of the medical profession and as such – we cannot endorse or support an endeavour, especially one which might potentially hurt players, without substantial evidence. You are discussing a topic that neither of us, or many of us have the profession or knowledge to compare against. Please do forgive us for doubting you despite your kind intents. Unless you can prove you and your colleagues are true medical practitioners of the field, I am afraid Nezumi cannot support your proposal.'

Keima's answer seemed to take Francis aback and the elderly gentleman nodded his head in understanding. He considered for a moment, his thoughts in the issue before he cleared his throat and replied.

'That is true, one of the issue that we wish to discuss with you is medical confidentiality, but it seems that we would need to go verify our identity first... very well, I admit that does put a wrench in our proposal to come up with the counselling service – but I am more than willing to compromise with a solution. My fellow colleagues and I are more than able to come up with a checklist of questions for us to evaluate the stress levels of an individual – that would be the only data that we require. In this case – we would seek to be the advisors to the players that would be conducting the test and would assist in evaluating and providing results as well as prescribed actions for the affected individual. In this proposal, we would be the medical advisor rather than the consultant. Would you accept this revised proposal or at least consider it?'

Francis tried with a sincere smile, the man was trying his best to sell this idea to the two of them. Keima could see the benefits of having such a system, it would give them the power to decide on how to better help the guilds. However there was the issue of medical confidentiality like he said and how he'd rather this medical examination be of a neutral ground. The last thing he needed was for the other large guilds to accuse him of trying to play favorites through the medical examinations.

'Well – I suppose we can think about it... It's something that will help the players...'

Argo started, sound hesitant as she was thinking about the proposal – Keima believe she was putting the dollars and cents in front of the potential good something like this could do, it might even benefit the local population as well.

'… I have a few ideas that I would need to discuss with Argo about your proposal... but most importantly – would you be willing to extend your services to the non-clearers. There are clearly many in the first floor who require your assistance and help. We would assist with the recruitment efforts, that you need not be worried about.'

Keima offered with a nod and that made Francis nod his head eagerly – the elderly looking player getting up and reaching for Keima's hands.

'Your support and understanding truly is very reassuring. I hope for a positive and prompt reply from you, Keima, and Argo of course.'

'We would be sending representatives with our ideas to discuss with you in a later date, we hope that you would understand the need for us to study this proposal...we look forward to having a sample of the medical questionnaire that would need to be filled up.' Keima answered while turning to look at Argo, the Rat looking a little sour but nodded her head nonetheless when he nodded very slightly to ask for her opinion. Looks like she was supporting this fully, that's good.

'Of course, of course. We would get right on it.'

Argo gave a sigh as the three of them settled down to discuss this proposal over again. Charlotte didn't seem to have much to add, the secretary was in charge of simply taking notes short-hand and would write a detailed report later on for the two of them to refer to for their use. In her opinion though, it was a good idea – it would really help the players who were most stressed out. The top of the list were her two employers right now.

'I like the idea – but we'll be forcing them to take part, right? If not, they won't go.'

'We'll get the members of Nezumi to go... imposing a similar work schedule like the real was a masterful plan, Argo.'

'Seeing we pay all of them a stipend for their work, we have to manage costs. Jokes aside though, it'll be bad if we get out of here and we can't acclimatize to the real world again. Having doctors like this to help, and if they are psychiatrists, it will be good to have them around to deal with some players who might have developed traumas. Not to mention – it'll really help the doctors when we clear the game. … It's about time that the adults stood up, with Healthcliff and Dr. Francis showing up now – they must finally be humiliated to act?'

Argo gave a disgusted sound but turned professional again when Keima voiced his own thoughts about the situation.

'You took the words out of my mouth – only... once again we have to be concerned bout what this would do for the players. Especially the players in the front lines. We simply cannot lose any players in the front-line for matters like this. Dr. Francis has his heart in the right place, but... we simply can't accept any of his professional advise even if he might be true. The 'real' is too sheltered, we cannot allow further complacency to grow simply because of the opinion of a doctor, but in the same vein, we can't ignore it either.'

Keima was being realistic about the situation, it had been months since he had forced himself to look at the big picture and not being focused solely on the real or the ideal. He had to as he was a leader now, if he didn't, no one would – and like many times before, he was weighing the options in front of him while discussing with Argo.

His fellow guild leader knew what was at stake here and like before – as the Capturing God, he knew he was making the right decision if this was the ideal, but this wasn't – as such, he had to seek Argo's views before a decision would be made.

'There is only a small number of players, around a quarter of the ten thousand players who is actively trying to clear the game. The remaining 1/3 is currently supporting the players who are clearing the game. Out of the 2421 active levelling players, approximately 800 of them are in the front lines. The levels would only get harder, the amount of resources to be channelled to maintain this current pace of clearing floors would increase. One would argue that there is no rush to clear the game, but both of us know that clearing the game as fast as possible without any causalities was the unstated main goal of Nezumi after all.'

Keima ran a hand through his hair while running through his thought processes with Argo. The Rat huffed, almost seeing amused as she interrupted his tirade with a small smile.

..

'So TL;DR, are we prepared to lose players in the front-line because of the doctor's recommendation? Would that be the right thing to do? We are the ones who wanted the front-liners to speak with them to help them in the first place. Would or could we be able to answer if we forced them to continue be on the front-lines even if he should be unfit, and what right do we have to ask them to do that?'

Argo listed down the problems while typing it out in a PM to be shared with him later on before slapping her forehead and turning to scowl at Charlotte.

'You're not doing your job by taking minutes of this meet- oh you are, okay then. Anyway – I'll still send this to you later on.'

Argo gave a satisfied nod before going back to her train of thought, noting with satisfaction that Keima was indeed listening to her as she listed the immediate problems to be faced if they take the suggestion.

'Not to mention how it might affect morale if people were to start doubting how they can clear the game in the first place if they are suffering from stress and not getting treat? Could the doctor treat them in the first place? That's not even going to how reliable their diagnosis or treatment is going to be?'

Argo said her piece and the two of them reflected on what she said, Argo giving Charlotte a thumbs-up when their ever reliable secretary sent a PM to them with what the two of them had already raised about this particular issue. Argo would really like the older woman to give her opinion about the matter, but had also resigned herself to knowing that it was not going to happen.

It had taken her so much effort to persuade her to come work for them, she did not want to push her luck more by forcing her to do things that she did not wish to. It was a pity too – she was much older and had more experience in such matters. Argo was also pretty sure she had a child, which would make her input even more valuable. Sadly – she wasn't offering any advise or input today, per the norm. So the two of them would have to do make the final call themselves.

There was not going to be another meeting with others in the ranks of Nezumi to discuss this, there might be one to haggle out the details – but as the established leaders of the revolution of change – Keima and Argo was expected to make a decision by themselves.

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'The last thing we need is more stress and tension, and having a mandatory test like this – is something that is not needed.'

Keima added on out of the blue while Argo sighed.

'You're just worried that people would stop being front-liners if they know of the negative effects to their health in being one. Or... we might even slow our progress down by being too careful. No entry no gain, like I always like to say – it's something that's needed for the non-clearers more than the clearers because every one of the clearers have their own way to de-stress.'

Argo was on the fence on this one, it would help the non-clearers much more than the clearers, in a way the clearers were able to channel their frustration and anger out by well, clearing the game – but the non-clearers did not even have that. Even the support group, her people, could boast of a more healthy mindset than the others who just went on with the barest minimal activity to live in Aincrad.

'If you really want to – I suppose we can propose a rest day of sorts to help them relax?' Argo raised concession while she mentally calculated the impact of having a mandatory rest day, at least one like in the real world rather than expect the clearers to go 24/7 – 365 days a year till they clear SAO. As Argo looked back at what she had just thought, she sighed and agreed that for all their efforts in trying to support and help the players, all of them, it was probably long overdue for them to implement.

'It could be an interim method to help the players adjust, as well as to do their evaluation if they wish to... At the very least – I would think that it's best to have a mandatory counselling session for the members of those individuals who... lost someone in their midst.'

Keima replied with a perfectly blank look before standing up and excusing himself.

'Where are you going, Keima – we are not done with this discussion yet! Oi! Was it something that I said?'

Argo turned to look at Charlotte only to see the secretary looking back at her in confusion.

'No? Gaah... what's the matter with him? … We should just, you know, look over it again, just you and me for now, ya?'

Argo gave a sigh as she broke the promise that she made earlier to not involve Charlotte even more. Surprisingly, the older woman didn't seem to mind that much and nodded, listening to Argo list the pros and cons while weighting each option to her.

It was rumour that has been spread since the first few floors, of a hero – of a player who was a hero.

Some say that he was inspired by the Super Sentai shows, where the masked heroes would ride to the rescue every week to save innocent civilians from the monsters that plagued the land. With Aincrad filled with monsters in their own right, a hero here would be welcomed by many. However as Aincrad was still in it's heart a game, the existence of a hero who would intrude on the private engagement between player and monster, regardless of how dangerous it could be, was viewed as a cardinal sin by some, and a god sent by others.

The rumour has it that the player, dressed in a white jumpsuit with a matching red scarf was one of few players to sink his stats to the Agility stat, giving him unparalleled speed and mobility. This advantage allowed him to move faster and to hit faster to take advantage of the critical damage feature which allowed players to deal significantly more damage if they hit certain weak points of the monster they were facing. But legends, like history, fade over time. The rumours were never substantiated, proven or fully denied. It would remain an urban legend for those who he had 'saved' or an infamous maniac trying to kill-steal from their hard earned pray. The fact that such a hero did not take part in a single floor boss raid laid claim that he was merely a rumour that was made up by the NPC as part of a quest – or perhaps even a hidden GM to prevent deaths early in the game.

But there was no smoke without fire, every rumour would have a silver or a grain of truth within it.