Figures that even after finishing the battle in Underworld, the battle in the real world would need to be resolved as well. They may have gotten Alice out of the Underworld, but now they need to get her out of Ocean Turtle
.
I've had my fair share of criticisms towards Kikuoka across this arc, but fighting off the soldiers, saving his subordinate, and helping to make sure Kirito and Asuna get out of there while he takes a bullet in the process is slowly (and I emphasize
slowly) improving my opinion of him
.
It was kind of funny seeing Yanai's corpse. I didn't expect we'd see what happened to him, but there he is dead on the ground. Probably the least of what he deserved, but still fitting
.
Miller finally becomes the soul he was so desperately obsessed with seeing, but the numerous atrocities he committed in the pursuit of that obsession damned his soul to Hell, and leading him down there is his childhood friend Alicia whom he murdered along with likely the hands of all his other victims. Can't think of a more fitting end for that monster
.
Vassago...has seen better days
.
I guess it couldn't really settle things without Kayaba turning up. There's probably something to be said about a man who was so obsessed with a dream of a virtual world and fully immersing oneself in that dream to the point he was willing to sacrifice so many for it would end up sacrificing themselves to save the one thing in the real world he truly cared about and kept him tethered to some form of humanity. Is this it for Kayaba? Did he truly die pushing the robot to the breaking point to stop the bomb? I'm just not sure
.
It kind of stings that most of Miller's team got away, but I guess they took care of the really problematic members by then and they utterly failed their mission. Without Miller there's not too much left for them at this point
.
So...Niemon is gone. Vassago's body is gone. What the heck happened there
?
Of course Asuna could figure out what Kirito was really planning and what would've happened to him if he'd been left alone (sorry Alice, your not getting your intimate reunion with Kirito yet). And of course she would be willing to spend thousands of years with the man she loves more than anything. As nice as it was to see them flying off together hand in hand, I am really bummed we didn't get a grand romantic kiss before they flew off
.
So it looks like they successfully logged Kirito and Asuna out...now the question is just what they got up to in the Underworld in the interim and how it might have effected them
.