SAO S1 E12

## Plot

Yui is feeling better. A woman from the army stops by the church. Her name is Yulier, and she thanks Kirito and Asuna for dealing with the soldiers. She came to ask for their help. The army's leader, Thinker, never wanted the army to be like it is today. It was a guild designed to share information and food, but the guild got too large, and there was lots of infighting. Kibaou, from the 2nd episode, grew extremely powerful. To get back into the public's good graces, he sent Corbatz and his men to the front lines, during the 9th episode. After that massacre, he was officially denounced, and they thought about kicking him out of the guild for good. Now that he's becoming desperate, he's decided to eliminate Thinker. He set a trap and stranded him in a dungeon. Yulier's level isn't high enough to go in and help him, and Kibaou is using his influence over the army to stop them from helping her. She asks them for help finding Thinker. Asuna and Kirito are uncertain if she's telling the truth. Yui tells them that she's telling the truth. She doesn't know how she knows, but she does. Yui demands to come along with them. There's a secret dungeon underneath the Town of Beginnings. Yulier smiles at Asuna and Kirito's antics, and Yui excitedly says that she's never seen Yulier smile before. They find Thinker inside a safe zone, but the corridor is rigged, revealing the boss Fatal Scythe. Kirito and Asuna fight it. They can't see its stats, so it could be like fighting something on Floor 90. Kirito is about to be hit when Yui steps forward and takes the blow. The "Immortal Object" announcement appears. This means Yui is an immortal object whose health can never go into the yellow zone. She summons a fire sword and destroys the monster. She tells Asuna and Kirito that she remembers everything now. She explains that everything in SAO is controlled by a system called Cardinal, which includes the psychological care of the players. Code name: Yui. She's a program/AI. On the day of the official launch, the Cardinal program banned her from interacting with the players, and it continued to do so. All she could do was watch as most of them suffered mental breakdowns and negative feelings. However, she found two players who were very happy. There was love, peace, and joy. They were Asuna and Kirito. She's wanted to meet them for the longest time, so she went to the forest to see them. The things she's feeling are real human emotions. She wants to stay with Asuna and Kirito, but it's too late. The bench she's sitting on is actually a console, which the game master can use to gain emergency access to the system. She used it to destroy the monster. Because she disobeyed its directive, Cardinal is running a check on her program. It's likely that she'll be deleted. Asuna and Kirito are devastated at this. Yui asks them not to cry, and to continue her work by making other players smile and laugh. Kirito doesn't give up though, and hacks the console. Kirito was able to save Yui by turning her into a game object called Yui's Heart, much like Pina's Heart back in episode 4. They say goodbye to Sasha (the woman from the church), Thinker, Yulier, and all the children. They head back to their cabin. Kirito made sure that Yui's data was saved locally on his NerveGear, so that even when they beat the game, they have access to it.

## Review

I liked this episode. Yui saying goodbye was so sad though! Especially Asuna's reaction! There were quite a few call backs a.k.a. nods to several previous episodes.