[Kamui04]

Damn, people arguing still with the dual wield.

Here's my take. First unlike SAO where dual wield has a big benefit combat-wise, since you get a 32-hit combo just by going thru the initial motion of the sword skill. In ALO where there's no system assist and the natural/real skills and abilities of the players reflect on their combat skills. Dual Wielding per say doesn't add any big benefit and may even hinder on the long run since you have more work for barely any benefit at all.

Watching this scene in the anime is fast, action packed and short, but reading the novel one has more time to think the scenario. In this case the "phasing" of Eugene's sword. While reading the first thing that came right into my mind was: "what if that phasing bonus applies to the first block only? of course Kirito might try dual wielding..." And lo and behold the next thing he does is get a second sword.

In the end I think the point with Kirito dual wielding or not. Is that on normal combat in ALO without any system assist, it doesn't provide any benefits and you're putting more effort for the same result. But in the case of Eugene's fight he had the double whammy of being able to block the phasing and the element of surprise providing an opening to attack. Just like other people mentioned, Kirito having an internal monologue and explaining what he was thinking might have helped people understand his decision to dual wield at that moment, but on the other hand it would have interrupted the pace of the fight.