[orpheus2]

Originally Posted by Anarchy

Spoiler for Questions and stuff:

Who are the four saints? And do they have different forms or appearances
Iike Megatron?

Spoiler for Reply:

Unknown yet. However, Amaterasu is one of them. The Four Saints might be a combination of different religious and mythological dieties.

Originally Posted by Flere821

Spoiler for reply, incl SAO spoiler:

IIRC, somewhere in Alicization Kikuoka and Rath had connections to the Imperial family. In GGO arc as well it was said Kikuoka's name in English was 'chrysanthemum', which IIRC is the Imperial family flower as well - though this could just be reaching instead of foreshadowing.

Which further plays along the hypothesis that Rath designed the various Acceleration games for the benefit of the Imperial family, seeing as how the Imperial Palace is the same in all 3 games according to Metatron. If Rath was indeed backed by the Imperial family however, it could explain how/why Kirito (if any version of him is Graphite Edge) could be Heir's BB parent.

Further WMG, in Vol18 it was also said KYH might have to move overseas due to her family sending her on a exchange trip (possibly due to White Cosmos interference), and it's said in AW-verse Japan is the world's leading VR development culture, and US for example don't have the security cameras - which means if KYH leaves for US it means her as Lotus is effectively dead to Accel World, as going into BB world doesn't work there.
Leading on from that, Rath is conducting state of the art research on VR backed by the Imperial family for nationalistic purposes, which could feasibly mean Kirito working for Rath was introduced to the Imperial family, or just another copy of him is given to Heir by Rath.

Spoiler for Reply:

If I remember correctly, the Alicization Project was meant to develop A.I. soldiers using copies of infant children that were raised in an environment to raise combat potential. If all three acceleration games were developed by RATH, then they did not give up yet considering the central BB server contained Fluctlight copies. But still, why would Imperial Family support this?

Continuing from this, the Acceleration Research Group might be backed by Suguo's remnant researchers. Remember one of them worked on the Alicization Project. Instead of infiltrating Rath again, they decided to back ARG to be more discreet. After all, ARG is researching ways to exploit the Acceleration technology. One of those exploitations is memory manipulation which is the researchers' original goal back at ALO.

A little WMG regarding White Cosmos. It might be possible that she's a victim of memory manipulation. Black Vise doesn't strike me as someone who could gather people like Dusk Taker and Rust Jigsaw and have them follow the ARG goals willingly. He more of a researcher than a leader. Thus with his backers, he chose White Cosmos to become the leader of the ARG due to her charisma. This would explain White Cosmos' sudden personality change with Black Lotus. It might be part of the plan to let BL draw attention of the Kings away from ARG. However, the Kings attention are now on them, AS such, they let WC arrange BL to study abroad to remove at least one King out the equation.