A/n Sword Art Online season 1 was on Netflix and I decided to watch an episode to see if I liked it... I finished season 2 two days later. Needless to say, I really enjoyed the show, hope you enjoy my Fanfic.
"A forced teleport?" Kirito whispered as he looked around the enormous plaza in the Town of Beginnings. He'd never liked the first city and even in the beta-test he rarely came back to it if it wasn't necessary.
The bell in the center of the square stopped ringing and the players all looked up as a red hexagon appeared on the ceiling. More and more began to spread all around the sky as scared players began shouting.
"Is this an event?"
"I want to log out."
"Ahhh!" The scream came from a little girl who almost fainted at the sight of the red liquid seeping from between the cracks in the hexagons. It looked like the sky was bleeding and it made the black haired avatar shiver as he looked at his new friend in worry. Damn it, why couldn't me or Klein log out, what's happening?
Kirito's question was soon answered as the blood-like fluid falling from the sky transformed into a huge figure with a red cloak. As the man explained what was happening, Kirito shot his eyes around the central square and analyzed hs surroundings. A pair of people tried to walk out of the plaza but a forcefield knocked them back causing a bunch of angry and scared yells to be shouted at the weird figure.
Akihiko Kayaba, it's definitely him, Kirito had done his research on the creator of the game he was so invested in, so he knew that only this man was capable of trapping them all inside the game like this. But why is he doing this, is it some sort of challenge to start off the game right?
"...and no one on the outside will be able to shut down or remove the NerveGear." Kirito's face fell in shock as he thought about what this meant but his face distorted even further as the ominous floating figure continued, "Should this be attempted, the transmitter inside the NerveGear will emit powerful microwaves, destroying your brain and ending your life."
Klein asked if the man was serious and Kirito became grim, explaining that it was possible that the NerveGears could do something like that. The pink haired man seemed to be in disbelief but he turned back to stare at the looming cloaked man.
The kid felt his vision go blurry as his head swarmed with possibilities. Maybe this really is just an event. What if it's real? Sugu... what if I never get out of here? He shook his head and gave a weak smile to Klein who didn't see him since his eyes were focused on the figure above and his bottom jaw was dropped several inches. It's probably nothing big, he'll get in so much trouble for pulling a stunt like this, I hope it doesn't affect the future... of... Sword, NO!
The fourteen year old felt his heart wrench as he heard what Kayaba was saying, "Unfortunately, there have been several instances where players' friends and families have ignored this warning and attempted to forcibly remove the NerveGear," if they did that... "As a result, two hundred and thirteen players have exited permanently from both Aincrad and the real world."
This is insanity, Kirito tried to calm himself down as Klein and the others around him started to yell at the hooded figure. Akihiko Kayaba, why? The man was explaining that the world's media was already in an uproar; news articles started appearing all over the plaza so the players could look on for themselves. He told them that the risk of someone removing their headset would be lowered now that people knew the danger of removing it, but it didn't make the terrified ten thousand players feel any better.
Kirito was staring at one of the news articles in particular but he was still listening to the crazed game creator and his mouth opened a little in shock as he heard the next segment, "The instant your HP drops to zero, your avatars will vanish forever. Simultaneously, your brains will be destroyed by the NerveGear."
As the man kept explaining, Kirito felt increasing afraid that he was never going to get out of the game. Clear all hundred floors! I spent months in here and barely made it to floor eight!
All the players removed the item that Kayaba revealed to them from their inventories and stared into the mirror they were each holding. Within a few seconds, blue lights surrounded them and they saw their real faces appear in the reflection, "The full body scan," he explained it to Klein who didn't look much different than his avatar. Then again, neither did Kirito. He just bought the system when he got the game, he's still new at all this.
"Right now you all must be wondering why?" the figure started talking again and Kirito looked up.
Actually, those were my thoughts exactly.
"My goal has already been accomplished. I created Sword Art Online for one reason... To create this world and mettle in it. And now, all is complete..."
"Kayaba," Kirito growled as he clenched his fists.
The red cloaked figure started to raise his arms and said in a welcoming tone, "This ends the tutorial for the official Sword Art Online launch. I wish you luck players." His body started to smoke and fizzled out of existence, the sky turning back to its normal color.
This is happening, Sugu and her mom were definitely on that monitor, and they were crying. They're hoping, praying, that I come back to them as soon as I can. So that's what I'm going to do. Kirito's hair extended over his eyes and cast a shadow over them as he continued glaring straight ahead. Kayaba you madman, 213 people are dead because of you! This is real, he shot his head up as a little girl's scream echoed throughout the plaza. Immediately following her, the entire crowd of now 9,787 people started to panic and start rioting as they tried to all escape the square at the same time.
Kirito noticed that the barrier surrounding the outside of the central square faded and he turned to the man he'd been helping learn how to play all morning. In a quiet whisper he pulled the man aside, "Come with me Klein," we can't talk here, too much chaos.
As soon as they were a safe distance from the center of the Town of Beginnings, Kirito turned to the now red-haired man and started talking, "Right now I'm going to the next village. Come with me. If everything he said is true..." Kirito went into his theory about how they needed to become as strong as possible fast because the resources around them were limited.
"B-but... I was out all night with friends from another game waiting on line to buy this. They must be out there in the plaza. I can't leave them behind." Klein explained and the younger boy looked at him, contemplating his options. Just Klein would have been fine, maybe even better to have someone watching my back, but two, or three more people is... "Sorry, I can hardly ask you for anything else, can I?" Klein asked while smiling. He seemed unusually calm considering the situation they were in.
Klein... I'm sorry, the man tried consoling him saying that he would be fine since he ran a guild in the last game he played. However, Kirito knew better than anyone that this was unlike most VRMMOPG's. He was part of the thousand beta-testers that tried out the game first and knew exactly what was in store for hundreds, if not thousands of players if they weren't careful. "I see, then let's say goodbye here. If something happens message me."
The red-haired man smiled at him and waved as his young mentor ran off down the street. Kirito glanced back once, but his new friend was already gone, heading back to the plaza for his lost friends.
The two of them were already close to the outskirts of town and after saying goodbye, they separated and Kirito sprinted out of town. He used the main road out of the city and as he looked to either side of him, he saw a few players, mostly going solo like him. They must all be beta-testers, he realized that a small group of them, exactly one tenth, were going to have an extreme advantage over the others.
He was just guessing that the others were beta-testers, but after seeing one attack a wild boar like the one he helped Klein defeat, he knew they had been in Aincrad before. The boy shook his head and stared straight down the road, you don't have time to think about anyone else, I need to get stronger. Stronger than anyone else. I'm going... I'm going to suvive... He slowly unsheathed his beginner sword from behind his back and charged forwards at the wolf that appeared in front of him.
One strike was all it took to slice straight through the creature and it exploded into a hundred little blue particles. In this world! He looked up at the sky and screamed, letting out all the anger that had been welling up inside him for the past hour. I will clear this game, and get back home.
After night had fallen, Kirito finally saw the next town and picked up the pace as he ran towards it. Urg, stupid name for a town, it was much smaller than the Town of Beginnings, but it was where most of the good quests on the first floor came out of. If I do the Isenrall quest first I'll get the sword reward that will make the other first floor quests easy as cake.
As he got into the safe zone of the town and monsters stopped forming around him, he looked up at the sky upon hearing a loud bang. Spreading across the sky was a large photo of a person he didn't recognize. Uhiko Pina? Another bang that sounded like a gunshot rang out and he saw another photo appear next to his.
Under the names of the players' he looked at their photos, and more importantly, the time written under their pictures. TOD? There were three large letters before the time and each time a person appeared on the sky accompanied by a gunshot, he saw that the time was getting later and later each time.
The photos didn't stop at ten but Kirito continued to count until he reached twenty, then fifty, then a hundred. The number doubled again and it finally reached two hundred and thirteen. Wait, T.O.D. Time. Of... Death... he thought the pictures would stop appearing and forced himself to look down so as not to get too depressed by the adults and children alike that he knew were dead. Suddenly another shot rang out and he looked up at the sky again, seeing another photo appear. That time is after the announcement in the square!
More and more photos appeared in the sky, pushing aside other photos an becoming a huge box filled with faces. They all have loved ones, people who cared about them! His sadness turned to fury as the gunshots finally stopped. He thought the number was somewhere around two hundred and thirty.
Those fools, they know that if they die here they die for real, so why are so many of them still dying? He walked into the inn and saw the NPC innkeeper who would give him the quest for the sword. As he collected the quest he thought about it further, we don't need food to eat, or water to drink. I don't need to sleep, however, I might go insane if I don't so I have to be careful about that. People other than me will try to clear the game. Other beta-testers will fail: they'll play like they did in the beta, when the world was fresh and had respawn points. If they don't adapt to the new way of playing, they'll die trying to survive in the old way.
As he walked out of the inn he looked both ways for other players and saw three men coming towards the building from down the road. They saw him and ran over, I'm in a safe zone, he reminded himself as the people ran to him. "How did you get here so fast?"
"We've been running since the announcement but still just barely made it here," the man was panting and Kirito recognized him. He fought the level three boss with him during the beta-test. His avatar looks very similar to the real thing. The man realized the same thing and said, "Wait, are you Kirito?"
The black haired boy nodded and the man turned to his friends that were with him. Apparently they weren't part of the beta-test as he started waving his arms around and shouting, "This kid was a lone wolf back in the beta. Got farther than I ever did, maybe farther than anyone," he looked back and his friends turned too but Kirito was already far down the street and exited the town.
The kid thought about smirking, knowing proudly that his reputation followed him. Unfortunately, he was not in the mood for smiling as the photos on the ceiling slowly faded. From this world, and the real one. He growled and headed in the direction of Isenrall.
Day 2
Kirito felt that he should sleep, knowing that he'd been awake for over thirty hours straight already. He looked around the meadow he was standing on and sighed, all the level one and two beasts that were forming on it couldn't even take a fraction off his health if they tried. He finished all the quests in the Inn, and moved to some of the other buildings in Urg, taking as many as he could find.
The quests sent him all over the first floor area around the town and he had to explore two separate dungeons that had enemies up to level ten. Now, the boars and wolves wandering around the meadow could be inches away from him but they wouldn't be agroed on him because of the huge difference in their levels. Maybe I could just lie down for a little bit.
He still had a completed quest on him and wanted to go hand it in to gain more experience, but a nap did sound good right about now. Kirito was about to sit when he heard a scream and looked across the meadow. What is he... No! Kirito started to sprint through the grass, drawing his sword as he did. Why are they all attacking him? He looked up at the health bar near the top of the kid's head. His eyes went wide, despite it already being deep in the red, there was a level indicator, why is a level two fighting all of them at once while he's alone!?
Kirito got closer and started shouting to try and get the animals' attentions but they all seemed to take that exact moment to charge the kid at the same time. "NO!" he screamed and the boy dropped his sword and looked twenty meters in the distance where Kirito was running towards him.
"Help..." the boy was cut short as two wolves bit into either of his arms and pulled them off. "AHHH!" he screamed before flashing blue and dissolving.
Kirito stopped running and stared at the spot where the child was a second before, he couldn't have been over ten years old. "This is sick!" he screamed at the sky in anger. A gunshot sounded and he saw the kid's face appear in the sky. Don't look at it, his hair shadowed his eyes as he continued walking towards the four creatures still standing where the child's body should have been. "RaaaAAAA," he charged and sliced through all the enemies in one shot.
Even avenging the kid didn't quell the burning hatred growing inside Kirito as he forgot completely about the nap he was planning on taking. The boy turned back towards Urg and ran to the town, staring through strands of hair as he did, not caring to push them to the side.
Overnight, Urg had started to bustle with people. Any beta-testers who were good, as well as the regular players who followed them, were leveling up and gaining experience fast. Kirito walked into town and handed in his quest to the blacksmith. "Thank you for helping out my shop, next time you come, I'll give you..."
"A twenty percent discount, yeah I know," Kirito responded as he shut the door in the NPC blacksmith's face. All these quests once seemed so original to me, playing them for a second time doesn't seem too much fun. The only difference so far... he'd taken a break from quests during the long first night to check on the floor one boss, but when he got to the area it was supposed to be, all he found was a large group of arguing beta-testers, all confused at why the boss's dungeon entrance was gone.
After listening in to their conversation, he had to agree with their theory that Kayaba didn't want the first eight floors to be too easy and moved the boss room around. As Kirito looked around at the fighters gathered he was happy they didn't find the boss room, they would've been slaughtered in the states they were in. A bunch of frantic, panicking players doesn't make for a great raid party and he didn't want them all to get slaughtered.
Now Kirito was walking back down the main street of Urg. His hair still shadowed his eyes as he scanned around him. A few people were dueling, some were eating, some laughing, the ones who had left the Town of Beginnings were the ones more able to adapt than the others.
He saw a media file box in front of the post office and went and deposited five Col into the slot, receiving a small white platform which showed him the news. Some of it was the normal stuff that he saw in the beta, but there was another section that looked like it was written manually. It talked about how the majority of people were staying in the big city and a guild that proclaimed themselves the protectors of the city had already been formed. The Army, good name if all they're going to do is protect the newbs, he felt a little more reassured that the people back there were in good hands and a thought crossed his mind, wonder if Klein is still there.
Kirito shook his head and deposited the media file into his trashcan. His spirits were raised a little and he thought, no way, he wouldn't just stay there. I'll see him again, probably at the boss raid if nowhere else.
The fourteen year old grimaced as another gunshot sounded and he saw most of the people on the street look up with frowns. If they're going to do that every time someone dies, then we might all go crazy sooner or later. He went into the town hall and grabbed the hardest quests in Urg, just as he suspected, the building was empty except for him and the NPC's.
No one else has made it here yet, probably won't for another couple of hours, after he took the quests from the distraught mayor and worried knights, he heard a noise behind him and turned around. He started walking towards the door and as he reached for it, it was pulled out slowly and a brown-cloaked figure poked her head in the door. Kirito came face to face with her and she let out a high pitched yelp before closing the door.
Weird, wait. If she was here, does that mean she's already ready for these quests, or is she just lost? He pushed the door out and stepped back on the busy street but the cloaked girl was nowhere to be found. Probably just lost, he chuckled and then got serious again, turning the direction his quests were towards on the map and starting to sprint.
Day 5
Kirito growled and threw the media file on the ground where it exploded into a bunch of blue virtual fragments. Four hundred! This game is ruthless, no. Not a game, this world is ruthless. He turned the corner of the street he was on and saw a sight to behold.
His face lit up and he stepped forwards, seeing Klein in the distance and wanting to run over to him. I was worried that if I continued to not look at the pictures, I wasn't going to know if he was ok or not. He saw the red-haired man with the scruffy chin laugh heartily and pat the man next to him on the back.
They were all wearing red and as he looked closer, they were definitely part of a party, maybe even a guild already. He was glad that he leveled up his sight so that he could see farther away and he was able to stop before the other man saw him. He might invite me to join, I don't want to turn him down... again. The black haired teen turned and walked back down the empty street, I need to get stronger, or we'll never get out of this game.
Day 12
"How could no one have found the boss room yet!" A man shouted from atop a cardboard box. He was in the middle of the bustling market of the Town of Beginnings, and shouting to a huge crowd of people as Kirito exchanged some of his monster drops for cash.
The kid was thinking about stopping there to get some food but as he heard the man shouting he felt that urge again. It was the one that told him to stop fooling around, that Sugu was waiting for him to come back home. He'd told his only friend in SAO that he had a sister and a mother, but he knew that he wasn't really that woman's son, or the girl's brother. He'd treated the girl so coldly ever since he found out about it a few years before.
The two of them used to be inseparable, but when he realized that she wasn't really a real part of his family, he tried to distance himself. I'm sorry Sugu, I'll come home. Things will be different, I promise.
He left the town and headed to one of the areas on the first floor he had yet to explore. The dungeons were well hidden for the most part, if you didn't know where to find them, and truthfully, Kirito had never spent too much time of the first floor during the beta-test. Those two months were spent shooting up the floors as fast as he could, dying over and over in boss fights to learn their strategies before going in a final time for the kill. He knew his entire game plan had to change and he was just looking for the first level boss room now.
Around midday, he found a dungeon he'd never been to before. Inside weren't the highest level monsters he'd fought so far, but he couldn't defeat them all in one hit so the experience helped. When a person reaches as high of a level that he had reached, experience doesn't do much for him anymore. The monsters are so much lower of a level than he is that he can't continue to gain strength at as fast a pace as the first few days. This was put in place primarily to make it so that players couldn't be completely ready for the next floor, but also so that they would have a hard time fighting the boss.
The boss on each floor was so much more powerful than each of the individual monsters that no single player, or even a group of people under three parties of seven, had been able to defeat one during the beta-test. As Kirito reached the end of the dungeon he scowled, "Tssk, another dead-end." He pulled out a teleportation crystal and vanished, appearing back in the center of Rath, one of the cities he'd set his home to while on the first floor.
Kirito went up to the room he was renting and pulled out a hologram of the map of the first floor. He tapped on one of the dots on the image and it faded, still leaving hundred more on it. "Another one down," he whispered to himself, falling back on the bed, "another thousand places to search." He closed his eyes and before he knew it he was asleep.
Day 26
Almost a month has passed since this game has started and during that time, two thousand people have died. Kirito had his back leaning up against a wall of a building in Tolbana. He was darting his eyes around the park in front of him, somewhat upset, and somewhat at ease upon seeing the large number of people sitting around and talking, or having picnics.
Not everyone needs to treat this like the end of the world, but they could at least help out a little, he sighed and looked up at the sky. We still haven't been able to find the first floor boss. None of the other beta-testers have found it either and we're all just sitting around waiting for something to happen. That's probably why yesterday's media file said to meet here for a meeting today. Kirito got off of the wall as he saw another two players walk towards the amphitheater where they were going to hold the meeting. The were obviously fighters telling from the swords strapped on their backs instead of tucked away in their inventories.
After he walked into the open-air theatre and sat down on a bench, he stared up at the sky wondering whether any off the people there were even capable of fighting a boss. A few minutes later the meeting started with a blue haired man up front. His name was Diabel and he called himself a knight which got a few laughs from the audience he had in front of him.
Makes sense that so few people showed up, Kirito looked around and realized there were only about fifty or so people gathered around, despite there being hundreds if not thousands that were probably looking for the boss's room. Does this guy think this is a game.
Kirito's opinion of the man changed as Diabel's demeanor suddenly switched to serious and he looked straight at the gathered crowd. "Today, our party found the boss room at the top of the tower."
The teenager leaned forwards, he had been looking all over the place for it, and was sure that he checked the dungeons up there as well. Looks like this guy really does know what he's doing. "We need to defeat the boss, and get to the second floor. That was we can tell everyone waiting in the Town of Beginnings that it is possible to beat this game. That's the duty of everyone of us here now! Isn't that right everybody?"
Kirito smiled as everyone around him started clapping and whistling. The man started going into the details of the plan but he decided that everyone would get into parties first. The boy quickly realized that he was being left out as all the people around him moved towards each other and formed perfect groups of six each.
He looked around for anyone that still needed a party member, not wanting to be left out after all he'd worked for and finally saw her. Wait, he saw a lone figure wearing a red cloak who looked very similar to the person he bumped into when he was leaving the mayor's office back in Urg.
Kirito scooted down the bench and whispered to her, "You got left out too?" She was sitting all by herself and hadn't moved since Diabel sent them to gather in groups.
"I wasn't left out. Everyone else seemed to be friends already, so I just stayed out of it," she sounded very sad and Kirito offered to enter her in his party. She nodded to him and he invited her, which she quickly accepted. Asuna, he saw the name appear under the green bar on the top right of his vision.
Soon Diabel started talking again. He checked if everyone had a party and was going to go straight into the specifics of the raid, but someone interrupted him from atop the bleachers.
"My name's Kibaou," he went on to explain how angry he was at beta-testers for running off and taking all the good quests and experience. They abandoned all the people still at the Town of Beginnings and even Kirito lowered his head realizing that they were somewhat at fault.
"My name is Agil," Kirito looked up and saw a large, dark-skinned man standing over Kibaou who started to lose his nerve upon looking at the bulky individual. "You received this guidebook didn't you..." Kirito started to smirk as he saw where the man was going with this, "Beta-testers made this book. You all had it," he started addressing everyone and Kibaou went to sit down. "Yet many people still died."
Diabel went on to explain that the guidebook was updated and he went into the exact specifics of the boss. The dark-haired boy at the top of the bleachers nodded, remembering the boss when he first fought it.
"EXP will go to the party that defeats the monster, and whoever receives an item..." Kirito stopped paying much attention and caster a glance at the girl next to him. "Ten a.m. tomorrow." The meeting seemed to be finished and Kirito saw the angry short man Kibaou shaking hands with the blue-haired knight Diabel. Well, at least he's a little calmer than he was earlier. If everyone starts to turn on the beta-testers, it could cause a rift between players.
The cloaked girl walked away from him and he watched he go before relaxing and lying back. There was no point in trying to go get more experience now, the little bit extra wouldn't make a difference in the boss fight. Instead, he wandered around Tolbana for a few hours before stopping at the party that the fighters were all taking part in.
He saw Kibaou and Diabel with their elbows locked as they took swigs of beer from mugs and then he saw who he was really looking for. Kirito walked over to the girl in the dark red cloak and stood behind her. She seemed so sad and alone as she ate the loaf of bread in her hand so he went and sat next to her. They were going to be in the same party after all so he needed her to trust him, and as importantly he needed to be able to trust her.
"They really are good aren't they, but I like to change it up a little," he had his own loaf out now and was chomping down on it. He let her try the butter substitute he had obtained and she seemed to really like it as she quickly devoured the rest of her meal.
Once he offered to show her where she could get more of the butter, she shook her head and in a solemn tone whispered, "I didn't come to this town to eat good food."
"Then why did you?" the boy asked, genuinely intrigued.
"So I can still be me. I'd rather stay myself until the very last moment than lock myself in an inn back in the first town, and slowly rot away." That slow rotting is exactly what thousands of people are doing right now, Kirito thought as she spoke. He had often thought the same things, "Even if I'm defeated by a monster and die, I don't want to lose to this game... this world. No matter what." Her words sounded so similar to him that he felt a connection with his new party member.
"I wouldn't want a party member dying on me, so at the very least, don't die tomorrow," he requested with a small smile. She looked back at him and her lips almost moved up enough at the sides to call it a smile, but as soon as she did, she turned back to watch the party.
The two of them sat there in silence for a while before standing up and going their separate ways, mentally preparing themselves for the next day.
Day 27
"That's when you'll do a switch," Kirito wasn't happy that he was put in the back, but it made sense strategically with his group being the smallest. Their party would fight back the boss's Kobold minions while everyone else targeted the main monster.
"Switch?" she asked him.
"Don't tell me, is this the first time you've been in a party?"
"Yes," she responded and he looked down, fearing he had a lot of explaining to do before they reached the boss room at the top of the tower.
About an hour later, an hour full of explaining how parties and raids work for Kirito, the raid party made it to the boss room. After a quick pump up speech, Diabel led everyone inside the room, weapons drawn and potions ready.
The lights in the room turned on and a huge red monster with an axe and a buckler roared, landing on the floor in the center of the room. Above its head read the words, 'Illfang the Kobold Lord.' There he is, "Attack!" Diabel pointed his sword ahead and their plans started moving into action.
Asuna and Kirito stayed in the back as they watched the army converge on the three minions and the boss. If anyone had to retreat because they were low on health, the two of them would give the person enough time to get somewhere safe. The black haired teen stared ahead in respectful surprise as he saw the beta-hater Kibaou was the first to charge in and clash swords with a Kobold minion.
After twenty minutes of fighting, the boss was still standing strong and Kirito watched Diabel in amazement. The blue-haired man was meant to be their leader as he switched parties at the exact right moments to keep any of their members from dropping too low. "Squad B block..." Kirito parried an attack by one of Illfang's minions and shouted, 'Switch.' Diabel was more focused on the main battle and the two of them were keeping monsters off of him while they did. When he shouted, the girl behind him charged forwards with a thin sword called a Rapier raised.
She didn't know what a switch was, but her dexterity is amazing. I can't even see the tip of her sword, "Good job," he whispered as she took out the Kobold and it vanished.
He heard loud growling coming from the main fight and spun, looking over at the large dog-like monster. It was already down in the red and he grinned, seeing the end of the battle in sight. The monster threw its weapons down and Kirito watched as Diabel ran to the front of the pack. I thought everyone was going to attack together. He saw the blue-haired man smirk at him, he just wants the experience.
The boy thought he'd be angrier but he suddenly became worried about the man who claimed to be a knight. The information they got in the guidebook was wrong, this boss was different than the one in the beta. Instead of a Talwar, which they thought he was going to have, he had a No-Dachi! "It's no good! Jump back as far as you can," Diabel ignored him and charged at the monster with his Sword Skill readied.
The Kobold Lord gained speed fast as he bounced off the walls and slammed down on top of an astonished Diabel. The slash it made with its weapon cut all the way up the man's torso before Illfang smacked him to the side and jumped into another group. "Diabel!" Kibaou shouted before having a shadow drop over him and the boss roared in his face. They didn't have the luxury to check on him and started going on the defensive as the monster had become too powerful in the last bit of health that it had left.
Kirito ran over to the collapsed leader however and bent down over him, "Diabel." He looked at the man's health and it was lowering fast, dropping down into the red and still decreasing. "Why did you try to do it alone?" the fourteen year old asked.
He tried to hand the dying man a potion but Diabel pushed it away, clasping Kirito's hand with his own. "You were a beta-tester, weren't you? You know." The way that Diabel said it, Kirito knew the man was one himself.
"You were after the rare item from the last attack bonus," he stated. He'd heard about it but never seen the man who vanquished the boss the first time ever use the item. "You were a beta-tester too," he asked already knowing the answer.
"Defeat the boss, for everyone," Diabel responded and then he exploded into hundreds of shining blue lights.
Kirito still had his hands outstretched to where he was holding the man a second before. When this death game started, all I thought about was my own survival. He remembered ditching Klein with a pang of regret, he remembered all the faces he saw that first night. But Diabel, you never abandoned the other players. You led everyone and you fought brilliantly, you did what I couldn't. This game needed someone like you, he frowned and stood up, looking at the monster as it roared at the group of attackers.
His party member walked up to him, sword ready, "I'll go too." She'd heard what Diabel said and was ready to start fighting for others, not just to keep herself alive.
"Thanks, use the same sequence we used against the sentinels," they charged forwards as the other raid members backed off. Kirito sprinted forwards and deflected an attack from the boss before shouting, "Switch!" The girl ran towards the monster and pulled up her Rapier for an attack but Kirito saw its eyes glow red, "Asuna!"
She had seen it as well and in mid-air, she twisted her body to dodge the next attack. Illfang sliced through her cloak with his extra long sword and it was destroyed. Long, light orange hair flowed out from underneath it and Kirito saw the beautiful girl around his age turn back and stab the monster hard in the stomach with a "Hi-ya!"
The amazed look was wiped off his face as he became serious again and parried a few more attacks from the Kobold lord. Asuna charged in and used his attacks to her advantage, slamming the monster multiple times in the chest and stomach with her sword, making Illfang grunt.
It swiped in to attack Asuna while her guard was down but Kirito jumped in front and blocked his attacks one by one. Finally it caught him off guard as well and slammed him hard backwards into Asuna where they both fell to the ground, his sword dropping to the floor.
The girl leaned over Kirito and watched his health decrease almost halfway which surprised her. That attack was enough to kill Diabel, but it didn't even take him more than halfway down. She looked up in fright as a shadow fell over her and Illfang had his weapon raised again. The No-Dachi started coming down but the black man from the meeting jumped in front and parried the blow away.
"We'll hold him off for now," Agil said and charged forwards with a party of six. They were all defeated quickly but had stalled for enough time for Kirito to get back on his feet.
"Watch out!" Kirito shouted to the fellow members who were all lying on the floor, about to be struck by the boss's powerful attack. It was coming down fast but Kirito met it mid-flight, "I'll get you first," he screamed in a rage-filled voice.
Many of the others watched with dumbstruck awe as Kirito slammed the monster across the room and into the floor.
"That thing just defeated seven of us without a problem, but against him alone its struggling."
"Who is that guy?"
"Asuna," Kirito called over as he dive-rolled and sprinted towards the monster. "One last attack! Let's do it together."
"Roger!" she shouted back and they charged the weakened beast together. It was low on health now and they were going to finish it. This time Asuna was the one to attack first, her strike knocking the monster off balance enough for Kirito to follow through.
"AhhhHHHHH," he shouted louder and louder as he swung his sword across Illfang's stomach and the stabbed him in the side. "RAAAA!" he continued to scream as he pulled his sword up the monster from its waist all the way to its head and split it in half. The beast stumbled back a step or two, and then it exploded into a bunch of blue shards.
Everyone remained silent for a few seconds before, "We did it!" Cheers burst out as everyone started celebrating and partying.
Kirito was kneeling with one foot on the ground and saw the message appear in front of him. 'You got the final attack bonus.' Another screen popped up with the words, 'Bonus Item,' on it. Coat of Midnight, that sounded exactly like his style and he accepted the reward.
"Good work," he heard Asuna say from behind him and he turned around.
"That was excellent swordsmanship," the black man Agil continued. "Congratulations. This victory belongs to you."
No, it belongs to Diabel, no matter how pleased he was to have defeated the level one boss, it wasn't worth a man's life. However, everyone else started clapping for him and cheering him on.
"Why," Kirito heard it over the applause and looked for the source of the saddened voice. "Why?" it asked louder and the clapping stopped as everyone turned to Kibaou who had an angry look on his face. "Why did you let Diabel die?!"
"Let him die?" Kirito asked, looking at the ginger man who was sitting on the floor with a few of his supporters.
"Of course!" he shouted at the kid. "You knew what technique the boss would use! If you'd given us that information up front, he wouldn't have died!" Slowly the people who were only seconds before clapping for him turned on him and stared questioningly.
"He must be a beta-tester," one person next to Kibaou pointed and called out. "That's how he knew all about the boss's attack patterns. He knew but he kept it from us!"
Stupid.
"There's gotta be others here too, right? Those beta testers!" if the man had thought about it, he probably would've realized that many, if not most of the people there were probably beta testers considering their group was supposed to be the strongest there was so far. "Come out!" Nobody moved but a few people started questioning each other with uneasy looked on their faces.
Stupid.
"Are you one?"
"No, of course not," another man responded, looking away in fear of being persecuted.
Stupid fools, there's only one option. All around him, beta testing was becoming synonymous with evil and it wasn't going to be pretty if this continued. As Asuna and Agil tried to reason with Kibaou, Kirito just started to laugh. Quietly at first, but slowly he got louder and louder until the entire room was looking at him. 'Beta-testers are so bad, they should've helped more!' Arrogant pricks don't even care that I just saved them.
His laughing only got louder until it filled the entire room, "An ex-beta tester you say? I wish you wouldn't compare me to those newbies."
"W-what?!" Kibaou shouted, surprised that someone admitted to being a beta-tester. Sweat started to slowly drip down his face as he stared at the boy now facing the entire raid group.
"Most of the 1,000 people who won SAO beta test slots were beginners who didn't even know how to level up." Now everyone was looking at him with semi-scared looks as he walked into the group. People parted to the sides so that he could walk straight up to Kibaou. "Even you guys are better than them," the way he said it sounded snide and like he was suggesting he was better than they were.
Kibaou gulped as Kirito walked right between the two fighters who were sticking up for him. Even Agil and Asuna were looking at the kid with worried looks. "But I'm not like those guys. During the beta test, I made it to higher levels than anyone else was able to reach. The reason I know about the boss's sword skills," he smirked evily at the man in front of him and continued, "was because I fought tons of monsters with those skills on floors far above us." His hair shadowed his eyes and he glared at the man in front of him while smirking, "I know lots of other things too. Way more than any information broker."
Now the man who was starting the riots against beta-testers started to regain himself and said, "That's, that's way worse than a beta tester!" He started clenching his fists in frustration, "That's cheating! You're a cheater that's what you are."
"A beta tester and a cheater," someone shouted out.
"A beater."
"A, beater," Kirito muttered, "that's a good name." He saw Asuna looking at him with a disappointed look and understood that he was acting horribly to the other players, but it was the only way he could think of that could get the heat away from all the beta-testers. "I am a beater," he opened up his inventory and selected his new cape, "from now on, don't confuse me with those other testers."
The room suddenly felt very eerie as everyone stopped shouting at Kirito and just stared. He equipped the cloak that was much more powerful than anything else on floor one, it had defense that gained strength as the user progressed so that it would continue to be the best throughout the game. Coat of Midnight, I like it. His black coat made him seem much more menacing than the usual garb that you could buy in the store that everyone else was adorned in.
He slowly walked away from the now speechless group until he got to the exit to the second floor. "Wait," he heard a girl's voice call from behind him. "You called my name when we were fighting."
Kirito didn't turn to face her, he simply responded, "Sorry for being rude. Or did I mess up the pronunciation?"
"Where did you learn it?" she asked.
"You can see another HP gauge below yours around here right," normally he didn't like explaining to newbies, but she had helped him a lot during the fight. Probably wouldn't have been able to defeat it without her. "Isn't there something written below that?"
"Kirito, is that your name?" he nodded, "Oh," she said blushing and smiling at him, "so it was there the whole time." She kept laughing trying to lighten the mood.
He was partly turned towards her but he now faced the doorway completely. "You can become powerful," he whispered so that only she could hear it. "So if someone you trust ever invites you to join a guild, don't turn them down. Because there's an absolute limit to what you can do as a solo player."
"What about you?" she whispered back. He seemed so lonely and she wanted to stay with him but he had his own path to follow.
Kirito dissolved their party and walked forwards, the door to the second floor opening up and allowing him to walk through. She didn't follow from behind him, getting the message and turning back to join with the rest of the group as they headed back to the first floor. It was time for them to tell the rest of the people trapped there that the game was beatable.
The boy walking the opposite direction let the noise of the raid group fade into the distance as he walked up the steps and out into the clean air once more. It was sunny outside and he smiled as he felt the heat bear down on him and he could see the new beast running around that would replace the boars and wolves of the first floor.
Just as he was about to head to the closest town where he knew there would be quests, a gunshot was fired and he looked up at the sky. In the air was a picture of a man with blue hair. Diabel Bu, he grimaced and shook the image of the dying man out of his head. Remember what he said, it's up to me now. He started running across the grass and shouted, "I will win, and I'll get everyone out of here Diabel."