Maiden In Blade
By The Ephemeral Sanity
Prologue
Rozen of the Blade
Sword Art Online
Beta Version
July 2021
I ran towards the woods, hoping to lose the monster that was chasing me. I have to admit, Sword Art Online's battle system was rather too realistic that it makes all of my gaming experience useless in combat. Unlike 2D or 3D games, I only have to use a portion of my body to control my character's actions. My field of view's in first person so unlike most MMO's, my view is very limited. I'll probably need some time to adapt before I could play smoothly with this kind of system.
Once I believe I gained enough distance away from the monster, I stopped to catch my breath and update my knowledge of my surroundings. It wasn't really necessary to stop and catch my breath considering that I don't get tired in this game—there was no stamina bar. But I needed to know where I was because the area that I was in was rather different from before.
The trees of the forest was different from before. It wasn't only the trees but also the ground, the sky, and the atmosphere of the environment. The luscious green leaves of the trees was now of a lustrous bold blue shade, the soil was of marble white, the clear blue sky turned into a roof of lonely grey, and the atmosphere became eerie—it was too silent that it was deafening.
"Where am I?" I asked myself. I only ran a few meters inside the woods, how come my surroundings had drastically changed?
[ Hey kid. ]
I thought I heard someone talk. I gazed from left to right to check, but I couldn't feel any presence of another player. Maybe it was just my imagination. So I continued to check my surroundings.
Out of the corner of my eyes, I saw a sword standing on top of a small isolated land surrounded by water. Why was a sword there, I could only guess. Maybe it was some kind of quest item? I couldn't tell. Curious, I walked towards it cautiously. While moving towards it, I kept an eye out of my surroundings. Since I was in a new area, I don't know the kind of monsters that I might encounter. Never hurts to proceed with caution.
When I came close, the water prevented me from getting closer. It didn't seem to be shallow, rather, it seemed to be fairly deep. I wondered what was the purpose of putting a sword in the middle of nowhere and surround it with water. I sighed. Questioning the logic behind it wouldn't help me progress. Now good question would be, "How do I get there?"
There wasn't anything to use to go across. No boats, no bridge, no stepping stones, no nothing.
I sighed and scratched the back of my head. I couldn't chop a tree down and use it as a bridge. The game wouldn't allow me to do so. I sighed once more and looked at the sword. If there wasn't anything I could use to get across, maybe I should just leave it and move on. It was instant death if I swim across and get attacked by a hidden monster that was possibly lurking inside the water. So I turned and slowly walked away, grunting how I just wasted my time.
[ Scared of getting wet? What a sissy. ]
I sharply turned my head towards the location of the sword. I thought I heard voice coming from over there. But I couldn't see anyone. No one was there. Was I getting hungry that causes me to hear voices? It was quite weird. "Is anyone hiding out there? Show yourself!" I shouted. Maybe someone was playing a prank on me. Yeah, it was the most logical explanation I could ever come up with at the moment.
[ Come over here and I will. ] The voice replied.
I unconsciously raised an eyebrow. "Come over where?" I still couldn't see anyone. But the voice was clearly coming from where the sword was.
[ Cross the waters, fool. A little splash won't kill 'ya. ]
The owner of the voice was rather too obnoxious. But nevertheless, I was curious. It could be a trap, I don't know. I was too curious to even pay attention to my safety.
I ended up going back and stopping again next to the waters. I swallowed a lump of saliva down my throat, quite nervous about what I was about to do. If ever this was a trap, then I would call myself naive and stupid forever. After a sigh, I jumped into the water and swam my way towards the small mass of land at the middle of it.
The water felt cold, but I didn't made me shiver nor sneeze. Strange, the game was filtering some of the things that I was supposed to feel. I hauled myself up and landed on the island. The sword was just a walk away from me. My eyes scanned the area. No one was there.
"Where are you?" I called out, expecting to hear the same voice to reply.
[ Kid, in front of you. ]
"In front of me?" I asked myself. I see nothing but only the sword stuck to the ground. I scratched the back of my head as I walked towards the only thing that was on the island.
"I don't see you!" I said as I arrived near the sword.
Suddenly, I heard a growl. I looked around and unsheathed my sword, ready for battle. The sky became dark and huge droplets of water fell on me. What was it?
[ Watch out! Above you! ]
I looked up immediately after I heard the voice spoke. An enormous fin and scaled creature was flying on top of me like it was about to flatten me. "A leviathan?!" I exclaimed in shock. Quickly, I tempted to evade the drop designated to squash me by running and dodge rolling towards the front of the land where the shadow of the creature didn't existed.
I hastily regained my balance and composure before looking at the creature that attacked me. It was long and big like a giant anaconda, but it had big and lustrous blue scales that looked like jewels as light reflected on it. It's head was of a shape of a dragon. The leviathan had two horns on each side of its head with whiskers, and fins that stood on its head down to its spine and tail. The expression of the leviathan was extremely alarming.
As soon as it growled once more, it began to move towards me—angrily crawling on land. I quickly ran around it as fast as I could, evading the water. If I jumped down and swam across, it would be the death of me. It was a bad idea to go in to the territory of the leviathan. At least in land, I was more mobile than I am in the water.
Another growl and the distance between me and the mouth of the leviathan became smaller and smaller. I was going to get eaten alive!
[ Quick! Take me. Take the sword with you! ] The voice exclaimed.
My mind didn't question the voice. When I was near the sword that was stuck on the ground, I quickly grabbed it with my left hand and turned around to face the monster head on. There was no use in running away. I had to fight. Two swords and one man versus one seriously pissed off leviathan, this ought to be good.
The voice laughed menacingly. [ Follow my lead. ]
The sword that I just took shone brightly. A white figure came out of the sword, took blade, and stood beside me. The figure's head seemed to be facing my direction as it held the blade with one hand in a compose and confident manner. It seemed to be gesturing me something but I couldn't tell. There was no face and the gender was unrecognizable because of the shaky form. The figure was just all white, barely taking a form of a person.
[ Let's dance! ] The figure said as it embraced the sword and started to sway before jumping towards the leviathan to attack. I followed the figure closely and ran towards the monster.
The figure laughed as it dealt the first three blows on the leviathan. It swung its sword from left to right, landing two hits and then slightly jumping upwards to deal an uppercut blow with the sword. After dealing three blows the figure quickly jumped to the side, giving me the turn to attack as well.
Simultaneously, the figure and I jumped towards the monster. The figure laid out a powerful kick midair, making itself spin in the air to land a blow. I let my hips be my axle and rotate me as gravity pulled me down, casting a frontal spin while heading towards the enemy. We both landed a blow—slashing parts of the leviathan, counting it as the fourth and fifth hit of a combo. As soon as we hit the ground, we leaped back towards the monster to execute a side slash.
A X-mark was embedded on the skin of the leviathan as soon as we delivered the blow. I landed on the left side while the figure landed on the right side.
The leviathan growled and wailed. I thought it was going to die until its tail slapped me towards the ground. That was bad on my part.
[ Kid! ]
My health bar was drained as the full green bar slowly declined and turned yellow to orange to red.
I wasn't paying attention to the battle anymore. I just heard a loud thud on the ground. My head rolled towards the direction of the sound and saw the leviathan dead. The figure was standing on top of it with the sword at its hand. It stabbed the leviathan and quickly, the monster shattered into pieces of data like glass.
[ Aw shit, what a pain. Better fix you before you die. ]
The figure walked towards me. As soon as it was near me, it raised its sword and—before I could react, it stabbed me. There was no pain. Apparently pain didn't exist in the game. Although I could feel a strange sensation flowing in me. Before I knew it, my health bar turned green and was now full—like nothing ever happened.
[ There you go, good as new. ] The figure said.
I stood up and dusted myself. "Who and what are you?" I immediately asked out of curiosity. It couldn't be a player. The figure seemed too powerful to be one especially the game just started a few hours ago.
The figure clicked the tip of its tongue and tapped its foot while crossing its arms. [ Have you not own any manners, kid? Introduce yourself first before asking people their names. ]
Suddenly, I feel small and ashamed. I scratched the back of my head and introduced myself, "Oh, sorry. My name's Kirigaya Kazuto. Kirito, preferably. What's yours?"
[ That's better. ] The figure said as it gave a giggle. [ Hm, call me Rozen. ]
"With what just happened, I assume you're not a player. So what are you?"
The figure stabbed the ground with the sword and then suddenly shattered into pieces. But instead of the pieces disappearing, it was being sucked inside the sword. [ As you can see, I am the spirit of this sword. Rozen of the Blade. ]
"Okay. So... are you an NPC or something? Like a quest item?" I asked while looking at the sword.
[ Yeah... something like that. ]
"So... what now? Do I leave you here and do your fetch quest like the rest of the NPC's gives?" I asked. It was amusing that this NPC actually could talk like a normal person would. But it was also strange at the same time. Are there more NPC's like Rozen?
[ No. Tell you what, kid. If you take me with you, you might unlock things that no other player will ever discover. I'm also pretty useful in battle if you're in a clutch as you could tell from our previous endeavour. So, what do you say? ]
"Sure," I said.
[ Sweet. ]
So that was the start of the friendship between Rozen and I. At first, I thought she (assuming Rozen's a female) was just a special NPC companion that was trapped inside a sword in the game that I would travel with as I progress. But as time went by and with the circumstances drastically changing, I thought wrong.
She was something more. Something more than just a spirit trapped inside a sword.
Something entirely different from what I could see.
And I was about to find out.
Author's Note: My second Sword Art Online fan fiction. Soul Nomad (Soul Cradle) and Transistor inspired me upon writing this story. Both of it are pretty much amazing games, I hope other people know these games. So anyway, this is just an introduction to Rozen. Basically this chapter tells us the story of how Kirito and Rozen met each other. A lil bit of a back story before actually entering the chapters. Feedbacks are much appreciated.
Until the next update~