"The World, Revision 2". A virtual reality governed by lawless strength and ruthless destruction. With the strange data anomaly, AIDA, 'The World' took another step towards ruin, its order corroded by the amplified power of human emotion. The decadence tore its way beyond the realm of virtual reality, and the real world faced the peril of "The Third Network Crisis". Alas, human emotion can truly rend apart the laws of logic, and made the impossible quite probable.

But, 'The World' had a savior. He who bore the Key of Twilight, the famous PKK, Haseo, "The Terror of Death." Through countless battles, Haseo had found an irreplaceable strength, and with that, reestablished peace and order into 'The World.'

And from that order…the new generation begins. .hack/Absolute Zero

Screen Name: Zero
Character Class: Shadow Warlock
Race/Gender: Human Male
Element Affinity: Fire
Element Weakness: Earth
Hair Color: Silver White
Eye Color: Pale Blue-Silver
Primary Color Scheme: White
Secondary Color Scheme: Silver/Black
Character creation…complete.

Commencing Login in 5…4…3…2…1…

…System Error.

"What the HELL?! (BEEP)ing computer...(POUND POUND POUND)"

…Recommencing Login.

Ancient City of Eternity
(Delta) Eternal City Mac Anu

"Finally…I can get it started again!"

Light propagated from the M2D to my eyes…and I was once more a denizen of 'The World'. It seems as though nothing has changed…the spinning gyro, the two NPCs, other players prancing in their own merry, goddamn glee.

I started walking around the city I knew so well, ignoring the remarks of other players. "Hey, check this out." "That guy new around here…?" "Ha, newbies! They're so…" "But he looks really cute…"

Something's off...but I couldn't be bothered by that.

I made my way to the harbor. The eternally setting sun still hung on the horizon. Perpetually between this side of the world and the next…"How boring," I thought. What's the point of only being halfway in one side of the world and halfway in the other? It's better to just see the whole thing…I kept pondering. "Why doesn't the sun move? It's boring when it's an 'eternal sunset'. Come on, night and day are parts of our-"

"Gaspard! Watch where…"

CRASH! The vibration from my controller sent my train of thought halfway to the moon.

"Ugh…what the hell…" I picked myself up to see a round-looking Beast-type character on the ground beside me.

"Ooohhh…sorry about that…" a human player clad in green said as he approached the beast. "Gaspard, watch where you're going next time!"

"Ah, sorry…" said the Beast character, whom I was assuming was Gaspard. "C-can somebody please help me up?"

Subconsciously, I reached for him and grabbed his arm. He managed to roll to his feet and dust himself off, then smiled at me. Then, he stared for a few moments; with a gaze so intense I could've sworn he was looking into my SOUL for secrets. Or whatever the saying was.

"Heeyyy…you're a noob!"

My train of thought (and anger management) came crashing down with a blaze of fury. "Wh-WHAT the…? What the HELL makes you say that?" I shouted at him. I would've berated him further, but apparently, my remarks were ignored…

"Silabus, Silabus! Noob alert, noob alert! Attention all players, we have found ourselves ONE GENUINE NOOB!"

The urge to reprimand welled up inside me…and just before I was going to shout, the player named Silabus said, "Now now, Gaspard…that's not a very nice thing to do…"

As I sucked in my breath to yell at him, Gaspard turned around and said, "Oh, sorry…I got a little carried away there, didn't I? Really, I'm so sorry…I saw your player level and…um…heehee…"

"…what's so funny about being level 1…? What's it to ya anyways…?" I said instead, crossing my arms for dramatic effect.

Gaspard started snickering. "Well, allow me to introduce ourselves! We're part of the guild called…CANARD! We're the super-famous noob support guild!"

Those two looked as though they were eager to see my reaction.

"…never heard of ya." Boy, crushing someone's hopes and expectations never felt better. "And I'm not a noob, I've been playing for a while. This is a new character."

"Whaaaat? But if you've been around, then you must've heard of us…!" Gaspard pleaded.

"This is the first time I've logged in since the server crash. The whole thing about being 'unable to log out'. Were you guys caught up in that, too?"

Silabus stared at me. "Hm…well, there was this one time where Gaspard said he couldn't log out. But…there's no way that could happen, right?"

I raised an eyebrow. "I guess not."

"B-but it was true! I couldn't log out…and…and…sigh..." Gaspard stuttered, then trailed off. Clearly he feels that his argument would be groundless and gave it up. "Anyways, that explains why you don't know us. But are you sure you should be walking around town like this?" He looked up hopefully.

"Like what...? Being level 1?" Half of that question was because I wanted to know what he thought. The second half was because I wanted to see his reaction.

"Hm…you SURE you're not a noob?" Gaspard asked.

"What do you mean?" I replied. "There's nothing wrong with making a new character."

"Well, yeah. But…you know, 'The World' is full of PKs and stuff…" Silabus tried explaining.

I knew it. Something was off. The first time I logged into 'The World', I listened in to many conversations. The ones involving me (the noob) all had the word "PK". This time, I didn't hear a single threat, despite my lackluster level. But just as I was about to object and tell them I'd be fine, I saw their hopeful, pleading eyes. What gave me the right to deny them like this?

"…right, raise my level. So, you guys are gonna help me?"

"You bet!" they said in unison. They seem so happy, I thought…

"Let's go! Escorting one noob to the dungeon! Repeat! One noob! To the dungeon! NOOB!" Gaspard shouted. He succeeded in drawing quite a bit of attention…I felt my face flush.

"…I'm not a noob!"

End Volume 1: First Log-In.

A/N: Aahhh...I always wanted to try my hand at writing a story. .hack/ had a wonderful storyline to continue with, so I seized the opportunity. As a disclaimer, if I owned .hack, why the hell would I be here?

Zero's encounter with Silabus and Gaspard was SUPPOSED to be similar to Haseo's, but they have entirely different backgrounds. As a result, this is the best I came up with. How can you blame me, Zero was an ordinary player!

Speaking of which, Zero was around all through Rebirth, but since AIDA became active around Reminisce, he decided to take a break from the game and move on from his life. After this story is finished, I might write a bio for his real-life self.

This is actually a rewrite of the story, .hack/Absolute Zero. I decided that first person perspective explores Zero's character a bit more, and allows me to delve deeper into the surroundings of the story. I dunno, this was a personal preference, and I think it turned out a lot better than the third person version I wrote. But, PLEASE excuse my grammar being very imperfect. It's hard to capture the effect of certain scenes with monotonous perfect grammar...so yeah. Even though I want this to be as good as possible, I also want to deliver the effect of my story, which is top priority. So...bear with me.