This story, while set in Accel World's universe, has certain alterations on Accel World's canon - Primarily - The Colour Scheme does NOT function according to the official canon's fluff. The originators were not so limited in number. The unlimited burst zone is immediately available. The timeline is also different. This takes place around the origin of Brain Burst.
Urban legends exist in this world like fallen stars. As human knowledge expands ever further we accept that the light of stars is no more a view of heaven than it is eternal. We yearn for something to believe in. Anything. Urban legends are desires, a desperate wish to believe that there can be something better than the mundanity of existence.
The legends of werewolves stalking the moors of Devon.
The legend of a secret society that exists right beneath our very noses, controlling every country's leaders from the shadows.
The legend that a human could become immortal by stopping time and living a thousand lives every second.
These were never more than fancy. Something for idle minds to dwell on, passing the time as their clocks ticked ever closer to a certain end. They existed only to ignite a passion for a decaying world in broken lives. Nobody believed in them. Not really. And so nobody ever questioned if perhaps, just perhaps, they might be true.
One such legend was born from a rumour. A rumour that was dismissed and discarded as too impossible to believe. A player who existed in countless games in the hallowed seat of 'Undefeated Champion'. A player whose record has never sustained a single blemish, erratic, unpredictable, and yet able to predict a million million permutations of the evolving state of play every second. A god of games who could see through the screen into the very soul of the player they were facing and know what they might do. A demon of games who could not be slain by the unstoppable tide of a horde of foes, regardless of their skill or their unscrupulous means. A force of nature, silent and merciless as the encroaching crest of a tidal wave.
Such a person was simply too ridiculous to exist.
And yet they stood atop the public leaderboards everywhere you might look. Their name fields ever empty. Blank.
The truth, however, is never so kind as myth.
Two siblings, both alike in mystery to a world in which they cannot live.
The elder brother unclipped the neurolinker from its port on his neck, running a hand through his hair and letting out a long sigh.
"We won. Somehow." His sister looked up to his chest, with his bedraggled shirt plastered to his skin. Her eyes never daring to meet his eyes. "Hey, Shiro? How long's it been now?" He asked, his eyes equally trained on the crown of hair silvery white hair, matted from days of sweat and neglect.
"Why does that matter?" Her head drooped as fatigue eventually washed over her. "It's not like... you've got anything..." She trailed off as her eyes slipped closed.
Sora trailed a long, angular, hand down to stroke her hair. "Come on Shiro, it doesn't do to forget the days. We might miss some event online!"
"Mmmm..." Shiro straightened herself again, drifting back into wakefulness just long enough to survey their darkened room, that would've been large had it not been
filled ceiling to floor with ancient consoles and stacks of games from before the advent of the neurolinker. She still had hers clipped in. Shiro, being only ten was born on the cusp of when it became standard for all children to be implanted with one at birth. Sora, on the other hand, now eighteen had been one of the first trials. A prototype at the dawn of this new age. But it had never been enough for either of them. There weren't enough games in the world to sate these siblings. She counted the empty pots at her feet. "Four days." Her reply was short, succinct. Shiro was a quiet child. Bullied brutally she had been taught to fear people. Monstrously intelligent she had never been able to forget what she had learnt.
Sora nodded grimly. "We've only got a few hours then, before that 'War' raid." He passed a container of cheap, nutritious, bland food down to Shiro and took one up himself. Sora turned back up to the incessant glare of the computer in front of him and smiled, a hollow smile that reached up to eyes that reflected back the shining blankness of the screen.
"Full Dive."
The two players walked into the chaos of the battlefield as if the ceaseless crash of metal on metal was quieter than the last breath of a mayfly. Two masks floating amidst a sea of orcs, goblins, dark elves, and men of some Empire or other. They fought like composers orchestrating a symphony, gouging deep cuts in orc and man alike who shattered into pixels with a melodic tinkling. Beneath his mask Sora's eyes shone with the blood that the game, "Albion and Annwn" or something, didn't render, a manic grin flickering across his face. Shiro, beside him had a similarly ecstatic visage beneath her mask as she chanted spells and thrust her dagger into the chinks in the armour of those running at her, evaporating their health bars with a vicious wrenching sound that echoed only inside her head. This was their world. A reality created solely for them, with clearly defined rules, accepted boundaries, logical limitations. Everybody had a goal. This world was ruled by code. Predictable and certain.
For the space of a heartbeat both players froze. A light, musical chime sounded like a droplet in a perfectly still pond. A popup materialized in the very corner of their vision. They both resumed fighting as quickly as they had stopped, picking up their movements as mechanically as if the life of a soldier was the only one that they had ever known.
"Message?" Sora's voice was low, quiet, as if he didn't trust his ears. They spoke over their private chat, soundless to the enemies thronging around them. The siblings had eternally set their accounts as private. Visible, but you had to be on their friends list to send messages. This was new. Blank had an email account outside of games for accepting challenges and adverts about games but this was new. This was different.
"You too?" Shiro whispered back blasting the head off an orc whose player name only flashed up quickly enough to confirm his death before vanishing again.
"Who?" Sora's eyes were clear and sharp, detached from the battle.
"Friend?" Shiro's tone held a bite of accusation, subtle but Sora could taste it bitterly on the back of his tongue.
"Whose?" Shiro breathed again and contained the petulance in her voice.
"Yours?" Sora grimaced. Feeling like he'd been cruelly mocked.
"Open it." Those two words held a wealth of trust. They said 'I'll keep you safe' 'I won't let anyone touch you.' 'Trust me.' And Shiro did.
"Now you." She bit her thumb lightly as she closed the message again. Her brow furrowed and uncertain. Almost concerned. Sora obeyed and his message read.
* Blank
Have you heard the urban legend? A pair of siblings who could conquer any game. Care to test your legend against mine? I'll be waiting.
-The_Unbeatable_Game*
Sora broke into a laugh. Shiro knew they'd accept the challenge. Sora knew they'd accept the challenge. Blank could conquer anything.
The Empire fell. The elves vanished into dust and the orcs became nothing more than pixels. As the siblings looked up at the victory banner smiling a single knight teleported into the field, a crystal shattering between their fingers.
"Have you heard the urban legend? Of a game where time stood still and you could play forever? Where your entire lives became a game."
Sora tilted his head genially at the man. He'd always had an intrinsic sense for people's motives but he couldn't feel his.
"A game like that is too ridiculous to be true. Everyone has to eat, and sleep. Those are just the parameters of the shitty game we call life." Shiro nodded beside him.
"Yes. And you will. But what if I told you that you could live for two years between dusk and dawn?"
"We'd join it. Even if you're lying, there doesn't exist a game that Blank can't win. If you're just looking to challenge us Blank have an email."
"You think? Would you believe me if I hadn't found you myself? Would you believe me if I didn't know that you two were brother and sister? Would you really, honestly, discard all other games and live for me if I couldn't defeat you, here and now?" They said something outrageous with a light and casual tone and Sora laughed as he threw himself forward into the battle. Shiro's spell fired seconds after and both converged on the enemy simultaneously but they were both dodged as if they were no more threatening than a paper airplane. The figure brought their sword down instantly where Sora should have ended, but he deliberately tumbled and rolled out of reach coming back up on his feet a couple of metres away, Shiro on the other side of the player. Sora charged back in and engaged the player in a flurry of strikes, each being met precisely and blocked perfectly, chipping health off both players slowly, but surely. Even though Sora had a lot more health his enemy didn't seem concerned. Sora grinned beneath his mask.
"So. Little boy. If I beat you what do you say? Will you become mine? Devote yourself to my game and live an eternity trying to beat it?"
"I'll join your little game, and we'll beat it before you've even had time to notice. But what about when I kill you?" A thrust deliberately thrown wide, ignored, the knight stepped in to attack Sora's opening as he pushed himself back and away.
"Then you should come and play my game." Sora struck back again. "And if you're lucky, I may even tell you how I got my message through."
Shiro finished chanting the spell she'd been muttering all this time. Or rather, spells. The magic in this game could be delayed with the right keywords and as she uttered her last note six tier seven spells shot toward the knight's wide back.
He turned to face Shiro for less than a second, and then it was like he vanished. Sora's parrying with him was mostly just so that the pair could get a feel for his speed and reaction times, so Shiro could account for them. So that his attention lingered on the player in front of him. So that there was no way he could dodge. The AOEs would rip out all of his protections and the seekers would finish him. Sora held firm to stop his escape and then it was as if an entirely different player stood before them. The speed of his thrusts rocketed past what even Sora could keep up with and in the flurry of strikes he reached out a hand, through the space where Sora's blade had been less than a millisecond before, grabbed his shoulder and threw him between the knight and the spell an instant before it hit. The knight turned and stepped slowly toward Shiro, through the shattering pixels that were her brother. He hefted his sword as Shiro raised her dagger and slashed eight feints while drawing a dagger from his side and thrusting it into her neck. And she dissolved.
The pair respawned and the knight was sat with his helmet off, smiling at them. His avatar looked young, carefree, relaxed.
"I'll send you the install file as soon as I log off. And I'll warn you, because you impressed me, you're in for a rough night." He looked at his knees ruefully. "Seriously though, you actually forced me to panic! You might even be strong enough to be fun to play against. Someday, when you earn back your crown as the Demon of Games." He was laughing again now as his avatar disappeared.
Sora and Shiro each put an arm around each other and solemnly logged out. Blank didn't lose. They felt hollow, tired... mortal. Blank couldn't lose.
Sora covered his face with his hand but almost instantly the chime of The Message came through.
The siblings simultaneously opened the file and successfully installed it, a flash of fire and the words "Welcome to the Accelerated World" dropped on chains in front of them. Sora went to try the "Matching" button immediately but the game merely spawned a pop-up.
*Please wait. Brain Burst must collect additional data. Please, go to sleep.*
Sora and Shiro looked quizzically at each other, glancing at the time. Three in the afternoon. It had been five days. Shiro flumped heavily onto her side, resting her head on a warm, idle, console, and closed her eyes. Sora laid back in his chair.
Blank don't lose." He muttered to himself bitterly before closing his eyes as well, a hot tear dripping off his chin.
Sora saw a white world. Empty from edge to edge. Except for Shiro. Of course. She smiled sweetly up at him. Walked towards him. And whispered.
"You really are empty. Aren't you?" He looked at her and smiled. He knew this dream.
"Would you like to play a game?" He responded, smilingly broadly.
"Don't you think we're a bit too old for games now?" The young girl in front of him turned away, a stranger. "I think it's time we grew up Sora." She walked away. Faded away. Who? How? Why?
No.
She couldn't. Shiro wouldn't abandon him.
She promised.
She promised.
Everybody promises.
Everybody leaves.
Yes.
Everybody leaves. Shiro was bound to leave. One day.
Yes.
Sora sat in that white world. All alone. Hugged his knees and smiled for an audience that wasn't there. He opened his eyes and saw his hands turn white, as he blended into the landscape all around him. He called out and the silent void filled him from the outside in.
He could feel himself rotting from the inside out.
"Empty." The word had lost Shiro's voice but it was still echoing inside him.
Yes. He really was empty. Wasn't he?
He smiled at the void. Acting like there was anyone left to hide himself from. Acting like there was anything left to run away from.
And then he woke up.
Shiro lifted her head in that large room, small for all the games. She turned her eyes to her screen and saw the title screen of a new game. Then turned to look at Sora.
But there was no Sora.
Shiro called out for him, searched the room for all of its lack of hiding places, panic gripping her second on second. She started ripping out the lining of his chair, before huddling down into it. Whimpering. Crying. Begging the empty air to bring her brother back.
Didn't they say they'd stay together?
Weren't they going to stay together?
She curled up into a ball as small as she could get but the chair started rolling backwards and the door flung open. All of the locks they'd piled onto it melting away into a puddle on the floor.
The chair vanished and she fell hard against the ground with an audible thud. A woman came over to her, some strange look in her eyes. The noise of the world spun around her, cars and chatter and life. The sun beat down on her. Shiro pulled her arms in tighter across her heart, beating faster than a hummingbird in flight.
"Are you ok?" Shiro looked blankly up at her as if she were speaking in some language that even she didn't know. The strange woman started calling more and more people around her. Shiro shrank smaller and smaller but they wouldn't leave her alone.
They stroked her hair. They balled their fists inside her hair. They laughed. Their voices grew rougher and coarser. They lifted her off the ground and slammed her against a wall.
"Come on. You can talk can't you? You're not that dense are you!?"
Shiro closed her eyes harder, wishing it all away. Cursing the shitty world that had stolen her brother away.
And then she woke up.
Shiro awoke to Sora holding her tightly in his arms.
"Shiro..." He buried his face in her hair.
She buried her face in his shirt, tears streaming down her face.
"Don't leave." They both whispered together.
*Ping*
Two notifications tones chimed.
They opened the message first.
* Blank
Unlimited Burst.
-The_Unbeatable_Game*
Then they checked the system notification.
*Brain Burst - Ready to Play.* Flashed before their eyes.
They sat together, on Sora's chair as they booted up the game.
"Unlimited Burst" Their voices were almost sing-song, a lullaby, a trance-like prayer whispered to an unborn God.
The game world broke out over their vision. It looked like the hollowed out inside of a tree, they could see a bright light shining in from the gaping hole where their front door had been behind them.
Their bodies had been replaced.
Sora stood almost six feet tall, his body a vaguely humanoid arrangement of thin panes of amber. Some were backed with a reflective material while others were perfectly clear. His face reflected the image of anything that looked at it and his eyes were picked out in glass, a hollow clarity to their paleness. His fingers were long and bent and swivelled like caterpillars around his mirror-backed thumbs and palms. He snaked his fingers into his menu and found the name "Amber Mirror" reflected in his eyes.
Shiro stood barely four foot tall, with hollow gaps where her eyes should have been and small rounded stumps where her legs and arms had been. Her avatar had no mouth or hair and her body was almost completely seethrough. She looked like she'd been forged of frosted glass. When she opened her menu she found the name "Blank Space" staring back at her.
They looked at each other, and stepped toward the exit into the game, each smiling with faces that could not smile.