It was always an odd feeling.
The feeling of cyberspace completely enveloping his body, pixels substituting for the all-to-grey appearance of his cramped bedroom. Even with his multiple ventures into the Nervegear world, he never could get used to it. Yet, this rather expensive device gave him a happiness that for the most part, real life couldn't. I gave him a sense that he could escape, escape the true world and indulge in non-reality while feeling as if he wasn't running away. Of course, he was running away, running away from his troubles and problems, yet at the same time, unbeknownst to him, he was about to fall straight into an unearthly hell.
"I need to enter my username? Cmon, the "Remember Me" feature shouldn't stop working just because the public release is out." He begrudgingly entered Akihiko into the highlighted field, a combination of Aki and Rutohiko, his first and last names. It wasn't a very clever or inventive name to say the slightest, yet he wasn't one to really obsess over the aesthetics of his character. Sure, he did a little bit of character customization, mainly because he wanted some differentiation between himself and the other 9,999 players, many of whom would likely just go with the default model. Then again, he really only made himself look like a different average-joe, and if he got caught in a crowd, he wouldn't stand out. As he completed his login, a small circle spinning around and around greeted him, indicating that it was loading in all of his pre-recorded data into the virtual reality world. After a few moments of anxious waiting, the circle disappeared, and he started to feel his body materialize into the game. The rather bland lobby screen transformed almost instantaneously into the bright and vivid colors of the Town of Beginnings. Even though he had logged on as soon as he could, the starting area was already swamped with new and seasoned players. He caught a glance of one or two of the latter, yet the newbies stretched on beyond the eye could see.
"Great, just what I needed, a packed crowd." He opened up a menu, and looked at his buddy list. "Empty. Damn. Now I'm going to have to find them all over again." "Them referred to a group of six other individuals, all except for one he knew exclusively from the internet. His only friend to make it into the beta test was a guy named Haruka Kurai, who, despite the intimidating name, was one of the most laid-back people he knew. They attended the same High School, Aki being a second year and Haruka a first year, and while they weren't particularly close, they were more than simple acquaintances. "I have his number, I'll just call him to arms and have him track everyone down once the wave of people diminishes." At that thought, he tucked his hands into his brown cloak's pockets, and began on his journey.
He was gathering when it happened. He had just plucked an uncommon healing herb when the landscape of forest was replaced by that all-too-familiar town. It took him by surprise, yet at the same time, it didn't arouse any panic or confusion, as in the beta test a Gamemaster would gather up all of the online players to explain new features or warn them of common glitches. Of course, the new players, many of whom unaccustomed to Virtual Reality itself, quickly started to contemplate loudly on what was going on. Some were frantic, others seemed to be complacent, but all shared the same look of curiosity. And while most individual conversations were masked, he heard three recurring words that were oddly frightening to him. "No logout button." It wasn't just one new guy who didn't know how to navigate the menus, it was dozens upon dozens repeating that exact sentence, and in a futile effort to tell himself that they were wrong, he pulled up the menu for himself. That attempt was futile due to the fact that they were not wrong, the log-out feature had been removed, haphazardly wiped from his existence. It was unnerving that he might be stuck in this world for a few more hours, while he liked it more than real life in many aspects, he had been planning on finishing Clannad after he had completed his playthrough for the day. "Heh. I guess I'll just be up all night, sleep's overrated anyways." He laughed at that, and relaxed his physique. Due to his prior experience, it was little surprise to see a looming creature suddenly emerge out of seemingly nothingness, and instantly identified the character model to SAO's creator, Akihiko Kayaba. After a few moments of the crowd silencing itself in anticipation, he finally spoke.
"I'm sure you've already noticed." He spoke in a voice that was deep and commanding, reminiscent of some of Aki's stricter professors. "That the logout button is missing from the main menu. Yet this is not a fault in the game, but instead a feature of Sword Art Online."
"F-Feature!?" Panicked voices started to murmur around him, as the collective crowd started to realize what this meant. Yet, Akihiko was not done in his explanation.
"You cannot log out of SAO yourselves, and at the same time, if any outside source attempts to disable or interfere with the Nervegear, it will emit a powerful microwave transmission and end your life."
The panic was now growing to be indiscernable, with the structure starting to fade away. Some were crying, others trying to escape the spawn area in the thought that they could possibly escape their fate. And some, like Aki, were frozen in sheer terror.
"And by far my most important message to you is to notify you that there is no longer any method or way to revive a fellow character in the game. If your HP drops to 0, your life in Aincrad as well as the Earth will be briskly ended." He paused, possibly in an effort to let that message sink in before continuing. "In order for you to escape this life, you must defeat every single floor from here, floor one, to floor one hundred. There are no alternative ways of leaving Sword Art Online."
The rest, the surprise of the mirror and the change back to his true face, including his long brown bangs that liked to part in odd places, was truly a blur. That last line refused to stop playing in his head.
"There are no alternative ways of leaving Sword Art Online... There are no alternative ways of leaving Sword Art Online... There are no alternative ways of leaving Sword Art Online..."