Disclaimer: I do not own Sword Art Online

Co-written by: TheSilentSwordsman

I - Escaping Reality

November 6th, 2022 12:53PM

Shino Asada stared down at the NerveGear headset in her hands, wondering what had persuaded her to buy the ugly looking thing in the first place. She'd never really been into playing video games before, she didn't have any older brothers who played them either. So why? The only reason she could think of was to escape. Escape the real world and the horrible people who plagued her everyday life. Of course it was only temporary escape, but for now she felt that would be enough. She'd spent all her savings on this game–Sword Art Online–and the equipment required to play it. She hoped that it was worth it.

Setting the headgear down for a brief moment while she removed the bulletproof lenses from her face, she planned to only stay in till dinner time just to try and get the hang of things in the game. The headgear was bulky but surprisingly lighter than she thought it would be once it was on her head. She watched the internal clock, as it ticked away at the time.

12:59PM

There was a brief moment where she felt she should take the headgear off, maybe wait until tomorrow to start playing. It was her turn to make dinner tonight after all and what if she ended up spending more time than she had planned inside the game. Something inside her was begging her not to play this game, but she couldn't understand why. It was almost time, she didn't take the headgear off.

1:00PM

This was it.

Her conscious told her this was a bad idea.

She didn't listen.

"Link start!"

Cyan colored hair fluttered in her field of vision. That would be something to get used to. It was almost as if she were wearing a wig, except when she pulled on the strands she could feel it tugging at her scalp. The actual sense of touch in this game was remarkable; it was almost as if she'd never left the real world. She pinched her arm and felt a sting, so pain was replicated as well. She wondered how painful it would feel the first time she died in game, all the more reason to become a good fighter she thought. She glanced down at her clothes–the most basic armor available, the signs of a beginner. Looking around the square she had materialized in everyone else wore the same generic armor, the only variations being in color, hers was tinted teal blue. In the corners of her vision she could see things like a health bar and her player name, one of the few indicators apparent that this was just a video game.

The square was in a frenzy; but not the kind that meant panic. It was joyous and full of players getting to know each other for the first time. A small fraction of these players probably already knew each other from the beta test, but most were newbies like her. It was easy to tell NPCs from real players because of their more elaborate clothes, although once people started leveling up that was sure to change. She began to push her way through the crowds of people, deciding that the best place to start was a weapons shop.

Suddenly, she was approached by a girl with long baby blue hair. She realized how many people in this game had chosen hair that was wildly colored, like an anime character's. "Excuse me!"

"Um, yes?" She stopped when she saw the girl waving for her attention.

"I'm uh… new to video games so I'm not exactly sure where to start here…" The girl admitted sheepishly. "Do you mind if I tag along with you?"

"No not at all. I've never played video games before either, but I think we should probably start with weapons."

"Oh yeah! That seems logical." The blue haired girl giggled. "My name's Asuna, by the way!"

"Sinon. It's nice to meet you."

Asuna gave a friendly smile. "You too! A-ah you don't mind me asking but you are a real girl right? I hear sometimes guys will pick female characters in games so they can get closer to girls."

Sinon shook her head, smiling back. "No I can assure you I'm a real girl, I'm going to assume you are too."

"Mhm!" She nodded, "Well now that we've got introductions out of the way, why don't we go get those weapons."

"Alright."

No matter how many of these frenzy boars she killed, the sword she held in her hand didn't feel right. Maybe she should try a different weapon, even though it seemed odd to use anything other than a sword in a game called Sword Art Online. Maybe something like throwing knives would be useful. For a little while she and Asuna had worked on leveling up together, but the latter decided she wanted to have another look around the city and Sinon wanted to keep practicing. So they went their separate ways.

Checking the time she realized it was about time for her to logout if she wanted to have dinner done in time, besides she felt the only thing she could do right now is just practice with the sword and that was getting boring. With a swish of her finger she opened the menu, looking for the logout button. But it was strange, she must have clicked on the wrong thing because she couldn't find the log out anywhere. Maybe it was only a glitch that would go away if she closed and reopened the menu. But no, that didn't work either.

No matter how much she looked she couldn't find it. She looked at the time and it was getting later and later. Sinon bit her lip, she wondered if she bit it hard enough it would bleed. As she found out though, the game wasn't that realistic. Maybe she could ask around to see if anyone else's menu was acting weird. Weren't glitches like this common in games? Wait… She couldn't log out. That meant, as far as she knew, she was stuck inside the virtual world. She hoped she could be lucky and run into a beta tester who could point out that she'd been doing it wrong the whole time.

However before she could move to go anywhere, she was startled by the ringing that echoed out through the landscape. "What on earth-" Suddenly she found the world around her fading away, her body surrounded by a blue light. When she had first entered the game she swore she saw similar light around people who had just entered the game. Her question of what it could be was quickly answered when the light disappeared and she was back in the Town of Beginnings. People around her were shouting with frustration. From what she could tell, she wasn't the only one who couldn't logout.

"Sinon!" The voice beckoned her attention and she turned to see Asuna nearby and coming closer. "What's going on, do you know?"

"No, but I can't log out."

"Me neither… Apparently no one can."

"What?" For a simple glitch that was a pretty big problem. No one could logout? She hoped they got that fixed soon.

"Sinon look!" Asuna pointed upwards and the other looked in that direction. To her surprise the sky was now covered in red tiles with text in all caps saying WARNING and SYSTEM ANNOUNCEMENT. She wasn't sure what to think about it, for something that was probably a harmless explanation it sure looked ominous. But ominous seemed to fit it best considering what happened next.

She and Asuna stared on as a faceless, hooded figure began to explain that the missing log out button was not a glitch, but purposely removed as a feature of the game. But the most appalling thing in his explanation, that if they were to die in game or someone were to remove their headgear, the NerveGear would scramble their brains, killing them instantly in the real world. "No…" Asuna whispered in a state of shock, as the figure revealed two hundred and thirteen players had already made those fatal mistakes. Sinon didn't want to accept it, it had to be a lie. From the look on Asuna's face she didn't want to believe it either. The rest of what the figure said was mostly drowned out by her own racing thoughts.

Suddenly Asuna nudged her shoulder. "Look in your storage."

So she did. She swiped her fingers down to open her menu and pulled up her item storage. There was something there that hadn't been before, something labeled HAND MIRROR. Tapping the button to materialize it, it was exactly what the name suggested, a small square mirror. She was confused, staring into the reflection of a girl with hair and eyes completely different from her real ones. But then she was enveloped by light again, and when it disappeared she was staring at her own reflection, not that of a virtual avatar's. The dark eyes and hair that reminded her of the timid girl laying in her bed, trying to escape reality.

"S-Sinon?"

She looked up and in the place of the blue haired girl she knew as Asuna, there stood a girl with long, chestnut colored hair and hazel eyes. They stared back at each other with astonishment. She heard the sound of glass cracking and assumed someone had dropped their mirror in shock.

She barely heard the hooded figures final words before he disappeared. The joyous frenzy from earlier was nothing compared to the pandemonium that ensued. "Sinon, w-what are we going to do?" The new Asuna asked her, but she wasn't listening. Her world had begun to spin out of control.

She came here to escape reality, to escape the girl in the hand mirror, but now this was her reality. She thought of pinching herself earlier to test out the pain sensors in the game, and how dying was something she didn't want to do even then. Now… now dying wasn't an option at all. It suddenly felt like reality. No, it was even more dangerous than reality. Primal, even. She had to survive this no matter what, or she would never see her mother again.

She had to survive. She had to survive.

This time it was her mirror that shattered against the stone pavement.

A/N: And it's back! A Different Love Story revised and rewritten. Version 2.0 if you will... Heh... Well there's not much difference between this chapter and the first two from the original version. Why? Because this is the first two chapters of the original story. They've just been combined to make a longer first chapter. If you'll also notice, I've got a new partner. A huge thanks to TheSilentSwordsman for helping me rewrite this story. You won't see much of his influence until next chapter, but if it weren't for him the revised story would be taking a lot longer.

For those of you who are new to A Different Love Story, welcome and thank you for reading the first chapter. I hope you plan to stick around as I crack out new chapters at least once every week or two. The first few will come quickly since, if you hadn't already gathered from the last two paragraphs, they were already written some time ago. I can't say what will happen once I finish rewriting chapters and start writing new ones. But please stick with me! I promise I will finish this story, even if I may not update for a month or more. Some of my long time readers may know that writer's block is a frequent problem of mine, so please be patient with me.

Once again, thank you to old fans for sticking with this and waiting for the revised story, and thank you to new fans for checking out my lame little love story. I hope you all enjoy A Different Love Story 2.0!