AN: This is one of the stories I still had in storage. It was originally spurred by the 'what if' that was 'What if someone who had actually lived a live that actually resembles one or multiple of the virtual worlds more than what is perceived 'reality' is forced into the deathgame?'

I was doubting whether to upload this or not, seeing how it's mainly an X-over with a relatively unknown rp, [it's not the sole cross-over, but it's the most prominent] but then I went: 'Ah well, lets just mark her down as an OC [I got permission from her co-owner], throw in some flashbacks for the uninformed masses and be done with it'

The only thing that still worries me is that she's overpowered in comparison to most other characters. She isn't on the Sue scale -God, I hope she's not-, but considering how she'd actually been fighting monsters with swords for the majority of the life she remembers she is currently miles ahead of most. 'Real-life' experience might not translate into actual experience points, but unless the level gap is ridiculously high (Point in case: Kirito vs the orange guild attacking Sylica and him), it does actually help a lot.

I planned to make this somewhat slow-building [well, slower-building that my usual stories at least, since I can't actually write slow]. SAO probably won't come in until chapter 2 or 3, with a brief mention of it in chapter 1. Ah well, it's time to stop my rambling and get on with this.

Disclaimer: All things recognizable belong to their respective owners. Not that the Logia-verse is copyrighted, but meh... That part is very, very likely to go unrecognized anyway since only seven people ever participated in that rp.

Why?

Lying on her bed, practically strangling her pillow, this was -once again- the main question on Cassai's mind. To her it had been months since the timeline shifted, but she still was not closer to finding a satisfactorily answer. Why did Noir break the most sacred of rules? Why did he choose to erase it all?

Well, she thought grimly, choking back another sob, worded like that the reason was clear, had it not prevented the war? but still how could he let go of everything, just like that?

The world had already been at peace though. Through blood, sweat and tears the wars had been won. Certainly, much had been sacrificed, but they had been victorious. A new dawn had come, and everything was being rebuild. Why did he spit on all those who had given their all to get to this end? Desecrated their memory?

Oh, sure. There was peace now. The war had never happened, the Others having been killed before they could implement their 'dastardly' plans and bring mankind to it's knees. The world was prospering, it was untouched, albeit not very idyllic. Crime had far from ceased to be, although there was little to no oppression, struggle to survive or cullings.

A perfect world?

To her, never.

Noir had done what the Others had never accomplished. He had killed them all. Utterly destroyed all traces of what they had been in his efforts to rewrite history. The only reason she still lived to remember was because of the Aeon blood she had inherited from her father. She may not have been a completely timeless being like one of the pure ones, but she was a fixed point. Her birth had been a fact since the beginning of time and history had literally bend and twisted so that her existence would come to be.

The others though, her brothers and sisters in arms who she had thought of as her kin in all but blood? Not so much. This significant a shift in the timeline, affecting whether trillions lived or died or not, one that dated back over 500 years at that would make their birth a statistic impossibility.

More than half a millennium. Maybe that was part of the problem. To them it had been their present, their world, but would it, to Noir, have been nothing more than a terrible future to prevent perhaps? Had he still thought of their past as his present? Little wonder that he had thought little of erasing it.

She could certainly empathize, albeit only to a certain degree. This may be her reality now, but it certainly wasn't her world, nor was this was not her life. She may have received the memories of this life affected by the shift, but the person she had become, the person the war had forged her into, it was who she was. In the end that 'False Universe' was still her reality, and like him, she would have done everything to get her world back.

Ironically, this degree of empathy was limited by that very same fact. After all, his actions, in ensuring the peace and stability of what he likely had still thought of as his world had destroyed hers. And for that she could never again forgive him.

The woman who had, once upon a lifetime, been Cassai Logia, hugged her pillow -if possible- even tighter. The fight against her tears already lost. On a small screen in her darkened room the date flashed.

December 18th, 2021

Today would, after all, have been the day she and Tristan had planned to marry.

Yet she would never see him again.

Never hear his voice call out her name

Never feel his arms around her

Hardass commander she might have been, but that had never made her heartless, no matter how callous some of the decisions she had been forced to make had been. It was hard to move on when everything she cared for was gone. All but her mother anyway, for all that that said anything.

At one time she would have given everything to see her again, but while this woman was certainly nice, this was not the person that had raised her. She was not the woman that had taken time to play with her, despite her cynical, jaded nature. She was not the woman that had taught her to survive in the face of overwhelming odds, and she was not the woman that had sacrificed her life, so that Cassai might, might have a chance to escape.

The woman loved her, and Cassai loved her back, despite this discrepancy , but she could not confide in her. This version of her mother knew nothing of war, or even Aeons, despite having conceived a child with one. She would most likely not believe her, and on the off-chance the pragmatic did, she could still not understand. She might grasp the loss of everyone her daughter had cared for, if not the depth of it, but little more than that.

It was after all not only the people she had lost, but her entire way of life. Just as her mother would not understand how Cassai could live with having killed, Cassai could never understand why humans in this day and age turned on each other for the flimsiest of reasons. Why bully, when it did nothing but cause hurt and resentment? Why steal, when you are not in need? Why murder, unless in defense of yourself and your loved ones?

Whereas the society that Cassai still regarded as hers had had the discipline to hold themselves to the unspoken rules that were common sense and decency, this world seemed to be the complete opposite. It was bogged up in laws, yet its people seemingly without moral. They were weak, both physically and mentally, following their impulses even if it harmed others. and only very rarely, if ever at all taking responsibility for their actions.

Looking back that was probably the crux of things. The one reason I could not understand Noire's choice.

The war might never have kicked off, but humanity was off all the worse for it.

Certainly, this corrupt, divided, complacent mockery of mankind could not have been worth the price that was paid?

- excerpt from the diary of Cassandra 'Cassai' Simmons, May 21st, 2022

AN2: To clear up some confusion: When she speaks of a 'False Universe', it doesn't actually mean a 'Fake' one, or even a 'Virtual World'. In this case it refers to the temporal phenomenon that is caused when someone travels back in time -In their own timeline's timeline, not an alternate one- and rewrites history. The 'original' history technically never happened outside of the loop created, and is therefore named 'false' by the temporal theorists. Or something like that...

To use a Doctor Who-ism: [Which I'm sure I got at least somewhat wrong] It's all timey-wimey and wibbly-wobbly, and on par with the year-that-never-was, albeit it being closer to 565 years than that one, and being more of the result of destroying several fixed points in time as opposed to foiling the plans of a mad Time Lord with a Paradox Machine.