Disclaimer: I do not own Sword Art Online or any of its characters, but I do own most of the ones in this story.

Prologue :

One particularly windy Monday morning (1/07/22), in the city of Tokyo, a Red haired woman, Ichigo Hikari and her son, a young, jet black and messy haired boy named Ryuga Hikari, Grandson of Higashi Hikari and Hinata Hikari, were driving through Nishishinjuku on their way to Minato-Ku where Ryuga's grandparents lived.

"Are we there yet, Mom?" He asked his mother with an intense anxious look on his pale face as he pushed his glasses back into position with his index finger.

His mother let out a sigh and asked "Wow you seem to be in quite a hurry, do you dislike me that much?"

He laughed at the sarcastic look on her face as he replied "No, its just that there's this new game being released soon and grandpa said that..."

"I should've guessed as to why he plead to get you here, but it can't be helped, after all you're like "him"." she said as she let out a slight chuckle.

"Well, tell me when we get there." He announced placing his headset over his ears which had been plugged into a handheld he was playing on.

Ryuga had just defeated a boss when he heard his mother say."Ryuga, come on, get out, we're here!"

"I'll be right there, just let me save the game first!" He objected as he suddenly felt a heavy pulling force in his stomach, it must be S.A.O, he thought.

He saved the game and it off, loosened the safety belt from around his waist, as he got out of their steel silver Nissan GTR, he pondered on what his avatar would look like, and what he was going to name him, whatever it was, he had to have a cool name. He took out his cell phone and walked through the pathway leading to their destination.

As they approached the door he thought about the previous time he visited "this place", that was when he was introduced to his father's favourite RPG, Final Fantasy XII-2, which he instantly grew a liking to, and became obsessed with the genre and started playing Dragon Age Online on his computer as soon he they got home that holiday.

His mother rang a doorbell to the left side of a glass door which could only be seen through from the inside, and not too long after, a grey haired old lady opened it. He let out a longing smiled as he saw the face of his grandmother since it has been almost 3 years since the last time they met.

"Hi, Grandma" he as she threw a "so glad you came" at him saying "Oh look, it's a little boy, come in, I have candy, I promise I won't kidnap you."

His smile disappeared and became an awkward look of confusion as he asked her "But grandma, why would you wanna kidnap your grandson?"

A smile appeared on her face as replied saying "Oh, in that case I definitely won't kidnap you."

She then invited them inside, all laughing she invited Ichigo to sit down on one of the three couchs in the lounge. Ryuga definitely missed his grandparents' house, to him it was like his second home, he had been had been waiting for that day for nearly 5 months seeing that the first generation of VRMMORPGs were soon to be released and his grandfather had promised him that he would get Sword Art Online and his NervGear as soon as he they arrived, so naturally Ryuga went around the house looking for his grandfather who he found in the kitchen with a suspicious look on his face, Ryuga scanned his grandfather in a none suspecting manner.

"Wow, look how old you've become!" Implied the old man as he hid a box he had in a cupboard behind him.

Ryuga laughed and replied "Gramps, you shouldn't comment on how old I am when you're nearly in you look like you're about to turn to dust."

His grandfather laughed and told him "You've become pretty good at this comeback thing. Did bring your computer along, if so I thing we should set it up in your room."

Ryuga had a computer of which he was most proud of, having a octacore CPU, DX22 128-Bit GPU, 32GB RAM and a 12TB internal HDD in it with an extra 6 external, he cherished his PC more than he did his life, because to him that was his escape from reality, a place where he could be free to do anything, whether it was to kill off the covenant army on Halo : Revenge of Spartan MkXII, or completing quests on Cloud 9, this was where he felt at his best. And now he would be playing a VRMMORPG, where imagination is turned into a reality, nothing could possibly go wrong with it, otherwise it would never have been announced in the fist place, he couldn't wait to get started.

Ryuga ran through the house past his mother and grandmother straight through the now open door, he quickly ran around the corner where his mother had parked Nissan and opened the right door, he let the seat down and reached out his arms to pick up a backpack, in which he had put his computer, it was usually heavy for a modern computer, but that was due to his PDQ A/C system he installed in it. He closed the door behind him and went back into the house, he walk through the lounge and as he got to the passage straight ahead from the door he turned to his left and climbed a huge flight of stairs to the second store, he walked straight and entered the room to his left. He quickly set up his PC and plugged three display units into it and turned on the power to see whether it was properly connected or not, and as always he had done everything correctly and decided to ask his grandfather if he could start installing it onto the NervGear and install the NerveWare onto his PC so that it'll pick up the signals from NervGear.

He went downstairs shouting "Gramps! Gramps! Could I please have the NervGear and S.A.O you said I would get?"

Higashi signalled him by whistling aloud, Ryuga ran in anticipation of a NervGear but only saw one box behind his grandfather, he knew that this had to be the NervGear, but he couldn't see S.A.O. He let this slip seeing that his grandfather would probably give it later. But he realised that this wasn't the case when he saw Higashi didn't have it.

"The game's release date has been pushed back two month, seeing that I own a gamestop, I 20 BETA versions, who's servers will be opening starting at ten tonight, I have to choose 20 worthy gamers and you happened to be one of them." Chuckled a lightly smiling Higashi taking out a black game casing.

Ryuga first stood still as though thinking about the situation he was in, he stayed this way for a while then responded with a huge smile on his face as he joyfully took the casing from his grandfather's hands. "So I'll have more experience than most other players, thanks gramps, this is better than the full version."

Excited as he was, Ryuga had to wait another four hours before he could play, what a drag he thought deciding that he was going to set up everything slowly and then browse the web or watch anime. Time had passed and he got ready to play Sword Art Online. A blue light flickered from inside the NervGear to say that it was active. He lay on his bed and put the NervGear on his head. His palms started sweating because of the excitement. Just as suddenly as it went dark a register button appeared in front of him. He stared at it for a while then poked it.

He got a small fright as he heard a woman's voice say "Welcome to Sword Art Online, a VRMMORPG, create an account to proceed to creating your avatar."

It also worked by a eye/voice recognition system, but he preferred to type it out the word Hikari, as it was the first thing he could think of, combining he last name with his first. He then put in his user password and pressed continue, after that, a list of options appeared under the heading of *Avatar Creation*. Ryuga pushed the randomise button and a short, white haired, dark skinned, fat boy appeared.

"Bleh, I don't wanna look like that!" He protested as he pushed the randomise button once again.

This time a medium in length, red haired, pale boy appeared, Ryuga turned his hair black, made him a bit taller (to fit his length, that way he'd be comfortable and not fight at an awkward hight), turned his eyes brown, and darkened his complection a little, thereafter he scrolled to the bottom of the page and touched the "Finish off" rejoiced deep inside as a huge grassland appeared with a village in the distance, feeling wind blowing through his hair, one wouldn't even say it was a game, finally he was in the world of Sword Art Online.

Side Note:This is my first story, so I'd like to ask you to help me in whatever mistakes I made, and also to tell me what you would like me to add, I'll run it pass my associates and we'll make a decision on it, thank you for reading, and I hope you'll enjoy the next chapters.