"Well be together forever right?" the boy asked looking to the girl sitting next to him. They were both only in grade school, both around 12 years old. Sitting on adjacent swings; hands cupped together. The girl smiled a bright smile before staring at him with her pale blue eyes. "Of course I couldn't think of anything I would want more, then being with you . . . ,"(AN: The name of the boy is spoken but not heard.) the girl replied as she watched the young boy stand to his feet. She watched him fiddling around with something and stood as well wondering what he was up to.
"Alright, it's a promise then ," he said turning to face her, hands behind his back, "Now close your eyes." She did what he had told her and closed her eyes tightly.
"Okay open em."
When she opened her eyes she noticed the red and black, flame bandanna he had always worn wrapped around her wrist. He grinned widely and chuckled as she pulled at the goggles around her neck and placed them on his head giggling softly. "Now we'll never forget each other . . . ," she said as they smiled at each other and laughed.
"Of course we wont Kuromi-Chan. Together forever."
Kuromi sighed as she got up out of the bed. Fourth time this week, old promises seemed to be haunting her a lot nowadays. She pulled on her school uniform and adjusted her hair in the mirror atop her dresser. She had changed a lot since that day five years ago. Her raven colored hair had grown much longer, reaching almost her mid back, and she had developed into a young woman. Reaching onto the dresser she grabbed the red and black bandanna, the same she had received all those years ago, tying it onto her head.
"I'm leaving for school mom!" Kuromi shouted as she made her way down the stairs and out the door. Today would be Kuromi's 11th grade year in high school. After moving away all those years ago, she had made quite a name for herself; quickly becoming one of the most popular girls in her school. A few of her friends caught up to her on the walk, gossiping as they usually did. "Hey did you hear? There's a new guy coming to our school this year."
"Yeah, and I heard he's really hottie."
"No one knows his name though."
Kuromi listened in on their conversation, a little curious at first, then slowly losing interest. As they arrived at the front gates of the school. Walking down the hall, students moved out of the way making way for Kuromi and her 'posse' of friends. Even upper-classmen moved aside. Kuromi truly hated being treated like some sort of celebrity.
There were squeals and screams of joy heard from down the hallway. The boy was walking down the hallway in a confused daze. All the girls seemed to be making a big fuss over his arrival, but he didn't seem to know or care why. He yawned as he moved the bangs of his black hair out of his bright green eyes. The girl's continued following the boy around, asking him all sorts of questions.
"Where are you from?"
"What's with that jacket?"
"Are you single?"
He stuttered hesitantly as he tried to answer all the questions. Kuromi watched the girls from a distance, not wanting to become involved in their fan-girlish obsessions. She needed an escape from the usual patterns of high school life. Kuromi was sure she wasn't going to find it here, and headed on to class.
Later that day, things went on as they usually did for Kuromi. After school, she stood on the side of the town market, drinking a can of cream soda. There was the predictable random guy of the day with his hands around her waist. Kuromi never had to try hard to attract guys, they always just seem to flock to her. Whether it be for her looks, or her popularity, each one was no different then the last one; trying to make moves on her like grabbing her inappropriately or trying touching her butt. This one was no different.
"Come on let's go do something," he suggested leaning his head on her shoulder, speaking in her ear softly.
"So what do you recommend?" she asked taking another sip of her soda. "Well we could go to my place and listen to some music, or watch a movie or something." "Sounds interesting," she replied in a half sarcastic tone.
"Wow, thanks.." he said disappointedly, but that wouldn't stop him from keeping up his endeavor. "All guys are the same.." Kuromi thought to herself as she sighed.
"Mom! I'm home!" Kuromi yelled as she shut the door behind her. She made her way up stairs and to her room. There was a box sitting outside her door. No one usually sent her anything outside of Christmas or her birthday. "What could this be?" Taking the package into her room, she sat it onto the floor tearing into it curiously. The box inside read in bold white lettering: The World Ver. 7.9.
"It's some online game from Japan. Your uncle thought you might like it," her mom said from the door, "Just don't waste all your time playing it."
Kuromi wasted no time installing the game to her laptop. She wasn't much of a gamer, but she enjoyed keeping up with the more interesting new titles, which her uncle knew well. Sending games to her on her birthday or Christmas. She picked up the controller as she pulled on the headset slowly, starting up the game. It then lead her to a desktop like screen as a notice blinked alerting her of a new message. It was just the usual welcome message, so she didn't pay much attention to it. As she moved on to the main game, she was amazed at how in depth the level of customization was, there were tons of character classes to choose from and clothes for your character. She chose the gunner class, long range with fairly higher attack power than the archer. She gave her character long red hair, tied back into a loose ponytail, a black, bikini-style top, and black shorts that came a little above her knees. And just for kicks, she found a bandanna similar to the one the boy had given her.
As she finally finished her character, she found herself in the middle of the Delta root town. There were shops and markets all around, and plenty of players as well, running around the city almost aimlessly or talking with other players. Her rifle weapon was slung over her shoulder in the large holster.
"Wow," Kuromi said looking over her hands, "Everything's so lifelike." Kuromi decided to get right to playing the game and headed for the nearest warp gate. It didn't take her long to find it, with the help of the mini map, She stood for a moment thinking of what keyword she wanted to use for her first dungeon. She remembered a good dungeon for beginners from the manual.
"Hidden Forbidden Holy Ground," Kuromi spoke to the warp gate. It teleported her to a new area, more spacey and grassy; filled with old ruins and worn down statues. Small harmless monsters roamed the area. Kuromi ginned pulling her rifle from behind her back and began testing her skills, quickly making work of a few easy monsters. After leveling up a few good levels, Kuromi headed toward the area on the map the boss was said to be hanging around. She hadn't noticed any other players since she came to the area. Maybe there weren't so many new players on today using this server. Kuromi could see the boss up ahead walking around the plain. Kuromi grinned pulling out her rifle and took aim. "Fire Bullet!" the flaming shot hit the monster right on catching the monster off guard and causing the battle area to finally take effect, forming around Kuromi and the monster in a tall circle. Upon closer inspection the attack hadn't even dented the monsters health, no a single change. She kept firing attacks at the monster, all to no avail as she dodged the monster's attacks as best she could. "That's weird, I'm not doing any damage," she said preparing to fire another shot. The silent clicking of the gun; however, signaled that she was out of MP, "Shit.."
The monster took this time to sneak in a powerful swinging blow, knocking Kuromi back into the battle area wall inflicting extra damage to her. She slowly stood to her feet, with barely any health points remaining. "Crap.. I'm going to end up getting killed her already," she muttered silently. The monster lunged out at Kuromi, preparing to make its final attack on her.
"Tiger Storm!!"
A figure jumped out into the battle slashing wildly with the glaive weapon left and right, slowing the monster down.
"Darn it's one of those monsters," he said lowly. Kuromi could only see the players back, but from what she had heard it was a male. His hair was short and silver, and his character had large, angelic black wings. He stood almost staring down the monster.
"What's he doing?" she thought to herself watching. The monster roared lunging at the boy, but hit something like a wall that didn't seem to be there and was then launched back into the area wall. A strange circular barrier encased the monster as it rose back to its feet. Kuromi noted the strange shadow looming over the boy's head, like some virtual ghost.
The boy held out his arm as it turned into a large barrel with cooling fans angled around the end and they began spinning furiously.
"Data…Drain!" a large beam of energy shot from the gun hitting the monster before reversing seemingly absorbing the data from the monster itself. It changed forms turning into a harmless rabbit-like creature attempting to hop away. The boy quickly finished the monster off, turning his attention to Kuromi now.
"You okay?" he asked slinging the glaive over his shoulder. She nodded now taking a closer look at him. Around his neck hung a pair of goggles, like the ones in her dream.
"Uh, yeah I'm fine," she replied shrugging her shoulders, "So what was that thing? Isn't this map supposed to be for new players?"
"It is, but recently the game's been having a lot of problems and glitches involving the monsters. Me and my group have been trying to eliminate the monsters around problem areas, but they spark up so fast," he explained sighing softly and shaking his head. Kuromi chuckled placing her hand on her hip, "That's quite courteous of you guys. So what's your name?"
"Well, on here I'm Axle"
"Nice to meet you Axle, the name's Kuromi." she replied shaking his hand gently. He smiled as he pulled his hand away after they finished. "Well I'm off. Hope to see you again," Kuromi said as she logged off and removed her headset sighing in relief. Maybe she would play again tomorrow. Kuromi turned looking to the clock and gasped looking at the time.
12:00a.m.
She quickly stood rushing to the bathroom to take her shower. She let herself get to caught up!
End Chapter One
Hey you're author Toka here! I finally got around to typing my first fan fiction. I hope you guys like it. And be sure to give me some positive criticism on how I can improve my work, and write the story better. I always appreciate good advice. Ja ne! And look out for Ch2 sometime soon. As soon as I finish I'll start typing it as well.
And also as a complete bonus, if you're an artist and you decide to draw maybe a fan art of one of the characters from the story (Kuromi-ingame or real life, or Axle) or if you draw your own character as they would look in a Dot Hack style game, I might add your character into the story. But, be sure to tell me if they would be a good guy or a bad guy. ^^;;