11- 2027

"Ugh!" I thought as I dodged the rushing boar. "What's going on?" I thought. "I thought SAO was cleared already by the Black Swordsman?" I looked down and saw leather armor along with a longsword in my hand. I slashed at it with the sword, grazing it as it went past me.

As I braced for its next attack, I swiped the air next to me with my fingers and ,with a chill down my spine, saw the menu come down. It was definitely a player menu but it was from a different style than SAO which meant...

"I'm in another virtual game?!" I thought. I looked over at the top of the menu where it read "Battle Royale Online".

"I see. Looks like I am in another game after all. In that case..." I thought.

As the boar rushed at me, I quickly sidestepped, sheathed the longsword by my waist and breathing in, I slashed with the sword in a half arc, slicing the boar and causing it to shatter. As the pieces disintegrated and the familiar menu with the gold and exp came out, I tried to remember what happened.

Fragments flashed by my mind. I remembered waking up from the hospital ward, remember searching for something (or was it someone), then suddenly being here? I tried to remember more but couldn't.

As I walked back to town, I saw people screaming clenching their hair while others were bending over and crying.

"What the hell is happening?" I thought. I was about to step into an inn when a voice behind me said "I wouldn't do that if I were you Kage. Everyone here is in a drunken frenzy I'd say"

I quickly turned around and swung my blade, pointing it at the head of a girl with a hoodie of a short stature with yellow hair and red markings on the sides of her face. She quickly put her hands up and as she shook her head said "My my. You're definitely as aggressive as always Kage."

I sighed and, sheathing my sword, said "Oh it's you Argo. You know I do that if someone comes up from behind. And for the last time, my name is Akai"

She apparently ignored what I said as she replied "So judging by your expression, I'm guessing you don't know what's going on?"

"No, I don't" I said. "Why's everyone in this state?"

"Well I don't know why you don't but we're once in a game that we can't log out of. Just yesterday, about 5000 of us began to beta test this game because of a letter and a package with the game inside it. Of course since there are only 5000 of us, there were some that decided not to play it. However, when we came into this world, we saw that we couldn't log out."

"I guess the events of three years ago repeated itself again?" I said

"It's five Kage. But yes. A GM by the name of Janus came down to explain that we were not doing a death game but the ones who died would quickly be transported into a virtual space in which they would be held until someone clears the game. This game is running using the flux light system so 1 second in real life is 1000 here." she continued to explain.

"I see so we don't have to worry about anything bad in real life happening here so it's not as bad as SAO" I thought. "But..."

"What's everyone crying about then?" I asked

"Directly to the point as always eh?"she said "Well I heard that these bosses are harder than the ones in SAO and for a test, they're giving us an automatic boss fight in one month."

"One month?!" I thought. "I heard the frontlines beat the first boss within that time period but if everyone has to go through that same thing then..."

"Yep." she said "It's exactly as you think Kage. Many will likely die."

"I see. Thanks for the info Argo. Do you want payment for this like always?" I asked

"Nope." She said while turning around. "Since everyone knows this, I'll give it for free today. Oh yeah by the way Ka-"

"AUUGH!" as a scream went off.

"Oh dear." Argo said. "It's already started huh?"

"What is?" I asked

"I forgot to mention this but there are four things that this game is different from SAO. First is that magic is in this game as well as magic-involved sword skills. Second is that we don't die but we get locked up. Third is this mandatory boss fight we're going to have in the next month. And last but definitely not least is what you just heard just now. Player killing may be somewhat frequent.