Chapter 1- Link Start!

I opened my eyes and looked around the area. New players were spawning in the Town of Beginnings every half second, so I booked it to the market to check out the stock. They had different varieties of shops like jewelery, clothing, and knives or daggers. As I walked by the clothing store, I stopped in front of a mirror and gazed upon my avatar.

I was literally a different person on the outside. Besides my face I was wearing a black shirt underneath my leather chestplate with blue jeans and a sword strapped to my back. I knew it was starter gear, but to me I looked like a man on a mission.

"Hey Psyto! "

I turned around to see a player running up to me with excitement. He was wearing a ripped up scarf around his neck that reminded me of...

"Is that you Kaito? "I asked the avatar.

My best friend smiled and said, "Did you really think you can play VRMMO's without me? " He tightened his scarf and asked, "Doesn't this scarf look like mine from the real world Psyto? "

"At least I'll know which one is you Kaito, "I said opening my menu. I went to my party tab and clicked on Kaito's name to invite him to the fold.

"You ready to do this? "he asked accepting my request.

"You know it. "I said as we turned around and ran to the north gate. As we passed different buildings my inner gamer was having a heart attack. The graphics on each piece of virtual land was just the most incredible thing I've layed eyes on. We exited the Town of Beginnings and ran into the fields.

Then the monsters came.

Someone must have ran through here before us, because they were respawning as we ran by. I turned around to the boar that spawned behind us. "This ones mine! "I said, running at it. I pulled out my sword and activated the sword skill slash. As the boar and I charged at each other I swung my sword and cut the creature in half. The boar vanished into the air as a pile of crystal shards.

EXP: 20

COL: 15

ITEMS: 2

My heart was racing with excitement as the box floated in front of me. Then I heard Kaito's sword slash the air as he took down his boar with his sword.

"That was AWESOME! "Kaito yelled as he sheathed his sword, "Come on Psyto. Lets go get some more. "He ran up the hill with me at his heels.

LATER THAT DAY...

By the end of the day Kaito and I had reached level 3, and had enough col to buy each of us a pair of iron armor. By this point we were getting tired and were heading back to the Town of Beginnings.

"You gonna pull an all nighter? "Kaito asked me.

"Well yeah. "I responded, "We always pull all nighters with video games, especially VRMMO games. "

"Even though that's true, "Kaito said with dissapointment, "its almost sunset in here, which means my family is about to leave for dinner, and I told them I would go this time. "

"Guess I'll see you tomarrow then, "I said as Kaito stopped to open his menu. I just kept walking, not waiting to get my iron armor, when suddenly-

"Where did the logout button go? "

I stopped and turned around to Kaito who was shocked. I walked back over to him and peered at his menu. Where his logout button should be their was just a blank space. "That's impossible, "I said to him while opening my menu, "It should be right- "I paused to see that mine had vanished as well.

"Maybe it's a glitch, "Kaito said, closing his menu, "New games like these will always have buga on the release day. Hopefully the GM's will fix this soon, or my parents are going to freak out. "

Out in the distance, the bell in the Town of beginnings started to ring all across floor one, then suddenly Kaito and I were surrounded in seperate crystal shard vortex's. Then when it stopped, we were in the spawn area of the town.

"Why were we teleported Psyto? "Kaito said with confusion.

"I don't know Kaito, "I responded, "but were not the only ones... Look. "

More people were teleported in just like us until all players were standing inside the spawn.

"I don't like the looks of this. "Kaito said. He was about to say something when his jaw dropped while looking up at the sky. I decided to look up and what I saw made my heart stop.

The entire virtual sky was covered in "System error" symbols from the top to the ground of aincrad. Then suddenly, red looking liquid started oozing down like jelly. As it came down to the center of the spawn, it started to take shape until a giant in a long red cloak floated in the middle of everyone.

It spreaded its arms and said in a calm voice, "Greetings players. My name is Akihiko Kayaba. Welcome to my world. "

As Kayaba kept talking, my heart was dropping with every word. According to him, the reason our logout button was gone, is because he wanted a world of his design. The only way to get back to the real world was to clear all one hundred floors of aincrad, and if our HP hits zero, we die in the game and in real life.

"If you look in your item storage, "Kayaba continued, "I left a little gift in each players storage. Go ahead and open it. "

I opened my menu and went to my item storage. I equipped what turned out to be a mirror. As I looked at my avatars reflection, I was suddenly surrounded by a familiar crystal vortex. It swirled around me for so long I lost track, then it stopped. I was still in the same spot in the spawn area. For a second I thought it was a defect, then I looked at Kaito and my eyes widened in shock. Kaito wasn't his SAO avatar anymore. The mirror had given him his real life appearence. I looked back at my mirror and saw that my face had changed. Instead of my avatars shaved white hair, I was looking at my wild unbrushed hair from the real world. Their was also my blue eyes, my face expressions ... It was me!

"This concludes the tutorial, "Kayaba said, "and the official launch of Sword Art Online. Players, I wish you the best of luck. "When his speech was over his body turned back into the red looking jelly and went back up into the sky. Then the sky cleared of all "System error" signs.

I started to process all Kayaba said. He never actually told us why he would do this to us, but he did it anyway. Then questions atarted forming in my brain, How long will we be stuck here? How will taken down bosses be like now? More questions were forming, but I had to keep my cool. If this is what Kayaba wants, then we'll need to prove to him that we can't stay here for his amusement.

Kaito grabbed my shoulder, "Hey Psyto, "he said in his calm voice, "Lets go get some food and get that iron armor we been wanting. "I guess he was keeping calm about the situation to.

My stomach growled at me, "Lets get food first, "I told him, "Then we need to come up with a plan of action. "As we jogged to a nearby food shop, I thought about how the fighting that was fun would now be a tool to survive the now Death game.