Hello, faithful readers! This is my 2nd story, and I want criticism! Please leave a review!

It's been awhile since I've been to my parents grave. My family, my surname was Kansatora, was in a building in Tokyo when a terrorist bombing took out all my aunts, uncles, grandparents, parents, now only myself and three siblings are what's left of our great family name. Now I live with my eighteen year old sister, fourteen year old brother, and seven year old sister. Me, you ask? Well, I am Tryn. I am fifteen, and everyone in my family hates me. Tisha, the older sister, hates me for being so childish. Bronts, my only brother, hates me for not spending enough time with him. Alisha hates me because I always seem down, and am no fun to play with. I am the only blonde in the family, my hair being almost white, although, everyone has the same baby blue eyes, mine are green. My siblings all have the same jet black hair, and features passed down from my father, who was a wealthy business man, owning everything from hospitals, to grocery stores. I look almost feminine. I am skinny, look weak, and all my features come from my mother, whose maiden name was Thrista,, an American, who inherited a very large amount of money from her father, but, she was never one of those prick, or stuck up women. She was kind, generous, and loving. My father, on the other hand, was abusive, cruel, and downright mean, though she adored him. Hell, I am also hated, because I am the only one in our family not Christian. Wow, that's hard. My mother was the only person I could talk to, the only person who would listen to me. And she is dead. Their deaths were over a month ago, but I still hear the screaming of people in the bombed building like it was yesterday. I still have nightmares, of myself in the flames of the building. I can hear the crash of it falling, killing everyone inside.

One day, a friend at school told me about this new game coming out, Sword Art Online, or SAO for short. He also told me that the beta tests were ending shortly, and he had reserved two games, one for himself and one for me. After the fire, the government took our money, leaving us a low-middle class house. My friend, on the other hand, was filthy rich, so, I didn't hurt his pocketbook to reserve two games.

I walked home, ecstatic about this. I had a new NerveGear rig, and a game to try it out. I walked through the door and was assaulted by my younger sister and brother, who, I learned, both also had rigs and games. They explained that they had gotten into the beta test, so they could actually help players in the game. To this, I smiled. Once in the game, I am going to have to ditch them, I decided. They really don't want to team with me. After calling out to Trisha, telling her I would be in my room, and I hooked up the rig, slotted in the game cartridge. "Link, start"

Colors zoomed by me, as the operating system started. "Hello, NerveGear user, please touch all parts of your body so the calibration for the software can begin, this is necessary, and we are sorry for any inconvenience." Well, here goes. After following the instructions, I found myself in a blackness. Then a light appeared in front of me, it seemed to be a mirror. I reached out to it, and touched it, but the mirror image didn't move. Then arrows appeared around my head, torso, hair, and legs. I tapped one, and my body became larger, and more muscled. After playing around with it, I settled on a medium height figure, dark hair, dark eyes. Not scrawny, not muscled. Perfect.

I clicked "accept" and teleported into an open field. I looked around me, and raised my hand. Wow, so lifelike…

I made my screen name "Tryth", a combination of my name, and my mother's last name, as a kind of tribute to her.

Then he was forced teleported. To the center of town. With every other poor soul. I opened my menu, and …. no logout button? What the hell? Then… hexagons started spreading from the middle of the sky, to the horizons. Then the sky was bleeding. Wow, not such a great start to the most wanted game ever!

From the blood, a crimson cloaked figure appeared, larger than fifty feet tall.

"My name is Akihiko Kayaba, and as of this moment, I am the sole person who can control this world." Ok, nice prank, can you let us go now?

"I am sure you have already noticed the logout button is missing from your menus. This is not a defect, I repeat, this is not a defect. This is the way Sword Art Online was intended."

Ok, fuck this.

"If you die here, you die IRL, if the NerveGear is removed from your head, you die IRL. There is no longer any way to revive another player, so, once your HP drops to zero, you are dead."

Shitfest.

"The only way to free yourselves is to clear the game, all one hundred levels of Aincrad"

Ok, this is insane! Since when are MMORPGs actually completed?

"Look in your inventories, I have given you a mirror" everyone took out the mirror, then we all changed…. into what we looked like irl. Shitshitshit.

"This is the end for the official tutorial for the SAO Death Game"

After he disappeared, the crowd stood in shock for a while. Fuck this, I thought, and started pushing my way out of the crowd.

Almost as soon as I made it outside of the Town of Beginnings, it seemed everyone snapped out of the trance at once. Shit. The roar and screaming, and pleading, and yelling was too loud to bear. I sprinted towards the next town, Horunka, where my siblings told me I could find a rare item. Well, sorry we couldn't meet up, just don't die, ok? On the way, anything that spawned near me, got my short sword shoved in its face. By the time I reached Horunka, I had already leveled up. "Now that you are level two, pick two skills that you will have for the rest of the game, these skills will automatically level up as you do, others take skill points, or SP to upgrade." Said that female voice. Hmm, looking through the list, I chose One Handed Swordsmanship, and Detection. I realized that I get three SP to spend, so I put two on Agility and one on Intelligence, which would up my critical chance.

I made it to Horunka, very winded though. I spent what little Col I had earned on some cheap bread, and ate some of it, restoring my stamina a little. Then I made my way to the house my sister had talked about. Once inside, I saw an old woman, stirring a pot. She had 'NPC' above her head.

She turned around, and said "hello wandering Swordsman, I am sorry, I don't have any food, only water for you" and she poured me a cup, which I took willingly. After finishing it, I heard fierce coughing from the next room over. Curious, I asked "hey, everything ok?" A question mark appeared above the npc, and she said "oh, that is my daughter, she is very sick and on her deathbed. The herbal medicine I got from the town" she gestured to the pot, "has no effect. The only way to cure her is to use the fruit of a Little Nepenthe. But they are dangerous for an old woman like me to fend off, would you, Swordsman, please retrieve the fruit for me?"

"Hell yeah, anything to help!" I said, then the question mark turned to an exclamation mark, and was accompanied by a "Secret Medicine of the Forest quest accepted"

As I walked out, I ran into….

"Tryn? Is that you?" I pulled my younger brother and sister into the house, shushing them.

"I go by Tryth, now. Please don't call me by that name!" I growled. Why did they have to be here now? Goddamn life!

"We were looking for you Try-Tryth!" My little sister hugged me. She is only seven, and she is in this death game.

"Bronts, take her and go back to town, stay there it's safe"

"Nuh-uh, we beta tested, we can help!" He said.

I shook my head, "it's too dangerous. Don't"

"And what? You get to be the hero? No!"

Ugh.

I walked out the door, towards the forest. I found out that they were following, so I turned around, "you do realize we can't split the fruit needed for the potion?" I said.

"We didn't accept the quest, it's yours, we are here to level up and get stronger!"

Idiots!

"Guys" I said, kneeling down, "I don't want you to get hurt, please go back, take up smithing! People will need that! Or be an info broker!"

They stubbornly shook their heads again. I sighed. I can't stop them from following. We went into the forest, and hacked and sliced our way through every Little Nepenthe that spawned. After a few hours, we finally killed one with fruit, and by that time, I was level five, and my siblings three, since I did most of the work. Again, I put my SP on Agility, and Intelligence. My brother and sister both became Str/Agi types, so the strike fast and hard, me, I thought that a little too mainstream.

I took back the fruit back to the granny, and presented it to her.

"Oh, thank you my Swordsman! Thank you! I will repay you for your trouble!" She walked into a room, and returned with a long sword in a red scabbard. I took it, and saw "quest completed", and I looked appreciatively at the Col and XP. Almost level six. The sword though was a little heavy for my tastes, but will do nicely, for now.

I started walking towards town, looking for a npc shop. After finding one, I walked in, opened the shop menu, and purchased a dark travel cloak. I don't want anyone else knowing who I am. "What's that for, onii-chan?" Asked my sister, still tailing me with my brother. "I am disappearing for a while." I replied.

"But, there is a labyrinth meeting tomorrow! To see who is going to fight in the labyrinth to find the floor boss!" Shit, I have to go to that!

"Fine, I will be there"