My readers will hate me. Another story, and with my update rates… unfortunately I could not hold this one in. The world of Sword Art Online has so much untapped potential – and this is the first fanfic of its type for this world.
I, INSERT_VALID_AUTHOR_NAME (I still haven't been able to fix that…), am proud to present…
…ooOoo…
Rising Dawn
Arc I – Aincrad's Bringer of Hope
Prologue
November 2023 – Front Line at 40th Floor of Aincrad
They all heard it.
They all saw the notification.
But no one, not even the death game's creator, who was hidden away in his own avatar, knew what it meant.
WARNING: SWORD ART ONLINE PATCH 1.01 WILL COME INTO EFFECT IN TEN MINUTES. ALL COMBAT WILL CEASE, AND ALL PLAYERS WILL IMMEDIATELY BE TRANSPORTED TO THE NEAREST SAFE ZONE. TAP HERE TO READ THE PATCH NOTES.
It was like a sick joke. For an entire year, they'd all been toiling through this joke, this mockery of life and death, and now they were being told that the game was getting an upgrade!? As if it wasn't hard enough already!
Of course, that was before they read the patch notes themselves. New quests, new armors, new items, new weapons… really, it sounded as if someone was looking out for them on the outside. There was even a new weapons class included, along with its appropriate skill – Ranged Weapons. Bows and Crossbows were now craftable, with special, rare, monster drops as well.
But then those who read the patch notes through their entirety got to the bottom.
UNIDENTIFIED NPC – EOS.
Everyone was confused, naturally. Those who knew their mythology knew that Eos was the Greek Goddess of the Dawn – but what did that mean for everyone? And this was an NPC, a non-player character; did this mean that they had a new set of quests related to this goddess? Was there to be a simulation of the goddess, one that players would be forced to interact with? Was she an enemy, or a friend?
In the ten minutes after the patch was announced, theories were made far and wide, each more and more far-fetched than its predecessor. Every single one of them was wrong, and as the forced teleport came into effect, bringing every player to the closest town to their position, no matter what floor they were in or what dungeon they were grinding or what skill they were training or what quest they were solving, the most important question was asked:
What happens now?
An hour later after the forced teleport, in which not a single player was allowed to leave the safe zone they were currently in, a new notification was given to every player.
SWORD ART ONLINE PATCH 1.01 HAS NOW BEEN APPLIED. NEW ITEMS ARE NOW AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE OR TO BE FOUND AS DROPS. NEW QUESTS ARE READY FOR THOSE WHO DESIRE A NEW TREAT. A NEW SKILL IS NOW AVAILABLE AS WELL FOR THOSE WHO SEEK MORE POWER. LET YOUR ENEMIES TREMBLE AT THE SIGHT OF THE NEW RANGED WEAPONS.
HAVE FUN PLAYERS, AND GOOD LUCK!
Message given, the barriers surrounding the safe zones dropped, and everyone was free to go. However, nobody left the areas as players began to swarm NPC shops, looking for the new items. Armor, shields, swords, all new items were added. But what caught the eyes of many players were the new weapon types – bows and crossbows, each with different types and special effects. Col was handed over, and hundreds of players left for areas to grind their newly acquired skills.
However, in the excitement of the new drops and items, most, if not all of the players failed to notice the small message at the bottom of the last notification – a message that only played after about a minute of remaining idle, looking at the screen.
THE BRINGER OF HOPE IS HERE. MAY THE PRISONERS OF AINCRAD BE LIBERATED AT LAST, FOR A NEW DAWN IS RISING. ALL HAIL EOS, THE BRINGER OF HOPE!