Agony. It crept slowly. The pain flared briefly. The suit answered with a beep of its own. The antiseptic, the cauterizing nanomachines, the smell of dirt and the taste of the coppery blood in his mouth told him a single truth. The enemy had hit him.
In Sword Art Online, one could both parry and dodge. If hit, one only had to make sure the life bar wasn't depleted.
In Alfheim, wings added a third dimension of dodging and attacking, but in the end, what they did was to add a new way to avoid damage.
It was skill and luck, but mostly skill, that made Gun Gales Online easy to win with but a sword.
However, in the middle of a battlefield filled with the screams of the wounded, the agonizing shrieks of pain and the terror-filled soul that death was real and coming…
He, Kirito, needed luck.
A medic ran towards him, hoisting him up over his shoulder and starting to run away from the frontline. Bullets flew, tinging the sky red with the laser rays that intermixed with the steel rounds. Their own side fought too, trying to cover the retreat of the wounded and the medics.
The man who carried him back had no discernible appearance. A default face, a default helmet and a default suit were all that he had. His nickname was 'DrShepard'. Maybe he was American, or European. God if he knew just how many there were, trapped in this hell.
The call signs automatically translated. Things like 'Medic' 'Enemy' 'Flank them' were easy to use. There was a single fleeting instant of fear as an artillery strike slammed close to them, sending a shower of dirt to cover them as they fled.
His ears ringed, his breathing grew ragged, but the medic still hauled him back.
They reached the backward outpost, where the medic pulled him on a stretcher and then on a Magnet-Transport, which began to power-up as it synchronized with the overhead spaceship, the Dominatio.
Like a bullet, the Magnet-Transport burst forward, breaking through the atmosphere with ease and landing then safely inside the hangar of the Juggernaut-Class spacefaring vessel.
"You okay?" the medic said using the call signs.
"Okay," he managed to gurgle back. The pain was receding already. In his opinion, the medic was overreacting. Still, it was better to be back aboard the spaceship than down on the ground.
"Exchange Contact Information?" the medic added. "Friend Request?"
He accepted them both.
The loner thing of Sword Art Online was something of the past. The help of his sister in Alfheim was something he would never have again. This wasn't like Gun Gales Online.
This was far worse.
The game was simple. In an infinite set of infinite planets, randomly generated every time, were key planets to conquer. Using space ships, the players had to travel with the rest of his Faction to conquer those planets in the name of his side.
It was a war game. The title of the game was simple.
Space Conquest Online.
It was a competitive game, not like Alfheim were Player Killing happened, or Gun Gales Online. There were two factions in the game.
One was the Empire, the usual evil hyper-technologized race that revolved around a central figure of power.
The other was the Consensus, a democratically strengthened ensemble of various colonies that believed in solving issues through talk.
The game was set so that the two Factions could not sue for peace. One of the two had to lose so that the other could win the game, because among the Key Worlds to conquer for the Victory was the enemy's Capital World.
This vast game would have required an incredible amount of players beforehand, but it hadn't been needed. The game was, after all, nothing more than an over glorified virus. He had been playing Alfheim with his family, when the entire world had frozen over.
The next moment, he ended up with an impossible to defy choice. There had been nothing to do, but to choose a Class and start playing. He hadn't even managed to contact Asuna.
He belonged to the Empire Faction.
For once, he, Kirito, wasn't the good guy.
He was the bad guy, the one who oppressed. He belonged to that faction; he belonged to those evil minions and men. He was a killer.
Every enemy was not an NPC, but a player. Death was not destruction of bits, but of lives.
To clear the game however, there was no other choice. To unlock power-ups, to become stronger, to become better, there was no other choice but to do what his Class was best suited at…
He had chosen a meddlesome class, the only one with swords.
He was an Enforcer.
It was the glorified way the Empire defined another word…
Assassin.
The agony he felt in his chest thrummed painfully once more. The next day, he'd be out there to kill once more. The next year, he'd kill again and again.
It had already been two years. Cryo-genic sleep helped pass the time, but there was no fast-forward button.
Everything was real, and yet he hoped he would make it before the end.
He had to clear the game. He had to get out.
It was the only way…
Even if his heart agonized for the deaths he caused, even then…he would fight.
DrShepard excused himself then, leaving for the battlefield once more. Kirito watched him go, looking at the friend list he had through one of the panels in the menu that floated to the side of his eyes. He watched the green dot next to the name and then looked at the names on the rest of the list.
XXX-Legolas was dead, skull and bones were right next to his name.
LegioQuinta was dead too, as were many more names of people who had made a friend request with him.
People from various sides of the world, from various places…were dead and taken away by maybe the littlest of thing, like a bullet in the head or the result of a crumbling building.
His heart painfully thrummed once more.
How many more looked at the same list through different eyes and felt like him?
He didn't know.
All that he knew was that he was…
In agony.
Author's notes
After Gun Gales Online, the new one is Alicinization (I think it's that term) where Kirito ends up inside a fantasy world where 'Souls' are created through ultra-complicated Ais.
Since he forgets who he is at first, and is forced through it I thought…
'What if, instead of a fantasy game, he'd end up inside a sort of mix between EVE Online and Dust 513? And what if he believed the same rules as with Sword Art Online applied?'
This is what happens next.
It was just a plot bunny that sailed in my head. Nothing more than a one-shot.