There are 100 floors in Aincrad with 10k players in the beginning I wanted to do a story that showed all of the floors that were getting cleared and some of the other Characters. O/C's Himeko, Sota, Hirashi, Taka, and Ayame. There will be origional characters in this story. I own nothing SAO.

Sword Art Online

Darkness Before the Dawn

Chapter 1

The Beginning of SAO

1/7/17

"November 6, 2022 the official release of Sword Art Online you see all these young people have came out and camped out to get the newest game. This is a full dive game into the virtual world with the NereGear they have dubbed this kind of game as a VRMMORPG or Virtual Reality Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game. Some of these people have been here for day's in hopes of getting the new game once it is available but there are 1,000 lucky players out there who were chosen as part of the Beta Test and they have given this game all thumbs up I've not seen any negative comments come out about this game..."

"Hoshi dear do you really trust something that is connected to your brain?" an older woman with sandy brown hair and flecks of gray asked as she turned down the tv.

"Yes mother, I've been playing the game for months now with no problems. But I don't like the idea of you coming in and shutting it off so if I'm playing please don't shut it off. They tell us its fine but I'd rather come out of the dive on my own not have my brain fully engaged in the dive to be thrust back into the real world without the usual log out time." Hoshi a 17 year old girl with short sandy brown hair and blue eyes answered back smiling at her mother.

"Alright dear I trust your judgment just be careful with that game." Hoshi's mother said and smiled softly at her daughter.

"Yes mother." Hoshi said softly and smiled back. She stood up and walked over to her room. "It's almost time see you for dinner alright?"

"Alright have fun dear." her mother said and smiled back. Then her daughter was gone and the door was closed she had a worried look on her face as she glance out of the house to the sky above. 'I really don't trust that full dive brain scan.' She thought warily.

A young woman looked around and smiled. She shook her head and her short blue hair moved from side to side and her green eye's moved around to see all the stalls and buildings in the town of beginnings. She adjusted her eyes to see her health bar and name 'Himeko' and smiled again. "Just as it should be." she said and laughed then pulled her sword from its sheath on her back nodded replaced it then turned around and started running for the edge of town she had agreed to meet 4 of her friends that she had convinced to buy SAO (Sword Art Online).

Himeko had been waiting for around 10 minutes leaned up against the outside wall to the town with her arms crossed and one foot pulled up behind her. She glanced over and raised an eyebrow. "Sota huh... could you have gotten any more flamboyant?" she said to the young man with bright red spiky hair and orange eye's.

"Hahaha... yeah couldn't help it thought it looked cool. Been waiting long?" Sota said as he put his hand behind his head and tilted his head kind of silly with a goofy little grin.

"Na just about 10 minutes. I figured the rest of you were probably checking out some of the stalls or ya'll got lost in the city one of the two. Either way you'd eventually end up out here." Himeko said and laughed.

"Well I guess that's true." a young woman with long black hair and brown eye's said and smiled as she stepped out of the city. "Himeko, Sota so we're the only ones to meet up so far."

"Yep Ayame. I'd say Taka, and Hirashi should be here any moment now that you two have arrived." Himeko said and laughed slightly.

"Yeah we're hear so what we doing now?" a young man with short black hair and black eye's asked curiously as he looked around at the others.

"This is wild Himeko... I never thought this could be so cool." a young woman said with long green hair tied back into a high pony tail and light purple eye's.

"Well Hirashi I was planning on teaching you guy's how to fight, level up, and earn cor or currency here in the game. And Yes Taka this is really cool game lets get to it." Himeko said and pointed towards the open field away from the town of beginnings. She pushed herself off the wall with her foot and started walking.

"Ok so is this like a normal game where we fight monsters to level up and earn money?" Sota asked curiously as he fell into step with the others following Himeko.

"Well yes actually but you have to get used to how to do it with your body." Himeko said and smiled. She stopped and pointed off to her left slightly. "Watch me." she said as she stepped off the path and over towards a boar about 10 feet away. She pulled her sward from her sheath then got into her stance. Then she charged at the boar and her sward started to glow and she struck to the boar.

The boar squealed and turned then charged at her. She jumped sideways away from the mad monster. Her sword was glowing again as she struck the boar again as she side stepped the boar a second time. The boar charged her again and this time she didn't dodge but took the boar straight on with her sword striking home. The next second there was an explosion of the boar and a congratulations sign in front of Himeko along with a status window with her rewards.

"Wow that was amazing." Ayame said and laughed as she and the other ran over to Himeko.

"Not really..." Himeko said and laughed awkwardly. "That was just a basic monster for beginners they get tougher the farther into Aincrad you go. Spread out and lets see what you guy's can do against a boar. If it gets too dicey I'll step in." she said and smiled.

Himeko watched for a few minutes stepping in every now and then when her friends had been knocked down by a boar and it was charging again. "Ok everyone get into your stance and hold it for a few seconds... ok you feel that your sword skill should be starting to take effect... now attack the system will pretty much guarantee you a hit."

"Wow we did it." Taka said as she jumped around a little and celebrated.

"Yes you did Taka congrats but it's getting late lets head back to town so we can log out. We can continue tomorrow." Himeko said and smiled around at all of her friends. Off in the distance a bell started to chime and Himeko stopped laughing all of the sudden and turned towards the town of Beginnings ready for anything. 'I don't like that bell...' she thought warily.

"What's wrong...uhm Himeko..." Ayame said quite hysterically as they all started to glow. Next thing they knew they were standing back in the town of Beginnings in the town square with other players appearing around them.

"Shhh... and stay together do not get separated..." Himeko said as she ushered her friends closer together.

"Some one forced a teleport..." a young man said with black hair and a sword strapped to his back beside a man with long red hair.

The sky turned red and seemed to bleed down until it took the form of a giant person. "Attention players I would like to welcome you to my world my name is Akihiko Kayaba. And as of this moment I am in control of this world. I'm sure most of you have already noticed an item missing from your main menus, the log out button let me assure you this is not a defect in the game. I repeat this is not a defect. This is how Sword Art Online was designed to be. You can not log yourselves out of SAO and no one on the out side will be able to shut down or remove the nervegear from your head. If anyone attempts to do so a transmitter inside the nervegear will discharge a microwave signal into your skull destroying your brain and ending your life."

"Are you listening to this crap he's got to be nuts right Kirito?" said the guy with the red hair and bandanna around his head.

"He's not the transmitters singles in the nervegear work just like microwaves if the safeties are disabled it could fry your brain." said Kirito

"Couldn't some one just cut the power?" said the guy with the red hair and bandanna around his head.

"That won't work the nervegear's got and internal battery." said Kirito

"Ugh this is crazy totally crazy..." said the guy with the red hair and bandanna around his head.

"Despite my warning the families and friends of some of the players have attempted removing the nervegear an unfortunate decision to say the least. As a result the game now has 213 less players then when it began. They have been deleted from both Aincrad and the real world."

"213" said Kirito

"No way, I don't believe it." said the guy with the red hair and bandanna around his head.

"As you can see news media out lets have round the clock coverage of everything including the deaths. At this point it is safe to say the likely hood of a nervegear being removed is minimal at best. I hope this brings you a little comfort as you try to clear the game. It is important to remember the following there is no way to revive some one with int the game if your HP drops to zero your avatar will be deleted from the system forever and the nervegear will simultaneously destroy your brain. There is only one way for a player to escape now you must clear the game right now you are all gathered on the lowest level of Aincrad if you can get through the dungeon and defeat the boss you may advance to the next floor. Defeat the boss on floor 100 and you will clear the game."

"Why should we believe any of the crap your saying?" one of the other players shouted.

"We can't clear all 100 floors that's frikin impossible... even the Beta Testers never made it that high." the guy with red hair said.

"Last but not least I've place a little present in the item storage of every player. Please have a look." Kayaba said

"A mirror...Klein..." Kirito said and everyone started to glow and once it stopped their apearence had changed to their actual physical characteristics.

"Right now you are probably wondering why. Why would Akahiko Kayaba developer of Sword Art Online and Nervegear do this. Ultimately my goal was a simple one the reason I created Sword Art Online is so I could control the fate of a world of my design. As you can see I have achieved my goal. This marks the end of the tutorial and the official launch of Sword Art Online. Players I wish you the best of luck." then the figure in the sky seemed to melt and the sky returned to normal. Everyone stood there all stunned and confused.

As soon as the barior surrounding the town square disappeared Himeko heard. "Come on Klein lets go!" and the two boy's standing a couple paces away took off running. 'He must have been a Beta Tester...' she thought as she turned and grabbed Ayame "Grab the others we're leaving...NOW!" she yelled and shook Ayame who finally reacted grabbing Sota and Taka as Himeko grabbed Hirashi and started leading them out of the town square as fast as she could.

"Wait where are we going?" Hirashi asked confused as he finally started moving on his own and didn't need to be dragged anymore.

"To one of the other towns and move! I'll explain on the way once we are out of the Town of Beginnings." Himeko said as she ushered her friend out of the town as fast as they could go.

"I don't understand what are we doing?" Sota asked confused as all five of them exited the city.

"Look in an MMORPG once the game starts the money you can earn and the experience you can earn is limited there is only so much of that stuff to go around. You saw how many players are here our best chance at surviving this death game is to make ourselves as strong as possible as fast as possible. We need to get to one of the other villages to have a easier time of it. If we stay here the limited amount of everything will be divided by all those people back there in the square and us. So our best bet is the next village. Lets go." Himeko said urgently trying to get her friends to see reason and run for it.

"How do you know we can trust that guy back there." Ayame said skeptically.

"Look there is no log out button. In the Beta it was right here and it's not there. There is no way the system admins would allow this to happen it would destroy the game and future games so the only explanation is the creator did something that the admins cannot override. Now I'm going come with me or stay here and take your chances!" Himeko said as turned and started to run. She hoped her friends would stay with her but this was totally their choice she gave them her opinion and explanation so now it was up to them.

Her friends looked between themselves and nodded. "Waite up we're coming!"

"Great kill every monster that spans around us on our way to the next village." Himeko said and nodded to each of her friends.