Sword Art Online is the property of Reki Kawahara.

None of these characters belong to me.

First Days

Diabel

It was some time before I had realized it: I had ran in the wrong direction. When I went out of my way to avoid that newbie, I ended up exiting Starting City from the opposite direction I had intended.

Though there might be a quest in this direction, I could recall that there wasn't anything of the sort during the beta test. Weighing the options in my head, I came to the conclusion that it wouldn't be worth the effort to look for a likely non-existent quest, and would be better off trying to get the Anneal Blade.

I had to return to the city.

With a disappointed sigh, I began to hunt my way back to the beginning.

When I once again neared the northern gate, I could see some other people. There were three players, two of which were actively fighting each other. I thought it was a friendly duel at the start, but focusing my vision on the color cursors above revealed one of them as «Orange». In other words, a criminal player.

Though it seemed like the orange player had his opponent on the ropes, it seemed like the third player began to take action, she entered a stance and began to slowly circle around to the orange player's back. With a two-on-one attack, I didn't expect the criminal player to stand a chance, but...

I noticed one more nearby player «Hiding». Yet another female player was intently watching the fight. I thought she might have been like me, a bystander that stumbled upon the duel, but the way she was gripping her sword handle indicated that she was about to jump in at any moment.

If that fourth player was with the two greens, why would she need to hide? It likely that she was with the orange player, and that this was an ambush. I thought about getting involved for a moment, but decided that it wasn't worth the risk. There's no need to get myself killed for some people I don't know.

So I carefully left the two-on-one, no, two-on-two fight, and made my way past the gate without attracting their attention.

When I entered the city, what greeted me was quite unexpected. A parade made up entirely of hundreds of players marched through the town. What was going on?

But even through the shifting masses, a familiar face caught my attention.

"Argo?" The bright red rat-like whiskers stood out quite well among the other faces. I ended up running towards her, relieved to find that I didn't make a mistake. If I wanted to know what was going on here, this would probably be the best place to start.

"Mm? Do I know you?" I expected her to remember me quite easily with her memory, before recalling that I made for a fresh start with the official release of SAO.

"Ah, I was one of the testers. Anyway, what's going on here?"

"Oh? If you were one of the testers, you should know that my information doesn't come freely."

"Come now, I could just ask one of the hundreds of people around." I found myself already complaining at her notoriously stingy nature.

"Yes, but most of these people don't even know what they're doing here. They're just caught up in the mob, hoping for something fun. 500 col for the info. Of course, you're free to ask around."

True enough, the players around had no idea what was going on, and the ones that claimed to, had rather conflicting stories. I ended up bargaining with the rat, and found myself paying with 100 col and my player info as a tester.

It was some sort of player protest led by a player named Kibaou. There was a problem with the in-game menu that prevented anyone from logging out. I was quite surprised to find that on myself, and even more surprised that Argo didn't have any information regarding forced log outs from inside.

"I suppose it can't be helped. This seems rather like a waste of time though, you're really going to stick around?"

Argo just nodded her head and waved, and I found myself standing around the evergrowing marching band.

This time, I paid proper attention to the gate I was exiting. Once again I saw some players hunting as I ran by, though it seemed like these guys were the most normal pair I'd encountered so far. Though they looked somewhat familiar...

Ah. One of them was the redheaded newbie I had ignored at the start. The other...

That's right. It was from some time further back. When I thought about it a bit more, I remembered him quite vividly from the beta test, one «Last Attack» I had on a floor boss was sniped by him. And his name was...

"Oi, Kirito!" The loud redhead player gave me the answer. Kirito. Taking that name to heart, I decided that I would get revenge in someway later on.

But for now, I put that thought away, and focused on acquiring that Anneal Blade.

After a while, I arrived in Horunka Village, and quickly activated the «Secret Medicine of the Forest» quest. I began hunting the key item, «Little Nepent's Ovule». Almost immediately, I had my chance, but it was a mixed blessing. The one that spawned was not the «one with the flower», but the «one with the seed». I could risk fighting it, but if I died and had to respawn, I wouldn't expect the quest to still be open.

Playing it safe, I ended up waiting for the safer target.

After a couple dozen «Little Nepents» were killed, the target finally spawned and with little problem, also killed. I picked up the key item off the floor, already rushing back to the village. If I was too slow, the durability would drop to zero resulting in my hard work being wasted.

Unluckily for me, it seemed like the administration finally decided to do something about the bug. I found myself forcibly moved back to «Starting City's» main plaza.

All I felt at the moment was regret, if only I was faster, if only I hadn't hesitated. I could have cleared the quest.

Notes: Next is probably Coper, then Keita.