When she blinked, she was in a grungy, dark alley. She coughed, feeling a heavy smoke enter her mouth when she loaded in. She rubbed her eyes to try and clear her vision from the blur of tears and painful smoke. It took her about a minute to steady herself. She realized something devastating as she finally got her sight and breathing in check. Her voice was deeper, not by much but enough that it made her uncomfortable. Her hair was short. She felt a lingering sense of vertigo, like she could fall over at any moment and the mere straightening herself straight upward made her head pound in protest.

"Just another cute boy..."

A man around his early thirties in his first appearance had been watching her since she loaded into the game. Presumably, he was watching for new players to load in. Maybe he was waiting for someone, she thought.

"...not that it's your business, but I'm a girl..."

She decided to walk with a slight hunch in her form and took a step out of the space she had spawned into.

"...seriously?"

The man stared with a more interested gaze.

"Did you transfer from another game? Any idea why you would load in like that?"

She shook her head.

"I came from another game, but I have no idea why I would load in like this. I am anatomically correct, at least. My height is wrong though, I'm super dizzy...it's not a good fit. I should log out..."

Kirito opened her menu with her thoughts and just as she was about to confirm logging out, the man shouted for her.

"Would you mind...selling me that account?"

She shook her head frantically.

"I'm very attached to this account. Hopefully I can get this resolved..."

The disappointment on his face was surprising to her, but she finished logging out and went right to a private server where she reached out to support for the game. She was responded to promptly with a game master loading into her private server only to be surprised right away.

"Gun Gale Online GM team, how can I-?"

She was surprised first to hear the English, but thankfully she had been learning plenty from Ela so she was able to respond to him, it would be good practice.

"Sorry about calling you out of the game, I just transferred in from another game and a lot of my features are different here in a difficult way to handle playing. Is there an explanation for this change?"

The American accented man cleared his throat and accessed his interface for GGO.

"I'm guessing you didn't check the way the loading of this game works. Transferring in from another game brings you better stats, but our game functions off of rare, uncommon and common skins. I am checking over your GGO account and apparently you were given a rare skin. You could sell rare skin accounts for several thousand dollars to willing players, or you could purchase augments for your skin within the game to change your features."

She sighed.

"Is there a way to change at least my height right away? I had a very bad first experience loading in. I had a very bad case of vertigo which is rare for me, just from trying to stand upright. I can understand a slight height difference, but that felt rather severe..."

The GM nodded frantically.

"Yes that would be a problem. Next time you should take this up with customer service before reaching out to the GM team. I will have them set your height adjustment to your online profile right away. Please enjoy GGO, and happy hunting!"

The GM disappeared from the private server in seconds. She sat down and waited for her messages to ping and tell her that her appearance had been adjusted. With surprisingly good customer service, she was notified within a few minutes of the GM disappearing that her GGO avatar had been adjusted, and to enjoy the hunt.

As she loaded back into the game, she was startled to see the same man she had disappeared in front of even closer, right in her face. She stepped to the side and sighed. He was much taller than she had the first impression. With a European type of appearance, tall, white with black hair and muddled blue eyes, he was probably appealing to a significant number of people.

"Welcome back! Have you recon...sidered?"

He looked down to her and sighed.

"Damn, now your skin isn't compatible at all. Guess it's back to camping. Hope you have a good time with the game."

She blushed and waved as she walked off. As she walked forward, she noticed Shiro leaning against the railing of the bridge across from the spawn in area. She called out to him and started jogging over. When he looked at her he froze in place.

"What happened to your hair? And what took so long?"

She stopped and gave him a confused look. She noticed that he was exactly how he was outside of the game, just with a fairly significant amount of military equipment on him. She pouted considering what she went through on first spawn in.

"I spawned in as a rare skin. I needed GM assistance to change my height because just standing normally was making me dizzy and giving me a headache. My hair might have gotten in the way with fighting here, but the height issue was more important and I didn't want to bother customer support too much."

Shiro stared blankly for a moment, shook his head then began leading the way, walking ahead of her.

"I'm surprised you spoke to customer service. They still only have English GMs and customer service representatives. Guessing another thing you've been learning from Ela-san? But it's a good thing you were able to get that resolved so quickly. We would be really slowed down by you being essentially disabled from that vertigo."

Kirito nodded and looked down at herself. Being used to seeing equipment she was used to when loading into a game, since every game so far had copied her crafted equipment, she was sorely disappointed with further inconsistency from previous load ins. She was in a basic long sleeve shirt that was a boring gray colour which gave the same impression as the roads and railings made of stone and steel. The air was muddled with smoke and neon lights which were drowned by the smoke.

The grungy feeling was more and more uncomfortable to her as they went. She was used to a more colourful reality, or the extra colourful virtual realities. Some people would like the lack of visual stimulation, the grungy atmosphere. It was baffling to her that GGO was a highly competitive global game. She had to accept though, that no matter the visual appeal, it functioned well for its purposes and some people wanted to enter a shooting VR game and feel like they were thrown into a grungy, disgusting battlefield to feel more immersed in it.

"Did you transfer over with any currency for this game? The basic starting amount is $3000."

She accessed her menus with her mind again and found her currency. Once again she was disappointed. Apparently GGO didn't like her type of account history.

"Base amount..."

He sighed.

"Good thing I saved up some of this game's currency to get you some equipment."

She became curious.

"Is there crafting in this game? I've been in equipment crafted by myself so much I just feel...sadly lacking in equipment if I haven't crafted it myself."

He smiled.

"Yeah, if you want me to take you to a material shop-"

"How about materials you might have on you? Have you fought anything significant that dropped materials?"

She was clinging onto that it was an mmo and that there was likely material drops from monsters she could use to craft.

"Not like I'm going to be staying in the game long term enough to turn the materials into anything anyways. I beat this behemoth guy last night and I got some hide, horns and claws. The PVE here is pretty interesting to be honest and even though you don't seem to like the visuals you might otherwise enjoy it."

He traded over the items to her and she checked her interface if she had her crafting sets on her. Finally a bit of good news. She moved into a spot out of the main road where she wouldn't be surprised from behind. She set down three of her portable crafting sets and got to work. Breaking down the materials into something she could craft, forming them into workable solid objects or beginning to tan them into leather, and then getting to work on crafting familiar objects.

What it took her fifteen minutes of expedited crafting time after processing the ingredients to make, was a light leather coat and battle skirt with knee high armored boots and a short sword, along with a compound hunting bow she had made before within her private server as a test. She held it to test, check if she needed ammo for it. Unfortunately she would need some ammunition supplied to her, but otherwise we was very well equipped. She examined it in a comparison to Shiro's equipment and was satisfied. Her equipment wasn't colourful yet because she wasn't supplied with dye or colourful materials, but that could be quickly remedied or just didn't really matter since she might not play the game for very long. The black and steel appearance of everything she wore made her feel rather intimidating when she stood up and looked at herself in the reflective window of the building they were next to.

"That's great that it was enough for a full set of equipment. Let's go get you some ammo. That really looks good on you though. I'm impressed that was possible in this game."

Shiro was also pleasantly impressed. She was just happy to be in more comfortable equipment than starting gear, and to have her favored weapon types with her already. If she needed a ranged weapon, a bow suited her best. So she had a backup for close range, the short sword shape she was most comfortable with.

Shiro continued to lead her until they arrived at a taxi stop. There were a few taxis waiting to take people around the massive city they were in, a significant height above the ground. The taxis were hover crafts, and there were some rental vehicles which floated slightly off of the ground. Powered off, it was safe to assume there was some type of gravitational system inside to keep it off of the ground or something related to magnetism. Shiro nearly went right to the taxis, but veered toward the rentals. There were three types of vehicles available, motorcycle shaped, car shaped and buggy shaped.

"I heard from Ela-san that you've been trying your hand at learning to drive between everything else so you can get your license. She didn't tell me what kind of vehicle you've been trying, so I guess we'll find out now. Renting smaller vehicles costs less, but whatever vehicle you're training for, I'll pay for the rental and put up a marker for you on where we're going."

Kirito became shy, looking away from him toward the taxis.

"I'm getting real tired of her sharing my secrets without my permission...I was doing that in private in my private server. I wanted to surprise everyone. I'm learning for two vehicle types...motorcycle and car. I'm better at the car so let's train up my slightly less comfortable, the motorcycle."

She walked past him, sat on the nearest rental motorcycle and waited for him to start it up with the payment. He sat on the motorcycle behind her, tapped a card against the terminal in between the handles of the motorcycle. The machine started up, and Kirito observed the functions of the terminal to make sure there wasn't anything strange going on. It only took her a moment to understand how the motorcycle operated different from a real one. A slightly futuristic take on controls with a very futuristic balancing challenge of not being connected directly to the ground. It might make her even better at driving a motorcycle than traditional practice on a real one.

"Hold on tight."

She revved the engine and gave it a second to finish going before shifting it out of park into drive. It was something more common in manual cars than motorcycles, but the motorcycle had a very car-inspired interface. As soon as it was in drive, she quickly accelerated, not too instantly and not too slowly. They took off fast from the parking space they had been in and practically flew down the highway. Shiro updated her map with an icon and she noticed that it was leading them into a cramped part of the city they were in. It was a shopping district. There were a couple shops closer to where she had spawned in, but she guessed they were trap stores, having extremely expensive merchandise a new player couldn't hope to afford unless they whaled, spending immense amounts of real life currency.

The highway she hard started on turned off into thin streets which she expertly swerved through. Keeping herself following the rules of the road, going swiftly with the absence of road signs very likely above the speed limit if there was one. It was definitely faster than outside. It felt natural to her that she was moving so fast. The roads were surprisingly empty of drivers, so she didn't need to worry about avoiding others.

The neon lights became more prominent, filling the streets and the ground with rainbows of colour dulled by the smoke. The marker closed in on her map and Kirito pulled into a parking space. She looked around but the signs were difficult to read through the heavy smoke. The words blended together.

"This way. Don't worry about the motorcycle disappearing. After one is rented it won't return to its spawn location until 24 hours after it was rented out. And it won't work without me on it since I'm the one who rented it."

Kirito smiled and followed Shiro with her hands linked behind her back. Her weapons were stored away in her inventory, so she wasn't showing off what types of weapon she would be wielding to any potential enemies she would later face during the tournament should their experiences go so far within GGO. She hoped they would be done before it would come to that, but she couldn't be certain she would get a better chance than the tournament which decided the victims. It was also strange to admit, being a primary bow fighter within a gun wielding game. It suited her though. The assassin who used a silent weapon type that was reliable with a certain use short ranged weapon if she would get close. Better to avoid using precious limited ammunition.

She was led into a shop which dealt in ammunition alone. There were cartridges, bullets, quivers of arrows and without arrows in them. All kinds of imaginable in a realistic and slightly futuristic ammunition to go with the types of weapons which operated within the game's specs.

"Yo~ how can I help you?"

The English speaking npc at the main counter beckoned the two over when Shiro had been leading her to the arrows shelf. When they arrived at the counter, he looked over Shiro and quickly moved his attention to Kirito.

"You're a new client. What type of weapon have you chosen?"

She glanced around the shop, listened deeply to the surroundings just in case someone might be using stealth in there. She felt breathing coming from not far behind her, barely landing on her neck.

"Excuse me, please refrain from sneaking on someone inside of a shop. We're civilized here aren't we?"

The person there who revealed their self was cloaked, pulled back their hood to reveal a boy somewhere between Kirito's relatively short height and Shiro's tall height. It was in that moment she noticed how tall Shiro had really grown. She, thankfully, hadn't continued growing. She was most comfortable with the height she was currently at.

The boy who was there ruffled his hair, scratching his head with a nervous expression.

"S-sorry about that...wanted to test my new cloak I bought. Took a lot of money. Works good right?"

Kirito gave him a confident smile.

"M-hm~ if it weren't for my senses being so strongly trained I might not have noticed you. But again, please refrain from using that to sneak on people in public businesses. I'm new but I definitely read it in the rules that combat is forbidden inside shopping districts."

He bowed in apology. He was probably a high school kid, ready to show off, maybe try and sneak a peak up her combat skirt when there was an opening. She didn't leave openings though. She kept a part of her awareness on him as she opened her bow's information page to show the store clerk. She wouldn't bring the weapon out, just in case the boy behind her was going to try and take a look. No matter how he was, he might be stronger than he appeared. Just like she was beyond first impression.

"Ah, on the discreet. The price for your ammo is this."

The clerk npc showed her a description page and she nodded. She spent $2000 of her $3000 starting money for fifty arrows. The arrows were expensive, she was surprised. She would need to be careful to make good use of every arrow, and try to scavenge any arrows she could. That, or go out with Shiro to make some money.

"Thank you for your business, good luck out there, hunters."

Kirito and Shiro walked past the boy who had been behind them and he backed away from them, showing that he was intimidated by one of them. It could have easily been on of two reasons. Shiro being as tall and built as he was, or Kirito's abnormal senses which caught him through a item meant to mask his presence.

"Well, next stop then. You spent most of your money so how about we run a mission or two?"

Kirito hummed.

"I would like to apply for the next tournament as soon as possible. Is there a quick way to make some money in this game?"

Shiro grimaced.

"There is gambling. There's a casino in this shopping center, so let's take a look over there. I haven't been in because I'm nervous of being swept into an addiction. But you make a good point. We're not here to play the game. We're here to search for the criminal."

She nodded, and sat on the front part of the motorcycle seat. Shiro marked her map and she got the notification that they were walking distance. She stood up and rubbed her cheeks to try and remove the blush from the embarrassment she felt jumping right back to driving.

"Sorry about not just saying how close we were. Let's go."

He didn't drag out the embarrassment, just moving to lead the way so Kirito could walk it off quickly. There weren't very many people outside. There was plenty of sound coming from inside of the surrounding buildings, so it stood to reason that the people who were online were doing their business, enjoying a break in between missions or planning their next mission.

It took them a minute of walking before Shiro stepped through the noisiest doorway. The sounds of a casino rang out into the street when he opened the door. The very stimulating, loud noises, victorious or mocking sounds, the flashing lights brightened the street in front of the door through the smoke and she was also nervous of entering. But, she needed to make some in game money for the application to the tournament.

When she stepped inside, she was surrounded with blinding levels of brightness and vibrant colours. She blinked until her eyes adjusted and continued in until she met up with Shiro in a space where there weren't any other people standing. There were people at all kinds of gambling machines, but there were some machines and stations which were rather bare.

"Adjusted?"

She nodded to Shiro and he continued to lead.

"I'd rather not put us up to a game of chance. Let's put you up to a game of skill."

She nodded, mentally preparing herself for whatever casino game she was going up against. There was a veritable wall of skill based games in the ground level of the casino she was led to. There were fewer people interacting with those games than the typical casino machine games. She observed as they drew closer and she noticed that some of the games required you use a weapon provided by the game, some were dodging games and the majority had some sort of aim based focus. There was a quick draw game which Shiro stopped in front of because it was in the middle of the skill based games wall and because it had the highest payout.

"Hmm, which one do you think I should try first?"

She directed the question to him, hoping he would choose for her. She had confidence she could do any of them well.

"Hmm, let's watch these guys attempt this one with the highest payout."

She nodded and watched as a group of several men walk up to it. A very confident man stepped up in front of them hyping himself up.

"It's about time for someone to defeat this game. Watch as the craziest dodger goes up against the undefeated casino game!"

She sighed and watched in silence to figure out what the game ran like. The guy tapped his hand against the payment module and walked up to the starting line. He got into a position to sprint. She became more and more attentive as the timer reached lower to zero. The moment it became a zero, the man took off at an impressive speed. The sprint wasn't perfect, but it had good form for his body type. There was a cowboy type of machine at the other end of the game who had just drawn the revolver on his hip. He took less than a second to aim and fire. On the other hand, the man taking the challenge had gotten into a dodging position ahead of time. She recalled in that moment that were was an aiming system which allowed players to see where another player's aim was going, and it also worked for monsters. Unless they were masking themselves, their shots would have a telegraph.

If the machine progressively got faster as he approached and there wasn't a pattern to the shots, then it was very understandable how it would be difficult for people to be able to win. It was entirely possible the skilled enough people to defeat the challenge just weren't the gambling type and hadn't been to the casino. That or incredibly talented people had put a lot of effort into it and it was just that difficult.

The game having a reputation for being undefeated was tempting enough to challenge it, and then there was the curiosity she had on just how difficult it could be. She continued paying attention as the current challenger got closer and closer. The machine bad talked him the whole way through and then the spectators who arrived with the challenger spoke up, mentioning he had reached the hard part.

The machine delivered a sharp line about how it was impossible to progress further and the challenger went into a full sprint full of weak points. She knew immediately that he wouldn't make it from the trajectory of the gun. The very next shot tagged him and he was thrown far out from the game.

"Graaaaah! I was so close too!"

Kirito was baffled he said it. He only ended up getting half way through the long field and then he was expelled swiftly. She understood what the game was like though, and had confidence that she could get much further if not defeat it. She didn't know how much of a risk it was to her current funds however.

She walked up as the other group were about to walk off, their representative defeated likely for another of many tries. That was the impression she had. As soon as she got up close to the game's start point, she noticed the cost for entry was the last of her funds. With a sigh, she tapped her hand to the console and readied herself for her attempt at the challenge. As soon as the gate opened for her, she took off without hesitation. She closed distance far faster than the previous challenger, and as soon as she saw the prediction lines, she adjusted her movement only slightly as soon as the shooter moved to fire. She only barely needed to move, and she continued forward as if she hadn't been fired at at all.

She reached the point where the previous challenger was defeated, having skipped a phase of firing. The second volley of bullets had a similar start, but also had a second volley of prediction lines which showed up. She lowered herself down a little, preparing to jump over the second volley while the first volley would fly over her head. She easily dodged all of the bullets without issue. Suddenly she heard cheering when she landed from the leap.

"Someone's passed the record point! And they're moving so fast!"

"That girl must be a gymnast. No way she makes it to the end!"

The previous challenger made the second remark. He was probably trying to cover for his failure, but he also couldn't take more of a hit to his confidence so soon. She smiled as she continued forward. She wondered what kind of expression that confident person would make when she would clear it. Her mind immediately cleared after settling on her competitive spirit. She focused entirely on the movements of her opponent and the prediction lines ended up meaning nothing. The prediction lines didn't last long enough to make use of them, so she was left to her instincts and watching the movement. She ducked, swerved, and barely moved as needed and in the thirty seconds from her starting to the moment she placed a hand on the machine's head, having gotten past him, she had been in top form for the most part.

"Sh-she beat it! She actually beat it! Nobody's beat it before!"

An exaggerated response from the previous challenger, and a very over the top animation from the challenge's main machine, giant golden coins rained from above her. She dodged them just in case they might do damage.

"Aaah...no point in trying that one again until the reward racks up again. How the heck is a superhuman like that even possible?"

The other group celebrated for her but the dulled reaction of the previous challenger to her soured the mood and they all walked off.

"Heh, I knew you would be able to do it. How did you react so fast toward the end though? Prediction lines aren't able to help when you get so close."

She shrugged.

"I followed the movements of the machine with my eyes. That's more reliable than the prediction lines."

He shook his head and sighed. He knew she was highly physically skilled, but it was beyond him how she responded so quickly to gun combat. He had a feeling his worth in the tournament would be very little to her.

"Well, now you're even wealthier than me, have equipment which is probably best suited to you alone, and you're getting used to the game faster than I could in two weeks. I guess we'll go register for the next tournament then. Here, I'll mark it on your map."

Shiro was a little disappointed. He was hoping he could help her more, but give her a little time and resources and she could quickly become overpowered. He knew what she was like.

They swiftly left, moving on to the capitol building, the center of the world of GGO.