Hana stared up at her ceiling, idle. In an hour, the game she'd been longing to play would go live. This would normally make her excited, but this one was special…
This one was fully immersive. She was told it would feel like she was really there- really, truly, with other people!
A holographic window suddenly appeared in front of Hana's face, snapping her out of her thoughts.
Her dad was calling.
Hana pressed the "accept call" button, and her father's voice filled the empty silence.
"Hey honey! I just wanted to tell you, I'm not going to be able to leave work for another hour or so."
Hana's face fell. The game went live in 15 minutes. He wasn't going to be home for the launch…
"But you said we'd dive in together! It's been ages since we spent time together—!"
Her father didn't answer for a moment. When he did, there was a nervous edge to his voice. "I- I know. Can't you wait, just until I get home?"
"But I want to see the launch!"
"Hana, come on- I really don't want you logging in alon-"
Hana pressed the end call button, huffing as the window disintegrated.
"Whatever- I can go in alone, I'm not a baby."
Hana swiped two fingers up in front of her. A holographic window appeared in front of her. For the most part, this is how she controlled her room. From here she could summon her PC, (a computer inside a computer. Hana found that incredibly amusing.) change the scenery outside her windows, and text her family.
However, there was a new option. "Play Games"
Under that option, there was only one choice: Sword Art Online.
Hana looked to her bedside table- checking the time on her clock.
1:00. The servers were live.
Hana squeezed her eyes shut, pressing the button.
When she opened them, she was in a small, circular room. The walls were a deep blue, an ever changing mass of green binary text scrolling from top to bottom.
In front of her was yet another holographic window, with nothing on it expect for the text "Base Playermodel not found. Scanning the device for backup…" and an "ok" button on the bottom.
Hana pressed it, unsure why there was already an error for a moment. Until it hit her, of course.
"Oh, I'm not using an actual nervegear, I'm using a third party system. Everyone from the closed beta said the nervegear had data of your real body that you built your playermodel off of…"
"I hope this is the only error I run into."
Hana pressed "ok", and in front of her was… herself.
It was how she looked in her bedroom, pink hair, eyes, and all.
Hana laughed a bit. It was pretty funny to her that the system thought this was her real body.
She decided to skip the character creation, going with the "default"- which was really just what she wanted anyway.
Hana choose her class quickly- there were a few options for her starting weapon- One handed sword, rapier, dagger, axe, spear, and scythe. But Hana had had her sights on the standard one handed sword for a while, and her mind wouldn't be changed now.
The next window was to put in her username- Hana paused for a second. She was told not to use her real name in games like this- but she couldn't think of a cool username.
Maybe something flower themed? Hana did like flowers a lot. Maybe a pink flower?
She figured a pink flower would make the most sense, considering how she looked…
Roses could be pink, couldn't they?
Quickly, Hana typed in her username- Rose. She figured it would be fitting. They looked pretty and delicate, but their thorns could hurt anyone who touched them wrong.
She pressed submit, and her surroundings changed once again.
Now she was in a large, circular plaza. Buildings surrounded it, and there was a large stone structure in the middle, to the left of where she'd spawned in. Rose recognized it as the teleport gate she'd seen from the trailer.
Her clothes had changed too- she was now in a long sleeved pink shirt, a white skirt, brown boots and a small metal chest plate.
In addition, there was the starting blade at her hip. Rose couldn't help but feel a little giddy as her hand grasped the handle. She wanted to get out of town and to an area with monsters as soon as possible.
Glancing to the right, Rose saw the exit of town, and taking a quick look behind her revealed the shopping district. A quick swipe up with her fingers showed her inventory- and that told her the painful truth that she didn't have any starting money at all.
"Stingy, aren't you, Mr. Kayaba…"
Well, Rose knew how to fix that problem! She would just have to go kill some monsters, no biggie.
Walking towards the gate leading to the plains, Rose noticed a girl dressed in a long, brown dress. She was standing there, looking rather concerned. Rose almost thought it was a player, until she noticed that they didn't have a green marker above their head.
Approaching, she couldn't help but notice that the NPC was incredibly reactive, almost waving her over before speaking.
"Traveler- oh, thank goodness! I was going to head into the plains to pick flowers, but there's just so many Nepents! Can you clear some out for me? I'll reward you, of course!"
Rose's face fell slightly.
"What a typical starting quest… I was hoping for a bit of creativity…"
Since there wasn't a list of dialogue options to choose from, Rose assumed that she could simply talk to this AI like they were a normal person. This was pretty curious to her, so Rose decided to test the limits a bit.
"Oh? What kind of reward?"
The woman didn't skip a bit- this AI didn't need any time to register what she was saying at all!
"100 Cor! Quite a bit for a new traveler such as yourself?"
Rose pressed her lips together for a second. For starting money, that wasn't as much as she'd like. Maybe she could somehow raise the reward prices up?
"Only 100? Miss, you insult me!" Rose feigned offense, raising her tone to something a bit more pompous. "I am Rose, the great Sakura Knight! 100 Cor for my services is an insult!"
The NPC's brow furrowed at Rose's display.
"Great Sakura Knight? Child, I have seen a hundred travelers in your exact outfit today. Don't pretend to be something you aren't, you egotistical brat. You know what- just for that, I'll only offer you 75 Cor. Take it or get out of my sight."
"Seriously—? She didn't even have to think about that, she just straight up denied me! Did I fail a speech check or something?"
Rose dropped the attitude. "I'll… do what you ask, ma'am. Thank you."
A window appeared in front of Rose again.
"New quest! Monsters Of The Field"
Sigh. She should have kept her mouth shut.
Behind her, Rose heard the sound of laughter. Turning around, she saw a girl with bright purple hair, tied into short pigtails, and green eyes. She was wearing the same starting gear as Rose, although the shirt was blue, instead of her pink.
She had a bow at her side, and was looking at Rose with an amused smile on her face.
"I haven't seen anyone fuck that up before."
Rose pressed her lips together, embarrassed at her display.
"Well, you know, I was just trying to get extra money-"
The girl put her hand out, interrupting her. "You failed when you walked up silently. I remember this from the beta, watch."
The girl approached the woman, her face changing to reflect the concern on the NPC's face.
"Ma'am, are you well? You look distressed."
The woman perked up, instantly more friendly with this player then she was with Rose.
"Oh, traveler! It's the fields. They're infested with Nepents. I was going to pick some flowers for my husband- he's fallen ill, you see, and I can help him if I gather these flowers and add them to a stew. I'll give you 200 Cor if you help me."
"I'll do it."
The girl accepted the quest, walking back to Rose with a smirk.
"That's how you do it! Just roleplay a bit better and you'll get it."
Rose was embarrassed. She just had to act nice? Guess that made sense…
She looked up at the other player's marker- it was green, like everyone else's- and below it was her name.
"Kya…"
"Thank you for showing me, Kya."
Kya nodded, looking towards the plains. "Well, we should be going then. Wouldn't wanna let this lady's husband get sicker, would we?"
"I guess so. I don't wanna waste any time- My dad is logging on later and I want to be as leveled as possible by then!"
The purple haired archer started walking towards the gate, motioning for Rose to follow. Rose did so, and soon the two had broken into a run.
Rose immediately noticed the feeling of wind against her face, and the sense of breathing in fresh air. The grass swayed in the breeze, and in the distance she saw floating islands, waterfalls falling from them and into the horizon, as small rainbows sprung from where the light hit those streams of water.
It was… breathtaking.
"Hey, Pinkie, look sharp- we got a monster at 12 o'clock!"
The monster in question appeared to be a living plant- a large yellow bulb with a mouth full of teeth and two thin, long vines.
It seemed to walk around on a mass of smaller, thicker vines. It looked… horrific.
Kya pulled out her bow, drawing it as an arrow automatically appeared, ready to be fired. She jumped to the side and began to shoot at the monster, constantly moving back and forth to avoid it's attacks.
"Hey- come on and help me here!"
Rose drew her sword, holding it in her right hand as she charged forward, jumping on top of the monster and driving her sword into its body. Rose laughed at how easy it was to stab such a thing, and kept her sword wedged inside it, crouched on top of the monster and waiting for it to die. Surely it would only take a moment.
The monster didn't die, though, and it's vines whipped at Rose, throwing her off. She landed a few feet away, but kept a tight grip on her sword.
Kya laughed, charging towards the monster and shooting it head on, which finally killed it.
Once it was dead, she doubled over, still laughing.
"Oh my god! You really did that!"
Rose sat up, huffing. "I thought it would work! They're low levels!"
Kya stood up, regaining her composure. "So are you. A stunt like that will only work if you have a bit more level. Good spirit though."
Standing up, Rose looked around for another monster. She noticed one a little further into the fields.
"Well, we need to kill 3. There's another over there."
Kya looked over, immediately charging towards the monster- not even waiting up for Rose.
This went on for a while, with the two eventually forgetting about their quest entirely. After a while, they laid on the grass, staring at the metal ceiling floating about them.
Raising her hand up, Rose reached towards the ceiling, smiling.
"That's floor 2, isn't it? What do you think is up there?"
"...Cows. Lots of cows."
She turned her head towards Kya, wide eyed. "You've been there?! How?"
"I was a beta tester, remember? We managed to get to floor 45 or so before the beta ended."
Rose smiled a bit. "Wow- you guys must have been trying to clear the floors before the game even came out."
The archer nodded, swiping her fingers in the air to open her menu.
"Oh, damn, it's already five o'clock. I should log off and eat." Kya mumbled, moving her finger over to log out, when she paused, silent for a moment.
"Five o'clock already? Dad should have been here by now…" Rose thought, pressing her lips together as she looked at Kya. "Hey, what's wrong?"
"...Check your menu real quick. Is your… log out button grayed out?"
Grayed out? Why would the button to log out not be usable? Rose opened her own menu, eyes nervously drifting over to the offending option in question. Sure enough, it was completely unusable. No matter how many times she pressed it, nothing happened.
"It wasn't like that a few hours ago. It's probably a bug." Rose muttered, sitting up and staring at her menu, confused. "I'm sure they'll patch it in a second."
Kya shook her head, closing her own window and sitting up. "What bug have you seen like this? This is intended- it has to be."
"Well what game have you seen like this? It's probably something to do with how this game is run…"
The other player shook her head. Despite what she was suggesting, Rose hardly sensed any panic. "No, if that was the case I would have seen it in the beta."
"You're suggesting someone has intentionally trapped us in here?! Do you have any idea how crazy that is?"
"Relax. It's… probably a joke. This isn't exactly an uncommon trope…" Kya muttered, only really saying that to calm the other's nerves.
Rose fell silent. Kya sighed, closing her menu and standing up, detecting Rose's panic. "We should get back to town. See if anyone else is having this issue."
Rose nodded, standing up as well. "My dad should have logged on by now. I need to meet up with him anyway. He helped with the nervegear, too- I'm sure he has an answer!"
"Yeah, I'd like some answers alright. I'm starving, and I can't even go eat something." Kya mumbled, voice laced with annoyance.
Suddenly, the sky was covered in strange, red tiles- with one word written on them, "Error"
Rose looked up, wide eyed. "What's going on?!"
"I think it's an error message-"
"No shit!"
Suddenly, there was a brief flash, and Rose was standing in the Town of Beginnings plaza again. On top of the teleport gate was a figure, which looked incredibly similar to the grim reaper. He wasted no time in speaking.
"Greetings, dearest players. I am Akihiko Kayaba. I am this world's game master."
Rose flinched, trembling at the booming voice. From what she knew about the man, Kayaba was very soft spoken. This voice was booming, menacing.
"Most of you have noticed by now that the logout button is no longer useable."
Oh, thank god. Despite the large figure looming over her, and the reddened sky, Rose's anxieties calmed. This was probably just Kayaba's quirky way of addressing the bug.
"This is intended." He continued.
"Fuck."
"None of you will be able to voluntarily exit until you reach floor 100, and defeat the boss."
"Defeat the boss..? This is a god damn MMO! You can't beat an MMO in a few hours- how long are we gonna be stuck here…"
"In addition to this, being separated from the Nervegear device will result in your brain being fried with an electric shock, killing you."
"Is that possible with my machine…? I'm not using the standard nervegear- so what would happen to me?"
"Just so you know, 213 players have already perished, because their families did not heed our warnings."
"Warnings?! This bitch put out a fucking press release?! The hell did he say? "Oh by the way, the game your kid bought earlier? It's a death trap. Don't try to save em, they'll die! Love, Kayaba."?!"
Rose's breath quickened. This wasn't real- this couldn't be happening… maybe she just fell asleep in the grass. That could be it…
"All of your real world bodies will likely be transported to hospitals and care facilities with your Nervegear intact to receive care."
"But, I must ask you act cautiously, because this game is now your only reality. If your health drops to zero, the Nervegear will send a high voltage shock to your brain, enough to kill you instantly."
"I… I can't do this. I can't do this-"
"To further blur the lines between your new reality and the old one, I have placed a mirror in everyone's inventory."
Rose swiped her fingers upwords, opening her inventory. There was a new item- a hand mirror. She selected it, and it spawned in her hand.
It was just a normal mirror. What was the point of this?
She soon figured out when she noticed a chorus of gasps and screams. Everyone's avatars were changing…
"Are you surprised to see your real face staring back at you? I'm sure you are. You see, Sword Art Online-"
Rose fell to the ground, covering her ears. She didn't want to hear anymore- she couldn't hear any more. It was too much, it was far too much. Whatever this monster was saying, she couldn't bare to hear it at all.
"I didn't change. My appearance didn't change… because I'm already using my "real body"..."
"Everyone else- these are real people now. I'm not looking at avatars anymore."
"Someone get me out of here! Death would be better then this!"
Rose wasn't sure how long she was on the ground, but she did know there was a flurry of panic and shock as the "Game Master" disappeared.
"Ok. Come on, Rose."
Rose looked up, seeing an archer standing in front of her, blocking the evening sun from blinding her.
The girl in front of her had orange hair and blue eyes. There was a small smile on her face, somehow confident and friendly. Rose recognized her as the girl she was playing with earlier.
"How are you so calm..? This is horrible! 213 people have already died!"
Kya nodded, strangely calm. "I know. There's probably going to be others, too."
"Well then how many more are going to die before someone hacks in and saves us?!"
"No one's coming. You heard him, we have to reach floor 100."
Shaking, Rose curled up again, beginning to sob. The air seemed to wear a thousand pounds, and she felt as though she was dying just from the panic of it all.
Kya's strange attitude wasn't helping, either. She didn't seem particularly panicked, as if she'd already accepted the reality of the situation.
"We may never see our parents again!"
"It is what it is."
"What about your friends- you have real life friends, don't you?!"
"Nah."
Rose sat up a bit, desperate and annoyed at the other's demeanor.
"Your real body is going to need food- your muscles are gonna go to shit, you know that?!"
"Yep. That's what happens."
Rose stood up, finally having had enough. She shoved Kya with all her strength. "Asshole!"
Kya stumbled back a bit, but her expression hardly changed.
"...Rose. Look, I'm sorry I seem cold. But we can't panic. The time we spend panicking can be used to get to our goal."
Kya offered her hand. Her voice was sincere. "I don't want to play solo. And like… I think you're cool. You aren't an ass like some other people I've run into. You've got a fight to you. So… party up with me. We'll watch each other's backs."
Rose stared at Kya's hand for a moment.
"I'm not going to be able to handle myself alone right now. I know that much- I've never been on my own before… But she's so strange. I don't think she even cares that she's trapped here."
"Maybe that'll be good for me."
Rose took Kya's hand. "What's your plan?"
"Tonight? We're going to redeem our Cor from the NPC, and then we'll combine our money to get a hot meal and a room at the inn."
That was a decent plan, at least for tonight. Rose's stomach felt empty, which probably made her panic worse.
"You… you lead the way."
And Kya did just that, leading Rose through the town and they collected their money, using it to buy two loaves of bread and a stick of butter from a nearby merchant.
While on their way to the inn, where most people had gathered by now, Kya stopped at a set of stairs. Rose was confused as she sat down.
"It's going to be crowded there right now. Let's eat here and wait for people to clear out."
Rose sat next to Kya, silent. Her shaking and crying had stopped, but she still felt paralyzed.
Kya gave her a side glance, opening her menu and selecting the loaves of bread, holding out her hands as they materialized. Rose didn't react until she placed one of the loaves on her lap.
"Butter?" Kya asked.
Rose nodded, watching Kya grab the butter from her inventory and hold it out in front of Rose.
"Hover your finger over it. Your finger should start glowing blue. Once it does that, drag your finger across the bread until it's buttered the way you want- just try to leave some for me."
Rose did so, a bit mesmerized at the action. It was weird, but it wasn't too far off from how she'd butter bread back home.
After a moment, Rose put down her finger, grabbing the loaf and taking a bite. It tasted real- and kind of good, as well. Maybe it was because she was hungry, or maybe it was just that bread on butter was so normal it almost made this situation feel normal.
The two ate in silence for a moment, the setting sun changing to a pale, full moon. Fireflies dotted the area.
Kya finally spoke. "...congratulations, Rose. You've survived your first day in Aincrad."
"Yeah… you did too. Good job, I guess?"
Kya shook her head. "I didn't survive my first day- I lived it."
"What's the difference?"
Standing up, the archer wiped her mouth. "I didn't feel fearful all day today. I made the most of it."
Rose was quiet. She didn't understand how Kya didn't feel fear- or her logic. The only explanation she could think of was that the other was suppressing her feelings.
"You're allowed to grieve, you know? That doesn't make the day a waste or anything."
Kya was quiet, turning away from Rose as she started walking to the inn. "Maybe…"
"Come on, let's get a room. We have enough Cor for the night."
Rose stood up, and awkwardly followed Kya as she paid for their room and walked to it.
When Kya opened the room door, Rose's face fell. There was only one bed? Seriously..?
"Hey, why did you get a single bed room…?"
"This is the only type of room available. We spent 150 on loaves, and we spent 10 on butter. All together we had 275 Cor, and rooms were 50 Cor each for a night. This saves money. I'll sleep on the floor."
Rose watched Kya unequip the steel chestplate and boots she had been wearing. Rose did the same, hoping the clothes would be a little bit more comfortable without the steel plate.
"Toss me a pillow, Rose."
Rose grabbed a pillow from the bed and threw it at Kya. It hit her square in the face.
"ack- dude, what the fuck? I didn't mean literally…"
Rose couldn't help but chuckle. It was pretty funny seeing Kya's face so shocked.
"You know, I've never had a sleepover before…" Rose began, grabbing another pillow.
"So I've never had a pillow fight."
Kya's eyes widened, but soon there was a small smirk on her face as she held her own pillow in a defensive position.
"Well then I'd be honored to be your first opponent, Oh great Sakura Knight."
Rose laughed a bit, charging towards Kya. This little moment didn't fix her anxiety and fear, but it helped a little bit.
If there could be happy moments like these, then maybe, just maybe, Rose could pull through.