Chapter 1

Humming along to her music, Skye finished stocking her shelves, planting various items on pedestals and tables before taking a step back, sweeping her gaze over her shop to ensure everything was placed correctly.

With that done, she ran up to the doors, throwing them open as the game informed her of the start of a new day. Customers began spawning in the gates to her little shop-town and walking through in their pre-determined paths, some heading into her shop when they saw her wares. They always knew exactly where the item they wanted was, which added a level of mechanical accuracy that was a bit of a shame, but it was still satisfying seeing an NPC walk up to an expensive piece of kit and purchase it, even if it wasn't that much at the end of the day.

She spent the next fifteen minutes running around her shop, sweeping the floors, restocking the items as they were bought and occasionally dusting up a skeleton that tried to steal from her and paid the harsh price. Hey, if they wanted to try to steal things from her, they were prepared to die. After all, what kind of idiot tried to steal a health potion, they were literally cheaper than anything else in the entire game! At the very least they could try to steal something more expensive.

As the doors closed and the remaining NPCs who hadn't run off the map disappeared, she began wandering the shop dusting the dirt away and repairing the damage her placed tables, shelves and other furniture had taken. With a sigh she saved and closed the game, leaning back on her chair and cracking her arms. As she moved to get up from her chair her phone rang, prompting her to stay sat down as she flicked the case open and answered the call from her roommate. "Yeah?"

"Heya Skye. So you know that new Nervegear that got delivered today?" Skye hummed, having been the one to receive it since her roommate was at work. "Well the servers are all meant to go online in like 20 minutes and I'm not gonna be around for another few hours, so I figured if you wanted to you could have a go at it. It's like those VR headsets but like...way more immersive, since it's like you're dreaming or something."

Skye frowned. "You sure boo? I know you were super excited about this thing? Surely you'd want the chance to play it first?" Her roommate and friend made a noise, and they spent the next ten minutes somehow going from that to how dreams worked, before finally her friend noticed the time and told her that she should get that stuff set up if she wanted to get in early and have a mess about. "Okay, well thanks boo, I'll definitely make it up to ya. Later."

Tapping her phone, she flicked the case closed again and ran her thumb across it. She had to admit that the Nervegear kinda excited her, it would be like dreaming, except instead of the weirdness of dreams it was a rigid game with rules and limits, as well as no risk of being a nightmare of course. She kicked her chair back and got up, heading out into the hall where she'd put the box. She sat back down again cross-legged beside the box and opened it up, taking an extreme amount of care in removing the components.

There was the headset, wired ethernet cable and charging cable. She turned her attention to the user manual, quickly flicking through it and then taking all the stuff to her room, pushing her keyboard to the side and planting the stuff down atop her desk. Plugging the headset into power and one of her ethernet connection sockets, she flipped through the manual again to make sure she wasn't missing anything critical, then after folding her hair back to keep it out of her face she put the headset on, fastening the clasp under her chin and watching as a mostly-transparent visor came down over her eyes.

Rocking her head about, she frowned a little at the weightiness of the headset. Most of the VR stuff she'd tried on had been a lot lighter than this, but maybe it was just a limitation of the technology. The earliest VR stuff was definitely really heavy as well. Her phone then buzzed, making her flip it open and see that her roommate had texted her the account and password she'd need to use the headset.

With a smile she quickly text her back then closed the phone again, spotting in the corner of the visor that it was only one minute to one o'clock, which was when the Nervegear was supposed to become available, so she quickly shifted over to her bed, laying down and closing her eyes with a sigh. It was...a little nerve-racking being a part of something so major. Full-dive technology, and it was real. The potential was absolutely insane, even if right now it was just being used for video games.

As the clock ticked over to 13:00PM she opened her lips and spoke. "Link...start." Immediately her vision was assaulted by white, coloured lights streaming past her head. Next, large blue balls appeared, saying that touch, sight, hearing, taste and smell were all okay, presumably locking her real senses away and aligning them with virtual senses instead. Next was language, and she selected English.

Sure, she was living in Japan, but English was ner native language and she wanted to see just how insanely good the translation software would be. She then saw the Log_in screen, filling in the account and password then selecting her friends account. Hopefully there wouldn't be some kind of discrepancy, that would be a bit of a let-down, not that she'd mind all too much, she could always get her own Nervegear later.

But no, the headset accepted her, welcoming her to SAO and filling her vision with blue this time, dropping her straight into a character creation menu. Stood in front of her was herself, a perfect recreation of her entire body, and rather embarrassingly she was only clad in underwear. She honestly didn't care too much if people saw her, so all she did was mess around with her hair a little, changing it from the dyed pink it currently was into a blood-red, making it a bit shorter.

As she was about to confirm her changes, she then decided to change the iris of her left eye to red as well as the right to pink, just because she could and it looked nice. After all, wasn't that the point of a character creator, to make a character you like the look of? With that done, she gave her character, which was basically just her with minor changes, a once over before frowning and clicking at a few of the menus, eventually finding what she was looking for.

Clothing! Most RPG games let her customize the starting clothing of her character, and it'd be mortifying if she hadn't noticed this menu and appeared in her underwear in the game. She tapped at a few of the options, letting herself get stuck there for a while looking at the various options before picking some regular fabric gear. She selected the finished button, and the menu popped up, telling her that her gear was not as protective as it could be, and that if she continued, the game would reimburse her for 250 Cor. She had no idea if that was good or bad, so she went back and added a leather vest, making it bigger until the game told her she hit her defensive limit.

As she confirmed her choices, white overtook her vision. After a few moments it faded out, leaving her staring at the ringed walls of a stone plaza. She turned her gaze upward, taking note of the insane detail just the walls had, the spires of the large domed building ahead of the plaza reaching up for dozens of stories. Hearing whooshing sounds she turned around to see more blue flashes, people spawning in and taking in their surroundings. She could see a few who simply seemed excited, but not in awe, probably the people who had played before.

Nobody was wearing regular clothing though, they all had the same medieval-style of gear that she had picked from, in all shapes, sizes and colours. Some seemed to mostly lack protection, so presumably they started off with less cash, but the vast majority had opted for protection over extra cash starting off, which made sense to her. Unless you could buy better gear than the starting kit with the money saved, something she sincerely doubted, it would be best to be protected and be able to stay out longer farming mobs for money.

Swiping her hand down, she opened her menu, then her inventory, looking at the stats for her items, as well as what she had. There was a sword sheathed at her hip which she drew and waved about a bit, sheathing it surprisingly easily before chalking that up to the game having assist functions. Her clothes had a quality rating, health and mana rating as well as a few others, fairly generic for a game. She spawned with 100 Cor, a common health potion, a recall crystal and that was it. No repair kits, which she could already see would be necessary since all of her armour had their own durability stats and so did her sword.

Spotting someone who looked like he knew what he was doing she followed along behind them, watching them go up to an NPC and sell their health potion for a hundred Cor, then purchased a short sword before marching off down the street. Presumably that person was going to use their weapons until it broke, then switch out and keep going until that one was nearly broken before returning to town? She headed up to the vendor, being greeted by the friendly man with a single sentence.

Before she could reply the trading menu appeared, listing the items available to buy as well as showing her own inventory. Rubbing her neck, she stared hard at her potion, then at the sword. It cost 150 Cor, so she had to sell her potion if she wanted it...except did she? She had her armour, and the vest she was using was a separate item, worth a full 200 Cor on its own. But the guy that left hadn't sold his own armour, so maybe it was a bad idea?

Tipping the idea around in her head a bit, she eventually shrugged and sold it. If it was a bad choice then she'd just have to make do. She looked at the weapon list, eventually settling on buying a short sword of her own and leaving herself with a spare 150 Cor. She replaced her regular sword with it, drawing the new sword out and testing it by waving it about a bit. It definitely felt better in her hand, faster and easier to wield compared to the larger blade, probably because of a lower strength requirement or something.

She sheathed the blade and then turned her attention to the direction her quarry had run off in, jogging in that direction and quickly realizing two things. First, the guy she decided to follow had probably left the starter town since the road led straight to a big gate with grassy fields outside. Secondly, she was actually able to run for a bit longer than normal.

Skye wasn't a fitness freak or anything, but she did go for jogs every few days and stayed in shape, so she knew her limits, and she was definitely not being nearly as strained right now. Coming to a stop at the gate, she caught her breath as she looked out at the grass, spotting a few boars wandering and occasionally nibbling at the grass. There, she could also see the guy she'd been following.

If it wasn't already obvious that he was experienced, he made it clear now, as he flung a rock at the nearest boar, pulling its aggro and then sidestepping the charge, slicing at it with his blade, then resetting himself as the boar spun around and charged again, the obvious attack pattern being avoided with ease as he slashed and killed the boar. As soon as the beast was dead he moved on, pulling the aggro of another boar with another rock and repeating his actions.

Watching him for a few minutes, she shook her head and took her own steps out of the town, her eyes on the floor as she spotted a rock appear on the ground, probably one the guy had already thrown. She picked it up and tossed it in her hand a few times, eyeing the nearest docile boar. Rearing her arm back she tossed the small stone at the creature, succeeding in missing completely.

Frowning, she picked up another stone and tried again, this time smacking the boar in the face. Immediately she saw the gleam in its red eyes as she became its focus, immediately charging at her. A little bit panicked she drew her sword, waiting until the boar was close before sidestepping and then just in case taking a second step. She was glad she did, since she had moved too early and the boar would have hit her.

As it passed her by she struck, her sword slicing the flank of the beast as it passed her. Immediately whirling around she re-acquired the boar, rocking on her feet as it snorted and came charging straight back. This time she waited a moment longer and then sidestepped, leaving the boar no time to change its path as she slashed it again. It took another two passes before the boar died, to which she gave herself a mental pat on the back as she grabbed the loot, a single boar hide and exactly thirty Cor. Evidently the drop rate for items was a bit funky, that boar should really have dropped some meat but there was always a chance that loot wouldn't drop in an RPG game, this probably being no exception.

More confidently now she grabbed another rock, taking her time to aim before throwing it at a boar and then began sidestepping it, mimicking the guy she had followed as she slashed at the boar until dead, this time getting hide and meat as well. The next boar gave her meat and teeth with the same thirty Cor, and then it was just hide again. She spent maybe a half-hour out there killing boars, levelling up a few times and occasionally glancing over at the guy she'd followed, wanting to approach him but also wary since he might have been annoyed that she had so blatantly copied him.

Surprisingly enough, nobody else came to their area, maybe they'd all gone elsewhere? She supposed most of the 'noobs' would have been caught up wandering the town, and anyone like this guy would have gone wherever they thought was best to level up, wanting to get an edge on the other players. But if that was the case, then maybe the people who had already played maybe all had their own little spots? She doubted that the regular players would take much longer to get out here though.

The sound of a smashing crystal drew her attention in time to watch the guy smoothly avoid another charge, changing his now-broken sword for a short-sword and swiping the boar, killing it. Seeing this as her chance, she decided to wander over. "Hey." She called as she got close, the guy eyeing her carefully. "So uhh...want to trade? I kinda prefer short-swords and haven't used the one we spawn with."

She watched the guy turn her words over a few times before shrugging. "Sure, it's your loss. You know the short-sword does less damage, right?" It was her turn to shrug, swiping her fingers downwards and opening a trade menu with him, placing her unused sword into the menu and waiting until he put the short-sword in before then accepting the trade. "Thanks."

Without another word he equipped the sword, a rock appearing in his hand which he immediately tossed at another boar. Skye watched him fight the boar, sighing as she realized why he seemed to be able to go through mobs so quickly, he probably had a bunch of those rocks in his inventory already. She spent a few minutes quickly looking around for rocks on the floor, picking them up and placing them in a stack in her inventory.

Interestingly enough she was able to equip them in her offhand, and as she watched the guy he killed a boar then flicked his hand in a weird way to which another rock appeared. She mimicked his action, feeling the weight of a rock appearing in her grasp. Smiling, she made a note to thank him for inadvertently helping her, going back to her actions. Before long, she heard another sound of a weapon breaking, looking over and watching as the guy dusted his hands. he probably had counted how many attacks his sword had left since if he was left with a boar chasing him he'd have to make a run back to safety or ask her for help, and his curtness led her to believe he'd probably fight the boar bare-handed than do that.

Skye killed the boar she was hunting, then jogged over to him, attracting his wary attention. "I wanted to say thanks for...y'know, helping me. Well, not that you really meant to, you were probably just doing what was best for you, but I would probably still be wandering around town if I wasn't following ya. Not that I was doing it in...sorry." She rubbed the back of her neck, keeping her distance from him as she decided to head back to town as well. "One question, do short-swords have more durability than regular swords?"

The guy sighed. "Yes, but the way the maths works out means that a regular sword is able to do more damage than a short-sword for the cost and the durability. A short-sword is less efficient, but the time it takes to head back to the trader and then return could be better spent by sacrificing a potion to buy the less efficient short-sword and then returning to be able to buy four regular swords, starting a perpetuating loop of weapon value." Skye ahh'd at that, figuring he knew what he was doing, even if up-front she thought the short-sword was more efficient, since while her sword was close to doing so, it wasn't yet broken.

"So you spend less time killing boars, meaning you can kill more of them in less time, even if the durability means that the sword will break faster, especially with the rate at which you attack and kill boars." The guy gave her a look, to which she rubbed her neck again. "Sorry, bad habit." She followed up by mimicking a zip across her lips, remaining silent as they both headed back to town. This time the guy didn't go to the trader he had before. He took a few turns off the street, coming across a much closer trader.

She stayed back, watching him make his sales and purchases, then when he left after giving her a look she stepped up and sold her own gathered resources, but her finger froze over the button to buy another sword. Spinning on her heel she jogged over to the guy, attracting his attention with her boots as she ran up to him. "I had an idea. I'm not exactly great at this game yet, so how about this. While I do my own farming you're of course doing yours. When your swords are all broken we trade, I give you swords and Cor in exchange for the stuff you've gathered from killing boars, minus a slight bit of money for a commission. You sacrifice maybe 5% of your mob-killing income in return for saving a ton of time travelling back and forth buying stuff. Plus I'd still be earning my own money using my short-swords."

The guy stared at her a moment, before opening his inventory, seeming to do a few calculations in his head. "An extra stipulation. You will also take back broken swords and resell them to the trader. This money will be used to buy more swords, the price of which will be deducted from the Cor you give me in return for dropped materials. All around a reasonable and fair deal making us both extra money in a shorter period of time. I accept if you do." Grinning, she stuck her hand out, her lips widening when he returned the shake.

Her first step in making herself into a trading tycoon had begun! Admittedly, not the worlds most efficient deal, but it helped them both gain extra money since he could kill boars way more efficiently than she could. When he levelled up he would increase the gap even faster, and she would probably end up just waiting around rather than killing mobs, if he even needed her at that point.

Hopefully, by then she'd have figured out where the Auction House was so she could put her skills to work buying and selling resources to make a profit. Then she had a lightbulb moment. "Hey, do you know if there's an auction-house in town?" Her associate turned his head to raise an eyebrow at her, prompting her to explain. "I mean, I already told you I'm not super-good at this whole combat thing, but I love trading and making deals, so if I could get a start-up of cash, by say having a deal with someone obviously better at the game than me, I could then start using the market to make money. And hell, maybe in the future you'd be able to give your stuff to me to flip for even more profit than you'd get selling to an NPC."

He palmed his chin as he walked. "You raise a good point. NPC pricing always dips heavily for buying versus selling, leading many to buy from each other, either through direct trade or in the auction houses. When I hit either 25,000 Cor or Level 10 I shall tell you where the Auction House is. But if you attempt to get this information elsewhere, I will spread word that I do not trust you, and as a beta tester, I will likely have enough of a level of influence to make this idea of yours implausible." Skye shrugged.

"Hey, this deal works for me. We both earn more starting money, probably faster than any other player since we aren't partying up, I get to make money without endless grinding and you get to level up and get cash without even having to return to town. What time do you have to go off though?" The guy checked his menu, frowning to himself. "Is it soon?"

He shook his head. "No, I have free time. I was just going over this deal in my head. It takes approximately ten minutes to get from the boar-farming spot to the nearest trader and then ten to get back after a few minutes at most of buying and selling, so approximately 20 minutes total of not farming. I can remain out here for approximately two hours before all 5 of my allotted blades break, meaning 14% of my time is wasted. If you were to carry just my spare swords with you, I would be willing to have you take a 10% commission in return for only having a single short-sword to use."

Skye hummed at that. It would mean she would only have one sword to use, since SAO had a limit apparently of five swords in inventory, one equipped. She didn't know that, but it helped her so she didn't care that much. Besides, she wasn't that interested in combat and wasn't deluding herself too much to assume she'd be able to keep playing for long. It'd definitely surprise her roommate when she started playing. "Uhh...sure! Sounds good to me."

The guy nodded and started heading off whilst she jogged back over to the trader, purchasing five of the regular swords. They'd probably only get one cycle of farming off, two hours before her roommate was back, but it would be a proof of concept if nothing else...not that she'd really use it for long, it was mostly a way for her to get a bit of extra cash whilst farming mobs since she was going to be seeing if she could trade at the...Auction House.

Frowning, she turned and leaned her hands against the stall the trader was stood within, letting out a sigh. There was no way her associate reached either of his milestones in time to let her see if she could use the Auction House to make money. Oh well, at the very least she'd give her friend a good starting off point with extra cash and equipment. With that settled in her mind she jogged to catch up to the guy, quirking her head to the side. "So, you got a name, because I have to keep referring to you as 'the guy' if not. I'm Skye by the way, nice to meet you."

He snorted. "Just call me Kage." She raised an eyebrow at that, it was a pretty funky name, but she supposed it was his made-up name. She preferred being spoken to by her actual name, it made it easier in her opinion. But if he wanted to be called that, well it was a free world. Though it was quite interesting that the auto-translate had picked up on the fact that it was his name and thus didn't translate it to Shadow. They didn't speak more as they left the town, this time seeing a few other players wandering out of the town into the boar-farming area and starting to hunt them. "Tch, faster than expected."

And obviously Kage wasn't too happy his nice and empty farming spot was being used. But while it was a bit annoying, there were plenty of targets to go around. Before too long they settled into the same farming method she had seen him use before, their inventories steadily gaining more meat, hide, teeth and the occasional tusk, which was different to the teeth.

She kept an eye on the time, watching him more closely when twenty minutes went by and his sword ended up breaking. he didn't panic even as he was in the midst of fighting a boar, smoothing evading it and drawing a new sword with deft movements of his hand through the menus. He then kept on going, slaying the boar with his second slash then pulling another target.

Skye was being careful that she didn't break her own sword, only having replacements for Kage to use and none of her own blade. When she saw that the durability on her weapon was getting low she stopped attacking the boars with her blade. Instead, she waited until Kage had killed a boar then called out to him. "Hey Kage." His eyes snapped over to her, a rock already in his hand. "I'm going to go sell drops and buy myself another sword, I'll be back before you run out, alright?" He looked thoughtful for a moment then dismissed her with a hand, tossing the rock within it to the nearest boar.

A little irritated she turned and started heading back to the town, slipping through the gate past the slow stream of other players who were exiting, a few even laughing at her when they saw she had no chestpiece or sword, probably assuming she was coming back in after they broke. She flipped them off as she walked past, making a beeline straight for the trader and offloading her inventory of boar parts. She sold the broken sword she'd been using then purchased a new one, turning over in her head whether or not it might be more efficient if she were to also pick up blacksmithing, tailoring or other crafting abilities.

With those, she could then buy materials from the Auction House and turn those into better ones. Or maybe facilitate trading the raw materials to people who want to do those jobs, then take the finished products and sell them at a marked-up price in the Auction House or even if she could afford it her own store, since she didn't know the pricing of buying properties in the game, just that it was possible, it had been advertised to hell and back after all.

But she was getting way ahead of herself, maybe if she managed to nab a Nervegear of her own she would actually go ahead with those plans. As she equipped the sword on her hip and turned to head back to Kage, she wondered whether he'd get annoyed if she told him she had to leave soon. But then again, it wouldn't be nice of her to suddenly spring it on him, so she decided that she would tell him when she got back, and maybe when she got a Nervegear of her own she could find him again and thank him for giving her an incidental leg-up on other players.

She jogged back most of the way, swiping into her menu as she headed through the gate. She was now level 5, and she presumed that Kage would be maybe level 8 or so, not that she knew for sure. So maybe there was a chance he would hit level 10 and she could at least find out where the Auction House was before logging off. She had to head out a ways through the fields before coming across the spot Kage was farming at, immediately settling back in and killing boars on her own.

Honestly, Skye was a bit confused, since surely there was a better place to farm than here, with tougher mobs that would give better drops, but maybe the proximity to town was what had settled Kage on this spot. Maybe his plan was for their little deal to change so that she would spend most of her time heading back to town, selling off drops and buying weapons then travelling across the floor back to where Kage would be farming. It'd cut into her experience points, but it would probably be worth it. "Swords."

Kage spoke up after a little while, his blade breaking as he killed the boar he was fighting. Skye quickly opened a trading menu with him, dropping the swords she had bought into it and then quickly looking across the monster loot he had gathered and was putting into the menu. "Okay, so 37 boar hides at 20 Cor each, 740, 23 boar meat at 35 Cor, 805, 14 teeth for 40 Cor each, 560, and 3 tusks each worth 100 Cor, 300, bringing the total to 2405 Cor. Ten-percent for commission is 240.5, rounded down to 240 Cor, and the five swords at 250 Cor each, -50 each for resale value is an even 1000, bringing the total to 1165 Cor."

She tapped on the menu, inputting the money she had already earned into the menu. She was grateful that she had killed enough boars and sold their parts to bring her total Cor to above that total, otherwise it'd be a bit embarrassing. When done she clicked the accept button, giving Kage a few moments to double-check to make sure she wasn't swindling him before he then put the five broken swords into the trade, making her dip her head. "Another 250 then." Skye nodded at that, revoking her accepted trade and quickly adding the extra Cor to the trade and then re-accepting the trade.

This time Kage accepted the trade, and without another word drew his sword, seamlessly going back to hunting boars. She killed a few as well, but honestly, the fun had worn off. Kage seemed like the kinda guy who would farm for literally days until his next chosen target couldn't bother him, then would do the same to that target in steps until even the final bosses of games couldn't touch his bloated stats. If he wanted to do that then that was fine with her, but she was getting a bit bored of killing the same predictable pigs over and over again.

Instead of doing that, as well as rather than just training her Agility running back into town yet again, she decided to find a convenient pile of boulders to sit atop, opening her menus and going through them lazily. The stats screens were kinda standard, they had proficiencies for a bunch of things, some of which were related to trading, a bartering skill being most prominent. She didn't know how major the effect would be, but since she was only half-way to the first level, she presumed she would have to deal in way more expensive items to level that up quickly.

If her auction-house plans came through, she would hopefully not have to worry about that for long. Even if she was low-level, money didn't really have a limit as far as she knew, a level 1 was fine for using as an auction-house character as far as she knew. People would park them in those places to buy and sell things, sending them items from their main accounts to auction off without ever having to return there. It wasn't quite the same as running her own shop, but for getting a profit of Cor and the starting capital, using the auction house would be most efficient.

She frowned as she flicked her inventory back and forth. It was a bit of a shame, she'd have to keep an eye out and grab one as soon as she could, since stocks were basically nonexistent for acquisition. If she wanted one, she would need to be able to nab one as soon as it became available, or she'd miss her chance to get back in-game. Sighing, Skye closed the menu, hopping off her boulder and flagging down Kage, waiting as he finished another boar then raised an eyebrow at her. "I'm going to have to go offline now, and I don't know if I'll see you again, since I'm using the Nervegear of a friend right now. So, mind if I get you as a friend so I can contact you later?"

Kage snorted, turning away. "No point, by then our mutually beneficial deal would favour you more than I. You can find the auction house two streets north of the spawn plaza, if you miss it then I overestimated your intelligence." She blinked at his dismissive tone, shaking her head and huffing. If he wanted to get all pissy at her because she had to go offline then that was all on his head, he was more than welcome to his solo style of playing. Skye walked back to town, entering the walls and leaning against a building, controlling her emotions. It wasn't like it was a big deal, who cared if some random guy in a game rejected her offer of friendship? She swiped her hand downwards, her finger drifting to the bottom icon to log out, pausing above it as she tilted her head to the side.

The button...was greyed out?

So...yeah, new story.

I'm curious how this one will be received. Yeah, I know that a lot of my recent stuff has been based on game systems, but it's just what I prefer writing now I guess. I really hope people like the idea, Skye isn't going to be going into fights with the Gleam Eyes or anything, she's going to take this world and make it bend to her will, playing how she wants to play, not how the game expects her to play. Who cares about being super high-level if everyone tip-toes around you thanks to the fact you are literally richer than anyone else?

Please, PLEASE leave reviews or PMs on what you thought, I'd really like to know whether people like this story of not. Thanks boos =D