DISCLAIMER: I do not own Sword Art Online or any of its characters. I do, however, own the fanart used as the cover; as I drew that myself.
EDIT(1): FFN does not support angle braces, so I have been forced to use double chevrons instead.
EDIT(2): Missed a couple more places where double chevrons were supposed to be. Whoops.
() = Skills.
EXAMPLE: (Blacksmith).
[] = Stats and status effects.
EXAMPLE: [Strength] and [Invisible].
{} = Item names.
EXAMPLE: {Anneal Blade}.
«» = Monster and location names.
EXAMPLE: «Dire Wolf» and «The Town of Beginnings».
Chapter 1: First Meeting.
Aincrad's water was beautiful.
Normally people didn't stop by a gorgeous water bed in a video game, too busy hurrying from one quest to another. But Sword Art Online was different, taking advantage of the NerveGear's Full Dive to simulate an entire world. This meant you could actually feel whenever there was a chilly breeze from the mountains, or smell the salt from the ocean's rising tides. Some player's would even stop to smell the flowers, simply because they could and it was incredible!
Currently in Closed Beta Access, Sword Art Online was shaping up to be one of the most ambitious projects of the current millennium, one man's dream to pave the way for VR gaming.
Kazuto Kirigaya, a young kid, was one of the lucky few to visit the world of Aincrad. He was ravenous when it came to anything regarding this game, digesting as much information across forums, blog posts, and development logs as he could.
He squealed when he found the NerveGear sitting in his room one day, an event his sister, after several weeks now, refuses to let him forget.
But that was then, when young Kazuto was busy setting up the futuristic looking helmet; making sure its settings were to his liking, and listening to his helpful sister read the manual out loud. Now however, was when Kazuto became Kirito, a vision of what the young man sought to be in the future.
A tall man, for life had something against Kazuto, having stunted his growth in the past few years. The defined musculature and peak physique of Kirito was a little more accurate to the beta tester's current stature than the height change, as years of kendo—and a competitive sister—helped hone his body. The blue gray hair that crawled down his avatar's neck was as close to his normal hair as the Closed Beta would allow, yet after so many weeks young Kazuto had grown attached to the different style.
The only part of his avatar remained completely unchanged were his eyes; a perfect gradient of black and gray, akin to a polished gemstone or a heralding storm.
And those crystal clear eyes pierced the pristine river below him, their owner leaning against a lone and mighty oak. The two of them, high above the water on a rocky cliffside, listened to the swooping of birds and the rushing of waves below. Nothing for miles to disrupt their perch on the outcropped cliff—
—or so they thought, as another player casually strolled up the pathway to the man and his tree companion, humming a tune to herself all the while.
In Sword Art Online, players increased special abilities known as skills. Skills were vital to enjoying the game as a whole, as a majority allowed a player to perform special interactions outside of combat. Two of the most popular in the game ran counterpoint to the other, (Hide) and (Seek). When a player uses (Seek), the game checks 30 meters away from the player's current location for any player or non-player characters that have a (Hide) lower than the activated (Seek). (Seek) even has an automatic state, constantly checking 10 meters away instead.
However, a player or non-player character whose (Hide) is higher than the opposing (Seek) will be considered [Invisible] and will not appear until they attack, interact with an item, or physically interact with a person. In a strange quirk of game design, the [Invisible] status effect also mutes the target's sound, preventing even the keenest of listeners from hearing someone using (Hide).
This meant that despite humming a catchy tune to herself, the newcomer still had not alerted the other player to her presence.
The humming girl, Tomo Hosaka, keeps her personal life to herself, preferring to live her life as Argo, instead of Tomo. Now Argo wasn't just her name in Sword Art Online, it was the nickname she used for the entirety of her Internet presence. The origin of said nickname came from one of the young girl's favorite legends growing up; a Greek epic commonly known as "Jason and the Argonauts".
The young woman sought to be, in her own way, just like the legendary ship that carried Jason to the Golden Fleece; a vessel to keep heroes safe and plentiful on their harrowing journeys.
However instead of a boat, Tomo learned the art of info brokering, buying and selling information to aid as many people as she could and even turning a profit. One such piece of information was how to use «The Town of Beginnings» to skyrocket a player's (Hide).
In «The Town of Beginnings», a few small alleyways exist between streets, with even fewer housing indestructible barrels. If a player were to climb inside one of these barrels and attempt to (Hide), that player would gain the [Clever] status effect, which doubled the amount of skill points earned using (Hide).
All of this information culminated into this one moment, where a girl with an absurdly high (Hide) taps the shoulder of a boy whose (Seek) had never failed him.
The result—predictably—is a startled half-jump turn from Kirito, whose foot catches on one of the rocks. Bad footing leads to wild flailing, as Kirito tips and slips right off the cliffside. In a panic Argo rushes forward and grabs the young man's hands, only to feel herself fly off the cliffside alongside him, his spastically swinging arm catching on the poor girl's cloak and pulling forward.
Before either could say the first word to the other, the two of them now hugged the other close, ripping free high-pitched screams as the previously-beautiful-now-suddenly-terrifying river of water decided, at that very moment, to reveal the perilous spikes that lined the riverbed.
And when a «Siren Lord»—a massive grotesque combination of man and fish—rose out of the water and prepared to hurl its colossal trident at the falling duo, their fearful hug only tightened and their frightened screams only grew louder.
Dying in Sword Art Online, at least dying in the Closed Beta Access, resulted in the loss of one-fourth of your items. These items were technically reclaimable, but you only resurrected in one spot in Sword Art Online, a single church in «The Town of Beginnings», all the way at the start of the game. This meant that most players viewed lost items as gone forever, due to the sheer amount of time it would take to get them back.
"—n'another thing, whose first instinct 's t' pull thr' damn help off th'cliff with 'm!"
Currently the lone player was doing their damnedest to fend off the angry woman, an intense blush on his face as the other players in the church had turned in his direction with various smirks and chuckles. He was afraid they would start getting a very, very wrong idea.
Especially considering that the rightfully-mad woman, Argo, was effortlessly pretty; a pair of golden eyes, offset by a wild an untamed messy poof of green hair; painted-on whiskers (only barely hidden by her messy mane) that accentuated her rounded face; all brought together by her short stature and flowing cloak.
"Dude." One of the player's sitting in the pews says, a male voice coming from a female body. "Tell your girlfriend to chill. My ears hurt."
"Y'want chill?!" Argo says, digging her fingers so hard into a nearby church pew that a box reading [Indestructible Object] pops into existence. "I'll show ya chill!"
And then she lifted the entire bench, reared back and ready to throw.
"Wait!" Kirito says in a panic, grabbing the girl's arms to halt her momentum. "Wait-wait-wait, how about me and you go somewhere else and you don't go to «Black Iron Palace», okay?"
There's a beat of silence in the church. When the pew had been lifted there was a mad dash of players getting out of the way, even knowing they wouldn't actually be hurt from the experience. Now only silence as players take stock of the fact the [Indestructible Object] box kept periodically popping up, signifying that Argo would be damaging the bench by simply gripping it if it wasn't an immortal prop.
"Fine." Argo says, dropping the improvised javelin off to the side with a heavy thud. "But ya owe me coffee."
Those were the angry woman's last words before grabbing the young man's hand and marching out of the church, forcefully dragging poor Kirito behind her.
There was no way for Kazuto Kirigaya to know this, but the moment that short, angry girl had dragged him past the church's open threshold, his life would be forever changed.
AN: I joined an SAO Fanfiction Discord to aide me in my writing and art. My favorite ship was severely lacking in content, so I've set out to try and make more of it.
Be the change you want to see and all that.
(Yes I'm still working on DB: Reincarnation Game and DB: Gathering of FighterZ, I love them too much to not work on them.)