Tales of Aincrad: Claire
Tales of Aincrad is a retelling of the Aincrad arc that loosely follows the Progressive and canon timeline of events. Follow the perspectives of other players in Sword Art Online as they attempt to live their new lives; finding companions and relationships in a horrific reality where dying in a game means dying in real life.
The story in this tale will be about Claire: A 22-year old otaku who becomes a blacksmith and bruiser in the game, contributing in the clearing progress and preventing deaths in her own way.
Preface
Hello there, thanks for stopping by to read this fanfic! This little preface will just be some clarifications on how the story will work.
This is a fanfiction that will attempt to stay as closely to the original canon as possible, while also changing certain events to either make them flow better, make more sense, or add a little more depth to a situation. If you're familiar with the SAO universe and SAO (the game)'s mechanics and in-game or out-of-game lore and think "This didn't happen in the original", then it's most likely intentional.
The one thing that will have the most change however will be the game mechanics. Because Sword Art Online's leveling system and specific game mechanics are not clarified, I'm taking some liberties on how the gameplay works, but still taking lots of inspiration and reference from the original, such as keeping most of the Sword Skills and Skills in general accurate to the original series.
Otherwise, I will still attempt to stay as faithful to the canon mechanics, quests, enemies, locations, events, etc. in the original as possible, however this is just a reminder that there may be some (or a lot depending on the situation) changes taken to expand on the source material.
This fanfiction will primarily focus on Claire and her story, however perspectives may be shifted around to other characters at times to enhance the experience and give more context to situations and events surrounding her.
Note: There will be text, mostly descriptions, directly lifted from the light novels. This is a non-profit fan creation. All rights go to their original owners.
Chapter 1: The World of Swords
"Sword Art Online may be a game, but it's not something you play."
—Interview with Kayaba Akihiko, a month before the official launch of Sword Art Online.
Words flash on the screen surrounded by a black background, accompanied by a virtual-sounding jingle that only accompanies one company:
ARGUS
Presents
A grand orchestral soundtrack suddenly begins to blare through my earphones as visuals of clouds fly past the screen. After a second, the screen turns black once more with words flashing onto it:
In 2022, humanity has finally…
Soon after, the visuals change back, this time to a thick, foggy forest dashing past the screen— mimicking the feeling of running forward. Then, the screen turns black one last time:
…created a complete virtual environment.
And the final visual pans the camera through a grassy hill, eventually stopping short of a cliff and looking up towards a giant floating structure in the sky. A floating structure that's conal in shape, but somewhat resembles a castle. A floating castle in the sky; one-hundred floors tall. After the visuals get a full view of the floating structure, the title is finally dropped:
Sword Art Online
The rest of the trailer showcases visuals of the video game. Sneak peeks of each floor, the types of skills you can do, the enemies you can fight, the quests you can take, and nearly everything else you can think of in a massively multiplayer online role-playing game; all the while every single visual makes sure to keep the view in a first person perspective to emphasize that you are in the game.
That's because this MMORPG isn't just the typical monitor and keyboard setup I'm used to for these types of games. This game will literally transfer anyone who plays it inside of the virtual world; inside of the floating castle of Aincrad. It's a complete virtual reality experience, something that hasn't been perfected until recent years. Now, in the present day, a gigantic game has already come out with a huge launch title.
The trailer ends with a more detailed title drop, with the words on the bottom saying 'Out now for the NerveGear'.
I smile giddily as the trailer ends, and I come out of fullscreen to see the same trailer I watched on YouTube already having over 500k views on Argus' channel, even though it only came out an hour ago.
'Mmmmmmmmmmhmhm YEEESSS!'
I clutched my pillow and began to roll around in my bed excitedly. Suddenly though, my giddiness is interrupted after I get a text message.
'Mmh? What is it now…?'
I quickly glossed over it.
«Mom»: Hi sweetie, me and your dad are planning to go out to eat today. Do you want to come? I know work has been hard for you. We're going at 6 p.m.. Don't force yourself, I love you.
'Mm…'
I roll over towards my clock and check the time.
Exactly 12:00 p.m., November 6th, 2022. One more hour until the servers for Sword Art Online come up.
'Errrr, if I'll only have six hours to play if I start exactly at 1, then I'll have to get out of bed now…'
I type "I'll come mom, just text me where it's at and I'll drive there" and begin to think about my options.
Get out of bed to maximize play time, or stay in bed for another hour.
Get out of bed and stay healthy, or stay in bed and watch YouTube on the phone.
Get out of bed and be productive… or stay in bed and be productive in the other way…
I slowly opened my eyes to the sound of a certain anime's ending [1] softly playing through my earphones.
Oh, so I did stay in bed.
'…Mm, what time is it…? It's…'
1:24 p.m.
…
"…Oh crap I'm gonna be late for grinding!"
I suddenly yell out loud and immediately shoot right up.
Ah yes, the good ol' "5 more minutes turns into 5 more fucking hours!" Always happens when you don't want it to. Anyways, see that idiot that didn't fix the bed sheets, almost tripped on the mountain of clothes and games on the floor, and is somehow screwing up putting on her clothes? Hi! That's me! My name's Seiko Iyoku!
I'm just your local nerd who began living alone away from my parents for the first time in her entire life after a crap ton of convincing. I totally wasn't sheltered in any way, shape, or form!
I was totally prepared for the real world!
…
Yeah… of course I wasn't. Even in college I was still relying on my parents, as sad as that sounds. The only real access I had to the outside world was either through school or the internet, which was and still is practically my lifeline for everything.
I look around my room, which is littered with clothes, Cup Noodles, plates, video games, a stack of random manga and light novels, and the occasional garbage bag.
'Eeeeh, I'll clean those up later.'
I have two desks. One is for my clock and about a dozen photos of me and my parents together. They gave some of the photos to me as a parting gift when I moved out of the house. They're pretty overprotective at times, but looking at the pictures of us eating dinner at a fancy restaurant (at the expense of my dad's wallet), having fun at amusement parks, hiking mountains, and even playing some video games together… It reminds me that they did the best they could to raise someone like me.
On the other hand, my second desk (which is much less sentimental) is for my game consoles, PC, and the NerveGear, which I got a few weeks ago with my saved up money. A VR multiplayer experience is entirely new to me, even though I've played my fair share of MMOs in the past.
I smile at the thought of playing Sword Art Online, but first I gotta at least eat breakfast— or lunch. Whatever I just gotta get to playing as soon as possible so I can level up!
I hastily run over to my apartment's bathroom and begin to brush my teeth and splash a crap ton of cold water onto my face to murder the sleepy from my eyes. I'll just take shower when I get out of the game.
Before leaving the bathroom though, I take a look in the mirror and slow down a bit. Messy black hair down to my waist, dark brown eyes you can just consider black at that point, and a completely average-looking twenty-two year old female Japanese face stare at me back.
'Geez, are you seriously thinking about maximizing play time over spending time with your parents? Isn't that weird?'
That's right. I'm a degenerate that used to lock myself in my room after school (and now work) playing video games, watching anime or YouTube, pirating manga or light novels, doing things to myself when seeing certain stuff on the internet, and lurking through random internet forums for no reason other than having nothing else to do.
So yeah, normal nerd stuff.
I didn't really have many people to spend time with outside of my parents or teachers. The places my parents sent me never had anyone who liked the things I did. That or I'm just weird. I was never able to make many friends, and the ones I were friends with ended up leaving after college to find their "dream jobs" and never contacted me back. Knowing their luck, they probably already found those jobs, while knowing my luck, I'll somehow be fired at my job in about another month at best. I do feel like I've been slacking off recently anyways.
I sigh at my reflection, but then slap myself and stare at the mirror intensely.
"Stop complaining, it's annoying. You already know that you're the reason why you feel like you're not accomplishing much in life, so stop procrastinating and start actually doing something!"
I accidentally yell to myself out loud. I suddenly panicked and listened if anyone heard me next door. After a couple seconds of silence, I sigh in relief before staring at the mirror one last time.
"Will I really do something with my life…?"
Twenty-two years of going through the motions. Twenty-two years of passively following what my parents or teachers say. Twenty-two years of seeing amazing people constantly do amazing things. The only place where I feel like I'm able to even affect anything is on the internet or playing games, but even then I'm not doing anything productive in real life…
I shake my head and discard the thought before drying my face with a nearby towel and running into my small kitchen to cook some fried rice with the leftover rice from yesterday.
While eating, I opened Twitter on my phone and began to just lazily scroll through Sword Art Online hashtags. No reason in particular, other than I needed something to occupy myself while I was eating.
That's when I stumbled upon it.
Zeke.
I heard the username thrown around on the internet a bit. All I know about him is that he's an international streamer, Japanese-American, with a relatively small (if you can count a few million followers as small) but active fanbase. I watched a bit of his content myself.
That wouldn't really be special on its own, but apparently he traveled back to Japan from America just to buy a NerveGear and test out the game. That's pretty big news though, since this guy is so good at games that he's dubbed in his community "The King of Gamers", as arrogant as the title sounds.
After his popularity spiked, many tried to copy him and take his username "Phase" in many games, but even with his username only a few could match his skill. His combo videos in Devil May Cry 5 was what got me interested in his content, but what made me stop watching him was his apparent foul and blunt personality on social media. Through numerous comments on Twitter and even a few news sources, it's apparently known that the real "Zeke" is a despicable man who used others to climb his way to the top, which is why he isn't talked about much anymore other than within his own fanbase.
He is the perfect example of someone who is both superior to me and the type of person I hate: A person who is selfish, a person who disrespects others, and a person who harms others in an attempt to boost their own ego.
That's a person that I feel could be me at any time if I let my guard down. If I allow myself to open up… I dunno. It feels stupid to say, but maybe I could end up exactly like that. Maybe I'd even ruin someone else's life somehow without even knowing.
…I don't want to become like that. I'd rather be alone if that ever happens.
I shook those negative thoughts from my head a while ago and began to boot up my computer and NerveGear. I bought a digital copy of Sword Art Online, so all I needed to do was set up the helmet. I feel bad for the people who wanted to buy physical copies, having to wait in a giant line most likely only to find out the last copy was taken. Geez that would suck.
After finally finishing the setup, all that's left is to enter the game. I put on the NerveGear helmet, lay down on my bed after struggling to untangle the wire, and smirk. Now that's all done, it's time to say the magic words. The two words that will launch me into the virtual world for the first time.
…
"Link start!"
The world suddenly began to change around me into a white void. Colors of every kind immediately flew past my vision as the NerveGear connected all five of my senses in the virtual world while also disabling my motor functions in the real world for a full immersive experience. The act of a device completely throwing you into the VR world is called a «FullDive», and as far as I know, only the NerveGear is capable of this kind of feat so far in any VR platform.
After all of my senses are transferred into the virtual world, I reach the login screen, which is just a hologram/futuristic-looking screen. I'm still currently surrounded by an infinite white void with my real life self as my current VR Avatar. It was weird how you had to touch yourself to calibrate your true body, height and everything, and how the NerveGear can scan your head to recreate your face in scarily accurate detail, but hey, if you can make photorealistic graphics, you can replicate a real life face pretty accurately I guess.
After almost getting a headache trying to figure out how touching yourself can give the NerveGear your accurate height and body type, I type in my username and password, signing me in and opening up the games catalogue. Suddenly, two portals begin to appear in-front of me. One portal said "Settings", while the other said "Sword Art Online". I don't have any other games for the NerveGear, so Sword Art Online is the only one here.
Now it's finally the moment of truth. I tap the portal, and my view changes once more. A multitude of blue colors fly past my vision as the portal transports me into Sword Art Online's menu screen. Upon arriving and the blue colors fade away, I'm now standing on a green grassy plain, just like in the trailer. And just like in the trailer, I look up… and see it.
The floating castle of Aincrad.
Before I could scream out loud in joy, the title suddenly appeared right in-front of me in big, bold letters: Sword Art Online, as well as the main theme «Swordland», the same orchestral soundtrack in the trailer, begins playing in the background… Then I scream out loud in joy and utter nerd hype.
Afterwards, a multitude of prompts show up on the bottom of the title: «New Game», «Load Game» (Which is of course unselectable because I haven't played the game yet), «Settings», and «Exit Portal». I decided to check Settings first, but after a quick glance, the default settings are already to my preference, so I leave it alone for now. I can just go back and fix it later anyways, so for now I smack the New Game prompt to get myself started. The rest of the prompts disappear in favor of a multitude of rectangles, representing my save slots. Since I don't have any to override, I just tap the first save slot to continue to the character creation screen.
Before the menu opens up the character selection screen however, it asks for my «Display Name», or the name that will show up on party or friend lists.
'Hmmm, I would just use my NerveGear account's username, but…'
«I_Like_Skiing» [3] is my NerveGear account's username. It's a username I kept using ever since I was a kid on a crummy old laptop, but I feel like that isn't really a nice name for a grand adventure game. Maybe I'll use it for an alternate troll account, but for now…
'Let's choose something more appropriate. Mmmmmm…'
After a bit of deciding, I eventually decided on the European-sounding name «Claire», firstly because it would probably sound more unique compared to the Japanese Display Names people will use, and secondly because it's the name of the protagonist from Claymore. Kinda fitting considering this is a fantasy world.
After deciding on my name and selecting the first empty save slot, the space around me suddenly changes to a new area (Still have no idea how the NerveGear doesn't make you nauseous when that happens. Maybe it blocks that sensation to an extent? I dunno). I'm now in a relatively medieval European-looking building with a mirror in-front of me. Suddenly, a bunch of options show up, with the bold letters Create your Avatar appearing at the top of the mirror and the bold letters Finish and Back to Main Menu appearing at the bottom of the mirror.
'Sweet! Hm, I don't really feel like roleplaying, and I don't really care about making myself look beautiful… Ooooh, being a guy sounds fun! Er, but I already named this character Claire, and having a penis would probably be really weird… but maybe not a bad feeling.
…
… Eh nah, I already play as a guy a lot in other games, might as well switch it up here. Hmmm, maybe I can just use my real life self here. Nobody will know it's me after all, so it'll probably be fine. Plus being a self insert in a fantasy setting and getting to save the world as 'you' instead of a character you're controlling sounds much more appealing.'
And so I didn't choose to change my appearance. I'm kind of content with my look anyways, even though I'm average across the board. I click Finish and a new screen pops up saying "Are you sure this is the look you want?", with prompts saying Yes or No. Of course, I click Yes.
Afterwards, I was transported into an armory-looking room, filled with weapons and armor all around me. Another screen popped up, which was the stat distribution, weapon select, and «Skill» select screen. Usually there would be a «Class» select here, in which you'd select a variety of specific "roles" you want to fit into, and you'll be stuck in that role for the rest of the game. However, from what I remember, Sword Art Online doesn't have a traditional "Class" system, and instead allows you to specialize in specific "Skills" and weapons that boost your affinity for certain roles, such as being a tank or a support, but won't limit you to that role. This means that you're not really bound to a specific archetype, and can build into whatever you want, which I love when MMOs do that. It's always nice to not have to create a character for every single class when I can be a hybrid in one character, even though being everything usually turns out horribly and results in crap-tastic stats all around.
To make this long story of customizing and optimizing my stats short, I decided to go with a bruiser build, focusing more on tanking. The beginner Skill I chose is «Heavy Metal Armor Forging», which increases proficiency when blacksmithing, well, heavy metal armor. The system also automatically gave me the «Two-Handed Straight Sword» Skill since I chose a greatsword as my weapon of choice, filling up both of my «Skill Slots». I'm always either a full on DPS, full on tank, or full on support, so being a mix of all three will be an interesting change of pace I guess. Not really focusing on a specific role, but hey, what can I say? I can be indecisive as hell.
After finalizing my stats, one last screen appeared before me, saying "Do you wish to see the tutorial on how to play the game?", with prompts saying Yes or No. I already know how MMORPGs and FullDive VR games work though, so this game should be easy to learn on my own. I'll have no problem gitting gud at this game!… I hope. I click no, which finally sends me into the world of Sword Art Online.
The next thing I saw when I opened my eyes was a beautiful-looking plaza, with medieval European-style architecture all over the place. I looked up and saw a breathtaking skybox, as far as the eye can see, and the tower «Labyrinth» in the far distance, connecting this first ten kilometer floor of Aincrad with the next. I looked around me and saw dozens upon dozens of other «players», just like me, running around, yelling in excitement, socializing with each other, and just all around excited to be in the game. As for me? I just smile, raise my hands into the air, and let out the loudest yell I could possibly let out:
"HELLO WORLD!"
Free from the shackles of reality. Free from duties. Free from normal people.
In here, I can do anything.
I begin to run out the plaza (but not before grabbing a low level quest from one of the «Quest Boards») and explore the beginner town, the «Town of Beginnings». The town is absolutely massive, with houses (both NPC-owned and buyable alike), shops, inns, restaurants, bars, markets, and everything.
"Holy crap the devs really went all out on everything huh!" I say as I marvel at every little detail. The cracks on the walls, the reflection on my blade, the guy asking for picks of a cute girl's boobs right next to me— wait is that realistic?
Everything looks almost indistinguishable from real life, more so than all the other FullDive games before this one, save for the minor low-poly texture (compared to everything else) when I quickly move my entire body to check the background before it renders back in high detail after a split second.
'Well it's still a game after-all. They probably used a crap ton of tricks to make everything look as real as possible while also keeping the performance stable.'
I smile, still marveling at everything, before realizing I should probably get a move on to level up as much as possible before going out with mom and dad. I begin to run past the marketplace and onwards towards the front gate of the city.
After exiting the front gate, I just stare in awe at what's in-front of me. A giant grassy field, stretching on for kilometers upon kilometers, with hills, trees, «monsters», «players», and mountains in the distance, as far as the eye can see. Since it's already pretty late into the first day, but still a bit of daylight out, I don't see that many other players farming enemies near the town— probably because a lot of them have already moved on to tougher monsters to grind. Can't complain though, I have nearly the entire beginner field to myself, barring some other players a bit into the distance.
'Hehe, time to farm out some pigs. Oh, right. There were things called Sword Skills in the game. I don't know how to use one right now though… eh, I'll probably not need them.'
The quest I picked up requires me to kill 10 «Frenzy Boars», and the reward is 60 «EXP» and 50 «Cor» (the currency of the game I'm assuming), of course along with the EXP and Cor I gain from the boars themselves.
'This quest was listed to be the easiest kill quest on the board, so I shouldn't need to worry that much about losing HP. Alright, maybe this'll be pretty easy.'
'THIS IS NOT EASY WHAT THE FUCK?!'
I desperately dodge and weave through the pack of boars I (somehow) aggroed. Barely any of them are even half-way damaged, much less flat on the ground dead.
'Where did I go wrong?! Did I not do enough damage!? I thought greatswords were supposed to be powerful! Did I not swing it hard enough?! IT BARELY MADE A DENT ON THE DAMN THING!'
I attempted to kite all of them. Luckily their attack pattern only consisted of "ram until grill is ded", so I sort of had an easy time sidestepping and chipping away at their (for some reason) stupidly massive HP bars (or I'm being stupid and missing something). Problem is, because of my luck and terrible perception (though it's my fault I didn't put anything into the «Perception» stat), I keep on aggroing other boars to me, and it doesn't help that I'm starting to become mentally tired.
'Dammit dammit dammit, I don't want my first death to be against goddamn boars! What the hell is with the difficulty of this game anyways?! Even in Dark Souls the beginner enemies only died in a few hits!'
Before I knew it, I felt like I had an entire army of boars chasing me. Just before admitting defeat however, I hear a… revving sound? A virtual-style revving sound, followed by a soft blue horizontal streak of light flying past my vision, sending a large chunk of the boars back and killing a lot of them outright. Then after that another streak of light, this time green, came blurring past me, killing the remaining boars straight away.
"Geez, I didn't even know it was possible to increase the Hate stat on that many monsters, especially Neutral ones." A pretty deep voice said in-front of me. The owner of said voice was this… frankly pretty sexy guy, though it's probably just his character's Avatar. Still, I just looked in awe, before another voice spoke up, this time a feminine voice.
"She must be a noob if she didn't even use her Sword Skills." The girl (who frankly looks much hotter than me but is probably just a guy or something) said. I simply tilted my head… then resisted the urge to facepalm.
'Hey, I didn't know Sword Skills are that OP! How do you even use a Sword Skill anyways?!'
It should've been common sense though. MMOs would have active skills for fighting after-all. You just can't depend on auto attacking for everything or else you would barely do any damage, unless of course you build strictly for that purpose, but skills are usually much more useful. I already knew that this game had something called «Sword Skills»: techniques that could boost your speed and power to do badass combo hits, but I got lazy and didn't try to find out how to use them. God I'm an idiot. Maybe my brain is still tired.
"Hey, you guys found another noob too?" This time a third voice came from behind me, walking up to the other two. This guy seemed less… attractive I guess(?) and quite a bit older than the other two (he looks like he's around 2 years older than me while the other two people actually look a few years younger than me, though maybe that's for catfishing), but in my opinion that's probably good. To me showing flaws is much more appealing than being perfect in everything. That's what being human is after-all.
However I for one have way too many flaws, as showcased by my previous attempts to kill a boar with what was basically auto attacks.
"Yep. Hey, at least we were finally able to find someone on your skill level!" The pretty-looking girl and guy laughed at the average-looking dude. I pouted and finally decided to respond.
"Hey, I just didn't know how to activate a Sword Skill…"
'Even though I should have.'
"Shouldn't the tutorial have taught you that? You have to activate the pre-motion of the Sword Skill to activate it. Just open your menu to see the description of the pre-motion of whatever Sword Skill you wanna activate." The pretty boy explained to me.
I suddenly froze in place. The pretty boy blinked a few times before responding.
"Uhhh… you do know how to open the menu, right?" He said while I continued staring into the distance wide-eyed. After looking at the other two players, he just sighed and waved his hands in-front of my face, which snapped me out of my self-paralyzation debuff. I looked down awkwardly, then the group just chuckled a bit.
"Damn, you're really a noob huh? SAO is a bit different from other MMOs, considering we, y'know, are in the game. Just put your right index and middle fingers together, then swipe down vertically to open it." He explained, demonstrating exactly what he said, and lone behold a clean, transparent white menu-interface dropped down. I repeated him down to the mark, and the menu dropped down for me too. Right now it's just six transparent white circles all stacked vertically atop each other, however when I hover over one of the circles it shows its name, then when I click on it, it opens up a new screen on the side while still maintaining that sleek transparent white look.
I let out a little "Oooooh…" as I began to fiddle around with it. The rest of the players all chuckle, and finally the pretty boy began talking again once he saw me start to check the description of the Sword Skills «Cascade» and «Cyclone».
"Alright noobie, now do the pre-motion and the Sword Skill will be automatically activated."
"R-Right…" I almost silently replied back. He sounds pretty arrogant, but that's probably because he's played more than me. I can't complain though, for now I actually wanna learn how to do this.
'So a pre-motion is basically just telling the system what skill to use by settling into its stance. Huh… sounds like it'll get complicated later on when new Sword Skills (Combat Skills? Sword Arts? Combat Arts?) are introduced, but maybe I could get the hang of this.'
I begin to settle into the Sword Skill Cyclone's pre-motion, which, according to the description, is when you hold the sword with both hands at the right of your waist. The second after I do so, I hear a virtual-like revving sound coming from the blade, and I see a green light coming from that direction from the corner of my eye.
Then—
WHOOSHH!
I suddenly started moving on my own. I felt like I could control it somewhat, but overall it felt like something was controlling my body during the skill (which was a really weird feeling). My body quickly spun around and delivered a diagonal slash from right to left faster and more powerful than anything I could ever do in real life.
After the attack was over, I felt like I was frozen for a split second before being freed again after the blade stopped glowing. A little icon and the name of the Sword Skill then appeared at the bottom left of my view, signalling it was on cooldown. I got back to a neutral position and looked at my sword with an ecstatic smile.
"Aaaaaah~ That's so coooool!" I blurted out. The others just started laughing.
"It is isn't it?!" The normal-looking guy said back with as much enthusiasm as I had.
"Yeah. What's cool is if you learnt a pre-motion of a Sword Skill from muscle memory, the system will immediately activate it the instant after you're in the pre-motion instead of having a bit of lag while you're stumbling to find the proper stance, though you'll still have to go through the post-motion." He paused for a second before remembering something. "Oh, right you're a noob so of course you wouldn't know. A post-motion was the little stun you experienced after the Sword Skill, which prevents you from chaining other Sword Skills together in rapid succession." He added while smirking with an attitude of superiority.
I got a tiny bit annoyed by his tone, but I replied normally. The guy's pretty much my teacher right now after-all.
"Huh, I guess it makes sense from a balancing standpoint, but it still sucks that you can't do combo attacks with other Sword Skills."
'Meaning it'll be harder to style through this game like I do Devil May Cry games. That sucks.'
Either way, after that I began my Frenzy Boar killing spree.
"Aaaand finished!" I yelled out as I looked at the quest screen in the menu. The «Frenzy Boar Extermination» quest is now completed, and because I farmed a little extra on other monsters when attempting to create combos to no avail, I gained some extra EXP.
While fiddling around the menu figuring out what everything in it does, the three players who helped me walk up to me once more.
"You learn pretty quickly huh? Faster than me at least." The average looking guy smiled almost embarrassingly, probably because he's being outdone by a girl. He shouldn't be embarrassed though.
"N-No, all I did was fiddle around with stuff and paid attention to the pretty boy over there!" I responded back hastily to correct him. I should really get to know their names.
"Pretty boy?" The pretty boy asked. Yeah… I should really get on that right now.
"Er, sorry. I just don't know your guys' names yet." Though it's called a «Display Name», said name isn't actually displayed atop a player's head like in most RPGs (which is weird but I guess it makes things more realistic?), so people actually have to ask outright.
The three looked kind of surprised that they forgot to introduce themselves too. The pretty boy, who at this point I'm just going to assume is the group's leader, speaks up first.
"Right. Well, sometimes we forget proper manners when playing a game huh? My Display Name's Darius, and I'm a beta tester," he smirks with an air of pride before continuing, "With my knowledge, we'll be able to clear this game in a month at worst!"
I couldn't tell whether he was joking or completely serious, but right after he said that, his back is smacked by the pretty girl.
"Pffff, sureeee," the girl looks at me, "Yo, I'm Yuriko! Also a beta tester. A pleasure to meet you~" She says in a flirtatious tone, as if she thinks I'm a dude behind the Avatar. I just awkwardly smile and wave as a response.
Finally, the average looking guy walks up to me and waves.
"I'm Fayse, with an 'F' instead of a 'P' and a 'y' between the 'a' and 's'. Oh, and also drop the 'h'. The name 'Phase' was already taken last time I checked, so I had to go with this one. I'm a beginner just like you, though it seems like you're already gonna surpass me." He smiles sheepishly before Yuriko wraps her arms around Fayse's shoulders and practically puts him in a chokehold.
"Err— Wha?!"
"Ehehe~ Trying to copy that streamer's username huuuh~?"
"Er— Hey, I only used Zeke as inspiration for the name!" He struggles to get out of her grip while I begin to laugh.
'For people who probably don't know each other in real life, they get along really well.'
I smile hopefully and begin to think to myself.
"…Maybe in here I'll be able to be like you guys too. All I do in real life is just go through the motions. I don't really know if it'll get better from here, but maybe…"
Er, well I thought I was saying this in my head, but looked like I suddenly blurted my thoughts out on accident.
The others suddenly looked at me, and I felt my face quickly heating up from embarrassment. Upon seeing my reaction, they each had different expressions on their faces. The silence was only for a few seconds, but it felt much longer than that. Eventually though, someone finally spoke up.
"It'll definitely get better for you!… I know it will!" Fayse said a little emotionally for some reason before calming back down and muttering a 'sorry'. It took me a second to recompose myself, but I eventually did and responded back.
"R-R-Right. Y-Yeah." I replied back as an awkward stuttering mess.
'Uuugh, I really gotta stop saying crap out loud…'
Afterwards, I realized that all of their names were actually displayed atop their heads. Apparently if you show your name and level, you can see it next to their Health Bar, so I guess I can retract my previous statement.
The rest of the day basically consisted of more tutorial from Darius (even though I didn't really need it anymore) and farming with the rest of the group.
It was decided by Fayse that we'd work better if I joined their «party», since we'd all share EXP and Cor upon one of us killing a monster (but it'd still depend on how many times each of us hits said monster), so I agreed and joined. I've been in plenty of parties in games before, but it's a completely different feeling being in a party in VR. I don't really know how to describe it, but it kinda feels… comfy? Having others to just have fun doing random crap like farming, annoying NPCs, teaming up against monsters, and exploring the world feels much different than traditional monitor and keyboard gameplay… in a good way.
Speaking of party members, I had a bit of time to get used to playing with them. Darius liked being a straight up DPS, hogging all the damage to himself. Yuriko was more or less the same; her and Darius would compete constantly on who could kill a monster first. Meanwhile, since Fayse and I didn't focus on damage dealing, he just focused on using a Sword Skill with his sword every chance he got while I focused on drawing aggro and tanking the attacks. We had no dedicated healer, but I guess that's fine since the monsters we're farming don't need that much coordination, and can be done solo. I mostly fought with Fayse since Darius and Yuriko were doing their little murder spree, preventing us from getting any of the kills where they were.
After a long grind, me and Fayse reached a bit above halfway to level 3 together by farming «Dire Wolves» and went back to town to check out some shops. Soon after, Yuriko led us to a giant cliff to scale to see the sunset, since it was nearing that time. SAO followed time in the real world, which was weird because usually a game's day/night cycles would go faster than IRL, but I guess it just helps with immersion.
Upon walking to the top, my breath was taken away once again.
"Woah…" Me and Fayse said at the same time.
Just when I thought this game couldn't be more beautiful, this sunset definitely proved me wrong. To the grass and trees gently blowing in the wind, to the water reflecting the orange light from above, to the sun itself gently resting on the mountain peaks, to the birds flapping in the wind. Everything seemed ripped straight out of a moving wallpaper.
"Right? To be honest this was my favorite spot on Floor 1 back in the beta." Yuriko replied back enthusiastically. Darius simply stood back and fiddled with his menu, as he seemed to do often.
"Yeah. Still, I can't believe VR advanced this quickly. I mean, we're literally in the game!" Fayse exclaimed while looking straight at the beautiful view. I nod and reply back with the same enthusiasm.
"I know! The combat's a little weird but it's easy to get the hang of, and the graphics are amazing."
Fayse and I looked at and smiled at each other.
"Why don't you two get a room already?" Darius suddenly said with a smug grin on his face after closing the menu.
"Wha—?!" We both have the same shocked/embarrassed expression.
'Wait, am I being shipped? Is this a good thing or a bad thing?'
"H-Hey! 'She' could be a 'he' y'know!" Fayse suddenly pointed at me while flustered. I look back at him with a face of objection.
"Wait wha— Hey, that's a false accusation! And err— That isn't the point!" I stamper back with superior fluster power.
'Why am I getting embarrassed over this?! Uuugh stop it, stop it, you're being awkward!'
Suddenly Yuriko begins to chuckle, which transitions to a fit of laughter.
"What?!" Both of us yell out at the same time.
"Pppfff, n-nothin'," she chuckles a bit more, "Geez, but in all seriousness you guys seem to get along well, but I guess you guys are both beginners."
"Y-Yeah. It makes sense that we have to help each other out." Fayse said.
"M-Mhm." I don't really have anything to add. Even though it's a joke, I can't help but feel a little happy for some reason.
No, I know the reason.
I met people who have similar interests as me that's not on the internet, rather than people who just talk about something related to school, or to guys, or to whatever's on the news recently.
It puts a smile on my face that I can interact with these guys so naturally; to joke about random stuff like this whenever without having to worry about being called weird or worry about acting like I know what I'm talking about in terms of normie stuff.
That happy expression though soon turns into an 'oh shit' one when I just remembered something important.
"Crap that's right, I have to go now! I'm going somewhere in a bit with my parents!" Ugh, I had too much fun that I forgot my real life relationships. Video games are a hobby, not something that should consume your entire life…! Though maybe I wish it did sometimes, even though that's a horrible thought.
"Oh, is that so…? Well, alright then. I'll be logging off to prepare for work tomorrow too anyways." Fayse looked a little disappointed before looking back up brightly, "Hey, why don't we add each other as friends?"
"Oh, right! Yeah, let's do that." I opened my menu and sent a friend request to Fayse and the others. They all accepted.
"Alright, it was nice meeting you guys." I smiled and looked at everyone. Everyone waved back. My first day playing as myself in a brave new world was a success. I opened my menu. Before I opened the Settings tab though, Fayse began to speak.
"Hey, when you log back on, wanna do some questing?" He said. I hesitated to click the Settings button. I turned to Fayse and smiled widely.
"Of course!" Back to real life. I clicked the Settings button and tried to find the logout button…
… to no avail…?
"Uh, hey, reaaally noob question, but where's the logout button?" I asked.
"You an idiot? Settings." Darius bluntly said. I start at him with a 'come on, really?' face.
"I'm already there." I replied back passively.
"Erg, just look at my menu." He swipes down his fingers to open the menu and goes to the Settings tab… to also find no logout button.
"Huh? Strange. Why's the button blank?" He looks genuinely surprised. This was when everyone else looked into their menus and tried to find the logout button too. We checked every menu tab, but it wasn't anywhere to be found, and the place it was supposed to be simply had an extra blank button.
"Maybe it's a bug?" Fayse hypothesized.
"I hope so." I say a bit worriedly.
"Nah, the GMs would've likely noticed the bug and fixed it by now." Darius tried to rationalize the situation. Yuriko seemed to agree.
Before we were able to make further assumptions however, we heard the Town of Beginnings' bell ring in the distance. The bell sounded a bit ominous. Maybe it was because of the quickly descending sunset, or that all the birds are suddenly up and flying across the sky.
Before we knew it, however, we were all engulfed in a pillar of blue light.
As the blue light faded, I was able to see properly again. However, this wasn't the beautiful cliffside I was at before.
A giant plaza surrounded by brick walls. A pitch black castle nearby. Stone streets and medieval lamps. No doubt about it, this was the «Town of Beginnings»' plaza; the place where everybody spawns at when they start the game.
I look around for my other party members, and lone behold they're all right next to me, along with thousands of other players surrounding us inside of the plaza. Thousands of, quite frankly, pretty hot people (this is kind of making me regret not changing my appearance at least a slight bit) with a huge variety of different equipment and unique individual looks, as if they were all main characters. If there were this many people here, then everybody currently in the game was probably forcibly teleported here as well.
I looked over to my party members. Darius looked like he was trying to stay calm, but it was obvious he was just as confused as the rest of us. Yuriko had an uncharacteristically worried expression; she was mostly cheerful and energetic before, so this is a new sight to me. Fayse looked like he was just about the same as me; completely confused and not even trying to hide it.
For a few seconds, nobody said anything.
Then for the next few seconds short murmurs were heard, which quickly became louder and louder as the seconds passed.
"What's happening?"
"Can we log out now?"
"Can't they take care of it quickly?"
Comments like these could be heard from time to time.
As the players started to get more annoyed, shouts like "Is this a joke?" and "Get us the hell out here, GMs!" could be heard.
Then suddenly…
Somebody raised his voice above all these comments and shouted.
"Ah… look up!"
Me and others around me instinctively looked up, and were greeted with something strange in the sky.
The bottom of the second floor, one hundred meters above us, was checkered in red. Upon closer inspection I noticed that the checkers had text in English.
"Hey, what does that say? I can't see that well." Fayse tapped my shoulder.
"Uhhh… I think it says… 'System Announcement'." I replied back after squinting my eyes a bit at it.
"Oh thank God, then a GM will come and tell us what's happening." Yuriko sighed in relief, and the rest of us tensed up a little less.
'Well that's good at least. Maybe they just teleported us to announce the bug.
…
…Wait, why would a GM teleport the entire player-base just to announce that there's a bug and fix it?'
I became slightly cautious again and kept on looking at the sky.
The next thing that happened honestly scared me.
From the middle of the red checker pattern, a liquid that looked like blood started oozing down slowly. It came down at a rate that almost emphasized how viscous it was, but it didn't fall all the way down; instead, it started congealing into a shape.
What appeared was a twenty-meter tall figure with a hooded robe draped around it. No, that wasn't exactly right. From where we were looking, we could easily see into the hood— there was no face. It was absolutely empty. We could clearly see the inner cloth and the green embroidery inside of the hood. It was the same inside the robe, all we could see inside the edges were shadows.
From there, murmurs started being heard again. From "Is that the GM?" to "Why does he look creepy as fuck?"
So about the same reactions as me.
"That is the GM, right? Or at least one of them?" I asked with a worried tone.
"Yeah, that's the robes GMs wore during the beta test, but I dunno why this guy doesn't have a face." Darius simply said. There was no overconfidence in his voice like there usually was this time.
Then the right sleeve of the huge robe moved as if to silence them.
A pure white glove appeared from the folds of the long sleeve. But this sleeve, like the rest of the robe, didn't cover any sort of body.
The left sleeve slowly lifted upwards, too. Then, with its two empty gloves spread out in front of ten thousand players, the faceless person opened his mouth—no, it felt like it did. A low, calm, male voice resonated from high in the air.
『Players, I welcome you all to my world.』
'My world…? The creator of SAO?'
『My name is Kayaba Akihiko. Right now, I am the only person who can control this world.』
It was. He's the development director of SAO, as well as the designer of the NerveGear. I don't know him that well, but I know his success story. He's someone who popped into the radar of the video game industry out of nowhere a few years ago with frankly beyond genius-level intelligence, and the one responsible for bringing the company Argus onto the radar as well.
The videos about him are an interesting watch, but why did he appear before us now? From what I remember in the videos, he always refused media exposure and attention. Before I can think of an explanation, Akihiko continued to speak.
『I believe that most of you have discovered the fact that the Log Out button has disappeared from the main menu. This is not a bug; it is all part of «Sword Art Online»'s system.』
"Part of… the system?" I heard a red-haired player with a bandana say near me, just as confused as I am.
The announcement continued in its low voice as if to cover the sound.
『Until you get to the top of this castle, you cannot log out of your own free will.』
'Castle? Does he mean…'
Aincrad itself? All 100 Floors…?
The words that came next only fueled the slowly growing unease in my mind.
『…also, the disruption or dismantling of the NerveGear from the outside is strictly forbidden. If these things are attempted…』
A moment of silence. An overwhelming silence. The next words came slowly.
『the signal sensors in your NerveGear will emit a strong electromagnetic pulse, destroying your brain and stopping all of your basic functions.』
I look over to everyone's faces.
Shock.
Horror.
Denial.
A wave of negative emotions could be seen just through the other players' faces. No words needed to be expressed. What he was saying, in short…
…Was that the NerveGear will kill us if someone tried to log us out.
By the looks of everyone's faces, most people want to deny it; that we're really trapped in here. It's too scary after-all to imagine this as our new lives for most people, especially when they most likely have loved ones at home.
…As for me.
"Mom… Dad…"
I begin to quiver a little. Quiet murmurs start to intertwine with each other; most of which are trying to rationalize the situation.
"Hey, hey… He can't be serious, right? I mean, couldn't Argus just shut down the server and get us out of here?" Yuriko said with a tone of urgency and growing uncertainty.
Her question was answered by Akihiko himself.
『To be a little more specific, disconnection from an outside source of electricity for ten minutes, being cut off from the system or server for more than two hours, or any attempt to: unlock, dismantle, or destroy the NerveGear. If any of these conditions are met, the brain destruction sequence will start. These conditions have been made known to the government and the public through mass media in the outside world. On that note, there have been several cases where the relatives or friends have ignored the warnings and tried to forcefully remove the NerveGear. The result…』
The metallic voice took a short breath here.
『…regretfully 213 players have already exited this game, and the real world, forever.』
There was silence for a few seconds, but a long, thin scream from a little girl in the crowd broke it. I looked around. Most of the players looked like they couldn't or refused to believe what they had been told, and just stood there slack-jawed or with a wry smile on their faces.
I look over to my party members, who are visibly shocked and scared, just like me. Fayse glances over to me, as if to try and read my expression as well.
I'm worried about them. My party members. They're probably living better lives than me. If they die… that's just unfair.
And the people who have already died. Those were people who could have changed someone else's life. Those were people who could have made another person happy. Those people could have done something special. So why…!?
'Why did someone with such a popular reception stoop so low as to end a life with meaning?!'
I clench my fists.
『Players, there is no need to worry about the bodies you left on the other side. As of this moment, all TV, radio, and Internet media are repeatedly reporting this situation; including the fact that there have been numerous deaths. The danger of having your NerveGear taken off has already all but disappeared. In a moment, using the two hours I have provided, all of you will be transported to hospitals or similar institutes and be given the best treatment. So you can relax… and concentrate on beating the game.』
I wanted to say something; anything to understand why he's doing this. However, before I was able to mutter a single word, another person suddenly yelled out in anger at the giant blood-red robe above all of us.
"What are you saying!? Beat the game!? You want us to play around in a situation like this!?" The black-haired player who was next to the bandana-wearing player said.
He kept on shouting angrily; desperately. It sounded like someone who was just betrayed by the person he admired for so long.
"This isn't a game anymore!"
Then Kayaba Akihiko started announcing quietly with his monotonous voice, ignoring all of what that player said.
『But I ask all of you to understand that «Sword Art Online» is no longer a simple game. It is a second reality…. From now on, the moment your HP reaches 0, your avatar will be gone forever. And at the same time…』
I could guess what he was going to say all too clearly, and I assume everyone here knew what he was about to say too.
『…your brain will be destroyed by the NerveGear.』
A game of life or death, that's what this was. A death game.
If your life was at stake, then of course there would be a high incentive to just stay in town and do nothing. However, this thought too was addressed by Akihiko.
『Players, there is only one way to be freed from this game. As I have said before, you must get to the top of Aincrad, the one hundredth floor, and defeat the final boss that resides there. All players still alive at that time will be immediately logged out of the game. I give you all my word.』
I then hear the bandana-wearing player yell out, "Clear… all 100 floors!?" He suddenly got up quickly and raised a fist up to the sky. "And how do you want us to do that? I heard that getting up was crazy hard even during the beta testing!"
The strained silence eventually gave way to low murmuring. But there was no sign of true fear or despair yet.
Most people here seem to still be confused about whether this was a real danger or a really fucked up «Opening Event». Everything Akihiko had said was so horrifying that it would probably feel unreal to most people, especially those who aren't used to the death game genre; and even some of those people would still probably be a bit shaken up considering they're practically in said genre now.
Just a few hours ago I was planning my play time so that I can see my parents again after a week. I was living a normal life, just like everyone else, only a few hours ago.
But now, according to everything Akihiko said, this is our reality now, and we won't be able to leave until all 100 floors are cleared.
Then, the red robe that had always been one step ahead of us swept its right glove and started speaking with a voice void of all emotion.
『I will now show you evidence that this is your new reality. In your inventories, there will be a gift from me. Please confirm this. 』
I saw a lot of people immediately opening their menus. I looked at Fayse, who had the same questioning glare as me. We both exchanged quick glances at each other before opening our menus as well and checking our inventories.
I pressed the Item button on the menu that appeared and the item was there, at the top of my belongings list. The name of the item — «Hand Mirror».
"Hm…" I took it out of my inventory and inspected it. The small, rectangular mirror looks normal. There doesn't seem to be any special properties attached to it. Me and Fayse exchanged glances once again. However, before we were able to speak…
All of the players were suddenly engulfed in white light.
Almost 2, 3 seconds later, the surroundings reappeared just as they had been…
No.
I look around me. Fayse looked the same, however when I checked to see Darius and Yuriko, I saw two completely different people.
Darius, instead of looking like a hot shounen protagonist, looked like what you would call your typical skinny nerd. Just put glasses on him and he'd look exactly like the stereotype of the nerdy, antisocial kid who plays video games to feel superior or escape from reality.
…Not unlike me, but still.
Yuriko on the other hand, instead of looking like a hot girl every boy would probably drool over… looks like your average… I wouldn't say fat, but above average weight Japanese male… With a skirt on.
'So she really was a he!'
I exclaimed internally (And made sure I exclaimed internally this time), however this isn't the time for that. Now I know what the mirrors were for. That's why the NerveGear needed to scan your real life body: to replicate it into SAO. However, because me and I'm assuming Fayse didn't change our appearances, we still look the exact same.
"Holy crap you're actually a girl?" Yuriko was the first to speak up from our party after realizing what had just happened. I just shrugged awkwardly.
"I-I just used my real life appearance. Y'know, to be like a self-insert in a grand adventure instead of another character." I stuttered a bit, but explained my reasoning.
"Huh, so the same as me huh? Phase— the streamer— is pretty cool… as a gamer anyways. But I wanted to feel good at a game like him on my own, with the only thing being similar being the name… I guess. It's a crappy reasoning, I know." He awkwardly said. We have a lot more in common than I thought, but at least he probably has his life together better than I do.
"Nah, I can relate." I smile back before remembering what kind of situation we're in right now. I look back to the giant hooded figure. Everyone else followed suit.
『You all must probably be wondering, "Why." Why am I — the creator of both the NerveGear and SAO, Kayaba Akihiko— doing something like this? Is this a sort of terrorist attack? Is he doing this to ransom us?』
It was then that Akihiko's voice, which had been emotionless up to now, seemed to show some signs of emotion.
『These are not the reasons for why I am doing this. The reason is because… this situation itself. To create and watch this world is the only reason I have created the NerveGear and SAO. And now, everything has been realized.』
Then after a short pause, Akihiko's voice, now emotionless again, spoke.
『…I have finished the official Opening Event for «Sword Art Online». Players—I wish you luck.』
This last sentence trailed off with a faint echo.
The huge robe rose soundlessly and started sinking, hood first, into the system message that covered the sky, as if melting.
Its shoulders, then its chest, then its two arms and legs merged into the red surface, and then a final red stain spread briefly. Right afterward, the system message that had covered the sky disappeared as suddenly as it appeared.
The sound of the wind blowing above the plaza and the BGM that the NPC orchestra was playing came softly to our ears.
The game had returned to its normal state, apart from the new information we've gotten.
Then— at last.
The crowd numbering in the thousands gave a proper reaction. In other words, countless voices started resounding loudly through the plaza.
"It's a joke right…? The hell is this? It's a joke right!?"
"Stop kidding around! Let me out! Let me out of here!"
"No! You can't! I've got to meet someone soon!"
"I don't like this! I'm gonna go home! I want to go home!"
Yells. Clamors. Shouts. Curses. Begging. Screaming.
The people that had changed from game players to prisoners in a matter of minutes crouched clutching their heads, waved their arms about, grasped each other or started to swear loudly. Some tried to calm the situation down. Others tried to escalate the chaos.
However, instead of joining in, one of my party members beckoned us towards him.
"Hey, c'mere. We're getting out of here." Darius tried to say as cool as possible before moving through the crowd. The rest of the party looked at each other before following suit.
It took a bit of struggle, but we finally made it through the crowd and went past one of the plaza's exits. Darius led the party down one of the many town's streets before stopping, allowing us to either collect our thoughts or get proper clothing, like in Yuriko's case. I look around at where we're at. All NPCs should have coded-in schedules, so that's probably why they're not in the market stands currently. What was once booming with life in the day is now an almost deafening silent atmosphere with nobody but us in sight.
I looked at everyone's expressions.
Darius looks like he's trying to keep calm and remain in his facade of the "tough guy", even though it's clear as day he's just as worried as the rest of us.
Yuriko (it feels weird calling him that now) meanwhile definitely looks like he's panicking, even though at this point he equipped proper male clothes. Of course it's not just his clothes originally being a girl's, or even his identity of being a dude being exposed that got him worried. Even without those two factors, a lot of people would still be panicking that they can't return back to the real world until the game is completed.
And finally, Fayse had a look of worry as well, but not like the others. It looked more like he was guilty— as if he possibly disappointed someone… maybe from the outside world?
I wouldn't know unless I ask, however my mouth never opens to speak. I hesitated and stayed quiet and passive, like I always have.
After what seemed to be forever, Darius looked at all of us and began to speak.
"Alright, here's the plan…" Darius looked like he was gathering his thoughts, "We can't just stay here and farm the starting monsters forever. That won't level us up quickly enough, and eventually other players will also take these farming spots and surpass us. The respawn time for the monsters will be utter crap…" He takes another pause, "That's why I'm planning to go to Horunka Village. The monsters there may be stronger, but we'll get much more EXP, and plus we can get better weapons there."
Everyone was silent for a few seconds, but eventually I gathered enough courage to speak.
"…Isn't there a higher chance we can die though? I know the farming spots will eventually be crowded since the monsters are easy to kill, but wouldn't it be safer to do that instead of being risky? I mean… we aren't even that high level." I look over to the others. From what I know, all of us are only level 2, with Darius and Yuriko being close to level 3. If we go to a stronger area, then there's a higher chance of death, especially for beginners like me and Fayse.
"Then fine, don't come if you don't want to. I'll go alone if I have to. I don't want someone I don't know with a higher level to have authority over me. The Anneal Blade quest only allows for one person to complete it at a time anyways." Darius bluntly stated. This time Yuriko stepped up.
"Oi, Darius, are you an idiot? You know what happened to us in the beta when we hit the wrong Nepent? You'll die alone! I…" He paused for a second, "…I'm coming too!" Yuriko blurted out. Even though his legs were shaking before, they completely stopped.
'They seem to know each other well. Maybe they're friends in real life. If so, it makes sense why Yuriko wants to go too. That, or he's just scared of being weak or falling behind as well…'
"Alright, just remember the Nepent's attack patterns and it'll be fine." Darius then turned to me and Fayse, "So? What are you two going to do?"
Me and Fayse look at each other, then at Darius. Fayse was the first one to speak.
"Well, I don't really know what else to do without you guys. Plus it seems like you two know what you're doing, so we'll probably be fine. If we get past the strong monsters now, then we can get better equipment to survive." Fayse gives a faint smile, however there still seems to be doubt written all over his face. That worry of doubt though sparked something in me, and I stepped forward.
"I'll come too. Like what Fayse said, you two played the beta, so you'd know what to expect." I stated with as much confidence as I could muster.
We've all accepted the reality of our situation, so now it was just a matter of getting stronger; at least for the other three. However, for me, after seeing the state of doubt and worry they have on their faces…
… It only makes me want to protect them even more.
End of Chapter 1
Author's Notes:
References/Trivia:
[1]: The song in question is the ending theme of the anime Violet Evergarden.
[2]: In Japanese the phrase is a pun that makes it sound like you're saying "to like" twice. Claire made the username when she was 9 years old; a time when she was barely starting to discover what puns were on the internet. After that, the username just stuck on most of her online accounts thereafter.
Changes From Canon:
The SAO trailer is expanded upon compared to the one in canon.
Zeke doesn't exist in canon. He's an original character made by a friend who will be important to Claire's story in the future. He will have little to no impact on other characters' stories, and I tried making it so that he doesn't seem out of place in the SAO universe and so that not many people would talk about him outside of Claire's story.
The NerveGear's startup and menu screen are completely different from canon. I took reference from the Wii's menu, since that seemed perfect for something like VR.
Sword Art Online's menu and character select/create screens are also completely different from canon. Because there's little information to go off of in canon, I took reference from a more standard MMORPG menu, along with all of its settings, customization, etc., however of course still keeping SAO's "Skills" system instead of the normal "Class" system since I'm still trying to stick as close to canon as possible while also making changes that would further enhance the experience.
Claire's Stats (Level 2):
Primary Stats:
Strength: 5
Agility: 2
Dexterity: 4
Vitality: 6
Perception: 2
Charisma: 2
Secondary Stats:
HP: 400/400
Level: 2
EXP: 94/200
Stat Points: 0
Skills:
Heavy Metal Armor Forging
Two-Handed Sword
Sword Skills:
Cyclone
Description: A two-handed spinning sword slash that consists of a single upwards diagonal slash from right to left with two hands holding the sword. Cyclone's pre-motion has the user holding their sword with both hands at the right of their waist. Cyclone's post-motion has the user holding their sword with both hands at the left above their head.
Cascade
Description: A two-handed overhead slash. Cascade's pre-motion has the user holding their sword with both hands above their head. Cascade's post-motion has the user holding their sword with both hands in-front of their stomach.
Back Rush
Description: A two-handed technique to spin around anticlockwise and diagonally slash from right to left when an opponent is at your back. Back Rush's pre-motion has the user holding their sword with both hands parallel and in-front of their stomach. Black Rush's post-motion has the user holding their sword with both hands at the left above their head.
