Hello, and welcome to my SAO story. I don't have much to say here, so I'll try to make it brief.
First off, this will not be a OC/Kirito fic, so get that thought out of your heads right now. While I don't necessarily care much for canon pairings as a rule, I actually really like Asuna and Kirito, and both of them deserve to have that ending. My OC, who's name will be revealed in the next chapter, will be more like a big sister to Kirito, not a lover. And yes, I very purposefully kept the name of the main character out of this chapter, to provide an air of mystery, since it fits really well with her character. I hope you like it.
So, that should be it for the most part. Read, Review, and Relax. Enjoy!
XXX
As a gray haired girl stepped out of the light that had engulfed her a few seconds earlier, she casually glanced around at her surroundings. She was no longer out in the fields surrounding the Town of Beginnings, where she had been hunting mobs all day, but was instead back in the town's plaza, where players would first spawn. Even as she looked around, she could see more and more of her fellow gamers stepping out of their own teleportation lights, confused looks on almost all of their features. The girl, for her part, simply stepped back and leaned inconspicuously against one of the pillars surrounding the plaza. The place started filling up fast, and the girl was suddenly filled with a sense of uneasiness as she realized that nearly all of the ten thousand players of SAO were being gathered against their will. Even if it had been for some opening announcement, something wasn't right. They should've gotten a message or something, with the option to go. That was how things had been done during the beta, at least.
The girl pushed those thoughts aside, however, when she heard cries of surprise and looked up from scanning the crowd to see the sky darkening. As she watched with narrowed eyes, dozens of red warning panels appeared and a thick red substance that looked remarkably like blood started to drip from between the liquid started coalescing and formed into a giant red cloaked figure, she cocked her head in curiosity. Well, that was certainly an impressive entrance.
"Greetings, players, and welcome, to SAO!" The figure swept out his arms, and there was an uproarious cheer from the crowd below. "I am Akihiko Kayaba, creator and game master of SAO, and right now, I am the only person who can control this game." Instantly, the entire crowd fell dead silent. The sentence itself was innocent enough, if a bit narcissistic, but the way the man had said it… there was a weight to those words, and everyone could hear it. "Now, many of you have likely realized that there is no logout button in your menu. This is not a malfunction." As she listened, the gray haired girl frowned. She had noticed the missing logout button, when she tried to leave the game right before being transported to the plaza, but saying it wasn't a malfunction… This was starting to sound really wrong.
"I repeat, this is not a malfunction. SAO was designed this way. As of this moment, you will not be able to log out of Sword Art Online, and no one on the outside will be able to remove or shut down the nervegear on your head. If anyone attempts to do so, the nervegear will send a microwave signal to your skull, destroying your brain and ending your life." The girl's eyes drifted towards the shadow the GM wore as a face. All around her, everyone started muttering about how it must be a joke, or impossible, but she knew better. The nervegear was built just like a microwave. The signal could easily be rewritten to destroy a brain, and even if someone were to cut the power, it had an internal battery. "Regrettably, the families of several players have already attempted to remove the Nervegear from their heads. As a result, the game now has two hundred and thirteen less players than it did originally. They've been deleted from both Aincrad and the real world." Instantly, the girl froze, and a burning sensation started to build from somewhere deep inside her. She could hear the truth in the GM's tone, hear his regret… but not at the loss of lives. No, he regretted that he no longer had those two hundred and thirteen souls to participate in whatever his fucked up plan was.
"As you can see, international media outlets have round the clock coverage of everything, including the deaths." Several panels of newsfeeds from various sources appeared in the air around the GM. "At this point, it safe to assume the likelihood of a nervegear being removed is minimal at best. I hope this brings you a little comfort as you try to clear the game." The grey haired girl couldn't believe she was hearing this. That was meant to bring them comfort? "It's important you remember the following. There is no longer any way to revive someone within the game. If your HP drops to zero, your avatar will be deleted from the system, forever, and the nervegear will simultaneously destroy your brain. There's only one way for a player to escape now. You must clear the game. Right now, you're gathered on floor one, the lowest level of Aincrad. If you can get through the dungeon and defeat the boss, you may advance to the next floor. Defeat the boss on floor one hundred, and you will clear the game. Last but not least, I've placed a little present in the item storage of every player. Please, have a look." The girl didn't want to, would rather anything other than doing something this despicable man asked of her, but she didn't want to know what a madman like Kayaba appeared to be would do if someone refused his 'gift'. Without taking her eyes off the blood red hood, she pulled up her menu and selected the first item in it. She glanced at it, for just a moment, but before she could draw her eyes away, the girl was suddenly engulfed in a bright white light. When it finally disappeared, a different face was staring out at her. Her features had rearranged themselves, but their new shape was familiar to her. Her hair, previously long and straight, retained its original color of charcoal grey, but was now short, hanging in a choppy, pixie-like fashion just below her jawline. Quicksilver eyes, previously dulled to a common grey, flashed from underneath long bangs. Her high cheekbones and wide eyes were reminiscent of European nobility and gave her an exotic, dangerous look. Her actual body had shifted from its previous form of a small, mousy, and borderline scrawny high school girl to a similarly aged athletic one, lined with hard muscles and possessing curves that most girls her age would kill for. All in all, the new changes made her look like some sort of exotic cheerleader, even with her somewhat ragged beginner clothes, and it seriously pissed her the fuck off. The girl didn't mind the face so much, it was hers after all, but she had very purposefully abandoned this body when coming to SAO. Far too many people had assumed what sort of person she was based purely off of her looks, and it was tiring enough to kick assholes up and down the street for it IRL. She didn't need to deal with that in game as well.
"Most of you are probably wondering, why? Why would Akihiko Kayaba, creator of Sword Art Online, and nervegear, do this? Ultimately my goal was a simple one. The reason I created Sword Art Online, was to control the fate of a world of my design. As you can see, I have achieved my goal. This marks the end of the tutorial, and the official launch of Sword Art Online. Players, I wish you the best of luck." The figure, that hateful robed being hanging in the sky, slowly start to dissipate, dissolving back into the red liquid and disappearing into the sky. For a moment, Every last player just stared horrified at the spot Kayaba had just vacated. Then, with one girl's sudden scream, chaos erupted. Players started shouting and running about like chickens with their heads cut off, or just staring into space emptily, a traumatized look in their eyes. The girl with the quicksilver eyes just ignored them, however, in favor of continuing to stare at the spot Kayaba had last floated in, allowing everything he said to wash over her. Two hundred and thirteen... two hundred and thirteen souls lost to this man's sick dream, and more likely on the way.
"So that's how you want to play this Kayaba?" She whispered under her breath, so low she almost didn't hear herself. "Fine, I'll play. But don't go crying to mommy when I drag your ass out of whatever hole you're hiding in and make you pay in kind for every drop of blood spilled, every innocent life taken by this monstrous game of yours. I'm coming for you Kayaba, remember that." Finally, she let her eyes sweep the crowd, one last time. Most of the other people were still around, panicking, but a few caught her eye. A black haired boy who looked like he was around her age, dragging a ginger man behind him with a determined look on his face. Another man, big, bald, and dark-skinned, frowning up at the sky. A small, mousy form disappearing silently into the crowd, pulling the hood of a light brown cloak over her head as she went. All these and more the girl saw, before silently turning her back on the almost ten thousand players still remaining in the plaza, and walking away.