Dreamers of the Day - Book One - Prologue
"A last question before we let our honored guest go for the evening, Akihiko-sensei, what do you have to say to the people raising concerns about Full Dive instilling violent impulses in players?"
"Violent impulses? I don't think I understand."
"Some critics have voiced concerns that playing such a realistic game, in such an intimate way by embodying their characters, could cause players to translate these behaviors to reality, where they could be extremely harmful."
"Ah, now I see . . ."
"Akihiko-sensei?"
"All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible."
"That's . . . T.E. Lawrence right? As in Lawrence of Arabia?"
"He was reminding us of the power of dreams to shape reality. Not just the things we do, but the things we imagine doing. I think . . . Such critics are entirely missing the point of Sword Art Online. It is a tragically common ailment in our modern day. Yes, it is true that combat is a feature of the game experience. It is a feature of many games. But Sword Art strives to transcend being merely combat. Castle Aincrad is a world of Weapons and Sorcery. But it is also a real place."
"A real place, Sensei?"
"Yes. Aincrad is a real place which we may all go to. A world to be fully realized by the players of Sword Art Online. A place of profound stories. Where our actions will truly matter."
"It sounds like a power fantasy, putting it that way."
"Many games are. But I prefer to think of it as an empowerment fantasy. Especially in our world of today, where so many feel powerless, even unto themselves. No action can matter if it does not have consequences. The only thing we can carry with us between these two worlds is our state of mind. I do not think there is much to fear of a world that sharpens a conscience as much as it sharpens a blade."
- Excerpt from MMO Today Podcast, Nov 3, 2024
In the outskirts of Saitama, beneath an overcast autumn sky, within a small bedroom, a boy was illuminated in blue by the light of a computer monitor. He was of almost exactly average height, and somewhat slender of frame, his sister would say 'scrawny', usually while trying to coax him to exercise. He resembled his mother much more than his father, soft, almost feminine features, his most distinguishing trait, beneath a mop of lank black hair.
The bedside clock sedately blinked 12:45 PM.
At that moment he wasn't paying the time any mind, he'd set an alarm for 12:55 precisely, the bedside clock was radio calibrated against the NICT master atomic clock, the same one used by the SAO servers. He wasn't worried.
Instead, his attention was focused entirely on his monitor. There were a few videos going all at once. One was a livestream from MMO Daily showing people picking up their launch copies of Sword Art Online. Another was last night's interview with Kayaba Akihiko.
A hard copy magazine sat open on the desk, the glossy pages turned to an interview with the genius behind Full Dive technology. Kayaba Akihiko, a tall and vaguely gray man, although not old, looked out from the page, smiling as he held the Prototype Nerve Gear helmet like a proud father.
"No doubt our avid followers were just as disappointed as us six years ago when SAO was suspended in the Pre-Alpha phase. After so much promising footage and multiple groundbreaking technical demonstrations. In the six years since, in partnership with RECT, RECT-ARGUS is finally proud to present Sword Art Online in its uncompromised and intended form!"
"It's certainly been a long wait, Kaori. But even if half of what the Beta Testers tell us is true, the wait has been well worth it! Games like ALfheim Chronicles, and Gun Gale : Squad Jam, have kept Full Dive gaming relevant, and shown the potential of the technology beyond the education enterprise, and medical spheres where it has exploded. But what has been missing so far has been a crowning jewel. Will that be Sword Art Online, I wonder?"
"Good question Kusakabe, I hope to find out soon! I can't wait to get started and roll my avatar. I think I'll be a pictish musketeer! What do you think, Kusakabe? As a cat-girl, I'd be pretty gosh darn cute!"
"It's certainly tempting to play something like a Si. But I think I'll be perfectly happy playing a human scholar. I just want a chance to explore Akihiko-sensei's marvelous world! Just remember, friends, SAO requires the Third Generation Memeosphere. So if you plan on picking it up, you're going to want to put the money aside for the new console too! That's all for now folks, this has been MMO Today's Deep Think segment!"
Both streams were minimized, playing in the background while the majority of the monitor was consumed by local playback from Sword Art : Dojo. The video depicted a young man, almost the young man sitting at his desk, but not quite, a little less soft, a little more lean, maybe who he'd have grown into, in a couple more years, if he'd been born a kendo fanatic like his sister.
That very same sister had once glimpsed him watching the playbacks and rolled her eyes at the idea he would shun kendo just to wave around a virtual sword in a virtual place. But they weren't the same thing at all. It wasn't Swords, it wasn't Sword Arts, it was Sword Art Online, the world he wished to inhabit.
He was watching, and thinking, his hands twitching as he absorbed his mistakes and considered corrections, how he'd do this against a human opponent. How he'd handle someone wielding an axe, or a spear, how much ground could he cover before a bowman drew an arrow, or a musketeer aimed their gun.
But he wasn't really alive, not at that moment. Just waiting.
In the video, the young man was engaged with a virtual opponent, an armored knight far larger and more imposing than he. Frame by frame, it would seem an impossible fight. But in playback it was just the opposite. When the video was running, at a smooth 244 FPS, the boy sitting dully at his desk, face slack, and the man on the far side of the screen, didn't look the same at all.
The young man was beautiful, it showed in the surety of his step, the speed of his sword, he moved with spare grace, never relenting as he thrust and parried, his swordsmanship a cascade of motions far beyond the capacity of the boy, flowing into each other like an undiluted stream. Sparks danced between their swords, he pried out the knight's weaknesses, chinks in their armor, slashing at straps, behind the knee, and beneath the shoulder. His his face was alive with intense concentration.
He took the knight apart until, finally, he delivered the finishing blow.
The simple iron sword shining to life as he achieved the conditions to activate his Art and felled the armored champion with a steel cleaving blow that split their helm.
The boy should have felt triumphant. Instead, he grimaced as he looked at the results. SAO didn't give the players a lot of HP to play with. You had to avoid damage at all costs, be it by speed, range, bladework, or heavy armor. Some of those swings had been near things, leaving the swordsman at half HP with a long list of debuffs stretching across his status ribbon symbolizing debilitating injuries.
It looked like slick dueling, but that kind of sloppy work would end a Labyrinth Delve in no time. Not good enough. Not nearly good enough. He glanced at the clock and was about to start the next playback when there was a knock at the bedroom door. "It's unlocked," he called, turning his chair."
A head of black straight shoulder length hair shyly peaked inside. He was met by the sweetly smiling face of the girl he called his sister. "Hey big brother, uhm, I'm heading to today's practice now . . . do you . . . need anything before I go?"
He opened his mouth, thinking for a moment, then smiled and shook his head. "I'm good, Sugu, thanks."
Her eyes darted to the screen. She didn't really approve of his hobby, but she still gave a small nod. "Okay then, have fun with your video game." She ducked out, and then poked back in again, "Oh and remember, CERO says you should take a break every hour to move your body and get lots of liquids!"
He blinked owlishly, then smiled sheepishly. "I'll try to remember that."
"Good!" She nodded gravely before closing the door.
As her footsteps faded, so did his smile. He didn't know why, but there had been a little bit of a thaw between him and his sister recently, so he wanted to try, really try, to keep that door open. It was kind of nice, almost like when they'd been kids again. And then he'd be reminded of how she was different now, not the little girl who cried when she skinned her knee, and needed her big brother to protect her. How in the end she'd protected him far more. It made him feel like an intruder into her life.
And then it would hurt for a while. He didn't belong there. But that was okay, he might not have known his place in the world of his birth, but he knew where he belonged in Aincrad. Forging a path with only the sword in his hand. He'd be there very soon.
In the corner of his screen, a message box opened.
ARGOleCat - How's it going Kii-bou? Plannin on an all nighter?
Kirito - You know it, Cat. Gonna bookit for the Anneal Quest first thing. You?
ARGOleCat - Gotta rebuild my network. :-(
Kirito - Rumors true then?
ARGOleCat - Yeah, RECT-ARGUS reset our whole accounts, not just progression. My message box is GONE. So I hope you listened about remaking your AS.
Kirito - Don't worry, I took care of it last night.
ARGOleCat - OwO? So did you take my advice? That Edge Lord pretty boy look didn't suit you at all XD
He grimaced as he remembered the Cat's good natured ribbing. The truth was, he had changed his avatar appearance since the Beta. Though not because of what she'd said exactly. More because of what Suguha had said when he'd shown her a high fidelity render, just to get a second opinion was all.
"Who's this? An actor?" She'd asked, missing the telltale signs of a 3D model.
"Just . . . How does he look?"
Studying the image thoughtfully for a minute, she smiled, "Looks like he could be Elza Kanzaki's boyfriend. Real Dreamy. I'd love to date a guy like that!"
And just like so, his previous avatar, which he had painstakingly constructed to embody his ideals of cool, had been consigned to the trash can. His new AS might have borne more resemblance to his real self than he really liked, but he felt better that way. Instead of relaying that, he simply typed :
Kirito - You'll just have to wait and see. Maybe I'll get the drop on you, Cat!
ARGOleCat - Not in a million years with your crap hiding skill! I'm setting up now, see'ya there, Kii-bou!
12:54 PM
Right, it was time for him to get started too. He glanced over to his bed. Despite his sister's well meaning advice, he did actually care for his health at least a little bit. He had his water bottle and some healthy snacks already arranged by his bed. He was dressed comfortably in a long sleeved shirt and sweatpants. He was used to Full Dive and knew how to stay comfortable and not harm his body during long play sessions.
Then he paused to examine the object resting on his pillow like a dragon's egg. It had taken some doing, but he'd managed to put the money together in order to qualify for the Beta Test. It had taken scrimping together all his new years money, for several years, selling his Nerve Gear, and the Amusphere he took on family trips, most of his gaming collection, and more than a few long nights building PCs, but he'd done it.
The Memeosphere, otherwise known as the Nerve Gear Revision 3, or sometimes disparagingly as the 'Nerve Gear Pro' by people who couldn't afford one. He knew that wasn't true though. He'd looked over the specifications. The parts he could understand anyways. It didn't even use microwaves so much as something called a 'Quantum Set Space' to read and manipulate the entire brain at a very high degree of fidelity. At least, that was what the technical specifications had said. It promised to be far safer and less invasive in reply to one of the persistent fears about the Nerve Gear, the microwave transmitters.
And besides that, the advanced functions of the MUSE system wouldn't work without it. The entire foundation of how SAO could be a game with progression but no skill leveling simply wouldn't have been possible.
Holding the clean, unblemished, glossy gray plastic, feeling the surprising weight of the circuitry packed inside, he carefully adjusted the headset until it fit comfortably, and settled down so that his head was well supported by the memory foam pillow. And then he waited. A small LCD screen was built into the visor, reporting connection status, remaining charge on the backup battery, and the current time.
12:59 it blinked. His eyes widened, finally coming alive, and then, taking a breath, just as the clock struck 1:00 . . .
"Link Start!"
A moment of tension transforming into vertigo as her bedroom sealing stretched away into pure white, and the feeling of the mattress beneath her dissolved. She was floating, bodiless, in a blank void that stretched on for as far as the eye could see. Then, as if approaching from a great distance at tremendous speed, a banner expanded to fill her vision. "WELCOME TO SWORD ART ONLINE!"
This was weird.
Really weird.
Really really weird.
It wasn't her first time using a Full Dive Rig, her brother owned a couple, both an original Nerve Gear, and the smaller sleeker revision he'd take on trips. She'd tried productivity software before, but never quite gotten the hang of thought based typing. Other than that, some of the guided tours of famous locations had been interesting and educational.
But this was different, she wasn't typing a report, or viewing a virtual lecture for a school credit. This was something entirely different. Entirely new. And possibly a little forbidden. Her brother gamed. She reminded herself. Her brother was also an adult and could spend his time and money how he liked, so long as he upheld the family name.
Meanwhile, she was expected to serve the family name. A very big difference. What did it matter if this was forbidden? She didn't have much time left anyways.
She would have bit her lip at that moment, if she'd had a lip at the moment to bite. Instead, she carefully 'thought typed' her credentials with the virtual keyboard and passed seamlessly through the login screen.
"So what to do now?" She thought out loud, surprised to hear a vaguely female voice echoing in her ears. "Huh? That's neat!"
"Welcome, Player!" A calm androgynous voice greeted, speaking as if it had materialized beside her. She spun her head, or rather, her field of vision suddenly panned as she tried to turn her head and came face to face, nevermind lacking a face, with a spark of light contained within a crystal sphere. It was a bit like a floating light bulb, she thought, not at all frightening once she got a look at it, and actually sort of cute.
"Wha! Ah . . . Oh uhm . . . Hi? Uhm who are you, exactly?"
"Hello player, I am Alvis, the SAO Tutorial program." The thing that called itself 'Alvis' flickered in time with the cadence of its voice. "I am a natural language enabled knowledge engine designed to assist new players with their full dive experience. Are you in need of assistance?"
"So you're an AI? It's nice to meet you, Alvis-san. Uhm, I was actually wondering what I'm supposed to do next. I see 'Create Avatar Self' and there seems to be a lot of different options."
"Of course." Alvis flickered for a few moments as it seemed to think. "I can help you with that! There are four methods to generate your Avatar Self within Sword Art Online. Option one, recommended for experienced players, is the character creator. In this mode, maximum customization and control is handed over to the user."
She thought at the indicated menu option and was immediately overwhelmed as an explosion of sliders and dials filled up her field of view. This was what an 'experienced player' was expected to use? Were they all JASDF fighter pilots? Just as quickly, she closed it out again.
"Uh . . . That was too much!"
"Very good!" Alvis remained endlessly chipper.
"Option two is random character creation. You will be spawned in with a random avatar of your chosen race and gender." Oh right, there were different races in this game. She knew that there were humans, but also her brother had described the Pictish and something called the Si which he'd pronounced like the english word 'She'. You could even play as a different gender.. She thought about that for a second, then shook her head, which was to say sent her vision rocking back and forth. That might be a bit too much. A random character sounded easy, she thought, but she still wanted to hear the other options.
"Option Three, you may upload an image from an authenticated social media account. SAO will then construct your avatar from your real life appearance. Customization is available after upload!"
"Uhm, no thanks." She said after a moment. She was in no way ashamed of her looks, in fact she took a fair amount of pride in them. But she wasn't exactly sure what this whole SAO thing was about, except what she heard from her brother, she knew it was swords and sorcery, not exactly the place she wanted to wear her real face.
"Very well, Option Four, assisted character creation, a combination of the above three options. Using prompts, biometric data, and provided social media, I will help you to realize your Avatar Self."
"Uhm really?" That actually sounded really cool, in a techy sort of way.
"Note that in this mode, customization options are under AI control, user input is indirect."
"So it's like a questionnaire?" Her curiosity piqued.
"Questions will include preferences, history, and intent, all data is anonymized after use. Your privacy is guaranteed and you may cancel this option at any time."
" . . . "
"Player?"
"Okay, let's try that."
"Preference questions. I will now say a word, and you may say what you think. Please answer however you wish, there is no wrong answer."
The purpose of some of the questions were pretty obvious. Things like how she responded to words like 'Masculine' and 'Feminine', 'Tall' and 'Short', 'Slender' and 'Strong', 'Stalwart' and 'Evasive'. She answered as truthfully as she could, though she wasn't exactly sure what all of her answers would mean in the end, which she guessed was the point. Then the questions had become steadily more esoteric.
"Princess or Knight."
"Pri . . . Knight." She was tired of being a 'princess'!
"Battle or ballroom."
"Battle!" She wanted to laugh, anything but another social occasion, another chance to be ogled by men almost twice her age, who'd ask her parents to marry her, and then would be cheating before the first anniversary.
"Intelligence or wisdom?"
"Wisdom!" She'd met so many smart, clever, insufferable people, she was just about sick of them.
"Strength of body or of spirit."
"Why not both?" After all, there was no wrong answer. It was aspirational.
"Earth."
"Forest." Like the woods near her grandparents' home, the happiest days of her life.
"Fire."
"Cooking." The smell of a stockpot, steaming in her grandmother's kitchen, the old radio crackling with some vaguely melancholy song.
"Water."
"Streams." Mountain streams, full up with fish, scales glittering at they darted. Her grandfather's fishing line as she sat on the rocks and watched.
"Air."
"Wind." Rustling the trees outside the guest room as she lay in bed at night.
"Void."
" . . . "
"Void."
" . . . "
"Is the question upsetting?"
"What?"
"Is the question upsetting? An alternative may be chosen."
"Uhm no that's fine." It was anonymous, she reminded herself, anonymous, it would never get back to her. "Home." The house where nobody talked to each other. Where servants cooked the meals.
"Favorite Color?"
"Uhm . . . I don't really have one. Red maybe? Maybe blue."
"What is it that you hope to accomplish?"
"Uhm . . . I'm sorry Alvis-san, I'm not sure what you mean."
"Within the world of Sword Art Online, players inhabit their Avatar Selves. Within Castle Aincrad, what is it that you wish to be? What is it that you seek, Player?"
She almost canceled and closed out of the program right then and there. The nerve of this machine! Why all of these questions just to play a silly game? But something compelled her to answer, maybe, she thought, it was just that a computer program had thought to ask her something no human ever had. At least, not since her grandparents. And back then, she'd just been too young to say.
What did she want?
"I . . . "
"Is the question upsetting?"
"I . . . I . . . "
"Is the question upsetting?"
"I want . . . to be different." And then she went on in the silence that Alvis left open.
"I want to be exactly myself but completely different. I want to be a better version of myself. One with a different life and a different future." It was all pouring out now, more than even she'd suspected.
"I want to be stronger, and braver, someone who can make her own money, and her own decisions, and stand on her own two feet, who doesn't have to go to the schools decided by her mother, and says what she thinks, and means what she says, and doesn't need to marry who her parents tell her to!" Then, as much as the menu would allow her, she shouted her own question back. "Is that enough? Can you make me that?!"
Her chest would have been heaving, that was, if she had a chest or the lungs inside of it. But her real body was doubtless laying perfectly still, showing no sign of her inner turmoil.
The silence stretched on for what felt like forever, the only indication of the passing of time was the gentle steady blinking of Alvis' crystal form. She wondered if she'd broken it.
But then, "Questionnaire has been parsed. AS compiled. By selecting Accept you will agree to the AS settings and composition and be transported to Castle Aincrad, First Floor, Town of Beginnings."
She stared at the prompt floating in the air, wishing for a moment she could just close her eyes. But she guessed she needed an avatar for that. The prompt flashed as she accepted, disappeared as the menu screen dissolved away and she felt herself beginning to fall, plummeting, though unafraid.
She felt the sense of a body returning to her. Arms and legs, hands and feet, wind against her face, and running through her hair. The white void grew brighter. "Linking Player to Avatar Self full sensory mask. Loading Motor Control and MUSE drivers. Releasing movement locks . . . Good Luck Player : Asuna."
And then . . .
The light was almost blinding. Asuna blinked, and her vision resolved into a colorful blur. She blinked again, and it became distinct shapes. One last time, the shapes became buildings, pillars, a brick paved plaza, and other people milling about, talking, laughing, running. Aside from the mundanely fantastical clothing, and the swords carried by every last one, they looked like excited tourists.
Asuna paused for a moment, just to take it all in. The simple feeling of presence. She was present in the place she was standing. It wasn't a picture, or beyond a computer screen. She had stepped through the screen, into another place, as another self. Only when she'd reconciled did she start to take in her surroundings.
It was . . . for a moment Asuna wondered if she had been transported to Rome rather than Sword Art Online, the columned perimeter was reminiscent of St. Peter's Square. But she'd taken that Full Dive Tour and immediately the discrepancies started to pop out. This place was decidedly smaller, though still vast, and decidedly more colorful.
Vibrant Banners draped from the curving colonnades, splashed with greetings to new players. WELCOME TO SWORD ART ONLINE! They declared YOUR NEW WORLD AWAITS! Faintly, Asuna heard the whine and -pop- of daytime fireworks going off in the sky, and when she looked up, she glimpsed small colorful puffs of smoke beneath . . . was that a CEILING?!
There was a flatness to the blue of the sky, giving the impression that the space between earth and heaven was maybe only a few hundred meters,at most. How very strange. She thought her brother had mentioned something about that. Castle Aincrad, it was something like a great big wedding cake.
Asuna shook her head, if she was really curious, she could certainly find out later. For now, she looked down and found herself looking at hands wrapped in brown leather fingerless gloves, her body, clad in a modestly fantastical outfit, a pleated linen blouse tucked into a red vest and shorts with dark leggings.
Her body!
This was her body now.
It felt . . . different . . . a little bigger. She blushed. Heavier. But also strangely lighter. Massier? As if she'd gotten stronger to balance out the change in size. Definitely a bit taller. She'd have to remember that, she thought, as she nearly tripped over her own legs. And this hair, it was wilder than she was used to, shorter and lighter than her real hair, as if from long days bleached under the sun.
Then, looking about as more players appeared in soft flashes of light, she spied a fountain and steeled herself for what she'd see.
The water made a poor mirror at first, revealing only the shadow of her silhouette, but then the surface stilled and the light caught it just so. What Asuna saw caused her to look about, sure that it was someone else. But no, there was only her.
'That's me?' She thought, hand touching the curiously familiar stranger's face. She might have been a sibling, or a cousin. An older girl, no, a young woman she thought, just old enough to have finished college, old enough to be out from under her parents. Features sterner and graver than Asuna's own. No less fair, but tempered by a life out of doors, as if she'd grown up in that wonderful home near the forest, hiking the mountains and swimming in the rivers. Not a princess at all, but a fierce and brave lady knight, just lacking her shining armor.
The young woman's lips trembled, and then parted as Asuna tried to think what to say. What she would have her other self say.
"She's perfect."
A voice a little older, a little deeper, and a little richer than her own whispered tightly as she quickly wiped the tears forming from her eyes.
She hugged herself. Then, she threw her arms wide, turning about and laughing as she drank in the vast world stretching out around her. Nobody else paid her any mind, they were all swept up in it, and that was exactly the way she liked it as she set out, head swiveling to take in each new marvel of this lively city in this fantastical world.
It would only be for a little while, this other Asuna knew, her heart fluttering in her chest. But for this precious little while, her worries melted off of her. For this little while, she felt free.
The launch day festivities proceeded apace. The Starting Square of the Town of Beginnings was lively with players spawning in and experiencing Steel Castle of Aincrad for the first time. They were already starting to spread out from the town's center, exploring the main avenue and side streets.
A few, Beta testers no doubt, were making a straight line for the Highway of Heroes. They'd doubtless be disappointed when they discovered that they were limited to the starting area and the surrounding training fields. A necessary step, it had been decided, to orient so many new players in the immersive world of Sword Art Online. No need to overwhelm them on the first day.
Not that Achilles could blame the Beta Testers. He was sure many of them were eager to acquire the bite of an Anneal weapon as soon as possible. In fact, he too felt the longing to rush off and upgrade his spear and shield. But the chains of obligation beckoned.
"The current player count is thirteen thousand four hundred and sixty eight. Seventy three new players have logged in within the past sixty seconds." Reported the beautiful young woman at his side. She was raven haired and pale as the moon, bright keen gray eyes seeming distracted by her analysis.
Unlike Achilles and their other companions, who were bedecked in standard starting equipment of their respective classes, no different from any other player, she wore a style of clothing that would have looked not too out of place in a modern boardroom. An elegant white and gold trimmed form fitting outfit that flattered her graceful figure. Even her hands were adorned in pure white gloves as she swiped and flicked deftly through the materialized menu that displayed dozens of different traffic metrics for the benefit of her companions.
There was no concern she would break immersion appearing like that. They were currently observing from an ornate second floor gallery. A sort of arcade full of minor shops and restaurants. Off limits to normal players for the time being.
"I expect we will meet the target player count by the 5PM deadline, Achilles-sama." She confirmed with a bright smile. "I believe that congratulations are in order."
"Save it for when Akihiko-sensei joins us." Achilles pronounced, throwing his arms in back of his head, stretching what appeared to be a tall lean and muscular frame topped by the sort of vibrant hair a manga hero might sport. Of course, the genius of RECT-ARGUS would deign to be fashionably late. He was probably putting the final touches on his personal avatar.
In the meantime, Achilles supposed, he'd just have to make his own fun with the people he was with. Which might be a challenge, he admitted.
His fellow man wasn't really the problem. Nishida, looking considerably less old and more handsome than his earthly self with the smoother skin and full head of hair of his idealized avatar, was great company. They'd been working together for almost a year now as Nishida's firm performed the herculean task of hammering out the security protocols for the world's first Full Sensory MMO, and Achilles had come to love hearing all of the veteran professional's war stories about the 'Wild West Days'.
Even more impressive was that, despite his years, Nishida was still sharp as a tack, keeping up with all the new technologies required to make Sword Art Online as secure as possible. Even Akihiko-sensei had paid his respects during an inspection.
And when conversation drifted to less technical topics, well, Mister Nishida's age certainly hadn't dulled his adventurous spirit. He'd traveled the world sport fishing with everything from rods, to spears, to harpoon guns, and he'd leaped at the opportunity to claim a launch day copy of the next generation Memeosphere's crowning achievement, Sword Art Online.
No, Nishida wasn't the problem, it was the dour girl walking beside him, looking much too serious as they strolled along in parallel with the players in the streets below, experiencing a technological marvel of the modern world. "This is all so frivolous." She grumbled, sounding a little bit like a petulant child dragged to a formal occasion she did not understand. She looked it too, a little uneasy, a little uncomfortable in her own skin.
Which might have been the case. Although the avatar did not look bad at all, she was very beautiful in fact, Achilles thought, a real princess in the rough wearing her starting archer's dress, long green and tawny hair in a crown braid, she just wasn't used to Full Dive. In fact, in her normal life she was reluctant to even use productivity software, claiming the old Nerve Gear rigs gave her migraines.
Achilles smiled sheepishly. "Well, it's frivolous to the Yuuki family to the tune of a hundred and seventy five billion yen, so maybe pray for its success?"
Maybe this hadn't been such a good idea, he reconsidered, in fact it could turn into a disaster. But Yuuki Shouzhou had been called to an important board meeting, so that had left them short an official representative for the opening ceremony at the last possible moment.
They could have just given the role to a member of the development team, or even to an NPC, but he was old fashioned like that, it didn't sit right with him for the launch day to not show the flag properly, and besides, his sister had needed the breathing room, more now than ever.
It had been bad before. Studying for the high school exams, the non-stop cramming. She'd become a lonely girl to meet their mother's demanding standards. But the closer she got to graduation, the higher Yuuki Kyouko's expectations seemed to rise. It wasn't good enough to go to the best college. She needed to marry into the best possible family. Marriage. When her parents had told his little sister she was going to have an arranged marriage, the light had gone out behind her eyes as she nodded dumbly.
Asuna was incredible in so many ways, she didn't even realize, but she'd never learned how to say no to their parents. And Kouichirou had never had to. He'd lived the comfortable life of a first son of a wealthy family. It wasn't hard, you just had to avoid taking any risks.
Getting their mother out of the house for a few hours was the least he could do.
It was the kind of cheeky plan he'd never really have considered in real life. He usually kept to his own business as the good first child even when he saw the weight of expectations resting on his little sister's shoulders. But the point of Sword Art Online was to role play a hero.
The kind of person he wanted to be, so . . .
"Actually, it's a rather important if minor role, you know, participating in the inauguration ceremony." He decided to speak tactfully. "Countless employees of our company have devoted years of their lives to making SAO a reality. So it would mean a lot for them to know their hard work is appreciated by the Yuuki family."
That got the intended response. Yuuki Kyouko could be a demanding woman, but she did respect hard work. And she was stickler from socially acceptable rituals.
"Do not get me wrong." It was shockingly endearing watching his mother express herself through that youthful face. "It is not that I cannot see the appeal of all this . . . after a fashion . . ." She managed diplomacy like she was pulling teeth. "However . . ."
"Huh?"
She bit her lip, a girlish blush was spreading, an artifact of the Emotion Engine making it hard for players to hide their feelings. "Is there a reason I'm a cat?"
A long silence passed before Achilles broke out laughing. For in addition to being quite a beautiful young woman, his mother's avatar did in fact sport the tawny ears and articulate tale of a cat. Yuuki Kyouko, the archer Atalanta as her screen name proclaimed her, didn't like that, her red face transitioning to a grimace, her ears flattened and her tail fluffed. "You're having fun at my expense, aren't you, Kouchirou?" The effect of a mother's authority over her children was rather weakened by her current appearance, causing him to laugh harder.
"No, no, it's not, it's not like that at all." Yuuki Kouchirou, the spearman Achilles, managed to get himself back under control. "It's just . . . You did tell my assistant to make the avatar anything. You were only going to use it this once, after all."
"I thought that would mean normal." She crossed her arms. "Not this . . . Cat . . . Girl!"
"Pictish."Nishida offered, coughing as he hid his own laugh.
"What?" Kyouko looked as if he had spoken in an alien tongue.
"I believe the game calls your avatar's race the 'Pictish'", Nishida elaborated, "They're a sub type of Fairy. And in the game that avatar is normal. It is an MMO after all."
Atalanta's scowl turned doubtful, she glanced back at her appearance reflected in the window and cautiously touched the ears atop her head, mildly startled when they reflexively twitched. "So you're saying cat girls are . . . an MMO thing?"
"Basically." Achilles agreed. A mean little part of him was taking pleasure in seeing his mother out of her element, but he did need to be careful not to annoy her to the point she logged out. "Besides, the Pictish have superb senses and agility, maybe you can fire the inaugural arrow at today's ceremony? Grandma was always proud of your kyudo."
She looked skeptical. "It's been a lifetime since I even touched a bow. And I was never that good!"
"The MUSE system will help you make the shot. Even if you've never touched a bow at all." Achilles told her, "No fear you'll embarrass yourself, Missy." Pictish had feline eyes, a trait that his mother demonstrated amply as she fixed him with a glare. "I mean . . . Let's try this place out." He hooked a thumb at the sign of a cafe overlooking the main boulevard.
While players perused the stalls in the streets below, and familiarized themselves with the wondrous array of items available even on Aincrad's first level, the four of them sat down to be served as the first customers of a pristine dining room. Achilles ordered milk tea and strawberry cake all around while chatting up Nishida about his work.
"Of course half of it was just learning what we didn't know about the new computational principles." Nishida was explaining. "Quantum computing still isn't well understood outside of specialized fields and there's a great deal of misunderstanding about what it is and isn't capable of."
"We had a LOT of strange ideas come through the office for approval." Achilles agreed, watching as an NPC waitress came and set a generous wedge in front of each of them, strawberries glistening as the whole mass was held together by a generous stripe of white frosting. He could smell the confectionery sweetness. "That guy who thought we could maybe entangle the Memeospheres directly with the main server Super Calculator. Obviously that's not how it works. He thought we could get exabytes of bandwidth out of each rig by entanglement!"
"Oh right, him!" Nishida chuckled. "Whatever happened to that fellow?"
"Akihiko-sensei let him go, I think." Achilles shook his head. "Bit of a nut. But lively."
"It reminds me of my days fresh from university." Nishida waxed nostalgic. "Chaos theory was a big buzzword back then, and there was this mathematician pestering the government that he could cloak information in pure chaos as a form of encryption by exploiting non-linearity functions. He swore it was promising."
"So what happened?" Achilles asked. "Didn't work?"
"Oh he was a very smart fellow in his field, but a simple application of Fourier Functions cleaned up the signal like that." Nishida snapped his finger sharply. "That's the thing about the sciences, they get so vast, you don't even realize you're working on a solved problem. Or plunging unexplored depths. Ah, he was a nice fellow though, I hated to see him disappointed."
"What happened to him?"
"I believe he's an adviser to the diet now."
Achilles darted back to Atalanta as she poked speculatively at her cake. She seemed surprised by how authentic it was before reluctantly lifting a small bite to her mouth. Her eyes widened and her ears perked. Then she hesitantly considered another bite.
"You know, you can eat as much as you want and you won't gain any weight." He chided, receiving the same deadly glare before she defiantly forked a bigger piece. After a sip of her tea to contemplate she said, "It tastes . . . real."
"Of course it tastes real." Achilles grinned. "The Memeosphere is just doing what the old Nerve Gear did but better. Directly stimulating the taste centers."
"Akihiko-sensei always said full dive would never take off until you could have a satisfying meal." Their fourth member said as she closed out her analytics windows. "I'm happy to say that all projections are nominal. I estimate twenty five thousand players by our 5 PM deadline."
"Good to hear." Achilles smiled across the table, a look that did not go unnoticed by Atalanta.
"So." She addressed the young woman. "You are an employee of RECT-ARGUS, correct, in my son's department?"
"I liaison between the development team and the CARDINAL AI system that forms the infrastructure of SAO." She explained politely. "But I do work with Achilles-sama on a daily basis."
"Good education?"
She tilted her head. "I studied under Akihiko-sensei himself. He was," she paused to blink quickly, "Responsible for my curriculum during my education."
"And is this relationship purely professional?"
Kouchirou cursed the emotion response engine at that exact moment, spluttering . . . "Uhm no . . . No no! No! We-we're not like . . . I like to think we're friends but . . . uhm . . ."
"What Achilles-sama is saying is that it wouldn't work out between us." She looked at him with a bright and magnanimous smile. If his avatar had a heart, it would have melted then.
"Y-Yeah . . ." Yui is a colleague." He explained. "And a good friend. A very good friend." A good listener to all of his troubles. "But just a friend."
"I see. Well then, Yui-san, another question." Atalanta played with her fork, seemingly testing the dexterity of her hands. "You were trained under Akihiko Kayaba . . . what sort of man is he exactly?"
"You mean you've never met him?" Yui tilted her head.
"Once." She said, frowning. "A dinner party hosted at our home. But he left early. He seemed quite cordial but . . ."
"Like he was lost in a dream?" Achilles asked.
"Yes, exactly." She nodded. "So he's always like that?"
"When he's not being a raging perfectionist." Achilles agreed. "It's the temperament of a genius, I suppose."
"I have to agree with Achilles-sama." Yui nodded, a thoughtful expression on her face. "I've worked with him for three years and I still don't think I properly understand him. He's a perfectionist, until he's not, some things are very important, while he doesn't care at all about others."
"Oh?" Atalanta tilted her head.
"He was absolutely insistent that the first floor be perfect." Yui explained. "No, not perfect, exactly as he described it, down to the smallest details. He said it was essential the Town of Beginnings in particular produce a sense of 'place' for everyone who inhabits it. But he didn't really care at all what the development team did with the other floors. He told them to go wild to their heart's content."
"Maybe he just wanted a good foundation." Achilles reasoned. Sure, Orignia felt a little mundane compared to some of the stuff they had in store for the players once they got passed the first floor boss, but it was a bit like what they were doing with the players right now, not overwhelming them too quickly."
"Maybe." Yui agreed. "But then he's also very demanding of the Axioms."
"Axioms?" Atalanta asked.
"The AI subroutines that operate under Cardinal, the Central GM AI that runs the whole show." Achilles explained. "They're like subordinate or lieutenant functions responsible for different domains. Cardinal itself is just the overarching administrator. Akihiko-sensei always insisted they must be absolutely perfect . . ."
"His precise words were 'incorruptible from their purpose'." Yui supplied.
"Yeah, that." Achille checked the time by the clock in the corner of his vision. 1:47. How time seemed to fly. "We should get down to the ceremony grounds soon."
"Oh about that." Yui perked up. "You know how you told me I should trust my own ideas more?"
"Yeah?" He remembered, how couldn't he remember? It was about the only time he'd been the one encouraging her.
"Well." She made a small gesture and Achilles heard his mailbox chime. "I thought this might be interesting, so I wanted to get your thoughts."
Swiping open his menu, Achilles looked the proposal over. "These are all the beta testers that are logged in right now?"
"Divided by their performance metrics during the Beta." Yui agreed. "I thought we could message them and organize a little demonstration for the new players. Duels and the like." She brightened as an idea clearly flashed behind her gray eyes. "Oh! I could even have a field boss spawned in!"
"That . . . might be a little much. But I do like this little tourney idea. If you can organize it, sounds great. Actually, do me a favor."
"Yes?"
"There was this player in the Beta group, he seemed kinda meek at first, but he turned out to be a real wise ass in a fight. I wouldn't mind a rematch." Achilles grinned roguishly, "My spear thirsts for his blood."
"I will find him right away, Achilles-sama!" Yui answered brightly. Atalanta was less thrilled.
"What?"
"This game brings out a different side in you, Kouchirou." His mother frowned. "I don't like it."
"Well it's a game after all." He finished his tea and stood. "It's not like if you die here you die for real."
KIRITO JOINS THE FIGHT! - "We are what we pretend to be. We should care what we pretend to be."
ASUNA JOINS THE FIGHT! - "There are no heroes to save us. WE have to save us!"
ACHILLES JOINS THE FIGHT! - "The point of this world is to be a hero, after all."
NISHIDA JOINS THE FIGHT! - "Ah what a lovely place for some fishing!"
ATALANTA JOINS THE FIGHT! - "It is frivolous . . . But if I must!"