Sword Art Online - Volume 1 - Aincrad (4 page)

“…
not there, right?
”
 

“
Yeah, it
’
s not there.
”
 

I nodded, although it felt slightly annoying to agree so easily. Cline smiled and started rubbing his thick chin.

“
Well, it
’
s the first day so these sort of bugs could occur. Around about now the GMs should be crying by now from the amount of messages flooding in,
”
Cline said calmly.

“
Is it alright for you to stand around like that? You said that you ordered some pizza, didn
’
t you?
”
I asked teasingly.

“
Ah, that
’
s right!
”
 

I smiled as I watched him jump around, his eyes wide.

I threw away a couple of items I didn
’
t need from the inventory, which had turned red due to having too many items inside, and then walked over to Cline.

“
Argh! My anchovy pizza and ginger ale-!
”
 

“
Why don
’
t you call a GM? They might cut you off from their side.
”
 

“
I tried, but there
’
s no response. It
’
s already 5:25! Hey, Kirito! Isn
’
t there some other way to log out?
”
After listening to what Cline said while waving both of his arms
—
 

My face became rigid. I felt a groundless fear send a chill down my back.

“
Let
’
s see
…
to log out
…”
I said while thinking.

To get out of this virtual reality and back to my room, I have to open the main menu, press the log out button and press yes on the window that popped up on the right. It was pretty simple. But
—
at the same time, apart from the procedure above I wasn
’
t aware of any other way of logging off.

I looked up at Cline
’
s face, which was situated quite a bit higher than my own, and shook my head.

“
No
…
there
’
s none. If you want to log out yourself you have to use the menu, apart from that there
’
s no other way.
”
 

“
That
’
s impossible
…
there
’
s got to be something!
”
 

Cline suddenly starting shouting as if he was denying my statement.

“
Return! Log out! Escape!
”
 

But of course, nothing happened. There were no voice commands on SAO of that description.

After shouting this and that and even jumping, I spoke to Cline.

“
Cline, it
’
s useless. Even the manual doesn
’
t have anything on emergency access terminations.
”
 

“
But
…
this is just stupid! Even if it
’
s a bug, I can
’
t even go back to my room and my body when I want to!
”
Cline shouted with a bewildered expression on his face.

I totally agreed with him.

This was impossible. It was complete non-sense. But it was indisputably the truth.

“
Hey
…
what is this? It
’
s really just weird. Right now, we can
’
t get out of this game!
”
 

Cline gave out a desperate laugh then quickly started talking again.

“
Wait, we can just turn the power off. Or just pull the «Gear» off.
”
 

As I watched Cline move his hands, as if he was trying to take off some invisible hat, I felt the anxiety returning.

“
That
’
s impossible, both of them. Right now we can
’
t move our bodies
…
our real bodies. The «NERvGear» receives all the signals that our brain is sending here
…”
I tapped the back of my head.
“…
and reroutes them to move our avatars here.
”
 

Cline slowly closed his mouth and put his hands down.

We both stood speechless for a while, each lost in thought.

To attain the Full Dive state the NERvGear blocks the signals that our brain sends down our spines and changes them so that we can control our avatars in this world. So however wildly we swing our arm about here, the arm of my real body, which was lying on my bed right now, wouldn
’
t move an inch; ensuring that I wouldn
’
t hit my head against the corner of my table or anything.

But because of this function we can
’
t cancel the Full Dive of our own free will right now.

“…
so unless the bug is fixed or somebody in the real world takes the Gear off, we have to wait it out?
”
Cline mumbled, still a little dazed.

I silently signaled my agreement.

“
But I live by myself. You?
”
 

I hesitated slightly but told him the truth.

“…
I live with my mom and my younger sister, a family of three. I think that I
’
ll be forced out of Dive if I don
’
t come down for dinner
…”
 

“
What? H-How old is your sister?
”
 

Cline suddenly looked at me, his eyes sparkling. I pushed his head away.

“
You
’
re pretty calm right now, aren
’
t you? She
’
s part of the sports club and hates games, so she
’
s got nothing in common with people like us
…
but more than that,
”
I spread my right arm in an attempt to change the subject.
“
Don
’
t you think it
’
s weird?
”
 

“
Well sure. Since it
’
s a bug.
”
 

“
No, I mean it
’
s not just a bug, it
’
s an «impossible to log out» bug, it
’
s a big enough problem to bother the operation of the game itself. Like your pizza in the real world is getting colder every second, it
’
s an actual economical loss, isn
’
t it?
”
 

“…
a cold pizza
…
it
’
s as meaningless as hard natto!
”
 

I ignored these meaningless comments and kept talking.

“
If it
’
s like this, the operators should put the server down and log everyone out whatever the case. But
…
it
’
s already been 15 minutes since we
’
ve noticed this but there hasn
’
t even been a system message, let alone putting the server down, it
’
s just too weird.
”
 

“
Hmm, now that I think of it, you
’
re right.
”
 

Now Cline started rubbing his chin with a serious expression on his face. In the area beneath the bandanna, which covered a little bit of his sharp nose, intelligence sparkled in his eyes.

I started listening to Cline, feeling a little strange about talking with someone who I
’
d never meet if I erased my account.

“…
the company which created SAO, «Argas» is a company that
’
s famous for being considerate about its users, isn
’
t it? That
’
s why everyone was fighting to get their hands on a copy even though it
’
s the first online game. It
’
s sorta meaningless if they screw up like this on their first day.
”
 

“
I agree, and SAO is the first VRMMORPG. If something goes wrong now they might put down regulations for the genre itself.
”
 

Cline and I looked at each other
’
s virtual faces and sighed.

Aincrad
’
s seasons were based on reality, so it was early fall here as well.

I looked up, sucking in the virtual air, taking a deep, cold breath.

100 meters away I could just about see the light purple bottom of the 2nd floor. As I followed the uneven surface I saw the huge tower
—
the «labyrinth» that was the path to the upper floor, and saw that it was connected to the outer entrance.

It was just past 5:30 and the small strip of sky that could be seen was red with the light of the sunset. Despite the situation I was in, seeing the endless plains painted gold with the light of the evening sun I found myself speechless in front of the beauty of this virtual world.

Right after that.

The world changed forever.

Ding, ding, a chiming noise like a bell, or perhaps a warning bell, sounded loudly, making Cline and me jump in surprise.

“Ah…”

“What’s this!?”

We shouted at the same time and stared at each other, both of our eyes wide.

Both Cline and I were immersed in a clear blue pillar of light. Past the blue veil, the plains in my vision blurred steadily.

I’ve experienced this a few times during beta testing. It was a «Teleport» initiated by an item. I didn’t have the prerequisite item nor did I shout the proper command. Did the operators initiate a forced teleport? If so, why didn’t they even inform us?

As my thoughts raced, the light around me pulsed stronger and darkness overtook me.

As the blue light faded, my surroundings became clear again. However, this wasn’t the plains lit with the sunset anymore.

A large road paved with stone. Medieval streets surrounded by street-lamps and the huge palace radiating a dark light a fair distance away up ahead.

This was the starting point, the central plaza of the «Starting City».

I looked at Cline who had his mouth wide open next to me. Then at the bustling layers of people that surrounded the two of us.

Looking at the bunch of stunningly beautiful people with a variety of equipment and different hair colors, they were no doubt other players like me. There were about a few thousand
—
ten thousand people here. It was likely that everyone who was logged on right now had been forcefully transported to the central plaza.

For a few seconds, everyone just looked around without a word.

Then a few mumbles and mutters could be heard here and there; it started to get louder.

“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 the hell out here, GMs!” could be heard.

Then suddenly.

Somebody raised his voice above all these comments and shouted.

“Ah…look above!”

Cline and I almost automatically turned our eyes upward and looked. There a strange sight greeted us.

The bottom surface of the second floor, one hundred meters up in the air, was checkered in red.

When I looked closely I could make out that they were made up of two phrases crisscrossing each other. The word that was written in red was [Warning] and the other [System Announcement].

I
was
surprised
for
a
moment
but
then
thought
 
Oh,
the
operator’s
going
to
begin
informing
us
now,
 
and
loosened
my
shoulders
a
little
bit.
The
chatter
died
down
in
the
plaza
and
you
could
feel
everyone
waiting
to
hear
what
was
going
to
be
said.
 

However, what happened next wasn’t what I had expected.

From the middle of the pattern a liquid similar to blood started oozing down slowly. It came down at a rate that almost emphasized how viscid it was; but it didn’t fall down, instead it started morphing into another shape.

What appeared was a twenty meter tall man with a hooded robe draped around him.

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 rim were shadows.