Hey guys! Firestorm40 here. This is one of my newest stories, don't worry, I still write Fox Slayer soon. If you guys wanna know why I slow on the update, I've kinda had this idea for a while now. Anyway, this is my newest project, a Sword Art Online story, I dunno if you guys enjoy it or not, I hope you guys do. Saito (my oc) and Kirito are good childhood friends, so don't get confuse when you read they already know each other. Anyway, disclaimer!

I own nothing but my oc. This will be following the anime, So if there's anything wrong tell me in the review.

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In 2022

Humanity has finally created a complete virtual enviroment.

In a game called...

"Sword Art Online"

"Its time for this week MMO stream! We began with a promotion video. Was this the day of last week's launch? What with all of the people waiting in line for? Sword Art Online!"

"Man... that's one hell of a line..." A spiky blond haired boy said as he continued to watch tv in his medium size apartment living room. He had tanned skin, and a slight muscular body. His green eyes watched the tv as it kept going on and on about the game."Good thing I pre-ordered that game..."

"Young master, do you want some tea?" An eldery man walked in, wearing butler clothes as he carried a tray of tea.

"Ah... thank's Robert."

"My pleasure, young master Saito."

The blond boy, who was now identified as Saito, sipped his tea. "Man... its been a week and the line's still that long...".com

Robert chuckled. "Well, it IS the only game that has virtual reality."

"True..." Saito's cell began to beep as he check it, 1 message, it said.

Hey, you ready?

Kirito

Saito grinned before replying.

Anytime!

Saito 

Saito quickly rose from his coach and walked towards his room. "Well Robert, I have an appointment I need to attend, thanks for the tea."

"With master Kirito?"

"Yup, we're meeting up inside the game, you know, the usual drill."

Robert nodded. "Have a fun game, young master."

Saito gave a thumb's up, before entering his room. His room was a medium size room with a desk and two drawers, books of manga and games neatly placed in one of the drawers, posters of games and anime hung all over the room's wall. Saito walked to his desk and picked up a helmet like device and putted it on, before he lie down on the bed and grinned.

"Link, start."

'Head link, check'

'Body link, check'

'Hands link, check'

'Legs link, check'

'Checking complete.'

'Language: Japanese'

'Account: ******

'Password: *******

Creation Character:

Beta test data still available.

Would you like to use it?

Yes/No

Please wait...

WELCOME TO SWORD ART ONLINE

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Floor 1: Town of begining

Saito, or Shoto, blinked as his vision was all blurry, he blinked two more times before his vision came back to him. Shoto raised his left hand, and squeezed it as he grinned. "I'm back..." he whispered. Saito's character had long blonde spiky hair, covering some of his face, deep green eyes, wearing an white novice clothing with brown leather vest and black pant. "Now to find Kirito..."

"No need." A voice said behind him, he looked towards it, and saw a boy with a long dark hair style. He wore a blue novice clothing and brown leather vest like Shoto with black pants. "Yo." The person extended his right hand with his palm clenched.

Shoto smiled widely as he punched directly to the other person's clenched palm. "Bro fist! Kirito! Its good to see you! How did you find me?"

The other person, now known as Kirito smiled. "Bro fist, its good to see you too, Shoto, to answer your question, I just accidentally spawned behind you."

"Really? Awesome, anyway, let's go to the hunting field! You can take point."

"Alright." Kirito nodded as he ran towards the hunting field with Shoto behind him.

The two of them ran past several people who already made a party, some buying from shops, and some were flirting to get partners. A red haired character noticed them running passed him into an alley, as he realized something he quickly ran after them.

"Hey! You two there!"

Shoto and Kirito stopped, both of them turned around to see a red hair character with white clothing and brown vest panting after them.

"Us?" Kirito asked.

The red haired man finally caught his breath. "Fwuh... Well, you two move like you two been here before, you two were in the beta-test right?"

"Y-yeah.." Kirito answered.

"You bet we were!" Shoto said with a thumb up.

The man smiled. "Today's my first day, show me the basic okay?"

"U-uh..." Kirito was unsure.

"Please! I'm begging you!"

Shoto shrugged. "Meh, why not?"

The man smiled again. "Really? Cool! My name's Klien, nice to meet you two"

"Shoto, nice to meet you too."

Kirito sighed, but smiled and introduced himself. "I'm Kirito."

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Floor 1, Town of Begining: West field

"Ugahhh!" Klein was thrown away as he was rammed by sword art online's most basic monster, Wild boar. "Ugh... right in the crotch..." Klein was holding his crotch in great pain.

"... Gimmie a break, you don't feel anything right?" Kirito said as he and Shoto watched Klein fought a wild boar.

Klein hearing that, stop holding his crotch and realizeed that he didn't feel any pain. "Oh yeah... just a habit I guess."

"Ahahahahaha! Just like us when we first started this game!" Shoto said, laughing while holding his side.

Kirito sighed. "I told you, what's important is your initial motion input."

"Sure, I get that..." Klein looked at the boar. "But he keeps moving around..."

Shoto stopped laughing as he wiped his tear. "Well, if you do the motion right, and activate a sword skill..." Shoto took a pebble and aimed it at the boar, the pebble started to glow red, then Shoto threw it, hitting the boar right on its... behind. "The system will ensure the hit connects." The boar now look very pissed.

"Motion... motion input..." Klein mumbled as he took a stance.

Shoto rubbed his neck. "How can I put this? Hmm...Oh! Just add a slight pause when the skill begins to active." Shoto took out a short sword, before he evaded the boar's first charge, and blocked the second. "And let it explode!"

"Explode...? Huh.." Klein then began to realize it, as he took a stance and his sword started to glow.

Shoto and Kirito smiled. "Here!" Shoto parried the boar and kicked it towards Klein.

Klein let out a battle cry as he charged towards the pig, at the last second he slashed the pig in half, reducing its health to zero and making it explode.

"Alright!"

"Congrats." Kirito said as he and Klein high fived.

"Yeah, congrats on beating that boar... although Wild boar are weak as a slime from other games." Shoto commented bluntly.

"Dude! You just ruined my moment of greatness!" Klein seemed annoyed by the comment. "So anyway, there are a lot of skills right? Like blacksmithing and stuff?"

Kirito nodded. "Yeah, I heard there are unlimited numbers of skills, but no magic."

"Man... creating an RPG without magic huh? Pretty bold." Klein commented while practicing a few swings.

"Uh, guys, not to ruin our moment or anything, but now the other boars are here.." They both looked towards where Shoto was looking, and saw 4 wild boars and one bigger looking boar in a 2-2-1 formation. "And a frenzy boar to boot."

"Uh... this looks bad." Klein said as he took a stance. "What do they want anyway?"

"Frenzy Boar usually led a pack of wild boar on a patrol or something, since the frenzy boar is aggressive... well, you get the point." Shoto informed him.

"Oh man..."

"Don't worry." Kirito took out his sword. "Just remember your training."

"Yeah and don't forget." Shoto took out another short sword. "Your friends always got your back."

The boars charged and so did the three players. "I'll take the frenzy! Shoto, Klein, do something to those wild boars!"

"I got it!" Shoto went to the right side to take out the boars.

"Yosh! Let's go!" Klein charged to the left side as Kirito was in the middle.

Shoto evaded the first charge of the first boar, and jumped over the next one, he immediately turned around and stabbed his short sword, resulting the second boar to stop. Shoto then proceeded to stab it again killing the low level first boar stop to turn around, Shoto used that chance to sprint towards it and slashed it two times using his sword, the boar stumbled in pain and Shoto thursted his sword, killing it.

Meanwhile, Klein, since he was inexperienced, was having a little bit of a hard time. Klein took damage, but he managed to somehow kill the boars.

"Klein! Let's help, Kirito!" Shoto yelled as he sprinted towards where Kirito was currently fighting the boar, Kirito was dodging a charge from the frenzy boar, "Kirito! Switch!" Shoto yelled seeing a chance, charged and drove his sword into the boar's back, staggering it, Kirito quickly took the chance and cleave the boar's head clean, causing it to disappear completely.

Shoto released the breath he was holding. "Man... we are so badass... believe it."

Klein laughed while panting. "I know, right?"

Kirito laughed. "Well, I'm just happy we managed to survive our first ecounter with a frenzy boar..."

"The first time we got our asses kicked." Shoto said remembering the memory. "Ah... The memory."

Kirito nodded. "Anyway, let's hunt a little more."

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Time Skip

"I still can't believe it, no matter how many time I see it..." Klein said as he watched the beautiful view of Sword Art Online world. "That we're in a game... whoever made it is a genius."

Right now, our heroes were sitting and resting at the edge of a cliff in west field while watching the beautiful view of the SAO world, Shoto was sitting at the edge, beside him are Klein, a little far away from the edge, and Kirito who was the only one standing up.

"It's really beautiful, I'm glad I was born in this time." Klein continued.

Kirito shook his head. "You made a big deal out of everything."

"Its my first time full diving you know!"

Shoto raised an eyebrow. "So, this is your first time playing a game with NerveGear?"

"I rushed out and bought the hardware to play SAO, I was lucky to get one of the ten thousands. You two are ten times more lucky, getting into the beta test, only a thousand people managed to do it." Klein said with a hint of proud on his voice.

Shoto and Kirito looked at each other before shrugging. "I guess so."

"How far did you two get in the beta?"

"Well, for a couple of months only to level 8." Kirito answered.

"And that's hard as hell, ya know" Shoto said, remembering the time they were beta testing.

Kirito nodded, then he smiled. "But now, it'll only take a month."

Shoto laughed. "You got that right! Bro fist!"

"Bro fist."

"Huh... you two are really into this." Klein said as he watched the two interact.

"To be honest." Kirito unsheathed his sword. "During the beta test, SAO was the only thing I can think of day and night, in this world, a single blade can take you anywhere you want to go." He stopped. "Its a virtual world, but it still feels more alive than in the real world."

Shoto looked away grimly.

"Anyway." Kirito said cutting the silent. "Want to hunt some more?

"Hell yeah!" Klein said, but then he held his stomach. "But I'm starving... so I'm logging out."

"Eating food here only made you think your full." Shoto said. "The damn thing is, there's no cheeseburgers!"

"Ah... well, don't worry! I already order a hot pizza for 5:30!" Klein said.

Kirito sweatdropped. "Wow, you're prepared."

"Of course! After eating I'm getting back here." Klein said as he stood up. "Hey guys, after this I'm gonna meet on some people I know from other games, want to friend them too?"

Kirito looked away, Shoto just rubbed his head while sighing, Klein, sensing the awkwardness said. "Of course, you don't have to if you don't want it, it's okay, I'll introduce you two on a later time."

"U-uh... yeah, sorry." Kirito said with hints of awkwardness.

"Hey, you know, I've been wondering, if I decided to get my cooking skill high enough, will I be able to make cheeseburgers?" Shoto wondered out loud.

Kirito sweatdropped. "You've been wondering about it since beta test."

Klein laughed. "Hehehe... man.. you two sure make an odd group."

"Hey!" Shoto seemed offended.

Kirito sighed. "So we've been told."

Klein shook his head in amusement. "Anyway, I owe the two of you, I'll repay it someday, in mental." Klein patted the other two players' shoulders. "Anyway, thanks for everything." He extended his hand, Kirito accepted it and shook his hand, then Shoto.

"If you have any questions, just ask Kirito or me, alright?"

"Yeah, just tell me or Shoto."

Klein nodded. "Yeah! I'll do that!" He mock- saluted the two, and opened his menu, searching for his log out option. "Huh?"

Kirito, knowing something wrong, asked. "What's wrong?"

"There's no button to log out."

Now that gained the duo's attention. "What? Look closer."

"Its not there."

Shoto opened his menu. "Its right... Huh? There isn't any...?"

"See? Not there."

Kirito opened his menu, and checked too, sure enough, there wasn't any log out option. "No... there isn't.."

"Well, its just came out of Beta right? The game are bound to have some bug, I'm sure the server people are freaking out."

"In a second, you will be too." Kirito said. "Its 5:25." He pointed out.

Klein gave his most horror looking face. "No! My teriyaki mayo pizza and ginger ale!"

"AAAhhhhhhh! Today Robert's making cheeseburgers as dinner too! Nooooo!" Shoto too showed a horrific face before falling to his knees and screaming to the world of his misery.

Kirito sighed, being the only sane one. "Just call the game master."

Shoto and Klein stopped screaming. "Oh yeah..." Shoto said, now remembering.

"I tried, but I got nothing! Is there any other way to log out?" Klein said and asked.

Kirito began to think. "I don't think so, if players want to logged themself out, they have to go through the menu."

"That's nuts!" Klein said, not believing. "There's gotta be some way!"

"Return!" Klein did a pose. Nothing happened.

"Log out!" Another pose, and still nothing happened.

"Escape!" Still nothing.

"It won't work." Shoto said with a almost panic face. "There's no secondary exit in the manual either."

"You got to be kidding me... Oh I know! I'll just rip out the NervGear on my head!"

"That won't work." Kirito interrupted Klein's futile action. "We can't move our real bodies, the NervGear intercepts everything we told our bodies to do here." Kirito pointed at his head.

"Y-you can't be serious..."

"We can either wait for someone to fix the bug, or for someone to remove the NervGear from us." Shoto said.

"But I live alone." Klein said. "What about you two?"

"I have a... uncle back home." Shoto answered.

Kirito was silent for a minute. "I have a mother and a sister."

Kirito was immediately interrupted by Klein as he dashed towards Kirito. "H-how old is your sister?"

Kirito was getting really freaked out. "S-she's on a sport team...she hates games and she has nothing to do with people like us!"

"That's not-" Klein was interrupted as Shoto grabbed his shoulder and threw him away. Kirito coughed to regain his composure. "More importantly, don't you think it's weird?"

"Weird? Yeah, its a bug." Klein answered.

"No, it isn't a bug is it Kirito?" Shoto muttered.

Kirito nodded."Yeah... if we can't log out, don't you think that will pose a serious problem for the game future?"

"Yeah, I guess you're right."

"If they wanted to, they can just shut down the server and log everyone out." Kirito continued.

"And there isn't even an annoucement..." Shoto said, thinking.

*Gong* *Gong*

The sound of the town large bell was heard, as blue lights surrounded them.

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Town Of Beginnings

When the lights were cleared, they saw that they were at the town center, and every player too started to appear one after another.

"What in the-" Shoto's question was cut off as someone pointed at something in the sky.

"Up there!"

A red warning sign could be seen, then the sign began to spread across the entire sky. A blood like ooze started to fall down and form something, a humanoid creature. When it was done, a humanoid hoded figure appeared wearing a crimson robe, with it's face covered entirely.

"A game master?"

"Why doesn't it have a face?"

"Is this an event?"

"Welcome players to Sword Art Online, my world," the hooded figure spoke in a deep and booming voice.

"My world?" Kirito asked in a whisper.

"I am Kayaba Akihiko, as of this moment the only person who can control this world," the hooded figure greeted.

The players eyes' went wide, now knowing who the figure was.

"Is that really him?"

"He must've spent a lot of time for this."

"I know many of you are wondering about the logout button went missing. I wish to tell you that this is not a defect in the game, but all part of Sword Art Online," Akihiko said making many eyes widen.

"What!? Is he insane?" Shoto said, gritting his teeth. That guy pissed him off!

"You cannot logout SAO yourselves, and no one on the outside can shut down or remove the NerveGear," Akihiko said before continuing, "if one were to attempt to remove your Nerve Gear during gameplay...the Gear would sent off microwave waves that would destroy your brain and thus, ending your life."

Many players gasped as some took a step back, but Akihiko wasn't finished.

"What's he talking about? He must be insane, right guys?" Klein asked, looking at the duo.

"He's right." Kirito answered. "The transmitter work like a microwave."

"If the safety turns off, then it could fry the brain." Shoto continued. "And the gear had an internal battery, so power cutting is out of the question."

"But that is crazy! What's going on here?!"

"Unfortunately, some players' family and friends have ignore this warning, 213 people have already suffered that fate regrettably and are now gone forever," Akihiko informed bringing up a screen with various pictures of players... were players. There were news coverage all around and various videos of families and friends breaking down crying.

"It's... that many?" Shoto asked in shocked.

"213..." Kirito whispered in horror.

"Damn it! I don't believe it!" Klein said.

"The entire world news has already reporting this, including the deaths, thus you can assume the danger of NerveGear being remove is minimal. So relax and focus on beating the game." Akihiko said calmly. "But, I want you to remember this clearly, there's no method to revive someone in this game, if your HP reaches zero, your avatar will be forever lost and the NerveGear will destroy your brain."

The players could only stare in shock at what Akihiko had just calmly proclaimed.

"There's only one mean to escape, and that is to complete the game. Currently you are in the lowest floor of Aincard, floor 1, if you make your way through the dungeon, and beat the dungeon boss you may advance to the next level until you reach floor 100 where the last boss is waiting, defeat it, and you will clear the game." Akihiko said.

"Clear?"

"What is he talking about!?"

"No! You're lying!"

"Beat 100 floors? That's imposible, the beta testerss haven't even made it that far yet!" Klein yelled.

Kirito and Shoto only glared at Akihiko.

"And finally, I've added a present to your inventory, please see it yourself."

Kirito and Shoto exchanged looks, and opened their inventory.

'Inventory:'

-Mirror.

"Mirror?" Kirito asked as he and Shoto took out the mirrors.

"Uagh!?" Klein screamed suddenly as he was surrounded by blue light, so did the other players, including Kirito and Shoto.

When the light faded, every player transformed. "Kirito, Shoto, you guys okay?" Kirito and Shoto looked towards the sound, and saw a man with short red hair.

"Who are you?" Kirito asked.

"Who are you two?" The man asked, Kirito and Shoto looked at the mirror, and see their faces, their real faces. Kirito had short black hair and black eyes, he was quite pretty with his thin and small body, hell he could past as a girl! He was even shorter now.

"What in the world!? I'm me!" Shoto freaked out. "Kirito! You're you! And that means..." Shoto looked at the red-haired man. "Klein!"

"Shoto! Kirito!" Klein exclaimed. "How...?"

"Probably the NerveGear, it covers your entire face with high density signal or something, so it can see what your face looks like." Shoto guessed.

All the players too, transformed into their original forms, all the men that lied behind their character were found out, and some girls even turned into guys! Which was very disturbing.

"But... our height and bodyweight?" Kirito asked.

"Well, when we first used it, it had us calibrate it right? You had to touch your body all over." Klein answered.

"That's right... I didn't know it would be this advance though..." Shoto said.

"But why?"

"I'm sure he'll tell us." Kirito answered, pointing to Akihiko.

"I'm sure you are wondering, 'Why?' Why would Kayaba Akihiko, the founder of SAO and NerveGear do all this? My goal has already been achieved, my goal in creating SAO... its to create it and intervene it, and now its complete... The tutorial for SAO launching is complete... good luck players..." Akihiko then transformed into a red mist and went back up to the sky, making the red warning sign, disappear.

All the players looked at where Akihiko was before, all of them lost for words, that is, until some one dropped their mirror and screamed.

"Nooo!"

"Screw you!"

"Let me out! Let me out!"

"Help us! Someone!?"

"I have a meeting after this!"

"Help us! Help us!"

Kirito and Shoto looked at each other and nodded. "Klein, come with us."

"Huh!? W-wait!"

Shoto and Kirito dragged Klein to a desserted street.

"Listen to me Klein, we're heading to the next village right now. Come with us."

"Huh?"

"If what he said is true." Shoto said. " The only way to survive is to make yourself as strong as possible... In other words, the money and EXP we can earn are limited. The field around here will soon be hunted clean, and that's not a good thing."

"In other words." Kirito continued. "To do this efficiently, we need to head to the next village. I remember the route and dangerous areas, so even at our current level, we can reach there safely."

"But... but you know..." Klein sighed. "I spent a night in line to buy this game with my friends from other games, they're out there, in the plaza, I can't leave them."

Kirito and Shoto stayed silent, knowing that the more players they bring, will increase the danger.

"Sorry, I can hardly ask for anything else, can I?" Klein said. "So don't worry about it, go to the next village, I used to run a guild in my other game you know." He then gave a thumbs up. "I can use what you two taught me to get by!"

Shoto and Kirito looked at each other. "Alright then, let's say good bye here, send us a message if anything happens, alright? We're still on your friend list you know." Shoto said.

"Okay."

"Well, bye then Klein." Kirito said, as he and Shoto prepared to walk away.

"Kirito! Shoto!" The two boys stopped. "Uh... you know, your looks right now suit you guys better."

Shoto and Kirito smiled. "That unkempth face of your suits you ten times better."

Shoto laughed. "Hahahahaha, sure!" Then he and Kirito turned around and ran, as Kirito took one last look back, Klein was already gone. "I hate saying good-byes..."

"Same here ."

The two of them ran and kept running pass the desserted street and into the field.

"We... we're going to survive!" Kirito cried out.

"Hell yeah we are!" Shoto cried put as he and Kirito kept running to their destination, a wolf appeared in front of them and charged to attack, but both of them were ready and unsheathed their swords, and cut the wolf in half.

"WE WILL SURVIVE!"

To be continued...

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Hope you enjoy it! And pairing vote for Shoto. Vote for it from review or PM! More review faster update... I hope, I feel really happy when people review my story... even for one line.

See ya!!!