Fake World. Real Experiences.

Chapter 2: Welcome to Sword Art Online

All of a sudden, everything went white. I felt weightless now, as if I was floating in space. Colors quickly fly by my head, but avoid me. I was amazed at how this was going. It was like as if logic was no longer a factor. 

It was five circles that interrupted my thoughts. One flew right up to my face. The display showed text that said "Touch". I wasn't sure what it meant by that. But it almost immediately said "OK" and flew back to the other circles. And then another one approached me. This one said "Sight" and then said "OK". It was here I realized what was going on. They were checking my five senses! The other three confirmed this by checking my hearing, taste, and smell. Once the five circles were done, they turned green, and flew away.

A rectangular display now appeared before me. It said "Language" Then showing two smaller boxes of text. "English" and "Japanese". You don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure out what this was asking. I selected English, then watching the boxes vanish. The login box showed up next, luckily I made an account already, so I simply signed in.  This box expanded and changed the text to "Character Creation". Great, avatar creation. 

My avatar pretty much looked just like me, but his hair was a bit more of a mess, and he had yellow eyes. I wanted to be me, but not to where everyone could figure out who I was. Of course I was male and my name was...? My name. It had never occurred to me till then that I would need a nickname to go by. I stood there for the longest time, trying to come up with one. But in the end, I gave up. It wasn't worth putting in the brain power to come up with one. I simply went with "Joshua" because it was the longer version and what I was less known by. I confirmed my avatar. 

Once again,everything was white, but it dimmed to a more grey color.  Big black text appeared that said "Welcome to Sword Art Online!" About damn time! Then the colors of blue and white flew past me, then things went white, and faded to black.

...What's goin on? I thought to myself.

Why is everything black? Are my eyes closed?

I then felt my eye twitch a bit. They were closed! I slowly open my eyes, and what I saw will forever be one of the most amazing things in my life to have seen.

I was in some kind of town square, and there were lots of other people around me, talking to each other excitedly. I looked around seeing almost thousands of people in this square. I look down and notice my hands, I hold them up in front of my head.

It was here I noticed some...grey bar thing. It was filled in with a green bar, to the left of it it said "Joshua" .

Wait a minute...that's my HP! I thought excitedly.

I feel a huge grin form on my face.

"I'm in the game! I'm in Sword Art Online!" I blurt out, raising my hands in the air with joy.

It was here I felt my starting armor and my starting sword on my back. Again, I was rather surprised at how light they were. Especially the sword. It was lighter then what I was expected as I took it out of its sheath. It was a simple one handed steel sword. Not much else to say about it. But hey, ya gotta start somewhere. 

Oh! I need to add Zack! I recalled to myself. I remembered from one of the reviews that in order to bring up the menu, you had to swipe down in front of you with your right hand. I did just that, and it popped up, I sent my friend request to Zinshaw, and not a moment later, he accepted it, and I was able to see his position on the map. I made my way trough the crowd to him. 

When I was finally able to see him, I saw his avatar was rather different then he was in person. Even though the only real differences were he had white spiked hair and red eyes. I noticed he was talking to someone with blue long hair.

Zinshaw saw me approaching, and waved over at me.

"Hey, whats going on Josh man?" He said with enthusiasm.

The blue haired man just gave me a look.

"Not that much, I can't believe I'm finally in SAO!" I reply.

"Me either! Oh, I should introduce you guys!" He turns to the blue haired man.

"This is Cody, AKA: Kaleb!"

Kaleb let out a light smile to me, bowing to me. 

"Greetings Josh. Zack told me plenty about you from the line." He said calmly.

"U-um...thank you." I said.

Zinshaw grinned as it seemed everyone was getting along.

The three of us had a short conversation before Zinshaw whispered something to Kaleb. He nodded and looked over to me.

"Say." Kaleb said.

"I know a good spot to level grind from the beta-test, Zinshaw and I are going there. Would you like to come along?" 

I had to admit, I felt a fire light up in my eyes.

"Hell yea!" I almost screamed.

"Alright, we set out!!" Zinshaw said.

And with that, my adventure began, as we walked out of the town square and out from town. Kaleb taught me the basics of fighting, and how to use all the items. The three us found a large group of boars. And one by one, we took them all out, using some of the basic sword skills. We all were amazed as they dissipated in fragments of data.

This is what I've been craving!  This is what it truly feels like to be alive!  I thought as my sword went through a boars head, killing it in one hit, resulting in a level up and some COL.

"Josh! to your left!" Kaleb yelled.

I turned to my left, I was amazed at the speed of what was coming my way. With sword in my right hand, I pointed it at the sprinting wolf coming at me.