[IC] The Link to Reality - An Alfheim Online RP (Always Open!)

[HereComesTheSnow]

POMF

Well, he'd found the NPC in question...

"Fuck! What the--"

But hadn't mentally prepared himself for just how disorienting an experience VR teleportation could be. Something he found himself regretting instantly, as he tried to find his footing once again.

One brief stumble and cautious looks thrown at his surroundings, the Gnome allowed himself to exhale and stand a bit straighter, greatshield still at the ready.

"So this should be Aarun, right? How do I get to the boss from here?" he wondered aloud, beginning to walk and ignoring the brief glances from other players, who for their parts quickly figured out what was going on from glancing at his level.

Just a rank newbie fresher and greener than a newly cut lawn. Nothing that out of the ordinary.

Bon Bon's domain had to be somewhere around here, right?

[Crimmy]

There were times when AntoniusPius really wished that money was easier to find in-game.

Her buying offer of three hundred <<Health Potion>> for four hundred Yrd on the Auction House had yet to find a willing seller. It was the lowest one on the list of course, but was there really nobody out there who would part with the potions for less than five hundred? She was starting to get a bit desperate, especially with so many of the in-person vendors also refusing to drop their prices. Maybe she'd level up her Alchemy and Crafting skills in the future, because going through all this trouble was quite frustrating.

With a sigh, the Púca girl shoved her hands into the pockets of her dress skirt, stepping away from the auction box and onto the street. The offer was still up, but she wasn't putting too much hope in it succeeding. Maybe she'd have to find <<Food>> instead. It healed for less, but it was still cheaper than a <<Potion>>.

For now, she was just going to roam Àrun for a bit.

Her eyes glimpsed a gnome.

Wait, was that a newbie?

"You're pretty underlevelled for the Capital," AntoniusPius called out as she approached WalliamWillace.

[HereComesTheSnow]

"I kind of noticed." came the reply, as he quickly sized up the person who felt like talking instead of just shooting him one of those "you're pretty nooby to be out here buddy" looks. That had already put her in his good books, as far as he was concerned. Weren't these games all about playin' with other people, anyway?

Puca. Interesting. Those were sort of like bards, if he remembered right. Either way, she definitely had sunken in much more time into the game than he had, going off her level alone.

AntoniusPius, huh? Marc Antony, right? Sounded like a safe bet. Didn't really matter in the long run. After all, he wasn't Scottish in the slightest and yet here he was running around with a pun on the freedom fighter's name. Wondered if they'd catch that, seeing as English'd have to be her second language.

And speaking of second languages, time to put that Japanese to work. "NPC teleported me here. For the event."

[Crimmy]

"The Easter Event?" she asked. It looked like the newbie wasn't Japanese; it was quite obvious from the accent. "You know you can go hunt for eggs up near the Gnome zone as well, right?"

There was something familiar about the Gnome player's name. Maybe from a movie she had watched with her father when they were younger or something. She wasn't really sure. Mr. Choi had always been a fan of American movies after her grandpa had served with the UN forces during the Korean War, so everything really blended together. AntoniusPius was more of a Shakespearean type of girl anyway, and it was a lot easier reading the Japanese translations than trying to piece together English with half-baked fluency.

Anyway, why would the Gnome be down in Àrun anyway? Could it be because of the Bon-Bon boss? Did it possess level scaling to fit the abilities of the parties facing it or something? Or was it just high-levelled players only?

[HereComesTheSnow]

"Yeah. Figured I'd take a look at the boss first. Dunno what it's like. Holiday event, so it oughta scale, right?"

It was sound logic. If you wanted to fight the boss for event specific drops, it should scale to your level, right? That way there's no being left out of the loop for drops or anything. Any other way and there'd have to be an uproar from the playerbase.

He supposed if the drops were levelled too, that would also make sense.

It'd also blow all kinds of ass.

"You know?"

[Crimmy]

"It might be scaled," she said, thinking back to her attempt at fighting against the monstrous eight year old, "but I'm not too sure. I was part of a raid earlier, but we were completely eradicated. Couldn't really tell from that one fight."

If this Gnome (she decided that he would be WW from now on; it was a lot easier than trying to pronounce the English in her head every time she read the name floating in the air) went through the same experience as her, then there was no doubt that it would be bye-bye for him. AntoniusPius had gone into battle with a numerous amount of potions, utilised a lot of buffs on her party, and was promptly decimated like Spartacus' armies were by the Romans. A bit humiliating, honestly.

That was why she was going to try and again and make sure that Bon-bon went down hard.

[HereComesTheSnow]

-"So I just need ta git gud, huh?"- he muttered in English to himself, listening to the Puca's--Pookah's--either or's-- recounting of a complete wipe her first go round and giving a curt nod.

"Doesn't sound like the most easy time for a noob, then. Guess we'll have to see?"

Tanking would have been his primary idea, but at basically starting level, even with scaling he would be way too squishy. Averaging his own with the other raidmembers'd result in something still far beyond what he should reasonably be able to handle.

Should and could being very different terms, however. He made a grin that wouldn't look out of place on a shark.

"Sounds like it could be fun."

[Crimmy]

"You might need better equipment than," she gestured at WW's armour and tower shield with her left hand, "what you're carrying. Bon-Bon is quite a tough boss."

A complete newcomer to the game, one that had likely not trained any skills whatsoever, would be mincemeat the moment they tried fighting the Easter boss, especially without a decent set of gear. Had she some Yrd on her, AntoniusPius probably would have given the guy some of it. But alas, she was broke again, and most of her cash was waiting at the <<Auction House>> for her <<Health Potion>> offer to go through. If it ever did, but she was holding out for a miracle.

"How familiar with the game mechanics are you, by the way?" asked the Púca girl.

[Shadowcatcher]

.......

............

......................

Bon-Bon stared at the fairy man who suddenly entered her field. Her head tilted slightly to the left as he asked If the two could be friends. This fairy hadn't taken her quest... that meant she wasn't allowed to play with him.

"Bon-Bon's mommy says it's not good to talk to strangers. "

Suddenly a single vine would rise up from the ground and wrap around the torso of the fairy, lifting him up and tossing him into the air, out of the clearing. Waving to him as he was ejected from the field, Bon-Bon would sit and wait for someone to come back and play.

---

Shadowy's Place - Butterflies Valley

Listening as the guy named Sindri answered the few questions she had asked, she noticed that a few people got up and were getting ready to leave. Thankfully they didn't come up to the counter until he had finished talking. It would have been awfully rude to have their small talk inturrepted once again. When he had asked for her name, she was happy to tell him. Hopefully it would get her name out there and in turn attract more people to come by. Even if they were coffee drinkers.

"My name is Shadowy. Hence the name of the shop, 'Shadowy's Place'. Sorry I can't talk more, I'm a little busy. Feel free to stay as long as you like though." she turned to the short line at the counte after speaking to him. "That"ll be ten Yrd please."

"Oh, I'm paying for these guys too." the Undine man said, pointing with his thumb to the four people behind him. "Alright, fifty Yrd, please." she would correct herself, opening her menu as the other fairy would do the same, transferring the money easily. "Man, I can't believe how cheap this stuff is. It's so good, and not even a quarter of the price of a glass of alcohol. Seriously, this is going to be the most popular place in Alfheim one day."

Blushing about as red as her hair, she laughed and waved her hand. "Oh, no way. I think that's exaggerating a little. In any case, I think I like things how they are now. My house can only fit so many people, and business is good. I can't ask for anything more than that."

After the group talked to her for a few more moments, insisting she should try to get out there more, they had to go and once again, her cafe settled into a silence. Save for a few whispers here and there. That silence only lasted a short while before she saw Beasty-kun suddenly wake up from his temporary coma. Her brow raised when he lunged for the cup of coffee she placed near him, spilling a bit as he did and downed it in one go. That was when her clumsy friend began to walk forward and she parted her lips to speak a warning.

It was... a little too late.

Cringing as her friend stumbled haphazardly over the short coffee table, she was concerned for his well being for a moment. As if nothing had happened, he got right back up and went over to the counter, placing the cup down gently. "I need another cup, please." he had said as she looked at him with wide surprised eyes. Reaching over to take the cup from him, she would prepare his next cup easily, stirring in the nectar as she added it to her coffee blend.

"Here you go. .... You should maybe sit down before you... die. Are you playing while your tired again? You seem clumsier than usual today." she asked him, genuinely concerned.

It was then that her front door opened and in walked another customer. She held a finger up to Beasty, signaling for him to wait a moment and not make a scene. The new face was that of a cute girl with the features of an Undine. She marched right up to the counter and spoke to Shadowy, having no interest in anyone else really.

"Ciryes can see shit, but can she see why do kids love Cinnamon To- ahem, many people love your coffee? Uhh... price?"

"Uh... " she was slightly thrown off by what she had said. Instead of trying to figure it out, she decided to just answer the questions she could. "Ah... I suppose some people think it's good. I certainly do, else wouldn't have this cafe. Each cup is ten Yrd. Would you like to-"

Suddenly she gasped as a sudden loud noise rang through her ears. Only a moment later did her vision start to get blurry and a disconnection notice appeared before her. The red haired avatar's eyes would slowly close as she collapsed, being forcefully pulled out of this world.

Momo's eyes shot open and she looked around noticing she was back in her apartment on her bed. Removing the neuro linker from her head, she struggled to adjust to the sudden darkness. Had the power gone out or something? She was sure she had the lights on before she dived. Momo felt a twinge of anxiety as the room lit up in a blue glow and the roar of thunder was heard only a moment after her pondering. Covering her ears, Momo shrieked at the sound, dropping to her knees and crawling under her bed for safety. She cowered there, trembling as the start of a thunderstorm would bring back memories of a tragic event from her childhood.

---

Back in Alfheim - The Ancient Forest

Another party (NPCs) was starting to gather at the area where the Event Boss was waiting. Walking up towards the field, from the ground, vines would slowly rise up and wind together to take the shape of a humanoid tree that stood in their way. . (Imagine something like Groot from GOTG) It had what appeared to be a mouth, but said nothing, simply holding out its arms as if to accept an offering. And an offering is exactly what it wanted.

One party member stepped forward and placed his hand on a screen that popped up before him. A moment later he would pull up his inventory and select a sword weapon, placing it in the outstretched hands of the tree monster. Finally moving again, the tree would appear to examine the sword before nodding. From within the center of the tree, a small, white easter egg would emerge and in a flash of light, the sword would be sealed inside it.

"Your contribution is much appreciated."

One more screen would pop up with the message to accept the quest. After tapping the blue circle, the white egg would float up and land in the ever growing pile of easter eggs that was guarded by the boss.

"Oooh, goodie! Another egg to add to Bon-Bon's wonderful collection! Go ahead and let those nice peole in, cause Bon-Bon wants to play with them!" The boss would say happily jumping up and down. As the tree unwound into vines that receded into the ground, the party would enter, heads held high and with confidence. Once again, large vines would rise up and encircle the area in a large and spiked dome, making any noise that went on in there, not heard by anyone outside.

[RoflsMazoy]

"Ay wat," Kosuke said as Shadowy disappeared. "My coffee..."

He was willing to ignore the coffee disrespect he was hearing right now from the person standing next to him, but this he couldn't ignore. That coffee had done him good, but he needed more. His fuel meter was still leaning more towards empty.

"I'll just make my own, I suppose." He sighed, fishing through his menus. He quickly found what he was looking for, the log-out key. He plunged his finger through it and his vision cut to black.

Kosuke pulled the Amusphere off of his head, light returning into his eyes. He lifted an arm and parted one of the blinds covering the window beside his bed, and saw that it was just about night time outside. It'd been a bit darker last time he'd looked through the window, but he looked at the digital timer on his desk and he saw he was just about hitting the 20 hour mark.

"Damn, I've been gone a while." he said to himself. He'd taken breaks for meals of course, and he had paused the timer each time. He'd been busy the day before, compiling information on the new monsters that had appeared for the easter event. A lot of new rabbit themed monsters dropping eggs for the gathering quest had appeared and he'd had to catalogue them all.

His stomach growled, reminding him of his predicament. New checklist: he thought, 1: Check the fridge, 2: Boil some water - more if nothing in the fridge, 3: Grab the coffee beans - grab ramen if nothing in the fridge, 4: Make coffee and make ramen.

But suddenly, he became aware of a source warmth on his chest. NO. he thought. But deep down he knew, there was no way he would be able to move now. Looking down at his chest, he saw a little white ball of fur, curled up and breathing softly.

Fuuuuuuuuuuu-. No. He could do this. He lifted his arm from the bed and slowly tried to ease his fingers under the sleeping kitten. But to his surprise, the kitten suddenly woke up and looked at him.

It gave a soft, sleepy mewl, before grasping at his fingers and pulling them into its furry embrace, and going back to sleep.

Kosuke's resolve instantly crumbled to dust. How could he betray such an innocent soul? There was no way, it would have been a sin. No person alive would have the heart to commit such a cruel act to the creature. Though it looked small and defenseless, truly it held the world in its hands. There was nothing Kosuke could do, but entrust himself to the capricious hands of fate.

Even as rain started to fall from the heavens, and thunder rent the sky asunder, the pure white kitten slept soundly through it all. Well, at least it's storming. He thought as another thunderstrike boomed, I love thunderstorms.

[Bright_Ops]

@Shadowcatcher

Politely nodding his head to the now named Shadowy, Sindri's gaze followed her as she went about her business. Frankly she seemed to be the most interesting thing in the room and honestly he wasn't all that interested in talking to anyone as he continued to sip at his coffee and if he was perfectly honest with himself he could understand why they didn't wish to talk with him in turn. Even without the hat and mask, his outfit was quite intimidating to behold; One of the two reasons he had spent so much time putting it together. The other of course being that he thought it looked awesome.

Sooner rather then later, the coffee was gone. Taking a moment to look at the time, Sindri sighed as he decided he should go and check out the Easter event properly now that the crowd had a bit of a chance to clear out. Leaving the empty cup on the counter and getting up, Sindri opened up his menu and quickly went through the options until he found what he wanted. Since Shadowy herself seemed to have DC'ed, Sindri sent her a quick message with twenty Yrd attached to it:

Dear Shadowy,
You seemed to have been Disconnected before I could pay you for the drink. Here is ten Yrd for the drink and a ten Yrd tip for the enjoyable evening. I hope to see you again soon. -Sindri.

Message and payment sent, Sindri retrieved his mask and his hat from his inventory and donned them. Standing just that bit taller as he quickly ran his hands over his bird feathered cloak to ruffle them out, Sindri made for the door and stepped outside before letting his black wings get some air and taking off towards the Easter event. He had some quests to do.

[NarcissisticPotato]

Pain. Running about on your feet all day at the beck and call of good, paying customers was a task that seemed to tear into the very fibre of her feet. It wasn't even just a sharp pain, it was a dull pain that never faded and just constantly wore her down. A day of lectures was bad enough but having to work for five hours in a restaurant afterwards was a killer.

When she was finally freed into the cool, Tokyo night, she pulled her hood up over her blond hair and silently plugged in her earphones. Japan was one of the safest places in the world and that was proven by just how at-ease she was walking along the less-populated streets leading to the nearby train station. Her apartment was on the outskirts of the city, only twenty minutes away from her university by train but hours away by foot. Her parents had recently returned to her hometown in Northern Japan which meant that she had to fend for herself, which wasn't much of a problem except for the fact that she had to cook her own meals. Thankfully, the restaurant owner was feeling generous that day and had sent her away with a freshly-cooked meal that she simply popped in the microwave.

Once her belly was full, she took a quick shower which eased her muscles before finally collapsing down into bed. Equipping her phone, she went through a few texts from her friend.

"Omg, have you seen the new raid boss? She's so kawaii!"

"You should totally try the egg hunt thingy. I made a total killing on it now some girl is buying me rounds of alcohol! Life is great! Brb, going to fight the boss thing!"

"My party just got rekt by an oversized eight-year-old."

Smiling, she slid her phone away - it seemed that this new boss was demolishing everyone that went up against it. Once she had scanned some of its details on the newly-updated wiki, she began to form a plan in her head. Easter was a Christian holiday, right? Alfheim had a lot of western inspirations and there was some religious undertones to it. What did Jesus do? He was a pretty nice guy except for one or two times --RIP fig tree-- and judging by how the developers liked to challenge people, Naomi reckoned that was the key to victory - being nice.

Slipping the AmuSphere over her eyes, she relaxed back and cracked a soft smile. "Link start!"

Her sense of the real world faded away and suddenly, she was PotatoMuncher, the nomad pyromancer. She had logged out in some inn - after blasting a party of thieves the day previous, she discovered there was a bounty on her head and inns were a relatively safe place to log out. As she left the inn, she took note of two dark looking men leaning up against the wall and keeping a firm eye on the door. "Gentlemen…" Their surprise betrayed their intentions as she gave them a provocative wink, her curls bouncing a little.

There must have been quite a price on her head because as she walked further into the main streets of Aarun, another four joined the previous two in tailing her. Humming softly, she browsed the various stalls until she found precisely what she wanted. Passing some gold to the vendor, she picked up the smokescreen ward and quickly activated it, chucking it back towards her tail. It exploded in a thick cover of smoke and with that, she sprouted her wings and took to the sky. By the time the smoke cleared, not one of the men knew where she went.

It took her about half an hour to reach the Easter Boss but by the time she got there, the vines had begun to clear to reveal a whole party of flickering flames. "Damn, looks like they got wrecked after all." As her lips set into a pout and she adjusted herself so she was sitting cross-legged in mid-air, she took note of a particular guy approaching the boss before being flung out. It seems that she wasn't the only intelligent one around here. Moving from her position, she gently fluttered to the ground before approaching him as he climbed to his feet.

"Hiya! It looks like you had the exact same plan I had but you didn't queue up! Plus, I have a little something that should help us out! You wanna go into a private queue with me? You have to make sure not to equip any weapons or armour though." She was referring to the unopened present from the Christmas event that she still had in her inventory - chances were, she could get a lot better loot from here. Turning, she didn't even wait for his answer before she created the queue and extended an invitation to him. Mythrilite, huh? That was a pretty cool name!

@Scarifar

[Unfortunately]

"Ten Yrd...

Cheapo!"

Sure, she got the price understood, but the blue fairy didn't even got a single hint on why do many people proclaim her drinks "the best in all of Alfheim". The secret recipe might be really secret. But even so, the silly Ciryes almost began to badger a long sequence of questions, even having asked a "Do you really have a mysterious ingredient thingy in it?" that would really confirm her earlier assumptions and a "How did you manage to advertise your brand to such a broad group?" that hinted at her real persona that had mass communication as her course, before actually realizing that the vendor disconnected in the midst of asking the first question.

"Shit! Now what?"

...

And so, trying to sample the coffee that everybody-- okay, almost everybody loved, the inane Ciryes rudely snatched a cup from someone beside. Before the poor, startled and angry player could stand up and try to snatch it back, the Undine already started to guzzle the beverage.

"HEY!"

She could feel her hot drink gushing deep into her throat as her eyes widened in yet another discovery. Two minutes worth of caffeine made a glopping noise as it flowed endlessly into Ciryes. Every time her mouth gulped, fireworks would go off in her head.

Alfheim Online, volume 1

"GIVE IT BACK!"

Ciryes plopped down on a chair, returning the drink with only one-fourths of it left as she glared defiantly at its owner.

"Girl on counter disconnected. Ciryes is sorry. But Ciryes. Demands. MORE!"

[Scarifar]

@NarcissisticPotato

At first, it seemed like his idea might actually work. Then Bon-Bon's response came and a vine wrapped itself around his waist. Startled, he began to say, "Woah, what the-" before he was violently thrown out. Screaming, he traveled quite a distance before he was able to stabilize himself again with his wings. Smoothing out nonexistent wrinkles in his clothes, he was thinking what he had done wrong.

His thoughts, however, were interrupted by a player flying over to him. Mythrilite gave an inquisitive look at the girl as she explained a little bit as to what had happened. "A queue?" Mythrilite asked as the party invite appeared in front of him. Pressing the "Accept" button, he then opened his menu and opened up the event info. Information about the boss, check. Information about the location, check. Information about the queue..... Also check, apparently.

"Could have sworn that wasn't there before," Mythrilite said. "Oh well, perhaps I was just too excited about the event and missed it." Examining the Salamander closely, he noted her name, PotatoMuncher. Odd name, although it seemed familiar for some reason.

Putting the thought aside, he said, "Well, my name's Mythrilite, although you can probably already tell by now." Looking past Potato to examine to clearing that he was thrown out of, he then saw the NPC's walking over to the boss. "Now what could that be..." Mythrilite muttered to himself as he flew closer to the location. Seeing the offering being made and Bon-Bon getting excited, he took note of everything that happened.

"Hmm..."

Turning back to PotatoMuncher, he responded, "Sure. I suppose I could use a helping hand." Opening his menu, he opened his equipment menu and replaced any bits of armor he had with his casual clothing. The bits fizzled blue before being replaced with a simple grey shirt and leggings.

[Onarax]

The city of Aarun was always an interesting place. Always bustling with players of all races and levels of experience. Take for instance the shield wearing newbie that had just stumbled into the capital city. No doubt he harbored aspirations of taking down the event boss, it'd be a good learning experience for him to see just how far he had to go in the game. Still the choice of the shield intrigued Malik, it was often one saw tanks like him in this game, people always seemed to go for the aggressive play style preferring to just focus on skills with swords. It was a bit of a relief to Malik to see that some classic playstyles still existed. It was rather boring seeing parties composed of only swordsman with maybe the token mage or two.

Currently that player was talking to another interesting character, a Puca by the looks of it and one that appeared to have gone half combatant and half support route by the looks of thing. While support wasn't too uncommon, it was still interesting to see another high level one in this game. Of course the main part that amused Malik was that the support character and the tank were conversing. If given time to level up, the two of them could be a very difficult combination to take down. Fighting them would be one hell of a time, to be honest the thought made Malik excited, it'd been a while since he had partaken in PvP.

It was then that another interesting character caused a mild ruckus. A Salamander had walked into the square, a mage by the look of things, of course that wasn't the interesting part. The interesting part was that there were obviously six guys tailing her. Of course this did not pass the notice of the Salamander. Malik noticed fairly early on that the Salamander had changed her movements, shifting between stalls in search of some sort of item. The item in question soon became apparent when she threw down a smoke bomb and escaped. Clever girl, Malik mused to himself. Seeing that display only left Malik itching for another fun fight.

At this point he just couldn't wait any longer, and thus Malik found himself moving off towards the Ancient Forest ready to face the event boss and have some fun. Logging in on Eastern weekend had been well worth it so far. He'd gotten to see some fun antics of other players and now he was going to have some fun battling a boss. Today was a good day indeed.

[soph]

Two years worth of nemes made a glopping noise as it flowed endlessly into Asuna

16.5

dank fucking SAO joke chapter memes m8 u wot u wotti wot m8 wot u ye wata lglkg

---
Apparently Shadowy has disconnected randomly. That also meant that there was nobody to serve the poison, which meant that people were more safe. Unless there were employees coming in, then it probably wasn't safe.

When Komin saw the weird Cirno cosplayer, she noticed that she had stolen some coffee from some random coffee-drinking girl. Why was there even a coffee shop in an MMO, wouldn't people that wanted coffee get some coffee irl? See, people don't make sense sometimes. Everybody, not just a certain amount of people. So, this didn't make much sense.

When the Cirno cosplayer put down the cup of coffee and returned it to the random girl, Komin made a mad dash for the cup of coffee and dived in order to make it fall and break, and that is what she did. She may have hit someone in the head whilst doing so, but she didn't care much while she was saving people from poisoned coffee.

After she got up from the poison and glass mess on the floor, she looked at the owner of said coffee. What the owner said, and I quote, was:

"WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE!?"

aand then the owner of the coffee cup stomped out of the coffee shop.

saved players : 1

[HereComesTheSnow]

@Crimmy

Good question.

"Well, I've figured my menu, walking, and talking out, and hitting crap with a shield seems basic enough." he replied, placing said shield on the ground and leaning on it slightly. "Other than that, not really. Just one of those 'learn by doing' games, isn't it?"

Shades of the Souls series, in that regard.

[Robo27]

Keisuke sat in his chair at his desk and stared down blankly at a book. The book he was “reading” was one he had read many times over and didn’t gain much from reading it over for the ten billionth time. At the corner of his desk sat a small case no bigger than an informational pamphlet; this case was a case for a game he had picked up fairly recently. The game was called Alfheim Online, or ALO for short. The only reason he had not touched it was simply because it was a VR game, and quiet honestly with what Keisuke had gone through with the death game, Sword Art Online, he wasn’t too sure if it would be safe for him to jump into another VR game so quickly.

While this thought ran through his mind several times over he really couldn’t help the fact that it was a game, and on top of that a virtual reality game. It was like second nature to Keisuke to be in a virtual world; after all he was trapped in one for two long years, with his life on the line. He also knew very well that unlike SAO, ALO was safe and wouldn’t trap him in for eternity, making him risk his life.

「No point in me sitting here and moping around about a past experience.」

With a slight hope to his step he got up from his chair and reached up to his overhead shelf and grabbed his old Nerve Gear peripheral

「It's time to see some action again old friend.」

He gave the slightly tattered helmet a small dust with his hands before hooking it all up, once everything was set and ALO was loaded into the Nerve Gear he put the helmet over his head, at that very moment old memories flooded into his mind, some bad, some good, but nonetheless they were nostalgic. After a few brief moments he came out of his dreaming state and got into a comfortable position on his bed. Once he was settled in he stared up at the ceiling as the Nerve Gear booted up. Once everything was ready he uttered the two words that would send him into a whole new world.

「Link Start!」

The swirl of various colours entered Keisuke’s vision before fading away quickly. For afew brief moments there was a black screen before the title screen of the game came into vision. Once he proceeded on he was told to choose a race to start as, it was also noted that the appearance of the avatar would be randomly generated. Keisuke nodded to himself as he slowly scrolled through the various races.

He finally settled on the Spriggan race as it fit his style. Once he picked his race he was shown a screen to choose an in game name he thought for a few seconds before deciding on 'けい' Seeing as he didn’t want to bump into any SAO survivors he kept from using the alphanumeric letters and went with the Hiragana version of his old SAO name, which was ‘Kei’

Once he pushed enter he was shrouded in darkness before appearing in what seemed to be the Spriggan’s territory. Looking around he immediately noticed the huge pyramid.

「Must be the main landmark.」

He said quietly to himself, before exploring anymore he wanted to see what had changed from the old Cardinal system he was used to from the SAO days. At first he tried to bring up the menu with his right hand, but he quickly learned that it was opposite so right away he swiped down with his other hand, making the menu appear from thin air. Upon a quick inspection he realized his old data from SAO was still in but ninety-nine percent of the items he had were useless, the only things that transferred were his stats, sword and currency. He sighed lightly before closing his menu.「Maybe the items can be of some use later? I’ll leave them be, I am sure there won’t be any problems.」

Once he was done with the initial inspection of the UI he looked around his surroundings, the first thing that caught his eye was a very familiar floating castle in the air. Keisuke did a double take before gluing his eyes on the castle that sat floating in the middle of the air. It was Aincrad. His mouth dropped, he was completely awestruck. From there he immediately began walking at a fast pace trying to get closer and closer to the castle. Before long Keisuke found himself in the middle of a forest, completely lost and nowhere near reaching the floating castle.

[Crimmy]

"It really is," she answered. Fortunately, the learning curve for the game was not incredibly steep; when one simply needed to act like they did in reality with only a few new concepts (magic and the like) to understand, it was a lot simpler to get the hang of ALO. "Though you do seem to have most things down-pat already."

Hopefully he was on his way to learning how to utilise magic, because otherwise the game would be far more difficult. That and <<Sword Skills>>, though the addition of them by Ymir hadn't really changed much. They were useful from time to time, but AntoniusPius found spells to be more beneficial to her playstyle. She was a Púca, so jumping straight into the fray wasn't really her thing.

"Anything else on your mind?" asked the blonde fae.

[Krayzikk]

"If you know how to move in real life, you know here." Abraham commented, approaching the two other players. He didn't know either of them, ad for that simple reason he normally wouldn't have stopped to talk, but one seemed to be a new player. That was cause for him to pause a moment. On the altruistic end of the spectrum, he wanted to see if they were adjusting well. But on the other end, he loved talking to new players for the simple reason that their opinions were fresh. A new take on a world that he was already used to, and fresh eyes were an invaluable learning experience.

"Well, except for weapons and a few other tricks. The controls are nice and basic, though." The college student was sure to speak in Japanese, given that most of the players were Japanese themselves, but something about the Gnome's username indicated that he might not be. The fact that it was a pun on William Wallace, specifically. Maybe he'd ask later, but for the moment, he needed to remember his manners. Giving a slightly sheepish smile, he held a hand out to shake.

"Sorry, I couldn't help but overhear. Talking to new players is always interesting. What do you think of ALO?"