Note: There is a new auxiliary chapter, for those who want to know what happend in the SAO world, after they beaten the game.
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Light, warm and welcoming, shining between the trees leaves, hit the face of a prone figure.
"Mhn."
Blue eyes slowly open, requiring a hand to shild it from the blinding sun.
A mess of dark hair cover part of a young man's face.
As he slowly stand, his mind also start to clear, the cogs turn and his eyes widen.
Then.
"KAYABAAAAAAAAAA!"
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Mordred liked to think he is a chill dude. He is used to rolling with the punches, then punching back if given the chance.
Of course, he would talk shit, bait and belittle. But he never start shit without reason.
So, yea, a calm, collected individual, he likes to think.
That is why, when he entered into a rage filled crashout, he quickly got a hold of himself... as soon when his voice started to choke and crack from screaming bloody murder and his fists began to bleed.
Panting for breath, head pulsing, he looked at his hands, finally noticing the pain in them and his throat.
"Wha... this isn't... a game?"
Saying so, he sniffs the iron on his fists, feels the breeze in his sweat covered body, the ground given way to his boots.
That is all to realistic, it can't be a game.
The nerve gear wasn't capable of such thing.
He remember the nights he would spend at Asuna home, eating her delicious food made by her max level cooking skill.
The way she would retell things Kirito told her. How the nerve gear, to spare processing power, would only render fully just what you where focused on.
How it didn't had the power to simulate all senses simultaneously. How only the sound of life was heard in a florest, but the actual animals and criters.
Mordred crouches, eyes zeroing on a line of ants going both ways. One way, ants carried little pieces of white food.
He followed the empty clawed ones.
Minutes later, he watched as a swarm of ants dismantled a couple of apples for its flesh.
Eyes going up, the apple tree still have some ripe fruits. Naturally, he climbed it, and plucked one.
Bitting, he tasted the sweet juice fill his taste buds, he heard the crunch of the bite, and even experienced a pice of the skin being stuck between his teeth.
"If this is real, then why...?"
So wondering, he thinks back to his reasoning that made him assume this place was a game.
Mordred had woken up in the middle of a forest, using clothes no one from the 21st century would ever use.
Rough cloth, no zippers in sight, leather boots, though that one is still in use.
Flexing his body, he can touch his toes no problem, jump way to high. His muscles are to defined, to lean, like a professional athlete.
Even if in the game there was no cosmetic changes following the players stats growth, it would make no sense for him to wake up of three years of "coma" this ripped.
Taking his shirt off, he finds his chest filled whit thin lines of pale scars, where he is pretty sure where major injuries spots he had, including in his left wrist, where his hand was choped in the final battle against Heathcliff.
Almost as if his body had actually experienced all that happened inside that game.
Mordred spend some more time examining his body, testing things.
"Right, there is no chance this is real."
Just to make sure.
He is inside some new fucked up game of Kayaba.
"It has ben more then three years, that fucker probably invented some new things, and improved even more the nerve gear."
There was only one logical thing to do now.
Mordred brought his index and middle finger together, then, acted as if he was scrolling up the air in front of him.
"Tsk."
Sadly, the tel tale sound of a menu being accessed did not come to pass, neither the interface in question.
Trying other like gestures, all of then failed.
"Just my luck. Status! Menu! Sheet! Character sheet! ... inventory! Info! Fuck!"
Nothing worked, not only that, but he just noticed he can't see his health barr or any other information in his fild of view.
"... No, it makes sense. Kayaba's going whit a more realistic game this time around. I did bleed, and my body changed for a more fiting image of an swordsman."
Saying so, he start walking, as there was no reason to not look for some town or village.
After all, forests weren't exactly safe in the outside world. He doubt it be any better in this one.
Probably worst, knowing Kayaba.
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A road.
It was hard to spot through the woods, but Mordred had finally found something to go of.
A natural road, out of compressed dirt from people walking and pulling carts. Probably from a rural area, leading from village's to small cities.
Or at least, that was his thoughts. As in Aincrad, the roads leading to central parts of the floors where generally bricked, it would make sense the same logic to follow here.
Now the last question, where to go.
Left or right.
"Arg, why you didn't spawn me in a city already."
But before he could decide. His ears picked the sound of wheels rolling in the distance and the clipclop of a horse hooves.
Go with caution, this is a realistic game, the ai is probably more life like.
Plan made up, Mordred walked in a more straight part of the road, to give ample time for the driver to notice him. And give himself time to run in case they turn hostile.
Moments after, a little horse draw cart comes into view, and quickly slow down as the driver(?) notices the person standing be the side of the road.
"Good morning!"
The driver was a older man, grey hair and beard combo. Mordred noticed the man's eye quickly scan him, pausing briefly on his hands, and squint suspiciously.
"Afternoon! What u doing there, son?"
Wincing, he looks up, confirming that yes, the sun had already passed its peak.
"Sorry for inconvenience you, sir, but I'm quite lost. Could you point me to the closest settlement?"
The older man seems to reach for something on his back, while subtlety start examining the trees.
"...That depends, what happened to your hand there?"
Fuck, that some smart npc.
"Right... Some asshole dumped me around here with no direction or a means of transport... I got a little... upset, and started punching some tree..."
Voice fading by the end, Mordred fights a blush forming is his face as the driver stares at him.
Saying it out aloud, I feel kinda dumb.
Seconds stretch out infinitely as he is judge until Mordred watches as the man's body relax and...
Snort.
"Aha hahaha cough cough a ahaha!"
A deep belly laughter brokes out.
Hands slapping his knee, the old man spend some time laughing while the one his amusement originated just stands there, arms crossed with deadpan stare.
"Sorry, sorry, Ahem. Just didn't expect a city boy in this parts. Tough it was a trap I did. Names Gus."
Smiling, Gus pats the sit besides him, eyes twinkling whit mirth and relief.
"Comon now, git up. Let me take you to the nearest village, son."
And so, Mordred's encounters the first "npc" of this world, and take his first step forwards.
Blissful unaware of what's to come.