Crossover PS 199 (Patreon)

Suddenly, in their field of vision, all images froze simultaneously and the sky turned blood-red.

A massive figure appeared in the sky. It was a giant phantom composed of red and black, wearing a cloak, with no face.

Seeing this phantom, Minoru narrowed his eyes. It seemed the timeline had shifted. This announcement had come so much earlier.

There was only a mouth that kept opening and closing.

[Welcome to my world.]

[Players, I am Kayaba Akihiko, the developer of Sword Art Online. From now on, you will be unable to log out of the game voluntarily.]

[Any attempt to forcibly remove the NerveGear will cause the microwave transmitter to activate, instantly frying your brain. External attempts to remove the device will result in the same.]

[Your goal is to clear all one hundred floors. Once you defeat the final boss on the hundredth floor, you will have fully cleared the game and can log out safely. Finally, here is a gift for everyone.]

The phantom raised its hand and a mirror appeared out of thin air at everyone's waist.

[Your current appearance will be projected onto the mirror. This is what you will look like in this world from now on.]

Before the sentence could be finished, a flash of a blade cut across the sky.

Kayaba Akihiko's phantom was sliced in half from the middle.

Minoru withdrew his hand. He had let Tenryū fly over and give it a light swipe. Even at the data level, he could easily achieve this.

As for why?

Minoru could only say he turned on his cheats.

In the world of SAO, the Central Plaza of the Town of Beginnings.

Tens of thousands of players were squeezed together, with screams of panic, cries, and curses rising one after another. All the players' gazes froze at the same time, shocked by the scene before them.

How was that giant figure sliced in half by a single strike?

The entire plaza fell into a deathly silence.

Tens of thousands of players simultaneously tilted their heads back, staring at the sliced phantom in the sky.

What was that?

That was the god who was just announcing the rules of death, the creator of this world.

And then, that phantom was just sliced open like that?

"W-what happened..." Someone murmured.

The bottom half of the phantom began to break apart, turning into countless motes of light and vanishing into the air. The top half still maintained its mouth-opening posture before it also slowly dissipated.

The entire announcement process came to an abrupt halt.

A moment later, the plaza completely exploded.

"What just happened?!"

"Did the projection malfunction?!"

"Impossible! This is a game! How could a projection malfunction?!"

"Did a hacker break in?!"

"Who could hack into SAO?!"

"Thank goodness it's fixed!"

The panic didn't disappear, but the direction of the fear changed.

"What on earth is happening in this game?!"

"Can we still exit the game?"

...

The real world, a certain hidden underground laboratory.

Kayaba Akihiko took off his equipment and sat in front of the console. He didn't understand why his red-clad phantom had suddenly split down the middle.

His hands tapped rapidly on the keyboard, pulling up the real-time logs of the announcement program.

[Announcement module startup] - [Normal]

[Global broadcast deployment] - [Normal]

[Projection rendering] - [Normal]

[...]

[Data stream interrupted] - [Unknown error]

[Reason:...]

[Reason: Unable to check]

Kayaba Akihiko's fingers froze.

He had developed Sword Art Online for ten years and knew every line of code by heart. But at this moment, the characters "Unable to check" on the screen were like a slap across his confident face.

Unable to check?

The system actually said it couldn't check the code he created?

Kayaba Akihiko took a deep breath, forcing himself to calm down.

His fingertips danced rapidly across the keyboard, and lines of code scrolled past at high speed. But the more he typed, the more desperate Kayaba Akihiko became. He couldn't even capture a trace of where that blade had appeared.

Just then, a blade slowly materialized in the center of the screen. It wasn't any model he had designed or even virtual data. It was a real, tangible blade.

That blade was pressed right against the center of his forehead. A chill crept up his spine.

He had lived for over thirty years. This was the first time he had felt such an overwhelming sense of oppression that he could not resist.

It wasn't the fear of death but the helplessness of seeing the world he had spent his entire life building being completely crushed.

"Wh... What is this?"

A few lines of text suddenly appeared on the screen.

[Do your game properly. Don't cause trouble. Understand?]

Kayaba Akihiko stared at the text, silent for a full half-minute. He slowly raised his hand toward the screen, nodding his head solemnly.

After Kayaba Akihiko nodded, the blade and the text vanished, the screen returning to the global surveillance footage of Aincrad.

Kayaba Akihiko leaned back in his chair and looked at the chaotic crowd in the Town of Beginnings on the screen.

His gaze finally locked onto a corner of the world. There was a black-haired figure there, accompanied by two girls.

"This world..."

Kayaba Akihiko whispered to himself, his eyes devoid of fear. Instead, a near-manic desire to explore the unknown ignited within him.

"Finally, a variable I cannot control has appeared."

[Hmm? Didn't I tell you to do your game properly?]

A light flashed and Kayaba Akihiko's left arm was severed cleanly at the elbow. Blood sprayed out, splattering onto his pale face.

"Ahhhhh!!!"

Kayaba Akihiko let out a scream, falling backward and knocking over his chair.

He wanted to run, to scream but his body completely refused to obey. That blade hung in front of him, his blood still dripping from its tip.

Kayaba Akihiko knelt on the ground, clutching his severed arm tightly, watching it. The arm began to disintegrate and turned into ash, which was scattered by the laboratory's air conditioning.

[First warning. If there is a next time, it won't be so simple.]

Kayaba Akihiko nodded desperately, sweat streaming down his forehead.

"Under... understood... I understand..."

The blade pressed forward an inch and Kayaba Akihiko's heart almost stopped beating.

Just then, a warm light surged from the blade, enveloping his severed arm. After the light dissipated, his arm was as good as new.

It was as if that strike had never happened but the bloodstains on the floor were still there.

Kayaba Akihiko knelt on the ground, gasping for air. He looked at his intact hand, then at the blade slowly vanishing.

The moment the blade disappeared into the screen, he collapsed to the floor, trembling all over.

—

Seeing Kayaba Akihiko's performance, the corners of Minoru's lips curled up slightly. 'You're sensible enough.'

Kiss-Shot looked up at him. "That projection earlier, was that your doing?"

Minoru nodded. "Just making it shut up."

Kiss-Shot raised an eyebrow. "Interesting."

Erii tugged at Minoru's sleeve and whispered, "Is that... a bad guy?"

"I suppose so." Minoru looked down at her, "But he won't dare to be anymore."

Erii nodded.

As long as Minoru was around, she didn't need to fear any bad guys.

...

The three of them didn't go to the plaza in the Town of Beginnings to join the commotion.

Minoru took Erii and Kiss-Shot and headed straight towards Horunka Village. Along the way, they could occasionally see a few players who had been teleported to the outskirts.

Some were squatting on the ground, gasping for air but their faces already showed the relief of surviving a disaster.

"Damn it, that scared the hell out of me. I thought I was really going to die here."

"I tried that logout button earlier, it really works."

"So what was that projection? A prank?"

"Maybe it's some kind of launch easter egg. This game company really knows how to play."

"But did you see it when that projection got slashed? That was so cool."

"Special effects, right? The details in this game are maxed out."

The panic had largely faded, replaced by the sense of relief from a false alarm.