The Meeting

N /A : Thanks for your opinions, I know what I want to do now. Before I start, I'll answer a few more quick questions you're having.

1. She will gain 5 strength with her passive per level, but how many stat points will she gain per level?

R: She will earn 3 stat points per level, this is the official amount of points each player earns per/level.

2. Is Silica the love interest?

R: Rory won't touch Silica, she's more like.....a pet or little sister, so to speak.

3. Will she be able to take others with her to other worlds?

R: Unfortunately no, this fan-fic is not a Harem fan-fic, honestly, if I were to write Harem, I would probably ignore the story development and focus on the girls. The premise here is that she is on a mission given by the angel Gabriel, she is not the one who has the power to transfer between worlds, but Gabriel, having said that, she will not be able to take nobody.

4. Will there be romance?

R: Yes, there will be romance, but not now in the beginning, and even if there is romance, Rory won't go into a serious relationship, Rory is not the type to get attached to people....you know, 900 years and such, get attached to people are harmful when you're immortal, which is also one of the reasons Rory doesn't care if Silica dies, even if she likes Silica.

5. If Rory is straight, and Rebecca is gay, is she bi then?

R: You have a point, but how can I say this....the only man Rory has ever fallen in love with in nearly a millennium of existence is Itami, that being said, she won't fall in love with another man, but as she is influenced by Rebecca, naturally she will be curious about the women's honey pot, if you know what I mean.

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-----[ One month later ] -----

In a large forest at the edge of the First Floor of Aincrad, a large camp of Kobolds is burning and falling apart, shrill screams could be heard even in the distance.

*KIIIIIIEEEEG*

A small Kobold in full armor is in the middle of the camp on fire, he's crawling on the ground while seeming to try to run away from something, both his hind legs have been ripped off and he is also missing an arm.

A Kobolt is like a werewolf, except that it has no fur and can also not only stand upright, but can also wield weapons and armor, the Kobolds are the strongest's creatures on the First Floor.

The first floor is mostly infested with monsters of the common wild animal type, such as wild boars, snakes and wolves, and at the top of the First Floor food chain, are the Kobolds, who can use weapons and armors. They reign supreme.

Of course, just wielding weapons and armor is not enough to be the top of the food chain, the Kobolds are also very fast and agile, and to make matters worse, they attack in groups. This combination of defense, attack and agility has caused many players to die at the hands of the Kobolds.

And because of the high mortality rate when fighting Kobolds, all players ignore parts of the map where Kobods reside for fear of dying, the players, even after a month, they still haven't fully processed what happened and prefer not to risk. But without anyone knowing, camp after camp was being destroyed by a single person, or rather, by a little girl with long black hair and rosy red eyes.

*KIIIIIIEEEEG!!*

The little Kobold, as much as it was just a bunch of program code, looks legitimately terrified, he tries to crawl as far away from the camp as he can.

*KIIIIIIEEE-*

*BANG*

With a bang, the Kobold's back was hit by a black halberd, the attack so strong it cracked the ground. Then with a last breath of life, the Kobold's HP reaches 0, and it explodes into particles of light.

''Phew, looks like this was the last one!'' says Rory as she wipes the imaginary sweat off her forehead, '' You can come out now, Silica.''

From the shrubs, a wild Silica appears with a smile on her face, ''This was the last camp, right, Rory?''

''Hmm, I don't know, let me take a look~'' With a wave of her hand, the status menu opens and she clicks on [Quests].

-----[]------

Name: Kobold Terminator (Special)

Mission: Destroy the Kobold camps that terrorize the southern forests.

Progression: 100%

Reward: Necklace of Fangs; 5600 Cor; +1000 Reputation; 6000 XP;

-----[]-----

''Yes, we finished the quest, now we just need to go back to the village to get the rewards''

''Hmm! Alright, let's go!''

''Heeh~, you look pretty happy for someone who hasn't done anything~''

Silica blushes, ''I-It's not like I want to do nothing!''

The two leave the field and head towards the nearest village while talking.

A lot of things happened in a month, and Rory and Silica understood a lot of things, not only about the game, but also about each other.

In this one month of exploration, Rory learned a lot of things that weren't explained in the Anime, and what she liked the most, was the missions. The biggest source of income for Cor and Xp are quests, especially special quests. Rory discovered something Kirito didn't tell her: Special missions, and probably the hidden quests, can only be done by one player, after finishing the misssion, the mission is gone forever. But luckily, if you're in a party, the mission is shared, but only the Cor and Xp are shared, the unique rewards like equipment go straight to the player who accepted the quest. Now she understands why Kirito is so eager to move quickly to other villages.

Another thing she learned was that unfortunately, if she wants to live comfortably after finishing the First Floor, she will need skills other than her original ones. For example, she already has plans after she completes the First Floor, and to complete the game it will take some time, and during that time, she doesn't want to have to eat unflavored meals all the time. In Sword Art Online, the food sold by NPC's is completely devoid of flavor, so if she wanted to have a tasty meal, she would have to learn [Culinary].

Silica also learned a lot of things, and especially things about Rory. After spending a month with her, Silica already knows that Rory has a very distorted personality, she is sadistic, loves violence and likes to fight, and doesn't seem to care if she is close to death, on the contrary, the closer to death she gets , the more excited she seems to get. But she also has a gentle and loving side that she shows only to those who are close to her, during that time, Rory has also helped Silica get used to the reality that now she lives inside the game, now she is not so afraid of fighting monsters, but still hesitate most of the time, unfortunately, Rory cannot change a kid's nature.

''Now that I think about it, I think I'm going to level up by delivering this mission'' Rory comments.

''Seriously? Let me see!'' Silica asks excitedly.

Rory with a wave of her hand opens the status menu and clicks [Character]

-----[]-----

- Name: Rory Mercury

- Level: 26

-Cor: 28675 (N /A: Cor is the form of currency in the world of Sword Art Online, in Romaji it's Koru)

-Strength: 170 ( 10 + 5*25 + 35);

-Agility: 155 (10 + 5*21 + 40);

-Skill Slots: 6 -Attribute Points Avaliable: 0

-EXP: 64.769/67.000

(N / A: For Rory her status appears like this, but for Silica she only sees a normal status.)

-----[]-----

After a month, Rory is at level 26, she is probably close to Kirito's level, or maybe she is even in a higher level than him. Kirito may be playing solo and probably hunting all day, but like all other players, he ignores the most difficult missions, as they are the most dangerous, but they are also the ones that give the most XP.

But even at level 26, Rory is way off the curve, she got 125 points of Strength with [Superhuman Strength] by gaining 25 levels, and when she reached level 4, she opened another skill slot and promptly enabled the skill [Superhuman Agility], and got 105 Agility points. She also opened skill slots at level 7, level 10, and level 20, totaling 6 skill slots.

She also got 75 attribute points to distribute between Strength and Agility, she distributed 40 points in Agility and 35 points in Strength, in total, she has 170 points in Strenght and 155 points in Agility.

The skills she currently has are: [Halberd User Lv. Max]; [Culinary Lv. 12]; [Superhuman Strength (Passive)]; [Superhuman Agility (Passive)]; [Super Regeneration (Passive)]; [Immortality (Passive)];

''Wow, with this mission you will really level up! To think that in a month we are already reached above level 20!'' Silica jumps excitedly.

Silica doesn't normally help in tougher battles, but she's also above level twenty because she's in the same party as Rory, Silica is currently level 24, and unfortunately, she hasn't tamed any animals yet, because according to her, they all are very ugly.

Leveling up twenty levels in a month in other games would be considered slow, but the EXP rate in SAO is really absurd, every ten levels the EXP needed to level up increases by a large margin. If Rory wanted to, she could already be level 30, but she's doing missions and leveling just for fun, she's not rushing everything like Kirito.

About Kirito, him, Rory, Silica and Klein still kept in touch during that one month period, and today Kirito invited her to a meeting that will take place between the players, the subject, he didn't say, but Rory already knows what it is about.

''Hey Rory, are we going to the players meeting that Kirito said?''

''Why this sudden question? Are you missing your Oni-chan~?''

Silica blushes and pouts, ''Of course not! It's true that I want to see Kirito too, but I'm curious about what they're going to talk about!''

''Well, if you want to go, why not~?'' Rory opens the status menu and sends a message to Kirito, stating that she would be there with Silica, ''It will take a few more hours to start the meeting, how about we turn in the mission and take a break?'' Rory suggests.

''Yes! A break would be nice, I'm really tired! Nununununuh~.....!'' Silica nods and stretches her arms.

''Heeh~, how are you tired if you didn't do anything?'' Rory says, pretending to be amazed.

Silica puts her hand on Rory's shoulder and sighs, ''You wouldn't understand a lazy person's heart, Rory, doing nothing is also tiresome'' she looks at Rory and shakes her head, as if it's something Rory can't understand.

And of course Rory didn't understand what she meant, she just tilted her head with a '?' on top of her head and with a smile on her face.

.

-----[]-----

.

In Town of Beginnings, some players were meeting inside a miniature coliseum, there weren't so many players, some were standing looking in the distance and others were sitting in the stands, and Kirito was also there, but sitting far from the others.

''All right guys! Let's start!'' A male player with armor and blue hair was in the center of the coliseum, and drawing everyone's attention, he starts talking, ''I appreciate everyone's attendance today. My name is Diabel, I like to consider my ''profession'' that of a knight!'' he says with a smile.

With this comment, the other players present started to laugh.

''Hahaha! There are no professions in this game! What are you talking about?''

''A knight? Pfft!''

''So is this meeting a joke or what?''

Seeing the commotion, Diabel tries to calm them down, ''Don't worry, I'll take the matter of this meeting seriously!''

The crowd calms down and they are silent, Diabel then takes a deep breath and looks at the players present with serious eyes, ''Today, our team found the floor chief's room at the top of the tower.''

With this sudden information, the stands are noisy again, Kirito was also surprised by this news.

''We need to defeat the boss, reach the second level and tell everyone waiting in the starting city that it is possible to complete this game.'' Diabel continues, '' Everyone here shares the same duty! Don't you agree, everyone?!''

The players present were silent again, but after a while they began to argue and agree with what Diabel said. Then all of a sudden, they start applauding Diabel, Diabel's initiative and his brief speech managed to lighten the players' hope a little, even Kirito had a smile on his face

Seeing that everyone agrees, Diabel smiles, ''All right, so let's start planning! First, we'll divide the teams into six, a regular team doesn't stand a chance against a floor boss. We will need to form a Raid group, using multiple teams!'' Diabel concludes.

Several players in the stands started to assemble their teams, and Kirito, who was sitting far away from everyone, looked around with a bit of panic, he didn't know anyone present at the meeting, basically he's is a total loner.

However, he heard a voice that made him relax, ''Oh my~, looks like we're late, well, not that it really matters.''

''Don't say that, Rory, from what I see, it looks like something important happened....'' Silica looks around and sees players forming groups and discussing something seriously.

Kirito turned and saw Rory and Silica, and a smile broke across his face, ''Silica-san, Rory-san, over here!''

Kirito couldn't help but be surprised by the looks of the two, they seem to have leveled up a lot. Rory is wearing a short steel chestplate, two bracers, and two steel shin guards. Underneath, she is wearing a red blouse with a fitted black skirt.

Silica is wearing a yellow leather overcoat, she is also wearing black gloves and a fang necklace around her neck.

''Oh, there you are, Kirito-san~'' Rory notices Kirito and she and Silica go to him, '' Alone as always I see~''

An imaginary sword hits Kirito in the chest and he crouches in pain, '' Y-Yeah...It-It's been a while...''

The three sit down and Kirito tells them what was discussed, ''I see, a team of six huh? I don't think a group of six is ​​really necessary, the bigger the group, the greater the burden the group carries, none of the players here have experience in group fights, doing that would be more harmful than good. Making teams small and splitting them up would be much more beneficial.'' Rory comments as she looks at Diabel with boredom on her face.

Hearing Rory's opinion, Kirito nods his head in agreement, he can't disagree with what Rory says, she has a point. No players present have experience in group battles, coordination is very important in battles and bad coordination could put everyone in danger.

''I see, what you say makes sense, what would you suggest then, Rory-san?''

Rory looks at Kirito, ''You are a Beta Tester, right? What are the mechanics of the first floor boss?''

''The floor boss is the king of the Kobolds, he is a giant and agile Kobold, but the biggest problem is that he can summon smaller Kobolds to help him.'' Kirito responds.

Rory yawns and stretches her body, ''Yawwwn~ in this case, in my opinion, the safest thing to do would be to make two types of teams. Teams to control the boss, and teams to control the minions. For minions, teams with only two people are sufficient, two people can easily defeat a Kobold that is alone, and for the boss, three teams with five people would be safest option, each group would take turns to control the boss, and the same thing with groups of two, the basis of this formation would be the switch of the players, because as I can see, most of the players here are very weak.''

She then rests her head on her arm and looks at Diabel, who was chatting with a confident smile on his face with other players, with cold eyes, ''It's fascinating how humans can be so stupid. Dreams of heroism only lead to death, making hasty moves only lead to death, becoming someone's flag of hope when one is weak, only leads to death and failure, it's so stupid it's tedious.''

Kirito blinked in surprise, he didn't expect Rory to say such heavy things with such a cold look, he wanted to say something, but was interrupted by someone.

''Hi, could I join your group?''

Kirito, Rory and Silica turn and see a person who close to them who is completely covered in a wine red cloak with a hood, hiding it's body and face from everyone.