Sword Art Online – Progressive - Volume 1 - Chapter 1.05

5 
FORTY-FOUR. 
That was the number of players who gathered at the fountain in Tolbana. 
I had to admit, it was well below my expectations—my hopes. An official party in SAO could be up to six players, and a throng of eight of those, forty-eight people in total, was a full-size raid party. My experience in the beta test had taught me that the best way to tackle a floor boss without any casualties was two raid parties trading off, but this wasn’t even enough for one. 
I sucked in a deep breath for a sigh, but held it in when a voice came from behind me. 
“There are … so many …” 
It was the fencer in the hooded cape. I turned and shot back, “Many …? You call this many?” 
“Yes. I mean, they’re all here for the first attempt at this floor’s boss monster, right? Knowing that they could all die in the process …” 
“… I see.” 
I nodded and gazed around at the small groups of fighters huddled throughout the square. 
There were five or six players I knew by name, and another fifteen or so were familiar faces I’d come across along the frontier. The remaining twenty-something were all new to me. Naturally, the gender balance was extremely uneven. As far as I could tell, the fencer was the only woman in the group, but with her hood pulled so low, it wasn’t quite apparent, and I was certain that anyone else observing would assume it was all men. Across the square, Argo the Rat was perched upon a high wall, but she would not take part in the battle. 
The fencer was right—they were all going to face the first floor boss, an enemy no one had seen before, at least in the official Aincrad. Of all the battles one could tackle on the first floor, this would carry the highest risk of death. That meant that every player here was prepared for the possibility of death, in order to serve as a stepping-stone for those who came after them. However … 
“I’m… not so sure,” I muttered. She turned to me, her eyes flashing doubtfully within the hood. I chose my words carefully. 
“I don’t think it applies to everyone, but I think a fair number of them aren’t doing it out of self-sacrifice, but because they just don’t want to be left in the dust. If anything, I’d be one of the latter, myself.” 
“Left in the dust? Behind what?” 
“Behind the frontier. The thought of dying is frightening, but so is the idea that the boss is being defeated without you.” 
The cloth hood dipped slightly. I figured that being a total beginner at MMOs, she wouldn’t understand what I was saying. But I was wrong. 
“Is that the same kind of motivation… like when you don’t want to fall below the top ten of the class, or you want to stay above the seventieth percentile, or whatever?” 
“…” 
Now it was my turn to lose my voice. Eventually, I agreed. “Yeah … um … I think so …” 
The shapely lips visible through the hood crinkled into a tiny smile, and I heard a few quiet snorts of breath. Was she … laughing? The wielder of that ultra-precise Linear, who told me to mind my own business when I brought her out of the dungeon? 
I was almost about to rudely stare directly under the hood, but I was saved from that faux pas by the sound of loud clapping and a shout that echoed across the square. 
“All right, people! It’s five minutes past already, so let’s get started! Gather ’round, folks—you there, three steps closer!” 
The speaker was a swordsman clad in glimmering metal armor. He leapt nimbly up onto the lip of the fountain at the center of the square from a standing position. A single jump of that height wearing heavy armor made it clear that he had excellent strength and agility. 
Some within the crowd of forty-odd began to stir when he turned to survey the group. It made sense—the man standing on the lip of the fountain was so brilliantly handsome that you had to wonder why he would bother playing a VRMMO in the first place. On top of that, the wavy locks framing his face were dyed a brilliant blue. Hair dye wasn’t sold at NPC vendors on the first floor, so he must have gotten it as a rare drop from a monster. 
If he’d gone to all this trouble just to look good in front of the crowd, I assumed he must be disappointed, given that there was only one woman in the group (and it wasn’t clear she was one, given the hood), but the man flashed a dashing smile that suggested he would never stoop to thinking such a thing. 
“Thank you all for heeding my call today! I’m sure some of you know me already, but just in case, my name’s Diavel and I like to think of myself as playing a knight!” 
Those closest to the fountain started jeering and whistling, and someone cried, “I bet you wanted to say you’re playing a ‘hero’!” 
There were no official character classes in Sword Art Online. Every player had a number of skill slots, and they were free to choose which skills to equip and advance. As an example, players who focused on crafting or trading skills might be referred to as blacksmiths, tailors, or cooks … but I’d never heard of anyone called a knight or hero. 
Then again, if someone wanted to be known by that title, that was their prerogative. Diavel had bronze armor on his chest, shoulders, arms, and shins, as well as a longsword on his waist and a kite shield on his back. Added up, they certainly made a proper knight’s outfit. 
Watching his proud display from the back row, I quickly consulted my memory. The equipment and hair were different, so it was hard to tell, but I could have sworn I’d seen that face a few times before in towns around the first floor. What about before, in the other Aincrad? I didn’t recognize the name … 
“Now, you’re all top players in the game, active around the front line of our progress, and I hardly need remind you of why we’re here,” Diavel’s speech continued. I stopped trying to remember and focused on his words. The blue-haired knight raised a hand and gestured to the massive tower—the labyrinth of the first floor—outside the town limits. 
“Today, our party discovered the staircase that leads to the top floor of that tower. Which means that either tomorrow or the day after, we’ll finally reach … the first-floor boss chamber!” 
The crowd stirred. I was surprised as well. The first-floor labyrinth was a twenty-level tower, and I (and the fencer) had been just around the start of the nineteenth level today. I had no idea that others had mapped so much of that floor already. 
“One month. It took an entire month… but we still have to be an example. We have to beat the boss, reach the second floor, and show everyone back in the Town of Beginnings that someday we can beat this game of death. That’s the duty of all the top-level players here! Isn’t that right?” 
Another cheer rose. Now it wasn’t just Diavel’s friends but others in the crowd who applauded. What he said was noble and without fault. In fact, anyone seeking fault in it had to be crazy. I decided the knight who stood up and took on the role of uniting the scattered players at the frontier deserved some applause from me, when— 
“Hang on just a sec, Sir Knight,” the voice said calmly. 
The cheers stopped and the people at the front stepped aside. Standing in the middle of the open space was a short but solid man. All I could see from my position was a large sword and spiky brown hair that conjured the image of a cactus. 
The cactus took a step forward and growled in a rasp totally unlike Diavel’s smooth voice, “Gotta get this offa my chest before we can play pretend-friends.” 
Diavel didn’t bat an eye at this sudden interruption. He beckoned to the squat man with a confident smile. “What’s on your mind, friend? I’m open to opinions. If you’re going to offer yours, however, I’d ask you to introduce yourself first.” 
“… Hmph.” 
The cactus-headed man snorted, took a few steps forward until he was right in front of the fountain, then turned to the crowd. “The name’s Kibaou.” 
The spiky-haired swordsman with the fierce name glared out at the gathering with small but piercing eyes. As they swept sideways, I had the fleeting impression that they stopped on my face for a moment. But I’d never heard his name and didn’t remember meeting him before. After his lengthy survey of the gathering, Kibaou growled again. 
“There gotta be five or ten folks in this midst what owe an apology first.” 
“Apology? To whom?” 
Diavel the knight, still standing on the edge of the fountain behind him, grandly gestured with both hands. Kibaou spat angrily, not bothering to turn around. “Hah! Ain’t it obvious? To the two thousand people who already died. Two thousand people died because they hogged everythin’ to themselves! Ain’t that right?!” 

The only sound through the heavy silence was the distant strains of the NPC musicians playing the evening BGM. No one said a word. Everyone seemed to understand that if he spoke up, he would be branded one of them. It was certainly that fear which gripped my mind at the moment. 
“Mr. Kibaou, when you refer to ‘them,’ I assume you mean…the former beta testers?” asked Diavel, arms crossed, a look of grave severity on his face. 
“Obviously,” Kibaou said to the knight behind him with a glance, the thick scale mail sewed to a leather frame jangling as he turned. “The day this goddamn game started, all them beta testers up an’ ran straight outta the first town. They abandoned nine thousand folks who didn’t know right from left. They monopolized all the best huntin’ spots and profitable quests so’s they could level up, and didn’t spare a backward glance for no one. I know there must be more’n one or two standin’ here right now, thinkin’ they can get in on the boss action without anyone knowin’. If they don’t get down on hands and knees ta apologize, and donate their stockpile of col an’ items for the cause o’ fightin’ this boss, I ain’t gonna put my life in their hands, is what I’m sayin’!” 
Just as the “kiba” in his name—the word for fangs—suggested, he ended with a snarl of bared teeth. Unsurprisingly, no one spoke up. As a former beta tester myself, I clenched my teeth, held my breath, and didn’t make a sound. 
It wasn’t as though I didn’t want to shout back at him, to ask him if he thought no beta testers had died yet. A week earlier, I bought a piece of intel from Argo—technically, I had her look into something for me. I wanted a total of dead beta testers. 
The SAO closed beta, which ran during summer vacation, only had a thousand open slots. Every member also got exclusive first rights to buy the official package edition when it was released. Based on the number of people logged in at the end of the beta, I estimated that not every person was going to keep playing when the game was released. It would probably be seven or eight hundred—that was my guess as to the total number of beta testers present at the start of the game of death. 
Finding out who was a beta tester was the tricky part. If there was a ? mark next to the player’s color cursor, that would clear up the matter at once, but (fortunately) that was not the case. And physical appearance was not a factor either, as the GM Akihiko Kayaba had ensured that every player was now modeled after their own real-life appearance. The only hint to go on was player name, but many of them could have changed names between the beta and the full release. The reason Argo and I recognized each other as beta testers had to do with the circumstances of our first meeting, but that’s a story for another time. 
At any rate, Argo’s investigation should have been incredibly hard. Yet she came back to me with a number after just three days. 
In her estimation, the total number of beta testers who were now dead was about three hundred. If that figure was correct, it meant that of the two thousand dead, seventeen hundred were new players. Put into percentages, that meant the death rate of new players was 18 percent—but the death rate of beta testers was closer to 40. 
Knowledge and experience did not always translate to safety. At times, they could be one’s downfall. I myself nearly died on the very first quest I followed after the game of death began. There were external factors as well. The terrain, items, and monsters were virtually the same in the finished game as in the beta, but just the slightest little difference could pop up, as small and deadly as a poison needle … 
“May I speak?” 
A rich baritone voice echoed throughout the evening square. I looked up with a start to see a silhouette proceeding from the left end of the gathering. 
He was large, easily over six feet tall. The avatar’s size was supposed to have no effect on stats, but he made the two-handed battle axe strapped to his back look light. His face was just as menacing as the weapon. His scalp was completely bald and chocolate brown, but the chiseled features on his face fit that bold look quite well. He didn’t even look Japanese—for all I knew, maybe he was of a different race. 
As the burly man reached the edge of the fountain, he turned and bowed to the crowd of forty before turning his attention to the woefully outsized Kibaou. 
“My name’s Agil. If I have this right, Kibaou, you’re claiming that many newbies died because the former beta testers didn’t help them, and therefore they ought to apologize and pay reparations? Is that correct?” 
“Y… yeah.” 
Kibaou was momentarily taken aback, but he recovered and stood straight, glaring back at the axe warrior Agil with his glinting eyes. “If they didn’t abandon the rest of us, that’s two thousand wouldn’t be dead right now! And that ain’t just two thousand random folks, that’s the best of the best from other MMOs that we lost! If those beta assholes had the decency ta share their loot and knowledge, we’d have ten times as many folks here … In fact, we’d be on the second or third floor by now!” 
Three hundred of the people you’re mourning are those “assholes,” jerk! I wanted to yell, but I held back the impulse. I didn’t have any proof backing that number, and in more self-centered terms, I just didn’t want to be singled out. This much was clear: Outing myself as a former tester could not possibly help my situation. 
The four or five hundred testers left were hiding among the players new to the game. In terms of level and equipment, they likely weren’t any different from the other top players. But if I stood up and revealed my background, not only would it fail to smooth over tensions between the two groups, it would probably just end with a witch hunt. The worst possible outcome was in-fighting between new players and testers among the elite players on the frontier. We had to avoid that outcome at all costs. Whether in the fields or the dungeons, the “outdoor” areas of SAO were free rein for attacking other players. 
“So you claim, Kibaou. While I can’t argue with the loot, we’ve certainly had the information out there,” Agil spoke in his rich baritone while I hung my head pathetically. He reached into the pouch on the waist of the leather armor stretched over his rippling muscles and produced a simple book made of bound sheets of parchment. On the cover was a simple rat icon with round ears and three whiskers on either side. 
“You got one of these guidebooks too, didn’t you? They were handing them out for free at the item shops in Horunka and Medai.” 
“F-for free?” I murmured. As the icon on the cover suggested, it was a guide to the area that Argo the Rat sold to other players. It contained detailed maps and lists of monsters, their item drops, and even quest information. The large splash text on the lower half of the cover that said “Don’t worry, this is Argo’s guidebook” wasn’t just a cheeky bit of fluff. Admittedly, I’d bought the entire set myself to keep my memory fresh—but from what I recalled, they went for the hefty price of five hundred col a book … 
“I got one, too,” the hitherto silent fencer whispered. When I asked if it had been for free, she nodded. “It was stocked at the item store on consignment, but the price was listed as zero col, so everyone took one. It was really helpful.” 
“But … what the hell …?” 
The Rat—a scheming dealer who would sell her own status numbers for the right price—giving away information for free? It was unthinkable! I shot a glance back to the stone wall where she’d been sitting minutes ago, but there was no one there. I made a mental note to ask her the reason the next time I saw her, then reconsidered when I heard her voice inside my head saying, “That’ll cost ya a thousand, dig?” 
“Yeah, I got one. What of it?” Kibaou snarled, bringing me back to the present scene. Agil put the strategy guide back in his pouch and crossed his arms. 
“Every time I reached a new town or village, there was always one of these books at the item shop. Same for you, right? Didn’t it strike you as too quick for the information to have been compiled already?” 
“What’s the point if it’s too quick?” 
“I mean that the only people who could have offered this information and map data to the informer are the former beta testers.” 
The crowd stirred. Kibaou’s mouth shut, and Diavel the knight nodded in agreement. Agil looked at the group again and spoke in his loud baritone. “Listen, the information was out there. And yet people still died. I’m thinking it’s because they were veteran MMO players. They assumed that SAO worked on the same principles and standards as other titles, and failed to pull back when they needed to. But now’s not the time to be holding anyone responsible for this. It seems to me that this meeting is going to determine whether we meet the same fate or not.” 
Agil the axe warrior’s tone was bold but reasonable, and his argument was so sound that Kibaou had no immediate retort. If anyone other than Agil had argued the same thing, Kibaou would likely have accused him of being a beta tester himself, but in this case, he could only stare daggers at the large man. 
Behind the two silent debaters, standing on the edge of the fountain with his long flowing hair almost purple in the light of the setting sun, Diavel nodded magnanimously. 
“Your point is well taken, Kibaou. I myself nearly died on several occasions due to my ignorance of the wilderness. But as Agil says, isn’t this the time to look forward? If we’re going to beat the floor boss, we’ll even need the former testers … no, especially need the former testers. If we exclude them and get wiped out, then what was the point of it all?” 
It was a sweeping speech more than worthy of a noble knight. Many in the crowd nodded in agreement. As the mood seemed to tilt toward forgiveness for the testers, I sighed with relief and not a small amount of shame. Diavel continued. 
“I’m sure you all have your own thoughts on the matter, but for now, I would like your help in clearing the first floor. If you simply can’t bear the thought of fighting alongside beta testers, then we’ll miss you, but I won’t force you to participate. Teamwork is the most important part of any raid.” 
His gaze slowly swept across the crowd until it fixed on Kibaou. The cactus-headed swordsman met the gaze for several long moments, then he snorted loudly and growled, “Fine … I’ll play along for now. But once the boss fight’s over, we’re gonna settle this once and for all.” 
He turned, scale mail rattling, and walked back to the front row of the crowd. Agil spread his hands, signaling he had nothing else to say, and returned to his spot. 
In the end, this scene was the highlight of the meeting. There was only so much detailed planning to be done for a battle when we’d only just reached the floor the creature was on. How does anyone plan a boss fight when no one’s even seen it yet? 
Well, that wasn’t quite true. I knew that the first-floor boss was an enormous kobold, that he swung a huge talwar, and that he was accompanied by a retinue of about twelve heavily armored kobolds. 
If I revealed that I was a former beta tester and offered my knowledge of the boss, our odds of success might rise. But if I did that, people would ask why I hadn’t spoken up before, and it might inflame the undercurrent of anger against the testers again. 
Plus, my knowledge was only of the previous incarnation of Aincrad, and there was always the possibility that the release version of SAO had a redesigned or rebalanced boss. If we formulated a plan based on the beta information and charged into the room only to find it had a different appearance and pattern of attack, the ensuing confusion would be the downfall of the raid. Ultimately, until someone opened the door to the boss chamber and got him to pop into the world, we couldn’t begin to plan. 
This was the excuse I told myself to hold my silence. 
At the end of the meeting, Diavel led an optimistic cheer and got the rest of the gathering to shout in approval. I raised a fist in solidarity, but the fencer beside me did not even pull a hand out of her cape, much less join in the cheer. She turned around to leave even before the call of “Dismissed!” rang out. Before she went, she spoke in a whisper that only I could hear. 
“Whatever you were about to say before the meeting … Tell me, if we both survive the battle.” 
As she headed into a dim alley, I silently answered. 
Yes, I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you how I left everything else behind for the sake of keeping myself alive.