Sword Art Online – Progressive - Volume 1 - Chapter Aft

AFTERWORD 
Hello, this is Reki Kawahara, author of Sword Art Online Progressive 1. 
The word progressive might make you think of video formats, but in this case it is meant in the “incremental increase” sense. I chose this title to represent the task of conquering Aincrad bit by bit, from the very first floor. From this point on, I’ll be using the abbreviation SAOP. 
So first of all, I should explain why I decided to start writing this series. 
If you’ll permit me to repeat what I said in the afterword of the first volume of SAO, I wrote the story as a submission for the Dengeki Novel Award, so I had to finish the story with the game being beaten, right in the very first installment. Later on, I wrote a number of shorter prequel stories that filled in gaps (see Volumes 2 and 8), but they’re more like little episodes, and don’t focus on the meat and potatoes of the players advancing through the game. 
So I’ve always harbored a secret desire to write about how Kirito and the others cleared each floor and defeated each boss in the game, it just didn’t really happen until now. Because I’m now trying to write it all over again from the first floor, it creates a number of issues. 
Biggest of all is how to deal with Asuna, the heroine. In the previously published series, Kirito doesn’t get to know Asuna until much, much later. If I depicted Kirito as working with Asuna on the first and second floor of Aincrad, it would contradict what I’ve already published. 
For a long time, I wavered between two options: avoiding that contradiction by starting off Progressive with a different heroine, or embracing the contradiction and going with Asuna right from the start. Ultimately, I admitted to myself that it didn’t feel right having anyone but Asuna at Kirito’s side, and I suspect that most of my readers feel the same way. So I decided to have Kirito meet Asuna right away. 
Of course, I’m certain that some readers will not be able to accept the contradictions with what I’ve written before, and that’s okay. But I will do my utmost to make sure that the choices I make line up with the established events as best I can. My hope is that you’ll be able to overcome my inconsistency and enjoy this new series for what it is. 
Now that I’ve gotten my customary apologies out of the way, let’s go over each of these stories. 

“Aria of a Starless Night,” the story of the first floor of Aincrad, picks up right after the story of “The First Day,” which is found in Volume 8 of the main series. We see characters that had only appeared in name before, such as Kibaou, future leader of the Army, and the information dealer, Argo the Rat. Then, of course, there are old favorites like Agil before he became a businessman, and Asuna when she was just a beginner to MMORPGs. It was a very strange mix of the new and familiar as I was writing. Of course, Kirito is still Kirito. 
Part of the point of Progressive is to explain the systems of SAO in greater detail, so “Aria” spends a lot of time covering the concept of a “boss raid.” I hope you really got the feel for a great big group of eight parties of six members each. If it didn’t make sense to you, watch the second episode of the SAO anime series, please! Ha-ha. 
The story of the second floor, “Rondo of a Fragile Blade,” features a whole host of new faces. It took me quite a while to decide if the character of Nezha should be a man or a woman. Eventually, I got the feeling that having him be a girl would pose a whole new set of problems, so I took the easy route in making him a man. 
I meant to have this tale feature the weapon upgrading system, but I let it slip away from me a bit, and the result was more of a mystery story surrounding the concept of upgrade fraud. Since there wasn’t much fighting in the early part of the story, I wanted to feature a nice, meaty boss battle, and ended up bringing out quite a nasty boss for just the second floor of the game. If that happened in a real MMO, I would totally throw in the towel! 
Those two stories made up the first volume of SAOP. I’ve already got the title of the third-floor story picked out: “Concerto of Black and White.” In game system terms, I’m going to focus on the theme of campaign quests. 
Well, now that I’ve gone and done a sneak peek for the next volume, I should probably come clean and admit that I don’t think I can write more than one volume of Progressive a year. So if I cover two floors a year, when will I actually get to the seventy-fifth floor …? I’m too scared to consider the possibilities! Hope to see you in Volume 2! 
And of course, I’ll be continuing with the main SAO series. Part Three of the Alicization arc, Volume 11, should be coming out in December. Kirito and Eugeo will be tackling the mysteries of the Underworld. Please check it out. 
Also, the continuation of SAO means that I’ll need to skip Accel World this time around. Deep apologies! But since Volumes 9 and 10 of that came out in quick succession, it should be back to its normal schedule now. I’m not sure how long I will be able to keep up writing a book every other month (in fact, it’s already looking hairy) … but I’ll do my best! 
Thanks once again to my illustrator abec for eagerly tackling two series at once, to my editor Mr. Miki for eagerly (I think) tackling this five hundred–page monster of a book, and to my vice editor Mr. Tsuchiya for dealing with the ulcers (I assume) of waiting for my very late replies to every message. And to those of you who read to the end of this very thick book, the greatest LA bonus of my gratitude! 
Reki Kawahara—August 2012