Infinite Trial from the Giant

"Hum"

Another manic wild boar shattered in front of Xia Tian's eyes, and the experience value information popped up. Xia Tian looked at the experience bar that was barely increasing and the pitifully small amount of experience, and put the curved sword back into the scabbard behind his waist. By practicing with these poor wild boars, Xia Tian was already familiar with the basic one-handed curved sword skill that he had mastered at the beginning - the use of the plundering slash.

It's almost there.

Looking at the beautiful grassland dyed golden by the setting sun, an inexplicable expectation flashed in Xia Tian's eyes.

As if in response to Xia Tian, ​​the sound of tinkling bells spread throughout Aincrad. Then, a blue beam of light rushed up from the ground, enveloping Xia Tian, ​​and then Xia Tian's figure disappeared from the grassland.

Under the effect of forced transfer, Xia Tian returned to the central square where he first entered this world. Of course, it was not only Xia Tian who returned here, but also all the nearly 10,000 game players in Aincrad.

The square gradually became noisy.

"what is going on?"

"Are you kidding me? Why won't you let me log out? Let me log out!"

"Stop joking, GM, come out now!"

Listening to the constant noise coming from the crowd, Xia Tian began to look around one by one, trying to find Kirito.

As the protagonist, Kirito's strength is unquestionable. If you can successfully team up with Kirito, it will definitely be a great help in completing those additional goals later.

However, there were too many people in the square, and it was not easy to find Kirito among so many people. Moreover, Xia Tian did not have much time to look for him. Above the square, red prompt blocks composed of alternating warnings and system announcements completely replaced the entire sky in an instant.

Then, a large amount of blood began to seep out from the gaps between the blocks. The blood did not fall to the ground, but gathered in mid-air, gradually forming a huge figure wearing a red cloak and with no visible face.

The sudden change made the originally noisy square quiet for a moment. Everyone looked at the sound of the huge red cloak appearing in the sky, and soon the low discussion sounded again.

“Is this the game manager?”

"Why is it so weird? It doesn't even have a face. What kind of evil taste is this?"

"So what's going on now? Server launch event?"

Amid the discussion, the red cloaked figure in the sky slowly raised his hands, and a voice came out from his bare cloak.

"Dear players, welcome to my world."

"My name is Kayaba Akihiko, and I am the only human who can control this world. I'm sure you players have noticed that the logout button in the main menu is missing, but this is not a problem with the game."

"Let me repeat, this is not a problem with the game, but the original gameplay of Sword Art Online."

Yes, the original gameplay.

This is the rule of the game set by the man in front of him named Kayaba Akihiko. Longing for another world, he created one with his own hands, and then brought in many players in the form of a game to fill the world he longed for.

What Kayaba Akihiko said afterwards was just as Xia Tian knew. He could not log out. The only way to go out was to complete the game. The resurrection mechanism was completely cancelled. When HP returned to zero, he would be truly dead, whether here or in the real world.

After Kayaba Akihiko distributed mirrors to all players, restored the players' postures to exactly the same as in reality and disappeared, the entire central square fell into great panic.

There was no time to waste. He was not a closed beta test player like Kirito, and did not know any information. If he wanted to catch up with the progress of those closed beta test players, squeeze into the front line, and keep up with the progress of conquering the BOSS, he had to spend more time and effort.

It would be best if I could meet Kirito.

Just as Xia Tian was about to leave the central square, he suddenly caught a glimpse of a relatively familiar figure out of the corner of his eye.

That's... Klein?

After taking a few careful looks, Xia Tian immediately confirmed that the figure not far away, wearing armor, a turban wrapped around his red hair, and a little stubble like a warrior, was the man named Klein.

Who is next to him?

Originally, finding Klein was definitely a good thing. According to the original anime, Klein saw Kirito when the server was launched, and took the initiative to ask Kirito to take him to familiarize himself with the game's mechanics and gameplay. So it can be said that as long as Klein is found, it is equivalent to finding Kirito.

However, Xia Tian did not see Kirito next to Klein, but several other players he did not recognize at all.

what happened?

Turning around, Xia Tian squeezed through the crowd, came in front of Klein, and asked directly.

"Are you Klein?"

Clay was also in a state of panic because of what Kayaba Akihiko said. Hearing the voice, he turned his head to look at Xia Tian. Seeing that it was someone he didn't know, he was stunned for a moment, nodded as if subconsciously, and asked, "Who are you?"

After confirming the other party's identity, an idea flashed through Xia Tian's mind. He did not answer Klein's question, but continued to ask: "Do you know a player named Kirito?"

Just as Xia Tian had expected, Klein frowned and asked back with a very puzzled expression and tone: "Kirito? Who is that?"

really...

"Sorry for disturbing you."

No longer entangled with Klein, Xia Tian turned around and squeezed out of the crowd without hesitation.

As the son of the Redemption Church, Xia Tian was specially trained to read people's expressions and judge lies. When facing most people, Xia Tian could read their minds through their expressions and subtle movements. It was easy for Xia Tian to judge the truthfulness of ordinary people like Klein, and Klein had no need to lie.

It is precisely because of this that Xia Tian acted more quickly.

According to the plot, Kirito had come into contact with Klein not long after he entered the game, but now Klein doesn't know Kirito, which means he has never had any contact with Kirito at all.

What caused Klein and Kirito to not have contact?

The biggest possibility that Xia Tian could think of was that someone else contacted Kirito faster than Klein and changed Kirito's original actions.

I didn’t expect that someone had already taken the lead at the very beginning. Was it luck or some special means?

No matter what, Kirito, the greatest helper in the whole world, was taken away by another fighter, which is definitely not good news for other fighters including Xia Tian.

Bad start.