Floor 1 - Starting Town, Eastern Plains
"Huff—huff!"
On the plains, a wild boar charged straight at the player in front of it. The player sidestepped slightly, easily evading the attack, then brought a hammer down on the boar's head, instantly emptying its HP bar.
[Exp: 25]
[Col: 30]
[Items: 2]
Looking at the pop-up window, Lillian nodded slightly.
Col (or Cor) was the currency of this world, while Items referred to materials. He checked his inventory and saw that it now contained two pieces of Frenzied Boar Hide.
As for combat…
Lillian looked at the short-handled hammer in his hand, deep in thought.
This hammer was one of the starter weapons players could choose from—others included one-handed swords, rapiers, scimitars, and one-handed hammers. He had chosen the hammer because the other weapons felt far too light and awkward in his hands.
At first, he had considered choosing a sword. After all, as a man, swords held a natural appeal. But that familiarity came from anime and novels and TV dramas—in reality, Lillian didn't know a single thing about swordsmanship. After giving it some thought, he decided that for actual combat rather than showmanship, the hammer was the better choice.
As for the combat system, unlike other games, SAO—which emphasized full-body sensation—had no magic, meaning no guaranteed long-range attacks. Instead, it relied entirely on various Sword Skills.
Players only needed to assume the correct preparatory stance. Once a Sword Skill was triggered and the skill gauge filled, the system would automatically assist and correct the motion before executing it. Whether offensive charge-type skills or defensive ones, both speed and power would be significantly enhanced.
That said, players could also perform attack motions without activating Sword Skills. For example, a one-handed sword's [Slant] wasn't particularly difficult. Even without activating the skill, the motion itself could still be performed—just without system correction, resulting in much lower speed and power.
However, Sword Skills were far from perfect. Their biggest flaw was rigidity. Each skill had a fixed motion, and once activated, it couldn't be canceled or replaced with another skill.
As a result, PvP battles were less about reaction speed and more about prediction. If you could anticipate which Sword Skill your opponent was going to use, you could counter it with a superior skill once they were locked into the animation.
This wasn't much of an issue early on, since players hadn't yet cataloged the available Sword Skills. But once the game progressed and information brokers compiled a relatively complete "database," precise prediction and counterplay became possible. Despite the game claiming that Sword Skills were nearly "infinite," in practice, having around twenty commonly used ones was already considered a lot. More specialized skills required players to experiment and discover them on their own.
Beyond Sword Skills, there were also Unique Skills—abilities that only a single player could possess. Examples included Heathcliff's (Akihiko Kayaba's) [Holy Sword], and Kirito's [Dual Blades]. There were likely others, but they hadn't been revealed. Unique Skills were extremely rare and had incredibly harsh acquisition conditions, making them inaccessible to most players.
At this moment, Lillian himself possessed something unusual.
He discovered that although his body had been fully datafied in this world, his physical capabilities still existed.
His attributes were no different from those of an ordinary player, but his real-world strength and speed remained exactly as they had been in the AOT world. Yet when he struck monsters like the boar with that overwhelming strength, the damage dealt was still the same.
In other words, damage was determined strictly by stats. Even if Lillian could punch a planet apart in reality, if his attack stat was only 1 point, then he would still only deal 1 point of damage in-game.
It was frustrating—but fair.
Still, his powerful physical condition wasn't completely useless. His speed, at least, remained meaningful. With it, he could kite monsters even with melee weapons. This meant he couldn't rely too heavily on Sword Skills, since they required charge time and had rigid recovery frames. Those limitations would actually interfere with his natural speed, making combat feel awkward.
In truth, Lillian had already been thinking along these lines. While Sword Skills increased raw damage, their rigidity was unacceptable to him. He would rather sacrifice some attack power in exchange for a more flexible combat style.
"It's still too light," Lillian muttered, swinging the hammer. He wanted to get his hands on a large, heavy metal weapon as soon as possible—but when he checked his level…
Level 2.
Right…
Lillian figured the beta testers were probably already level five or six by now. They knew the best farming spots and high-exp quests, so leveling quickly was only natural. Though he was eager to level up, he wasn't about to recklessly enter a dungeon.
In SAO, there were generally two leveling methods: field grinding and dungeon crawling. Dungeons were far more dangerous—elite monsters, mimic chests, trap rooms, ambushes around corners, and the possibility of accidentally stumbling into a boss room. Kayaba's malice alone was enough to kill countless players.
Greater risk meant greater reward. Dungeons dropped more Col and had much higher chances of good equipment. Still, Lillian had no intention of entering one just yet. He planned to grind outside first—and was also considering forming a party.
Given his personality and background, Lillian was better suited to solo play. But he wasn't a beta tester and lacked experience and intelligence. Charging into dungeons alone just to look cool would easily get him killed. If he encountered a monster with debuffs like Paralysis or Stun, he'd have no way to save himself. That was where teammates became invaluable—even if they could only pull aggro for a bit or feed him a potion to clear the status effect.
If this had been the old Lillian, he might not have cared much. But now, he carried responsibility on his shoulders.
He needed to survive. Then, he needed to find something—somewhere, in another world—that could break the curse of the AOT world. And then he had to bring it back, so Annie, Ymir, Eren, Marco, and the others could escape that horrific cycle and not become sacrifices.
Finding such a thing wouldn't be easy. Time was also a problem. Lillian didn't know how time flowed in the AOT world after he left, but he could only assume it continued normally.
That meant every day he spent here was a day passing there.
Time was running out.
Annie inherited her Titan power in the year 843. Lillian left in 850. That meant she had, at most, six years left to live. But given the situation on the island, Marley, and the rest of the world, surviving peacefully for those six years was impossible. Marley wouldn't wait that long.
Those six years would shrink—to five, four, maybe even three.
Lillian set his absolute limit at three years. Within three years, he had to find a solution and return. As for Sword Art Online… this world didn't seem to contain what he needed.
Which meant one thing.
He had to clear this world as fast as possible.