Pokémon World Online [Pokémon and Sword Art Online Crossover Fanfiction.]

Chapter 14: Guild [Introductory arc: END]

Once we made it to the safety of a hotel room, it sounded as if we all did a simultaneous sigh of relief, although, we were safe from the moment we set foot in the town. We all bought our separate rooms in the hotel, yet we all decided on going into Haruka's room for the time being, there were a few things we needed to discuss about this second floor.

"Amika, you can probably reveal Venu now, we should be safe." Haruka spoke.

"Are you sure? Can we trust everyone to not go blabbing about this?" Kurosuke spoke, blankly glancing towards the girl.

"I'm not going to say anything." She responded, shooting a glare at Kurosuke that looked like it could cut steel.

"That was... Rather unnecessary." I responded, letting out a small sigh. Opening Venu's menu, I pressed reveal, the small dragon plopping itself on the floor in front of my feet, curling up like a kitten before falling asleep. I smiled a little, it seemed really cute to me.

"A-Anyway... What exactly happened out there? I assume only fairly low-level monsters would appear, not one with the strength of a fully evolved Pokemon..." Cayden asked.

"As I said before, I arrived on the floor just after the teleport gate was activated, I was going back below to train my Pokemon, yet I saw that on the list, so I went to train my own skills instead. I 'unno, I took care of a few low-leveled slimes before the dragon appeared. I'm just as confused as you are." While the girl told her story, Haruka had simply stared at the floor, lost in thought.

"Haruka, everything okay?" Cayden asked, a small smile forming.

"Oh, y-yes... It's just... A high-level monster such as Venu, it shouldn't have appeared, it had to be a glitch. But... The system should have fixed the glitch quickly, she, or us, shouldn't have encountered it. The system created for this game, the Cardinal System, I hadn't seen anything like it before, it should have done something to fix it, made the glitch vanish..." Haruka mumbled to herself. There was a slight moment of silence after she spoke. This entire predicament was entirely strange, yet... What could we do about it? Even Haruka, who had assisted in creating the game, was rather befuddled by it.

"Even somethin' as amazing as this 'Cardinal System' thing is bound to have it's mistakes. It may have been created by some tech genius, yet even so, it's not gonna be perfect. To be honest, I'm just glad I didn't end up dead," She responded.
"Man. The last thing I'd want to die in something like this. Thanks for saving me and all, you guys a guild or something?"

"Ah, n-no, we're just a group of friends, I suppose," Haruka replied.
"Um, if I may, what's your name?"

"You could probably see my name, it's- whatever. Name's Murasaki," She spoke, smiling a little.
"But... With you're teamwork saving me... I reckon you'll make a pretty awesome guild!"

"You think so? I mean, aside from Haruka and Cayden, we haven't really known each other very long, wouldn't it be more wise to make a guild with people you know?" I asked.

"W-Well... I think it's a good idea anyway. We could make a guild on the next floor, that's when the guild quests start anyway." Haruka explained.

"Really? I guess everyone who's formed guilds recently have only made them in name. Although... It's different from the Teams down below, from what I've seen, they act as if they're guilds. I think they're the closest thing to guilds we have at the moment, it's probably why they're so popular." Murasaki responded. A feeling of dread formed in my stomach. I had previously encountered Team Rocket, one Team was bad enough, but more?

"...Have they done anything, um, bad?" I asked.

"Not currently. All I've seen is the occasional scuffle between Teams Magma and Aqua here in Aincrad, yet everything else has been pretty quiet. It seems worrying, doesn't it? These Teams feel more like a crime syndicate than a guild. I'd understand if there were friendly competition with clearing the game, yet from what I've seen, it seems more like an all out war. I worry that they'll harm other players." Murasaki responded.

"I doubt the GM's will do anything. After all, they're probably non-existent in this game now." Kurosuke muttered.

"I... Want to stop them. I know there isn't much we can do now but wait, yet I want to stop these Teams from harming others. I can't forgive anyone who kills people, game, or real life." I muttered.

"To be honest, all I've heard from Team Galactic is that whoever's part of their group wanted to follow closely with the roles the team played in the original games. I imagine that's what Aqua and Magma wanted to do, their argument does make sense if you think of it like that," Haruka explained.

"However... I have also heard that the leader had vanished. Maybe someone killed him? I don't know, but they've gone silent after that. Although, it doesn't quite mean we should ignore them, they could return."

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"Why do we all remain in this region when there are more places we, Team Galactic, can conquer? Following the roles we had been given in this world will constantly result in failure! We must extend our reach, we must rule this world!" A cloaked figure spoke in front of a group of Team Galactic grunts, all were paying attention to this figure. All expect a single grunt who had hidden themself away from the group, listening to the speech by themselves.

"Our former leader was incompetent, it resulted in his... untimely death. It was quite a shame, really, yet I will lead Team Galactic into a new era, an era of victory!" The room was filled with a deafening cheer from the grunts, with the lone grunt simply rolling their eyes. They moved to glance towards the crowd, or to be more specific, their player cursors. The majority had a mixture of orange and green cursors, yet that masked man, red. Something about this individual's speech seemed... very suspicious...
With a huff, the grunt began to exit the building. Removing the irritating wig all grunts were made to wear, a collection of red hair fell down to her shoulders. She ran a hand through her hair, dropping the wig as she left.

"What a farse... I don't even know why I joined anymore." She muttered. Once out of the building, she opened the menu, moving to the team menu to remove herself from the member list.

Now she simply had to prepare for when they came searching for her. After all, there was quite a severe punishment for traitors. Yet that was the least of her concerns, this world was so vast, she would manage.

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[A/N: Sorry for this taking so long. To be perfectly honest, I absolutely hated this chapter until I made it to the ending. You'll have to thank the mysterious red haired character mentioned at the end for me finding inspiration, without her, I would have been stuck on this for a while.
Oh. You may have noticed the 'Introductory arc' part, it was something I added on a whim. This fanfic will be split into different arcs, much like with SAO. I don't quite have a name for the next, I can't think of one without spoiling stuff, so unfortunately, you'll have to wait for that.
I will say that there will be a time skip and I may potentially get some inspiration from Pokémon VGC things going on in Australia tomorrow, which I'll be participating in. I'm not too confident I'll do too well, yet I'm gonna try my best! ^w^
Thanks and sorry for putting up with my slowness, I'll try to be quicker!]