dothackers.net

"Who's this?"

"Don't....remember...?"

It was clear that the words had caught the girl off guard and the response was more than expected. Her grip on the handle of her sword tightened and her eyes shut as she gritted her teeth and tried to relax. But as she was known to do when attempting to settle down, she exploded.

"HOW RUDE!!!! You don't just go around making promises to people after they've helped you fight random monsters and coma inducing psycho programs! And you call yourself a friend?! Friends don't make promises and then just forget about the people!"

She leapt back and the light of the sun bounced off her sword as she moved it infront of her. The blade, larger than herself, and much too large to seem like it would be wielded by someone like her.

"My name is BlackRose! And if I have to carve the letters into your chest, so help me Kite, YOU WILL REMEMBER ME!"

Stepping forward a bit and putting his hands up in a stopping motion.

"Whoa, hey, take it easy...Blackrose, was it? You couldn't PK him even if you wanted to, since we're in town. I'm sure there's some... Actually, what is going on here? Something about a promise?"

"Hmph!"

Despite the intrusion, the stranger was right. PKing wasn't allowed in towns. And BlackRose wasn't a PK to begin with. She put her sword back over her shoulder, only one this time, in case she needed to smash him, and turned her face away.

"Back in R:1, me and Kite teamed up. We were both new to this World and were both here because of similarly traumatic experiences. We became known as the .hackers after that and when it was all over he promised that one day we would log back in and go on a normal adventure. That was his promise to me. I plan on collecting it." She paused. "Who are you anyways?"

"I'm Haseo....uh, nice to meet you. It's nice to see people returning to 'The World'. I was just telling Kite and Balmung about our own little "problems" we had awhile back."

"Haseo?"

The name had sounded slightly familiar to her but she couldn't put her finger on why. She let it pass and extended a hand in greeting. It was the polite thing to do. She contemplated apologizing for making a scene but then placed the blame for that on Kite's inability to remember the person who'd fought by his side all those years ago. Time wasn't supposed to erase friends.

"Yea...I don't really know why I'm back. I got an email saying that my character had been restored and that the monthly dues were entirely paid for unlimited playtime so I figured I'd hop on to see what became of [The World]. It's rather...different."

"Heh, I'm sure it is. The email you got is pretty suspicious though. And that, together with three of the .hackers coming back at the same time, has me a bit worried."

"Heh...nevermind about that. You guys wanna go do something? I bet you haven't seen the arena before. It's in the town 'Lumina Cloth'."

Haseo was right. The sudden reappearance of .hackers in [The World] was an ominous sign. As far as BlackRose knew, every time her and Kite's character data appeared on the net all sorts of bad things happened. Also, she had no idea where the text had come from or who would fund her play time the way it said they did. It didn't seem like the type of thing CC Corp. would do. But until something actually happened, she couldn't really stop it.

"The Arena? I heard it's like...sanctioned player battles? Sounds like it could be fun. I'm in~"

"Alright, let's head to Lumina Cloth. You two coming as well?"

Haseo stepped toward the Chaos gate and paused briefly at the town selection menu. 'Netslum...I wonder if these guys have been there. And if they know Zelkova and Yata.' He brushed the thoughts aside and warped to Lumina Cloth.

There, the flashing lights and music gave the feeling of a bustling city nightlife, but these days the population just wasn't as high as it used to be. Ever since the "incident", a lot of players left. However, since things became stable, gradually new players and old have been returning.

"Here it is, Lumina Cloth. We can go to watch the Arena, or if you're feeling adventurous you could try forming a team and registering for the regular battles."

"did you have to yell? well whatever..... im going to an area who wants to come?"

"High strong as always I see..."

BlackRose followed the white outfitted boy to the chaos gate and accessed Lumina Cloth. Somewhere she had gotten there before he had and wondered what was taking so long but quickly he arrived beside her. Looking around she realized that [The World] she had come up in and the one she was in currently were distant relatives of one another. Luckily, she hadn't changed at all. BlackRose was rather fond of her PC and probably wouldn't have returned if she had had to make a new one.

"Adventerous huh? What do you say Haseo? Think you and I could take on an army?"[/b]

She smirked playfully at the...Adept Rogue. She wasn't sure what that was but it had come up when she targeted him and so she accepted it for whatever it was. Either way, he looked strong enough.

He turned to kite and shrugged.
"What do you want to do? Should we follow them?"

Kite:that depends on whether hessseeeeo [pronounces his name wrong on purpose] can withstand the annoyance.......oh well i'm going to level up....

"Heh." Haseo chuckled.

"I'll need to invite you...can I have your member address?" Haseo sends Blackrose an invite as soon as he receives her address. As he walks up to the counter, he makes it obvious he's glancing up at the board displaying the current Sage Palace Emperor before flashing grin towards Blackrose.

[appears behind haseo suddenly]

" hey question...my name.. why is it that im the emperor of this....sage palace thing, according to the boards it was supposed to be............ you right hessaeio?"

"What are you talking about...?" Haseo looks back at the screen to see Kite listed as Sage Emperor.

"What the hell? That's not possible... There hasn't even been a title match since I beat Tohaku. And you've never competed..."

"wait look! your posted next to me we are being scouted for the arena! heessseaai lets get another to join us and register.....

[walks up behind haseo]

Silabus: hey i'll join.....

well......heessssseao what should our third member be