"Shiro-san is here?!"

With shoulder-length black hair, the petite girl peeked her head out of the door before locking gazes with Shiro.

"Yes, I'm here." He wryly smiled at this oddly enthusiastic girl, Sachi.

In contrast with her self in the anime, she regained her former liveliness this time. Who wouldn't be that depressed when they get trapped in this world where death here would be death in real life?

"Remember the thing that I said back then?"

"You mean, that one when we become part of the top 5 guilds in the frontline?" Keita asked with some uncertainty in his voice.

"Yup. It seems like you still remember it." 

"It's only been a year since you mentioned that."

"A year..."

At first, Shiro thought that they'll be able to quickly clear this game in less than a year given their powers, but he's mistaken. One of the objectives that the Chat Group gave is to clear the 75th floor WITH the other Clearers.

Since the others aren't as monstrous as them, they needed more time to hone their skills and raise their levels. The only thing that they could do is to provide some sort of help, so that this process would be accelerated.

With that in mind, Shiro wandered around many floors a year ago in search for some ways to accelerate the players' growth. That's how he met the Moonlit Black Cats, the guild who is doomed to die in the anime.

"Does this mean that you'll cook for us?" Sachi, who closed the door behind her, asked.

"Aha, you got me there."

""Yosha!!! Shiro-san's cooking!!!""

Tetsuo and Ducker cried out in joy as the thoughts of Shiro's cooking filled their head. They might have some quarrels regarding some stuff, but this is the only thing where they could agree to be the best.

Even though they thought that he's a martial artist, his cooking is very good, too. 

"I'm not only cooking. You gotta look forward to something else later."

Entering their guild base, Shiro headed to the kitchen. Though, he met someone along the way.

"Looks like you're still a bookworm."

A man with curly brown hair and green eyes held a log in his hands. Soon, he noticed Shiro.

"Shiro-san."

Sasamaru, the secretary of the guild. Since he's loved reading about books to the point that he's the most knowledgeable about computers in their club, he took in the role of analyzing each monsters' patterns and the corresponding measures to deal with them.

He also deals with the guild logs and stuff, which is mostly documenting their expenses so that they won't run out of funds.

"How's the past few weeks?"

"Nothing notable happened. Though, I think we need to hire more NPCs to handle the stores."

"More NPCs? Alright, I suggest you talk to that guy later."

Shiro recommended a certain NPC that is actually the leader of the townspeople looking for more jobs. Due to his max-level charm, he could easily brush up their favorability to the max.

"I've heard of his before, but I didn't know that you knew him. As expected of Shiro-san."

"Just luck. Anyways, I'll be heading to the kitchen first."

"Shiro-san will cook?" He exclaimed in surprise, but he remembered Shiro saying this as an encouragement a year ago. "The agreement."

"Right. You can look forward to it later~"

"I understand."

Sasamaru separated from Shiro as he handled their guild affairs in the study.

'These pure people. The world's really cruel.'

While he prepared the ingredients, Shiro reminisced about the events that happened starting a year ago.

'These coincidences are truly caused by my luck stat...'

...

At a certain time, he wandered around the 35th floor labyrinth, he noticed a party fighting against a huge swarm of insect-type monsters. He planned to watch them, but he soon noticed that one of them would die at this rate.

Since he didn't mind helping them, he lured most of the monsters before finishing them off while dodging all of their attacks. This action of his lessened the pressure that the party is facing, giving them the chance to kill the rest of those insects.

They didn't forget about Shiro, however, and ran over to help him. But, they only saw Shiro standing there all alone, with no other monsters whatsoever.

"You... You killed them all?"

"That's right. As long as you can see their movements, you can use it to avoid their attacks on time."

Shiro's voice rang out, causing them to be stunned for a while. Ducker and Sachi thought that he's a girl while the rest thought that he's a guy. 

This misunderstanding of theirs didn't get fixed until some time had passed...

"Thank you for helping us." Keita, the guild leader, slightly bowed to him as a form of gratitude.

Seeing him, the rest of the guild followed.

"You don't need to do that..."

"Yes?"

"Actually... I'm a foreigner."

They soon noticed his appearance, which will definitely earn the admiration of many guys and girls alike. Since he only wore the light armor this time, its hood isn't enough to fully hide his stunning appearance.

Sporting a soft look, his silver-white hair with tinges of black in it would gather enough attention from the crowd. His deep orange pupils made him seem like someone straight out of an anime.

Overall, his looks could be said to be perfect.

"If you would, we would like to treat you to a drink for helping us."

"A drink?"

Shiro wondered if he would accept this until he noticed their familiar faces.

'Aren't they... the one who is supposed to die due to a dungeon trap?'

This familiarity deepened when he saw Sachi, one of the supposed "love interest" of the protagonist. That is, until she died.

'I now know how Kuroneko felt back then.'

Seeing characters that you've only seen in an anime is definitely an indescribable experience. They are considered as works of fiction, after all.

"Alright then."

...

Blue lines appeared in the middle of a cabbage that is on top of a chopping board. Cutting it precisely, Shiro saw that it gave him a 100% quality, causing his <<Cooking>> skill to level up once more.

He didn't mind this as he continued preparing all sorts of ingredients to whip up a good dish.

After some time, he noticed that Sachi is approaching the kitchen.

Without looking back, he said in a teasing tone, "Won't you help your 'sister' in this one?"

"Mou, Shiro-san. That was my mistake a long time ago!"

Funnily enough, Sachi considered Shiro as a girl when she first interacted with him. It was only until a month later did he realize that misunderstanding and corrected it.

Of course, this made them closer due to that incident.

"...When will you come back after this?"

The atmosphere became serious once Sachi asked him.

"Probably a week later? Things is getting hectic lately."

"You mean, the Laughing Coffin guild?"

"Mn, someone gave a tip regarding their headquarters and was confirmed to be true."

Shiro knew that the one responsible to this is PoH, their guild leader. It has been more than a year since SAO's release, so it's inevitable for him to become bored at this rate.

When some players investigated that area, they saw dozens of Laughing Coffin members. In the end, they didn't startle the snake and reported back to the guild alliance instead.

*****

Fact #23: In Sword Art Online, there exists a thing called "Ethics Code". Simply put, it restricted players from sexual acts. This is also the main reason why there's no told cases of **** in the game. However, it has an option of being "disabled" so that they could do the deed. Useful it may be for riajus, it's questionable in a way that the game allowed such acts whilst having many underage players. This thing is tackled more on chapter 16.5, which is a lemon chapter (between Kirito and Asuna) created by none other than Reki Kawahara himself. It's in the webnovel version of SAO, something between chapter 16 and 17 (basically the aftermath of Kuradeel arc and their marriage). This is the time when Kirito came over to Asuna's house when he hunted a <<Ragdoll Rabbit>> if someone forgot about this. 

Also, how non-canon that chapter may be (author said so himself), it is implied a couple of times that this really happened. Reki Kawahara is contradicting himself, doesn't he?