I have been soaked in the Anime series "Sword of Art Online"(abbreviated as SAO), and I decided to share some of my reflections about it for today's journal. SAO is a series of light novels written by Reki Kawahara, which has been recreated into Anime due to its worldwide popularity. The idea of this work is about virtual reality and the relation between ideality and reality. In the following paragraphs, I am going to introduce some of my findings of relationships in this phenomenal work.

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    Which world do you prefer, reality or ideality? This is the issue that keeps vibrating in the audience's mind. The plot of SAO begins with the release of a new technology called "NerveGear", which is a helmet that stimulates the user's five senses via their brain, allowing the players to control and experience their game character with their mind. After the protagonist wears NeveGear and accesses the game SAO successfully, his spectacular journey in the imaginary world of SAO begins. However, the peripeteia turns out that the game is a scheme. Once the players wear the gear and log into the game, they are allowed to stop it until they beat the game. If somebody tries to wake them up or they die in the game, either of these circumstances will kill them in real life. In other words, the players are now forced to engage in this dreadful game. On one hand, they can experience that magical world with great adventures ahead, which we cannot do in our life. On the other hand, they are risking their lives just to be in the game, and any wrong moves could end up killing them. 

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    Can love and friendships in the virtual world be equivalent to those in real life? I was pondering this question when I first saw the characters in SAO start to build friendships. Due to the function of NerveGear, the players' real appearances will be shown literally in the game. Hence, there would not be any problems like male players pretending to be female and other issues we typically see on the internet. In the plot, the protagonist Kirito befriends a young girl Asuna, and they fall in love with each other later on. The Show is about their love and friendships along their journey in the game. Nevertheless, could this kind of relationship last after they escape the game? The answer is yes. During the rising action, Asuna is being set up by the owner of the game(the antagonist) and in life-threat danger. It is the love that Kirito felt for her that motivates Kirito to go against the owner of the game. Well, it might sound stupid to go against the owner of the game as a player. Also, it seems impossible to beat him since he is the owner, it is almost like he is the god and the players are mere mortals. Yet, with the aid of a deus ex machina, Kirito still pulls it off to beat the immortal and save his loving girl. Out of sympathy for the couple and admiration for the protagonist, the producer of SAO shows up in their presence, giving Kirito the highest authority of the game, which allows Kirito to beat the antagonist. During the falling action, Kirito and Asuna finally meet, and their love does not change much regardless of they are not ln the virtual world anymore. In some way, their connection with each other is not limited to the physical condition as we always do.

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    Towards the end, we might not be able to experience this kind of virtual world in our life, Still, we get to catch a glimpse of what is it feels like to meet and love somebody in the non-real world via watching fictional content. In my perspective of view, I consider the relationship that develops in virtual states are as precious as those in real life.