A.N. Less a prologue, more a foreword.

To describe the exact nature of The Void would be difficult. It is inconsistent; a formless, chaotic nothingness that adheres to no rules, not even its own. Perhaps it may best be said that The Void is the opposite of nature itself.

Nature is. The Void is not.

Yes, you could say that The Void is «non-existence» itself. What is it? What does it do? Why does it do this? None of those apply to The Void, because the void is nothing; which is why, when at times The Void encroaches upon reality, producing illogical and unpredictable effects, it is pointless to ask the reason why, because there is no reason. There is no rule that can tell The Void not to do as it does because The Void does not care what it shouldn't do.

And so it was that one day, for no reason at all, something just «broke». Not unusual — nature is in fact full of such holes — but this particular «break» was significant in that it was the first «break» ever to open in the grasp of human hands.

On that day, by cause of no intent or fate or even reason, a human touched The Void, and «broke».

Specifically, it was his magic that broke. Though his innate ability to channel inner, arcane power remained, his affinities were blank and empty. In their place, was «nothing»; a pocket of «unreality» trapped like a bubble of air in the ocean. The mage could no longer channel his natural power, but he gained something greater in its place.

In place of his power, a trump remained.

Cause without effect, wrapped in a thin layer of «reality».

The mage experimented. He forced his will not outward, but inward, manipulating that border between «real» and «unreal» within him; changing «rules», setting «parameters», giving «direction»...

The mage realized that he had become something unreal. The Void obeyed no laws but those he assigned it. It would act, unfettered by any rule of nature or logic, performing without fail for as long as he could channel it. The mage possessed no limits but the extent of his will and his ability to instruct The Void.

And so a legend was born.

One of the Founder's most well-known spells was the Familiar Summoning Spell. Normally performed during the Springtime Summoning Ritual, the summoning of a familiar was a rite of passage for a mage and one of Brimir's most intricate spellworks.

The Spell consisted of a fragment of Brimir's Void, anchored to reality in no specific time or place. When invoked, The Spell would briefly appraise the summoner and assemble a set of parameters with which it would select a suitable familiar. Normally, an animal or less commonly an autonomous construct of some sort would appear, though occasionally by whatever alien logic The Void dreamed up a more unusual object would be summoned, such as a plant or tool.

But The Spell's true purpose lay not within its service to the natural mages, but the unnatural ones; the inheritors of Brimir's Void, blessed with the «authority» to command a fraction of their ancestor's «power».

It was on one fateful day that one of those very people invoked The Spell, appealing to The Void with all the desperate passion her weary human heart could muster.

The Spell reacted immediately, once more calling on routines it had used... what, not a decade ago? That three void mages had called it in less than a decade was a good sign.

The preferences detailed in the invocation came first; «sacred», «beautiful», «strong»; all vague, relative qualities. A quick scan of the caster herself gave The Spell the rest of the parameters needed to operate, most importantly the class of familiar which the young void mage had been assigned. «Gandalfr», the familiar obligated a fraction of The Void's power for assisted handling, comprehension and maintenance of weaponry.

Its parameters set, The Spell spread out from the caster's location, tendrils of magical influence probing the lands in an expanding circle.

A few options presented themselves almost immediately. Servants in the Academy, commoners in nearby towns, at least one vampire of adequately benign disposition; human mages were the only options vetoed by the Founder.

Still, none of them quite matched the troubled young mage; not to The Spell's satisfaction. It needed to go wider. Further.

So further it went, beyond Halkegenia, beyond the Elven lands and the Shaitan's Gate which the Founder sought to reclaim. It was becoming ridiculous, nothing seemed to fit the troubled young noble's parameters.

The Spell reached further, not across this time but away; through the Shaitan's Gate, away from this «reality» and into another nearby. Through Shaitan's Gate, reaching it took no more stretch than reaching the eastern lands of Rub'al Khali.

Options here were certainly more... interesting. No magic on this plane, noticeably less animosity towards authori— or not...

Seconds had passed by now, the search taking much longer than usually expected of The Spell. Truly, this was a particularly troublesome summoner. Briefly, it considered settling for the ordinary boy it had most recently indexed...

Nah, wasn't worth the effort of inter-dimensional displacement. Besides, the boy appeared to be incapacitated at the moment.

Actually, upon closer inspection, something seemed odd about that. The boy was unmoving and unresponsive, yet a quick scan of his brain revealed activity as if he were up and about like any conscious human.

Now granted, The Spell was not a sentient entity, nor was The Void which it directed. However, it certainly was intelligent in that it possessed reasoning of a sort, as well as a drive to collect and process information.

And in an approximate sense of the word, The Spell was curious.

Investigation revealed a startling discovery; following a stream of conspicuous electromagnetic waves, what The Spell found at the other end was the boy, paradoxically existing on not one, but two planes simultaneously.

It was something the likes of which The Spell had never seen before. A «reality», nested within another «reality». A sub-reality, of sorts. Certainly, there was the occasional instance of a particularly involved dream in which the dream world could be said to «exist» within the mind of the dreamer, but those tended to be unstable «realities» built on abstract laws at best.

What lay before The Spell was a «reality» in every sense of the word that mattered. It had a «nature» of its own; consistent laws and logic, supporting numerous fundamental reactions, collectively manifesting as macroscopic effects. Certainly, the rules were much simpler and stricter than most «realities», but they were a «nature» nonetheless.

In that macroscopic world, humans wandered about and interacted while simultaneously existing, in a state of inactivity, on the base plane upon which the world was built. Several native beings existed there as well, most simpler than animals but a few nearing a level comparable to sapience. More interestingly, on this nested plane humans seemed to possess a «magic» of sorts — arbitrary, direct interaction and manipulation of «nature» to achieve supernatural effects — a force notably absent from the base plane.

Interestingly, a major component of this world's magic seemed focused on weapons handling.

Dear Void, it was like the essence of «Gandalfr» itself had manifested as an entire «reality»!

And then, in a vague, approximate sense of the word, The Spell had an «idea».

It knew exactly what «Louise» needed.

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«Name not available. Please enter a different name.»

Wait what? Oh, dang, hold on...

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It knew exactly what «Louise-000» needed.

ZnT/SAO Crossover, Louise gets reverse-summoned to Aincrad.

A.N. So yeah, starting this with a wall of quasimagitechnobabble. Probably a bit convoluted and hard to follow, but basically what I wanted to lay out for the readers in this prologue/foreword is what exactly The Void is in this setting, why The Spell works the way it did, and how The Spell can Voidhaxx a virtual world.

Basically, what I wanted to declare about this setting is that A) from an absolutely fundamental perspective, the virtual world has all the qualities necessary to be defined as a reality with a nature in its own right; that as far as The Spell is concerned, SAO is a reality nested within another reality; and B) The Void and void magic are basically Deus ex Machina — no, Nihilo ex Machina equipped with an in-universe interface. That said, I'm definitely going to limit their role in this story as much as I can to avoid exactly this.

Okay, well; this is my first honest attempt at writing. If you have questions, ask away but remember that the story proper has yet to come, and there's much you will have to wait and see. Pre-emptively I'll tell you now that A) the full reasoning behind The Spell's alien logic may not be very clear until the very end, or maybe even the sequel (yes, I've thought long-term enough for that) and B) Hiraga Saito will not be a character of any consequence in this, or any of my future stories, or if he is he will at best be a Saito-In-Name-Only because I really do not care for that idiot of a flat plot enabler.

The real story should begin soon, look forward to it~