Tropes I to M / Sword Art Online

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I Believe I Can Fly: Alfheim Online's most famous feature is allowing players to fly through the air as a fairy race.
Idiot Ball: Sugou, running highly unethical human experiments on a public server — no matter how ostensibly secretive those involved are — which is still debugging from the transition from a previous incarnation, in which several characters get an Old Save Bonus when they transfer, was not your brightest move.
- Shino is able to load and fire a Colt M1911 (well, an airsoft copy) thanks to her experience in GGO.
- Kirito manages to match his sister in a kendo sparring match with his SAO skills (it should be noted that she's a national level competitor), dodging a blow that reportedly had never been successfully blocked by either her coaches or tournament opponents, and later beats a knife-wielding madman barehanded, though the latter is justified as the madman was currently suffering from phantom injures dealt by Kirito inside ALO, particularly a bad case of depth perception. It's all but stated that Kirito would have lost had his opponent been in tip-top shape.
  - Another thing about the kendo match: despite it being a month after his escape from SAO, we still need to remember that it's ONLY a month, so his body is still both severely physically weakened from muscle atrophy and from malnutrition. They both pretty much come to the conclusion that had he been healthy at the time he would have won (the only real reason he lost is because his arms had atrophied so much that when he tried to block one of her strikes she just blew straight through and hit him. That, and he tried to use a Sword Skill with predictable results.)
Image Song: Several for several of the major cast members.
Impaled with Extreme Prejudice:
- One of the Salamanders ambushing Kirito and Leafa in the cave gets impaled on monster!Kirito's fingernails and hangs there in the air until he dies.
- In Episode 22 of Season 1, this happens to Kirito in a scene very, very reminiscent of Asuka's death in The End of Evangelion.^note
- Two episodes later Kirito kills Sugou's Oberon avatar by tossing him up and letting him fall onto Kirito's sword in a pose strikingly familiar to the iconic Last Shooting scene in Gundam.
- Moments before that, Sugou impales Kirito with his own sword, just after altering the pain absorber to make the experience even worse for him.
- Kirito does this to the first opponent he fights in the Bullet of Bullets tournament in Episode 5 of Season 2 once he manages to get close enough to use his energy sword.
Implausible Fencing Powers: The entire skill system in SAO is based on swordsmanship. Not a single spell to be found. Hand Waved as an attempt to raise immersion.
- Kirito can cut bullets in midair easily in Gun Gale Online. When he gets back to ALfheim Online, he uses the same skill to cut magical spells. Nobody, not even Asuna, Leafa, or Klein, who're the closest players to his skill level, can do that. (And also comments that even the fastest spell is slower than a particular kind of rifle, implying that those spells he cut apart were slow.)
Impossible Task: The "Grand Quest" of ALO.
Improbable Weapon User: Not an issue in SAO and ALO where swords are commonplace, but come Volume 5 of the light novel Kirito becomes the only character to wield a sword in a gun fight in a game that's all about shooting.
Improbable Aiming Skills: Shino scores a headshot on The Behemoth after jumping from a skyscraper while dodging a minigun in midair.
Incapable of Disobeying:
- In the Alicization arc, the artificial souls that make up the population of Underworld live under a "Taboo Index" that enforces Underworld's Fantastic Caste System with absolute authority. An example of its effect on its people is when Eugeo tries to stop the attempted rape of two girls he and Kirito were mentoring. The act Eugeo wants to stop is not a violation of of the Taboo Index, but the fact that it's being performed by a noble, where Eugeo is a simple commoner, means that trying to stop it is. As a result, Eugeo can, at first, only watch helplessly, unable to move or act in anyone's defense. When Eugeo manages enough Heroic Resolve to resist the Taboo Index and fight back, the effort and backlash of doing so causes his eye to explode from its socket.
- From the same arc, while fighting their way through the Cathedral, Kirito and Eugeo meet Linel and Fizel, a pair of apprentice nuns who snuck out to see the intruders after all the non-Integrity Knights were ordered to lock themselves in their rooms. This trope is one of the factors in Kirito's realizing they weren't what they claimed to be, since if such an order had been given, then the girls could never have stepped outside their rooms. Because of this, Kirito is able to turn the tables on their sudden but inevitable betrayal.
Inside a Computer System: The "partially attached" variety. VRMMOs use the "Full Dive" system to completely immerse the player in a virtual world, controlling all five senses.
Inverted Portrait:
- Asuna in the Closing Credits of the Aincrad arc.
- Shino in the Closing Credits, and her in-game alter ego Sinon (along with Death Gun) in the Title Sequence, of the Phantom Bullet arc. Twice over in the former, in fact: once as her present self, then again as her 11-year-old self, when she shot and killed a would-be bank robber.
- Leafa in the Caliber arc's Closing Credits.
Invisibility Cloak: Death Gun uses one. It helps him sneak around on the battlefield and is also used to spy on people when they enter their real-life details, including home addresses, in order to register for tournaments in GGO.
Ironic Echo:
- Kirito starts chanting "hayaku"^notefaster whenever he's caught up in an intense fight, two of which has been against Heathcliff. Nearly every time he's done so it hasn't ended well for him.
- "Sorry, this area is currently off-limits." Said by Kirito to a Jerkass guild member, echoing another guild member's words to the Sleeping Knights.
- Also in Episode 24 of Season 1, "Hurts, doesn't it?" Also said by Kirito to Sugou/Oberon when he slices his cheek after turning the situation in his favor, echoing Oberon's words when he was in control of the situation when he lowered the pain absorber on Kirito.
I Surrender, Suckers: Kuradeel tries this when Asuna beats him to within an inch of his life bar. He feigns asking for mercy/forgiveness, but then immediately tries to kill Asuna with a cheap shot before being taken down by a recovered Kirito. He even lampshades the fact that she fell for it!
Japanese Christian: Yuuki's family, and Yuuki herself. This is apparently why Yuuki names her Original Sword Skill "Mother's Rosary."
Japanese Honorifics: Most characters respectively use honorifics when addressing others.
- Asuna heavily uses these, which is unsurprising given her upper-class upbringing. She refers to everyone but her very closest friends with an honorific, even her husband/boyfriend Kirito is addressed as "Kirito-kun" and her daughter Yui as "Yui-chan". The only exceptions are Lisbeth and Sinon, who she refers to by nicknames "Liz" and "Sinonon", along with Yuuki who she addresses by a first name since the two are close enough to be surrogate sisters.
- Silica and Yui are known to use honorifics for everyone. Given how much younger they are in comparison virtually everyone gets addressed with a "-san", even Kirito who is usually addressed as "Kirito-kun" gets called "Kirito-san" by Silica, or Lisbeth who prefers going by a nickname gets called "Liz-san".
- Kirito averts this, rarely ever using honorifics and addressing his peers simply by their gamer name or their first name if he knows it. He only appears to use honorifics when the situation requires him to be respectful such as when addressing his elders. Asuna once calls him out on how rude he was being before she gives him permission to only call her by name. Amusingly, Kirito will only ever call her "Asuna-san" whenever he knows he's in trouble with her. Surprisingly enough, he uses "-san" on Quinella.
- Lisbeth, being very casual and carefree also generally avoids honorifics among her friends, calling Kirito, Asuna, and Silica by name. Kirito gets mildly annoyed that she starts off using yobisute on him, but generally tolerates it.
- Leafa/Suguha, unlike her brother, is quite adamant about addressing others respectfully with honorifics- "-san," in most cases, since said individuals are older than her. The one exception is Shinichi/Recon, which is attributed to her being annoyed by him, and she's the one who keeps insisting he refer to her as "Kirigaya-san" and not as "Leafa-chan" or "Suguha-chan".
- Sinon seems to be a mix of this. She respectfully calls her Only Friend in real life (at the time) Kyoji as "Shinkawa-kun", but all of her in-game friends generally get addressed without an honorific.
- Yuuki being very informal by nature is virtually never seen using honorifics, with the exception of individuals she doesn't know and needs to show respect to. That said, she does start out using "-san" on Asuna, but stops when Asuna says she doesn't need to.
- Argo is an odd example given she loves to nickname everyone. She does use honorifics, but very unorthodox ones that seem to make her peers seem younger, such as Kirito as "Kii-bou" or Asuna as "A-chan".
- Alice uses the extremely respectful "-dono" on senior Integrity knights, but uses yobisute on the people closest to her(Kirito, Eugeo, Eldrie and Selka). Asuna gets rather annoyed when she hears Alice using yobisute on Kirito.
Jerkass: At least one in every arc.
- The Fairy Dance arc has Sugou as the primary jerkass, with practically no redeeming qualities, unlike Kayaba from the first arc.
- To a lesser degree, there's Sigurd. He bosses Leafa around in spite of the fact that her agreement with him gives her flexibility as far as partying with him goes, and when Kirito sticks up for her, Sigurd tries to kill him, since Kirito's in an enemy race's capital and can't fight back. He ultimately sells out his faction in hopes of rerolling as a race that he heard was going to be at an advantage in a later patch.
- Endou from Phantom Bullet. She's a bully who exploits Shino's trauma to steal her money, and it's revealed that Endou and her sidekicks were taking advantage of Shino the entire time they were "friends."
- In Mother's Rosario, a guild uses a spell to spy on Asuna and the Sleeping Knights' first attempt on the boss. When Asuna and her friends come back for another try, they find the other guild sitting in front of the door, not yet ready to face the boss but refusing to let anyone through.
- In Alicization, Raios and Humbert are two arrogant nobles who look down on Kirito and Eugeo and try to make their lives miserable, from cutting the buds off Kirito's flowers to trying to rape Kirito and Eugeo's valets in order to provoke them into violating the Taboo Index.

Joke Weapon: The Lightsaber is considered this in Gun Gale Online, which makes a certain kind of sense as it's an MMOFPS.

Karma Houdini: Although they were all placed in a separate building from other SAO survivors for rehab/observation purposes, none of the players who committed murder in SAO are publicly revealed nor receive justice for their actions, as all blame is placed on Akihiko Kayaba. This leads to repercussions in future arcs.
Kissing Cousins: One-sided on Suguha's part. She slowly falls in love with her cousin Kirito (who was raised as her brother); however, since he already has Asuna and Kirito isn't really into that stuff, he doesn't reciprocate. Suguha also knows her parents would never approve and tries to get over her feelings.
Kissing Discretion Shot: Sometimes when Kirito and Asuna kiss.

Lady of War: Sakuya, guild leader of the Sylphs, who wears a katana.
- Conceivably, Asuna counts as this, too. Comes from money, doesn't act "prissy" to any real degree but is even less considered a tomboy, uses a rapier, a weapon most often used by royalty or those close to it in stories like this.
Lampshade Hanging: In the Light Novels, at least, Kirito thinks that he looks like a typical manga protagonist. Also, in the Light Novels, when Asuna breaks free from an unbreakable paralysis to save Kirito, Akihiko Kayaba points out that "This is really surprising. Isn't it just like a standalone console RPG scenario? It should have been impossible for her to recover from the paralysis... So things like this really do happen..."
Laser-Guided Amnesia: This franchise seems to like memory manipulation plots quite a bit. See also Fake Memories.
- In the "Fairy Dance" arc, Sugou threatens to erase Kirito and Asuna's memories; erasing her memory of Kirito would most likely help in brainwashing her to love only him (though how well it would actually work is another matter). He is also, more generally, working on experiments involving manipulating memories, which might include this trope.
- Ordinal Scale has the Augma, which, while marketed as safer than even the AmuSphere, is in reality a modified NerveGear that can even secretly do full dives, and helps the villain steal memories of SAO from its survivors, whenever they are defeated by the special event bosses.
- In Alicization, the Soul Translator is programmed to block Kirito's memories of being in Underworld while he is in the real world, and vice versa. Additionally, in Underworld itself, Integrity Knights have all of their life memories stolen away, being told they were called from the heavens, and that memories of that have been blocked. Administrator does a similar thing to Eugeo after he is captured.
Laser Sight: In GGO, the Ballistic Prediction Line (Bullet Line) is an inverse example, as it appears only to opposing players, though sniper rifles don't project a line until they've fired a shot (and in which case the line disappears after a minute). Normally, this gives opposing players a chance to dodge incoming gunfire, but Kirito takes it up a notch by using these lines to deflect gunfire with his light saber. Not that he needed those lines to guess where the bullet was coming to anyway.
Laser Blade: GGO has "Photon Saber" weapons.
Lethal Joke Weapon: The above mentioned weapon's damage output is incredibly high, but its short range and limited battery life relegates it to Joke Weapon status... but in the hand of a skilled player it has the ability to block everything up to and including ''a sniper bullet''and ''a sword made of the strongest material in the game''. Naturally, Kirito no-sold every shooter with it. After he becomes the co-winner of the third GGO in-game tournament, more players begin trying to emulate him apparently to no success, as they lack Kirito's incredible reflex and his ability to guess bullet lines.
Level Grinding: In SAO, Kirito does a lot of this off-screen. In fact, in SAO it's not considered safe to explore a floor until you are at least 10+ levels higher. Kirito himself does a massive power leveling after Sachi dies, in order to solo an event boss monster to obtain a rumored One-Time Revival item to bring her back to life.
Light/Darkness Juxtaposition: Kirito gains this dynamic with the first two Big Bads, Heathcliff/Kayaba and Oberon/Sugou, with Kirito being Dark Is Not Evil while the villains being Light Is Not Good. Kirito is The Hero who always dresses in black, earning him the name the "Black Swordsman" and has swords named after dark themes like "Dark Repulsor" and "Night Sky Sword". Heathcliff is a paladin with his attacks including the "Holy Sword" and "Spiritual Light". Meanwhile Sugou made himself into the King of the Fairies and the God of Alfheim Online, giving himself a divine appearance with blonde hair and ornamented with gold.
Lighter and Softer: The Calibur Arc serves as a bit of a Breather Arc, following up on the previous arcs which all involved very high stakes such as death. This arc is more of a Slice of Life away from immediate danger, with Kirito and friends having a lot of fooling around.
Lighthearted Rematch: The SAO survivors who migrated to ALO treat the return of Aincrad as this, intending to clear all hundred levels for fun, instead of a matter of life or death.
Light Is Not Good:
- Kuradeel of the holy-based guild Knights of The Blood Oath turns out to be working for Laughing Coffin.
- Heathcliff, Leader of the Knights of The Blood Oath, has light-based skills and turns out to be the Big Bad Kayaba.
- The Guardian Knights that guard Oberon's Fortress are all clad in white and have white wings, and they're preventing Kirito from reaching Asuna.
Lightning Bruiser:
- Kirito is this no matter what game he is in due to having Super-Reflexes.
- Asuna is this in SAO, doing less raw damage but attacking and moving more quickly. More than once she's taken down opponents who've given Kirito trouble.
Little Bit Beastly: The Cait-Sith, one of the nine playable races in ALO, are basically an entire nation of cat-people.
Lock-and-Load Montage: There's a short one in Caliber, just before the heroes set out to challenge the quest and grab Excalibur.
Locked Room Mystery: The short story "Murder Case in the Area" is about figuring out how someone was killed in a town — a safe zone, in which players are normally immune to damage.
Logical Weakness: Kirito's fighting style in Gun Gale Online, in particular using his lightsaber to deflect incoming fire, relies entirely on being able to see bullet lines, and even predict when they'll appear, in order to figure out where and when to put his blade into position to allow him to deflect incoming fire. This of course means it can be countered, for example, by players firing sniper rifles from concealment at range, as they don't generate a bullet line if the weapon had not been fired for the past 60 seconds. But what about for weapons that don't get a free first shot from concealment, or for snipers who've already fired and are either still waiting on the 60-second timer to expire before they can get the free shot again, or are forced to continue engaging the enemy and unable to break contact? Head over to the Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online page for more details on a method for those types of scenarios.
Loners Are Freaks: Kirito and the few other solo players are seen as unusual for not joining guilds and going out to battle alone, something that is likely to get them killed. On the other hand, it's the reason Kirito is so skilled, and presumably the other solo players as well.
- In Progressive, the leaders of the rival factions ALS and DKB spend a great deal of time trying to pressure Kirito and Asuna into joining their guilds (one for each, as a compromise of sorts).
Look Behind You: In Intermission: Reason for the Whiskers^note, Kirito says this to Kotarou and Isuke from the Fūmaningun guild who cornered both Argo and himself. They don't believe him at first, thinking it's a trick, but it isn't because a Trembling Ox just spawned behind them.
Loophole Abuse:
- Towns are safe zones, where players cannot be killed except in a duel. PKers discover that if you challenge someone to a duel while they're asleep, you can manually move their hand to accept, and then kill them without retaliation.
- Several people are killed in a town, without anyone seeing the duel victory symbol appearing, so everyone is confused as to how it's being done. Some of the victims think it's a ghost of vengeance, but Kirito and Asuna assume it's just a system exploit. It turns out to be neither. The "victims" were faking their deaths to terrorize the man who murdered their guild leader. They took advantage of the fact that players can't be harmed in cities, but items (including armor) can, and a destroyed item Disappears into Light in the same way a dead player does. So they just stabbed themselves, faked being in pain, and when their armor was destroyed, teleported away.
Loose Canon: The Girls Ops manga spinoff. Given that it isn't written by Reki Kawahara, it's never really acknowledged in the main storyline but for the most does nothing to contradict it either. Though issues of Unital Ring have created continuity errors with Argo being revealed to have never played Alfheim Online like she's shown doing in the spinoff. Though it's still up in the air if Girls Ops is outright non-canon or not.
Loot Drama: In-Universe example, played seriously. One early episode revolves around a younger character being bullied by a crooked guild trying to rob her of a rare item that could revive her familiar, and later in the season, several Player Killing incidents revolve around a guild that crumbled after a disagreement over how to use a rare ring that dropped from a mob.
Lord British Postulate: There are a number of areas in ALO that are locked simply by placing enough powerful enemies that no one should be able to pass. The quest to enter the World Tree is this. The enemies themselves are on the low-end of the power scale, but they spawn infinitely. And if you do manage to get past them, the door will not open for anyone but a GM.
Love Confession: Recon gives an awkward one to Leafa in episode 23. She seems to reject it with a Megaton Punch, but it also seems to snap her out of her funk.
Love Makes You Evil: Kyouji became part of Death Gun because of his crush on Sinon.
Luminescent Blush: Kirito has a tendency to provoke these unintentionally.

Magic Skirt: Averted, thanks to the physics engine which simulates gravity. Silica learns this the hard way.
Male Gaze: Unsurprising considering the Shounen demographic this franchise was intially catered to; two or three lingering camera angles on backsides in the first and second season notwithstanding, onscreen nudity is usually minimal and tasteful to accentuate a character's emotional vulnerability during heartwarming moments; the modesty of the girl in question is preserved with long-and-beautiful Godiva Hair, the conveniently present Modesty Bedsheet, or a generous amount of Censor Steam and opaque water in bath sequences.
- When sexual-violence and cruelty is enters the equation, such as Asuna/Royen/Tiese's infamous Attempted Rape scenes, and Quinella's inhuman indifference to her own nudity, however, this trope is always Played for Horror.
- As the demographic eventually expands to a growing female audience, equal loving attention is paid upon muscular masculity of handsome men such as Buercoli, Klein, Aegil and once in a blue moon even Kirito and Eugeo.
Manly Tears: Happen from time to time, usually from Klein.
Marry Them All: In the Noncanon Gaiden X2, which takes place at the end of the Underworld arc, basically all of Kirito's somewhat Unwanted Harem decide to just marry him in-game, and both Kirito & Asuna agree, making the Battle Harem "official", at least for around 5 years of accelerated time. Non-canonical, since Word of God confirms it, and Ronye wasn't part of the harem (though Alice was).
Massive Race Selection: There are nine playable fairy tribes in ALO. Four of them are based on the Alchemic Elementals:
- Sylphs, wind-class fairies, who excel in flight and have acute hearing.
- Salamanders, fire-class fairies, who excel in fighting.
- Undines, water-class fairies, who excel in healing and underwater tactics.
- Gnomes, earth-class fairies, who excel in defense and mining.
- Cait-Siths, cat -class fairies, who excel in beast taming, agility, and intelligence.
- Spriggans, shadow-class fairies, who excel in treasure hunting and illusions.
- Pucas, musical-class fairies, who excel in playing musical instruments and singing.
- Leprechauns, blacksmith-class fairies, who excel in weapons manufacturing and crafting.
- Imps, dark-class fairies, who excel in night flight and night vision.
Mass Monster-Slaughter Sidequest: In ALO Archduke Þjazi gives one to kill beast-type Evil Gods in order for players to receive Excaliber but in actuality the prize is Caliburn and for Jötunheimr to spread to Alfheim.
Meaningful Name: "Unital Ring" also refer to how the game is basically all the Seed-based VRMMO forcibly united into one single game by an unknown force.
Meaningless Villain Victory: During the aftermath of Fairy Dance, it is discovered that even if Sugou had managed to perfect his Mind Control research, it would have only worked with the (now-defunct) first-generation NERVgears.
Mechanical Horse: One of the modes of transportation in GGO.
Meditation Powerup: In SAO, Meditation is a mental concentration skill that increases the rate of HP recovery and reduces the remaining time of negative statuses. However, due to its low efficiency and lame pose, not many players use it.
Mercy Reward: Naratively it could be said that Yui is this to Kirito for doing his best at invoking Video Game Caring Potential within the Death Game even going so far as to duel Asuna to prevent her from invoking Video Game Cruelty Potential against the NPCs, however since by the time Yui shows up Asuna is firmly on Kirito's side but still in need of a lesson on the humanity of AI's resulting in Asuna bonding with the AI who calls her mommy only to watch helplessly in anguish as she's nearly deleted only for Kirito to get this trope again with him having just enough time to save her, albiet as an in-game object attached to his nearvgear.
Metal Slime: The Ragout Rabbit in SAO. They are very hard to find, and though it doesn't offer high EXP, their meat can be sold for a somewhat high mount and they make for some of the best meals for anyone with a high enough Cooking skill to prepare it.
Million Mook March: When they first reach the inside of the World Tree, it doesn't seem to be very well-guarded. However, once Kirito attempts to break through, they start showing up en masse. After Leafa and Recon try to help, the numbers grow even bigger, to the point that all you can see up there is a wall of guardians.
The Mirror Shows Your True Self: Kayaba gives every player of SAO an item called "hand mirror", which forces the player avatars into the players' real-world appearance.
Modesty Bedsheet: Asuna uses one after the Relationship Upgrade.
Mood Whiplash:
- In-universe. Kirito and Asuna's Relationship Upgrade. Asuna prepares to go all the way... and Kirito explains that he meant they should stick together to watch out for assassins. It's a while before he can placate an embarrassed, raging Asuna, and the romantic mood is completely destroyed. Not that they let that stop them...
- Kirito's first meeting with Leafa and first ALO PvP encounter keeps jumping between "Laugh out Loud" and "Let's Get Dangerous!."
- Episode 21 of the anime has Asuna sneaking around the top of the World Tree interspersed with scenes of Kazuto and Suguha... well, being brother and sister, which itself alternates between funny and heartwarming.
- In the first episode of the anime, Ominous Latin Chanting accompanies Kirito's departure from the Starting City, his mind in turmoil and anguish... and then the hopeful determination of the OP kicks in.
Mook Horror Show: Episode 19 has Kirito transforming into an appearance very similar to The Gleam Eyes and summarily wiping out a group of Salamanders pursuing him and Leafa. One gets impaled on his fingernails, one gets eaten by Kirito, one gets eaten by underwater high-level monsters when attempting to escape...
Morality Kitchen Sink: The Alicization arc. Once again, Kirito and his friends are the heroes, starting out trying to make sense of the situation, and eventually fighting to defend Alice and the Underworld. Kikuoka is morally gray, with him running an experiment to create A.I.s that can fight in wars, while the U.S., with cooperation from the JSDF, wants to stop him in order to maintain the East Asian power balance. The Integrity Knights start off as antagonists while fighting for the Pontifex, but are ultimately trying to defend the human realms against the forces of darkness. The inhabitants of the Dark Territory avert Always Chaotic Evil, since they're composed of several different factions, some evil and others not so much. The human players who fight for them are Unwitting Pawns who got tricked by the main villains. The main antagonists of the arc- Quinella, PoH, and Gabriel Miller, as well as lesser antagonists Raios, Humbert and Chudelkin, are all truly despicable and have no redeeming characteristics.
The Most Dangerous Video Game: This is the entire premise of the Aincrad arc and, for 300 people, the Fairy Dance arc.
Most Gamers Are Male: Demonstrated a few times in group shots, particularly in the opening and during raids, but it's most obvious when Akihara scrolls down a list of players and only one of around 15 is female. Particularly interesting because this trope is averted in Japan.
Mundane Utility: Some players use VRMMOs to do homework, as it can display a lot more screen data than would be possible at home and allows for players to gather despite real world distances.
Muscles Are Meaningless: Occurs a lot in VR worlds. It's discussed often, as well as in spin-offs like Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online, that there can be some weird dissonance between the appearance of a player's avatar and what their stats dictate they're capable of. A prime example of this would be Kirito, who like looks like a skinny teenager both in-game and IRL, but also focuses on STR for his stat build, giving him a good deal of strength in-game to lift heavy swords effortlessly.
- This generally also applies in the Underworld, as in most cases strength is largely about your self-image manifesting as your strength^note. In Moon Cradle, it's stated that Ronye was able to effortlessly beat her younger brother in an arm wrestle, with him not even moving her arm half a cen, despite her not being depicted as particularly muscular.
Musical Theme Naming: Each story arc in the Progressive light novel series is named after a musical composition style (with the only exception being the Interlude chapter in the first volume):
- Aria of a Starless Night
- Rondo of a Fragile Blade
- Concerto of Black-and-White
- Barcarolle of Froth
- Canon of the Golden Rule
- Rhapsody of the Red Blaze
Mutual Kill:
- Kayaba deals Kirito a mortal blow, but he lasts long enough to return the favor.
- How Shino and Kirito end up as co-winners of the BoB tournament.
Mythology Gag: In one of the side stories, Kirito is called to test a new 4th Generation Full Dive Unit, and finds himself stuck in another virtual world battling Silver Crow.

Sword Art Online / Tropes I to M

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