.hack//Link: BACKLOT [.hack//Archive 04 TRANSLATION]

Please read this before you start reading: This is a low to medium-translation level, which is not much higher standard level than how it was translated, especially how this translation using a translator and adds few edits to match English viewers' understanding, but hoping this would help viewers to understand what contents and information based on it means. If any translator is willing to help me for corrections I would be glad and appreciate their contribution and their help.

Disclaimer: The following is a non-profit fan-translation, all .hack title series, including .hack//Link is owned by CyberConnect 2 and Bandai Namco Entertainment, please buy .hack//Archive 04 -.hack//Link- official documentation setting and support the official release on CC2 Store Page.

WARNING: IT CONTAINS A MAJOR SPOILERS FROM .hack//Link

This is the first time that we have published a plot document that tells the story of each character from a different point of view, right up to the start of the main game.

Act one: JYOTARO AMAGI

Summer 2012...

16 years old, Jyotaro Amagi

The woman he loves.

His aunt Ayaka Amagi died by an illness.

That was the beginning.

It was the moment he stopped believing in life.

From that day on, his sharp mind kept spinning at a frightening speed in search of a way to keep his personality forever.

It was only two years later that he arrived at the answer...

Act two: Akashic Line

Few people remember the online game "Akashic Line", which went live in 2014.

It was a closed beta version that lasted only 3 months. Moreover, only 666 children between the ages of 7 and 12 were selected.

Some wondered about the strange conditioning, but when it was explained that this game was an educational software developed under the control of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry and the Intelligent Information Department, they were strangely convinced.

Communication in the network activates brain function, which is effective in fostering intelligence in children. ......

It was a young genius, Jyotaro Amagi, who had just joined the Ministry this year, who convinced the upper management to believe such nonsense and put the game into practical use.

Of course, this game has no effect on intelligence development.

In fact, it had the potential to jeopardize the very existence of the player, but Amagi was the only one who understood this.

And in the list of 666 users who were gathered without knowing anything about it, there was the name of the main character, Tokio Kuryuu, who had just turned eight years old.

Act three: Real Digitalize

For Tokio, it was a dreamlike experience.

A vast world with fantastic scenery. The sense of accomplishment he felt when he and his friends defeating the strange monsters that appeared out of nowhere.

All of this was new to him, as it was his first experience with an online game.

He kept logging in and adventuring every day in no time at all, and three months passed in the blink of an eye. Finally, today was the last day of the beta version.

The Final Quest.

The last chance to rescue the "Princess" from the captivity of the King of the Underworld.

As we proceed through the long, long cave into the Underworld, one by one, our friends in the party fall.

Tokio was the only one who could reach the altar where the Dark Lord awaited.

At the altar, a "Princess" in a dress is bound to the altar.

Tokio was astonished as he fought back against the Dark Lord, who attacked him with tremendous fury.

His attacks were not working!

In the underworld, the deaths become fruit and the living become imaginary. In front of Dark Lord, he is nothing more than an unreliable shadow. “More.. More, I want to be one with this world!!” The moment he thought about it, he was surrounded by light and filled with power. He slammed all that power on Shadowlord.

After the Dark Lord vanished, he freed the body of the princess bound to the altar, and she opened her eyes and smiled.

"I've been waiting for you for a long time... You are forever... my hero! You are my hero forever!"

It was nothing more than just a standard message that were set up for the event, but it left deep impression on Tokio's mind.

Act four: RA Project

Jyotaro Amagi watched the boy fighting in the monitor.

In the middle of the fight with the Dark Lord, the boy's PC shines and the body in fantasy-style armor overlaps the boy's body in civilian clothes. Now, realistically, the boy's body shouldn't exist.

Real Digitalization… the phenomenon of turning a human being into light particles by irradiating him with light of a specific vibration frequency, and then turning him into data.

This was the answer that realize his goal, and the moment of its demonstration.

But for some reason, Jyotaro's expression was grim as he stared at the monitor.

It turns out that only a limited number of people with special qualities could be digitized in the "Akashic Line" system.

The complete digitalization of the entire human race.

To share with all mankind the happiness of existing purely on the basis of reason alone, without aging, sickness, or death, and without being bound by physical desires such as sexual desire, appetite, or the desire to sleep. 

That is Jyotaro Amagi's ideal.

To achieve this goal, he needed a powerful force beyond the Akashic Line capabilities.

After much investigation, he found the ultimate AI, "Aura", which lives in the network. But she had vanished from existence.

He learns the truth about the Morgana Incident, The Second Network Crisis, and plans to salvage the power of the eight phases that triggered the anomaly.

CC Corp, wanting to take the initiative in the network society, is lured by his sweet talk of "creating Aura's power by human hands", and approves the RA project…

Act five: Saika Amagi

9 year-old Saika Amagi was angry. Six months ago, her "older brother" Jyotaro left home without her.

And today, he is inexplicably missing after a fire broke out at CC Corp's research facility.

Upon hearing the news, she locks herself in her room and has locked in her room for more than 10 hours, pretending not to hear her "parents" calling out to her from the outside.

"Parents"... they're not Saika's real parents. Her real father died before she was born, and her mother, Ayaka Amagi, died of illness when she was six years old.

For three years after being adopted by her uncle and his wife, the lascivious and shy Saika opened her heart only to Jyotaro, the eldest son of the family. When she heard that Jyotaro, whom she had always looked up to him as her real older brother, was suddenly leaving home, she felt betrayed.

Later, when she heard that he was going to participate in a project for a certain company, the object of her hatred shifted to the company that had taken him away from her.

Since then, her distrust of CC Corp has only grown. She has never been able to believe that this incident was just an accident, as was publicly announced.

"I will definitely …… expose CC Corp's conspiracy!" Driven by a desire for revenge, she continues her investigation and receives an e-mail. It was addressed to "J." The email reads as follows:

“Saika….. I now live amongst 0’s and 1’s. Please come find me, please help me.”

Act Six: Geist

In 2016, when he woke up in the cybernetic world. He knew everything he had to do. His name was "Geist".

He is an AI with the memories of Jyotaro Amagi inputted into it. And the fact that he has awakened indicates that this is the worst that could be expected.

He was a back-up, prepared to replace Amagi when he was no longer able to carry out his objectives.

He quickly accesses information sites around the country to get an overview of the situation regarding the accident at CC Corp.

Amagi was missing after the "fire" incident, but it was clear that he was dead or close to it, given that he had not been heard from in several months.

"Then, from today, I must become Amagi myself and carry on his will."

"I am the ghost (Geist) of Amagi!" 

Thus began Geist's activities. The first thing he did was to send out two e-mails under the name "J".

One letter is to Saika Amagi. The other letter is to CC Corp.

As for Saika, he needs a collaborator to act on his behalf who is unable to act in real life. As for CC Corp, it was necessary to use "The World" as a platform to execute real digitization.

Amagi had already prepared the "R:X" concept, a concrete plan for incorporating the Akashic Line into "The World".

He was sure that CC Corp would not even look at him now that the transition to "R:2" was still in its infancy. However, he was convinced that an opportunity would eventually present itself.

Act Seven: The World R:X

The "Opportunity" Geist had anticipated came surprisingly quickly.

In August 2017, the effects of the "Rebirth" triggered by "The Epitaph User" Ovan and the emergence of the "Anti-Existence" caused a Third Network Crisis that caused enough damage to cause a worldwide network panic and quickly brought the popularity of "The World R:2" to an all-time low.

CC Corp also avoided assigning responsibility by manipulating information, which is one of its specialties, but once public opinion had shifted, it was necessary to make a major image change in order to overturn it. And quickly.

The "R:X" concept was accepted largely because it could be developed in a very short period of time by applying the "Akashic Line," a system that had already been completed. The biggest concern was the existence of "Aura", but here, too, the troubles of "R:2" had a positive effect.

Aura had materialized again in "The World" at the time of the crisis of the emergence of the Anti-Existence.

Geist requests CC Corp. to sign a contract with "Schicksal (Fate)," a group of hackers that were capable of capturing Aura.

Geist recommended them, of course, because of their technical capabilities, but there was one more reason.

He himself hid his true identity and belonged to them. Now, as a subordinate of CC Corp, he could watch their movements while pretending to follow their orders.

It was only two weeks later that Schicksal captured Aura.

Act Eight: Twilight Knights

Akashic Records is a database of all records of "The World" and is a semi-autonomous, unmanned management system.

This management system made possible a new form of MMO called IL (Infinity Link), in which tens of millions of users each connect their portable PCs in series.

However, these are only "Cover" of it's functions.

The true function is a transmitter that real-digitizes all humans connected to the network.

At the deepest level, Aura was sealed as a "Core" that supplied unlimited energy to the Akashic Records.

However, Aura, fearing that her power would be misused, sealed herself in a rock door and went into "Sleep", thereby suppressing the energy she released to an extreme degree.

Moreover, the heroes who were summoned from "The World" in the past era by her link to the Akashic Records began to work to destroy the Akashic Records. She called it "Twilight Knights".

Schicksal dives into the "Memory Fountain" of the Akashic Records and "alters" the past data, thereby "freezing" their time, one by one.

However, Schicksal and his team were unable to pass through the "Rock Door" of Aura.

If you are not more "Close" to her, you wouldn't be able to reach the "Rock Door". A being that is neither just a PC nor just an AI….

Geist traces the memory of "The Former Amagi" and recalls the name of Tokio Kuryuu.

He was once the only boy in the "Akashic Line" who succeeded in real digitization. He was the most loved human being by the electric brain.

The question is how to invite him into the "Akashic Records"…? Geist decides to enlist the help of Saika Amagi, whom he had contacted several times under the name "J".

She already had no doubt that "J" was Jyotaro Amagi, and she was willing to help in anything she could. The problem is that she is too dynamic. As a junior high school student, she has developed considerable hacker skills and has hacked into the "R:X" server many times, even clashing with Schicksal.

At such times, he would try to get her out of the way so that the other members would not know. He still has uses on her. He can't have her crushed in a place like this. And thus Saika seems to have arranged to transfer to another school to meet Tokio.

Geist begins to making a disc for Tokio to hand over.

A special disc….