Shino and Shinkawa's First Conversation: How To Establish Character

A lot of people criticize Reki Kawahara's writing, particularly Sword Art Online, for a variety of reasons. Some criticisms are fair, while others are less so, but I've found that many people don't give him enough credit as a writer. I will look at a scene from Volume 5 of Sword Art Online's light novels, in which Shino "Sinon" Asada meets Kyouji "Spiegel" Shinkawa in a cafe, which shows a surprising amount of foreshadowing and subtle characterization.

First, it's important to briefly discuss the scene before this one, in which some bullies are shown harassing Shino, demanding that she "loan" them 100,000 yen (about $100) for train fare, and using her trauma against her when she refuses. The anime unfortunately omits a bit of context- that the bullies used to be "friends" with Shino, but constantly took advantage of her to throw parties in her apartment- and that their extortion is in retaliation for Shino standing up to them. This also explains that while Shino keeps others' at arms length, she does actually want friends, which is why Shinkawa is fairly important to her.

At that point, Shinkawa shows up, acting as though he's guiding a police officer there, and forcing the bullies to flee. Shinkawa then takes Shino to a cafe, which leads in to the scene we're about to discuss.

Once inside the cafe, Shinkawa talks to Shino about her fight with Behemoth's squadron(Sinon's first scene), which ended with Sinon putting a bullet through Behemoth's head while in midair. As impressed as Shinkawa is at Shino's victory, Shino says that it isn't all that impressive, since her squad was supposed to have the tactical advantage. The two discuss how Behemoth isn't well-known as a player in the Bullet of Bullets tournament, since his loadout isn't practical for solo combat, showing how the gameplay priorities of a free-for-all are different from party-based gameplay.

Shino's rather self-deprecating about her performance, partly out of humility and partly because she knows she isn't where she wants to be just yet. However, Shinkawa makes it clear that Shino is doing better than she is; he only got up to the semifinals of the second tournament's preliminaries, while Shino placed 22nd out of 30 in the actual tournament. Unlike Shino, who believes stats matter less than a player's strength, Shinkawa believes that he hamstrung himself by focusing so much on AGI that he doesn't have the STR to equip powerful rare guns. This not only shows more about the game's mechanics, but also hints at each of their personalities in the process. Shino is more confident than she seems in reality, albeit not without her weaknesses, while Shinkawa is hiding his vulnerability.

The conversation then shifts to how Shinkawa is too busy to attend the next BoB. Despite being the second son of his family, he's set to inherit his family's hospital, so he's under a lot of pressure to get into a good medical school. Shino becomes concerned about how much time Shinkawa is spending in-game, but Shinkawa insists that he's getting his studying done. Shino leaves, since she has to cook dinner for herself, and Shinkawa asks if she can cook for him again soon. Shino says that she needs to get better at cooking first, but it's actually a lie; she isn't entirely comfortable with having him over just yet.

The scene helps establish the dynamic between Shino and Shinkawa and explain their relationship by showing in addition to telling. The two have a common interest in Gun Gale Online, which helps them connect, albeit one that Shinkawa introduced to Shino. The two also get along reasonably well, and aren't above joking around. Despite that, the fact that Shino and Kyouji call each other by their surnames with appropriate honorifics- "Shinkawa-kun" and "Asada-san," respectively- indicates that they aren't especially close. Compare how Asuna starts calling Shino "Shino-non" after knowing her for a few months (the first nickname Shino's gotten), whereas Shino uses Asuna's first name(which also happens to be her username) without honorifics.

In hindsight, a lot of things come off differently when you learn that he is part of Death Gun, helping this scene foreshadow later developments.

• Shinkawa's complaints about AGI-type builds no longer being viable helps foreshadow part of the reason why he snapped-he can no longer be #1 in Gun Gale Online.
• Similarly, the mock exams that he mentioned also reveal that his real life is worse than we thought. Of course, one thing that this scene doesn't reveal is that he lied to Shino- he'd failed his exam.
• The fact that he spends a lot of time online also shows his growing obsession with GGO. This, combined with his difficult family life, shows he's losing his grip on reality. When he later plans on killing Shino and himself in a murder-suicide, it's less indicative of him being suicidal and more than he honestly believes that death is just a way to be reincarnated in another world.
• Even his appearance to help save Shino from Endou is suspicious. Either he was just lucky enough to be in the area at the time, or he was stalking Shino, the latter of which turns out to be true. It also vaguely implies that while Shino is strong in his eyes, he also would prefer that she be dependent on him, something that is further driven home in their scene in the park in Volume 5.

As you can see, a lot of the meaning behind the scene is best appreciated when you read more deeply, and with the knowledge of what comes next. Kawahara is hardly perfect, but while his faults are worth discussing, so is his ability to write scenes like these.