Log Horizon

In medias res Shiroe, Naotsugu and Akatsuki find themselves ambushed by a pack of briar weasel monsters. Following a game update in the present, a confused Shiroe awakens to find himself in the District of Akihabara inside the Elder Tale MMORPG while donning his in-game avatar. He encounters other panicked players and all find themselves unable to log-out. Accessing his HUD, Shiroe quickly makes contact and teams up with his friend Naotsugu. Eventually the assassin Akatsuki joins them on account of helping her revert to a feminine avatar. The next day, Shiroe and co. meet with his friend, the Master of the Crescent Moon Alliance Guild—Marielle to compare notes on their current reality. Shiroe and co. learn that the teleportation gates across all the Japanese game districts have been rendered offline in addition to the start of a widespread guild recruitment campaign to deal with the changes of the recent "Novasphere Pioneers" update. After declining Marielle's recruitment offer, Shiroe and co. discuss the possible outcomes of an in-game death and head into the Archive Tower Forests to test the theory where they are ambushed by the pack of Briar Weasels. After some initial difficulty, they are able to overcome the ambush by naturally moving their bodies to attack rather than relying on their preset attack commands. Elsewhere, a girl called Serara makes a panicked call to Marielle while being chased by two male players as a mysterious figure looks on.

Upon dying while fighting monsters, a player revives at the Cathedral and Shiroe deduces that they are truly trapped inside the game. After another meeting with the Crescent Moon Alliance, Shiroe and co. learn of the stabilizing power balance between guilds in the District of Akihibara in addition to a rise in recent PKings. While heading back to Akihibara after a day of training Shiroe and Naotsugu anticipate an ambush from nearby PKers, forcing them into a direct confrontation. However the PKers' overconfidence quickly becomes their undoing as Shiroe and Naotsugu's team work proves to be too much for them and are quickly overpowered by the latter's high-level combinations. In desperation, the PK leader tries calling in reinforcements only to discover they have been already taken down by Akatsuki. Feigning defeat, the leader tries to attack Shiroe however Akatsuki kills him. In the aftermath, Shiroe and co. try to discern the motives of the players in the game, and he deduces that since people can survive in-game without doing anything, the string of PKings were purely for entertainment purposes. Afterwards, Shiroe receives a call from Marielle and learns that she intends to take a party on a mission to rescue their comrade Serara in the District of Susukino and asks Shiroe to take care of the guild in her absence. However, Shiroe and his friends counter by deciding to go in Marielle's stead.

While continuing on their way to the District of Susukino, Shiroe, Naotsugu and Akatsuki enter a familiar dungeon known as the Depths of Palm. As Marielle calls to check up on their progress, Shiroe surprises her at the distance they managed to cover in three days. Meanwhile in Susukino, Serara seems to be doing fine in the care of Nyanta—a player using a cat avatar who had saved her from her pursuers. While they wonder about the kind of people Shiroe and co. are, the Dark Guild, Brigandia continue looting and pillaging the district. Back in Akihabara, Marielle begins a meeting with the guild masters of Akihibara, while another mysterious guild master learns of the meeting and of Shiroe's movements. Meanwhile, Shiroe and co. cross an ancient bridge in the dungeon which suddenly starts crumbling and causes Shiroe to plummet into the lake below. As Shiroe recalls his time with the adventuring group, Debauchery Tea Party, he regains consciousness to find himself having been saved by his comrades. Eventually Shiroe and co. find themselves face to face with the dungeon's boss, a Novasphere Pioneers' creature called the Rat-maso and quickly engage and defeat it battle. Afterwards, they finally arrive at the dungeon's exit and are rewarded with a spectacular view of the sunset over the channel. Elsewhere, the guild master of Brigandia—Demikas, issues a manhunt for Serara and Nyanta.

Finally arriving in Susukino, Shiroe, Naotsugu and Akatsuki enter the district weary of an ambush by the Brigandia Guild. Meanwhile, as Demikas becomes alerted of their arrival, Shiroe meets up with Serara and Nyanta at a secret location, and shockingly discovers that his old friend Nyanta had been the one protecting Serara. Afterwards, Shiroe relays his plans with Naotsugu and Akatsuki and prepares to leave the district with Nyanta and Serara. After having waited patiently for them to exit the district, Shiroe, Nyanta and Serara are surrounded by the Brigandia guild and Shiroe taunts Demikas into a duel with Nyanta. As Nyanta's swashbuckler class inflicts severe status ailments on Demikas, he crudely calls in his guild members for aid however Naotsugu intercepts them with Anchor Howl. Eventually, Naotsugu and Nyanta's HP drops to dangerous levels and Shiroe has Serara heal them. With the healing having seemingly little effect, Naotsugu activates Castle of Stone and buys them enough delay time for Shiroe to ensnare Demikas in Thorn Bind Hostage, allowing Nyanta to defeat him. As Akatsuki marvels at their perfect timing and silent teamwork while taking down Demikas' remaining healers, Serara delivers the finishing blow to Demikas in defense of Shiroe, winning the battle. With their mission successful, Shiroe, Naotsugu and Nyanta summon three griffons and the party makes their way back to Akihibara.

Having flown far out of Brigandia's reach, the group breathes a sigh of relief and Serara can't help but be overwhelmed at the kindness Shiroe and co. showed in her rescue. The party then sets up camp and Nyanta brandishes his cooking prowess by explaining that only those with the Chef sub-class are able to manually prepare food with flavor. After a venison barbeque supper, Nyanta, Shiroe and Naotsugu explain their history as part of the legendary adventuring group—Debauchery Tea Party, which causes Akatsuki to lament her own abilities. As their journey back to Akihibara continues, Shiroe reminisces about his time spent mentoring two beginners—Tōya and Minori, just before the Apocalypse, and recalls having glimpsed them joining a guild back in Akihibara. The next day, a sudden thunderstorm forces the party to seek shelter in a nearby farming village and they meet Fedor—one of the People of the Land. After interacting with Fedor and his grandchildren, Shiroe deduces that the NPCs of this world have more human characteristics, and making themselves—the anomalies of the world. Elsewhere, Tōya and Minori along with other beginners find themselves taken advantage of by the guild who coaxed them into joining. Finally, as Tōya and the rest of his guild set out the next day, he happily notices Shiroe and co. safely back in Akihibara, but finds himself unable to meet him.

The Crescent Moon Alliance guild throws a party in their guild hall to commemorate Serara's return, in addition to keeping Nyanta's cooking methods a secret from the rest of the city. Afterwards Marielle explains to Shiroe that during his absence, Akihabara remained relatively peaceful despite an unnatural uneasiness befalling its citizens whereby no fault of their own, a social divide was established between the strong and weak guilds. Marielle also outlines that since the player level-limit was raised to 100 following the Novasphere Pioneers update, the stronger guilds such as the Black Sword Knights and Silver Sword have been leveling up using EXP pot items obtained from the Hamelin guild who had been requiting low-level players for the sole purpose of creating a monopoly on their EXP pots to the stronger guilds. Following this news, Shiroe later ponders on all of his excuses up until that point but upon running into Nyanta, realizes that he had just been using them as a means to run away from the reality of Akihabara's state of affairs—despite his friends remaining by his side. Afterwards, Shiroe calls Minori and assures her that he will save them. Filled with new resolve, Shiroe meets with Marielle, Henrietta and Shōryū the next day and asks them to aid him and his newfound guild—Log Horizon, in ending Hamelin's plot and restoring Akihabara's sense of goodwill.

Naotsugu, Shōryū and Hien begin hunting ingredient monsters in the Imperial Garden Forest while the girls, builders and cooks of the of the Crescent Moon Alliance along with Nyanta begin preparing themselves for one of Shiroe's plans. At the same time Henrietta and Shiroe task Marielle with approving an exorbitant amount of budget requests for the guild as part of Shiroe's plan to obtain his requested five million gold funding by taking advantage of the fact that the world of Elder Tale has no strict ruling on how currency should be obtained. The following day the Crescent Moon Alliance opens a food booth in the city and despite initial reluctance from the citizens, becomes an instant hit with word of their delicious food quickly spreading throughout the city. Afterwards, the stall manages to make over forty thousand gold in profit despite their sales being restricted by the total amount of citizens living in Akihabara in addition to the total number they can serve daily. Shiroe then leaves the next stage of his plan to Henrietta before he informs Minori of their progress and urges her to wait a while longer. That night, Shiroe and Nyanta meet with Soujirou Theta—master of the Caravan of the West Wind guild and former Debauchery Tea Party member and asks for his aid, which he gives to Shiroe without hesitation. Finally Shiroe beings the second stage of his plan the next day.

Following the second stage of Shiroe's plan, Marielle and Henrietta meet with Karashin—master of the Shopping Street 8 guild to discuss an agreement involving the exchange of food ingredients. Karashin tries being coy in his attempt to establish an exclusive deal with the Crescent Moon Alliance's food business. Having already anticipated this, Shiroe has Marielle and Henrietta introduce their intention of bringing in the masters of the other business venturing guilds—Michitaka and Roderic of the Marine Agency and Roderic Merchant Guild respectively—thus forcing Karashin to hurriedly accept the Alliance's proposition at a severely reduced price. Meanwhile, Minori laments all of the struggles she and Tohya faced when they became trapped within Elder Tale and that they didn't heed Shiroe's advice before it was too late, thus making them unworthy of Shiroe's rescue. Back at the meeting, Shiroe has Henrietta play a dangerous game of baiting the three guild masters into investing the remaining amount of gold under the false pretense of an extremely profitable legendary Novasphere Pioneers quest led by non other than the "Villain in Glasses" himself—Shiroe. Afterwards, Tohya relates the same feelings of undeserved rescue to Minori before the Crescent Moon Alliance and Log Horizon issue invitations to Akihibara's largest guilds for a conference to discuss the city's future.

The Round Table Conference begins as the masters of Akihibara's most influential guilds gather at the city's Guild Hall. Shiroe firstly eases that he seeks only to improve the city's living state, prompting disinterest and departure from Silver Sword's guild master—William Massachusetts. Unperturbed, Shiroe continues his explanation of the conference's formation. Elsewhere, as the Hamelin captives prepare to escape, Shiroe mentions the EXP Pot extortion campaign including Susukino's dire state with Black Sword Knights' guild master—Issac arguing the lack of laws in the world. D.D.D.'s guild master—Crusty asks of a guild's fate should they refuse the laws to which Shiroe proposes harsh sanctioning. However, Honesty's guild master—Ein along with Issac and Crusty argue of the agreement's flaw should they refuse to cooperate, with Issac even threatening war. Shiroe then plays his trump card, revealing his acquisition of the Guild Hall using the five million gold and counter blackmailing the guilds over his absolute control of their affairs. Meanwhile, as the Hamelin captives manage to escape the Hall, Minori and Tohya are unfortunately captured by Hamelin's master—Schrieder. However Shiroe's control of the Hall along with help from his friends manage to successfully blacklist all of Hamelin's members. Finally, as Shiroe makes one last pitch to the conference, Issac demands Shiroe's plan.