Vanguard of the Eternal Night

translator: xiin

editor: kara

Victor's nervousness continued until the next day before the game.

He hadn't slept well all last night, and when he had woken up in the morning, he had found that his old antique had woken up even earlier than he had and was currently reading in the study.

Victor always remembered that Tyron had said that he didn't like mathematical calculations, which was why he hadn't become a mage. He'd basically adopted a basic strategy of reciting magic.

At this time, he saw that Tyron was looking at the formulas and was momentarily startled, "Is there a problem?"

Tyron shook the papers and said, "Only one."

Victor: "???"

Tyron: "Can't I take you with me into the game?"

Victor: "……"

The old antique continued sincerely, "It's too complicated to calculate these things. If the opponent chants a single segment, I'll have to calculate the magic effect at the same time… There's no need to fight for more than a minute, and I'll die automatically."

Victor was full of heartache, "But, but I can't help either? How about you take a break in the middle and don't do the calculations for every spell?"

"I still want to carry you in my pocket…" The old antique murmured in a low voice, then shook the papers again, and sighed.

Alas, when he had been flaunting the edge of death on the battlefield back then, it had always been when he had faced against a powerful mage. There was no limit to the power of real mages in a Western fantasy world, even if such real mages were extremely rare.

At that time, if he could have carried Victor in his arms, he could have just poked Victor and had him do the calculations while he had fought. He'd have saved a countless amount of time and effort…

Before dealing with a mage, it was good to have a general spell formula. At least, it gave him a certain chance of knowing the effect of the spell.

When there was no formula, he could only speculate and guess based on experience and knowledge.

If he could hear that there was a fire element in the chant or see a transmutation gesture--then it was already considered quite a good understanding of the spell. After that, he could only guess whether it was a flamethrower, a fire cloud, or a fireball…

Half of it was based on experience, and the other half was based on luck.

In the real world of magic, all mages were self-made. Nobody would disclose their magic and spell compositions, and even a spell book that taught the most basic elemental knowledge was priceless. This was because, for mages, once the knowledge was made public, it would be targeted, and its value would reduce greatly.

Without a stable social structure, it was impossible to establish a magic research system. Without such a system, magic would always be a rare thing of knowledge and would only become increasingly scarce as time went by.

By the time one reached Odin’s position in his previous life, his thousands of years of accumulated experience in dealing with mages was enough for him to write an entire encyclopedia about going up against mages&#k2013;&#k2013;this knowledge was even more valuable. If he’d passed it on, he could have definitely trained up another famous assassin who would have shaken the continent in a few years.

After having arrived in this interstellar society, one of Tyron's favorite things to do from beginning to end was to learn general knowledge.

Everything here was contrary to what he'd known. Precious knowledge was taught publicly, and some people even wrote science books dedicated to difficult content. Not only were spells commonly seen, but they also were popular enough to be organized into formulas, and everyone openly discussed their own knowledge and was proud to share their experiences--and everyone was used to this as the norm.

Tyron was flipping through a spell book that Crimson himself had written.

This was a version from a year ago. Crimson would occasionally share his own experience, and it wasn't unreasonable for other mages to regard him as the 'God of Mages'.

A mage's spell books would clearly show their tendencies.

Crimson was a player who had extremely accurate calculation abilities. As long as there was data shown in his spells, it would be accurate to at least two decimal places, and it would also have its own error coefficient. There was a rumor that Crimson had the same style in the arena. When he improvised new spells, he would also calculate up to the decimal points in his mind…

This kind of computing power was absolutely a gift. Even across the entire Alliance, the number of people who could do this didn't even exceed double digits.

It was because of this terrible mental calculation ability that Crimson could go so crazy with spell reconstruction--he had set a world record for spell reconstruction.

If conditions permitted, at his peak, Crimson could reconstruct a spell four times! Four times!

For example:

You knew that he was about to cast a flash ignition spell. Crimson knew that you also knew this, so he suddenly chants another segment, and the spell changes into a Hand of Fire. You have some knowledge of magic and recognize the Hand of Fire, but he knows that you knew this too, so he suddenly chants another bar, and the magic becomes a Fire Snake. Just while you are preparing to hide, he immediately reconstructs it again, making it a flying Fire Snake that could track its target; you finally break down and open up your skills, preparing to fight hard. Then, Crimson finds that he has the chance to kill you and uses another 0.5 seconds to reconstruct the spell into an enhanced version of an automatic tracking, flying Fire Dragon…

Ah, my friend, just lie down, and wait to be **ed.

In addition to this point, another of Crimson's features was that his moves were all closely linked together, and his pacing and control were watertight.

He basically didn't play with things like probability. He wasn't a gambler. As long as he made a move, it meant that he had at least 80% confidence that things would go according to plan--

Because, he would have blocked all the other options in advance.

As a master who understood a bit of all types of magic and was also a master of the energy system, there was almost nothing he couldn't do.

From the master assassin's perspective, all of his experience in dealing with this kind of mage could be summarized with two points: The first was to 'attack the enemy while they were unprepared and kill them right away'.

Unfortunately, there was no way to really launch a sneak attack at all in the e-sports arena. Everyone was already on alert when they stepped into the arena, and this was why the assassin profession that relied on stealth wasn't strong here.

The second point was to 'wait for the opportunity to fight back and strike like lightning'.

--Find an opening, and take the opponent's life in an instant at any cost. Never give them a chance to breathe and recover.

It didn't take Tyron much time to come up with tactics. He didn't even forget to run two extra laps at noon.

Perhaps because Victor had been so nervous yesterday, he'd spent the entire afternoon stewing soup that was very delicious. Tyron had silently eaten a lot of herbal replenishments, which was probably why he had a feeling of boundless energy when he had started running.

Having a family felt great!

The old antique, who had a family, was in high spirits as he took Victor with him back to the contestant seating.

The match between him and Crimson was arranged for the afternoon. Their match was the only one arranged for the afternoon, and everyone else's matches had been arranged for the morning.

Watching other people's games was a way for the old antique to adjust his physical and mental state. Sometimes, when he saw the young players (they were young to him) fighting in the arena, it made him feel like he'd gone back to the past and could see young whelps working hard at the training ground.

By about ten o'clock in the morning, Crimson had also arrived in the stands.

The two players, who would compete against each other in the afternoon, weren't far from each other. The two parties themselves hadn't realized yet, but the director and audience who could see them were already acting as though they'd seen a meeting between great enemies. Even one of the side screens switched to quickly show a shot of the two of them.

After glancing at the camera, Crimson realized that Odin was also present. He looked back to say hello, which could be considered as getting to know each other before their game.

There were several seats between them, so there was no way to talk. Tyron didn't take it seriously either and simply nodded to express that he'd seen him.

--For them, it was nothing but a two-second episode.

However, as a result, the media and audience comments all exploded!

"The fight for the title starts early? The god of mages, Crimson, and the great demon king, Odin, have appeared at the National Championships! Whether it's just passing by to watch the game or deliberately exerting psychological pressure on their opponent, can the experts analyze it for us…?"

"In my lifetime, I actually saw the two abstinent male gods of the e-sports circle greeting each other…"

"The dark undercurrents are surging. There must be something behind it! Was Crimson's movement just now like a casting gesture? Odin's nod must have some profound meaning!"

… Heavens knew, in fact, they had just been saying hello to each other.

Victor noticed the audience's over-interpretation of their interactions and pulled on Odin's sleeve.

Tyron: "They're messing around, just let them be."

Victor whispered, "That's not it, I just want to know… why are they calling you an abstinent god? When did that happen?"

Tyron looked closely, but the comment had already drifted a hundred and eight thousand miles away and couldn't be seen at all.

"Whether or not I'm abstinent, you know best." The old antique leaned over slightly and spoke smoothly, "They even call me an iceberg, but am I icy? Weren't you all burned up two days ago?"

"……" Victor felt that he must have become too dirty. He could actually understand the implication behind the words.

Tyron blew out a breath beneath Victor's ear and was satisfied when he saw a series of little goosebumps. "Let's rent a hot spring after the competition."

Victor couldn't help asking, "How many days?"

"30 days."

Victor blushed, mumbled, and then whispered, "Alright, I'll go and find a spaceship with hot springs…"

Tyron spoke meaningfully, "A pair of hot and cold springs with anti-skid flooring."

Victor was so heated that he exploded with a bang, smoke curling from above his head as he said, "Don't, don't play like that…" Who was it!? Who had helped his old antique open up the door to the new century? Even he didn't know how to play like this! Give him back his icy, jade-like old antique!

……

A few seconds later, the public screen stopped discussing Crimson and Odin and began to wonder, "Why is Representative-kun so red?"

"What did the great demon king turn to say to him? I really want to know!"

"Is Lord Four preparing to propose in the provincial competition, then announce his wedding ceremony during the National Championships?"

There were also the daily actions that the fans wouldn't miss out on, "The War God's beauty makes me feel suffocated, lick lick lick!!"

Shortly afterwards, the final game of the morning had finished--Vantico was tentatively in fourth place, and in the next round, he would be up against Jiuzhou. Whether or not he could make any further progress in this National Championships would depend on whether or not he could win against Jiuzhou.

Unexpectedly, Vantico headed straight over to Odin after his game.

At this time, there was no more competition to watch, so the camera focused decisively on the two high-profile assassins.

Vantico deliberately avoided the camera, went over, and held up a virtual key in front of Tyron's eyes, saying dejectedly, "… Someone wants to meet you."