Vanguard of the Eternal Night

translator: xiin

editor: alamerysl

The first thing Tyron did was to check Pei Rong's health, and the results were terrible.

Pei Rong's entire nervous system was on the verge of collapse. He was only hanging on by a thread as he hung suspended in the nutrient chamber. He had remained in the virtual network for nearly a month not because he didn't want to go offline, but because his body might suffer from the impact once he went offline.

The only way to thoroughly eradicate the disease once it had reached the later stages was to change bodies.

Technology from the Vermillion Bird Empire allowed humans to transfer their consciousness. That was to say, to use ** technology to create an entirely new body and transfer their consciousness over as the ultimate means of escaping from this disease.

But this method was very expensive. It required about 60 million dollars to have the operation done within the Chaoyang Alliance, and if one wanted more assurance and had it performed in the Vermillion Bird Empire, it would be even more expensive.

Pei Rong's account balance: 300,000, with some loose change.

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No matter what kind of star he was, once they reached the stage of being a household name, it was impossible to only have such a small amount of savings.

Tyron naturally went to look into it, and sure enough, he found clues in his accounts.

Pei Rong had a sister named Pei Ying. Pei Rong had been supporting her until she got married, and basically spent half of his income on his sister. Five years ago, when his sister got married, Pei Rong also took pains to set a high dowry and paid a sky-high price for the wedding celebrations and decor. He even set up a trust fund for his sister, fearing that she might accidentally lose money.

Then, two years ago, problems arose in his brother-in-law Ji Sixian's freight company, and he was implicated in an illegal incident. In order to balance the accounts and clear up suspicion, he asked Pei Rong for help. Pei Rong had always loved Pei Ying, and after their parents died, Pei Rong considered her to be his responsibility. After his sister begged him twice with a face full of tears, he finally stepped into the muddy waters, paying money and spending effort to help resolve the matter.

Unexpectedly, another traitor soon appeared in the company. He took this matter and reported it to the rival company, and within a month, Ji Sixian was put into prison again.

In order to pay off his brother-in-law's huge bail, Pei Rong accepted two more contracts. As a result, he had an accident while shooting one of the advertisements and fell down with internal bleeding. Internal bleeding could be fatal for others, let alone Pei Rong with his hereditary disease. With this, he ended up in the hospital, and was severely admonished not to continue filming - he wanted to continue making money, but his collaborators were unwilling to be labelled as Zhou Bapi!

He had no choice but to fade out of the entertainment industry and try his hand in the virtual network. After all, he did not have a fatal disease in the online world.

Unfortunately, Pei Rong did not have the talent required to play e-sports. His switch in careers was unsuccessful, to the point where he was placed in an even more embarrassing situation. His hereditary disease completely destroyed his body, and he really reached the end of the road.

It could be said that besides the title of 'was once a great star', what Pei Rong left behind was nothing but a mess.

If he didn't want to follow his predecessor's path and die, Tyron would have to find a way to make about 60 million dollars and buy a new body.

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Tyron thought about it, opened the contact list, looked at the name of his 'sister' Pei Ying for half a minute, opened the recent contact history and studied it for a while, then imitated Pei Rong's tone of voice and sent a message: "Xiao Ying, your elder brother has had no time to see you recently, how are you?"

Pei Ying answered ten minutes later: "Elder brother, I'm really in a hurry and really don't have time to chat. Sixian has been bullied very badly while inside. His hand was almost broken, and he doesn't have money to get it looked at. I'm now working three jobs every day, and have to save up just to have a good meal in the evening. Anything at home that can be sold has already been sold off, and I really don't know how I'm going to live on like this…"

Tyron raised his eyebrows and simply closed the chat.

He hadn’t even said anything, and his little sister had already hurried to cry about being poor.

Was she really poor, or was she just anxious to let her elder brother know &#k2018;I have no money to lend you’?

.

Tyron looked through Pei Rong’s list of contacts again. His only relative was Pei Ying, and the rest were all either collaborators or colleagues.

Tyron deleted all his contacts, including his sister's.

In any case, Pei Rong had already killed himself, and other than his fame, he hadn't left Tyron with anything else. Tyron also made the decision not to inherit anything except Pei Rong's name - even the 300,000 dollars was left there untouched.

Unrelated matters should be kept strictly separate. Tyron regarded Pei Rong as a dead passer-by; he would never wrong himself by living other people's lives for them.

His new life was the reward that he earned for himself from the God, and he would use 60 million dollars to buy himself a new body… the accounts between the two of them had been cleared.

Tyron admitted that he felt no obligation to take care of Pei Rong's sister and solve Pei Rong's problems.

To explain it with his own personal motto: I've never been willing to owe anyone, so I'll also never let anyone have the chance to owe me.

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After clearing up the final traces of Pei Rong's original existence, Tyron cheerfully began his brand-new life.

The first letter he received in his empty mailbox came from E-Sports A League, and it was the qualification certificate for the semi-finals.

By now, he had already realized that this was not some sacrificial ceremony for the God of Slaughter. It was simply just a virtual 'game' in which players sparred and competed against each other. Participating would not bring about any moral or legal problems, and they could even win great glory and honour.

This world was really not bad at all.

Tyron glanced at the prize pool for the semi-finals and finals, saw the number of '5 million' under first prize, and unhesitatingly decided to compete.

He was a man who still had to earn 60 million.

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Next, he logged on to the official website and took a look at the rules for the competition. Because he had come in first in the free-for-all battle, he was eligible to go straight into the top 32 and compete to enter the top 8. It was a one round decisive battle, and the match-up for the first round had already been announced: #419 (Tyron) against #213.

Clicking on the name '#419' would even bring up a page containing his details:

Player number: 419

Source of Competition Qualifications: Free-for-all Battle

GNA Comprehensive Rating: B-list

PVE Score: Unknown

PVP score: B

PVN score: B

GNA Evaluation: An assassin class character with unknown potential as they have only demonstrated their abilities during a single free-for-all battle. The player showed excellent concealment and assassination skills, as well as a considerably high battlefield life-harvesting capability. Has shockingly explosive power in 1v1 PVP situations. Because the 1v1 battle time was short, and the number of participations in free-for-all battles was too few, the player is temporarily rated as a B-class player.

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Two motion images were included at the bottom of the page.

First image: He was silently sliding behind one of the players, his dagger swiftly slicing out a line of blood as it harvested the last bit of life. Dark golden eyes flashed across the camera, leaving the illusion of a line of cold light.

Second image: He dropped from the sky, stabbed a small bloody wound on the mage's forehead, and then flipped over and landed on the ground. The picture was fixed at the moment of his landing, when his cloak flew up and revealed his posture as he knelt down on one knee. This image was very dynamic, and one could almost feel the impact as air was forcefully displaced.

Further down the page was the constantly updating comments feed.

"Hubby! In this year's A League, my hubby will be him!"

"A model with legs I could play with for a year."

"My screen is a little salty… Tsk! "

"I've rewatched 1000 times but can't stop!"

Tyron: "…"

This master assassin who had come from another world looked on blankly. He couldn't understand a single thing, and silently closed the page.

Sometimes, one could learn everything about a world from books… Except for the memes and slang circulating on the web.

Tyron was probably going to spend a good amount of time being an internet antique.

…

A week later, Tyron was like a sponge as he learned about the world and slowly integrated himself into virtual network society.

In order to prepare for the 'game' that he was unfamiliar with, he watched some videos of famous experts and obtained a general understanding of e-sports' so-called competition style.

During this period, the E-Sports A League's World Championship had already begun, and the opening ceremony was very lively. It was said that the contestants were provided with free accommodation and travel expenses to go and watch the opening ceremony in reality.

Tyron wasn't interested in it and spent his days like a recluse until his first game.

In the first round of the semi-finals, Tyron's opponent, #213, was also an expert who had come out of the free-for-all battle. He was an arcane mage.

Before the game, Tyron had watched the replay of his opponent's last free-for-all battle and rated him as: a foolish idiot who had more damage spells than field control spells.

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Thirty seconds before the start of the fight, the two players were 50 meters apart, standing face to face as they waited for the countdown.

The mage's expression was imposing as he looked calmly at Tyron.

Tyron carelessly looked towards the other side and thought to himself: Make it high profile, and deal with him in 10 seconds… or should he be more low-key, and get it done in 12 seconds?

In order to create a tense atmosphere on the main screen, the view was switching back and forth between the two players, and the gazes of the two contestants could be clearly be seen:

One had an inspiring, eager gaze.

One had eyes like a dead fish.

…

Audience: "Yeaaaaaah 419 is so cool!"

In recent years, people with a positive image and good temperament were always more popular… Regardless of what expression he had.

Tyron's eyes were inherited from the ancient elves' royal lineage. His golden pupils become lighter and lighter with age, eventually becoming a translucent platinum sphere, which others usually considered to be very attractive.

If he were still in his original mixed-race body, the level of attractiveness his appearance carried was basically equivalent to the effect caused by using magic, and could be considered a supernatural force.

Strangely enough, although he was now using a virtual body and supernatural forces should not exist in this scientific world, Tyron's eyes still seemed to have the power to mesmerize and enchant others.

Perhaps this attraction could only be explained as charisma.

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Returning back to the present.

There was now fifteen seconds to go before the game officially began.

The commentator finally finished loudly introducing both sides' backgrounds, and continued to banter: "So, this round of the competition is a machine gun mage versus a head harvesting assassin. Generally speaking, the latter will have an advantage, but our mage is famous for his instantaneous guided-missile type spells. That is to say, if the mage sets up his machine gun directly in the beginning… I mean, starts casting the arcane storm spell, 419 will have already lost—"

The sentence wasn't finished, but the countdown was over and the fight was about to begin.

Indeed, the mage did not hesitate as he made a casting movement on the spot. In another 0.5 seconds, his Arcane Storm would begin.

In a split second, a deluge of blue arrows appeared behind him one after the other.

Right then, Tyron showed no hesitation at all as he jumped back and avoided the first wave of missiles.

Only the crackling sound of gunfire could be heard as the missiles bounced everywhere. Meanwhile, the mage was still continuously firing arcane missiles in a steady stream, and they blotted out the sky as they whizzed towards Tyron.

No wonder he was called a 'machine gun mage'.

"He's halfway—!" The commentator had only just caught up, "Arcane Storm's massive damage has only just started. Our player number 419 is already in critical danger!"