The King's Avatar – For The GloryChapter 1 - The Summer We Were Fifteen

THE KING'S AVATAR – FOR THE GLORY

C1 - The Summer We Were Fifteen

Chapter 1: The Summer We Were Fifteen

i

It was a sweltering summer afternoon, the sun scorching, the air thick with heat. Su Mucheng walked to the small cold drinks stall at the side of the road, wanting to buy a popsicle to ward off the summer heat, but even the popsicle vendor apparently didn’t care that this summer day was the perfect time for selling cold drinks, and had hidden somewhere to avoid the heat.

After waiting for a while, there was still no one around, so Su Mucheng could only helplessly depart. She walked along the empty streets for a while before arriving at an Internet café. Pushing open the door, the blast of cool air caused her to let out a sigh of relief. Then, she heard a noisy racket coming from within.

What was going on?

The curious Su Mucheng looked toward the source of the noise. The manager of the Internet café saw this young girl walk in, but instead of treating her like just another customer, he waved to her cheerfully. “Little Mucheng is here?”

“Hi, Brother Cui,” she replied, greeting him.

“You’re bringing food for your brother again!” Brother Cui saw the insulated lunch box in her hand; he was quite familiar with this sight.

“Yup, where is he?” Su Mucheng asked.

“Over there.” Brother Cui pointed toward the area where the noise was coming from. “However, he might not have much of an appetite today.”

“How?”

“He’s met an opponent,” Brother Cui laughed.

An opponent?

Su Mucheng was startled. Even though she didn’t entirely understand the video games that her older brother played every day, she understood one thing clearly: her brother was very good. When he played these sort of competitive games with other people, he rarely lost.

An opponent? That was to say, someone who was just as good as her brother?

Su Mucheng headed over toward the source of the noise. Two back-to-back computers had been surrounded by a crowd three layers thick, and with Su Mucheng’s short stature, even on her tiptoes she couldn’t see a thing of what was going on. She could only hear the crowd’s reactions – a gasp here, a shout there.

“Su Muqiu, you’re not doing too well today!” someone suddenly yelled.

Not doing well?

Su Mucheng was stunned. Not just someone who was as good as her brother, but someone whom her brother couldn’t defeat?

She desperately wanted to watch, and so she plunged into the crowd of people. Su Muqiu was a regular at this Internet café, thus Su Mucheng appeared often as well, and was quite familiar with the manager. A few people, after recognizing her, shifted aside to let her pass – everyone quite liked this pretty young girl.

Finally made it through!

Su Mucheng let out a breath. Lifting her eyes, she could see her brother on the far computer, face wearing an uncommonly intense expression.

And his opponent?

His opponent was on the computer closer to her. She could only see his back, but he seemed to be a teenager around the same age as her brother. Her eyes fell upon his hands – they were quite pretty, dancing expertly upon the keyboard and mouse. The crisp percussion of his movements was accompanied by the gasps of the surrounding people.

This person really was quite good!

Even though Su Mucheng didn’t entirely understand these video games, she still couldn’t help but arrive at this conclusion as she watched the other boy play. Just then, the spectators once again erupted with shouts, a mixture of shock and sympathy. Like that, the match was decided.

Who won?

Su Mucheng didn’t need to look at the computer screens. Just by looking at her brother’s face, she could figure out who had won.

Sounds of mockery began to fill the air. In this crowd of spectators, quite a few had lost to Su Muqiu in the past. Now, upon seeing his defeat, they were quite gleeful.

Su Muqiu rolled his eyes, and though he felt a little awkward, he wasn’t angry. A lot of these people were his friends, after all, and the teasing was all in good fun. Normally, everyone here would win some and lose some, but Su Muqiu, with his high win streak, always had the upper hand. With his defeat today, could they let this rare opportunity to mock him go to waste?

“Su Muqiu, your little sister brought you food, better eat your fill and get your energy back before trying again!” someone yelled, causing the spectators to laugh. Su Muqiu looked around, finally seeing Su Mucheng standing just across from him.

“Alright, I’m stopping,” he said, pushing back the keyboard and standing up.

“Eating your fill before trying again?” His opponent said with a laugh.

The spectators were delighted. This kid knew what was up, even playing along with everyone’s mockery!

Su Muqiu glared at the other boy. “Come, come, have some food too, so that when you lose next time you don’t have an excuse.

“I don’t think I need to worry about that,” the opponent said, although he stood up as well.

The crowd laughed uproariously. Not only was this kid skilled, he had quite the sharp tongue!

“Come on, eat with us!” Su Mucheng said at this moment. She’d been standing behind him this whole time, so now she scurried forward to where the opponent could see her.

“You’re his little sister?” the boy asked, looking over at Su Mucheng.

“Yup!”

“Do you play these games too?”

“Not really.”

“You should learn, it’s fun,” he said.

“Mucheng, come over here, don’t talk so much with strangers,” Su Muqiu said, interrupting them.

Su Mucheng smiled and skipped over to her brother’s side. The Internet café had a lounge where customers could wait for an open computer, and Su Muqiu would often eat lunch here. The other boy wasn’t shy and followed the two siblings over here.

Su Muqiu took the lunch box from his sister and deftly split the food into three equal portions. After looking at it for a bit, he scraped some more food from one portion to another. He gave the larger portion to Su Mucheng, took the smaller one for himself, and gestured for the other boy to take the remainder.

“Brother, you should eat this bigger portion!” Su Mucheng said immediately. The meal was meant for two people. Splitting it three ways was already stretching it, and now that her brother had given even more to her, he probably wouldn’t even be half full with his portion.

“I can’t finish that!” Su Muqiu insisted, lifting up the lunch box.

“Hahaha, because you’re mad? You shouldn’t be, losing and winning is very normal. Composure, composure.” The other boy took the portion he was given, but his hands were fast – in the blink of an eye, he had dumped some of his food to Su Muqiu’s portion.

“I’m in a good mood, I don’t need to eat this much,” he explained.

“You…” Su Muqiu grumbled, but he didn’t want to bother with this any further.

“I’ve never seen you around before,” Su Mucheng took this opportunity to say. This time, her brother didn’t stop her with any warning of “don’t talk to strangers.”

“Oh, I was just passing by, just wanted to casually play a bit. Then I heard there was a skilled player here, and then…”

“And then?” Su Mucheng prompted.

“And then I went to see if I could learn anything from him. He really is a skilled player. Only a little worse than me,” he said.

“Hey, don’t speak too soon!” Su Muqiu shouted. “We’re going again after eating!”

“Haha, I can’t,” the other boy said.

“What, running away?” Su Muqiu said angrily.

“I don’t have any money left,” the boy said, patting his pockets.

This reason was too strong. Of course, without money, there was no way to use the computers in the Internet café.

“It’s on me!” Su Muqiu refused to let this go so easily.

“I eat your food, I use your money for the Internet café, and I beat you too? That’s not too good, is it?”

“Who said you were going to win for sure?”

“Well, of course I’ll lose once in a while, too,” the boy said, very naturally.

“…I’m done eating.” Now Su Muqiu really was too annoyed to eat.

“Why don’t you guys go home and play?” Su Mucheng suggested.

“Oh?”

“At home… at home the computers aren’t the same, so you can’t really play games like this on them,” Su Muqiu said to his sister.

Computer configurations would affect the battle, and one of their computers was much worse than the other, making some PvP games unfair. Su Mucheng didn’t understand all this, and thought that as long as you had two computers then you could battle on them.

“But there should be other games where that doesn’t matter too much, right?” the other boy asked.

“Are you saying that you’re confident you could beat me in any game?” Su Muqiu said.

“Of course not, there are too many games out there! Only in the games I know how to play.”

Su Muqiu wanted to flip the table. “Stop eating! Stand up, we’re battling this out!”

“I’m already done eating,” the other boy answered, putting down his bowl and chopsticks.

“Let’s go! Mucheng, come join us once you’re done.” Without wasting a moment, Su Muqiu dragged the other boy away.

“See you in a bit!” The other boy managed to turn back and give her a wave as the two of them left.

“See you,” Su Mucheng answered with a smile.

She never would have imagined that this random stranger, crashing into her and her brother’s life, would end up walking alongside her for ten years and beyond.

The King's Avatar – For The GloryChapter 2 - Friends from the Start, Opponents for Life (1)

THE KING'S AVATAR – FOR THE GLORY

C2 - Friends from the Start, Opponents for Life (1)

Chapter 2: Friends from the Start, Opponents for Life (1)

December 3rd, Glory!

For a full month now, this logo, with its bold letters, crossed swords, and wings spread as though they would fly out of the paper, was grandly displayed almost everywhere you looked – TV screens, computer screens, physical posters and flyers in every corner of the city.

“One month? December 3rd, that’s exactly six weeks away, 42 days!” Su Muqiu spoke while scrolling through yet another Glory ad that had popped up on the screen. This upcoming game was invading everyone’s line of sight at any given moment.

Ka ka ka…

But the only answer he got was the sound of a keyboard and mouse, light but rhythmic.

Su Muqiu glanced at the one sitting beside him. The screen was currently displaying flashes from attacks and a river of blood, but the player himself wore a bored expression. Clearly, doing something like this didn’t require his full attention.

“Did you hear what I just said?” Su Muqiu complained. The fight clearly didn’t require his friend’s full attention, so there was no reason for him to be oblivious to the outside world.

“I heard, Glory, my ears are bleeding from hearing that word from your mouth so often, can’t you see?” said Ye Xiu. Ever since Glory had begun its advertising campaign, Su Muqiu had talked about this game almost incessantly. Heaven knew how much he was looking forward to it.

“It hasn’t been announced for too long, but with this kind of explosive momentum, this is enough. This is definitely going to be a successful game,” said Su Muqiu, ignoring Ye Xiu’s apparent disinterest.

“Mm,” Ye Xiu said noncommittally. He really had heard this too many times.

“I heard this game doesn’t use a username and password to log on, you need an account card to swipe.”

“Mm.”

“You need a specific card reader too, for it to work.”

“Mm.”

“But this card reader is still relatively cheap.”

“Mm.”

“But the system requirements for the computer seem to be pretty high!”

“Oh?” This finally got Ye Xiu’s attention – the rhythm of the keyboard got louder for a second, before stabilizing again. He turned to look with a serious expression. “What kind of requirements?”

Su Muqiu didn’t answer. He had two very old computers here; one was in slightly better condition, but even that one barely met the minimum requirements for running Glory. The other computer was so bad that it didn’t wasn’t even worth talking about. Ye Xiu was no computer expert, but he’d played on these computers for several months now, and Su Muqiu trusted that he didn’t need to explain.

“It’s time to exchange these,” said Ye Xiu, still with that serious expression. Although he wasn’t as excited for Glory as Su Muqiu was, he clearly didn’t want to lose the power of choice. To decide whether a game was good or bad, you had to play it yourself.

“Yeah, it’s time to get new ones, but money’s been a bit tight lately…”

Having lived here for several months, Ye Xiu was of course clear on the living conditions of these two siblings. They were orphans with no relatives, and their entire livelihoods depended on the income Su Muqiu earned from playing games. After Ye Xiu arrived, they now had a second person earning money, so their situation was a little better off. Still, although they didn’t struggle to get basic necessities, it would be a stretch to just pull out the cash for two new computers. Su Muqiu wouldn’t have put up with these two terrible computers if he had had that luxury.

“Looks like we’ll just have to go to Internet cafés for now,” said Ye Xiu.

“Yeah,” Su Muqiu nodded.

“You’ve already looked around for a good one?”

“Of course, I’ve been investigating for over a week now,” Su Mucheng said calmly.

December 3rd, midnight.

This launch time wasn’t very kind to the gamers. For most people, this was the time to log off and shut down the computer. But for an event like this, plenty of gamers were eager to sacrifice their normal schedules.

Six weeks, 42 days. Glory’s large-scale advertising campaign, as well as the well-timed release of the game’s details, had really succeeded in building up hype for this game, such that no one cared whether it was releasing at noon or midnight.

This night, countless people were gearing up for the launch.

This night, Internet cafés in all the major cities turned into lively “nightclubs.”

City H, Excellent Era Internet Café.

Ye Xiu and Su Muqiu had secured two computers in the café early on, and as the launch time approached, they became more focused and alert. Many people gathered in the café, but, seeing that there were no empty computers, became depressed and irritable. Unlike Su Muqiu and Ye Xiu, who went to an Internet café because they didn’t have advanced computers at home, most people went to Internet cafés just to hang out with other people. Playing games together in one location was often more enjoyable than playing online separately.

As midnight approached, the café was jam-packed, and those that had failed to get a computer could only leave in disappointment. The owner of the café, Tao Xuan, was very satisfied with this turnout. He’d invested a lot into this game, upgrading all the computers as necessary. None of the nearby Internet cafes had done the same; they were simply waiting and watching to see how successful the game would be. Although there was a lot of hype surrounding the game, who knew if it would end up a failure? After so many years, hadn’t there been many games that failed to live up to expectations?

Of course, Tao Xuan was quite anxious himself. He stared at the clock on the wall, watching the hands tick closer toward midnight. At 11:59, he extinguished the cigarette in his hand and sat down at the computer that he had prepared for himself earlier.

As a gamer himself, he wanted to try out Glory as well.

Midnight!

The lively Internet café suddenly quieted down.

Swipe a card to log on? This was a new mechanism, and people clumsily tried to figure it out.

Then, everyone sank into thought at the next screen. Account name…

“Let me, let me!” Su Mucheng had carried over a stool to sit between Su Muqiu and Ye Xiu. Seeing them reach this screen, she jumped up in excitement.

“And then go straight to bed, got it?” Su Muqiu said sternly.

“I know!” Su Mucheng took Ye Xiu’s keyboard and began typing in a name. She didn’t really play computer games herself, so this was the only way she would participate with Su Muqiu – and now, Ye Xiu as well – in these games.

Quickly, the name appeared on the screen. It seemed that she had prepared beforehand.

“One Autumn Leaf,” Ye Xiu read aloud. “One leaf heralds the coming of autumn” was a well-known Chinese phrase*, but, “Isn’t there a typo there?”

But Su Mucheng had already pressed the enter key.

“Alright!” Su Mucheng returned the keyboard to Ye Xiu, before taking over Su Muqiu’s.

“Hurry up,” said Su Muqiu, impatient to get started.

Su Mucheng typed quickly, and the name jumped onto the screen

“Qiu Mu Su?” Su Muqiu read aloud. “Hey hey, can’t you put a little more effort into this? I’m your blood brother!”

This username was simply the characters of his real name in reverse order.

However, when Su Mucheng pressed confirm, the system reported back: This name is already in use.

“Damn!” Su Muqiu glanced at the time on the computer. It hadn’t even reached 12:01 yet, and this name was already taken? How many people were playing this game at this moment?

Su Mucheng’s hands were fast. One name was taken, so her fingers danced to type another.

“Autumn Tree?” Now, Su Muqiu was speechless for good. The only thing different about this username was the second character, but it was still pronounced “Qiu Mu Su.” Once again, Su Mucheng hit confirm, and with that, his name was now Autumn Tree.

The young girl nodded, revealing a satisfied expression.

“Alright, it’s bedtime for you!” Su Muqiu reminded her. It was getting late, but their home was close by and the siblings were very familiar with the surrounding area. Su Muqiu wasn’t worried about sending his sister home by herself.

“In a minute,” the girl replied shamelessly, correctly guessing that her brother wouldn’t want to leave the computer to force her to go home.

“Just a minute!” Indeed, Su Muqiu relented immediately, and turned back to the screen.

“Hey, Ye Xiu, what class are you going to play? I thought about it a lot and decided on Sharpshooter. Why don’t you play Sharpshooter as well? I think two Sharpshooters could work together really well.”

“I’ll try things out first and see how it goes,” Ye Xiu replied.

The King's Avatar – For The GloryChapter 3 - Friends from the Start, Opponents for Life (2)

THE KING'S AVATAR – FOR THE GLORY

C3 - Friends from the Start, Opponents for Life (2)

Chapter 3: Friends from the Start, Opponents for Life (2)

In Glory, the player didn’t choose a class immediately. At the beginning of the game, characters could learn skills from any of the different classes to give players a taste of what they were like. Only at level 20 would the character settle on one class to specialize in.

Su Muqiu had already decided on playing Sharpshooter based on the data released by the Glory developers. Ye Xiu, on the other hand, planned to experiment in-game before deciding. Right now, however, whether going straight for Sharpshooter or getting an all-around experience first, they faced the same problem.

Too many people!

There were so many people online right now that even just taking a few steps was difficult. Su Mucheng found herself beginning to doze off.

“I’m going home,” she soon announced. She wanted to watch the excitement, but this was a bit too much. It was so lively that there was no excitement that could be watched.

“Okay, be safe,” said Su Muqiu, without even a glance back. Although it was currently impossible to progress in the main game due to the number of people, he could still investigate the design of many other features, and Su Muqiu had delved into the equipment editor. Apparently it allowed players to create completely customized weapons, and Su Muqiu had looked forward to testing it out since the day it was announced. It was shrouded in mystery, since no other game had a similar feature. Right now, he was already using the editor to take apart and experiment on the equipment that he had automatically received as a new player.

“I’ll go with you,” Ye Xiu said, logging off and standing up. Starting the game a little late wasn’t a big deal.

The first day that Glory was open, more people received frustration than excitement. But the frustration was only because there were so many people. In Glory, a game where you couldn’t pass through other people, it was impossible to play the game normally when characters were squeezing against you.

As the players leveled up wave by wave and began to split up toward all of the different areas in the world, the game finally began to proceed on the right course. Finally, the players could truly experience the game for what it was.

Difficult!

This was everyone’s first impression.

Glory was absolutely a game focused on technique. There was a lot of freedom in controls, and whether your technique was good or bad had a big impact on your battle ability. Too many things relied on skill, rather than powerful equipment or other thing.

Of course, equipment was still very important in glory. In-game, there were always two things that could get players excited: equipment and victory.

Glory Arena.

For a game like this, PvP was of course one of the most important aspects. Aside from the wild PK systems that most games had, Glory also had a built-in arena specifically so that players could play PvP.

GLORY!

The game’s logo appeared onscreen along with that large word – this was the victory screen, displayed after winning a match in the arena. The chat channel on the side was lively with shock and speculation.

One month. It had been one month since Glory opened.

And in that time, Ye Xiu’s One Autumn Leaf had become quite renowned in-game. Why? He had a perfect record for individual battles in the arena.

3685 matches. 3685 wins.

Just the number of battles alone was staggering. 3685 matches, that meant that on average, every day he’d have to play over 100 matches. Assuming each battle took around three to five minutes, that meant that he was spending around six to ten hours every day just in the arena.

There were a few quests or rewards for playing in the Arena, but it didn’t grant too much experience. Overall, using the Arena to level up would be very slow. Despite this, One Autumn Leaf was still fairly high leveled compared to the playerbase as a whole – level 32.

“How much time is he spending on Glory every day?” People in the world channel were discussing this constantly.

In reality, the other players were still underestimating Ye Xiu somewhat. He did spend a lot of time on the game every day, but not as much time in the Arena as they thought.

Someone who could play 3685 matches without losing a single one had to have overwhelming skill. For him, matches rarely lasted three minutes, let alone five. He would usually completely dominate a match and earn victory in under two minutes.

Yes, Ye Xiu was very good. But, he wasn’t the best.

On the current leaderboards for the arena, aside from those that only played one or two matches, there was one other person who also had a perfect win record with over 100 matches. There was one other. And in fact, this person’s match count was even higher than One Autumn Leaf’s.

Desert Dust.

The sole name above One Autumn Leaf.

Desert Dust was also at level 32, but in the arena, he had played 4012 matches. All victorious.

Of course, there were plenty of other extremely skilled players below them with high win rates, but these were the only two with perfect records.

Countless players speculated over which of them would lose their record first, and even more people anticipated when these two would finally face off. For the two of them to both have perfect records, that meant that these two people still hadn’t met in the Arena. As of now, you couldn’t send a battle request to someone in the Arena; it was the system that matched players to opponents based on level, Arena win record, and other such factors. Everyone guessed that these people would be matched up very soon.

“I’m looking forward to it too!” Ye Xiu whispered as he skimmed this discussion. He clicked the confirm button to begin the next match, hoping that this time, he would finally meet this powerful player Desert Dust.

“Hey hey hey, help me clear a dungeon,” said the boy playing on the computer next to him. Ye Xiu sighed in disappointment – once again, the random opponent was not Desert Dust.

“What dungeon?” Ye Xiu asked as he began the battle with this new opponent.

“Line Canyon, I need the clear record. Well, more accurately, I need the prize that comes with that clear record,” said Su Muqiu.

“One second,” replied Ye Xiu.

“Hurry,” urged Su Muqiu, but he saw how disinterested Ye Xiu looked while playing, and could tell that this match would end quickly.

“Let’s go!” 40 seconds later, One Autumn Leaf left the arena, leaving behind a channel of shocked emojis. The player who had just lost was also completely stunned.

This opponent’s win record was 96.1%, quite formidable in his own right. The arena system wouldn’t match anyone to Ye Xiu unless they had a win record of at least 95%.

This person, seeing that he was up against the perfect record One Autumn Leaf, knew to be on guard.

But he was beaten up in forty seconds.

One Autumn Leaf had lost some health, true, but the opponent felt that that was only because One Autumn Leaf wanted to sacrifice some health in order for a faster victory. One Autumn Leaf absolutely had the skill to win this battle at full health.

“Was he in a hurry or something?” This player had no tears left to weep. With his 96.1% record, he could be considered quite good, but what was he to One Autumn Leaf?