Chapter 40: Vanguard

"Cousin, what are you doing? We're family. Although I admire you a lot, if you treat me like this, I won't cooperate!"

"Shut up!" Xu Huo checked her shoulders—no numbers.

He made her face him, then used a small knife to cut his palm and squeezed out a string of fresh blood right before her eyes.

Yu Qingqing stared at him in shock. "Cousin, you haven't been around for days, and suddenly you picked up a self-harm hobby..."

Xu Huo breathed out slightly, feeling relieved. Good.

"You're not afraid I'll eat you?"

Yu Qingqing replied carelessly, "I believe you won't hurt me. Besides, there are so many people outside; you wouldn't just go after relatives to cause trouble, right? As long as I'm fine, whether others live or die has nothing to do with me."

Xu Huo felt a headache coming.

Yu Qingqing was his stepmother's niece. Nominally, they were cousins, but in reality, they had no blood relation. His relationship with his stepmother was cold, and he rarely saw her relatives. Yu Qingqing was an exception—since high school, she liked to cling to him. Later, when he settled in Ting City, this girl dropped out of college halfway through to become an actress and refused to leave no matter what.

"You are not allowed to say things like that anymore." He warned, "Unless you want to visit a psychiatrist."

Yu Qingqing stuck out her tongue and complained, "Humans are naturally selfish. What's wrong with that? I don't understand what my parents are thinking, making me see a doctor when I haven't even committed a crime."

"It'll be too late once you commit a crime." Xu Huo said, "Watch fewer gloomy movies and TV shows. If you dare make a mistake, I'll personally send you to the police station."

Yu Qingqing shrank her neck. "I'm not talking to you anymore. I'm going to sleep!"

After speaking, she hurried into the bathroom.

Xu Huo sat down at the computer and logged into the forum using the URL and number Nie Xuan had given him. The forum was called "Vanguard Players."

There were already many popular science posts about Evolvers and players. The content was mostly what he already knew, but the dangers of stopping the Evolver drug had not been officially disclosed—obviously, Nie Xuan knew about this.

Xu Huo understood the official’s purpose: they were worried that the Evolver drug would become the next resource players would crazily compete for after the tickets. However, if players knew that missing three months of dungeons would result in being sent to a random dungeon, few would rush to grab the Evolver drug first.

Players without tickets being sent to the station still had a chance to fight back. If they didn’t get the ticket by the end of the dungeon, they were very likely to be stranded inside. Whether they could meet other players afterward and snatch tickets again was uncertain.

The start time of the Dimensional Rift game couldn’t be measured by current time. It claimed to shuttle between three and five dimensions; maybe other time spaces and times existed. The Headhunter Demon dungeon was an example. It was now a closed dungeon but wasn’t always so. There were two possibilities.

One, the dungeon’s location was actually in the real world. If the dungeon wasn’t closed, not only players but non-players could enter. This meant the dungeon venue might appear in any country or city in this world. Non-players could also become targets of slaughter.

Two, the dungeon had a separate, specific game space, so the station connected the game’s internal venues. If these internal venues were open, then “non-player” would mean “non-current dungeon players.” This implied the game’s internal world was open, and players should be able to travel to any dungeon city via the train.

Either way, if a player was stranded in a dungeon city, finding other players smoothly would be very difficult.

Xu Huo had a premonition that closed dungeons like Hot Springs Villa wouldn’t be many.

Missing just one dungeon would trigger the game to notify the player to prepare for a random dungeon three months later, starting at B-level—essentially a death sentence.

He wasn’t sure if the officials knew this, as he didn’t know when Evolvers first appeared in the world he lived in now.

But it was only a matter of time before they found out.

Xu Huo didn’t dwell on this and instead looked up the official player rankings.

Currently, only players who had experienced one dungeon were rated. The highest was a player nicknamed "Golden Crow," an official staff member who safely escorted eight players out of the game and received a B-level rating. The officials also announced rewards: besides family benefits in all aspects, he was given an item.

Most players below him were rated E (ordinary) and D (good), with a few at C (excellent). This was very good for those just entering the game and confused. They also shared a common codename—Vanguard Players.

Dare to be the vanguard, willing to be the vanguard.

The post was completely boiling over. Many players became unstable after joining, worried about losing their lives and family care. But once enlisted officially, as long as they did well, the state would provide resources and money. Even if they died, their families would receive compensation, freeing them from worries!

It was clear many players were tempted. The post heated up, suppressing those trying to trade tickets or sell items and potions at high prices below.

Some tried to sell tickets and items, but any clear-eyed person could tell they were fishing for scams.

"Cousin, what are you looking at?" Yu Qingqing, with moisture in her eyes, came behind him.

Xu Huo closed the page and glanced at her bare legs. "You should know that right now, you look no different from a chunk of pork to me."

Yu Qingqing wore the big short-sleeve shirt he had taken out of his bag, pouted, and said, "My clothes are dirty. How else am I supposed to wear?"

"By the way, why do you have a razor blade in your pocket?" She held up a small silver shard the size of half a fingernail. "You almost cut my hand just now. You’re not seriously going to kill someone, are you?"

That was a fragment broken off from the Headhunter Demon’s axe. Although the game had taken the axe, the fragments hadn’t disappeared.

Xu Huo reached out to take it and then opened the ticket booking interface. "If you have no clothes, I’ll have the assistant send some to you. Stop rummaging through my stuff. The ticket is booked for you; go back early."

"Breaking the contract isn’t that easy. I might even have to sue the company." Yu Qingqing tried to struggle.

"You can’t sue. You don’t even have to sign. I’ll handle it. You go home and study. Don’t wander around when there’s nothing to do." Xu Huo said coldly.

"Xu Huo! You’re so unreasonable!" Yu Qingqing glared angrily. "My parents didn’t say anything!"

"Tomorrow, walk back yourself or go by wheelchair. Pick one." Xu Huo stood up and looked at her expressionlessly.

Yu Qingqing’s angry yet pitiful expression instantly disappeared. Her pupils coldly stared at him for a few seconds, then she jumped onto the bed, pulled the quilt over herself, and muttered gloomily, "I curse you to have no girlfriend for two years!"

Xu Huo turned off the lights and lay down on the sofa.

The next morning, the assistant delivered clean clothes. While sorting Yu Qingqing’s dirty clothes, he was cut on the finger by the razor blades sewn into the collar and edges of her skirt.

"I’ll do it." Xu Huo told her to treat the wound and removed the three razor blades sewn into the skirt, throwing them into the trash.

After sending Yu Qingqing to the airport and seeing her board the plane with his own eyes, he returned to the city and went to the entertainment company she had signed with.