Chapter 113: Man of Honor
Translator: Double_L Editor: Tehrn
That night, a chartered flight was scheduled to send everyone back to Ayrlarng; however, Samantha didn’t follow because she had other businesses to attend to. On their way home, Hu Yangxuan kept bugging w.a.n.g Tong as he was curious about what had happened earlier; however, w.a.n.g Tong was very good at keeping secrets, so Hu Yangxuan failed to dig up any gossips from him. Turns out Hu Yangxuan also had some potentials in becoming a paparazzi, as he was the only one amongst fellow students to be able to sense something’s fishy. Nevertheless, he respected w.a.n.g Tong’s bravery on taking on such colossal difficulty from the bottom of his heart.
They were back to Ayrlarng at last, and w.a.n.g Tong was wide awake in his room thinking about his bittersweet “first love”. He was able to sleep even on the Zerg-infested Norton, but what had happened earlier was strong enough to give him insomnia. Somehow, he had understood the meaning of “the first cut was the deepest”, as he closed his eyes and recalled Samantha’s graceful elegance of a G.o.ddess; he knew his relations.h.i.+p with Samantha had begun and ended on the same day.
It was the current w.a.n.g Tong that Samantha had rejected, a budding student of Ayrlarng. He knew he wouldn’t be able to go out with her judging from his current situation, he used to think that everything else didn’t matter as long as there was love, but today he had learned how naive he had been back then.
w.a.n.g Tong managed to find a reason to work harder and not to give up, he would be a d.a.m.n fool if he were to submerge himself into despair and lost himself only because he was rejected, and even Samantha would despise him for being so childish. Men were supposed to stay strong.
In the end, w.a.n.g Tong decided not to waste time tossing and turning on his bed, so he got up and went out for a fight in TPA. Suddenly he remembered the tempting invitation from DREAM, a b.l.o.o.d.y ten grand per match; how he wished he could accept that amount of money now since he had spent most of his dimes to impress Samantha during today’s lunch.
However, DREAM-Heaven was already packed with people when w.a.n.g Tong arrived; the shop owner apologized immediately, “Sorry kid but the house is full today, they have been hogging here for the past two days, and no one is willing to leave.”
“Wow, looks like your business is good recently?”
“Nah, everyone is here just to wait for some dude named Einherjar Wannabe; apparently, that dude would log in every weekend, but the time he login is unknown. Many of them missed out the chance to fight him because he logged in late last time; hence everyone had sworn and camped to wait for his arrival, some even hogged the machine by taking turns waiting,” the shop owner looked happy as he explained. Apparently, his business had skyrocketed ever since the appearance of Einherjar Wannabe, mostly contributed by those who spent their money on the food and beverages in his shop… yet the shop owner still couldn’t figure out why that “Einherjar Wannabe” dude was so popular recently.
w.a.n.g Tong was also surprised to see his ID rose to fame. But too bad, since all the machines in the shop were fully occupied, he had no choice but to go back to sleep.
Just when he was about to leave, two guys who were in their twenties came out disappointedly and payed for their bill, both of them gave up waiting because they still had to wake up early the morning after and go to work.
“Aha, at last, there’s a room for you, enjoy!” The shop owner was overjoyed to see a continuous incoming of business.
w.a.n.g Tong got his access card and walked toward room no.9. He had no intention to check out the trending discussions about “Einherjar Wannabe” in the forum because he knew it would be meaningless even if he saw what they commented. Complacence and vanity had no benefit for his own growth and would not earn him any penny. Without wasting any time, w.a.n.g Tong logged into TPA immediately. As he looked at his inbox filled with tons of challenge invitations, somehow he felt good for being famous, at least he didn’t have to worry about finding challengers anymore.
System notification: Einherjar Wannabe logged in!
Finally, after two days of waiting, Einherjar Wannabe showed up, causing another uproar throughout PA.
Just like the old saying goes: “When there’s a will, there’s a way.” Every player who had been waiting since the very beginning went crazy when they saw the notification, and everyone became energetic instantly.
“Einherjar Wannabe is here!”
Everyone started to wonder who would be fighting against him today.
The forum was bombarded with comments, some people… or rather a small group of people began saying bad things about Einherjar Wannabe after what had happened the previous week. Perhaps they were jealous or maybe they were just a bunch of haters. Those people were saying that the reason behind Einherjar Wannabe’s victory previously wasn’t because of him being invincible, but it was Solitary Snow’s fault for being a noob. They also said that Solitary Snow was insane for not playing defensively with his Dream-ranked METAL Suit; Einherjar Wannabe was not hard to be defeated since he had no weapon and armor, and it would be impossible for him to break the unrivaled defense of the Golden Marksman. Moreover, aside from ranged attacks, the Golden Marksman also contained the ability of high-speed mobility which was specially designed for dodging close ranged attacks. Solitary Snow at least could’ve tied the match with such advantages, but the dumb*ss went for the Golden Arrows instead, which got himself KO"d in the end.
Many TPA players also supported those comments, they said luck was definitely involved in Einherjar Wannabe’s victory, and IPA players’ battle strategies sucked. Solitary Snow might have surprised everyone with his b.u.t.terfly Dash, but flashy tactics absolutely had nothing to do with one’s victory.
Nevertheless, Einherjar Wannabe’s supporters stood up and “counterattacked” the comments of those haters, telling them to shut up unless they really had the b.a.l.l.s to defeat Einherjar Wannabe.
The dramas in the forum lasted for two days while they were waiting for Einherjar Wannabe to show up, now they shall see who would he chose to fight tonight.
“Boss, he’s here!”
“Good, let’s see how he responds!”
The PA staff had no choice but to work overtime due to Einherjar Wannabe’s appearance. This was Cameron’s last chance to please the board of directors, and now, he began to wonder if ten grand was enough to strike a deal with Einherjar Wannabe.
Was it too less to bargain? But it would be impossible for him to offer more than that because he couldn’t confirm how long would Einherjar Wannabe be able to sustain his winning streak. A good number of aces still seemed to be laying low throughout PA; however, he might be able to fish out the hidden aces if he acted too “c.o.c.ky”, and things would be different if that really happened.
Cameron was anxious, he had tried his best to strike a deal with Einherjar Wannabe by offering ten grand per match, now it was all up to him to decide.
Once again, w.a.n.g Tong opened the letter from the administration which was placed on top of his inbox, this time it was attached with the amount of money per match.
Ten grand?
w.a.n.g Tong rubbed and blinked his eyes, he couldn’t believe they were offering him ten grand per match!
The main purpose for him to play in the TPA was to train himself. He would never want to be restrained, and he didn’t want money to be his reason to fight someone else. However, Old Fart once said, “Love and dignity are the most crucial factors of a man’s life, but not if he ain’t got no dime.”
w.a.n.g Tong was shaken by the immense amount of money, he had never seen such a huge number of money in his life since he was born!
He wondered if the almighty Blade Warrior would bow and kneel down for the sake of money.
Immediately, w.a.n.g Tong shook his head for having such a weird thought. Of course, the Blade Warrior wouldn’t do that since he was the G.o.dly existence in everyone’s heart, it would be impossible for him to worry with such a silly issue.
However, w.a.n.g Tong didn’t accept the offer immediately because he had always been a cautious person and he understood the fact that was no such thing as a “free lunch” in this world. w.a.n.g Tong needed more time to digest this. Apparently, h.e.l.l always awaits right behind the veil of temptation.
w.a.n.g Tong never liked the idea of earning money through fighting in TPA because he didn’t want his original intentions to mutate by involving money. It was undeniable that money was important, but one had to learn to minimize its importance, or one would become the “slave” of money.
Old Fart always said, “Only those who know how to spend money would be able to become its master”. However, the point was, Old Fart didn’t know how to earn money!
w.a.n.g Tong was feeling that the temptation of ten grand was getting stronger; however, he would always tell himself to calm down whenever he was stuck in a situation like this, just like how he used to calm down and focus during battles. He closed his eyes and cleared his mind, it was funny how ten grand was able to disrupt his state of mind, if Einherjar Wannabe were to see him like this, he would definitely laugh his a.s.s out.
w.a.n.g Tong was no G.o.d, of course, he would make terrible mistakes from time to time; however, he was very good at self-reflection. Somehow Einherjar Wannabe approved this “talent” of his because it was unusual for someone at this age to possess such motivation, and Einherjar Wannabe even praised Old Fart once for his excellent teachings to w.a.n.g Tong; nevertheless, w.a.n.g Tong was annoyed by those words.
w.a.n.g Tong had always been a man of honor and still remained unstained after all these years.
“Hahaha, see Luv Ma? Didn’t I tell you that he will appear tonight? Chop chop buddy, he’s not escaping from us this time!” Miao Xiu laughed, he might have missed out the previous matches, but definitely not this time, as he had been staying online for hours waiting for him to show up!
“Shuddup dude, I’ve just sent out the challenge invitation, so all we need is patience, everything is up for him to decide now!” Luv Ma shrugged helplessly, he had been spending his precious weekend staying at home with the annoying dude beside him right now, but it couldn’t be helped.
“Chill bro, look at my brilliant records and my stunning image, I’m sure he will pick me as his opponent alright!” Miao Xiu shuffled his hair as he spoke proudly like he was the triton among the minnows! [1]
Luv Ma shooked his head as he looked at the narcissist, he was speechless against Miao Xiu’s severe sense of pride. Even idiots knew Einherjar Wannabe’s inbox would be flooded with thousands of invitations, and even if Einherjar Wannabe sorted his mails by descending orders of challengers’ Soul Energy, no one would be able to guarantee Miao Xiu’s name would be at the top of the list.
Nevertheless, Einherjar Wannabe was a weird person since no one else in TPA other than him would waste their time on those n.o.bodies in IPA.