The villain's side of the novel - Chapter 113: Aslan's/Luke's Pov

He’s in the deepest part of Jianghu.

Keep your eyes wide open.

If you do not wish to get dragged into the abyss.

In the year 2090, technology has advanced to the point where Simulation Boxes, (Sim Box for short) are common place, allowing for the user to link up their brain's neural network to a full dive Simulation. While initially used for educational purposes, recently a large gaming company, Averon, released a fully fledged immersive MMORPG simulation where users can become anyone they desire, level up, choose their class, and become a hero or a villain. The name of this simulation is The Shattered World Online.

Eli Winters had no interest in playing it. His father, a jobless bum who spent his entire life playing games in the hope of becoming a famous player or streamer, was able to use the release of The Shattered World Online to gain wealth and fame, quickly becoming the number one player and a household name as the game took the world by storm. He immediately abandoned Eli and his mother in favor of being with someone from his guild, despite his mother having worked two jobs to support them and raise Eli by herself. Eli had nothing but spite for his father and the game.

When Eli's best friend convinces him to try out the game, his father's fame begins to interfere, culminating in him being singled out and shunned by his peers, and his father offering to pay for his university tuition in return for Eli hiding their relationship and quitting the game. Instead of complying with his father's wishes, Eli decides to prove to everyone how useless a guy his father is by challenging him that if Eli is able to surpass him in the game world he must delete his account and quit his streaming career. His father accepts the challenge believing his son to be useless at games - but Eli will soon show him just how ambitious a spiteful person can be.

Leguna. An orphan. His life changed dramatically the day the thieves’ guild happened to select him for training and development. He would go on to become lifelong friends with a loyal mercenary, the partner of a beautiful magus who was cold as ice, the savior of a mysterious disfigured dark-elf girl with a talent for the Breath, and the unlikely caregiver for a feisty young maiden. And yet, who would be with him to the very end?

After being killed by a high-velocity tree-hug, Arlo is transported to a new world of skills, stats, and levels where those brave and talented enough to conquer ancient Delves are rewarded with incredible supernatural power. Unfortunately for Arlo, there is no tutorial, and he is immediately forced to tackle a Delve set to the highest difficulty with a party of adventurers who are not only strangers to him, but strangers to each other as well. Arlo has no armor, no weapons, no knowledge of the world at large, and his party is growing increasingly suspicious of his lack of preparation and paper-thin excuses for how he got there.There's also the fact that the System seems to be treating Arlo's situation like a big, cosmic joke.Determined not to die again, Arlo forgoes putting any points into his highest stat, Intelligence, and instead dumps everything he's got into Fortitude. After all, who needs equipment or fighting skills when you can eat fireballs for breakfast and still ask for more hot sauce?Mage Tank is a comedic LitRPG adventure set in an epic fantasy world that is rapidly evolving as new and powerful secrets of the Delves are uncovered. There are strong horror themes, graphic violence, overindulgent use of naughty language, and poorly constructed jokes. Mage Tank features slow progression and intelligent characters who spend time making intentional build choices. It’s not action all-the-time, but Arlo’s life is replete with danger and, more importantly, consequences.Cover art generated with MidJourney and Canva.Maps and world-building support by Sir Raiu Koren.