Chapter 62 Let the Battle Begin

The Metaverse was born somewhere between the remote seventh and eighth centuries, when three thousand top scientists from various fields gathered to jointly construct this digital edifice.

After more than three hundred years of continuous exploration, refinement, and optimization, the Metaverse gradually evolved from a rudimentary prototype into a powerful and intricately complex network world.

This massive data network was named Eisen.

Every user held a corresponding Eisen access clearance level. Those without an official supercomputer ring were classified as Silkworm clearance, granting only basic functionality.

Above that were Sparrow, Sheep, Snake, Wolf, Tiger, and Dragon, each clearance level marked by a corresponding icon. Further up were custom clearance levels, which lacked a fixed icon and could be freely configured by the account holder.

"Whoa—" Li Guansqi surveyed the crowd and sighed, "So many maggots."

The Silkworm clearance icon was a little bug; putting a positive spin on it, they were industrious silkworms, but realistically, they looked like gloomy, crawling maggots.

Gazing at the vast sea of Silkworm icons, he felt a damned sense of belonging.

Most users with higher clearance levels enabled privacy settings to filter out low-clearance users.

Maggots were only fit to keep company with other maggots.

[Humble Silkworm User]

[Hurry up and set your avatar]

Li Guansqi's face darkened: "Wait, is this onboarding system even polite?"

[Ding—]

The tutorial system immediately popped up an image projection interface. Before formally entering the Metaverse, one had to sculpt their face.

"No way..."

"They don't even give you a set of clothes."

The Metaverse featured a store where skins could be purchased. The virtual currency was DP, and top-up Gold Points could be converted into DP, though DP could not be converted back into Gold Points.

Li Guansqi couldn't bear to spend real money on a skin, so he casually tweaked his face, gave himself a formidable starfish hairstyle, donned the default black robe set, and swaggered into the public area.

However, everyone was rushing toward the dueling arenas, and no one paid any attention to a nobody like him.

The imagined "Welcome" message and chiming sounds did not occur.

"Huh?" Li Guansqi stared at his empty mailbox, his expression gradually twisting. "Wait, where's the beginner pack?"

"New user registration, and they give you nothing?"

"Even a skin would have been nice!"

Perhaps he had played too many gacha games and was accustomed to entering a game to find a sea of red notification dots. In the Metaverse, the only red dot was located in the personal interface, while the mailbox, quests, and other interfaces were completely empty.

Li Guansqi clicked on his personal interface, and the source of the red dot was the [Deck].

Following the instructions, he clicked on [Deck], preparing to check out the card pool, only for a cold prompt to pop up.

[Please scan your cards]

"I have to scan cards?!" Li Guansqi was dumbfounded. "Are you kidding me?!"

"An online game, and I have to scan physical offline cards?"

He never would have guessed that wanting to play an online duel wouldn't rely on an official card pool, but rather on the user's personal card pool.

Even so, the cards didn't strictly have to belong to the owner; borrowing cards from someone else to scan was also acceptable.

Li Guansqi finally understood the look of utter shock on Twin Flowers' face in his memories when she first saw the complete YGO card collection.

Free access to all cards—YGO was truly divine!

"Where am I supposed to find cards..." A flash of inspiration crossed Li Guansqi's mind, and a bold thought arose.

"Paper cards can be used in duel disks."

"Could it be..."

Figuring he had nothing to lose by trying, he took out the paper card box left behind by the black-robed woman and picked a card to place in the scanning slot.

[Sacrilegious card detected...]

[Ding—]

[Yubel, successfully registered]

"Hiss—" Li Guansqi took a sharp intake of breath. "It actually works!"

Never in his wildest dreams had he expected his very first deck to be made of paper cards.

And even more unbelievably, paper cards were usable!

Upon closer inspection, he realized these were no ordinary paper cards; during the scanning process, delicate blue patterns faintly emerged across their surfaces.

"These patterns couldn't possibly be..."

"No way, no way."

Ninety percent of the production cost of a magic card went toward the cost of the patterns, with material costs accounting for only ten percent.

Possessing the pattern of a card was equivalent to holding the design blueprint, allowing one to print copies indefinitely until the print path degraded and lost fidelity. Without a doubt, every single pattern was worth a fortune.

Alliance law dictated that patterns could only be controlled and distributed by the Alliance.

Paper cards with built-in patterns were known as Sacrilegious Cards. Smuggling Sacrilegious Cards undermined the Alliance's monopoly on patterns, plunging the market into chaos, which constituted a top-tier felony.

If trading cursed cards was akin to spreading biological contaminants, similar to drug trafficking, then trading Sacrilegious Cards was equivalent to smuggling nuclear materials—ten lives wouldn't be enough to pay the sentence.

Li Guansqi felt a creeping sense of eerie bizarreness.

These paper cards were given by that black-robed woman, the Executioner of the Spirit Detention Bureau—yet she was spearheading the distribution of contraband?

Every single card was worth over a hundred million; these were dangerously hot potatoes.

"Things have come to this, I might as well just play cards."

Li Guansqi pushed aside his misgivings and proceeded to scan the next card.

[Ding—]

[Ash Blossom & Joyous Spring, successfully registered]

Lady Ash Blossom, entering the field!

[Ding—]

[Maxx "C", successfully registered]

Brother "C", entering the field!

...

Within the Eliminators group chat, the conversation was lively and animated.

Rose: "Charge, charge, charge! This time, the First King title is definitely mine!"

Mermaid: "You said the exact same thing last time."

Mahjong: "For an event like this, the old man really has to step in."

Swordsman: "The sword says, do not charge."

Everyone had been chatting about the campaign for the month's first undefeated king. At that moment, an unprompted message instantly grabbed everyone's attention.

Shadow Mist Maiden: "@Executioner, how is Rose's fiancé doing?"

Compared to dueling and climbing the ranks, Shadow Mist Maiden seemed far more interested in other matters.

The very next second, however, a cold prompt popped up.

[Clover has been muted by the group owner for twenty-four hours]

Clover was the ID of the person using Shadow Mist Maiden's avatar, symbolizing hope and miracles.

And just like that, the miracle was muted for a day.

Rabbit: "Whoa, flexing administrative power."

Twin Flowers was the weakest member in the group, but she was also the group owner.

Rose: "Whoever mentions the word 'fiancé' again is getting thrown into the solitary confinement cell for a day!"

Mermaid: "You arranged the engagement yourself, yet you won't let people talk about it."

Rose cried out in grievance: "I didn't react in time! In the past, I always acted as a guarantor for women, so I've always used the term casually. Ahhh, so between men and women, there's actually that kind of *** relationship?!"

Due to eighteen-plus sensitive terminology, the system automatically censored the text.

A user with a blank avatar spoke up: "His reaction when seeing the paper cards was off."

"It's very likely—"

"He has seen them before."

Rose: "Could he really be my informant?"

A cloud of suspicion instantly descended upon the group chat. Sacrilegious cards were strictly circulated internally; if someone had seen and used them, they were very likely one of their informants.

Yet how could there be zero impression of him?

Rabbit broke the dead silence: "One minute left, it's about to begin."

To claim the first undefeated king title, one not only needed a flawless win record, but also had to be the absolute first.

Mermaid suggested pointedly: "Is Rose's mister logging on? Which node is he at? I want to use a smurf account to snipe him."

Rose: "Give it up. Even if he logs on, he's logging in from an apartment; it's untraceable."

The apartment shared by Li Guansqi and Twin Flowers had been constructed by an expert, boasting extreme secrecy that made IP tracking impossible.

Swordsman: "The hall is filled with nothing but candlelight and red blossoms."

"Raise your cup and take it easy, sing your song and take it easy."

Amidst the swordsman's poetic verses, the others successively logged into their Metaverse accounts. It was difficult for a single person to secure the title of the first undefeated king on their own, and the Clock Hands would also be participating in the event, but charging in collectively would drastically raise their win rates.

The worst-case scenario was a six-versus-ten situation, placing the Eliminators at a personnel disadvantage.

Yet their Executioner had flopped facedown onto her bed at that exact moment.

In less than five seconds, she fell fast asleep on the spot.

She had even forgotten to mention the matter of giving away the paper cards. As the manager of the Afterlife Shop, distributing paper cards was merely a routine daily mission, and she hadn't given it a second thought.