Chapter One: The Uncrowned Player Found a Crown

sword. The Cemetery offered no experience and no gold. Its monsters dropped nothing. It contained only one hundred stone guardians built from the combat data of past professional champions. A player could challenge just one guardian per entry, and a single hit meant immediate expulsion. Of the seven other players who had discovered it, none lasted three days. Lin Jin had lasted a year because time was the only thing he owned. By day, he was Gray Raven, a contracted sparring partner for the prestigious Zenith club. He earned forty yuan an hour testing compositions, feeding moves to star players, and reviewing matches. When a strategy worked, the star received credit. When training went poorly, the sparring partner was blamed.