002 Do you want me to be the tank?

After Cheng Xue left, Chen Feng lay on the bed, staring at the ceiling. Even though he had been reborn to a time before he was brainwashed, had broken free from the organization’s control, he still felt uneasy. He was haunted by the sense that if the Serpent Brain learned of his existence, it would bring a storm of unimaginable fury, and his body would once again be seized. Was he destined, even after being reborn, to perish together with that monster? Chen Feng would never accept such a fate. He was free now—he finally possessed the freedom every assassin longed for.

Other than his ID card, nothing could prove Chen Feng’s identity. The address on the ID was, unsurprisingly, the Xijiang City Orphanage. Chen Feng could easily guess why. His father must have known Chen Feng inherited his dual abilities, and, to help him evade the organization’s search, abandoned him at the orphanage. As for his mother, that remained a mystery—one even Chen Feng could not unravel.

The Serpent Brain must die! For having treated his life as nothing more than a pawn, Chen Feng could not forgive him. The Serpent Brain’s existence would always cast a shadow over his life. Whether for his father’s revenge, his own burning anger, or simply to survive, Chen Feng had to eradicate the Cobra Organization and destroy the Serpent Brain.

His body, his abilities—they were his weapons.

To take revenge, he would first need to train his body. This body was far too weak, clearly lacking any exercise. As for his supernatural abilities, it was even more pitiful: he’d never practiced them. Chen Feng knew well that revenge would have to wait; evading the Cobra Organization would be enough for now. His body could be trained gradually, but his abilities needed to improve quickly. In the organization, he had honed his powers through games—progress there was swift.

Now, since they’d opened a gaming studio, he could easily borrow a gaming helmet for training. Of course, his training would be nothing like theirs, who aimed merely to win Olympic e-sports gold medals. He would defeat every ability user in the game; only then would he consider himself graduated.

“Alright, I’ll ask them for a gaming helmet. Training starts tomorrow,” Chen Feng thought, a spark of excitement flickering in his heart. His new life would begin here.

But reality is always harsher than dreams. The moment he went downstairs to ask for a gaming helmet, a petite beauty with an impressive figure stood with her hands on her hips and sneered, “Didn’t you say you lost your memory? How do you know about games?”

“Xiao Xue just—”

Before he could finish, the beauty snapped, “Who gave you the right to call her that? Who do you think you are?”

So fierce! In the past, if a beauty dared speak to him like this, the outcome would have been unthinkable. After learning of his father’s fate, Chen Feng had stormed the Cobra Organization; his temper was well-known, his actions always impulsive. But having died once, he was no longer so volatile.

“So are you giving me one or not? If I’m just going to hang around here, I might as well be your bodyguard,” Chen Feng replied lazily. He knew he was looked down upon here, his status no higher than a migrant worker’s, feigning amnesia to stay; they probably wished he’d just leave.

“Bodyguard? Great, you can be the tank then. We need someone to draw aggro and tank in dungeons.” The fierce beauty pointed to the gaming helmets by the stairs. As a studio, they always kept a few in reserve in case one broke.

“A tank? Are you kidding?” Chen Feng, once a legendary berserker who dominated the gaming world and hunted down professionals both domestic and foreign, was now being relegated to a tank? What a waste of talent!

The term “tank” was borrowed from English, but in games, it didn’t mean driving an armored vehicle—it meant acting as the shield, absorbing attacks from monsters and bosses. Chen Feng remembered that in this game, there were few tanks because the 99% sensory realism meant tanks actually felt pain when hit. The lowest pain setting was 20%—it couldn’t be lowered any further.

In previous online games, “tank” wasn’t even a proper role; high-defense players would simply maneuver to take hits. But in “Savior,” it had become a specialized class, with one of the three warrior talent trees dedicated entirely to tanking. Dungeons were designed for one tank, three damage dealers, and one healer, because the bosses’ damage was brutal and many spells couldn’t be dodged. It was impossible for high-defense melee classes to tank bosses as in the past.

Tanks had high defense and health, but pitifully low attack. Unless their gear was godly, they stood no chance in the arena, let alone in professional tournaments.

Since tanking meant enduring pain, it was clear none of the girls would choose the tank talent. Now that Chen Feng had suddenly appeared in the studio, who else would they get to play tank?

“What, you want us to tank so you can deal damage? Are you even a man?” The fierce beauty’s retort left Chen Feng speechless.

“Fine! I’ll be the tank!” Suddenly, Chen Feng remembered there was a special talent stone in the game that allowed players to pick two talent trees. That meant he could take his strongest berserker talents and also the tank talents! Two years ago, when he first played, the organization couldn’t get him a talent stone, so he had to stick with single-tree berserker. Now, starting fresh with everyone else and knowing where some talent stones were hidden, he had a huge advantage.

The beauty clearly didn’t think much of him, but Chen Feng didn’t care. He grabbed a gaming helmet and returned to his room, putting it on and searching the official site for information. In the past, he’d only played to train his abilities and wasn’t up-to-date with the game’s latest developments. Now he did his best to recall and research, hoping to gain every possible advantage for his training.

There seemed to be an event at game launch...

An interdimensional merchant would appear somewhere, if he remembered correctly...

The time when the tribal invaders would burn the Alliance warehouse was...

Skill books! Chen Feng remembered complaints that during the first week after launch, elite monsters near the main city had a high drop rate for skill books the first five times they were killed. At launch, most people focused on questing to level up, not hunting elite monsters, since it wasted time. Everyone wanted to reach level ten first, change class, and race for first dungeon clears.

The next day, at 11:55 a.m., Chen Feng lay on his bed with the gaming helmet, waiting for the game to officially open at noon.

“Welcome to the world of ‘Savior’...” Every new player heard an introduction upon creating a character, but Chen Feng was already too familiar with it and skipped ahead. The first expansion pack, “Orc King’s City,” was set on a continent ruled by orcs called Ogras! On this land, the orcs had allied with undead, trolls, and goblins to form a Horde that dominated the continent, driving out the humans, elves, dwarves, and barbarians. Their homelands destroyed, the four races were forced to flee Ogras and survive in adjacent realms. In each realm, only one main city remained, protected by terrain and divine barriers. In the Chinese region, this last city was called “Xiluo.”

As for Ogras, now under orc rule, it was the game’s world map, and players from all regions could teleport there at level 30—the real stage for fame and glory.

“Please create your character...” Skipping past the race and class introductions, Chen Feng said, “Elf, warrior, game ID: Duan Chenfeng.”

The game offered four races—human, elf, dwarf, and barbarian—each with unique talents and limited class choices. In the wild, dying once or dying three times in a dungeon would prevent you from logging in again until after midnight. The official explanation was to reflect the perils of a post-apocalyptic world. Survival was paramount, and among all races, elves had the stealth talent, allowing them to go invisible as long as they didn’t move or take damage—the best survival ability. Previously, Chen Feng had chosen human for PvP, but this time, things were different.

The classes included warrior, paladin, hunter, warlock, mage, priest, and monk—a total of eight. At level ten, each could specialize into one of three talent trees. For instance, as a warrior, Chen Feng could later choose weapon, berserker, or shield mastery. The three trees per class enriched choices and allowed for more diverse team compositions in future tournaments.

Chen Feng used his real name as his game ID to avoid suspicion from the Cobra Organization. Every assassin group had strict rules: when training abilities or engaging in any commercial activity in-game, one could not use one’s real name or any codename from the organization. Someone using their real name as an ID would be immediately discounted as a suspect.

System message: Your character has been created. Please wait five minutes. At exactly noon, all players will be randomly teleported to a spot on the game map.

Xiluo Main City’s Summons: A Race Quest. Xiluo calls all adventurers arriving on Lingdong Continent. The first 100 players to reach the main city after entering the game will each receive three universal skill books as a reward; the top ten will receive additional prizes, and the first to arrive will earn the title “Xiluo’s Herald.” Players ranked 101 to 100,000 will have a chance to receive one universal skill book. Quest duration: two hours.