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chromemuffin · 6 years

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Quan Zhi Gao Shou / The King’s Avatar Novel (Vol. 1, Ch. 1-10)

How these liveblogs work: I read five chapters of the manhua at a time, then the equivalent chapters in the novel. This is probably going to take forever seeing as there are 800+ translated chapters available as of the time of writing this post and over 1000 chapters total, buuut at least each chapter is short.

Fair warning: I always sound as if I don’t like what I’m reading or I’m criticizing it (just read my captive prince liveblog lol...), but I am actually enjoying it immensely.

Volume 1: Banished Battle God

Chapter 1: The Banished Battle God

My first comment of the entire novels: What is with the “eccentrically-shaped ashtray”? It doesn’t specify what this ashtray looks like, only that it’s unusual. Why include this detail in the first place if you’re not going to tell us what it’s actually shaped like? Now I need to know!

This was also in the manhua, but I didn’t bother bringing it up then: Why was the first bit of dialogue translated as “Arrived”? I’m pretty sure it’s this character: 来. I never managed to learn enough Chinese to be worth a damn, but I do Japanese to English translations on the side and I’m pretty sure a loose translation would work better. idk, it just bothers me. Don’t mind me, though. I like nitpicking over translation stuff. And I won’t get to do much more of it.

Anyway.

“He gently removed the card from Glory’s dedicated log-in device.”

I love this description, a little throwaway word ‘gently’ tells so much about Ye Xiu as a guy who really loves and respects this game. I think he already know what is in store for him to some extent, but he doesn’t take it out on the game. In fact, he was playing right up until it was time for the meeting. The novel states that the manager didn’t even him any advanced notice, I’m assuming of their decision to remove him from the team, but that Yu Xiu also wasn’t surprised.

“Only they quickly recovered because there was another important person that deserved their attention.”

Hm, pretty girl or new team leader asshole? Tough decision indeed.

Ah, ok. So that’s the deal with his pseudonym. It’s so close to his real name (in English lettering at least) that I confuse the two. But it’s far easier to tell the difference when I look at the characters 叶修 / 叶秋.

It’s kind of confusing because (at least in the translation), he is referred to as his alias Ye Qiu in this chapter, whereas the summary and other places refer to him as Ye Xiu.

lol “Mine!” How shameless.

“After one year, even if he wanted to return again, for the elderly, without a year of intense competition to maintain his skills...”

‘for the elderly’ is just...hilarious because he’s only 25. that’s not old. (well, in this game’s context it is, but geez is that an early cut-off age)

Chapter 2: Area 3 Number 47

“As tactful as he is, he wouldn’t think to blame the club for retiring him.”

But that’s?? exactly?? what happened??? You’re already kicking him out after all he did for the team over the years. I mean, it’s a sound business decision, but no need to be so nasty about it. The stuff Ye Xiu pulls off in-game aside, he seems to be a relatively decent person, even going as far as helping out his friends to the point where he doesn’t have enough left to pay the penalty fee, whatever amount that is.

Ah, Su Mucheng, I like her the more times I read these opening scenes across the various media...She has a cute character design in the animation, which I watched when it came out, but she actually turns out to be quite mature and adorably worried/supportive.

Icicles also formed on his head. If he didn’t take shelter, he would die.

Seems a bit dramatic, but so is icicles forming on your head!! It must be really, really cold out, huh...

Su MuCheng was always gentle and serene. Even during in an intense PK confrontation, she always held a smile. Speaking about her, Ye Qiu sometimes watched as she smiled while causing her opponents to explode into pieces. When she then politely said sorry, he would always inexplicably tremble a bit.

ah, yes, I’m pretty sure the animation skips this observation, which builds a bit more character for Su Mucheng since we don’t see her again for a bit. Ye Xiu, also, seems a bit more “alive” in a sense in the manhua/novel, because of little comments like these.

Chen Guo is also a fun character ^.^ “She slammed the keyboard directly shutting down the game.” definition of a rage quit, huh.

Chapter 3: Special Duty: Night Shift

“My hands were frozen cold or else 30 seconds would’ve been enough.”

show off. Though he doesn’t really come off as showing off. The poor opponent must have been so confused, though. Wins 52 times in a row and suddenly gets beat in 40 seconds flat haha.

“Ye Xiu… … Ye Qiu? It really is him!” Chen Guo excitedly thought. It looked like she really had uncovered his hidden identity! This showed that he really was Ye Qiu. If she had seen the name Ye Qiu written, then she wouldn’t have believed it.

This part confused me a bit in the manhua, but it’s clearer here. At least the Ye Xiu/Qiu mess is clarified early on. Still don’t know why the narrative refers to him as Ye Qiu in the beginning if his name is actually Ye Xiu (and is the one used in the summary)...??

She had been prepared to use everything she owned to get his signature. Ye Qiu’s signature, ah! Who had it? No one!

Chen Guo’s thought process is just fun to go along with, haha she’s so dramatic. And also works well narrative-wise to show how popular Glory is. I mean, she works at an internet cafe but that doesn’t mean she has to be into Glory herself; but she is, played for a long time, and is up to date with the professional scene to some degree if she knows the names and faces of all of Excellent Era’s members.

...she [had] a strong urge to change the word Xiu into Qiu.

haha.

“Oh, so it’s like this… … how generous.” Chen Guo sighed with sorrow. This person’s strength was powerful, his account definitely wouldn’t be weak. Powerful accounts were extremely valuable. Gifting it away so easily was very valiant.

The irony in this part never fails to amuse me.

Later, in Glory’s fifth expansion, a lot of experts obtained the qualifications to complete the Challenge skill becoming the first ones possessing access to all servers.

This is an interesting tidbit. I like the novel, where it’s easier to absorb all the rules of the game/professional scene.

Ah, so the account card Ye Xiu uses is actually one from 10 years ago? And he held onto it for this whole time, not using it. That’s...pretty amazing, I would have lost mine after 10 years.

His hair looked as if it hadn’t been taken care of in at least half a month. His face didn’t look too healthy. Although it was white and clear, it was that sort of sickly pale. His two eyes gazed at her listlessly...The guy in front of her didn’t look too young, but was unexpectedly also so dejected and disdained.

I remember people being upset that he looked more handsome in his other appearances. He’s the sort to not care about appearances, and I guess he doesn’t get out much, stuck inside playing Glory all day. But, well, if he looks dejected and disdained it’s probably from what just happened.

“full-time night cat“ AH this is why the manhua drew him as a cat when he said he likes nights. I guess it’s an expression.

His approving attitude made Chen Guo feel very apologetic. This small storage room truly wasn’t a place for living.

lol not to mention Chen Guo drops a bucket of paint on top of the bed along with a whole shelf in the manhua. She didn’t seem as apologetic in the other mediums as she does here, though.

Even after all this, he had never asked for his boss’s name.

haha kind of important don’t you think.

Chapter 4: Mysterious Expert

“If you also want to go out and eat, don’t ask my employees to go on an errand for you.” Chen Guo said.

“Next time, could you tell us in advance? Can’t you help deliver it to us?” A person said.

“The Internet Cafe only has so many people. How could we deliver it all back? Enough of this nonsense, if you really want to eat so much but are too lazy to buy it, go ask for their phone number. Wouldn’t they be willing to deliver it?” Chen Guo said.

“Sister Chen do you have their number? Lend it to me so I can copy it down.” A person said.

“What would I do with their phone number? I have people to run errands for me. Why would I inconvenience the restaurant?” Chen Guo said.

Chen Guo is pleasantly vicious. I wasn’t overly fond of her in the animation, but she has great expressions in the manhua, and her dialogue is just great in the novel.

lol “it looks like I’m forcing him play.”

This Heavenly Domain wasn’t a single map. It was another world. The map was as big as the combined worlds of five other servers. This place had difficult instance dungeons, powerful equipment, precious materials, and also freedom. All experts would meet up there. The Heavenly Domain was a player’s final destination.

So that’s what the Heavenly Domain is...I don’t know if I ever quite figured it out casually watching the animation.

“Don’t fake it. You actually haven’t retired. It’s just that you were unable to win a seat, so you were kicked out right?” Chen Guo said.

Ye Xiu was speechless.

“No offense… …” Chen Guo realized that her words had somewhat stabbed at his sore spot.

Way to hit it where it hurts! Unintentionally, of course. I seem to like manhua Ye Xiu for his expressions, and novel Chen Guo because it actually gives some more depth to her character.

“Oh so it’s like this?” Tears streamed down Ye Xiu’s cheeks. Ye Qiu was currently chatting with you face to face, sister.

lol wait is this just an expression or- he’s not actually tearing up in this scene is he.

“Oh?” when Ye Xiu flipped to the last page and looked, a sudden wave of shame hit. Thinking about it, this hand guide hadn’t changed much over ten years. This was something players couldn’t update any further. For missions that veterans would choose, how could no one have come up with this type of strategy already? Right now, he needed this type of strategy. Just as Ye Xiu was ready to follow this strategy to take missions, tears immediately began streaming down his face. He was once regarded as textbook level figure! Now with a beginners guide in his hands, how could he endure this shame?

Ye Xiu’s a lot, ah, more expressive than the animation gives him credit for. I’m sorry, I laughed. He’s just so thrown off by having to start from scratch.

Chapter 5: Skill Match

But at this point everyone was still level 0. Their jumping abilities were too poor and there was no way they could jump high enough. Everyone repeatedly bouncing up and down was truly a cute and beautiful scene.

WHAT LOL Ok this wasn’t in the manhua was it, it’s indeed a glorious image. I like how the narrator even describes it as a ‘cute’ scene haha.

Aah, I appreciate the little break away to explain the mechanics of the game. It’s not terribly useful seeing as the game doesn’t actually exist in real life, but it’s decently interesting.

But if this skill set that had been picked by peak-level expert like him was seen by ordinary players, they would definitely laugh.

And an area where Ye Xiu doesn’t have to feel ashamed of, haha.

Chapter 6: Thousand Chance Umbrella

It’s not as if it wasn’t explained in other mediums, but the novel definitely has the time to go through all the details like the evolution of Glory’s class system and why no one would suspect anyone to play the ‘unspecialized class’ anymore.

Soon after, he directly headed to the storage chest in the warehouse and opened it. An equipment unexpectedly lay inside.

Accounts that transferred servers should be empty...

But Lord Grim, which had just transferred to the tenth server, unexpectedly had an equipment inside.

No one knew how this happened, but it seemed as if Ye Xiu had been expecting it. He knew that he would find an equipment here...

This, too, is interesting! Because it seems as if the warehouse pops up out of nowhere in the other mediums, and you’re not really sure if it’s something that everyone else can access or not if you weren’t paying attention to the fact that the umbrella is a ‘silver’ weapon and thus a unique item that no one else would be able to acquire.

...there wasn’t a trace of happiness in Ye Xiu’s expression. On the contrary, it was filled with grief. A rare tremble once again emerged on his right hand.

but then, there’s this. ;-;

The customizable/self-made weaponry is actually quite smart. Reminds me of the custom furniture you can make and add to the Sims... (look, I really am not a gamer haha, I have no clue how many real life games have similar features) I didn’t really understand what was so special about the umbrella before (I probably wasn’t paying 100% attention...).

Only, it could be a unique surpassing peak Epic equipment or it could also be a unique piece of trash.

Or it could be a unique piece of trash. hahaha

Ye Xiu gently retrieved the Thousand Chance Umbrella and placed it in Lord Grim’s hands.

Also the fact that he, gently, places a bunch of pixels into his inventory/avatar’s hands is telling how much this game and this item in particular mean to him.

Damn, reading about playing a game really puts me in the mood to play a game, too. I don’t really play games like this one, though...

Chapter 7: Midnight Phantom Cat

You saw clearly, spoke well, planned well, but in the end because of a single unexpected accident, your dreams and hopes all disappeared into nothing leaving only this incomplete Thousand Chance Umbrella to me.

“You originally had talent in Glory, a successful talent… …” His fingers gently wiped over the keyboard. With a quiver, Lord Grim cast a heal onto Sleeping Moon’s body. When Sleeping Moon promptly praised him again, Ye Xiu’s mind was no longer in the game.

More sad hints of the past. .-.

“It’s here.” Ye Xiu saw that typing might have been slow, so he immediately yelled vaguely. His mouth still held onto the cigarette!

Ooh! He spoke! Or, ahem, ‘yelled vaguely’.

He was even a little skeptical thinking that his healing might snatch away the enemy.

Don’t you hate it when you’re minding your own business, not even fighting, and the monster goes to attack you anyway? lol you know how many times my teammates died from that in Final Fantasy Type-0...the worst part is that you can only control one of the 3 party members at a time, so to save them you have to keep switching between characters. or deal with having no one to heal you and only bring 1 character. idk I really liked that game.

Beautiful! Ye Xiu couldn’t help but praise him.

lol lots of praise going around in-game. everyone’s still playing nice-nice. Well, in Ye Xiu’s case I guess he is genuinely praising him.

Ah, so Ye Xiu was actually going to warn the others, was he. He just didn’t get the chance. I wondered if he purposely didn’t say anything even if he knew Sleeping Moon’s plan, I can’t remember what happened in the animation.

Chapter 8: A Life and Death Struggle

In these seven seconds, not only would the mage die but Fallen Sun would die too. He might as well try to save one of them.

Ye Xiu had lost faith in Sleeping Moon and directly abandoned the mage to heal Fallen Sun.

I do like how they handled the back and forth for the battle scene here, it doesn’t have too much of a lag between action while explaining Ye Xiu’s thought process.

He couldn’t tell if Fallen Sun had bad luck attached to him. Right when the Bleed status wore off, the Midnight Demon Cat swiped at him again causing him to Bleed yet again. These types of status inducing attacks only had a small probability to appear. But it seemed as if someone added a 100% percent probability halo around Fallen Sun.

Don’t you hate it when that happens. I don’t think anything fishy is up? He just had bad luck. It’s also totally relatable haha.

Could it be that this guy had seen through his own own plan at that time?

Sleeping Moon sure manages to get a lot of musings into the space between attacks here. This is funny though, because the novel gives confirmation that Ye Xiu only realized this recently, when Sleeping Moon purposely let the others get attacked. He isn’t that godly that he realized it from the start.

“50%? I like 100%!” and “...be at ease and drop dead!”

lol and there the shamelessness comes out. Well, Ye Xiu also lost all respect for this guy so.

Furthermore, he opened it extremely exaggeratedly and the umbrella actually flipped the other way. He retracted the umbrella a bit...

Um, so this is possible with a real umbrella of course, but a virtual one too...?

Chapter 9: Ye Xiu’s Two Hands

A pair of hands that made people’s cheeks stream with tears appeared in front of her eyes — Ye Xiu’s two hands.

Those must be some pretty impressive hands.

The hands were beautiful hands.

And in case you didn’t get it the first time: Ye Xiu has beautiful hands. Well, that is in the chapter title after all.

lol and Chen Guo examining his speed, I guess he must be taking it easy since the boss isn’t a difficult one.

Their banter is also so fun to read~

Chapter 10: Shameless Novice

lol did you really get out of the dungeon just so you could switch computers to get a smoke. I don’t think he particularly cared about finishing it, since it just provides exp probably.

Haha “the shameless novice” but what does Sleeping Moon gain from labeling him a novice? Shameless, yes, to discredit him.

These identical messages mixed together with other anger and hate. Although the system automatically blocked profanities, people’s intelligence were boundless. They used same sounding words to complete their mission.

ah, yes, the ways people get past profanity blockers, particularly fun in languages with hanzi! (hanzi right? Chinese characters?)

“Just because I’m angry doesn’t mean I have to show it.” Ye Xiu didn’t look angry. He was even smiling. While doing so, he logged out of the game and shut down the computer. Changing over to the smoking area was still his current ambitious dream.

Ah, I love this series. He just really wants a smoke.

But I can relate, I’m fairly expressionless most of the time, even when I’m excited.

Only players over level 20 could leave the beginner area. When that happened, PK’ing would be opened up. In the meantime, those level 20 and under could only point fingers and argue.

lol just...lol

But now that he couldn’t form a team, his leveling speed would only increase.

HAHA joke’s on you, it apparently works out better for him, they can’t even start PKing so there’s really no use getting into a tizzy over it...not that that stops people from creating drama. ever.

Lord Grim was equivalent to three people. Furthermore, with Ye Xiu’s skills, he wouldn’t be slower in clearing a dungeon than a five man team. He might even be a bit faster.

The video game context really gives validity to Ye Xiu’s ability to breeze through the early stages of the story as well as his strength being far above the others. Plus, it’s true. There are some games where teammates slow you down, you might as well go at it solo.

“Hello hello.”

What a nice way to end this part! I’ll be bouncing back to the manhua now.

So, yeah, like I said. I’m actually having a lot of fun, the novels don’t linger on the mechanics long enough to become boring. Plus, Ye Xiu’s background - being 25 and already on the pro scene for 7 years - makes all of his overpowered-ness not just believable, but expected. Reading him go through the early stages of the game is sort of like watching a let’s play - relaxing.

#quan zhi gao shou #king's avatar blogging #qzgs novel blogging #qzgs vol 1

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