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Solon slowly opened his eyes.

It was already more than halfway into the month. Each time he attempted to open his eyes, dense amounts of data emerged in his mind. Countless 0s and 1s flashed through his mind, causing him to feel a brain-splitting headache in a split-second. He realized that his body’s awareness was very weak, and that there seemed to be an electric current within his entire body making chaos to his calm electric field. Although he could hear and sense everything outside, he was unable to move at all, not even lift a finger!

Not good!

I want to awaken!

I must wake up!

Although he didn’t know why he would be reborn in this mysterious world, Solon did know that young girl outside was in danger.

That young girl who continuously attentively attended to him was in danger!

She was called Vivian and was 8 years-old this year. She had beautiful light golden long hair and when she smiled, two small dimples would appear.

She was Solon’s half-sister.

She was also the target of many slave traders in the slums because they were certain that this little girl would become a great beauty in the future. As long as she was raised for a bit, she would be able to be sold for a good price. There wasn’t an easier target than a girl without parents, and an elder brother that was unconscious with life or death unknown.

This was an evil world!

Solon had already heard people trying to break in for this half month in many occasions.

If not for them being afraid of that old dog named ‘Heath’, perhaps Vivian would have already fallen into their evil schemes.

“Not good!”

“I must definitely awaken!”

Solon’s heart produced a bellow for the first time, causing his former lifetime’s memories become fuzzy. Then, the other Solon’s memory became weak and the only thought was to awaken, to protect that pitiful young girl.

She was already in quite a lot of danger!

It was impossible for a pretty barely-eight-years-old girl to survive in the slums.

From what he perceived, there were two evil people already discussing in how to poison that old dog named ‘Heath’, then sell Vivian to the woman named ‘Sofia’.

All this was about to happen!

If he didn’t wake up, the young girl would face an incomparably tragic fate!

………………

Darkness.

Boundless darkness.

There were still countless 0s and 1s in Solon’s mind. A fine electric current jumped around in his body. He could vaguely recall some things from his previous lifetime, along with some additional fuzzy memories.

Naturally, it was a very painful matter!

In this soul-wrenching pain, he gradually recalled the life-support cabin. At the time that his consciousness had already entered the virtual space, the scene of an additional memory soon after appeared. It was a wizard enveloped by a black mantle. The wizard faced him and pointed, then innumerable electric arcs flashed over, seeming to shatter his soul with lightning!

An indistinct hazy moon appeared.

A young and inexperienced-looking youth with black eyes and flax-colored hair appeared before him.

He stretched his palm towards him and solemnly said: “Protect her!”

“Do not let her receive any injuries!”

Solon’s consciousness became fuzzy once more. It seemed like he had a dream, and inside the dream, a lot of things happened. There was another person’s memories.

He had already thoroughly faded away!

Only one name remained, because he thought that he shouldn’t let his name be not left behind.

After all, Solon felt that his ego had already given himself up, and he could waken up from dormancy!

His name was Solon.

Therefore, he was called Solon.

As for what he was once called, it already didn’t matter.

The most important thing to do right now was to wake up, then drive off the scoundrels that were about to begin to that young girl named ‘Vivian’ that he had to protect.

Countless electric arcs were still inside his body.

However, the neverending 0s and 1s seemed to gradually stop and a faint feeling that his soul was full appeared. Then, there seemed to be an extra baseless spiritual strength suppressing the electric current and 0s and 1s in his body. Soon after, an abrupt depressed clap of thunder resounded inside his brain!

Suddenly.

Solon opened his eyes. A familiar image appeared in front of him.

Name	Race
Solon	Half-Fairy
Attributes
Strength	12
Agility	19 (+1)
Constitution	15
Intelligence	18 (+1)
Perception	15
Charisma	16
Faction:	Lawful Evil
Profession:
Level 5 Commoner	Level 1 Thief 【Base Class】
HP:	12/12
EXP:	150 (Not allocated)
Skill Points:	None
Attribute Points:	None
Condition:	Weak (Soul resurrecting)
Profession Skills
Sneak	20
Steal	35
Pick Lock	45
Snare	15
Legendary Skill
Omnipotent Dextrous Hands【Sealed】(Weak Soul)
Personal Ability
Deft Left Hand	Eidetaic Memory

………………

“This is?!”

Solon’s consciousness gradually sobered up. When he saw the image before his eyes, he immediately recalled the accident in the life-support cabin, how he was in the middle of a certain virtual reality game. It was no wonder why so many 0s and 1s emerged in his mind for the past half month. It turned out that when the accident occurred in the life-support cabin, the game’s data stream was also transmitted along with his consciousness. This time when he opened his eyes, it seemed like that dense data stream thoroughly fused with his mind.

A short moment of absent-mindedness.

Very quickly, a thought came into Solon’s mind. He attempted to concentrate his attention as he inwardly thought: “Could it be that I’ve really fused with that data stream? If so, doesn’t that mean my brain has become a self-conscious brain?”

“Don’t know if it’s really like this!”

“Allocate 150 EXP to Commoner profession!”

The trace of a warm current emerged.

Solon amazedly discovered that he could unexpectedly feel the existence of his four limbs, that the electric current inside his body was gradually melting, and threads of vitality were revolving in his body.

“Commoner profession has advanced to Level 10! Base Class has reached Level Limit!”

“Obtained 25 Skill Points.”

A line of familiar text appeared before him.

A surge of happiness welled up from Solon’s heart because everything before him was exactly the same as the virtual reality game that he was in.

Before his accident happened, he was right in the middle of the virtual space, and his consciousness was just about to be transmitted to game 《Clash of Titans》. This was a very popular game at that time. While other virtual games stayed somewhere around 75% reality, it made a high-profile claim that there was a technological breakthrough and had achieved 100% reality.

This caused an enormous vibration through the Earth Federation!

Just like the countless amounts of people were attracted to enter, Solon was also attracted over at that time. There was even the magic-esque game cabin that they released to exclaim in admiration about. Following that was unexpectedly an imitation of a enchantment spell-based cabin. In the period of time before he was reborn, the virtual world was a very significant domain because the Interstellar Age required a great amount of talents. Talents that had a grasp of a great amount of complex and astonishing knowledge. This demanded a powerful memorization ability and calculation ability.

The most initial studies of the virtual world was using slight electrical currents to stimulate the right brain lobe. The result was that it strengthened calculation and memorization, making the human body’s right brain development increase by 3% – 10%.

It could be said that there was research into the human body’s brain to some extent, so much that it would be likely to have a required intelligent chip implementation.

However, this advancement pace was relatively slow, and demanded a great amount of resources.

Therefore, the cheaper virtual game domain was ultimately expanded and turned into quite an important sector.

“Games are everything young children (animals and humans) subsist on and have the ability to bring about conscious want to imitate exercise.” —— Plato¹.

In the previous learning system, games were a very important simulation method.

Ordinary learning gave rise to an uninterested mood that would irritate the left brain, causing any knowledge learned to become very easy to forget.

Therefore, any exam-oriented learning would be more or less already forgotten.

On the other hand, the right brain was an active state of mind. In addition to possessing ultra high speed processing and a great amount of memory, it could be considered photographic memory to its truest sense, having 1 million times more memory than the left brain!

The potential disparity between both sides was over 100,000 times!

Therefore, development in the brain domain was a very important field in the Interstellar Age. Even many jobs required that one had to have 12% brain development degree or higher. So long as one could meet this requirement, then one would be able to very quickly grasp the knowledge of the related specialty. The massive amount of machinery used caused the demand for high-end talents to increase, while the overwhelming majority of the lowest rung labor force was replaced by machinery. Thus, virtual games, this type of low-cost and significant field that could alleviate social contradiction, became unprecedentedly prosperous.

There was research that stated it clearly.

Under the virtual world simulation of all kinds of extreme, nasty, or complex environments, the usage of a human’s right brain could rise to 300% or higher!

This had an impact regarding development of the right brain that was hard to imagine.

Although this situation was had the subconscious mental suggestion that ‘everything is false’, it was still several-fold more stimulating than ordinary learning.

Therefore, the more real a virtual game was, the more obvious the effect of exciting the brain area would be.

The degree of improvement for development would also be higher.

Although the premise of the ‘higher’ was from promoting 1% to 3%, and the pace wasn’t very obvious, it was already considered quite a major breakthrough.

After all, the highest stimulation degree of reality was only 1.5% at the highest.

Thus, those who previously possessed work qualifications entered the virtual game world was a lot of people. It was something that the had to experience and would waste a massive amount of time to process it.

This process would be quite long!

Because the brain’s mystical domain of decision-making that was full of unknown properties.

………………

Before this accident occurred, Solon had been right in the middle of controlling his ‘Legendary Thief’ game character to prepare to infiltrate Shadow Shrine, with the objective to steal half-god to god-tier Epic ranked gear. This was because he had become aware of the limits of the thief profession. If he didn’t have or run half-god to god-tier attributes, then he definitely wouldn’t have any advantage in the future of ‘Clash of Titans’.

When his advanced profession became Level 20, the special skill that he chose for his Legendary Profession was——Omnipotent Dextrous Hands!

“Omnipotent Dextrous Hands 【Legendary Skill】: Legendary Thieves possess incomparably deft hands. When carrying out any profession-related judgements, +5% judgement success. At the same time, when using any weapon to fight, automatically master the above-mentioned weapon specialty.

Theoretically, Omnipotent Dextrous Hands can use any Quest Item!

No matter what kind of mysterious treasure or weapon with an explicit limitation, Omnipotent Dextrous Hands can effortlessly use them.”

Omnipotent Dextrous Hands.

It was a Legendary Thief’s advanced special skill, as well as the shameless skill that made many people envy and gnash their teeth in anger in the game.

If not for thieves having insufficient fighting ability after entering the ‘Legendary’ domain, perhaps some people would have already felt discontented at an earlier time. After all, after learning Omnipotent Dextrous Hands, a thief would be able to use the majority of the weapon equipments. Not to speak of a Wizard’s high-level Arcane Scrolls, there were many artifacts with harsh requirements which a Legendary Thief could flexibly use.

Furthermore, there practically weren’t any side effects!

Clash of the Titans!

Profession advancement in this virtual game was extremely demanding. When an ordinary profession leveled up, they didn’t receive any attribute points, including being unable to upgrade the foundation life value.

One could only obtain 25 skill points.

Only when one advanced to an advanced profession could one obtain a bit of precious attribute points every 2 profession levels.

………………

Solon gradually regained awareness of his body.

By the time Solon opened his eyes once more, it was already the next morning.

Vivian’s petite body had fallen asleep lying on the bedside. Ever since he had opened his eyes yesterday, the little girl excitedly stayed up all evening, only lying down by the side at dawn and dazedly going off to sleep.

“Ow!”

A burst of soreness and pain.

Solon attempted to lift a finger, but was immediately assaulted with the feeling of an electric shock throughout his entire body.

The electric current was still within his body, and the data streams were still emerging in his brain. This made Solon doubt whether or not his brain had accidentally transformed into self-conscious brain. Because, in the domain of science, there was already proof that a human’s brain could become the core component of a super-intelligent brain. Once, there was a top-notch scientist, who advanced Earth’s civilization pace by a huge margin, that was willing to donate his brain to conduct a scientific research.

The smart microchip was also developed on this foundation!

An arc of electricity jumped within his body.

However, along with the disappearing of this electric shock pain, he gradually restored control of his body, then swayed as he sat up.

“Br……brother!”

Vivian blankly opened her eyes, then was immediately incomparably pleasantly² surprised as she embraced his arm and sobbed: “Wuwuwu……”

“You are finally good!……Vivian was extremely worried!……”

“Many bad people!”

“They wanted to catch Vivian to sell!……”

“Fo……fortunately there was Heath!……Otherwise Vivian would have been snatched away by them!……”

“Heath!?……”

Vivian had opened her eyes to turn around and look at the door. Suddenly, her body shook. She let go of Solon’s arm and darted to the doorstep to hold the old dog’s body. She spoke in an alarmed voice: “Heath, what’s wrong?”

“Don’t scare me!”

“Don’t scare Vivian!”

“Quickly wake up? Cry out? Please cry out, okay?”

Tears fell drop by drop.

Vivian quietly sat in the corner holding the black-yellow dog’s body as she cried large pea-sized tears. The old dog’s body was already ice-cold.

It lied in the doorway quiet and unmoving.

It slept very peacefully!

It was called ‘Heath’ and was a glass hound. During its prime, it could fight with a cheetah, but at present it was already quite old.

Even since Solon began his coma, it had tightly followed after this little girl named Vivian.

It had been protecting her.

It hadn’t rested properly this past half month because there was only it to protect Vivian from any harm.

It was awfully exhausted, as well as very hungry.

Because there was a scarce amount of food, Vivian starved the entire time, so it could only find the time to catch some mice that it once disdained to spare a glance.

Unfortunately, it was already too old.

It had been starving for a very long time, barely relying on its instinct to protect its master. Only then could it support itself for so long at its age.

Now, Solon had finally awakened.

Its duty was accomplished.

It was really, really already too old. Thus, it lied down at the doorway and serenely went to sleep.

Never to wake up ever again!

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Outside the room came the pitter-patter sound of rain.

Vivian placed a short-legged and small-seated stool in front of the kitchen stove, then immediately bent her waist towards the inside of the rice sack and took out two handfuls of coarse rice. There already wasn’t too much food inside the bag. Her big brother had exchanged only this sack of coarse rice with the silver ornament that he had stolen just last month at the pier. Even though she had already meticulously saved it many times for this past half month, the increasingly decreasing foodstuffs made her feel a sense of panic.

No more food.

They would starve after several days at max!

Vivian’s red eyes hopefully glanced at the small bed inside the shabby house. An unconscious youngster could be seen lying on top of the moldy smelling bedding. Her big brother still hadn’t woken up to today and the older sister Priest that had once wanted to help them seemed to give up hope. After all, Bishop Phil wasn’t willing to mental power to save a thief.

Vivian strongly wiped away the tears from the corners of her eyes and carefully climbed down from the small stool.

She was 8 years-old as of this year, but because of malnutrition, she seemed very petite. It was very challenging for her to do matters like lighting a fire and cooking a meal. She used both hands to carry several pieces of well-split firewood, then snapped some branches that she had collected in the daytime and she threw them into the kitchen stove. Because it had been raining heavily throughout the afternoon, all of the firewood had traces of moisture on them, thus making the speed of igniting it very slow. Along with the slow ignition was a nose-irritating thick smoke. Vivian was unable to deal with the ache in her eyes, but she roused her small mouth to blow. After waiting for the firewood to ignite, she softly rubbed her eyes.

“Big brother! ……”

“You must definitely wake up! …… Vivian misses you a lot! ……”

“Don’t leave me! ……”

A sparkling and translucent teardrop slid down.

Vivian sat by the edge of the kitchen stove lightly sobbing. After a while, she used her small hands to wipe her cheeks, creating two black marks on her face from the pitch-black smoke. There was originally some salt inside the house, but it had been finished last week. She wanted to imitate her big brother and steal some, but she was nearly grasped by the obese store boss. The boss’s wife had picked up a broom and thrashed her back and even now her back was still a purple color. Slightly bumping something would cause her to feel a scorching pain.

“Woof woof!”

An old black and yellow colored dog walked over. Even though it was already somewhat senile, it could be vaguely made out that it used to be an outstanding hunting dog. Vivian reached out with her small palm and the old dog silently walked over to her side. It raised its head to look towards the seat at the kitchen stove counter, opened its mouth and let out a low whimper.

“Heath.”

Vivian picked up the old dog and carried it in her bosom. As if discovering a longing in its eyes, she softly sobbed for a while, reached out and gently stroked its back, murmuring: “There’s not much food left.”

“It must be set aside for big brother to eat. Vivian is also hungry. Wait until the rain stops, then we can go outside to find something to eat.”

“Sorry!”

“Is Vivian very useless?”

“There’s no way to steal things, and also no way to save big brother, always crying like this……”

The expression in the muddy old dog’s eyes made it seem like it understood her words. It silently took back its sight and extended its tongue to lick her palm. Then, it immediately lay down at her foot and closed its eyes to take a nap.

The sound of footsteps came from outside the room. It seemed to stay at the entrance and the sound of talking could be indistinctly heard.

The original senile black and yellow colored old dog abruptly opened its eyes and in a split second, it was like a fierce wolf. A vicious ‘awoo’ sound came out of its mouth as it faced towards the outside and howled.

“Damn it!”

“Sooner or later, I’ll kill your old dog and stew it into soup!”

The sound of an utterly discomfited man came from outside, then the sound of footsteps gradually became distant.

Vivian’s alarmed complexion became calmer bit by bit. She extended her small palm to stroke the old dog’s head and softly said: “Heath.”

“If he dares to come in, bite him to death!”

“Big brother is currently unconscious. Only you are able to protect me.”

The old dog lightly comforted her as it was in her embrace. Although its appearance was already senile, it still bore a hint of demonic qi.

It was a glass hound!

In the prime of its life, it could even kill a leopard. Manao River¹ region’s folklore called it the hybrid descendant of the three-headed hellhound.

Unfortunately, it was already very old.

The fragrance of congee drifted over from on top of the kitchen table counter. The old dog twitched his nose, but it laid down again soon after.

Vivian’s stomach let out a ‘gugu’ sound, but she still took care to climb up the stool and used a shabby bowl with a cracked edge to put the congee in. She gently blew on it, then used the wooden spoon to feed the youth on the bed little by little. She truly was too young; her strength wasn’t too much, so she didn’t have the means to prop her big brother up. She could only slowly feed him like this.

“Big brother!”

“Eat a bit faster! You’ll get better if you finish eating! ……”

“Everything will get better.”

The little girl said over and over, and tears started falling down again. She reached out with her hands to wipe her tears, lay down the bowl and climbed down the bed to close the door.

This place was Amber City’s slums.

It was a place filled with thieves, robbers and slave traders. In a place like this, it was very difficult for a lone little girl like her to survive. If it wasn’t for her sufficient caution and Heath around to protect her, then perhaps she would have been kidnapped by a bad person in broad daylight. It only required a chloroform-soaked towel to cover her mouth and nose and she would very quickly lose consciousness. Afterwards, she would be loaded into a sack and sold to a slave trader. The slums had a lot of little girls who went missing this way. Sometimes, a considerably good-looking woman would also be kidnapped.

“Heath!”

Vivian went back to slowly feeding the male on the bed and waited for him to swallow more than half the bowl. Then, she hurriedly drank the remaining and used fresh water to wash her small hands and cheek. Afterwards, she shrank her petite body into the moldy smelling quilt. Because the wound on her back was bumped into, the little girl couldn’t help but sob in pain. Soon after, she used both her hands to hug the young male’s arm and said to the old dog at the doorway: “If someone comes, call out!”

“I know what they’re thinking.”

“They think that now that big brother is unconscious, it’s an opportunity for them to sell me to that woman Sofia!”

“This way, they can receive a sum of money.”
Since she had grown up in the slums, she knew more things than children the same age as her. Sofia was the slum area’s largest slave trader. She would choose pretty little girls, then train ** and afterwards send them inside Amber City’s largest **².

It was impossible for an eight year-old little girl to survive in the slums.

Vivian’s eyes revealed a hint of determination. She bent down and gently kissed the forehead of the vegetable-like young male on the bed, then said with a downcast voice: “Even if I’m to be sold, I must be selling myself!”

“Then, I’ll take the sum of money and go plead a genuine Priest, and possibly awaken big brother!”

She understood what kind of fate she would face!

That woman Sofia would first raise her for several years, then teach her how to attend to a man. If she looked pretty enough, she would probably be sent as a present to some aristocrat inside the city in that case. Otherwise, she would just be sent into those inferior **.

But for her big brother.

She was willing to do anything, because this was her only family member.

The sound of killing came from outside.

Vivian couldn’t help but shrink inside the quilt. At the doorway, the old dog’s eyes had an ominous glint emerge from them.

This was the slum area’s Cologne and Sawey fighting over domain. Ever since her big brother had been defeated with a serious injury by a formidable wizard, the slum area’s thief faction had many deaths. The original leaders all died violently on the streets and the remaining people started fighting over territory and had already done so many times. There were simply no guards coming over to control this place because this was Amber City’s forgotten corner.

They fought over influence over blocks and also fought over the children within the slums.

Because no matter which faction, all of them needed to nurture children to steal things. At that time, big brother had become a thief in order to support her.

The memories Vivian had regarding her parents were very fuzzy!

She only knew that her mother once had a husband and it was said that he was an outstanding godly thief. Unfortunately, he ultimately died inside some location’s Wizard Tower on his last mission.

From that time onwards.

Wizards became the most fearful existence in her immature mind!

That man was her big brother’s father. Although she hadn’t been born at that time, she had listened to her big brother speak of it.

Afterwards.

Her mother bought around the young big brother through a period of drifting in destitution. Because life forced even a tavern to become a brothel, that was actually just its concurrent **. Vivian knew these; she understood more things than her peers by far. This was the life mother had led until she came across a mysterious adventurer.

Very quickly, she became pregnant again.

The adventurer didn’t marry her and only treated her as a ** to raise. That man was Vivian’s father.

It was said that he also had a formidable profession.

Heath was his pet, but afterwards, he strangely disappeared.

Only this old dog was left to them.

Their mother had lost two men continuously and her mind began to deteriorate. It became so serious that she once contracted panic disorder and finally died of illness.

At that time, she was only 3 years-old.

Her big brother was 12 years-old.

The two young children lost their parents and very quickly began wandered around on the streets destitute. At that time, her big brother would frequently would fight other people in order to compete for some meager food.

Afterwards, her big brother became a member of a gang and turned into a qualified thief.

During that time.

Their lives gradually stabilized and the chaotic slums became their shelter.

A mournful scream could be heard.

Vivian shuddered from head to toe due to fright and hid her whole body in the young male’s bosom. The old dog at the door stood suddenly stood up and an ominous glint coming out from its eyes faced towards a distant alley.

Someone had died over there!

People dying in the slums was a regular occurrence. Even Priests of Dawnlight Shrine wouldn’t care about the fate of the slums.

The neighboring people all slammed their doors shut.

Some people picked up the door bolt and firmly locked up the entrance. Vivian also climbed up and strenuously went to close the door bolt.

According to the common sense she had from living in the slums for several years, if someone died, the problem would change very quickly. The following fighting would be even more ferocious and would possibly affect the people in the vicinity.

Fright.

The fright in the young girl’s heart made her tight hug the old dog and bring it by the foot of the bed.

“Heath.”

She gazed at the outside in fright. She could see some people’s shadows in the rain, their hands holding weapons and fighting each other.

Blood splattered the entire alley and was cleaned away by the rainwater soon after.

A faint trace of blood could be smelled!

Vivian bent down and felt the old dog’s head. Her immature body couldn’t help but slightly tremble due to fear and she whispered: “You’ll protect me, right?”

“Ao!”

The old dog suddenly called out.

The young girl immediately jumped in fright, but she discovered that Heath wasn’t calling out towards the outside. Rather, it was towards the young male on the bed.

“Big brother！？”

Vivian turned her body in pleasant surprise and discovered that the young male on the bed had opened his eyes.

Her lips slightly trembled.

All the pressure and fear until now had broken out in a flash!

The very small figure all of the sudden threw herself towards his bosom, big droplets of crystalline teardrops rolling down her immature cheeks.

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