Arknights: I became an NPC in the online game

When it came to close-quarters combat, Felix had nothing to teach Nine. If anything, Nine could be his instructor. But in archery, the Sankta physique gave him undeniable advantages.

He took Nine's crossbow, adjusted a few parts with practiced ease, then said:

"Honestly, I'd recommend replacing it. The parts on this one are already worn. It's cheaper and more efficient to buy a new one than to keep patching this up."

"Understood."

Nine nodded, then turned to glance at Ch'en Hui-chieh, who had been standing quietly on standby.

"Chen, why don't you give it a try too?"

"Yes, ma'am."

Ch'en Hui-chieh stepped forward, though her eyes narrowed slightly. In her view, the Sankta man before her didn't look much different from an ordinary citizen—if you ignored the fact that he was the chairman of Tomorrow's Development.

Felix didn't mention the drones. That was something Wei Yanwu himself needed to handle.

Meanwhile, Qianmen Factory kept churning out brand-new drones, packed into trucks and delivered to the L.G.D. This marked the first step of his formal cooperation with Wei Yanwu. A week later, Felix even attended an internal L.G.D. meeting.

Standing at the podium, he looked almost like a department head addressing his staff. The members of the Guard Bureau regarded him with open curiosity. To most of them, he was just "that enthusiastic Lungmen citizen," maybe a man with a slight crush on Nine (crossed out).

Felix skipped the technical deep dive. He didn't bore them with manufacturing details or energy requirements—this wasn't a lecture for Rhine Lab scientists or academic purists. Instead, he gave a concise explanation of the drones' functions, then let each squad take one to test themselves.

From the control room, Wei Yanwu and Fumizuki watched the live feed in silence. For both sides, this deal was a clear win.

By August, Lungmen's summer vacation was nearly over—and the announcement everyone had been waiting for finally hit: the World Championship stage was set.

This year's venue: Seattle, in Columbia. Teams would first battle through group stages, followed by winner's and loser's brackets. Group matches would be Bo2. Both brackets would use Bo3. And the grand finals? A full Bo5 showdown.

Besides team competitions, there would also be a solo bracket. Players were divided into groups, with the top two advancing until the top eight remained.

On a treadmill, sweat dripping down his temples, Felix scrolled through pre-event forum posts. As for smithing, that could wait a couple of days. His cooperation with Qianmen Factory was still ongoing—he no longer had to forge every item himself. Still, he knew this partnership wouldn't last forever. His ultimate goal was to build his own factory and become self-sufficient.

Meanwhile, in the faction hub, players could now pay Degenbrecher for training—essentially hiring her as a sparring partner. One versus twelve was nothing for her. Every time she drew her twin swords, pro players wailed in despair. With the championship approaching, they had turned her into the de facto practice boss.

Of course, that led to squabbles over who got training time first.

And the arguments didn't stop there. Tomorrow's Development had recruited pro teams from every region. Naturally, teams from the same country banded together—CN's teams clustering, Global's teams sticking close, and so on. Inevitably, friction followed.

Loughshinny once raised the issue with Felix: long-term, this kind of division could hurt Tomorrow's Development.

But in truth, this wasn't a bad thing at all. Players competing tooth and nail with each other—what was it really for? To fight over Tomorrow's Development faction missions, to earn more points and rewards. In essence, it was healthy competition.

Felix didn't particularly care how many factions or cliques emerged within Tomorrow's Development. Right now, during 1.0 when the CN server had the largest player base, most of its members were under his banner anyway.

As for whether this healthy competition might one day turn toxic, Felix had confidence he could keep every player's heart in his grasp—not just the ordinary ones, but the Infected players as well.

He checked the faction panel. Thanks to the efforts of the players, reputation had risen noticeably. But the real boost came from his latest deal with the L.G.D., which had netted a massive surge. Their reputation had finally broken past gray into white, which unlocked extra daily mission experience he could now allocate.

Training finished, Felix pulled out the schematics for Horizon Ark Project.

Mostima and Fiammetta had gone out for Messenger work. Patia and Spuria were busy with their own projects in the workshop. Plume stood guard outside. Everyone had their role, their task, their place—and so did Felix.

The selection rounds for the World Championship were nothing short of a battlefield. Each region was allotted three seeded teams, plus a fourth wild card slot clawed through in blood. For CN, where competition was fiercest, squeezing into the final four was brutally difficult. After round upon round of eliminations, the top seeds stood revealed:

First seed: Yanyu Pavilion, led by Yan Fei.

Second seed: Dynasty, led by Huang Tianhou Tu.

Third seed: Liquid, led by Lao Da.

Fourth wild card: Dreamchaser, an upstart rookie team.

Those who failed to qualify for the team tournament had no choice but to send their strongest solo players overseas to America for the individual bracket.

Among them, Yanyu Pavilion's vlog series stood out. Their content wasn't just strong in competitive performance but savvy in marketing as well—gaining traction, pulling in fans, and feeding their players a constant stream of exposure.

Felix clicked into one such video. The cameraman knocked on Yan Fei's door, got the coach's approval, and entered with the camera rolling.

Yan Fei was just waking up—her beauty evident even in that hazy, half-dreaming state. The chat exploded with heart emojis and drooling comments. But then the camera shifted, zooming directly in on the pillow she was hugging.

The face printed on it looked… awfully familiar.

"Holy crap, that's Mr. Pioneer!"

"No way—my goddess Yan Fei is hugging the Pioneer himself while she sleeps?! Damn it, I'm so jealous right now!"

Felix froze, pupils trembling.

In his past life as a player, he'd always supported Yan Fei, cheering her on with the crowd, calling her "goddess" like everyone else. But now, as an NPC, he was the one plastered on her pillow, being held tight while she slept.

What kind of light novel setup was this supposed to be? Breaking the barriers of two worlds just to force some kind of fated romance?

And worse—why the hell did the artist draw him with such a submissive expression? He was a man, damn it! A fighter! Not some fragile little rabbit!

Did anyone ask his permission? Did anyone pay him royalties?

Felix's future suddenly looked pitch black. Having once devoured countless doujins in his past life, he now realized his own cyber chastity might not survive this world.

Driven by a bad premonition, he clicked over to the pink sites—E-Station, N-Station. Sure enough, the fan-works were there. Stacks of doujins starring him, most of them pairing him with Degenbrecher. And every single time—he was the one on the receiving end.

"Oh my god…"

His stomach lurched. Degenbrecher wasn't just a comrade but a brother-in-arms, and yet in players' imaginations, they were twisted into that kind of relationship.

On the surface, he was the leader, Degenbrecher his right hand. But in the shadows of fanfiction, Degenbrecher became a jealous, predatory big sister archetype—straight out of a Master-Servant scenario.

Felix rubbed at the bridge of his nose, deciding he'd seen enough. He closed the tab, then let his eyes drift back to the storm of chatter flooding the forums.

It was the end of Version 1.0, with Version 2.0 right around the corner. In mid-August, Terra time, two months before launch, the official site finally dropped the long-awaited preview for the new expansion.

Like countless others, Felix clicked the link. The live view count shot past seven figures in minutes—a testament to the hype. Long-time players from 1.0 had shown up, but so had hordes of newcomers and onlookers. Some were curious thanks to the relentless marketing of the Ark Pro League; others were debating whether to dive in. Either way, 2.0's trailer had their full attention.

Civilization's Strongholds—the new era was about to begin.

The camera swept across vast lands: rolling mountain ranges, herds of cattle and sheep, frozen tundras. NPCs appeared along the way—some driving vehicles, some riding beasts of burden—each with different goals, yet all heading toward the same destination.

The shot pulled upward, and from the fractured land rose the colossal silhouette of a city wall. Towering, imposing, it filled the players' screens. They'd seen moving cities before, in videos from creators like Magic ZX and Yang Yan XF—but never in an official cinematic like this.

The trailer cut between cities. One was overrun with untamed greenery, nature reclaiming the streets. Another bustled with white-coated researchers, clean streets humming with order. A third drowned in neon lights and flickering ads, its skyline blazing against the night. A fourth carried a gray undertone, where suited Lupo NPCs strode briskly through somber avenues.

"This… this is the main city? It's gorgeous."

"Majestic. Look at the scale—these cities could house more people than real-world megacities."

"First one I don't recognize—looks like some rainforest settlement. Second's probably Trimount. Third's the Kawalerielki? Fourth I'm not sure, but judging by the uniforms, it might be in Siracusa."

"Damn… turns out I've been a country bumpkin this whole time."

Felix guessed the first city had to be somewhere in Sargon, though he couldn't pin down its name.

The scene shifted. The camera lingered on Theresa and Theresis, their expressions unyielding as they looked toward the horizon, eyes burning with prayer and conviction: "For the future of Kazdel."

A silver-haired feline stared quietly out the window, her gaze unreadable, emotions hidden behind her cool expression.

"Wait, are these the main story characters for 2.0?"

Speculation erupted among players. The three figures on screen were hardly strangers. Kazdel players had already exposed Theresa and Theresis's identities in livestream threads. And the silver-haired feline—Kal'tsit—had appeared long ago, back when Version 1.0 first launched, in the official character introductions.

Then, the camera cut again—to a snowy wasteland.

Hooded figures marched in silence, shoulder to shoulder. At their head, one lowered her hood, revealing a youthful face. Long rabbit ears marked her as Cautus. A scar across her nose, instead of marring her beauty, gave her the aura of a hardened warrior.

"Who is this girl? Gorgeous—I'm picking her day one."

"White hair. That's it, I'm sold."

"I knew it. I've been a Cautus stan from the start."

The Cautus raised her eyes to the distance, where more figures stood waiting. Young and old, men and women. A silver-haired Draco in a military uniform. A gentle-faced, white-haired Elafia. And a towering warrior, shield in hand, like a living mountain.

Men and women dressed in black-and-pink uniforms carefully wiped down their weapons, faces set with solemn determination.

Inside the bar, a penguin in dark sunglasses wore a playful grin, lazily sipping from his glass while his gaze drifted toward the city lights in the distance.

The screen faded to black.

"—I hope I am not the only one to open new paths on this land. I hope that adventurers in the future, too, will have the chance to explore and wander across this world, and be remembered as pioneers."

A slightly hoarse yet magnetic voice resonated, filling the silence.

Orange light slowly rose, like the first glow of dawn.

It was the halo of a Sankta. It was the color burning in his eyes.

"—We fight for a fair world! We fight to cast off the rot of the past! We fight to carve out a new tomorrow!"

The voice swelled in intensity. The Pioneer's figure appeared on-screen, his eyes ablaze, carrying the hunger of a lion. Dissatisfaction with the present. Longing for the future.

"Anyone can become a Pioneer."

Felix's voice steadied, calm yet firm.

"To blaze trails through the unknown.

To unearth ruins.

To open this uncharted world."

"Together with the guardians, creators, and pioneers of tomorrow, we will build a new dawn."

His words landed with weight, each syllable like steel striking stone. The camera pulled back—first from the company tower, then from the sprawl of Lungmen, until it revealed the vast continent beyond.

As the grand music swelled to its finale, the logo of Civilization Stronghold slowly emerged.

——

"Oh my god, they actually used a video edited by ZX himself!"

"Wait, did the Pioneer just found his own faction? What's it called? Don't tell me I've been living under a rock?"

"Bro… the Pioneer's too handsome. And uh—anyone know where those other white-haired NPCs came from? They hit my weak spot hard."

"Pioneer! My Pioneer!"