First Move, Checkmate: How Will You Respond?

“Victor, you’ve really made a name for yourself!”

An angry woman’s yell came from the study.

A black-haired beauty held a newspaper, pointing at the image imprinted on it with magic stone, fuming with rage.

“Are you trying to ruin the reputation of the Clayvin family?!”

Slap!

The newspaper landed on the man’s face.

He was expressionless as he took the newspaper off.

His obsidian bright eyes calmly glanced over the contents of the newspaper.

The man in the newspaper had well-defined features. Even in the black and white image on the paper, one could see that the man was exceedingly handsome.

It was a face that could captivate thousands of young girls.

But it did not include the girl in front of this man.

The man’s actions seemed to be inviting the girl, but the girl in the picture declined him with a smile.

In that smile, there even seemed to be some disdain.

Bang!

A sound pulled his thoughts back.

The woman in front of him – Lia Clayvin – heavily slapped the table.

“I sent you to attend the banquet as a representative of the family, but you confessed your love to the Duke’s daughter in front of everyone at the banquet?!”

“She’s still a minor! Have you lost your mind?!”

Yes, the contents of the newspaper wrote:

[Shocking! Viscount Clayvin did this at the Duke’s daughter’s banquet!]

One had to admit, the newspaper knew how to catch people’s eyes.

If he saw a headline like this himself, he probably would have spent a few coins to buy a copy for afternoon tea entertainment.

Unfortunately, the entertainment target on the front page headline was himself.

Victor Clayvin.

He looked at the mirror on the desk, the reflection matched the handsome man on the newspaper perfectly.

But as a transmigrator who had just crossed over today without any memories,

Victor did not want to take the fall for this.

Although in the face of the woman’s yelling, other than staying silent, he could only stay silent.

If a mentally ill patient killed someone and claimed they were not in their right mind when they committed murder, could they avoid the death penalty?

They actually could.

The premise was that they needed to have a certificate as proof.

Victor didn’t have one.

He could only listen to her vilification silently, head lowered without a word.

But this seeming indifference only served to further provoke the woman’s anger.

In the end, she finished her one-sided scolding with “I must be insane to think you’d actually listen.”

During the dozens of minutes of vilification, Victor tried his best to gather what information he could.

Based on the furnishings of the study and the woman with short hair before him, everything matched perfectly with a game he had played in his previous life.

It was an adventure MMORPG, a “massively multiplayer online role-playing game.”

In this world of swords and magic, players could customize their race and class to experience different storylines and challenges.

His class was a power leveler.

This game also had levels. If one was not a paying player, they would need to grind for various materials and resources.

If players didn’t want to pay real money but also didn’t have time to gain levels and materials, they would need power levelers.

At the same time, in PVP (Player Versus Player) rankings, players who needed to increase their rank beyond their own abilities also required power levelers’ help.

That was his job in his previous life, and he had some fame in power leveling circles.

Just yesterday, after seven days without rest he had finally finished power leveling the seventeenth order of this month.

Right as he was about to settle the payment, bam, he suddenly died.

That was how mundane his transmigration was.

Back to the main point, the character he transmigrated into was called [Victor Clayvin].

His position was that of a viscount.

In the Kingdom of Carenthia which used nobility titles to distribute power and status, his position as a viscount was more of a symbolic identity.

Aside from having some territory, he didn’t really have any other privileges.

In the eyes of commoners, Victor was naturally someone with power and influence.

But…provoking the Duke’s daughter?

A viscount really couldn’t compare to a duke.

“As expected of the villain boss, starting off on hell difficulty from the get-go.”

Victor muttered to himself.

“What did you say?”

Lia’s voice rose a few degrees, seeming puzzled but also dissatisfied with his attitude.

This naturally drew Victor’s gaze towards his so-called younger sister.

Lia Clayvin.

In the game, she was Victor Clayvin’s younger sister.

With her extremely high looks, she was also one of the few female characters in the game who players affectionately called “wife.”

A big reason Lia was so popular also had to do with her “villain brother.”

Victor Clayvin was the boss character that players had to defeat in the early and mid stages of the game.

Due to Victor Clayvin’s actions, the royal regime in the Kingdom of Carenthia was overthrown.

The current Empress issued a quest, asking players for help to defeat Victor Clayvin.

In the end, this villain with [high attack, high speed, difficult to defeat] and [high looks] took on labels like [trash wizard] and somehow became very popular.

Overall, transmigrating into a familiar game should have been a joyous thing.

But he wasn’t in the best mood.

Because…

Victor had a lot of enemies.

Maybe it was because the taller the tree, the more wind it caught, or perhaps it was the plot’s malice against handsome men.

In the game, any NPC the player encountered could potentially hold a grudge against Victor.

Perhaps it was a teacher from the magic academy, or an elderly villager.

Even a random street dog may have been kicked by Victor before.

Even more preposterous was how even a number of key characters wanted him dead.

These included Victor’s fiancée, Victor’s sister, the Duke’s daughter.

This was also the origin of Victor’s title as [Trash Wizard].

There were only so many famous female characters with high looks, and Victor had provoked over half of them.

It was a wonder he had even survived until now.

And now, replacing the original Victor, he had become the current Victor…

Just the accumulated hatred from the original was enough to fill a pot.

‘Don’t even know what time it is now.’

Having learned from Lia’s previous inquiry, he didn’t mutter out loud this time.

He just pondered it silently.

But this made Lia feel he was deliberately not speaking to insult her.

Her rage bar filled up instantly.

“Enough! Victor, do you even know what kind of situation you’re in?!”

She angrily fished out a contract from her branded handbag and flung it onto the desk.

“If it wasn’t for me using my connections to contact the academy to immediately approve a professor title for you, the Duke’s private soldiers would’ve been at your estate gates already!”

“Yet you sit leisurely in the study, drinking coffee and reading books! Now that things have come to this, you don’t even want to say a word of thanks?!”

“Thank you.”

“I hate you lik- huh?”

Lia’s words stumbled slightly as she blinked, momentarily forgetting how to vent her anger.

Victor sat in his seat, took the contract, and said while looking it over: “Thank you for handling this for me. Next time I’m out, I’ll be careful about what I say.”

“…”

Seemingly not accustomed to a rare word of thanks from her notoriously evil brother, Lia’s finger unconsciously twirled a strand of her hair.

Her mood was a little complicated.

“Anyway, I only did this because I don’t want the family name to be disgraced. Also, I could only resolve the immediate situation. You still have to personally go apologize to the Duke.

“Additionally, don’t just thank me, think about how you’ll deal with Miss Gwen first.”

“Gwen Delin?”

“Yes, just my nomination alone wouldn’t be enough for the academy to agree, so I asked Miss Gwen for help.”

Speaking to here, Lia’s gaze chilled a few degrees again as she looked at Victor, like looking at an insect.

“You already have a fiancée yet still want to fool around with girls.”

“As expected of you, Mister Victor.”

Victor actively filtered out her latter remark.

“Although I don’t know if you misunderstood something, I will thank her properly.”

An image appeared in his mind.

Gwen Delin.

The second daughter of the knight family guarding the northern border, and the game’s plotline’s Victor’s fiancée.

She was a true righteous knight, and righteous knights were destined to stand opposed to villainous mages.

Although this righteous knight was Victor’s fiancée in the game, the two never stood on the same front.

Including in the final storyline quest to defeat Victor, it was Gwen who arrived to end Victor’s life with one shot.

Their relationship was more like a forced family engagement, with not even a hint of affection.

Gwen the Great Knight personally stabbing Victor to death also seemed to prove the players’ speculation.

Unfortunately, the shitty devs never brought up anything about these characters’ backstories, so until the end, their relationship could not be confirmed.

‘Another dangerous character has been added.’

He silently sighed in his heart, feeling that life was very difficult.

Gwen Delin was no small character.

As the strongest knight in the Kingdom of Carenthia, even during the late game stages when gods and demons ran amok, her fighting strength was still astonishingly powerful.

In the late game, Gwen Delin would even become a boss that players had to face. During that time, Gwen the Great Knight’s might was deeply engraved in every player’s heart.

Victor had a clear understanding about her fighting ability.

This woman, absolutely could not be provoked.

Or else, he really would die.

Although he had transmigrated, it didn’t seem he had any golden finger powers he could use.

Seeing Victor looking a bit stumped, Lia felt inexplicably happy in her heart.

She had thought it was his arrogance that didn’t allow him to accept others’ help, but in reality, Victor was just thinking about how to survive this doomed ending.

“Hmph, there are still some matters to deal with regarding the territory, so I’m leaving.”

Lia coldly laughed and picked up her bag, about to head out.

“Oh right.”

Right before leaving, Lia looked back and used a pathetic looking gaze to glance at Victor.

“To actually keep a one-eyed crow as a pet. Your taste is still as terrible as before.”

Bang!

The study door closed shut.

From outside could also be heard the maid’s voice.

‘Miss Lia, do you need me to ready a carriage?’

But Victor’s thoughts couldn’t be placed on the departed Lia.

He turned his head to look at the jet-black creature in the corner of the desk.

It looked like a crow, but slightly bigger than a normal crow.

And just as Lia said.

It only had one eye.

That single eye seemed to contain human intellect as it roamed around.

Finally, its eye met Victor’s.

Then, it revealed a human-like smile.

“Greetings, I am the evil god – Habbie.”