☆ Chapter 7

Pang Wenguang and Ling Shaoze were chatting about some information they had seen on the forum: “I heard that during the third closed beta, there were 10,000 slots, and for this open beta, their accounts won’t be deleted. But they do have a level cap — the highest is level 30 — and their accounts can’t level up for the first seven days after the open beta starts…”

Following Pang Wenguang’s recommendation, Ling Shaoze also checked out the trending posts on the Eternal Forum, as well as battle videos featuring well-known top players of various classes from the third closed beta, to better understand the different classes and decide which one he wanted to play.

After spending most of the day watching videos, Ling Shaoze had only one feeling: except for the number one in priest profession, who was a pure and pretty girl, the number one players of the other seven professions (Mage, Swordsman, Warrior, Assassin, Archer, Summoner, Bard) were all handsome and charismatic in their own unique ways!

Even though Ling Shaoze was fully aware that the appearance of characters in the game could be adjusted up to 50% based on real-life appearance data —either to make oneself look better or worse — most people would naturally choose to beautify themselves. So, just because a game character was handsome didn’t mean the real person was too. However, Ling Shaoze still thought they were very, very attractive! He almost wished he could start a sweet online romance with any one of them right then and there!

After all, he wasn’t actually craving their real-world bodies — as long as the in-game character was handsome, it was good enough. Even if they were hideously ugly in real life—it had nothing to do with him.

Besides, someone truly hideous in real life wouldn’t be able to adjust their in-game face into an absolute heartthrob either.

Ling Shaoze was originally very excited about becoming a Warrior, dreaming of wielding a forty-meter-long Dragon-Slaying Sword to kill the enemy. But after watching the battle videos of top masters from various professions, he said to Pang Wenguang, “Guangguang, I’ve decided — I want to be a Priest!”

Pang Wenguang was also deeply fascinated by the mastery of top players of every profession. But being a straight guy, his favorite was still the No.1 in Priest profession “Qing Ruo” — a goddess-like figure who was pure, holy, gentle, and lovely, who absolutely hit all the marks for a straight man’s aesthetic!

Hearing that Ling Shaoze actually wanted to be a Priest, Pang Wenguang was shocked and said, “You don’t have to go that far just to get closer to the goddess Qing Ruo. Beautiful women all like top-tier combat experts… Wait, aren’t you GAY?”

Ling Shaoze grinned and said, “You get it — top battle-class experts all want to find a pretty and skilled healer to pair up with, right?”

Pang Wenguang understood — Ling Shaoze must have set his sights on some battle-class expert and wanted to become their personal healer.

Pang Wenguang guessed, “Did you fall for the top-ranked Warrior, God Zhan Feng? Honestly, his skills are insane — the way he wields his blade is just divine! He’s my idol, too!”

As a melee enthusiast himself, Pang Wenguang admired Zhan Feng the most.

Ling Shaoze simply smiled and said nothing.

Pang Wenguang continued guessing, “Then is it the top-ranked Swordsman, Yi Jian Feng Hou^[1]“One Slash, One Kill”? His swordsmanship is amazing — I saw posts saying he’s had professional training and probably train in real life.”

Yi Jian Feng Hou was the most popular among the eight top-ranked players across all classes. Not only was he handsome, but his stylish swordplay made him a total magnet for fans, making Swordsman the most popular class among the male players.

Ling Shaoze said, “Brother Yi Jian Feng Hou is indeed very handsome…”

Pang Wenguang replied, “Then you’ve got a lot of love rivals. Plus, that guy’s a cold loner—doesn’t interact with anyone. Actually, come to think of it, except for Goddess Qing Ruo, the other seven top players are all lone wolves. Their friend lists only include a few other leaderboard bigshots.”

Although Ling Shaoze was genuinely very good-looking—easily comparable to the hottest young male celebrities in the entertainment industry, perhaps even more refined—and carried the proud, pampered air of a wealthy young master, the game was full of handsome guys and beautiful girls. No one could tell whether a face was real or artificially tuned by the system , so what everyone truly admired was strength. Top-tier players weren’t people you could casually approach.

Ling Shaoze then boldly declared his grand ambition: “To be honest, all seven male top gods are my type. I can cast a wide net — who knows, I might just catch one or two!”

Pang Wenguang: …?!

After a long silence, Pang Wenguang could only pat Ling Shaoze on the shoulder and say, “Aze, it’s good to have ambitions.”

But the look in his eyes said something else entirely—Dream on, kid. You want to devour all seven of the top gods? Seriously?! There’s no saving you.

Amid Ling Shaoze and Pang Wenguang’s anticipation, the official open beta launch day of Eternal Legend Online finally arrived.

Ten minutes ahead of the launch time, Ling Shaoze climbed into his game pod — a transparent-shelled eggshell shaped pod — lay down, closed his eyes, and let the neural patches attach themselves to his head and the joints of his limbs…

Suddenly, a highly futuristic, vividly realistic virtual space appeared before his eyes —the game’s login interface.

Ling Shaoze watched the holographic promotional video for a while. Before long, the video ended and the screen returned to the initial space, where a small system sprite popped up:
“Dear player, hello! You can now create your character…”

First appeared a box for entering a game ID. Ling Shaoze manually typed in the in-game name he had often used in his previous life:
“Domineering Lingling“.

Because of his sickly body in his past life, Ling Shaoze had always longed for a powerful, domineering physique and appearance. Even though he could never achieve it in reality, at least he could be “domineering” through his in-game name.

The system sprite continued to ask:
“Please choose your profession.”

Ling Shaoze looked at the holograms of the eight available classes and said without hesitation:
“Priest.”

There weren’t any hidden classes in this game, but if a player’s body scan data was particularly outstanding, they would receive slight advantages in initial stats. Truly exceptional players might even earn a special title.

For example, those with strong mental power would receive bonus points in Intelligence, which gives an advantage to ranged or support classes like Mage, Summoner, Bard, and Priest. Those with higher physical Constitution would get bonus points in Stamina, which benefits combat-based classes.

Of course, these differences weren’t huge and could be overcome by spending money (pay-to-win). And if you couldn’t afford to pay, you could always grind.

The original body had an A in Mental Power—above average—and a B in physical constitution, which was average. Now that Ling Shaoze had taken over, his Mental Power had risen to S. That wasn’t too surprising; he was only twenty and still had room for growth.

After scanning, Ling Shaoze’s initial in-game stats were:
Intelligence: 8, Constitution: 5, Agility: 5, Charm: 10 (visible only to himself).

The max starting stat for each attribute was 10. The first three—Intelligence, Constitution, and Agility—could be increased by leveling up. Charm, however, would not increase with levels.

Ling Shaoze recalled that the Charm stat was based on one’s real-life appearance—the better-looking you were, the higher the score…

He was a little pleased. Did that mean his looks were maxed out?

When a stat hit the max value, it placed you in the “exceptional” category and granted a special title.

Sure enough, on his stats panel, a hidden title appeared next to his game ID—visible only to him:
“Beauty That Brings Calamity.” (lit. Hongyan Huoshui – a term historically referring to a beautiful woman who brings disaster aka “Red-faced Calamity”)

Ling Shaoze: …?!

What the hell? He was a man, okay? Even if his face didn’t qualify for badass titles like “Overwhelming Aura,” “Handsome God,” or “Sexy David”—all special titles other players had shown off on the forums—it should at least be something like “Blue-faced Calamity,” not “Red-faced!”

Special titles weren’t just for show; they came with unique skills. However, these weren’t particularly overpowered or usable all the time, but still quite handy.

Ling Shaoze tapped onto the “Beauty That Brings Calamity” title to check its special skill:
In-game, you can switch your gender to female. After switching, you can set a second game ID. The gender-switch lasts from 1 to 24 hours, usable once per day. The second ID is restricted only to the Mage class.

Ling Shaoze couldn’t help but rage again—
What the hell kind of skill is this?!

He wasn’t into cross-dressing. He absolutely did not need a one-click gender-swap feature, okay?!

Still, just because he had a special skill didn’t mean he had to use it. He could just leave it untouched.

But being able to switch to a female character also meant switching to the Mage class—essentially giving him a second class. That was actually pretty incredible. If he ever ran into a situation where his healer role couldn’t handle a fight, he could instantly switch to a long-range Mage with both strong single-target and AoE attacks. That would be super satisfying.

It wasn’t like he was actually changing gender in real life—just wearing a female avatar in a game where you couldn’t do anything explicit anyway. Once he accepted the concept, it even felt kind of exciting!

Besides, out of the seven top-ranked players he planned to flirt with, it was highly unlikely that all of them were gay. With both male and female avatars at his disposal, his chances of successfully seducing one—or maybe more— of them just got a lot better.

Besides, as a gay man—and a pure 0 at that —he had no intention of using a simulated womb to have a child via donated eggs from another woman, nor did he plan to undergo any kind of body-modification surgery to give birth himself. So, realistically, having children just wasn’t in the cards for him.

Playing a female character in-game? He could just treat it as a way to experience the joy of “raising a daughter” in a virtual world!

And so, although Ling Shaoze had been extremely resistant at first, once he considered all the perks of having a female avatar—and thought of her as his own daughter—he actually started to feel a bit excited.
“My daughter is definitely going to be super pretty!”

With that thought in mind, Ling Shaoze eagerly dove into the game.

What he didn’t know was that someone was already waiting for him in the game. The moment Ling Shaoze logged in, a man immediately tracked his in-game location and rushed over, ready to “accidentally” bump into him under a brand new in-game identity.

He Yi thought to himself, Fortunately I made seven alternate accounts while researching all the different classes. If my ‘Yijian Fenghou’ persona doesn’t fit the boy’s aesthetic tastes, I’ll just switch to another one!

Seven avatars—surely one of them will hit the mark, right?

---

T/n: Well I guess everybody now knows where the name “I have seven gongs in the holographic game” came from lol 😆. Now we know the source of chaos so Expect it very, very much coz things are gonna get interesting lol🤣. Stay tuned for more 🥰😆. You can support the original author here. If you’re enjoying what I’m doing, you can buy me a Ko-fi. Happy Reading ❤️🥳.