My Skills Can Evolve Infinitely in a Game-Like World

Chapter 18: Mysterious NPC Aurelius

A barrage of posts instantly flooded the forum.

The first post beneath the announcement attracted Aurelius’ attention.

There, the trailer was attached as a file, while thousands of comments filled the entire comment section.

So far, Aurelius had mostly focused on the posts themselves.

Yet, having just watched the trailer—and having seen himself in it—he now decided to take a deeper look at the comments.

He was curious, wanting to see what the players had to say about the trailer.

Yet the most liked comment at the very top immediately rendered him speechless.

"Livia, my love. Please step on me."

"Likes: 97,803."

Watching the like counter soar at an incredible rate and surpass one hundred thousand in mere seconds, Aurelius nearly cursed.

He understood that he might have overestimated the average gamer of the Nova Roma Game.

Or rather, he had underestimated how depraved the average gamer was.

Lowering his gaze only to find that the following comments were also the same, with people fighting intensely over whether Livia or Cassidra was the better "waifu", Aurelius had to suppress his urge to close the forum.

It was only several comments later that a person discussing the actual trailer finally appeared.

It was a familiar name: TheoryMaster69—the person who had once analyzed the Alchemist Sub-Class and claimed it was a cheat.

As soon as he saw this name, Aurelius’ eyes lit up.

He was most interested in seeing this person’s analysis.

Sure enough, as he went through his post, he had to admit that the other party had chosen an apt name.

"Fellow gamers, although I’ve only watched the trailer once, my brief observation has given me a certain understanding about what we just saw."

"I suspect that the Game has several unique parallel plot lines, depending on where players spawn."

"For now, these plot lines seem to be related to the four people we just saw."

"Think about it. An ambitious and manipulative princess, a knight with a mysterious master, and even a carefree pirate. All of these identities are what we could identify as ’protagonists’."

"As for the man who appeared near the end..."

"In my opinion, he is highly likely to be the main NPC for Version 1.0. If you wish to get an advantage in the early stage, I advise you to choose the Dawn Kingdom as your spawn point."

The comment was relatively long but was also quite insightful. At least, Aurelius agreed with most of his conclusions.

Although he knew this was a real world rather than a game, in the eyes of the Players, these people certainly looked like the sort of NPCs players would consider protagonists.

With faint curiosity, Aurelius wanted to see the reception this comment had. The result was... shocking, to say the least.

"I knew that my wife is the protagonist!"

"Bah! How can a princess be a protagonist? In my opinion, she’s likely to be a villain. Only my love, Cassidra, deserves such a title."

The fight over the two female protagonists raged on even here.

Moreover, Aurelius soon realized that the discussion was no longer limited to those two.

"My husband, Aurelius, is so handsome! Did you see how he knocked that woman unconscious and took her away?"

"Indeed! But, but... I could sense the love behind his ruthless strikes."

Perhaps because most female players were already accustomed to the knight archetype of Sauron, Aurelius happened to receive most of their love.

At first, Aurelius couldn’t help but smile, feeling that an outstanding person like himself would attract attention wherever he went.

However, as he went down the comments and saw the conversation slowly grow out of control, his expression darkened.

Seeing that thousands of female gamers were having fantasies about him, with some begging for him to kidnap them and do unthinkable things, he shuddered.

’There is a saying that women can be even hornier than men.’

’Now, it seems that this is not necessarily an incorrect assumption.’

He softly exhaled.

Hypnotizing himself to forget the graphic words used in the previous comments, he continued scrolling down the post.

Unfortunately, nothing of value could be seen.

People were fighting over their favorite "protagonists", others were talking about the awesome, extremely realistic graphics, while some noted down several key events they believed to be vital for the future.

As he reached the bottom, Aurelius was about to close the forum and finally go to sleep.

But just then, he caught a glimpse of another name he recognized.

"World_Builder".

Unlike his competitor’s comment, this one had been heavily downvoted as usual, getting hundreds of thousands of downvotes.

"In my opinion, the most important point revealed in this trailer is in the final NPC: Aurelius. All of you have seen that this NPC’s story lasted for more than half of the entire trailer."

"User TheoryMaster69 claimed that this is because his plot line should start first. However, I have a different view."

"I believe that this NPC is special..."

"Perhaps, he is not the protagonist of a single version, but will last for the entirety of the game, growing stronger alongside the players. His mysterious abilities, the woman who appeared at the beginning of his scene, and his unknown identity all point to this fact."

"What I’m trying to say is... when entering the game, you must all choose female as your gender! Only then can you work hard to seduce this mysterious NPC!"

"Fellow gamers, we should all work together to take off!"

"Edit: Come on, why is everyone downvoting me?"

"Edit 2: Stop downvoting me! Like! Like!"

"..."

Compared to TheoryMaster, World_Builder’s analysis did not lag behind in the slightest.

Had he not known the truth about the so-called Nova Roma Game, Aurelius might have really believed their words and regarded himself as the so-called growing NPC.

Unfortunately, he knew the truth very well.

While glancing at the dozen Edits begging for likes and cursing at his "haters", Aurelius snickered.

Without any hesitation, he also pressed the downvote button, watching as the downvotes poured in and reached the two hundred thousand mark.

’It serves you right! You want to have a bunch of ugly men try to seduce me? Ptui~’ he spat out.

Reveling in this despicable guy’s misfortune, Aurelius closed the forum and lay back on his bed.

It didn’t take long.

Soon, the exhaustion of everything that had happened earlier took over.

His eyelids slowly closed, and he drifted into sleep.

What Aurelius didn’t know, however, was that a notification appeared not long after he closed his eyes.

"You’ve gained the Title: ..."