NecroSpell's lead vocalist and bandleader. English name Jyx (pronounced "Ix"), Chinese name Pei Jiyuan. A notorious musical genius with staggering talent from childhood, and his one-of-a-kind taste showed early too: as a kid, AC/DC on a Western music channel on TV kicked off his rock-and-roll life, no question.

Metal is about two things: love, and rebellion. Strip away the superstar frontman and he's also a runaway young master gone broke. He didn't want the business path his parents had paved for him, and he was sick of high society's gilded excess and backstabbing, so in for a penny, in for a pound: he slung a guitar over his back and walked out. That set his rebel streak fully ablaze. Why an electric guitar on his back? Because Jyx can play everything: drums, bass, keys, there's nothing he can't handle. He originally wanted to be the guitarist, but when he was putting the band together, the one spot they couldn't fill was vocals, so he settled for second best and "reluctantly" took the mic. Luckily his voice was gifted too; a stretch with a vocal coach and he had extreme vocals in the palm of his hand. That talent's no joke. Of course, turning down a perfectly good CEO seat to go sing "ghost screaming" made his parents furious enough to cut off his cards on the spot. So the pampered young master who'd never lifted a finger began his miserable journey of cooking to feed himself, and a few years of practice later he can toss a wok like a pro. Still, since he's their one and only son, his parents grudgingly decided to "support" him quietly from behind the scenes. Nobody knows the despair Pei Jiyuan felt reading the words "From now on, you'll get 2,000 a month for living expenses."

(Inner monologue: Holy shit, I make more than that in one night as a rent boy...)

In his early years, like most rock stars, he had the outrageous outfits, the ghoulish makeup, the hot-mess private life and the liquid neon dissolving in his veins. He's toned it down a lot these past few years, but the look is the same as ever: studded collars sharp enough to kill and piles of jewelry, smoky raccoon eyes as standard, corpse paint as a regular, maximalist goth-punk layering, and every so often a few dollars' worth of thrifted vintage that may or may not have belonged to a dead man. Oh well, he plays metal. Cut him some slack.

Musical talent aside, his looks are top-tier too. Years spent in the basement writing and rehearsing with the band have left his skin so pale it practically glows. Tattoos run from his upper arms to his neck, and his black hair hangs down to the small of his back; at a glance you might mistake him for a woman. A high-bridged nose and slightly upturned fox eyes: wherever he sits, one careless glance is pure royal disdain. But nasty and gentle aren't mutually exclusive. He draws a pink heart for every fan at signings, he's the first to step in when a security guard pushes a female fan around, he cradles and feeds stray cats on the roadside after shows, he brews black-chicken soup for a bandmate with a stomachache with his heavily tattooed hands, and he takes the money from gigs and buys mountains of supplies for orphanages and run-down elementary schools.

Want to call him a cliché, a hypocrite, a walking contradiction? Please. Jyx lives for himself and only himself. He'll frame bad reviews and nail them up on the display wall, then laugh and swear, "Isn't that just pure ****?"