I DO NOT OWN RIGHTS TO THIS NOVEL

THIS IS NOT MY WORK AND NO PLAGIARISM WAS INTENDED

CREDIT GOES TO THE RIGHTFUL OWNER/AUTHOR

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For a certain LoL¹ competition, a certain online streamer famous for pissing people off was currently explaining and broadcasting it at the same time.

Streamer: This support, so tr*sh.

Streamer: If that jungler was my teammate, I would already be idling at the fountain and playing piano for him by now.

Streamer: I recommend that this player go back and properly practice how to last hit.

Audience: What bullshit! If you’re any better, then you do it!

Streamer: I, your Daddy, really can do it.

Audience: Okokok. If you can do it then I’ll chop off my head so you can kick it.

A few months later, the LPL’s veteran pro team TTC announced a new mid laner. A boy with flashy blue hair appeared in front of the audience and played Zed to utter perfection, killing everyone he saw, causing all the female fans to begin toeing the line of infidelity.

During the MVP interview after the match, everyone held their breath and eagerly watched this newcomer.

Only to see the boy accept the microphone, smile and ask, “That water friend² with the StarTV user ID ‘Suburb King 101,’ my team’s address is on the official website, when will you be mailing your head over?”

…

After a certain regular season match finished, the staff member went backstage to urge the team members to go onstage and conduct their interviews, only to see TTC’s new mid laner and jungler standing in the corner.

TTC’s number one ace • jungler daddy Road pressed their team’s new mid laner Soft against the wall. He lowered his eyes and asked slowly, “In the interview later, do you know what to do?”

That quick-tempered mid laner, who had solidified his image as a troll³ in the audience’s eyes the very first time he went on stage, was currently blushing completely red. “I know. I won’t curse at anyone… I definitely won’t curse at anyone.”

Lu Boyuan⁴ (gong) x Jian Rong⁵(shou)

Author: Jiang Zi Bei

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Hi ! This is my fourth novel. If you are not the original author/owner of this this novel , just stay happy and read. And please, please, please don't report (╥﹏╥) . I will be very sad.

I will be updating 5 chapters a day.

And again please don't report .

If you do this story will be deleted and my efforts will be wasted.

If you have an opinion about this story, feel free to comment ^-^

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1.LPL: League of Legends Pro League, the top pro league for LoL in China. 

2.水友: literally water friend, but used to refer to netizens commenting under the same post or the audience/fans of an online streamer (don’t really know an English equivalent, so I’ll leave it as water friends most of the time) 

3.喷子: basically an internet troll or a hater 

4.路/Road: The Lu in Lu Boyuan literally means road in Chinese, hence his LoL username. 

5.茸/Rong: The Rong in Jian Rong’s name can mean soft and fluffy (especially of hair, which is fitting because Jian Rong’s hair is soft and fluffy, and so is Jian Rong deep inside). This could be why his LoL username is Soft, but it’s unclear. 

Chapter 1: TTC ' Road

November 2nd, five o’clock in the afternoon, there was a fine drizzle in Shanghai.

The area outside Shanghai’s Oriental Sports Center was filled with people holding banners and LED signs printed with e-sport teams’ logos. They were currently lining up in an orderly fashion to enter the arena, and every person’s face was filled with excitement and anticipation. The rain didn’t seem to affect them at all.

Today, the semifinals for LoL’s S10 World Championship Series were being held here. The two teams participating in the competition were the HT team from South Korea’s LCK division and the TTC team from China’s LPL division.

The team who emerged victorious here would receive the opportunity to participate in the World Championship finals next week.

Since TTC had the home ground advantage, just from a cursory glance around, one could see that nearly all the merch the fans were holding were printed with TTC’s crown logo.

A bus pulled to a stop at the right side of the stadium, and a white crown logo was printed on the body of the gleaming black bus.

Seeing that, security quickly stood up to do their jobs, blocking all the media and fans who wanted to rush up and crowd around the bus door.

The door of the bus opened slowly, and TTC’s members disembarked one by one, smiling as they waved or nodded amidst the fans’ screams.

When the last member got off the bus, the surrounding screams clearly grew even louder, and the fans waved their LED signs even more energetically.

With many people, it was hard to prevent an accident from occurring. A sign with TTC written on it suddenly fell to the ground, followed closely by a girl’s shriek and the sound of security yelling at her to stop.

The girl said anxiously, “Sorry, sorry… someone pushed me just now, I’m really sorry. Can you help me pick up the LED sign? Please.”

The security guard said, “I’ll help you pick it up in a bit, back up a little…”

Right after the security guard said that, someone bent down and picked up the sign before handing it over.

The man who picked it up was wearing a black and white uniform. His hair was a little casually messy, and if you looked closely, you could see that there was an impression left behind at the corner of his slender and narrow eye from sleeping while leaning against something. Below that was a tall and straight nose and thin lips that were slightly pursed.

The girl looked at him for a few seconds, dazed, before she looked down at the LED sign he was handing over.

His fingers were long and slim, and there was an inconspicuous mole between his thumb and index finger.

The girl blankly accepted the sign. “Thank you…”

The man gave a tiny nod before he turned around and walked into the competition arena.

The girl only absent-mindedly collected her thoughts after the image of the man’s back had completely disappeared.

She tightly hugged her sign before suddenly spinning around and grabbing the clothing of her friend next to her. She screamed excitedly, “That was Road! God Lu! God Lu nodded at me!! And he even touched my sign, ahhh—”

Backstage in the break room, everyone in TTC evidently looked much more relaxed.

TTC’s support, Xiao Bai, sat down in a chair and took out a mirror to examine the hairstyle that he had messed with for a long time before leaving. “That girl’s voice just then was way too powerful. The reason China’s soccer team didn’t win championships is definitely because they were lacking her support.”

The team’s manager and coach smacked his head firmly with his notebook. “Don’t speak nonsense.”

The coach then turned to look at Lu Boyuan, or Road, who had just sat down. Lu Boyuan held his phone in his left hand and was scrolling down the screen. His right hand was propped against the armrest of the chair, and he was currently lightly curling and uncurling his fingers.

Half an hour before the competition began, the coach started to give everyone pre-match guidance.

At the very end, the coach glanced at the team’s mid laner and abruptly called him out. “Kan, you remember everything I told you before, right?”

The person who was called out took half a second to respond. “Ah… oh, of course I remember. I won’t make the same mistake as before.”

Lu Boyuan swept a glance at Kan. After the coach finished saying everything, Lu Boyuan stood up and said, “Going to the bathroom.”

As the water rushed over his hands, it brought a bone-chilling coldness with it.

——“Can you do it?”

Hearing that voice, Lu Boyuan lifted his head and looked through the mirror at the coach standing behind him.

Hearing that voice, Lu Boyuan lifted his head and looked through the mirror at the coach standing behind him.

A few seconds later, Lu Boyuan turned off the tap and drew out some paper towels to dry his hands. Calmly, he met the coach’s gaze. “As long as I’m allowed to go up, I can win.”

—

StarTV’s LoL livestream channels. Currently, the official broadcast room already reached over 800 million popularity points, solidly occupying first place among the other LoL channels. Following behind were the channels of previous professional players who began streaming after retiring.

As far as one could see, all the streaming room names were worded with titles like “S10 Semifinals,” “Passionate Commentary,” “TTC Must Win.”

On the first page of rankings, the room name at the very bottom of the list became a breath of fresh air.

[taking a lazy day. —Soft]. The livestream room had 130 million popularity points.

Jian Rong came back carrying takeout. When he saw that the host was still chatting away in the livestream, he unwrapped the takeout packaging.

Since it was raining outside, the takeout was almost half an hour late, and he was absolutely starving.

[No way no way, you’re making us sit here and watch you eat takeout?]

[Inactive livestream, reported.]

[Whatcha eating?]

“Zhajiangmian.” Jian Rong just woke up not too long ago, so he spoke lazily. “If I’m not full, how will I have the strength to explain things for you guys?”

[Okok, eat some more, I’m afraid you won’t have the energy to flame people later.]

[Left the LoL pit for many years, I want to ask who is this streamer? Why so popular? Is he also a retired player? So handsome?]

[This is a LoL streamer famous for pissing people off.]

[Dirty mouth streamer.]

[Noob streamer.]

“Room mod, please block the one who called me a noob… never mind, I’ll block them myself.” Jian Rong put down his chopsticks and arranged a speaking ban package for the person who called him a noob.

After chatting casually with the audience for a while, the two teams finally went on stage to prepare for the match.

Jian Rong sat cross-legged on the gaming chair, holding the bottom of the takeout container with one hand. His chewing slowed down a bit as his gaze unconsciously floated over towards the person sitting second from the left.

TTC’s jungler Road had already taken a seat and was currently adjusting his equipment. It seemed like he had just washed his face, as the tips of his bangs were a bit wet.

The broadcast started to give each player a close-up shot. When it was Road’s turn, the camera clearly lingered a bit longer on him than the others, and the commentator immediately changed the subject to Road.

Commentator A gave an introduction. “Next up, the camera is focused on TTC’s, and I could even say our LPL’s, ace jungler, TTC's Road! God Lu is as handsome as ever today.”

Commentator B, “That’s right, and what’s more, he doesn’t look nervous at all.”

“As expected of TTC’s stabilizing rock. Wherever he sits, I feel especially at ease.”

Commentator C laughed, and as the camera’s focus changed, he said, “However, the mid laner Kan seems to be quite tense today.”

Commentator B, “A little bit. Reasonably speaking, he shouldn’t be though. He’s already fought in the World Championship four times now. I hope that Kan adjusts quickly and does his best to relax before the game starts.”

Jian Rong glanced over the barrage and swallowed his noodles before answering, “Who do I think will win? Dunno, depends on the condition of the teams. If TTC wins, will I send red envelopes? It’s not like I’m TTC’s brand ambassador, why would I send out red envelopes if they win? … is Kan stronger or am I stronger? I am.”

His long-time fans instantly sent out a cascade of “666¹.” They had long since grown accustomed to Soft’s style.

Soft entered the livestreaming platform two years ago, and he had exploded in popularity just a few months after joining. There were many reasons for it, but if one had to pick the most important ones, it would be: one, he was strong and his stream quality was high, and two, his personality was arrogant and he dared to say almost anything.

But there were also a few new audience members who still didn’t like it.

[You can only run your mouth in a livestream anyway.]

[You think that you’re all that just because you solo killed Kan a few times? Kan is a farming-team-fight type player, not like you, the kind of idiot who plays Child Zed and Scammer Sou².]

“I don’t know what a ‘farming-team-fight type player’ is. All I know is that the winner is the one who can kill the other person and send them back home.” Jian Rong said, “Who made that compilation of me solo killing Kan while playing ranked last time? Share a copy with this fan.”

[…is this streamer really this conceited? A Kan anti?]

[Nope, don’t misunderstand, he’s like this towards everyone, not just your Kan. But Kan really has been pretty trash this season.]

[For the time being, I really can’t think of a famous player that hasn’t been roasted by Soft before.]

[There is one! He’s never roasted Road before!]

“Enough, the match is starting.” Jian Rong interrupted the barrage’s rhythm and adjusted the location of his streaming interface on the screen. “Is this video window covering up the competition interface? I’ll close it for a while.”

[Close it my ***! This old lady came just to see your face! If you close it I might as well go watch the official broadcast!]

[Don’t close it, I’m depending on that blue-colored thing on your head to keep me awake.]

When Jian Rong just started streaming, he had once been placed by the livestream administrator into the “Beauty category” because he was too good-looking.

His skin was fair, his eyelashes were thick and long, his eyes were even brighter than a girl’s, and there was a tiny mole to the right of his nose. As long as you muted him and went to look at the person in the video, you would discover that he was at most seventeen or eighteen years old.

But the main reason Jian Rong got placed into the “Beauty category” was because he had dyed all of his hair blue.

The aqua blue color contrasting against his skin made him seem even paler, and it felt like he could spin around and debut as soon as you placed a mic over his ears.

However, Jian Rong didn’t stay in the Beauty category for very long, precisely because a complaint had been filed against him after he insulted the audience. After being complained to several dozen times in a row, the administrator obediently put him back in the LoL category.

All in all, the mental endurance ability of the little brothers and sisters in the Beauty category was still too weak.

Jian Rong’s statement just then obviously wasn’t actually seeking the audience’s opinions. After he finished talking, he swiftly closed the video.

With the video on, he didn’t even feel comfortable eating.

He ignored the barrage’s protests and completely got rid of the video interface before he concentrated on watching the match.

The competition used a BO5 format, five games and three victories. Not only did it test the players’ strength, it even more so tested their mental fortitude and endurance. But none of the people sitting on stage were new to the professional scene; every person was in a very stable condition.

In the first game, TTC targeted the enemy’s top lane and uccessfully counterganked³ the enemy jungler twice, easily seizing the win in just thirty-five minutes.

In the second game, TTC’s bot lane created a huge advantage from the start and was the first to break through to the enemy base from the bot lane. But because Kan died twice in a row from sneak-attacks, he gave the other team an opportunity, and unfortunately TTC lost the game after forty-five minutes.

The score was 1:1.

The barrage flew by furiously. Everyone was roasting Kan for being trash, and there were also a few people who asked Jian Rong why he wasn’t insulting Kan anymore.

“Got tired of insulting.” Jian Rong looked at the stats from the previous game and said, “8,300 damage… in forty-five minutes, he only did 8,300 damage. If I put a Rift Scuttler in the mid lane, the Rift Scuttler would do even more damage than him.”

[All you ever know how to do is bbbbb⁴ in the livestream room, if you’re that great then you do it!]

“If you’re that great then you do it” – Jian Rong could see that phrase in the barrage thousands of times in one day.

He was too lazy to respond, and he leaned back in the gaming chair to pay attention to the third game.

If one were to say that Kan was still being reasonably trash in the first two games, then in this game, after Kan flashed mistakenly and became first blood for no good reason in the first five minutes, he was truly abnormally trash.

But luckily Road pulled through as always. In the mid-late game, he used Camille’s ganking advantage to kill the other side quite a few times in a row with TTC’s top laner, managing to secure the win with much difficulty.

The fourth game was even longer.

Kan finally behaved properly for once in the early game, and nothing happened in the laning phase. But during the team fight phase in the mid-late game, he actually ended up sacrificing his teammates and fleeing with half health twice.

Perhaps some players who weren’t skilled enough might feel that Kan running away twice was excusable, but Jian Rong knew very well that if Kan had done enough follow-up damage during those two team fights, he could have completely taken down two or even three people from the other team.

Never mind a professional player, if a Platinum-rank player fought in such a team fight, not even they could possibly choose to betray their teammates and run away.

After fifty-two minutes, TTC lost the fourth game, and the score was 2:2. It was the match point for both sides.

The moment the fourth game ended, Road stood up and walked backstage without looking back once; he didn’t spare a single glance at Kan, who was sitting beside him.

[Why isn’t the streamer saying anything anymore?]

[My empathy is too strong, I already helped Road beat up that piece of crap Kan.]

[The streamer actually hasn’t insulted Kan for two entire games now!]

Jian Rong was quiet for a short while, all the way until the camera focused on Kan. 

Kan was a big, tall, and slightly pudgy fellow, and he had a clean appearance, one that seemed very easy-going. At that moment, his head was lowered, and he wore an extremely remorseful expression. 

“You guys, take a guess at what he’s currently thinking?” Jian Rong suddenly spoke.

[Must be sad, after all he’s getting old, he’s already 24 this year. Both his APM⁵ and mind can’t compare with a younger person’s anymore…]

[Kan wasn’t all that great even when he was young, OK? The most useless one in the team is him.]

[Hater, watch your words, Kan has also helped the team win quite a few times before.]

The barrage fought noisily, before finally Jian Rong interrupted it with a single sentence. “My guess is that he’s thinking… ‘I acted so well during the last two games, I’m going to have to make the gambling banker give me some more money later.’”

After he said that, the antis and fans alike were shocked, and the barrage was instantly full of question marks.

The meaning behind Jian Rong’s words were very clear: he was secretly mocking Kan for putting on a show and cooperating with gambling bankers.

Naturally, after the LoL competitive scene grew to its current scale, it was impossible to avoid its fate of being used as gambling fodder. Many teams had been suspected of “matchfixing” before, but that was all just the audience’s private roasting. No one would say it publicly.

As soon as Jian Rong said that, his screen was basically filled with comments attacking him.

[Usually, when you badmouth a player it can be taken as a joke, but now that you’re slandering someone’s reputation, that’s a little much.]

[I fucking called and reported you, this streamer is so disgusting]

[Saying this kind of thing without any evidence at all, okay…]

Jian Rong couldn’t be bothered to argue with the barrage. Watching the last four games made his head hurt, so he decided he might as well get up and grab a can of iced coffee from the fridge.

By the time he was back, the starting roster for both teams had been announced for the fifth game.

There were two substitutes for TTC. One was the substitute mid laner, swapping out Kan, who was in a “poor condition.”

The other was the substitute jungler, swapping out the team’s backbone, Road.

........

1.666: Chinese slang for great/awesome/amazing

2.Chils Zed and Scammer Suo: Derogatory term to refer to the champions Zed and Yasuo

3.Counterganking: ganking is essentially a surprise attack on an enemy champion, usually in coordination with the jungler to outnumber/overpower the enemy. Counterganking is when you try to gank and the other team ends up ganking you.

4.bbbbb as in spew BS/flame others.

5.APM: actions per minute; measurement for hand speed.

Chapter 2: Not arguing with a troll over what’s right and wrong.

As he watched two unfamiliar-looking players come on stage wearing TTC’s team uniform, Jian Rong momentarily forgot to drink the canned coffee that he had just opened. Question marks swept wildly across the barrage to the point that Jian Rong’s computer even lagged for a few seconds.

Never mind the audience, even the two TTC substitute players who just took the stage—especially the one replacing Road—seemed to look a little perplexed.

All three commentators wore awkward and puzzled smiles as they exchanged looks with each other.

“TTC… must have some tactic in mind, right?” Commentator A stiffly tossed out a new topic.

After receiving his colleague’s signal, another person quickly nodded. “They definitely must have practiced some new ultimate maneuver. But if I’m not remembering incorrectly, this should be the first time TTC’s substitute jungler has ever gone on stage?”

“That’s right. This jungler is also very powerful, and he’s a player excellent at engaging in team fights.”

The game hadn’t officially started yet, and Jian Rong didn’t want to listen to the commentators’ cringey conversation, so he muted the official broadcast. He asked, “When did TTC get a substitute jungler?”

Actually, this already wasn’t the first time TTC’s substitute jungler had been brought up as a subject of conversation.

As early as the competition enrollment period, fans had discovered that there was an unfamiliar face at the very bottom of TTC’s roster. Rumor had it that he was a jungler who came straight from the youth training team. Because of that incident, TTC’s official Weibo had been blown up by the fans before—to be more exact, it had been blown up by Road’s fans before.

After all, TTC possessed the ace jungler Road. Ever since Road joined the team, TTC’s substitute roster had never once arranged for a jungler.

[This sub seems to have been here since the summer season.]

[If the mid sub had gone up last match, maybe TTC would have had a higher chance of winning.]

[This substitute jungler is finally here, after sitting on the bench for an entire season. If he didn’t show up soon I was gonna assume that TTC just grabbed him to make up for team numbers.]

[Just what kind of ultimate maneuver does TTC have, curious.]

Jian Rong lifted an eyebrow and didn’t say anything.

Even if TTC really did have some mysterious trick up their sleeve, there was still no reason for them not to use Road and instead make a substitute who had never gone on stage before cooperate with the team.

His phone rang briefly, and Jian Rong unmuted the official broadcast before he openly picked up his phone and slacked off.

[Shiliu¹: Big bro, how the hell do you have the guts to say whatever you want?]

Shiliu was one of Jian Rong’s few close friends, and he was also a male streamer on StarTV. He played LoL before, but now he had changed lanes and was messing around in the PUBG channel.

[R-ong²: What about it?]

[Shiliu: You actually implied that Kan is matchfixing in front of millions of people?? Are you not afraid of his fans going after you?]

[R-ong: I’m not even afraid of the man himself, why would I be scared of his fans?]

Shiliu originally wanted to reply with a “you’re so awesome,” but then he remembered that his friend seemed to have always been this awesome.

[Shiliu: You should just restrain yourself a little bit, I really am afraid that one day these LPL players are gonna band together and hire a contract killer to go after you.]

[R-ong: I didn’t roast Kan, I was praising him just then.]

[Shiliu: …… wdym?]

[R-ong: Before, though he was still trash, at least he was at Diamond-rank level. But his plays today, there’s no way to pull those off unless he had a blood clot in his brain for ten years. If I say he’s matchfixing, aren’t I just secretly praising him by saying he should be much stronger than the way he was performing?]

“…” Shiliu put away his phone with a wooden expression. Forget it, he wasn’t going to argue with a troll over what was right and wrong.

Jian Rong’s thought process was correct. TTC hadn’t prepared any “ultimate maneuvers,” at least not for this match.

Five minutes in, TTC’s jungler was solo killed while strolling in the jungle.

Twelve minutes in, TTC’s jungler went to the mid lane to gank, but ended up being counterganked, and the enemy got a double kill.

With the pillar of the team and two starting players off the stage, the other three starters were also clearly unsettled. Adding on the fact that they couldn’t cooperate very well as a team, when the first big team fight erupted at twenty minutes, TTC’s entire team wiped.

Jian Rong glanced at the gap in economy between the two teams and knew that there was no way TTC would be able to make a comeback this game, so he didn’t feel like wasting his breath explaining anymore. He opened the barrage helper in the livestream room, wanting to have some “friendly interactions” with the water friends³.

[TTC is so fucking trash.]

[Why isn’t the streamer flaming anyone?]

[I finally know why this jungler sub never played a single time last season. Is TTC crazy, putting him on stage at semifinals to disgust people? Road played so well during the last few games, why switch out?]

[Forget it, Road is also a noob, all TTC players are noobs. How well has Road even played these past few years, he should just hurry up and retire.]

Jian Rong moved his finger and blocked the last person who was cursing. The person swiftly opened a side account and rolled back in, stronger than ever.

[I just flame a tiny bit and you block and kick me? Aren’t you also badmouthing players all the time, why don’t you block yourself?]

“If you put me in a bad mood, I’ll block you. If you don’t like that, then hold it in.” Jian Rong was too lazy to explain more. There was no logic needed for confrontations between haters; all one needed to do was piss off the other side first.

He leaned back in the chair and chose a comfortable position before continuing. “The substitute jungler is useless, but since the deciding game for the semifinals is his first time ever playing, it’s still excusable for him to not play very well, right? You can tell that he probably practices very little with the starters in private. And also, it’s not like the rest of the team is playing all that well either. Just think of it as watching a Diamond ranked game.

“Though the substitute mid laner is alright. He’s barely a tiny bit more useful than Kan was in the previous four games… of course he’s still not as strong as me, don’t ask that kind of nonsense.”

Thirty-two minutes in, the deciding game that everyone was anticipating finally neared its end.

In that game, TTC was almost completely crushed.

At the end of the match, HT forced their way to TTC’s fountain and spawn camped⁴ them for almost thirty seconds.

At that moment, TTC’s break room was dead silent.

The competition staff members were affected by the atmosphere and didn’t even dare to breathe too loudly. They dedicated themselves to their jobs and filmed while carrying their cameras, giving quite a few close-ups to Road, who was sitting on the sofa.

Road watched the screen calmly, his right hand propped casually on the sofa’s armrest. He wore his team jacket loosely, the sleeve engulfing his entire palm.

Kan sat in the very corner. He chewed on his bottom lip repeatedly before he finally couldn’t bear it any longer after seeing his teammates be spawn camped by the enemy. He looked at Lu Boyuan and said, “Captain, I even said that I could play this round.”

It was as if Lu Boyuan couldn’t hear what he was saying; he didn’t even spare a single glance his way.

Kan, “Even though I didn’t play very well before, but…”

“Enough.” The coach interrupted him with a dark face. “Don’t say anything else.”

A few minutes later, TTC’s team members returned to the break room. Their heads were lowered and they looked at the ground. It was like an invisible rope was wrapped around each of their necks, stifling them so they couldn’t speak or express any other emotions.

It wasn’t that they had never lost a competition before, but this time they had lost too completely, too shamefully. Even the older team members who had experience playing in a few World Championships couldn’t help but feel their eyes redden.

The coach breathed in deeply a few times and comforted them simply a little before walking out to the balcony and calling the team bus. The fans were stirred up right now, so he had to tell the competition management to arrange for a few more security guards to maintain order.

In this stagnant silence, Lu Boyuan finally moved.

He picked up the baseball cap next to him and nonchalantly put it on. The brim of the hat was pressed a little low, and he said, “Time to go back.”

The team members stood up after he said that and began to walk stiffly out.

TTC’s substitute jungler was a seventeen year old boy who had been scooped out from the trainees by management the moment he reached the age he was officially allowed to participate in competitions. He walked at the very back of the crowd, looking dazed, his right hand tightly gripping the shoulder strap of his equipment bag as he pressed his lips together hard.

He was still quite some distance away from the back exit, but he could already hear the noise from the fans waiting outside the arena. For a brief moment, he suddenly felt as if all the indistinct chatter was peppered with his ID and some jeering, mocking words.

He even fantasized that he had already walked outside and was smashed over the head by TTC LED signs until he started bleeding.

Just when he almost couldn’t take it anymore and stopped walking, someone patted him firmly on the shoulder twice.

“You’ve worked hard,” Lu Boyuan said. “Practice more after we get back.”

It was as if an opening had been created by those two pats, and tears instantly gushed out. He first nodded heavily before he covered his face with his sleeves and couldn’t help but sob.

TTC’s bus drove straight back to the base.

After disembarking, the coach warned the other team members over and over to uninstall Tieba and Weibo⁵ before he went into a meeting room with Road.

“I’ve already contacted someone from the LPL. They’re on their way to the base right now.” The coach poured a cup of boiled water and placed it in front of Lu Boyuan. He was silent for a few seconds before he asked, “What if the situation really is like what you’re thinking?”

Lu Boyuan said, “Deal with it according to the rules.”

The coach frowned. As someone who had always handled things efficiently, he currently looked hesitant. “Kan, he… he’s been with TTC for seven years, even longer than you or me.”

Lu Boyuan made an “en” noise. “So?”

“Understood.” The coach looked at the untouched paper cup on the table, and his brows wrinkled even more. He asked, “How’s your condition? I’ve rushed the doctor, he’ll be here soon. Tsk… I knew I should’ve made him come to the stadium with us.”

Lu Boyuan extended his arm and exposed his right hand out of the sleeve. “It’s much better now.”

The coach glanced over. “It’s been so long, but it’s still trembling??”

Lu Boyuan said, “The two games in the middle took too long.”

“Don’t mess with me, you could practice for over ten hours a day before, but now you’re telling me that a fifty-minute game is too long? You definitely secretly practiced more!” The coach felt his heart hurt. “Don’t practice these next few days, don’t even open the game, do you hear me??”

Lu Boyuan was well aware of the situation. He really had exceeded the doctor’s set practice time, and by quite a bit as well.

Since there were no upcoming competitions for the time being anyway, Lu Boyuan nodded. “Got it. Have there been any developments in finding a mid laner?”

“You’re already like this, can you worry a little bit less.” After the coach finished lecturing, he still answered honestly, “There has. The team recently selected a few mid laners from among the trainees, national rankings, and players whose contracts are about to expire. We still have to inspect and filter through them one by one before we can reach a conclusion.”

Lu Boyuan, “Give me a copy of the list too.”

“Of course I’ll give a copy to you.” The coach thought of something and couldn’t help but wrinkle his nose. “But there are some things I have to say first. We’re looking for a teammate, not a wife. Don’t be so picky, you have to give them some room to grow… all those people you rejected last time have been snatched up by other teams by now, it really hurts me…”

Lu Boyuan gave a noise of assent with a cold expression. Inside, he thought, if it were as easy to find a teammate as it was to find a wife, then they wouldn’t have to waste so much time doing so.

.......

Shiliu :石榴 literally means pomegranate, but I’m assuming that’s not his friend’s actual name? Probably just his online alias, so I’m just gonna go with Shiliu rather than Pomegranate.

2.R-ong: Jian Rong’s user ID is 艹耳, but Cao-Er looks kind of dumb, so I just split up the letters in “Rong,” as his ID is technically just the character for Rong split up .

Water friends/水友: a way to address fans or netizens in general, depending on context.

fountain and spawn camped :This used to say Nexus (original t/n: Destroying the enemy’s Nexus is the only way to win the game in LoL.) Fountain refers to the spawn point, and spawn camping is the act of killing players as soon as they respawn. To my knowledge, it’s kinda BM to do this, especially in the pro scene (though it’s a lot more common now in normal play?)

Baidu Tieba and Weibo are both social media sites in China; there’s a lot of discussion forums on Tieba and microblogs on Weibo (kind of like Twitter)