Chapter 11
Translator: Aafkee
Proofreader: ChaiTea
In the resting room backstage of the tournament venue.
Pei Li has his earphones in as he stares intensely at the screen. After the streamer’s team’s Nexus*, he takes out his earphones and asks, “Chen He, who’s this MeowMeowPunch?”
(T/N*: The Nexus is the main crystal in each team’s base. Once the Nexus is destroyed, the game ends.)
Chen He lifts his head to look askance at his handphone screen but Pei Lu tilts his phone towards himself so he could only see the streaming page vaguely.
He lets out a short laugh, “Why, are you watching Meowmeow’s stream?”
“No.”
“She’s a female streamer. Quite pretty,” Chen He grins as he replies, “But I’ve put my hand to her now. Don’t you dare try and snatch her from me, Xiao-Lu.”
Pei Lu frowns, “...I’m not going to snatch her from you.”
Lil Meatbun asks, “Why are you still watching streams when the tournament is about to start?”
“I’m turning it off now.” Just as Pei Lu finished his sentence and is about to turn off the streaming software, a raffle suddenly pops up on the page.
【The streamer has started a raffle round: ‘Giving away 1000RMB* a red envelope if bottom lane loses’. Please type in the comment “You will not fail” to take part in the raffle.】
(T/N*: About 160USD.)
He suddenly wants to laugh when he sees Mu Wanwan’s gloomy expression.
Brother Yang sees Pei Lu’s smile the moment he steps into the room, “What are you smiling at? Have you thought of a good tactic?”
“No,” Pei Lu replies, “I can’t guess their team composition.”
They are up against a team that has a variety of playstyles and tricks up their sleeves. This team only has practice matches against their own club’s second team, so others can never guess what champions they will choose until the actual match.
“MA played really well in this match.” Brother Hu lays down on the sofa as he watches the television, “They managed to keep the pace of the game really tight. The other team did not stand a chance at all. They were just snowballed to death.”
“What’s so impressive about that? Only their middle lane is relatively stronger,” Chen He says half-jokingly, half-serious, “If you guys are as strong as they are, we may become the National Champion, too.”
The whole room sinks into silence. Everyone’s expression is heavy and the sound when Brother Hu tuts are extremely obvious.
Pei Lu lets out a sigh and stands up, “I’m going out to get some fresh air.”
“It’s cold; wear your jacket.” Lil Meatbun grabs the jacket and throws it at him.
“Okay.”
Pei Lu stops beside an opened window. He feels slightly better when the cold wind hits his face.
Brother Yang follows him out and stands beside him, “How’s that ADC?”
“Hm?” Pei Lu’s brow lifts slightly as he rubs his nose with his finger, “She’s alright…”
For a person like Pei Lu, who can not really say any brutal words, ‘alright’ is not a very good evaluation.
Brother Yang finds it a bit unexpected, “What is it that you’re unsatisfied with?”
“She’s too unrestrained. She’s not suitable for playing professionally.” He says truthfully.
Playing in a competitive scene is completely different from a normal ranked game. In a competitive scene, all your teammates are people you already know. There will be communication via voice chat even during the game and everything, including strategies, is prepared in advance. It is very common for teams to want to gain an advantage and snowball all the way towards their end game so if the ADC is too unrestrained and gets caught even once, that may cost them their victory.
“That’s nothing,” Brother Yang says, “Chen He had the same problem before. Isn’t he all good now?”
Now that Brother Yang had mentioned it, Pei Lu could not help but laugh as he shakes his head twice.
Chen He was once a completely unrestrained idiot and he was not much better than now. The only reason he is less so is that he was flamed too miserably by their fans, so he exercised self-restraint.
God knows how many lost matches it had taken them to get Chen He to change.
Pei Lu laughs involuntarily, “Brother Yang, I don’t want to lose six matches consecutively ever again.”
“Is being unrestrained the only thing you saw in her?” Brother Yang continues, “There’s nothing on her for you to pick on in all other aspects. Besides, what if she is more gifted and more obedient than Chen He?”
She is definitely more gifted than Chen He.
But… more obedient???
Seeing his strange expression, Brother Yang asks, “What’s wrong?”
Pei Lu shakes his head, “...Nothing.”
“Forget it, there’s no use for me saying these things now. I can’t even contact her.”
Pei Lu raises his brows, “Hm? Isn’t she a streamer?”
“Yeah, but I’ve tried contacting her privately. She stopped replying the moment I asked if she wanted to play professionally.”
Pei Lu nods his head, half-understanding, “Any normal female would think that it’s a scam when they are invited to play professionally. I wouldn’t reply, too, if it was me.”
Brother Yang frowns, “Huh?”
“So, if you truly want to invite her, contact her through a phone call or personally visiting her would be more polite.” And with that, Pei Lu turns around and says, “I’ll be going in first.”
Brother Yang is confused: So, did Pei Lu agree to him recruiting Wanan into their team or not?
On the other side; any good mood Mu Wanwan felt earlier is all ruined by this support.
“I’m taking a break to eat something. Five minutes.”
Doing other things during a live stream is considered intentionally extending your stream time with no actual content. It is against the rules and will be reported.
She has already received a warning from the admin the previous time when she ate hotpot during her stream, so she does not dare to take too long for her meal and orders a simple meal of noodles served with soy sauce that she can finish quickly.
This time, she turns on the live stream of the tournament on her own initiative without needing her viewers to remind her.
TS’s match today is at seven o’clock in the evening. The team has just finished banning and choosing their champions when she enters the stream, Pei Lu’s handsome face displayed on the bottom left side of the screen.
Mu Wanwan thinks that this man looks too delicate. His eyelashes are long, even the shape of his lips looks good and his nose is tall. She has seen his gaze before, it was as deep as the night.
When looked at individually, his features have an “ascetic” style to them, but he looks extremely gentle when put together.
“Say,” Mu Wanwan curls up her legs in her seat as she chats with her viewers, “Why do you guys think Pei Lu didn’t choose to become a celebrity?”
The comments paused for a moment when that sentence leaves her mouth.
It was followed by a series of different guesses and conclusions.
[I believe it now, this streamer is Pei Lu’s fangirl.]
(T/N: YES, ME TOO. I AM ONE.)
(PR/N: Me, too! Me, too!)
[He earns a lot being a professional gamer! He can even get into streaming after he retires, or open a clothing or Taobao* shop, and hire a few people for customer service. All he has to do is to lie down and collect money.]
(T/N*: A very big online shopping platform, kinda like Amazon.)
[The previous comment, you’re being too naive. It’s really hard to earn money through those too, unless he’s extremely famous… Personally, I think Pei Lu does not lack any money at all. Did y’all not notice? He’s the only one who doesn’t stream in Team TS.]
Mu Wanwan does not refute any comments. She merely stated what she felt.
Come to think of it, it truly is mystical. Her initially bad mood calms down quite a bit the moment she sees his face and recalls his voice. Even the noodles seem to taste more delicious.
A person’s charm can, indeed, be touching.
The game begins soon after. Pei Lu is playing as Tahm Kench — An ugly, giant toad monster with a gigantic mouth.
She finishes her noodles in only a few minutes. She turns on the stream on her handphone instead and places it right below her monitor, deciding to watch the stream as she plays.
In her opinion, Pei Lu is a strong player because of his flexibility as a support.
When you want to play aggressive, he will be more aggressive than you are; When you want to play a bit more passively, he can be fully relied on for protection; When you are being a bit too unrestrained, he can become the dependable one and pull you right back.
It is exceptionally obvious in this match. When Chen He is about to die, he did not hesitate to flash over and swallow Chen He, tanking a huge amount of damage from the enemies and yet able to bring Chen He back to safety under their tower.
Even when the other team wants to focus fire and score an instant kill, it is impossible.
[Why are you always glancing downwards? Are you using a cheat or something?]
[Do you think she’s playing a shooting game? There are only Taobao account sellers who would use a levelling cheat.]
[Wanan is watching the tournament.]
[Can you be more serious in your game? You’re being irresponsible to your team, what a trash!!]
“I’m playing seriously,” Mu Wanwan says, “I’m only stealing glances when I’m waiting to return back to the base. Can’t you see my 3/0 score? Did you think that was fake??”
[All you did was KS*, aren’t you embarrassed?]
(T/N*: Kill steal, taking the last hit when you are not the one who did the main damage.)
Mu Wanwan smirks, “I’m guessing that your account is not even level 30. You should just keep quiet and watch the stream if you don’t understand how team fights work. My damage dealt on those three definitely exceeded 60%, thank you very much.”
[How fierce. People who ask others to play their account for them sure are confident nowadays.]
[Don’t get triggered, it’s your loss if you take trolls seriously.]
Mu Wanwan knows that. She has always found it beneath her to argue with trolls. These people always seem to think that they own the world as long as they have their keyboards.
“I don’t usually like to reply to trolls but I must clarify today. Although I’m a newbie streamer, the quality of my streams are definitely not low. If you guys have any questions regarding the game, feel free to comment as I’ll answer as long as I see them,” Mu Wanwan pauses, “But that doesn’t mean I don’t have a temper. You guys can flame me if I do not play well but I’ll never accept it if you’re only here trying to pick out bones from eggs. If you’re here just to do that, I suggest you might as well improve your skills — or uninstall your game and study properly.”
[Why is it that I find it funny to hear ‘that doesn’t mean I don’t have a temper’ coming from Wanan’s mouth hahahaha]
[The ancient poetry we need to learn today is: The young and strong needs to work hard, in order to win Wanan’s maiden heart.]
[Hahahaha wtf that comment. Hats off to you!]
Mu Wanwan was initially still a bit angry, but the comment made her laugh immediately. She laughs out as she finishes off the enemy’s base.
At the same moment, Pei Lu’s team has already pushed into the enemy’s Nexus, their victory is right in front of them.
Team TS seems to be in good momentum in this Spring tournament.
A new notification pops out the moment Mu Wanwan finishes her game.
Lin Jiu, “!!!”
Mu Wanwan picks up her phone and replies, "???”
Lin Jiu, “Did you just give out a 1000 dollars red packet?”
Wan, “Yeah, what about it?”
【Lin Jiu transferred 1000 dollars to your account.】
Mu Wanwan lifts her brow, not accepting the transfer.
Wan, “What’s wrong? Explain clearly.”
Lin Jiu, “Your game just now. That bitch felt that she had lost face after she watched your stream archive so she intentionally made it such that you’ll lose your bet and make you give out red packets. Damn it.”
Mu Wanwan catches the main point, “What do you mean by she watched my stream archive?”
Lin Jiu, “It wasn’t her who was playing her account the other day.”
Wan, “............”
Does that mean that she has flamed another person without any reason?
Lin Jiu, “If she trolls you the next you meet her, just troll her back. At most, none of y’all goes up in rank, your Sister Jiu here will give you that 1000. Don’t worry, there’s nothing to be scared of.”
1000 is not a small sum to Mu Wanwan. She may not get 1000 even if she streams for the whole day.
Her contract with BattleCatTV has a base monthly salary of 10,000*, which is considered pretty high for a newbie streamer but if she does not receive many gifts from her viewers, it is not a big sum either.
(T/N*: About 1570USD.)
Wan, “No need, take it back.”
Lin Jiu, “Don’t be like this, take it or I’ll feel guilty.”
Wan, “There really is no need. Those viewers have always been complaining about how I’ve never started a raffle before so it was a good opportunity to shut them up.”
Lin Jiu, “Then what are you gonna do if you got into a game with her again? She said she will stream snipe you. You know this, too, it’s really easy to get stream sniped at your rank.”
Wan, “Not gonna do much.”
Wan, “Don’t you worry, I have ways to punish her.”
She is even looking forward to getting into a game with this Lady MeowMeowPunch right now.
She goes straight into another game after she finishes her conversation with Lin Jiu, realising that TS.Luu is online after her game.
Is he already back in his base? That’s fast.
She clicks to open the chat message box.
【DepressedPrince: Congratulations.】
On the other side, Pei Lu was just about to observe her match when he sees DepressedPrince’s status changing from “in-game” to “online”.
【TS.Luu: Thank you.】
【DepressedPrince: Wanna play a few games?】
【TS.Luu: Okay, invite me.】
Lil Meatbun sticks his head out from somewhere near, “Xiao-Lu, I’m getting online now, let’s duo.”
Pei Lu lets out an “ah” and says, “Meatbun, you go ahead and duo with Brother Hu, I’m already in queue.”
“???” Lil Meatbun feels like he has been abandoned, his expression looks like he is wronged by someone.
Pei Lu’s expression is even more pitiful than his and yet, there is no further explanation, “I’m already choosing my champion.”
Fine, seeing that he could not win him at acting pitiful, Lil Meatbun decides to solo queue.
Brother Hu shouts at him, “Invite me, Meatbun!”
“No.”
Brother Hu’s eyes widen, “Why not?!”
“Don’t you have the slightest idea why your account has yet to go up to Challenger rank, yet?”
Brother Hu is silent.
After selecting his champion, Pei Lu goes into the loading screen smoothly.
He is dumbfounded the moment he sees the loading screen.
The ID of the enemy’s Soraka is: LookAtMyUltimateMeowMeowPunch.
And the enemy’s AD, Caitlynn, is: TS.CCCCH.
That is Chen He, who had left the venue alone, right after the match.
After the loading screen, all five champions stand together in the base.
DepressedPrince (Draven): Don’t touch that healer when we get into a team fight.
DepressedPrince (Draven): Let me kill her, thanks. I won’t disappoint. :)
...Pei Lu can almost see the flame of rage burning on top of Draven’s head.
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Author’s note:
In reality, a Challenger can not duo queue with another Challenger but it is needed for the story development so I hope you guys don’t mind it too much~
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