Chapter 17
Translator: Aafkee
Proofreader: ChaiTea
Mu Wanwan gives Lin Jiu a call, “Big Sis Lin, why are you meddling with this matter…”
“Why can’t I?” Lin Jiu is obviously angered by this as well, “Do you think her post was only targeting you?”
Mu Wanwan blinks, “Hm?”
“That part regarding sound cards was targeting me.”
“...Wah, how dare she?!”
“How insincere,” Lin Jiu interrupts her, “Your channel is banned?”
“Yeah, they’ve banned me for the second time now. It didn’t work even after I streamed my hands controlling the character while I was playing. The viewers nowadays sure are strict.” Mu Wanwan clicks her tongue, “Forget it, it’s all because I’m too good. I should have thrown some games once in a while.”
“...Then, what are your plans now?”
“Not much. I’ll just take the money and go. Worst comes to worst, I’ll just stop streaming and I can even return home early.”
Lin Jiu rolls her eyes, “You’re silly.”
“Hm??”
“If you’re to go like this, you won’t get a single penny from them.”
Mu Wanwan widens her eyes, “Why?”
“You have yet to reach your quote this month so that’s considered not fulfilling your side of the contract so all your donations will be taken away.” Lin Jiu answers, “Didn’t I tell you when you signed the contract?”
Silence.
Mu Wanwan only feels hopeless at this point, “Then what should I do?”
“That’s simple, just take part in that…”
Mu Wanwan rejects immediately, “No, that’s too ostentatious.”
“How ostentatious can a tiny competition organised by BattleCat be? They’re not even asking you to play an international game representing China! It’ll probably be difficult to let Auntie know about this even if you want to, given how small scale it is.”
Mu Wanwan is slightly convinced, “But, if I am recognised…”
“If they can recognise you, they would have done so since you’ve started streaming,” Lin Jiu interrupts her, “Think about it, can you accept the fact that all the donations you get with so much effort just disappearing like that?”
Mu Wanwan is silent.
“Think it through. You can even trash that MeowMeowPunch with your own handsーlive on stream.”
Mu Wanwan nods, “I’ll go.”
“I’ll go, alright? You happy now?”
**
Since it is an event limited to only BattleCat streamers, the offline tournament has a very simple schedule.
There are a total of ten streamers participating in this event. The event will start with solo matches, followed by a 5v5 team match. The team members will be decided by drawing lots but of course, the streamers who are more familiar with each other are free to invite one another to their own team.
Lin Qiu reads out the rules as she helps her draw her eye shadow.
She picks up the mirror and plops it in front of her, “How’s this? This is thick enough, isn’t it?”
Mu Wanwan nods and glances at the time, “Let’s get going or we’re going to be late.”
She is wearing a thick down jacket and a cap which almost covers her whole face.
On the train ride towards the venue, she smiles and says, “If I knew better, I would have just worn a mask. I wouldn’t even need to put on makeup then.”
“Yeah and if you do that, the hot topic will become ‘Wanan’s substitute wore a mask to play in her stead for the offline tournament’.”
That silences Mu Wanwan.
The event venue is set at a large internet cafe. There is a large advertisement board at the entrance with the words “BattleCatTV Streamers Offline Tournament”.
It is quite crowded at the internet cafe and many of them are here to watch the offline tournament.
Mu Wanwan wraps her clothes tighter around herself and squeezes into the internet cafe, carefully following Lin Jiu.
She spots MeowMeowPunch with a single glance.
MeowMeowPunch has dyed her hair purple and is currently chatting with a man.
“That man is the sponsor of this event. The champion prize is only about 100 thousand, how stingy.” Lin Jiu mutters.
Mu Wanwan does not respond. Instead, her eyes are travelling across the location, looking at her surroundings.
She had gone undercover and observed other streamers before she became a streamer herself. She can already see two streamers, whom she knows, with a simple glance around the area.
Lin Jiu turns her head back to look at her suddenly, “What are you still standing there for?”
Mu Wanwan is confused, “If not?”
“There is a team match in the afternoon, why are you not going around looking for teammates? What, are you going to take the leftovers?”
“You think I need to look for a team myself?” A gush of cold wind rushes into the venue when the entrance is pushed open. Mu Wanwan shrinks slightly before she continues, “They’ll all come running to me after the solo matches in the morning end.”
Lin Jiu is quiet.
Although BattleCat is being stingy in the prize department, they are pretty on point with the other aspects of the event ー They have invited a host who is pretty well-known locally.
The host holds up the little notebook in his hand and calls out the name of each streamer.
Mu Wanwan is the last to be called.
“Wanan.”
There is an obvious silent pause when that name is called.
Mu Wanwan walks up the stage without any hesitation.
The gazes landing on her from the audience has a different meaning. Luckily, Mu Wanwan is nearsighted and she is in no mood to look at the audience either. She steps back right after she draws a lot.
The lots are then revealed and it seems like Mu Wanwan is going to go against a male streamer in a 1v1 match. He is a popular streamer thanks to his skilful gameplays and unique humour. He has always been the first ranking streamer in terms of popularity in the gaming department, always above Mu Wanwan, and is often known as BattleCat’s number one male streamer.
He grins, “Hey pretty, I’ll make sure you get the prize money if you call me big brother.”
A burst of boisterous laughter comes from the crowd.
Mu Wanwan laughs as well, “Talk big only after you’ve won.”
The male streamer is momentarily stunned before he follows up with a hearty laugh, “Alright, alright.”
Mu Wanwan quickly glances at the audience before she walks down the stage and finds a very unique… little green cap*.
(T/N*: In the Chinese culture, wearing a green cap/hat means being cheated on.)
There is even a sun design on the cap, making it extremely eye-catching. Unfortunately, she is shortsighted and the person’s face is almost completely covered by the cap so Mu Wanwan can not tell who the person is.
Mu Wanwan and BattleCat’s number one male streamer are among the first group of contestants.
When she digs out her keyboard from her big backpack, she can clearly hear the people around her snickering.
There is no comparison to her opponent’s shiny keyboard. The price of both her keyboard and mouse doest even add up to four digits. On top of that, some keys on her keyboard are already fading due to frequent use.
She is completely unaffected by the laughter around her.
What do these people know? The more used your own equipment is, the more comfortable it is to play with. There is absolutely no need to force yourself to change your equipment just to follow the trendーthat goes for everything else.
When both players have entered the character choosing screen, there is someone holding a camera facing them on the side, who is most probably a staff responsible for the live broadcast.
Just as Mu Wanwan is about to put on her headphones, she hears a voice from opposite her, “Hey girl, let me give you a bit of a head start. What champion do you want me to use?”
Mu Wanwan can not even be bothered to respond to him. She puts her headphones over her ears straightaway.
Her opponent chooses his champion almost immediately, in less than 20 seconds.
When it is her turn to choose her champion, she doesn’t choose until there are only ten seconds left.
A person near her can not help but remind her, “It is considered your loss if you don’t choose your champion in time.”
Mu Wanwan does not respond.
“Are you doing this intentionally?”
“Aw, c’mon, her substitute isn’t here yet, can you stop rushing her?”
“Hahaha, fine, fine.”
Mu Wanwan’s lips curl up ever so slightly.
How magical, Mu Wanwan feels like she can hear the voices from her comment section.
When there are only three more seconds left, she quickly moves her cursor and clicks on the champion who she has long decided on, edits her runes page with practised ease and enters the game in a split second.
It was so fast that the people around her do not even have time to respond.
And when a small and short character shows up at the base, a collective “wtf” can be heard from the crowdー
This person actually chose Captain Teemo!
Teemo is one of the cutest champions in LoL. A small body that carries ginormous power.
He can easily trash many of the solo top champions but when it is late game, he basically only serves the role of a lucky charm. There is absolutely no place for this champion in the Challenger games.
And her opponent chose Syndra.
ーAnd everyone is wondering, where is the competition??
The comment section of the live stream is immediately flooded by comments.
[Oh no, why do I have a feeling that Wanan is letting the game run its course? Don’t tell me she really does have a substitute.]
[This is the end… I even went around telling everyone that there’s no way she has a substitute playing for her.]
The game finally begins. Teemo arrives at the lane, kills a few creeps and begins using his auto-attack, which comes with poison damage-over-time, to harass Syndra.
Syndra also uses her Q to harass Teemo, both parties lose some health and it goes back to square one.
Teemo has the advantage before level six and he becomes extremely passive after that. With only slightly better equipment, Syndra will be able to kill Mu Wanwan in a single combo.
The two remain peaceful until level six.
Tut-tuts of disapproval can be heard behind Mu Wanwan. Some are shaking their heads in disappointment, while there are others sneering at her. It actually does look a little pitiful.
Pei Lu lowers his cap as he looks at the person in front of him controlling her character.
Syndra is walking leisurely on the lane, getting ready to harass Teemo again whenーpssh.
Syndra steps precisely on Teemo’s poison mushroom.
Five seconds later, another pssshー
Another mushroom.
Half of Syndra’s health is gone with just those two mushrooms.
Everyone is astonished. Mu Wanwan has placed her mushrooms in very awkward spots so how is it that BattleCat’s number one male streamer is able to step on her mushrooms every single time??
Syndra seems to be confused, too. After stepping on every single mushroom there is on the lane, Syndra’s health is now extremely low.
He swears as he turns back immediately, wanting to return to base.
And at that exact moment, Teemo flashes towards him and lands an ignite on him. Syndra wants to turn back to counterattack Teemo, hoping to trade her life for Teemo’s but who would have expected that when she uses her ultimate, only one out of her many orbs hit Teemo?
Because of that, Teemo only lost a bit of health.
BattleCat’s number one male streamer is momentarily stunned. He opens up the menu to check Mu Wanwan’s equipment and only realizes then that Teemo is wearing a little cape that has 450 magic resistance.
Seeing that trading one for one is not possible, he flashes immediately, wanting to escape, but a blind dart from Teemo comes flying towards him.
And his screen turns dark with a thud.
【First blood!】
A female voice can be heard in the game.
There is a commotion among the crowd as the audience begins chattering about what just happened.
After his first death, he has learnt his lesson. Instead of walking on the side of the lane, he walks right in the middle of the laneーpssh!
BattleCat’s number one male streamer is speechless.
Is this whole area her mushroom farm or something???
The match ends after another ten minutes. Teemo has won the solo match with a 3/0/0 score.
No one knows how to react to this outcome, including the male streamer himself.
A short pause later, he laughs awkwardly and stands up, “I didn’t think you’d like playing such a champion that requires no skill.”
Before Mu Wanwan can even respond, the female players who like using Teemo in the game already begin flooding the comments of the live stream.
[What do you mean by “champion that requires no skill”? Who was the one who got killed 3 times consecutively again?]
[This person is such a sore loser. He was talking big before the match even began. The mere thought of it makes me laugh.]
Mu Wanwan clears the rune page and stands up.
She smiles, “All champions are strong. It all depends on whether or not you know how to use them.”
Is she hinting that he doesn’t know how to play Syndra?
The male streamer’s face flushes red with fury. He stands up and leaves immediately.
Mu Wanwan leaves her seat as well. In the short ten minutes, the internet cafe is already filled with people. And since the next solo match has already begun, everyone is extremely enthusiastic and high. Mu Wanwan wants to go out to take a breath of fresh air and even that is difficult due to the crowd.
In the midst of the shuffling crowd, the tip of her forehead is poked lightly by the tip of a cap.
She lifts her head subconsciously and meets a pair of eyes.
At such a close distance, those eyes seem to look more brown than black, they are bright and the eyelashes are very long.
… P–Pei Lu??
“You… hngh…”
Her mouth is covered by Pei Lu’s hand the second she opens it.
Pei Lu looks around them to confirm that there is no one paying attention to them before he lets out a sigh of relief, “Shhh.”
Mu Wanwan nods immediately, indicating for him to remove his hands.
She asks, “What are you doing here? To join in the fun?”
“I’m looking for you.”
“??” Mu Wanwan does not understand, “Looking for me?”
Pei Lu nods and speaks truthfully, “Our team’s manager asks me to confirm whether or not you have a substitute playing for you.”
Mu Wanwan does not know whether to laugh or cry at that, “...Then, have you confirmed now?”
“Yeah, I have confirmed,” Pei Li looks at her and suddenly becomes serious, “Are you interested in playing professionally?”
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