FOG [e-sports]

However, among all the players who left their native land against their will and lodged under another person’s roof, there was only one who could have been raised into turning out how Whisper did.

Young Master Yu has seen and experienced all sorts of things ever since he was young. No matter if he were penalized hundreds of thousands or millions worth of fines, he wouldn’t even blink. If you want to penalize me, then penalize me. I don’t care.

Chen Huo remembered an old story and couldn’t help but sigh. “Was it about a week after we first came here? We encountered one of the stupidest things. We were taking promotional photos for the new season, which was normal. Then it was like our manager suddenly went sick in the head. The shooting was done and we were about to wrap up but he insisted we take some ‘fun photos’, to provide some amusement for the fans. Do you know what kind of photos he wanted us to take?”

Puppy sighed, “...cat ears, very cute ones.”

Shi Luo: “...”

Old Qiao and Zhou Huo both choked.

“I really f-ing suspect that he was scratched by a cat demon! Making us wear cat ears and then posing like that...” Chen Huo made fists with both hands and retched. “F*ck, just thinking about it is making me want to vomit. He wanted us to stand in a row, wear cat ears, act cute and throw kitty punches.”

Puppy couldn’t bear to remember. He covered his face with one hand, “Damn, crossing seas and oceans to work in a foreign land, you truly will suffer all sorts of hardships.”

Zhou Huo both wanted to laugh and felt sorry for them. He asked hurriedly, “Did you take the photo? Are there any photos? Those... those cat ears...”

Chen Huo said helplessly, “Look, I’m not discriminating against cat ears. If you get one for me now, I’ll pose for you. Really, I would be happy to ‘meow’ for you! Isn’t it all just to make the fans happy? As long as I am in a good mood, even doing an erotic dance wouldn’t be out of the question. But what was the situation at that time? Us three brothers, each of us looked worse than the last. We all look like we just lost our wives. Yu Sui, back then, was already starting to close-up on himself...If you want us to do business, you gotta choose the time and place, okay? I was worried all the time whether the sprayers back home would start poking around my ancestors’ graves. Was I in any mood to meow for you?”

Shi Luo couldn’t stand it anymore and asked closely, “So did you take the photo or not?!”

“Listen to me. I’m going to tell you slowly.” Chen Huo changed his posture and said leisurely, “At the time, in the photo studio, it was similar to this. The three of us were sitting like this... Several cat ears were placed on the table. All of us were ignoring the manager and we were in a deadlock. Of course, Sacred Sword’s manager had to get Yu Sui to do it first. He asked Yu Sui...”

Chen Huo looked at Puppy, “You take his role. Do the manager.”

Puppy, to the side, followed up. Pinching his voice, “Whisper, do you know how much you will be fined if you do not cooperate with official club activities?”

Puppy held up five fingers, expression proud and aloof, “Five thousand euros.”

Puppy looked at Yu Sui, “It’s your turn. Act out what you said at the time.”

Yu Sui glanced at Shi Luo. He said helplessly, “What’s wrong with you? What’s good about remembering such a f*cking embarrassing incident?”

“Hurry up!” Chen Huo had set it up for a long time and was waiting for Yu Sui to finish, “Come and wrap up the performance. We’re going to need to train soon!”

Shi Luo frowned slightly, staring at Yu Sui closely.

Yu Sui was left with no choice.

Yu Sui lifted up his empty left wrist and made a gesture as though taking off his watch.

Yu Sui was pinching air and said softly, “Do you know how much this watch is?”

Yu Sui couldn’t help laughing, breaking character. He held back his smile and said, “Five hundred thousand euros...”

“Pfft!” Zhou Huo couldn’t help it. He squeezed Old Qiao’s sleeve and chuckled, “I didn’t know you had b*tchy period.”

Shi Luo was still watching. Yu Sui knew that his little boyfriend was most afraid of him being insulted and being disadvantaged. He could only endure this rare humiliation and give a convincing re-enactment of this past event. “Before signing, you should have found out my financial situation... ”

Yu Sui’s went numb from how ‘chuuni‘ he was back then. He really couldn’t bring himself to act anymore. He sat back on his gaming chair and spewed out curses. “Who the f*ck started all this? You are all sick. Start training!”

Shi Luo imagined that scene and held back his smile. He sat back down in front of his computer.

It was a small episode in a foreign country. Due to various reasons, like the time difference and having to get over the Great Firewall of China, the domestic players were still unaware of what was happening in Germany. The focus of the domestic players was still on NSN. NSN lost a game in the group stage and the fans’ overall morale declined a bit. The players naturally wouldn’t let NSN go. During the two days of rest for Group A, there was a lot of heated discussion about NSN in China.

“NSN seems to have a really hard time holding their own.”

As long as it had nothing to do with the contents of the game, Zhou Huo could do the work of three people.

The next day, the day before the second loop of the group stage, Zhou Huo had contacted all the teams from each region who were willing to play practice matches with Free to arrange a reasonable schedule. While holding a mobile phone in one hand to order authentic Chinese food for everyone, he had a tablet on another as he used it to check on the domestic e-sports forums to grasp the direction of public opinion.

Free’s players have already played practice matches for eight hours today. Right now, they were reviewing their training mistakes while eating. Seeing that everyone was finally resting, Zhou Huo didn’t forget to gossip with the players as he did his three-way multitasking. “According to the domestic trainers’ analysis, NSN’s previous win in one of the games was a bit due to luck. The opponent made a lot of mistakes. In the second round, if they can’t continue to improve their performance and have a few luck bonuses, they may not be able to make it past the group stage.”

Zhou Huo was worried, “If they can’t make it through, we’ll become the last hope of the whole village. The pressure will definitely be even greater then... How did you feel when you played the practice match against Gu Gan and the others? Did they seem stable or not?”

Shi Luo shook his head, “No one can actually tell if anyone’s stable. Being strong is one thing, being able to display that on the field is another...there are all sorts of situations on the field. It all depends on actual combat.

Chen Huo thought about it and frowned. He said slowly, “The degree to which someone can perform their best on the field isn’t the same. It’s hard to say. There are those people who are particularly excited once they’re on stage, such as...”

Chen Huo was upset about Shi Luo’s three consecutive MVP wins and said coldly, “For example, Shi Shen. It’s easy for him to outperform himself when he’s actually playing in the match. He won the MVP title in the first game of his career. In his first World Championships, he won three more in a row.”

“As long as you make fewer mistakes, don’t get carried away when the match is going our way and don’t collapse when it isn’t, the MVP title would be yours too.” Old Qiao said leisurely, “Yu Sui has not chance to display his abilities playing against a weak team in the group stage. This is your chance...but you didn’t make good use of it.”

Chen Huo knew his old ‘nerve knife’ problem. He shrugged and stopped talking.

“Let’s rest.” It was already nine o’clock in the evening. Puppy got up and stretched. “Tomorrow’s the second round of the group stage. Let’s play steady and talk more when we make it past the group stage. Jiayou, brothers.”

The remaining three people didn’t pay any attention to him. Puppy got up, picked up his coat and headed to his room first.

In order to allow the players to train better, Zhou Huo declined the league’s provided official training venue that was five kilometers away from the hotel. His team rented a small meeting room in the hotel as a temporary training room. The daily rent was shockingly high but the advantage was that everyone no longer needed to run around anymore and they could go back to their hotel room directly after their daily training; not that much different from how they were in their domestic base.

Old Qiao felt pained every day that he entered this temporary training room but Yu Sui didn’t care at all. He had been the one who instructed Zhou Huo to rent the hotel meeting room.

It doesn’t matter how much you spend so long as it made things convenient.

When the training was over that day, Old Qiao looked at the rented computers in the room and felt distressed, “It’s all money...”

“Oh, stop trying to skimp on everything. Slag man Yu has the money.” Zhou Huo had on an indifferent expression. “Do you think these young masters would go hole up in an Internet cafe with you?

Chen Huo also got up and went back to his room. Zhou Huo looked at Yu Sui and Shi Luo and urged, “Aren’t you leaving yet?”

Yu Sui got up. Shi Luo was full of energy and wasn’t afraid of tiring out. He kept watching the game replay and didn’t even raise his head, “I’ll be watching for two more hours. You go first.”

Zhou Huo frowned. “How long have they been playing already? Two more hours? Are you looking to die?”

Shi Luo had on his headphones and pretended not to hear him, Zhou Huo couldn’t get Shi Luo move himself. He couldn’t help turning to complain to Yu Sui, “Captain! Don’t just stand there. Our striker is about to be overworked! You handle him! ”

Slag man Yu looked at Zhou Huo expressionlessly, and asked, “If you don’t go then how can I handle him?”

Yu Sui had especially emphasized the word “handle”. When good fortune comes, the mind works well and Zhou Huo slapped his forehead. He smiled and took Old Qiao away with him.

Only two people were left in the small meeting room.

Shi Luo stared at the monitor closely and watched the replay video at double speed. He would repeatedly tap the space bar on the keyboard with his thumb to pause and examine the details.

From out the corner of his eye, Shi Luo saw Yu Sui walking to the door of the meeting room and locking it.

Shi Luo smiled helplessly. He couldn’t explain it clearly anymore. He...this time he was really wasn’t making some scheme to deliberately get Yu Sui to stay with him.

All he really wanted was to review the game.

Yu Sui walked up to Shi Luo and sat directly on the table next to Shi Luo’s left hand. He moved his long leg and hit Shi Luo’s arm with his knee.

Shi Luo raised his eyes and glanced at Yu Sui.

It was a cold winter but it was warm inside the hotel. Yu Sui only wore a short sleeved shirt and sweatpants. He was about to leave the meeting room just now so he also had on a long and loose down jacket. This was the standard get up for internet addicted teenagers. In a while, it won’t be cold in the corridor and when he gets to his room, he can sleep as soon as he takes it off.

But when he wore such nondescript clothing, coupled with his face and his good figure, sitting on the table, turned towards him, even Shi Luo lost the will to properly do his game review.

Shi Luo took off his big headphones and hung it around his neck.

Slag man Yu nudged Shi Luo again with his knee. “Let’s go back to the room...and sleep together.”

Shi Luo’s fair ears turned red.

Shi Luo pushed away from the table, creating some distance between him on his gaming chair and Yu Sui on the table. He shook his head, “I won’t be able to sleep even if I did go back...”

Yu Sui upped the ante. “I’ll hug you to sleep.”

The corner of Shi Luo’s lips ticked up unconsciously.

Yu Sui continued to up the ante even more. “Hug you and tell you a bedtime story.”

Shi Luo bowed his head and smiled helplessly, “I will definitely have no problem with tomorrow’s game, I...”

“If you can’t sleep even after the bedtime story, I’ll add in a song.” There was a smile in Yu Sui’s eyes. “Have you ever heard me sing? It’s passable, pretty pleasant.”

These enticements were very tempting...Having reached this point, there was no way Shi Luo could resume his game review anymore but he still couldn’t help struggling, “I really didn’t mean to act spoiled with you. I’m...”

“You just want to be able to play a bit better and a then a little bit better and a little bit better...” Yu Sui interrupted Shi Luo and asked in a low voice, “The matter with Sacred Sword still affected you a little bit, didn’t it?”

Shi Luo paused. Knowing that he couldn’t hide it from Yu Sui, he said calmly, “Yes, they’re very smart. They know my sore spots... And deliberately poked right there. But don’t worry, I won’t show it and let them target me. ”

Yu Sui looked at Shi Luo silently.

Returning to this familiar place, he, Chen Huo and Puppy sighed somewhat in their hearts.

However, they were veteran players and wouldn’t be affected too much. When Shi Luo watched that interview with Sacred Sword that day, the three of them talked about funny episodes from the past to joke around and also to mutually adjust their moods.

All of this was already in the past.

Yu Sui was able to cooperate well with their impromptu play, bracing himself to play his idiotic flaunting-his-wealth nineteen year old self because he wanted to coax Shi Luo, to get him to relax, to get him to think that things weren’t all that unbearable for him back then.

But now...

Yu Sui was quiet for a moment. He looked down at Shi Luo and suddenly smiled, “Do you feel bad for your ‘ge’?”

Shi Luo’s expression became slightly uneasy. He took off his headphones.

Shi Luo was silent for half a minute and his eyes suddenly turned red.

Shi Luo irritably turned his head around. He couldn’t help but scold himself, “F*ck...what are you crying for.”

Shi Luo wanted to get up and wash to face but before he could move, Yu Sui grabbed the handle of his gaming chair and pulled Shi Luo over.

Shi Luo took a few deep breaths and buried his head into Yu Sui’s arms.

The warm cotton fabric of Yu Sui’s shirt turned wet with Shi Luo’s tears. Shi Luo buried his face deep against Yu Sui’s shirt and his shoulders shook slightly.

“I’m really...” Shi Luo pressed down desperately on the choked up feeling in his throat. “Ge, I really hate...”

Yu Sui lowered his head and kissed Shi Luo’s hair. Voice soft, he said, “I know.”

Yu Sui whispered, “There’s been that anger in your heart but you couldn’t let it out... I know, if you can’t digest that anger then cry if you want. There’s no one else here...”

“I...” Shi Luo tightly gripped Yu Sui’s sleeves. His voice was hoarse. “I know you’re not the type of person who would allow himself to suffer and I also know that you might not necessarily have suffered too many grievances in their hands during those two years, but I... ...”

Shi Luo had been resisting for two days but now, he couldn’t hold back. His tears fell, “I still hate it. I f*cking hate those f*cked up bastards...why?!”

“You’re young.” Yu Sui lightly flicked Shi Luo’s forehead, “You’ve got a filthy mouth.”

Shi Luo put his arms around Yu Sui’s waist, embracing him tightly.

He just felt distressed.

Distressed for his ge. Distressed for his captain. Distressed for his boyfriend.

He felt distressed for Whisper who was just a good person; who just had to encounter this kind of terrible incident and waste two years in this broken place.

Just after entering Free at the beginning of the season, Yu Sui told Shi Luo that when he first went to Germany, he didn’t feel like talking or going out, so he unintentionally let his hair grow long. It was something he had just mentioned casually.

Now, thinking carefully about Yu Sui’s condition that day, Shi Luo felt so distressed it was like his chest was about to explode.

Back then, Yu Sui had been a young master, cared for by thousands, doted on by tens of thousands.

Yu Sui smoothed out Shi Luo’s hair, letting Shi Luo cry in his arms.

He needed to let this out.

But Yu Sui still couldn’t help but tease Shi Luo. Yu Sui waited for Shi Luo to cry it out for a while. He mischievously grabbed the lapels of his loose down jacket and wrapped Shi Luo together in it. He then chuckled and asked, “All snug? ”

At first, it was okay but after a while, he would naturally feel suffocated. Shi Luo sniffled and sat down by himself. He felt a bit embarrassed, unwilling to look up at Yu Sui.

Yu Sui still questioned him closely, “Have you cried enough? Let’s let it all out once, lest Sacred Sword make another disturbance and get you angry again.”

Shi Luo wiped his eyes with his wrist, “Enough.”

Yu Sui asked again, “You don’t care about them anymore, do you?”

Shi Luo wiped his face.

Don’t care about them? How could that possibly be?

This hatred has already solidified and Shi Luo was never one to let things go so easily.

This matter must come to an end.

But Shi Luo was sure that he wasn’t going to make such a fool of himself again. He wasn’t going to let Sacred Sword get him so angry that tears would simply spring out of his eyes. And so he nodded. “En.”

Fearing that Yu Sui would still be worrying about him during this competition, Shi Luo cleared his throat and didn’t forget to remind him, “You said just now that...you were going to hug me, tell me bedtime stories and sing to me...to coax me to sleep.”

Shi Luo wiped his nose with a few tissues and mumbled, “Does that offer still stand?”

Yu Sui smiled, “It does. Let’s go.”