Translator: Nomyummi Editor: Nomyummi
The first rest day after the match passed just like that. Aside from the review in the afternoon, Happy’s players didn’t gather together. Instead, each did their own thing.
Ye Xiu and Su Mucheng just ate and chatted, treating it like any other day.
Tang Rou took a walk by herself, to keep her mind off things.
Fang Rui and Mo Fan closed themselves in their rooms and didn’t show their faces again.
And Qiao Yifan, An Wenyi, and Luo Ji, these three youths seemed to make the most of their time. Even now, they were still diligently investigating something.
The ones who ended up giving Chen Guo the most worry were Wei Chen and Steamed Bun. After the afternoon review, they left, and she didn’t see them at all after that. She’d said that everyone was free to do their own thing, so of course she felt it would be rude to ask. But as it grew later and later, these two still hadn’t returned, and Chen Guo gripped the phone in her hand, debating whether or not she should call and ask. At the same time, she listened hard for any sound of their return in the hallway.
She would wait ten more minutes. If they still weren’t back in ten minutes, she would ask where they were.
Chen Guo carried this determination, but ten minutes became twenty, and then an hour. By this time, it was already 11:00 at night.
Finally, Chen Guo couldn’t hold back any longer. She picked up her phone, and dialed Wei Chen’s number.
An unfamiliar ringtone sounded, right from the hallway!
They’re back?
Chen Guo didn’t hang up, instead directly rushing out of the room to look.
As expected.
In the hallway, Chen Guo saw Wei Chen and Steamed Bun beaming as they walked along. Because his phone was ringing, Wei Chen was currently feeling around in his pocket. When they saw Chen Guo rush out, the two of them casually greeted her, and then Wei Chen pulled out his phone, and saw who was calling him.
“Looking for me?” Wei Chen asked Chen Guo.
“Oh, I saw that you two still weren’t back, so I wanted to ask,” Chen Guo said, as naturally as she could. She didn’t want them to think of her as a worrisome old woman, even though she did feel much calmer seeing their return.
“Oh, we were just at that Internet café at the corner!” Wei Chen said.
“Why did you two go to an Internet café?” Chen Guo was confused.
“Running a black inn,” said Wei Chen.
“It’s really fun, Boss you should come with us next time!” Steamed Bun enthusiastically invited her.
Chen Guo was speechless. “Running a black inn” was a gaming term for something commonly seen in Internet cafés. To put it simply, a few players would sit together, so that they could see each other’s screens and easily communicate offline. With this advantage, they would be able to reach extremely good coordination, and they would bully their opponents, strangers that had been randomly grouped together.
This kind of behavior wasn’t worthy of being condoned, of course. As a devoted Glory fan, Chen Guo always gave dirty looks to the raucous guests running black inns in her Internet café. She couldn’t drive them out just for doing that, but whenever the Internet café held events, like discount cards, she definitely wouldn’t give these people preferential treatment.
But now, Team Happy, a professional team that had made it to the finals, two of their pro players had actually gone to an Internet café to run a black inn.
Right now, Chen Guo had only one thing to say to them.
“Do you really have to be like this?”
“Ah, if only you could do this during a match, that would be great.” Steamed Bun actually said this, with deep feeling.
Chen Guo glared furiously at Wei Chen. This was definitely all his idea.
“It’s getting late, go to sleep! If we ever have some free time later we can go again.” Wei Chen, completely ignoring her, said goodbye to Steamed Bun.
“Okay okay.” Steamed Bun cheerfully returned to his own room. But Wei Chen looked at Chen Guo, chuckled and said, “You think we’re very low for doing this, don’t you?
“Very much so.” Chen Guo nodded.
“Actually, this is a type of religious practice,” Wei Chen said.
“What do you mean?” Chen Guo asked.
“Next time, you can come along,” Wei Chen said.
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“Oh, okay!” Chen Guo automatically agreed.
Wei Chen smiled, said goodnight, and also returned to his room.
Chen Guo stood there dumbly for another half a minute, and felt like crying.
Morals! Where had her morals gone! What religious practice, this guy was making it up, right? He was just completely and utterly shameless!
Just like that, the first rest day passed by. The second day was also free time for everyone. Because there was no strategy meeting like the review, Chen Guo didn’t even see everyone.
Chen Guo really was very curious as to what everyone was doing, and she really wanted to send a “what’s everyone doing” message to the group chat.
But, restraint!
Chen Guo didn’t want to bother everyone. In her heart, she truly trusted everyone. Even though these Happy players all had different personalities, and some were all sorts of strange, Chen Guo felt that this was a very reliable team. Taking Wei Chen and Steamed Bun running a black inn, for example, Chen Guo believed that it was a sort of religious practice for them, a way for them to relax.
As for staying out so late at night, she’d said she was worried, but it might have been more curiosity.
So Chen Guo restrained herself. She didn’t want her curiosity to ruin everyone’s personal rhythms. If there was anything she wanted to know or ask, she could wait until the day the match ended!
The second day swung past. On the night of the third day would be the final, championship match of this season. And on this day, the team would have a team practice, for the sake of warmup.
And so, in the training room, Chen Guo saw everyone gathered together for the first time since that review meeting.
Nervous!
As the final match approached, Chen Guo couldn’t help but grow more and more nervous. She was scared, she was scared that after everyone had worked so hard for a year, they would miss this final step. That disappointment, that frustration, Chen Guo truly had no idea how to face it.
The team practice lasted for around two hours, but they didn’t interact much. The atmosphere was a bit oppressive, but under this atmosphere, Happy’s players were fully focused. No one said anything to try and relieve this atmosphere. They reached a sort of harmony with the pressure.
Ye Xiu seemed to be very satisfied with this way of handling the situation. After the two-hour team practice ended, he was smiling as he began speaking.
“Is everyone ready?” Ye Xiu asked.
Some nodded, some spoke, it was all in agreement.
“Then, let’s win this!” Ye Xiu said.
Once again, they nodded.
And then, head out! Toward Samsara’s home stadium, toward the final match of this season, Happy stepped onto their final journey.
The stadium was packed starting very early. Even the pro players had entered the stadium very early, and were now waiting patiently for the match’s start.
For the final match, the victory poll had been opened once again, and this time, what caught people’s attention was no longer just the comparison in percentage. This time, the number of people casting votes was incredibly few, far fewer than those of any previous playoffs matches.
This was the final, championship-deciding match. How could people not pay attention?
But to pay attention, and abstain from casting a vote, there was naturally only one explanation: many people didn’t know to whom their vote should go. Aside from those who were firmly biased toward one side, those who were neutral or those relying on logic to analyze the question had no way to predict this match’s outcome.
In the first game, Samsara defeated Happy at Happy’s home stadium. Such a strong performance had instantly destroyed the powerhouse Happy image that had been built up after Happy versus Tyranny. Thus, in the second game’s vote, Samsara completely suppressed Happy.
But then, in the second game, Ye Xiu led Happy by defeating Zhou Zekai in 1v1, and then in the team competition, all sorts of godly performances shook the stage. People found that they had been very wrong in their assessments that Samsara would win for sure.
Happy won in Samsara’s demonic home stadium, breaking Samsara’s perfect home record. Samsara defeated Happy at Happy’s home, and they retaliated by defeating Samsara in their home.
On paper, Samsara’s strength was greater than Happy’s, anyone would admit this. But if Happy once again had this kind of godlike performance?
Happy’s unpredictability caused everyone who wanted to rely on logic to become lost. Right now, everyone wanted to use the phrase that commentator Li Yibo often fell back upon when he couldn’t clearly determine the situation: let’s wait and see.
Wait and see, Glory Pro League Season 10, the championship-deciding final match! Amidst blinding lights and deafening cheers, it began.
The two teams’ players lined up onstage. The curtain was about to close on this season’s journey.
Who would be the champion?
Samsara!!
With the home stadium advantage, Samsara’s fans took the lead in making noise.