Though Lu Sicheng’s arrow had cost Tong Yao 400 gold, the advantage that action brought to the mid lane was still there. While C’s mid was waiting to respawn, a wave of minions moved towards the other side’s outer turret and he couldn’t farm any of them, missing the chance to develop. Tong Yao seized the opportunity to stunt his growth.
In the end, ZGDX defeated Team C with their bot carrying the game. The win calmed the nerves of fans across the Pacific.
After the match, amidst the cheering of the audience, the commentators also got quite excited---
Commentator D: What a match! LPL has shown us what they can do. We seem to be watching those excellent LPL AD players from S2. That year, they brought tremendous pressure and fear to the other regions!
Commentator D: I can still remember the names of those players’ id. Ah, haha! They were the ones who inspired me to commentate for the LPL competitions in the past four years.
Commentator F: LPL has produced a lot of top ADs. But in the past couple of years, their performance has been unsatisfactory. On the other hand, the AD players from LCK and LCS regions are much better.
Commentator D: You just can’t leave your beloved LCS players out of this. Ah, but that’s fine. I hope this match will be the bugle sounding before dawn…
Commentator F: What?
Commentator D stood up and waved his arms to shout on top of his lung: They’ve come back! Those excellent ADs from LPL, welcome back!!!
His excitement invigorated the audience. The audience also stood up in waves to shout: “LPL” ---
ZGDX players started to take their headphones off and the first thing they heard was the excited shouting of the initials of their league, as if they were playing in their home court…… They were baffled, but stood up to walk over to shake hands with the Taiwanese players--Tong Yao didn’t know what the commentators had said to arouse the audience to this degree…… She heard the other team’s mid mentioning Ashe’s arrow at the beginning of the game. He grabbed Lu Sicheng’s hand and said with a smile: “That shot was awesome, right on target, did you calculate it? It was unbeatable, I was stunned.”
Lu Sicheng modestly said: “Thank you.”
Tong Yao: .........
Tong Yao thought: all you remembered was that arrow? What about me? Me? The accurate calculation, the tricky angle, and the perfect casting of abilities in a combo had frightened you-- --What about me? !
After shaking hands with their Taiwanese friends, the ZGDX players walked to the front of the stage as usual and bowed to the cheering audience. Then they went back to their own seats to check the stats and packed up their equipment. Tong Yao sat down to check the stats; Lu Sicheng had 11 kills, 1 death, 5 assists and she had 4 kills, 4 deaths, 12 assists. His numbers looked much more grand than hers.
She recalled the last few team fights. Ashe stayed at the back of the team and dealt lots of damage to the enemy while the teammates at the front had all died. Ashe was still at full health. Stepping over the bodies of his teammates, Ashe was able to ace the enemy and had triple-kill twice…… The second time he got a triple-kill, Tong Yao was waiting to respawn and had looked up at the audience. Many people had stood up in the audience and were shouting something in excitement…… Probably just like they were doing right now---
They were shouting the game id of the AD god in their minds---
“Chessman.”
It was as if there was only one carry position in ZGDX all along. What was more amazing was that they weren't playing a 4 protect 1 game at all.
…She had a lot of envy and a little bit of jealousy.
She wanted to be like him, one day……
Tong Yao stood up, somewhat bewildered. She was uneasy about her own thoughts. She felt that it was dangerous for her to think that way. The man walking ahead of her was the pillar of Team ZGDX, how could she be thinking of surpassing him someday?
Tong Yao was lost in thought and suddenly figured out the meaning of what Lu Sicheng said to her last night, “You’d be better off begging me than trying to find a master.” She controlled her urge to beat up the man and rushed to catch up with him: “Lu Sicheng, I’m disheartened.”
Lu Sicheng didn’t even look back: “What’s wrong?”
Tong Yao reached over to clutch the hem of Lu Sicheng’s clothes: “I suddenly realize that you’re a heartless person.”
Lu Sicheng slowed down a little and curved his lips up: “What?”
The cheering from the audience was still loud and clear. Tong Yao paused for a moment before saying: “Yesterday you fed me kills, even a quadra-kill. It was like a couple in their love bubble, anything I said was good and you would accommodate me. But today, you snatched the kill right from me, turned against me. It’s like you’re trying to tell me that if one day you no longer love me anymore, I’ll starve to death and you won’t even give me a sip of hot soup.”
Lu Sicheng laughed.
In the beginning, Tong Yao was joking. But towards the end, she started to feel uneasy. Even though she felt that she was being childish and fussing over something trivial, she still tightly tugged his clothes and frowned: “What are you laughing about? I’m serious.”
The passageway to the backstage was a little narrow. Little Fatty was walking right ahead of them. Lu Sicheng slowed down, so he and Tong Yao began to fall behind their teammates. When Tong Yao tugged at his clothes, Lu Sicheng suddenly stopped and turned around. Amidst the loud cheering of “Chessman” “Chessman” “Chessman”, he held onto Tong Yao’s shoulder, bent over to kiss her knitted eyebrows, and quietly and gently said: “That’s easy to take care of. I’ll just love you for your whole life.”
The noise surrounding her seemed to have disappeared all of a sudden.
Tong Yao was taken aback---Has he ever made such a promise to her before?
It didn’t seem like he had.
Lu Sicheng released her and straightened up, his big hand picked up her hand.
The two walked forward, shoulder to shoulder. Tong Yao didn’t know when it had started but now Lu Sicheng knew to slow down so his steps could match the short legs next to him. Tong Yao pinched his fingers: “What about when I’m old and ugly?”
“I don’t know what gave you the impression that it was your beauty that won me over.” Lu Sicheng stopped for a while, his fingers starting to hurt: “I’m older than you by 5 years. When you’re old and ugly, I’ll be even older.”
“A model answer would be: You’ll always look beautiful in my mind no matter how old you are.”
“Oh.”
“But a whole life is too long. Captain, you’re just saying that.”
“How long can it be?” Lu Sicheng, with his eyelashes covering his dark brown pupils, unassumingly said: “Play competitions, retire, marry you--The exact sequence of events can be switched according to the actual situation---Have a daughter, then a son---Watch League of Legends shut down, carry backpacks for the children--Watch the children grow up, get married--Then we get old--One day, I’ll stand at your funeral describing your glorious life; counting how many games you’d carried and how many Koreans you’d made cry when you were young. Then I’ll carve “This woman was beautiful all her life, I love her” on your tombstone…… See, a whole life is just as short as that. Why would you feel it’s long?”
Tong Yao:.........
Tong Yao turned her head slightly, with her mouth slightly open and looked at the man next to her dumbfounded. It’s impossible that this man majored in law, he must be a Chinese language and literature major?
Otherwise, how could he be this good at phrasing words?
Listening to him describe the possible life they would have in such a calm and slow tone of voice made Tong Yao feel like crying. Not only had she gotten over the uneasy feeling that developed when Lu Sicheng took her kill from her. Now she was willing to feed him all the kills for the rest of her life.
Just like Little Fatty would feed Lu Sicheng.
With just a few words, Lu Sicheng had turned Tong Yao, the mid, into a support.
“Then,” Tong Yao had collected herself enough to speak again, her voice was a little hoarse: “Why do you think you would die after me?”
“Because a scourge lives for thousands of years.”
“Lu Sicheng.”
The two had arrived in front of the break room; they could faintly hear the voices of Old Cat and Little Fatty chatting inside. Lu Sicheng stopped at the door, resting his hand on the door knob: “You would be spoiled by me for most of your life. If I died before you, what would happen to you since you can’t take care of yourself by then? I’ve decided to take care of you for the rest of your life, I certainly have to be responsible for you all the way to the end, including your funeral. You’re such a high maintenance person, even when you’re older you’ll still be a demanding old lady. Obviously, you’ll be picky about your own funeral, no one, except me, would……”
Before Lu Sicheng could finish, Tong Yao had stretched her arms out and tightly embraced him around his waist. Her eyes were reddish, her facial expression, if it could be seen, showed that she was head over heels over him……
Tong Yao: “I was wrong.”
Lu Sicheng: “Why is that?”
Tong Yao: “I was jealous of you.”
Lu Sicheng laughed: “Oh.”
Tong Yao closed her eyes and pressed the tip of her nose to Lu Sicheng’s chest: “You’re all mine. Why should I be jealous of something I own? It’s ridiculous.”
Lu Sicheng patted her: “It’s a good thing. You’ve started to ponder how to surpass me to become the high achiever of the team, just like that kid, Dubhe, who’s energetic and motivated. It’s a comforting thing for you to think that way, at least better than having all of you always thinking of letting me carry the game so you can win without putting in any effort. When that day finally comes, I’ll be very glad. I’m getting old, sometimes I would also like to win a game without putting in much effort.”
Tong Yao looked up: “Really?”
He looked down to meet her eyes and smiled: “Really.”
Little Fatty opened the door and saw his team’s mid was holding their AD like he was a treasure.
Little Fatty was amused: “Yo ho, what’s going on here? Just ten minutes ago, didn’t our mid want to split up with our bot…… Why are you embracing him like he’s precious now? You aren’t going to break up with him? You aren’t going to avenge that 400 gold now?”
Lu Sicheng patted the back of Tong Yao who was buried in his chest.
He suddenly felt the arms around him tighten even more.
Lu Sicheng looked up and glanced over at Little Fatty with a spurious smile: “Aren’t I always precious to her?” Then he lowered his head to ask the person in his arms: “Right?”
Little Fatty rolled his eyes. He figured this man must have played some evil tricks on her…… With a cold shiver, Little Fatty stepped aside to let the two walk in the break room like conjoined twins so they wouldn’t be standing in the hallway and become an eyesore for the other teams.
Note:
Credits to Team DHH at http://dhh-workshop.blogspot.com
For translating this novel.