Tong Yao stood up, looking hesitant and nervous as she tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "But I want to sleep," she said.
As soon as the words left her mouth, a commotion erupted behind her—
Little Fatty: "She rejected Cheng Ge! She actually rejected Cheng Ge!"
Old Cat: "She won’t duo with Cheng Ge. She doesn’t want to win."
Old K: "She turned down an invite from the carry and a chance to climb back to Challenger."
Lu Sicheng paused for a moment before replying, "Eat and then sleep? Are you a pig?"
"Girls shouldn’t stay up late. You wouldn’t understand," Tong Yao said seriously.
"No girl just eats and then sleeps."
"What do you know about girls?"
"Oh."
Lu Sicheng glanced at Tong Yao before turning back to his screen, clicking into the solo queue interface to begin matchmaking—at the start of 2016, League of Legends had introduced the role selection system, where players could choose their primary and secondary preferred roles before queuing for ranked matches. This allowed the system to better match players into balanced teams based on their selected roles.
Lu Sicheng’s primary role was, of course, ADC; his secondary was Jungler.
Tong Yao stood beside him for a while before commenting, "You’re queuing as Jungler secondary? Then let’s duo tomorrow. If you get assigned Jungle, we can pull off some Mid-Jungle synergy."
Just then, Ming Shen, the former Mid Laner of ZGDX Team, strolled into the room with a pancake in his mouth and his hands stuffed in his pockets. Hearing her words, he chuckled. "You want to do Mid-Jungle synergy with our Cheng Ge?"
"What?" Tong Yao, still traumatized from Little Fatty’s antics, immediately turned her head. "Is this another one of those ‘ZGDX Team’s bot lane never duos’ kind of stories?"
"You’ll find out tomorrow when you try," Ming Shen said with a knowing smile, patting her shoulder. "Goodnight."
"……"
With a heart full of unease, Tong Yao picked up her cat Da Bing and headed back to her room to sleep.
That night, she had a nightmare. In it, she and Lu Sicheng duo-queued all day, only to drop from "Grandmaster" all the way down to "Diamond I." Enraged by the endless losing streak, Lu Sicheng grabbed a pillow and smothered her face with it, then wrapped his hands around her neck—
"Ugh… ugh…!"
Tong Yao woke up struggling, spitting out cat fur from her mouth. It turned out that Da Bing, with his terrible sleeping habits, had somehow rolled all the way from the foot of the bed up to her neck. The hefty cat, weighing nearly ten pounds, was now sprawled horizontally across her throat, his big paws happily pressing against her mouth as he slept soundly.
With a dark expression, Tong Yao pushed the cat away and sat up. Outside the window, dawn had already broken—she had spent the entire night trembling under the tyranny of a nightmare dominated by Lu Sicheng.
After showering and changing into fresh clothes, she went downstairs. It was 9 AM, and the first floor of the team headquarters was empty. Tong Yao turned on the computer and checked Lu Sicheng’s ranked match history, only to find that he had solo-queued until 6:30 AM before finally stopping. He had AFK’d in a few games, and his LP had fluctuated up and down, ultimately leaving him stuck at Diamond I with 20 LP.
"……" Tong Yao glanced upstairs at her teammates’ rooms, all tightly shut. Clearly, those who had pulled all-nighters had only just fallen asleep.
—Just another day in the life of Internet addicts.Tong Yao yawned and opened a can of food for Da Bing, who was closely following at her feet. Amidst the sound of the cat munching away, she turned and headed into the kitchen, opening the fridge to see if there was anything to feed herself... Just then, the housekeeping aunt hired by the team headquarters came in through the door, locking eyes with Tong Yao, who was squatting in front of the empty fridge, dumbfounded—
Awkward silence ensued.
"Hello there, I haven’t seen you before. Are you one of the players’ girlfriends?"
"No, I’m the new member who joined yesterday."
"Oh my, little girls can play games too?"
The aunt looked amazed as she walked in, putting down the groceries she had just bought. She then used the leftover rice in the rice cooker to make Tong Yao a plate of fried rice with eggs. It was 10:30 in the morning. Tong Yao checked her watch: "Auntie, are you preparing lunch?"
Housekeeping Aunt: "What lunch? These are ingredients for lunch. Those kids just went to bed—how could they have the energy to get up for lunch now... In esports, there’s no such thing as daytime. You should rest after eating too. They won’t wake up until the afternoon, and then you can play games with them."
Tong Yao: "..."
Tong Yao lowered her head and silently devoured the fried rice. After eating, she curled up on the sofa to reassure her family she was safe, then watched some American TV shows on her phone. Finally, it was 12:30 noon.
Tong Yao looked up at the ceiling: "So bored."
Slumped on the sofa, hugging the cat, and facing the empty training room alone, Tong Yao deeply felt just how unrestrained the daily routines of professional esports players were during the off-season...
At 2 PM, the first of the Sleeping Beauties woke up.
Little Fatty, wearing only his underwear, stumbled out of his room in a daze. Leaning over the railing, he suddenly locked eyes with a pair of unblinking stares—one human, one cat. Little Fatty froze, then let out a shriek and scrambled back into his room, slamming the door behind him.
Tong Yao: "???"
Twenty minutes later, a fully dressed Little Fatty came downstairs: "Tong Yao! Why are you up so early!"
Tong Yao glanced at the wall clock in the headquarters, its hands nearly pointing to three. She stroked the cat and said gloomily, "I’ve been awake for almost six hours."
Little Fatty, who was squatting in front of the fridge looking for food, turned to stare at Tong Yao as if she were an alien.
Tong Yao: "...Nice Ultraman underwear."
Little Fatty: "……………………You’re teasing me! I’m telling Rui Ge! I’ll dock your pay!"
...
Old Cat woke up at 3:30.
At 3:45, Old K, who shared a room with Old Cat, also got up.
At 4:30, Lu Sicheng appeared on the first floor of the headquarters, refreshed and with his hair still dripping wet. He propped one foot on the armrest of the sofa and said to the girl curled up watching TV and petting the cat, "Hey."
Tong Yao put down her phone and stood up, tossing Da Bing aside and brushing off the cat hair. The plump cat darted onto Little Fatty’s lap, circled once, and seemed satisfied with the softness before settling down.
Tong Yao started duo-queueing with Lu Sicheng.
...
First game.
Lu Sicheng was assigned the Jungler role. The two entered the game and initially went about their own business harmoniously. But by the seventh minute, just as Tong Yao was locked in a fierce duel with the enemy Mid Laner, she suddenly heard a deep, magnetic male voice beside her: "Want the Blue Buff?"——The so-called "Blue" refers to the "Blue Buff," a type of jungle monster on the map. Killing it grants the killer a buff that increases mana regeneration and reduces skill cooldowns. Generally, although the Blue Buff is a jungle monster, the first one on the map is usually given by the Jungler to the Mid Laner to enhance their laning advantage.
——There’s also a "Red Buff" on the map, serving a similar purpose as the Blue Buff, except killing the Red Buff monster grants the player additional damage... While the Blue Buff belongs to the Mid Laner, the Red Buff is reserved for the ADC.
Both buffs can be obtained either by killing the respective monsters or by killing an enemy player who carries them, transferring the buff to the killer.
Tong Yao: "I want it."
As she spoke, Tong Yao maneuvered her champion toward the Blue Buff monster. But just then, she heard Lu Sicheng say, "Don’t take it."
Tong Yao: "What do you mean ‘don’t take it’? The Blue Buff is the dignity and bottom line of a Mid Laner—"
Before she could finish, a bright light flashed over the Blue Buff monster. Before Tong Yao could reach it, Lu Sicheng used Smite (*a Summoner spell that deals massive damage to jungle monsters, typically carried by the Jungler) to secure the kill.
Tong Yao: "…………"
Lu Sicheng: "Their Mid Laner has it."
Tong Yao: "……………"
Lu Sicheng: "Go take it yourself."
In the end, the game began with Tong Yao, fueled by rage toward her own Jungler, solo-killing the enemy Mid Laner and stealing their Blue Buff. Her teammates seized the momentum, snowballing relentlessly to secure the victory... The moment their team destroyed the enemy headquarters, their Jungler still had the nerve to taunt: "If I hadn’t pushed you, you’d still be farming lazily. You could’ve solo-killed ages ago—did you not want to win?"
Tong Yao: "Shut up."
……
Second game.
Lu Sicheng was assigned the ADC role.
Seven minutes in—the exact same timing as the previous game—Tong Yao leisurely left the mid lane and headed bot, joining Lu Sicheng and their support to create a 3v2 advantage and wipe out the enemy bot lane duo... After the small skirmish, Lu Sicheng, now fat with two kills, happily recalled to base.
But the moment his champion respawned in the fountain, he saw their Mid Laner twist around and dart toward the Red Buff.
Lu Sicheng: "?"
【ZGDX、Chessman is pinging you to retreat】
【ZGDX、Chessman is pinging you to retreat】
【ZGDX、Chessman is pinging you to retreat】
A series of bright yellow exclamation marks lit up near the Red Buff monster, but that didn’t stop Tong Yao from acting deaf and blind as she swiftly used her skills to steal the buff.
Lu Sicheng: "Do you have a death wish?"
Tong Yao: "Their ADC has it."
Lu Sicheng: "..."
Tong Yao: "Go take it yourself."
Lu Sicheng: "..."
In the end, amid Old Cat’s remark of "Cheng Ge, how are you not rage-quitting yet?", the game concluded in 23 minutes because their team had completely steamrolled the enemy bot lane. By the end, their ADC’s stats were 22 kills, 0 deaths, and 3 assists—achieving Godlike multiple times and securing a Penta Kill once—This time, he completed the above actions fueled by anger toward his own Mid Laner.
At the same time, a post popped up on a famous esports forum with the title: [Holy shit holy shit, I just saw Cheng Ge and ZGDX’s new Mid Laner girl duo-queueing in the OB (online broadcast system)!]
The post was instantly pinned with hundreds of replies, filled with excited spectators eagerly waiting for the drama.
……
Meanwhile, Tong Yao and Lu Sicheng started their third game.
This time, Tong Yao pulled out her long-hidden pocket pick—Yasuo, a Champion notorious for dominating low-elo games and earning the title of one of the "Five Champions That Make Teammates Want to Surrender the Moment They’re Picked." Under her control, Yasuo lived up to expectations by achieving a glorious score of 0 kills, 5 deaths, and 0 assists.
Lu Sicheng: "I want to unplug your internet cable."
Tong Yao: "Nooo, wait for me to play safe and scale. I’ll carry late game."
As soon as she finished speaking, her screen turned black—another death.
—In the game, if a player dies repeatedly without contributing kills, their bounty decreases from 300 gold with each death, eventually turning them into a worthless walking ATM. Well, that was Tong Yao right now.
Lu Sicheng: "...Stop feeding."
At the 15-minute mark, after Tong Yao’s screen went dark yet again, Lu Sicheng—who could no longer bear watching his Mid Laner die over and over—abandoned his first Turret in the bot lane and headed mid. After a chaotic teamfight, the Mid Laner with a score of "0/7/0" finally upgraded to "1/7/0" —
Tong Yao: "Yes yes yes, I got a kill! I’m about to pop off!"
Lu Sicheng: "You’re not about to pop off—you just became worth gold again."
Tong Yao: "..."
……
After three games.
Lu Sicheng: "Get out of the car."
Tong Yao: "Was just about to."
The two immediately parted ways, each queuing up solo.
Tong Yao grabbed her phone and silently typed.
A minute later, a new Weibo post appeared on her homepage from "Salty Fish Girl Smiling" —
[Salty Fish Girl Smiling: Officially severed ties with ZGDX, Chessman (=_=)] .
OpenNovel