Chapter 144 – Back and Forth
The two began fighting. What made Tang Rou even more astonished was that her opponent was actually going all out. He was actually using the style he had used yesterday in the fight with Ye Xiu. Unpredictable and extremely fast, his swift movements alone already made it hard for Tang Rou.
And these swift movements naturally meant that the camera had to be adjusted quickly. For new players like Tang Rou, who didn’t yet have enough experience, this was a dead end. Wang Jiexi’s ever-changing combat style made it so that Tang Rou had no way of resisting. This was the difference between a top-tier God and a new player. No suspense. No openings. Defeat in 27 seconds!
This was the time that Ye Xiu had estimated.
Tang Rou finally realized how amazing the fight between Fiery Blaze and Lord Grim was.
Extremely strong. So strong that it made others speechless.
At this moment, Tang Rou recalled the scene where Ye Xiu and her had first fought. Repeatedly fighting against such a strong opponent was completely meaningless. The gap between the two sides was way too wide, so much so that she had no way of knowing what went wrong.
Tang Rou silently sat in the field, quietly looking at her Soft Mist.
The world really is large. She once thought that Glory was so simple. But from Ye Xiu and now these players, who could easily deal with her, she now understood that these were the true experts. She pitied her past self, who, after helping Chen Guo beat those unbeatable opponents, believed herself to be extremely amazing. Now that she looked at it, it really felt like was looking at the sky from the bottom of a well.
“Do you want to go again?” Her opponent’s voice suddenly interrupted her train of thought.
“Again?” Tang Rou stared blankly.
“Yeah.”
“There’s no point, right? The gap’s too wide.” Tang Rou said.
“The gap is only temporary. You have a lot of potential!” Wang Jiexi said.
“Thank you.” Tang Rou chuckled. It didn’t matter if her opponent was only doing it to comfort her, it was still a polite compliment, so she wouldn’t be impolite back.
“Do you have any interest in playing in the Pro Alliance?” Wang Jiexi suddenly said.
“Pro Alliance?”Tang Rou stared blankly.
“Right, the Pro Alliance.”
“Oh, so you guys were pro players!” Tang Rou said.
“Correct. We’re Team Tiny Herb. If you really are interested, then right now I want to give you a serious invite. An invite for you to come to our Club for a trial.” Even though Wang Jiexi was the team captain, he still didn’t have the authority to manage the Club’s players. No matter how good of a talent he saw, he could only do his best and give a recommendation to the Club. The Club might listen attentively to his recommendation, but the power to recruit and kick players wasn’t his. No Club’s team captain had that authority.
Team Tiny Herb? What was that? Tang Rou was puzzled for a bit. Her knowledge of the Pro Alliance was extremely shallow. The last match she saw was the first match she had completely watched from start to finish. She felt that she might have heard of Tiny Herb’s name, but she truly couldn’t think of where she had heard it from. She obviously knew that asking such a question was extremely impolite, so she calmly replied: “Thank you, but I don’t think there’s a need to.”
“What?” Wang Jiexi stared blankly. He hadn’t thought that this girl would actually reply so calmly like that. She had even refused too. Pro Alliance! These two words were already enough to make any Glory fan go mad. Entering the Pro Alliance was something many Glory players could only dream of. And to be personally invited by the Champion Team Tiny Herb’s captain, that was something that had never happened before. But in the first time that it had happened, it had been rejected neither softly nor strongly.
For a while, Wang Jiexi had no idea how to respond to Tang Rou’s reply.
“I’m very happy with the way things are right now, so I don’t want that to change.” Tang Rou at least explained her reasoning.
“What ….. type of life are you living?”
“A little sister at the Internet Cafe.” Tang Rou laughed. Although she didn’t mean to listen in on other people’s conversations, she had the title that Ye Xiu gave her yesterday.
“Internet Cafe waitress…..” Wang Jiexi was even more speechless. How could this type of life compare to a pro-player?
‘Okay. You’ve already beaten me, so you can go and duel him. I’ll be in this room, so have your other teammates come!” Tang Rou said.
“You…….. fighting like this with us. For what purpose?” Wang Jiexi avoided saying the reality that she was being repeatedly crushed by them.
“In order to improve, so I can be a better player!” Tang Rou said.
“And after you become a better player?” Wang Jiexi asked.
“After? Even better then. What else is after?” Tang Rou said.
This girl’s thinking wasn’t in the same line as his……. Wang Jiexi felt hard-pressed. The girl in front of him had excellent mental toughness. Her hand speed and mechanical skill weren’t bad either. He could even say that her hardware was all there, but her software was still lacking. Ye Qiu’s perception really was incredible. She was a truly hard to come by talent. For their team’s young talent Gao Yingjie, his mechanical skill was there and his skill level was constantly rising, but his mental toughness was entirely lacking.
Mental toughness. This was a large problem not only for Glory, but other eSports too.
This was all because the average age of eSports pro-players was relatively low. For example, youths such as Gao Yingjie could already enter the pro-scene, but they hadn’t completely matured yet and their mentality was still far from mature adults. Even for those top eSports players, most of them were around 20 years old. Impatience among eSports players was extremely prominent.
Wang Jiexi had already noticed this girl called Tang Rou the other day. She had lost ten times in a row. In addition, she had been beaten every time without a shred of mercy. But in her eleventh match against him, she was still the same as before, calm and unhurried. He didn’t see any sign of irritation or discouragement. All he saw from her was effort, effort, and more effort.
Wang Jiexi was amazed. Today, when he privately asked his teammates, no one had a big impression of her and no one had thought of recording their fights against her. Only under Wang Jiexi’s urge did some teammates just barely recall their fights with her, confirming his judgement towards Tang Rou.
She was definitely a promising talent!
Ye Qiu was clearly aware of this and had even begun training her. But right now, Ye Qiu was an already retired pro-player and could only act as a temporary tutor. If he was able to officially invite her over, wouldn’t he be able to snatch her?
Who knew that when he tried to invite her, she would actually reply calmly in such a way. Wasn’t such stubbornness a bit too excessive?
“Can….. you reconsider it? If you change your mind, come find me at any time.” At this moment, Wang Jiexi didn’t want to force her. He found that he was a bit too hot-headed this time. He should have at least understood the other side’s background first.
But honestly speaking, Wang Jiexi couldn’t be blamed. Who would think that a Glory player wouldn’t respond to being invited by a pro team? Even if this player was new to the game.
“I will. Thank you.” Tang Rou was still as polite as ever.
Wang Jiexi was just about to leave, when someone suddenly entered the room. After Liu Fei lost, Tiny Herb’s next team member arrived.
Wang Jiexi looked and went back into the spectator’s seats to see this match.
“Go ahead, Yifan.” Wang Jiexi sent a message.
The player who had just arrived was Qiao Yifan. Seeing his captain in the room, he felt baffled. After hearing his command, he immediately entered the field. He greeted Tang Rou and then the two began fighting.
For this match, Wang Jiexi looked a bit absent-minded. Although Qiao Yifan was an official team member of Tiny Herb, Wang Jiexi was more focused on Tang Rou.
For a new player to be able to compete with a pro-player and even make it difficult for the pro-player, that made Wang Jiexi sigh with praise. At the same time, he couldn’t help but feel unsatisfied with Qiao Yifan.
This team member was without a doubt the weakest player of the team. It could even be said that his skill level wasn’t enough to be a member of a Champion team. Even if he went to the Alliance’s weakest team, it would still be difficult to say if he could be a part of the main roster.
He had been in the team for so long. The others had all grown, but he hadn’t shown the slightest signs of improvement. He always looked like one of those people who always had their hands and feet bound together, constantly looking backwards. If he never looked ahead, what prospects did he have?
Even though he didn’t have the power over the players’ positions as a team captain, his suggestions still held quite a lot of weight in the Club. Wang Jiexi already couldn’t see any value in keeping Qiao Yifan in the team. He also knew that the kid was having a hard time meshing with the team. Perhaps if he wasn’t in a Champion team and in some other no-pressure mid-tier team, he might be able to make some progress?
The match had been fought for nearly three minutes and still hadn’t ended yet. Tiny Herb’s next team member impatiently ran over to see what was going on. In the end, Qiao Yifan still won. Although he was a small character that was ignored, for a new player like Tang Rou, he was still a strong existence.
Seeing how his captain had watched the entire match, Qiao Yifan felt terrified. He knew that the way he had played definitely wasn’t good. Just from the amount of time it took him, who in the team needed even close to three minutes to finish the opponent?
“Yifan, hurry up!” The team member, who had just arrived, urged him. Qiao Yifan was slow here, but it would be a quick fight against Lord Grim. After urging Qiao Yifan out, the team member immediately began fighting with Tang Rou, in order to hurry up and fight Lord Grim.
In Ye Xiu’s room, Qiao Yifan silently entered. Besides Gao Yingjie, who cheered him on, no one else gave any sort of encouragement to him. It looked like everyone had already determined that he didn’t belong in the team and had already stopped considering him as a member.
Qiao Yifan had gotten used to this long ago. He simply sucked in a deep breath and then entered the field.
“Oh, it’s you!” On the field, Ye Xiu greeted Qiao Yifan.
“Ah…… me…….” Qiao Yifan didn’t know what to say.
It’s you…… This implied that his opponent acknowledged him. When had he ever felt like he existed? And it was in God Ye Qiu’s eyes too. He was the same as captain, an almost godly person!
“You’re the one in your team that uses an Assassin, right?” Ye Xiu asked.
“Yeah.”
“Has anyone ever suggested that you switch classes?” Ye Xiu said.
“Never.”
“What class did you originally play?” Ye Xiu asked.
“Originally…..” That was so long ago. What class did he play before being on Tiny Herb? Qiao Yifan wasn’t able to recall. He only knew that after he joined, the Club tossed a retired player’s Assassin account card to him. And from then on, he used an Assassin. He had never went out on stage in any match before. Besides Gao Yingjie, no other team member ever asked to train with him. The tech department never made any self-made equipment for an Assassin to use. He truly became an Assassin, lonely and invisible.
“The Assassin isn’t a class that lets you use your full potential.” Ye Xiu said.
“Ah? Potential?” Qiao Yifan felt that this was a new word to him.
“Try out a Ghostblade! A Phantom Demon that mainly uses Phantom Ghosts to support the team.” Ye Xiu said.