The King's Avatar

Panda Novel

Culture Square, one of City S’s famous shopping areas. The giant open-air screen hanging on the outside of the north building was far more spectacular than any screen hanging inside a Glory stadium.

And right now, this screen that had become a symbol of the city was currently playing the highlights from last night’s match between Samsara and Happy.

Ten years ago, this would have been unimaginable. At that time, even though esports had already developed to a certain extent, it still didn’t attract much attention, and it was still far from mainstream. But today, clips from the finals would be played in a public city square. It seemed like Samsara had become the pride of city S. Because of Samsara, so many people in this city were now concerned about the Glory finals.

Of the people passing through this square, perhaps some would stop in their tracks and watch for a while, perhaps some would just spare a glance before continuing to walk. Some were paying close attention to these matches, some didn’t know much, but if someone were to say that they didn’t even know what this was, then they would certainly earn some disdainful looks.

Glory was no longer just the glory of the players, the teams, or the fans. It was now the glory of an entire city. And the weight of the hopes carried by the players and teams was greater than ever before.

“What a shame, if we won yesterday, we would have had three straight championships!”

Tang Rou heard the man standing ahead of her speaking regretfully.

“Yeah, too bad!” The person standing next to him was sighing as well.

Tang Rou had been standing here for a while. She knew that these two hadn’t known each other beforehand, but because they had both paused to watch and happened to be standing next to each other, they began a discussion.

Tang Rou could tell that these two weren’t Glory players. Their dialogue was full of that half-understanding, hearsay, exaggerated public opinions.

But from start to finish, the word they used was: we.

These two people weren’t Glory players at all, but they were still paying attention to this match, they still felt a strong connection to their city’s team, they still held high hopes for the championship. This was the best evidence of Glory’s ever-expanding presence and influence.

Tang Rou smiled.

Even though these people supported the opposing side, she deeply appreciated this attitude. She herself had started as an indifferent passerby, gradually investing more in all of this. Even in the beginning, she hadn’t even felt that Glory was all that interesting. All she wanted to do was become a bit stronger, and then defeat that guy who’d forced her to lose over a dozen games in a row.

But now?

It’d been a while since she’d cared about that. Now, she aimed for a larger goal than defeating Ye Xiu.

Like all of the other pro players, she yearned for victory. She hoped to win the championship.

Was this because she always strove to outdo others?

Maybe a little! But if she only cared about that, then perhaps her vision would have remained fixed on Ye Xiu. But now, when she looked at Ye Xiu, she thought about how to better cooperate with him, and then achieve victory together.

This was no longer simply a desire to outdo others. There was another feeling quietly growing in her heart. She no longer fought just for her individual interest. She now had things she was carrying upon her back. Her teammates, the fans, and those like the two people in front of her now, who didn’t understand the game, but still drew pride from it.

It was a bit unfortunate that she hadn’t gone onstage yesterday. But the team had won, and that was more important than anything. Right now, this was Tang Rou’s truest feeling.

“The championship is ours!” Tang Rou suddenly shouted. Without waiting for everyone’s eyes to land upon her, she spun around and left.

Everyone paused. The match displayed on this massive screen was quite exciting, but for them, for this city, it felt a bit oppressive.

Because in yesterday’s match, victory did not belong to them. Victory had gone to Team Happy. Right now, everyone was gathered here and watching this match, but their minds had already gone to the next match. They were looking forward to victory in the next round, and then, they would have the championship.

The championship is ours!

This sentence truly expressed the sentiment in everyone’s hearts. Even though it came out so suddenly, catching everyone off-guard, soon they were set aflame by the passion in this simple statement.

“Yes, the championship is ours!” Someone echoed the shout, and then, more and more, more and more. In this square, whether or not they understood Glory, as long as they knew this competition, they hoped for the championship, and they joined in this shouting.

Only those senior players who were very familiar with the Glory competition found the short-haired silhouette leaving the crowd. They were stunned.

“That girl… Wasn’t that Happy’s Tang Rou?” someone said.

“You’re saying, this year’s rookie king, Tang Rou?”

“The Tang Rou who promised to retire after failing a 1v3, but backed out?”

“That really pretty Tang Rou?”

More and more sets of eyes looked in that direction. Tang Rou walked farther and farther away, but everyone believed more and more, this was indeed Tang Rou.

“So, what she shouted just now…” someone suddenly realized.

“So that ‘ours’ was referring to Happy?” They were instantly dumbfounded.

And right now, the good citizens of City S in the square were currently shouting “the championship is ours” in a surge of public feeling. Thinking about how this “ours” was actually referring to Happy made them all sorts of uncomfortable.

But how could they explain it now? And even if they could, so what? Were they not allowed to use the word “ours”?

Tang Rou shouted “ours,” we’ll shout “ours,” and the “ours” that we’re shouting refers to Samsara. Everyone understood this clearly.

After getting this point clear, these loyal Samsara fans had nothing more to worry about. They would simply accept this mistake and make the best of it, shouting along with everyone: the championship is ours!

The shouts grew louder and louder, but Tang Rou didn’t look back. She strolled along the road, all the way back to the hotel.

Heading upstairs, she saw Ye Xiu hanging around in the hallway, smoking. When he saw her, he waved.

“Where’d you go?” he asked casually.

“I just took a walk,” said Tang Rou.

“Oh. Good luck tomorrow!” No moving, sensational encouragement. Ye Xiu simply said this offhand sentence to Tang Rou.

“Tomorrow?” Yet Tang Rou still found a fault in his words.

“More good luck for the day after,” said Ye Xiu calmly.

“Haha,” Tang Rou laughed, without saying anything. But then, she noticed that the room Ye Xiu was headed toward didn’t seem to be his own room.

“Where are you going?” she asked, curious.

“Some kids wanted some data, I’m bringing it to them,” said Ye Xiu.

In Happy, aside from Wei Chen, Ye Xiu would casually call everyone “kids.” Tang Rou didn’t know who he was referring to, but she saw him walk into Luo Ji’s room.

Now that her curiosity had been piqued, Tang Rou followed. In Luo Ji’s room, he, Qiao Yifan, and An Wenyi were all circled around one computer.

“Here.” Ye Xiu held out a USB.

Luo Ji accepted it and inserted it into the computer. He soon found what he was looking for and pulled it up onscreen alongside his own document. He also had his notebook open, covered in writing, and he began theorycrafting with An Wenyi and Qiao Yifan.

Ye Xiu stood to the side, arms folded, smoking, listening very attentively.

Tang Rou hid a smile.

She suspected that, regarding what Luo Ji was explaining right now, even she understood more than Ye Xiu. This kid was once again using his numbers to analyze some probabilities.

But he was speaking too in-depth. A formula here, a derivation there, An Wenyi and Qiao Yifan looked as confused as Steamed Bun.

Finally, Ye Xiu could take it no longer. He finally moved, and pointed to a spot on Luo Ji’s screen. “Take a look here.”

Tang Rou was shocked. The part of the document that he pointed out was the calculation of the characteristic function through a Fourier transform of the probability density function.Ye Xiu was able to understand something that complex? Even she only knew what the words were but, nothing of the details.

After pointing it out, Ye Xiu was already turning around to leave, and he was met with Tang Rou’s shocked expression.

“Another lesson for you,” Ye Xiu said, walking by Tang Rou. “Not just your opponents, you can’t underestimate your teammates either!”

He had already walked past, and Tang Rou could only continue to stare wide-eyed at his retreating back. But then, from behind her, she heard Luo Ji ask: “What’s wrong here?”

“There’s a bit of dirt there,” said Ye Xiu, walking out of the room.

“Oh oh!” Luo Ji hurriedly pulled out his glasses cloth and rubbed at that spot on his screen.

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