Chapter 21 - The first private game.
The person sounded young, and what followed was an abrupt hitch for air. The noise was made in his vicinity, and when You Liangxing raised his head, he happened to see the boy’s back and the lifted suitcase going askew.
The suitcase was not small, one glance was sufficient to determine that it was not light. If it were to drop, the sound of it would startle people even if it did not land on anyone.
Body one step ahead of his mind, You Liangxing responded quickly; he stood behind the boy as one hand reached out to hold onto the suitcase. The boy stilled before he immediately came back to himself, and he pushed his suitcase into the storage compartment with You Liangxing’s aid.
Once the pressure on his hands lightened, the boy let out a breath of relief. Hurriedly, he turned around and bowed his head, saying: “Thank you.”
Although he was not old, he had good manners. And when the boy who was thanking him raised his head, his stature was at least a head shorter than You Liangxing.
You Liangxing immediately understood. It was no wonder that the boy barely managed to support the suitcase when he was trying to put it into the compartment. According to his height, it was estimated that he could only use the strength at his fingertips to push his suitcase in.
Was he even one metre seven... Probably less than that.
The boy had a baby face and his features were delicate and pretty. Upon proper scrutiny, it was apparent that he had dimples and he possessed a smile that was capable of drawing people closer while bringing about an intimate feeling. And since he was busy thanking You Liangxing, it was only later that he managed to get a glimpse of You Liangxing’s visage.
When he saw his face for the first time, the boy froze. He was a little shocked and his expression became a little despondent as a result. He lowered his head again and repeated himself: “Thank you.”
You Liangxing shook his head to hint that ‘there was no need to mention it’ before he returned to his bunk bed to sit down. The boy sat down on the bed opposite of him as he happily stated: “How coincidental!”
His seat was opposite of You Liangxing, and it was also the lower bunk.
The boy was full of smiles and he looked at You Liangxing with glistening eyes and there seemed to be a glint of indescribable ardency within his gaze, such that even You Liangxing found it difficult to tolerate such a stare. Although he was often looked at in school, most of them would either brush past or they would keep their distance while watching. No one was ever blatant enough to stare at him face to face.
You Liangxing lifted his head, and his expression carried a hint of warning. However, he did not expect that after looking at him, the boy would return a blank expression, as if he did not realise that he had done something wrong. Rather, he had the audacity to ask: “What’s the matter?”
Rendered speechless by his reply, You Liangxing concluded that he could only find something to do to deal with the situation after much pondering.
It was still early morning. With every new station, the people who boarded the train came and went. Only a few people were sleeping at this hour and the cabin was relatively noisy. In this sort of environment, games were a viable option.
You Liangxing took out his phone and logged into King’s Glory. Taking his surroundings into consideration, You Liangxing decided to put on his headphones.
The game sound effects coming from his headphones drilled directly into his brain. In the brief instance where he was linking up with the game, the real world seemed to splinter away. You Liangxing followed the prompts to receive the login reward before he hesitated for a few seconds.
What should he play?
Just as he was meditating over it, another prompt popped up on the game interface.
&#k2013;&#k3010;don’t want to move&#k3011;invited you to participate in a party rank queue.
In less than a beat, You Liangxing recalled the name. Last night, before he went offline, he remembered that the person had requested to queue with him as well.
This person, was it a coincidence that they happened to be online?
It was not necessary to think about it too deeply; You Liangxing did not have anything to do at the present moment either. To him, there was no distinction between playing alone and accepting someone else’s invitation to play together. Hence, You Liangxing pressed accept.
–【Little Angel Liang Liang】entered the party lobby.
While You Liangxing was calm and casual when he accepted the invitation, he was completely unaware that on the opposite end of the game, Kang Shengzhe had shot up when he had done so.
Around this time of the day, Kang Shengzhe would usually be asleep, but he was rather uncharacteristic today. In fact, this was the second he had woken up. The first time was because he was too concerned about “The Case of Zhong Kui”, and the reasoning behind his second awakening followed a similar vein. His heart was hung up over the matter, and thus, his eyes were already open despite the early morning.
When he had just woken up, he was completely dispirited. But at this moment, he felt that it completely very worth it. Originally, he only wanted to check if【Little Angel Liang Liang】was online, but who would have thought that not only was she online by sheer coincidence, she had also accepted his game invitation.
It felt a little like an inconceivable dream.
Kang Shengzhe ran his fingers through his hair, brain still a tad bit muddled. In the party lobby, he typed: — We’re queuing?
The question was somewhat weird; he was the one who sent the invite, and he even had to ask if they were going to start the game. You Liangxing felt some puzzlement but he replied: — Start it.
To Kang Shengzhe, these two simple words were very unusual.
Prior to this, he never had a ordinary and direct conversation with You Liangxing. While You Liangxing had went off at him like a sonic boom the first time around, it was something that he said in a fit of anger and it could not be considered as a two-sided communication.
When he suddenly saw the words that You Liangxing typed, Kang Shengzhe was still a few parts sluggish and it took him a few seconds to adjust to the given reality: he was currently playing a game with Little Angel Liang Liang.
The two of them, in a duo queue.
They really became a team, out of nowhere...
Kang Shengzhe was so amused by his own delayed reaction that it made him laugh gently. To redeem himself, he quickly tapped on the voice channel’s listening function but he hesitated when it came to turning on his microphone. Seeing that You Liangxing only chose to listen in, he aborted his action and kickstarted the matchmaking queue instead.
Little Angel Liang Liang was probably the type who did not like to talk. Since she did not like to talk, it would be slightly rude if he started chattering away on his own.
Speaking of which, the first time he met Little Angel Liang Liang belonged to one of those special situations. Back then, he was in the middle of broadcasting, and he had to liven up the atmosphere in the broadcasting room. In contrast, they were in a private duo queue now, and there was no requirement to speak. Thus, Kang Shengzhe had no intention of speaking first.
Maintaining the necessary dialogue to text while the both of them remained quiet, that was perfectly fine by him.
When they entered the hero selection screen in game, You Liangxing chose the marksman Gong Sunli and Kang Shengzhe picked the auxiliary and tank Zhuang Zhou. When the game started, he typed: — I’ll support you.
The marksman and support have always laned together so You Liangxing had no opinions about the arrangement. He manipulated the pretty, bunny eared little girl to walk down the bottom lane with Zhuang Zhou. Meanwhile, the hero Zhuang Zhou was mounted on his big fish and his movement speed was faster than Gong Sunli’s. In less than two seconds, he was walking in front of the marksman.
As they were walking, Zhuang Zhou suddenly stopped and waited for You Liangxing to close up the gap before setting off together again. The two heroes walked shoulder to shoulder, and sometimes their figures would overlap as if they were as inseparable as body and shadow.
But You Liangxing was not paying attention to such details. Rather, he was more focused on their opponents, specifically the enemy hero Hua Mulan, with whom he would be laning against. Once they reached the tower, Zhuang Zhou separated from Gong Sunli to enter brushes and squatted in the bush that was closer to enemy’s side.
The two opposing minion lines came into conflict with another at the bottom lane. As You Liangxing cleared out the minions, Zhuang Zhou continued to stay in the bushes without moving. Although they did not communicate, both of them knew what the routine was.
One would stay in the light while the other was in the dark. They would wait for Hua Mulan to come out before Zhuang Zhou would obstruct her escape route and they would attack her from both sides.
It was a common tactic to employ and the enemy Hua Mulan was aware of it as well. Before she went forward to clear the minion line, she walked into the bushes to check it first, only to immediately come to blows with Zhuang Zhou when she entered and met him.
You Liangxing was a little far away from them, and even though he possessed a gap closer, it still required him to walk for a few seconds before he could reach them. In the fight between Hua Mulan and Zhuang Zhou, the former retreated. And despite Gong Sunli’s best efforts to follow up, the enemy Hua Mulan had already backed into her tower’s range.
If they wanted to kill Hua Mulan, it was a little too late for that.
You Liangxing stopped in front of the tower. Although he did not give chase, he felt some surprise in his heart. Since the game had just started, both sides were only level one. However, in a short moment’s work, Zhuang Zhou had beaten Hua Mulan back and reduced her to half her health. If it was not for the fact that Hua Mulan was too close to her tower, You Liangxing had no doubts that Zhuang Zhou would have killed Hua Mulan on his lonesome.
This person’s rank was definitely higher than Liao Su’s.
As he was thinking, Zhuang Zhou rushed towards the enemy tower despite the lack of minions in front of him to take the tower aggression. He chased after Hua Mulan, refusing to allow her to go. It was obvious that he had no intention of retreating, and he was determined to take the enemy down in this exchange. Without any hesitation, You Liangxing followed up and ran towards the enemy Hua Mulan who was under the tower to auto attack her. Meanwhile, Zhuang Zhou remained at the boundary of tower’s attack range, only responsible for resisting the tower. In a relaxed manner, You Liangxing took Hua Mulan’s head.
— First Blood!
Zhuang Zhou moved back as the notification sounded. Although the enemy’s defensive tower had shot him down to only strip of health, it did not kill him. You Liangxing used his ability to jump out of tower range and he hadn’t received a single hit. Between the two of them, there were zero casualties when they drew first blood.
Their teammates issued signals at them in game.
— Well Done!
In fact, throughout the entire exchange, no difficult operations were required, and it all depended on their excellent timing.
Had You Liangxing hesitated for even a second just now, it was very likely that Hua Mulan would have escaped with her life while Zhuang Zhou would have fallen due to the tower’s continuous shots. However, just as it happened, the pair cooperated well and took the kill by force even though they were only level one.
You Liangxing was speechless, and【don’t want to move】did not say type anything either. After replenishing his health at the fountain, he returned back to lane and they began a series of pushes that had such great momentum, and their enemies were hard pressed to resist.
The bottom lane was directly pushed to the last enemy tower in the lane, and whenever an enemy came calling, they would kill them. Even though the enemy jungler and mage came to provide support, the ones who were forced to retreat was not You Liangxing or Zhuang Zhou. In the end, their teammates converged on them to help out as well, and the bottom lane behind enemy lines had an outbreak of a large-scale team fight. Six minutes into the game, their opponents surrendered.
When the opponent’s crystal nexus shattered, You Liangxing, who had been engrossed and busy throughout, finally noticed the results of the game.
Gong Sunli was the MVP, and the Zhuang Zhou he queued with took the gold medal for his assistance. Looking at the results, You Liangxing went 11-0-5 while Zhuang Zhou had a KDA of 2-2-13. When they were put together, they accounted for ninety percent of the kills in the game.
Their teammates simultaneously gave their praises. The number of thumbs up that was behind You Liangxing’s in-game name rose to four, and after a while, his teammates’ avatar went dark one by one. Only then, did You Liangxing returned back to his reverie.
... Too fast.
This was not the first time You Liangxing played the game, nor was it the first time he had cooperated with someone to play the game. Furthermore, he had an inkling that the opponents’ skill level was not low, and they should not have been beaten back like this.
However, there was no changing the results. You Liangxing had no explanation for it, but at that moment, he felt.... Very happy.
T/N: It wasn’t quite KK, but it technically counts since he showed up right? x)