Chapter 11 – “Send me 50 million and let me see what you’re capable of.”
[“Wait, am I seeing things right? You little brat, why are you streaming?”]
[“Why do you always go live at such cursed hours? I’m only halfway through my meal here!”]
[“Hold on, isn’t today Tuesday? A workday? Little brat, aren’t you supposed to be training???”]
[“Dear fellow moms and dads in chat, I have a bold theory: our son got kicked out of Monster’s youth training camp because of the insane things he’s been saying these past two days. (confirmed)”]
[“The person above makes sense. I agree.”]
Qi Qiao had just finished pouring hot water into his instant seafood noodles. Carrying the cup back to his desk, he discovered that chat had already started worrying about how he was going to survive after supposedly being kicked out of the academy camp.
[“Baby, why don’t you take better care of yourself? Instant noodles again!”]
[“The little brat got kicked out of the youth training camp. At this rate, he probably won’t even be able to afford instant noodles soon, so be grateful!”]
[“Son, let’s make a deal. Come be my duo partner for hire, and I’ll spoil you with sea cucumber, abalone, and giant lobsters every meal~”]
Qi Qiao moved his mouse and immediately gifted the “dad” and “mom” commenters a nice shiny mute package.
“Instant noodles are convenient.”
“I didn’t get kicked out of the academy camp, so stop spreading rumors.”
“As for duo queueing, sure.”
“Send me 50 million first and let me see what you’re working with.”
Ever since Qi Qiao joined Monster’s youth training team, there had always been a notice pinned on his profile:
No streaming on weekdays.
Normally, the youth training team’s daily training schedule was packed, leaving basically no free time.
But since the season was nearing its end, after yesterday’s scrim session, Monster’s youth training program had relaxed the schedule a bit. Aside from the fixed training sessions at noon and in the afternoon, evenings were now free to arrange however they liked.
Qi Qiao had originally planned to go out and grab some porridge or something.
But after opening Bilibili Live Azure TV and seeing the several hundred streaming hours he still owed, he struggled for less than three seconds before deciding to go live.
After all, he didn’t have much money on him.
If he didn’t stream, he’d be living on air soon enough.
[“Alright then, son, send your WeChat ID to dad. I’ll transfer it!”]
[“The person above is totally going to resell it afterward, hahaha!”]
[“But seriously, little brat, eating instant noodles every day is bad for you. At least buy some eggs and vegetables and cook yourself something.”]
[“Don’t expect too much from Ghost. With hands as clumsy as his, there’s no way he can cook for himself.”]
Qi Qiao raised an eyebrow.
“How are my hands clumsy? I can cook, okay?”
As he spoke, he opened ACR duo ranked mode and sent Wink an invite.
“For example… tomato scrambled eggs, stir-fried pork with green peppers, Kung Pao Chicken… stuff like that.”
[“???”]
[“Damn, somebody ask Wink if he’s ever eaten food made by this little brat.”]
[“Biggest joke of the day: our son can cook tomato scrambled eggs~”]
[“I’m placing an order right now. Fifty million for one serving of Kung Pao Chicken. Make it happen on stream!”]
[“I’ll match another fifty million and order a plate of stir-fried pork strips with green peppers too!”]
[“+1”]
[“+10086”]
Qi Qiao was speechless. Not wanting to keep arguing with them, he immediately started the queue as soon as Wink was ready.
Wink clicked his tongue.
“Damn, you queue up so fast you could compete with those sketchy boosting services.”
Qi Qiao replied, “Don’t hit Ready. You can hop off anytime. No need for a farewell.”
Wink’s shameless voice came through the mic.
“No, no, no, Ghost. Whether it’s a rank-up ride or a rank-dropping ride, I’m willing to stay on either way~”
“But I saw your stream just now—you said you can cook? So when are you making something for me to try?”
Qi Qiao answered flatly,
“Sure, you can try it. Fifty million per dish. No bargaining.”
Wink immediately muted his mic, opened Qi Qiao’s stream, and sent him a Double Rotten Egg gift.
[“Forget the cooking issue. The “face-to-face” thing from last time still hasn’t been explained.”]
[“Right! Little brat, last time Devil told you “face-to-face.” Did you two actually meet up?”]
[“Son, why did Devil ask to meet you face-to-face? Were you supposed to apologize to him?”]
[“Can Ghost’s fans stop clout-chasing Devil all the time? Reported.”]
[“The person above, what nonsense are you talking about? Devil was the one who posted “face-to-face” himself, okay? If anyone’s clout-chasing, Devil started it first~”]
After loading into the match, Qi Qiao’s team ran into a lane conflict.
There were two mid laners on the team.
One was him.
The other was player four.
He glanced at player four’s most-played characters—all heroes usually favored by female players.
Qi Qiao didn’t think much of it, so he sent a message:
[“I can fill jungle.”]
“Didn’t meet face-to-face,” Qi Qiao said absentmindedly. “And stop dragging me into drama. There’s no such thing as either of us clout-chasing the other.”
[“Damn, little brat actually worries about getting hate now, hhhh.”]
[“Wow, tomorrow’s biggest joke already arrived.”]
[“Wait, if you didn’t meet face-to-face, then why did Wink send that message in chat?”]
Qi Qiao raised an eyebrow and pulled up the full stream chat display.
[“Wink: Didn’t we literally just scrim against your youth training team yesterday???”]
Qi Qiao fell silent for a few seconds.
Then he graciously rewarded Wink with a ten-day mute package and decisively kicked him out of the stream.
Qi Qiao said coolly, “If two youth training teams scrim against each other, does that automatically mean we met face-to-face?”
[“If you spoke to each other in person, doesn’t that count as face-to-face?”]
Qi Qiao opened his cup noodles.
“Then if I insult you guys right now, does that count as face-to-face too?”
[“???”]
[“Ungrateful son, arguing with your dad again!”]
Qi Qiao had no intention of continuing to debate with this bunch of shameless viewers who recognized no family ties whatsoever.
Just as he reached out to turn off the chat overlay—
A sweet female voice suddenly came through from the game voice chat.
“Second pick brother… can you let me have jungle?”
Qi Qiao paused mid-selection.
Then he typed: [You know how to play it?]
“Don’t worry, I’ll carry this game for sure.”
Although the female voice sounded sweet and soft, Qi Qiao could faintly hear a trace of irritation underneath.
After sending [OK], Qi Qiao quietly turned off the team voice chat without drawing attention to it.
Wink opened their party voice chat.
“Not gonna lie… this girl’s voice sounds kind of familiar.”
Qi Qiao raised an eyebrow and turned the stream chat overlay back on.
[“Holy crap, stream snipe match!”]
[“Ahhh, I really like this streamer too! She didn’t go live today!”]
[“Wow, little brat hears someone call him brother once and immediately turns off team voice chat. Your straightness has truly reached a whole new level.”]
Qi Qiao’s eyes swept over the comments, lingering briefly on the word straight.
For some reason, the image of Pei Ming leaning against the sink yesterday, smoking, flashed through his mind.
Suddenly, he felt strangely restless.
“Who exactly did we run into?” Qi Qiao asked, trying to distract himself.
[“Son, how do you not know this? She’s the #1 female jungler on the national server!”]
[“D-God Little Sweetie ahhh! Even though I’m one of Devil’s fangirls, I absolutely love her too!”]
Qi Qiao had been eating his noodles, but after seeing the comments, his movements paused.
“Who is she?”
Wink’s voice came through party chat.
“I remember now. [D-God Little Sweetie] — she’s the hottest female streamer on ACR right now. She mains both mid and jungle, and honestly, she’s probably the most mechanically skilled female ACR player I’ve ever seen.”
Qi Qiao asked, “Then why’s her ID called that?”
Wink replied, “Isn’t it obvious? [D-God Little Sweetie]. She’s a hardcore Devil fan, okay? Pretty face, sweet voice — she attends every single Faith match in person, and…”
Qi Qiao raised an eyebrow.
“And what?”
“Back when Faith won Worlds two years ago, she publicly confessed to Devil in front of everyone.” Wink clicked his tongue twice. “Looks-wise they match, skill-wise they match… honestly, I think she and Devil make a pretty good pair.”
Qi Qiao frowned slightly but said nothing.
[“Little Sweetie insisted on jungling this match because of someone on the enemy team, right?”]
[“Yep, I saw it too. Enemy jungler’s ID is [D-God Retirement Countdown.]“]
[“Wait, does ty mean retirement??”]
[“Probably. Even his profile picture is a hate edit of Devil.]
[“Damn it, how do you queue into this kind of idiot no matter where you go?”]
[“Game hasn’t even started and I’m already tilted!”]
Pei Ming glanced at the game loading screen and noticed that the enemy jungler had locked in Odin.
D-God Little Sweetie had chosen Loki, a hero with extremely strong early-game scaling and excellent gank potential.
Looks like she was planning to crush the enemy right from the start.
And sure enough—
As soon as the game began, Loki invaded Odin’s jungle with the roaming support.
The enemy Odin was probably solo queueing. Since his teammates rotated too slowly to help during the early invade, his red buff got stolen.
Losing the red buff immediately shattered his mental.
Then a message appeared in all-chat.
[All Chat] D-God Retirement Countdown: F*, all you know how to do is invade. Anyone seeing this would think you’re Devil’s damn dog, lol.**
Qi Qiao had just finished clearing a minion wave when he saw the message.
[All Chat] D-God Little Sweetie: Your ID’s got some nerve being this backwards.
[All Chat] D-God Retirement Countdown: F*, so you really are Devil’s dog. Instead of licking him, why don’t you come lick me? I’m way stronger than he is.**
Probably because the enemy jungler’s mental had already collapsed, the enemy bot lane completely lost control of the wave.
Qi Qiao went down for a gank and helped Wink secure two kills.
After placing vision, he noticed that Loki had already gone completely berserk in the enemy jungle.
It was almost comical.
Wherever Odin went, Loki followed.
With the roaming support tagging along, every single gank landed perfectly.
By the time the first Dragon spawned, the enemy jungler had already been killed four times.
Wink spoke through voice chat.
“Little Sweetie said just now that her own stats this match don’t matter…”
“But she absolutely wants to farm that disgusting guy’s reputation score into the ground.”
Every player in ACR Oracle had their own reputation score.
The maximum was 100 points.
If ranked matches detected violations like AFKing, or if other players reported you, points would be deducted depending on the severity.
If your reputation score dropped below 90, you could no longer queue for ranked.
Since the system review was automated, finishing a game with a scoreline worse than 0–9 would result in an automatic 6-point deduction.
And in matches ranked Oracle I or above, multiple reports could even double the penalty.
Of course, this kind of dirty tactic was usually only used by veteran players smurfing on alternate accounts, or when someone was playing purely for fun while deliberately targeting one specific enemy hero.
And more often than not, the victim was the enemy mid laner.
Qi Qiao had run into situations like this countless times before.
Whenever he played some squishy female mage, he often ended up getting hard-focused by the enemy team.
Qi Qiao said casually,
“Well then, good luck to her.”
The moment the words left his mouth, he saw Wink team up with Loki and gank the enemy jungler again.
[All Chat] D-God Little Sweetie: Using your own body to scout bushes? Trash-tier skills.
[All Chat] D-God Little Sweetie: And you think you’re qualified to compare yourself to Devil?
Qi Qiao’s movements paused for a moment.
The two messages he had sent to Wang Xiang yesterday suddenly flashed through his mind, and an instant headache came over him.
Still…
Wang Xiang probably wouldn’t tell anyone about that.
Otherwise, if Pei Ming ever saw it—
Qi Qiao genuinely had no idea how he would clean up that mess.
[“Little brat, Wink already joined in, so why aren’t you going too?”]
[“Seriously, that enemy jungler is a total piece of trash.”]
Qi Qiao fully charged his Q skill and cleanly unleashed a combo, instantly deleting the enemy ADC.
He lazily glanced at chat.
“I don’t think I really need to, do I?”
[“Umm… yeah, fair point, son.”]
[“Well, little brat is a Devil anti-fan, so understandable.”]
The game timer reached 13 minutes.
By now, the enemy towers had practically all been ground down to nothing.
And that enemy jungler had long since given up trying to play seriously.
All he did now was hide around the map to avoid getting caught by Loki, occasionally clearing a few minions whenever possible.
But even so—
Odin’s score had already fallen to 0–9–2.
At this point, all they had to do was push into the enemy World Tree and end the game.
But Wink got too reckless.
He charged straight under the enemy turret and started trading auto-attacks with the enemy ADC.
Unexpectedly, Odin suddenly flashed forward and activated his ultimate, instantly deleting him.
The enemy ADC was so furious that he immediately started cursing in all-chat.
[All Chat] D-God Little Sweetie: ?
Even Wink hadn’t expected that.
Knowing he was completely at fault, he quickly apologized.
“Damn! My bad, my bad!”
[All Chat] D-God Little Sweetie: Crap, now I won’t be able to tank his reputation score anymore.
According to the system rules, if the enemy player ended up with a scoreline of 1–9, the report penalty would be reduced.
But if Odin died one more time, it would return to the harsher penalty threshold for 0–9.
Qi Qiao glanced at the battlefield.
All three lanes of siege minions had already pushed up to the enemy World Tree.
The enemy team was already down three players.
Only Odin and their ADC were left alive.
There was no way the enemy could defend this push.
Which meant Odin probably wouldn’t have another chance to die.
[“It’s over, it’s over. All because of Wink. The whole match was wasted for nothing!”]
[“Seriously, unbelievable. Look at that disgusting guy — he’s still spamming emotes in front of the World Tree to taunt.”]
[“Nope, my blood pressure’s rising…”]
[“Wait… hold on. Guys, what is little brat doing?”]
At some point, Qi Qiao had quietly moved to the left side of the enemy fountain.
At the exact moment Odin flashed his emote—
Without warning, Qi Qiao used Flash, followed immediately by a W dash, diving straight beneath the enemy World Tree.
His ultimate connected perfectly, kicking Odin out of the fountain zone.
The explosive AoE damage instantly deleted Odin at full health.
Immediately afterward—
He activated Stasis with frame-perfect timing, avoiding Odin’s final desperate attack by 0.1 seconds.
The minion wave entered the tower.
[Victory.] [Game Over.]
Even in death—
Odin remained frozen in the exact pose he had been using to spam emotes.
[“???”]
[“Damn. Son, didn’t you say there was “no need”?”]
[“Son, you…”]
[“No need.”]
[“No need.”]
[““No Need” officially nominated for Literary Work of the Year~”]
Qi Qiao stretched lazily.
“There really wasn’t any need.”
[“666, then what exactly was the point of diving in there just to kill that idiot?”]
Qi Qiao casually lifted a finger and handed everyone calling him son a one-way ticket out of the stream.
(Ban.)
“Been too long since I worked my wrists properly,” Qi Qiao said lazily.
“Just getting the feel back.”
…
While watching the livestream on his phone, Jiang Jiang climbed upstairs with a braised giant shrimp still in his mouth.
The moment he entered the training room, he saw Pei Ming still sitting at the computer desk.
“Brother, why are you still sitting here?” Jiang Jiang quickly swallowed the shrimp in a few bites. “The food’s already cold.”
Earlier, around six o’clock, Auntie had called everyone down for dinner.
Pei Ming had said he’d come in a bit.
Jiang Jiang had been eating while lazily messing around for over fifty minutes—
Yet Pei Ming still hadn’t come downstairs.
Pei Ming was wearing headphones and didn’t respond.
Feeling ignored, Jiang Jiang pouted and walked over.
“Brother, what are you watching that’s got you skipping dinner and—”
Jiang Jiang stopped halfway through the sentence.
The words died in his throat.
The livestream playing on Pei Ming’s computer screen matched exactly what was showing on Jiang Jiang’s phone.
“Captain, you’re watching Little Green Hair’s stream too?” Jiang Jiang said, pointing at his phone.
Without taking his eyes off the screen, Pei Ming simply nodded.
Jiang Jiang clicked his tongue twice.
“I’ve gotta say, when this little green-haired guy stands up for someone, he really stands up for them.”
He had been watching that last play while eating dinner.
At first, the enemy jungler’s disgusting behavior had already left him sitting there boiling with anger.
Then Wink’s inexplicably stupid play had nearly made him storm straight over to the academy base and drag someone out himself.
Luckily, Ghost had charged straight into the fountain at the end and instantly deleted that disgusting idiot.
Otherwise, Jiang Jiang wasn’t sure he’d even be able to sleep tonight.
“Hey, I just noticed he changed his stream title today too.” Jiang Jiang pointed at Pei Ming’s monitor in surprise.
Pei Ming hadn’t switched to fullscreen earlier, so the stream title was clearly displayed at the top:
<Not clumsy. Can cook. Stop talking shit.>
Jiang Jiang burst out laughing.
“No way, he can cook? Cook my ass—”
Suddenly, Pei Ming shot him a glance.
That single look made Jiang Jiang’s scalp tingle, and he immediately swallowed the rest of what he was about to say.
“Uh… I mean… nice change. Definitely way better than the previous one.”
Pei Ming took off his headphones and closed the livestream.
“Are you using your computer right now?”
Jiang Jiang looked confused.
“Uh… no. I’m heading out for a walk later to digest dinner.”
Pei Ming nodded.
“Lend it to me for thirty minutes.”
Jiang Jiang blinked, completely baffled.
“Captain… what do you need my computer for?”
He remembered very clearly that Pei Ming had a bit of a cleanliness obsession.
He normally hated touching other people’s things.
Pei Ming stood up and answered calmly.
“Streaming.”
Author’s Note
Been writing for so long… my hands hurt, my hands hurt.