Chapter 15 – Then Praise
Sang Ye was bewildered and opened the message box without thinking.
The pop-up email interface lagged for a moment before loading an image, with the top reading:
[TES Club Player Trial Invitation]
TES, along with WLG and NSN, is one of the top three PUBG clubs in the country. If anyone else received such an email, they would have jumped up in excitement and screamed.
However, Sang Ye only glanced at the title before closing it, continuing to scroll through the forum as if the message he had just received was nothing more than a spam email.
…
The next day marked the beginning of a new week, and it was unreasonable for Sang Ye not to log in again.
Even the guild had sent him a warning, stating that the month was already halfway over and that his streaming hours were severely lacking.
Fortunately, Sang Ye’s embarrassment had mostly dissipated, and he no longer felt ashamed of facing the teasing.
He sat down in front of his computer promptly at eight in the evening. As soon as he opened the streaming room, his fake fans flooded in with congratulatory messages:
[“Congratulations on successfully chasing stars!”]
It turned out that yesterday during a lottery segment, Talk had played around with some jokes, and single-handedly managed to get the two of them trending.
In the post titled #What Are Some Good eSports CPs#, a pinned Weibo post specifically called out the “rap CP”: [Not getting married makes it hard to end things.]
Overnight, the number of followers for the super topic of the same name broke fifty thousand, transforming from an obscure topic to a popular one.
Naturally, Sang Ye also gained attention, with his fan count skyrocketing, making him the undisputed traffic king among newcomers, even surpassing Elan, who had made a name for himself in the Blue Whale competition.
But Sang Ye did not lose himself in this newfound fame; he clearly understood that this was attention gained by association. Looking at the screen full of [successfully chasing stars,] he found it uninteresting.
“Getting attention by hyping up a CP—what kind of success is that?” Sang Ye unscrewed the bottle cap, feeling disinterested. “For me, there’s only one way to succeed in chasing stars.”
The bullet comments flooded the screen with [“What?”]
“By earning my place in front of Talk through my own strength.” Sang Ye lowered his gaze, his voice dropping as well. “Then getting praised by Talk.”
Just like Elan did.
A voice emerged from the depths of his mind.
[“His values are so upright, I’m in love!”]
[“This is what positive fan behavior looks like! Isn’t the purpose of an idol to help us become better versions of ourselves step by step?”]
[“Our Fugui is just a pure fanboy.”]
[“Fugui, will we have a chance to see you and Talk duo queue together again?”]
“There probably won’t be a chance,” Sang Ye said, lowering his eyes sheepishly. He had already let it go and felt there was nothing he couldn’t say anymore. “I sent a friend request, but Talk rejected me.”
The bullet comments erupted in a chorus of wails, with exaggerated reactions like [“My CP has broken up!!!”] flooding the screen.
“Please don’t bring up this ‘rap CP’ thing in the future. Talk is a serious professional player and doesn’t like this sort of stuff.”
After lazily giving this reminder, Sang Ye finally had a moment to himself and took a sip of water.
Just then—
A message popped up in his Steam inbox, boldly displayed on the side of his computer screen.
[iam31415926 has sent you a friend request.]
[Message: Your husband Talk is looking for you.]
“Pfft—!”
Sang Ye spit water all over his keyboard.
…
Tonight, WLG’s first team had planned to play ranked games together, but unfortunately, Shine took leave after finishing the scrim.
They were one player short.
When Tan Mo returned to the training room from the team doctor, Xiao Pai and Hu Fu were already logged into the game and had even started their livestream.
Since the spring season, Tan Mo had been busy dealing with the doping scandal and hadn’t logged into his own account.
He opened Steam and noticed the red notification dot in the upper right corner, indicating only a little over forty new messages.
It used to be completely full, so it was clear someone had cleaned it up.
He turned around and asked Xiao Pai, “Did you mess with my Steam?”
“Nope,” Xiao Pai blurted out, but then he paused and turned around, “Oh, right. Last time I logged into your account, I helped clear a bunch of friend requests. It was exhausting! You’re welcome, no need to thank me!”
Tan Mo glanced at the long list of friend request notifications and closed it.
“So how are we going to play with one person missing?” Hu Fu asked. “Should we just queue up with a random?”
“Let’s try a random, and see who the lucky one is… Wait! Wait!” Xiao Pai, who had been scrolling through the list of players they’d previously played with, suddenly stopped as if he’d discovered a new continent. He quickly corrected himself, “Wait, let me invite someone!!!”
“Who are you inviting?”
Hu Fu noticed his inexplicable excitement and leaned over. The moment he saw the ID, his eyes lit up, and he quickly glanced over at Tan Mo, barely holding back his laughter as he whispered to Xiao Pai.
“Do you think he’ll accept your request?”
“Don’t worry.” Xiao Pai typed rapidly on his keyboard, a mischievous grin on his face. “I have a bait trap for white-haired ones.”
On the other side, Sang Ye, who received the friend request, coughed for quite a while.
His fake fans were clamoring for him to accept the request quickly.
After finally stopping his coughing, Sang Ye ground his teeth in frustration, knowing Xiao Pai was messing with him on purpose. He grabbed his mouse and was about to hit ‘Reject’: “Don’t listen to him, he’s lying.”
But then he caught sight of the name [Talk] in the message. He hesitated for a second, and against his better judgment, clicked [Accept].
Sang Ye straightened his back, his face showing a hint of annoyance, but he stubbornly insisted, “Just you wait… I’m going to settle this with him, and then I’ll delete him right after!”
As soon as the friend request was accepted, Xiao Pai quickly invited him into the team.
Sang Ye immediately checked the player list.
Besides himself and Xiao Pai, there was one more ID.
[wlg_Hufu].
Sang Ye pressed his lips together and slowly slumped back down in his chair.
“Hello, hello! Everybody!” Xiao Pai yelled into the team voice chat, his tone exaggerated and playful. “Can everyone hear me?”
Sang Ye didn’t even bother to turn on his mic, ignoring him as he prepared to leave the team.
Just a second before he exited—
A player dressed in all black suddenly joined the waiting screen out of nowhere.
ID: [wlg_Talk].
Sang Ye blinked, his actions paused, and his ears were filled with the loud thumping of his heartbeat.
“Tan Shen, look!” Xiao Pai said enthusiastically, with a bit of pride in his voice. “We brought Song here for you!”
Sang Ye instantly slouched all the way down, his pale face flushing red, and his whole demeanor became almost shy and well-behaved.
The next second…
A cool, low voice sounded in the headphones: “Which Song?”
Sang Ye was stunned.
Xiao Pai and Hu Fu were also caught off guard.
Even the nearly ten million viewers in the four-person livestream room were dumbfounded.
What’s going on???
Sang Ye furrowed his brow slightly. Overwhelmed by a wave of disappointment, his eyes turned red. He even realized how pitifully hurt he felt—like someone who called the person “husband” just yesterday but now was being treated like a stranger.
Tan Mo adjusted the position of his microphone and glanced at the ID [Song] in the team list. His tone remained calm:
“Is it the Song who has excellent game sense, outstanding dynamic vision, unbeatable close-combat skills, a deadly aim from over a hundred meters away, near-perfect recoil control… and a pointy chin when he smiles… that Song?”
“……..”
The livestream froze for two seconds.
Then—
[“Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha——”]
Xiao Pai, clutching his stomach, collapsed onto the desk, pounding it uncontrollably.
Hu Fu, covering his mouth, shook with laughter, nodding repeatedly: “Yes… yes, it’s that Song, pfft—”
The only calm person in the room was Tan Mo, who let out a soft “Ah” and, unhurriedly, said: “I see, now I understand.”
Sang Ye had already lifted both feet and curled himself into his gaming chair.
He bit his finger, his cheeks flushed red, and his eyes were misty with embarrassment.
Meanwhile, the livestream chat had been completely overtaken by a barrage of comments:
[“Congratulations to Fugui for his success in chasing stars!!!”]
Author has something to say:
Talk: Since my wife wants to praise me, I should praise her as much as possible.
Song covered his red face: OK… that’s enough.