Chapter 13 – Meng Meng, Stand Up.
“What’s going on? There are only two people in the car.” Tangyuan opened fire on the vehicle with his SCAR-L while relaying the situation to his teammates.
Their current location was the school at the center of the map—a prime spot with high-tier loot but relatively low quantity.
As soon as they landed, they had engaged in intense combat. Though their weapons were good, their resources were dwindling. The Burn team had likely pinpointed Xinghai’s location from the previous fights.
However, it was still early in the match, and rushing in with such a small group seemed reckless.
The Xinghai players speculated that the German team must have picked up a heavy weapon, giving them the confidence to push aggressively.
Tangyuan’s plan to fight while retreating was cut off by Burn’s coordinated attacks, forcing him to take cover behind a low wall for close-quarters combat.
The rest of Xinghai’s team was rushing to back him up, but bullets continued to tear through the air.
“What the hell—one’s using a UMP9, and the other’s got a Uzi!” Tangyuan shouted. “If this drags on any longer, I’m gonna lose weight! Everyone says esports is an easy money gig, just sitting around playing games. Who knew these damn Germans would turn it into a damn workout?!”
Shao Zhan took out an enemy squad that had been flanking them and analyzed the ongoing fight based on the gunfire patterns as he moved forward.
The sound of battle was chaotic yet structured—loud and intense, but not reckless.
After all, they weren’t playing in a casual lobby full of unpredictable, unskilled players. Their opponents were a professional team, and no one here was dumb enough to mess around.
“Stop advancing. Fall back and defend.” Shao Zhan ordered over team comms.
As the in-game leader, his commands were absolute.
Jiang Rannan and Zhuang Bai, who had set up sniper positions on the second floor, quickly retracted their weapons. The former, with a hint of mischief in his voice, said over comms, “Sorry, buddy. It’s not that we don’t want to save you—it’s just that we’ve got a bigger mission to handle.”
“Screw off, screw off, just get out of my way.” Tangyuan grumbled, “Too many people around, and I can’t move freely. If you don’t run fast enough, don’t blame me if you get caught in the crossfire.”
Shao Zhan switched to a different scope and scanned the battlefield. “Tangyuan, hold your ground. Rannan, Zhuang Bai—head to the vehicle spawn point, find a car, and rotate toward the two-story red building at eleven o’clock. Stay out of sight.”
“Copy that.”
Jiang Rannan and Zhuang Bai began repositioning. As they descended the staircase, they ran into Shao Zhan coming up.
Neither of them wasted words—they simply brushed past each other. Just before parting ways, Shao Zhan gave a quiet reminder: “Avoid fights along the way.”
While Jiang Rannan and Zhuang Bai drove around the map, Shao Zhan entered their previous building and carefully extended his gun barrel out the window.
But his gaze wasn’t fixed on the intense firefight below—instead, he was watching the seemingly quiet two-story red building on the distant hillside.
The second-floor side window of the eerily quiet red building, as silent as a haunted house, concealed the shadow of a tilted gun barrel, its sights locked onto the school building behind the battlefield.
Tangyuan’s intense skirmish with the two Burn players had drawn in third-party players from multiple directions, causing the battlefield to descend into chaos in an instant.
Even the enemy team hadn’t anticipated this development. After they had jointly eliminated two opportunistic players trying to sneak in for easy kills, Tangyuan—still playing cat and mouse with his opponents—shouted, “Check the kill feed! Look at the kill feed! They’ve got good guns—they’re putting on a show for me!”
[Burn—Kilian used S12K to kill Apricot.]
[Burn—Mats used S686 to kill LLL]
“You guys won’t know what ‘Daddy’ means until Fatty starts raging.”
Of course, Tangyuan was just hyping himself up—he knew nothing could save him this round.
Dropping a bold declaration over team comms, he left behind one last message:
“Remember to avenge Daddy!”
Then, secretly priming a grenade, he prepared to take his enemies down with him.
“Wait. Hold on.” Shao Zhan’s voice interrupted him.
Startled, Tangyuan jerked in surprise and instinctively tossed the grenade away, watching as it landed against the far wall before immediately ducking down to heal up.
The two Burn players chasing him down hadn’t expected this botched suicide attack, and ended up taking considerable damage themselves.
Then, Jiang Rannan’s report came through: “Captain, we’ve flanked them—we’re behind the small grain silo behind the sloped-roof building.”
That was the exact cover Shao Zhan had told them to find before they set out.
“There are two enemies in the southwest room on the second floor,” Shao Zhan said. After a brief pause, he added, “This round is yours.”
Shao Zhan scoped in, waiting for his moment.
At the same time, he knocked on Tangyuan’s metaphorical door:
“Meng Meng, stand up.”
[Starcraft—Mars used SCAR-L to kill Burn—Mats]
[Burn—Nick used 98K to kill Starcraft—Mars]
The two kill notifications flashed almost simultaneously.
But in the very next second—
[Starcraft—River used S1897 to kill Burn—Nick]
Shao Zhan had baited the enemy sniper into revealing himself. Jiang Rannan seized the fleeting opportunity and obliterated Nick’s Level 2 helmet with a single shot.
Although Jiang Rannan was quickly taken out by the enemy’s secondary sniper, he had accomplished his mission.
As for Tangyuan, after getting harassed by two pesky players for most of the round, he managed to take one of them down with the last sliver of his health.
In the final one-on-one gunfight, Keen, the last man standing for his team, secured victory by swiftly repositioning and swapping out damaged armor, ultimately taking down the last enemy player, Emir.
Although Starcraft didn’t claim the final win, their battle had already concluded.
The fourth and final round of the scrimmage was a narrow victory for Starcraft, but at a steep cost.
“The Chinese team, Starcraft, is very strong—extremely strong. Undoubtedly the best.” Nick said, his Chinese somewhat clumsy.
“Burn, your tactics are unpredictable—your future is promising.” Shao Zhan responded in awkward German.
After a half-hearted exchange of mutual praise between the team captains, the training match officially came to an end.
Despite securing the final victory, none of the Starcraft players looked excited.
The match had been brutally difficult—if not for Shao Zhan’s quick thinking and sharp command, along with the seamless coordination of his teammates, it would have been nearly impossible to win.
This was a far cry from their complete domination during last year’s European Invitational Tournament. The German Burn team’s improvement was nothing short of astonishing.
By the time the training session ended, it was nearly six o’clock.
Shao Zhan didn’t immediately start the post-game review; instead, he told Qin Chuan to order takeout for the team.
“Hey, where are you going?” Qin Chuan grabbed Shao Zhan by the sleeve of his tracksuit, spotting car keys in his hand.
Shao Zhan hissed in annoyance, swatting his hand away.
“Since when do employees get to question the boss?”
As soon as his tall figure disappeared, Qin Chuan exploded in frustration, furiously shadowboxing toward the dark doorway with a combination of wild punches and exaggerated footwork.
Unfortunately, his solo performance went completely unnoticed, leaving him devastated by the lack of attention.
He pulled up the takeout app on his phone:
“Alright, alright, order whatever you want. It’s on me today, boys.”
Normally, this would have triggered a feeding frenzy—these little brats would tear into him like starving wolves.
But tonight?
The usual ravenous beasts were lifeless.
Some were practicing recoil control, some were running movement drills, and even Fat Tangyuan—known as the team’s bottomless pit—was ignoring food altogether.
Instead, he was pressing a full, unopened bag of potato chips against his elbow, testing its flexibility.
Trying to make himself relevant, Qin Chuan stood akimbo, raising his hand in an overly dramatic flourish as he pointed at the dejected team members.
“What’s this? Got cocky after a win? On a hunger strike now?”
“You wouldn’t understand.”
Tangyuan buried his face into the plush corgi pillow he usually used as a lumbar cushion, looking utterly defeated—like he was spiraling into depression.