Chapter 60 – Let’s Not Get Too Ridiculous
“I think so too,” Zhuang Bi said, trying to reason with the colorful bunch at the table. “Let’s not get too ridiculous.”
Sure enough, the moment they returned to the base, Yang Sa announced he would be leaving with his team.
It was finally time to put their acting skills to the test. Max, sticking to the original plan, shifted the blame to the previous tenant.
“Leaky pipes?” Yang Sa didn’t even bother exposing him. Before deciding to settle back in Germany, this guy had lived his best summer life with the Boy Scouts in the U.S.
Little Blue hugged a pillow Fat Tangyuan had bought him on the way back—perfectly matching in color. “Yeah, I agree. Blaming something this minor… sounds pretty weak.”
Little Black, who had been about to pretend he had a stomachache, got a glare from Yang Sa and immediately straightened up. He shifted awkwardly and muttered, “I just… had a stitch.”
Little White, realizing how hopeless his brothers were, silently judged them. Back when Yang Sa was a teenager, he had already been their ringleader. He wasn’t tall then, hadn’t filled out yet, but he had a strong mind and was tough on himself.
But honestly, in that kind of environment, if he wasn’t tough, a small, yellow-skinned kid like him would’ve been bullied into the ground.
At first, Little White also couldn’t stand the idea of Yang Sa being the leader—until he saw him fight. There had been a few upperclassmen in the basketball club, white guys who’d been terrorizing the freshmen for a while, but Yang Sa had taken them out one by one with his fists and taught them a lesson.
That’s when Max and the others really started respecting him. Rumor was he’d gotten beaten up by Yang Sa when they were kids, and that’s how he’d been “tamed.”
The guys who had been so full of confidence at the breakfast table folded in no time. Under Yang Sa’s orders, they packed up, and ten minutes later, were standing at the gate of Xinghai with their suitcases, heads hung low, waiting for a ride.
It was nearing noon—not yet time for the young team members to get up. But behind the windows of the Xinghai base, shadows kept flickering by.
The kids were still young and had had a great time hanging out with the LAP guys over the past few days. They wanted to come down and see them off, but Yang Sa’s cold face scared them into staying hidden.
Fat Tangyuan immediately told Jiang Ranan to go notify Lao Du, Qin Chuan, and Shao Zhan.
Lao Du and Qin Chuan were currently busy handling the Silver Emperor team scandal and organizing the media release about Xinghai’s captain getting injured.
As for Shao Zhan—no one knew where he had disappeared to.
Deflated and trailing behind his friends like a chubby little tail, Fat Tangyuan couldn’t hold it in any longer and finally snapped at cold and aloof Yang Sa.
He said he just couldn’t understand—why did Yang Sa have to leave?
Why did he have to break up their friendship? These people were about to scatter across the globe. They were all independent adults, capable of making their own choices.
Whether they left or stayed, the decision should be theirs, not dictated by Yang Sa’s will.
If it weren’t for the trouble stirred up by LAP, Silver Emperor wouldn’t have lashed out like a cornered dog.
Their captain wouldn’t have gotten hurt, and Xinghai wouldn’t be facing a manpower shortage on the eve of a major battle.
No matter how you looked at it—personally or professionally—this was not the time for LAP to walk away.
“Are you truly heartless, or are you just pretending to be clueless?” Fat Tangyuan snapped, gripping Yang Sa by the collar. “Do you really not know why Shao Zhan got hurt? Who he took the hit for?”
He was getting more and more agitated, and his voice got so loud that a myna bird strolling under a tree root nearly twisted its ankle and scrambled to hide behind a patch of tall grass, poking its head out to sneak a peek.
These words had been bottled up inside him for a long time. He knew clearly that it was the Silver Emperor team who played dirty. Yang Sa was a victim too. When he’d entered the industry, he’d already heard the rumors about Silver Emperor’s shady origins. Their management had a murky past.
Yang Sa must’ve had no choice but to do what he did—of that, Fat Tangyuan was sure. Logically, he could understand that LAP were victims too in this mess with the thugs. But emotionally… he just couldn’t get over it.
Shao Zhan was the one who got hurt. He was the soul of Xinghai. Even if that club had hit him, Fat Tangyuan, and he ended up never being able to lift a mouse again, it wouldn’t have hurt as much as this.
After the incident, he’d taken the foreigners to the police, then brought them back to the base and settled them in. He’d kept smiling, pretending he didn’t care. But the truth was, he hadn’t had a single good night’s sleep since. The entire base acted like everything was normal, but he knew just how abnormal that normal really was.
Du Changcheng and Qin Chuan had repeatedly warned them—no emotional outbursts, no discussion of the incident around LAP members. Even Shao Zhan, with his arm still in a sling, ran around every day like nothing had happened, as if he didn’t even care whether he’d make it back to the competition stage.
Fat Tangyuan felt like he was going crazy—like he was going to be driven mad by all the “normal” people around him!
Was everyone around him emotionless, fake? Was he the only one who’d lost several pounds from guilt, just because he hadn’t managed to block that hit for his captain?
When watching dramas and movies, the “meltdown monologue” always felt cathartic—but that was fiction. In real life, when you publicly blow up at someone who might be having an affair with your boss—someone your boss willingly got his arm broken for—how exactly were you supposed to pick up the pieces afterward?
Fat Tangyuan tried hard to maintain his angry posture, but inside, he was already regretting it so much he was ready to summon the ancestors of eighteen generations past to help him out. He quietly started googling “What to do if you’ve pissed off your boss’s maybe-lover,” hoping to find some inspiration from morally-questionable netizens—when Du Changcheng arrived, still walking with a slight limp.
Du either didn’t notice the awkward tension in the air or pretended not to. With a big-hearted grin, he clapped Yang Sa on the back and said, “Xinghai’s doors are always open to you all. You’re welcome back anytime.”
Yang Sa nodded slightly, lips pressed tightly together, silent and unreadable.
The rideshare car arrived, and the LAP members didn’t put up any more resistance. Quietly, they carried their luggage and got into the car.
Just before leaving, Yang Sa walked over to Fat Tangyuan, placed a hand on his shoulder, and made a promise: “I swear, everything I owe Xinghai—I’ll pay it back in full.”
Then he glanced toward the villa. He didn’t see anyone, but he could feel a pair of eyes watching him the whole time.
Shao Zhan slowly withdrew his gaze. He had expected LAP to leave—just not so soon. Yang Sa hadn’t given him a definitive answer, but he knew: the two of them had reached an understanding.
From here on, they would be working toward the same goal from different angles. As for Shao Zhan, his job now was to act quickly—before the situation spiraled out of control—to help Silver Emperor’s talented players transfer out, and to minimize how much the club’s scandal would damage individual reputations.
Secretary Chen, as efficient as ever, had already sent over the necessary documents via a trusted subordinate before dinner.
Qu Jin, thirteen years ago, had been one of the top youth trainees on the Silver Emperor team. Based on the documents, he had first-rate talent, reflexes, and game sense. In the margin, there was an attached note: Chen had contacted the assistant coach from that time and learned that the head coach had actually planned to promote Qu Jin to the first team as a substitute. The report was submitted—but for some reason, higher-ups never approved it.
So it dragged on like that until Xinghai split off from Silver Emperor. Qu Jin remained a youth trainee the whole time. A month later, he applied to leave the team. His departure was marked as “personal reasons.”
But Shao Zhan noticed something odd from the way the paperwork was handled. Player transfers aren’t exclusive to the esports scene, but contract terms vary depending on a player’s rank. In simple terms: training a player capable of competing takes major investment from both coaches and the club. Based on the transfer request filed by the coach, Qu Jin’s exit shouldn’t have been so easy.
No penalty fees. No non-compete clause. In fact, Silver Emperor even gave him a bonus—an annual one, no less—even though it was only mid-year.
Most importantly, this payment wasn’t documented in Qu Jin’s departure paperwork. It was part of the supplementary materials—something Secretary Chen discovered by digging through old bank records from that year.
The timing of this event—right when Xinghai became independent—was delicate. Tracing it back wouldn’t be easy. For Shao Zhan, it wasn’t exactly difficult, but the real challenge was: what happens after the truth comes out?
Many of the people who had worked with his father back then were uncles and elders who had watched him grow up. Some of them might even still hold honorary or part-time positions at Xinghai. If he really decided to dig deep, he’d have to weigh the consequences.
Was it really worth opening up old accounts from years ago for the sake of just one person?
While Shao Zhan wrestled with this dilemma, Yang Sa wasn’t having an easy time either.
That man—he—was Yang Sa’s only connection to home.
All these years had been leading up to this moment. By giving up that man’s name, if Shao Zhan truly meant to seek justice for him as promised, then Yang Sa didn’t want to go scorched-earth. He didn’t want the younger players from both teams to suffer for it.
After all, once upon a time, he had been just like these kids—stepping into the club full of dreams about esports and hope for a better future.
That’s why Yang Sa agreed to Shao Zhan’s proposal.
But now, anxiety gripped his heart.
If this investigation ended up pointing toward Xinghai’s upper management—or people once close to Shao Zhan’s father—would Shao Zhan still follow through as promised?
Or would he bury the clues, silence those in the know, and leave the ones chasing the truth with nothing?
Yang Sa realized that because of his trust in Shao Zhan, he had unknowingly placed himself in a dangerously passive and vulnerable position. That went against everything he’d been taught all his life—but for some reason, he wanted to believe this time.
Maybe it was the softness of the night breeze.
Or maybe… he’d just gone a little mad.
Under the corridor where they’d once thrown noisy parties, his palm rubbed against the key he had never returned. The soft moon hid behind lead-colored clouds, concealing everything deep—very deep.
“Sa-sa! Come on, come on—he’s online! Help me out real quick—”
Long-limbed Max leapt out like a giant grasshopper. He’d been stuck indoors these past few days, recovering from his injury, and had picked up some killer new tricks from Xinghai. Now he was eager to destroy the fish he’d once hooked online.
But when the moment finally came, and the guy actually logged in, Max chickened out and immediately came running for backup.
Funny thing was—the guy had originally been lured in by a crossdressing photo of Yang Sa.
And now, because Yang Sa moved a bit too slowly, Max was already hollering impatiently.
Just as they neared the door, Yang Sa glanced back at the moon behind the clouds, a thoughtful expression on his face.
…
Through thick fog, a silver-white rideshare car quietly cut through the night, slowly making its way into the hillside neighborhood.
Shao Zhan stepped out, arm still in a sling. The road and the villa area were both eerily quiet—so quiet that only the sound of his footsteps echoed across the wide street.