“Oh, what's up?” Su Mucheng turned her head, offering a charming smile that starkly contrasted with Liu Hao's grimace.

Their eyes met, a silent battle waged between them.

Though still smiling, the firmness in Su Mucheng's eyes surprised Liu Hao.

In their eyes, Su Mucheng had always been a gentle girl, kind to everyone. She mostly stuck by Ye Qiu's side and seemed to lack her own opinions. Such a girl was easily seen as someone who could be bullied.

Liu Hao had stopped Su Mucheng as if he were a demon, but now, facing her gaze, he was the one feeling guilty.

"If there's nothing else, I'll be going." Su Mucheng smiled, already turning to leave.

Liu Hao watched Su Mucheng walk away, conflicted. Gradually, he calmed down. He took a deep breath and returned to his room.

Grabbing his phone, Liu Hao called Chen Yehui, the guild leader of Excellent Dynasty.

"Hello, Team Liu…" There was a hint of hesitation in the voice on the other end of the line, as if they didn't know how to start.

"Handle the dungeon on your own for now! I'm not free to help at the moment," Liu Hao said.

"Oh…"

"In the tenth server... if no pro players interfere, Ye Qiu will definitely dominate the records. So the competition between the guilds has shifted to who can get Ye Qiu's help," Liu Hao said.

"Then... it might be difficult for us, right?" Chen Yehui said.

"You can try to contact him and see his attitude. If that doesn't work, keep an eye on him and see if there's any opening. There's some information I want you to focus on gathering."

"What is it?"

"Ye Qiu's price. What kind of reward does he demand for working with each guild! I want to know this," Liu Hao said.

"Should we gather some people to deal with him? He's vulnerable right now," Chen Yehui said.

"That... you can consider it, but don't use guild members, or the other guilds might unite against you. Lord Grim is a popular figure in the other guilds right now; he might join one of them for support," Liu Hao said.

"Alright, I'll handle it myself then!" Chen Yehui said.

"Okay, I'll visit the tenth server often when I have time. Keep in touch," Liu Hao said.

"Okay."

Hanging up the phone, Liu Hao took a deep breath. He couldn't afford to be impulsive at this point. He'd been too excited these past few days and made a lot of mistakes. Failing to sabotage Ye Qiu's record attempt and being played by Ye Qiu had angered him, but it was just a personal matter and emotional pain.

The real mistake he couldn't afford to make was his repeated blunders in the evening's match that led to Team Excellent Era's defeat.

Although they only scored three points in the previous round, Sun Xiang's 1v3 performance had given people hope.

This match, playing at home against Blue Rain, the second-ranked team, was supposed to be a chance to turn things around. Excellent Era did have the initiative for most of the match, but it was ruined by the amateur mistakes of their vice-captain.

Right now, although everyone was unhappy, they were temporarily treating it as a slump. But if Team Excellent Era continued to perform poorly, then looking back on this season, this turning point would be seen as a major mistake caused by Liu Hao's failure.

This mistake could have a fatal impact on his future. If he still didn't understand the situation and was distracted by his personal feud with the retired Ye Qiu in the game, then he would be penny-wise and pound-foolish.

Ye Qiu... I know you're not giving up, but this is just the beginning. I'll be watching what you're capable of!

Liu Hao gritted his teeth and glared at the mirror one last time. Suddenly, he raised his hand and rubbed his face hard. When he lowered his hand, a harmless smile appeared on his face, as if by magic.

Liu Hao opened his door and walked out again, glancing at the slightly ajar door next to his. A sliver of light shone through the crack.

"Ahem." Liu Hao cleared his throat and gently knocked on the door. "Team Sun, are you resting?"

"The door's unlocked." The person inside answered coolly, but his annoyance was obvious in his tone.

Liu Hao adjusted his expression one last time and smiled. "Then I'll come in!" He pushed the door open and entered.

Happy Internet Cafe. Two dungeon runs were over. The records were broken, and the two girls were exhausted. Tang Rou did get water, but she refused to leave the front desk, chatting with Ye Xiu. Only when she saw Flowing Mist logout did she happily say, "No more dungeons!"

Ye Xiu smiled wryly. "Whatever!"

"I think I have a quest I haven't finished," Tang Rou muttered as she left. Ye Xiu was speechless. Tang Rou hated quests, especially those that involved delivering messages, gathering mushrooms, digging carrots, and finding people. She considered these low-difficulty, non-combat quests a waste of time. She only did the ones that Ye Xiu reminded her about that gave attribute or skill point rewards.

Tang Rou preferred to do quests she hated rather than continue running dungeons, which was meaningful. Ye Xiu had to admire Huang Shaotian for forcing the league to change its rules.

"What's going on? What's going on? Where did everyone go? Why isn't anyone responding?"

Ye Xiu wasn't that tough. He had taken off his headset and rested for a while. As soon as he put it back on, that noisy voice started up again. Huang Shaotian was afraid of being recognized, so he lowered his voice even though he was alone in a dark corner of Area A, but he still kept talking. What great energy.

"Okay, the records are out. We don't need to run dungeons anymore," Ye Xiu said, collecting himself.

"Did you hear what I just said?" Huang Shaotian clearly didn't know that Ye Xiu hadn't been wearing his headset. People with chatterbox tendencies often have a "talking to themselves" attribute, otherwise they wouldn't be able to chatter so much. Talking to yourself means not paying too much attention to the audience's reaction, so they don't even notice if the audience is listening.

"Oh, I didn't hear you clearly. What did you say?" Ye Xiu asked.

"What's wrong with your weapon?"

"Self-made, Myriad Manifestations Umbrella," Ye Xiu said.

"You made it? When did you make it? I've never heard of it!" Huang Shaotian asked.

"A long time ago. When you were running around the world stealing bosses," Ye Xiu said.

"Damn it! Don't bring up the dark history!!" Huang Shaotian was anxious. He was just an ordinary online gamer back then, but his opportunistic style was already fully formed. He was good at stealing bosses. Early Glory had many rules that were different from now.

"That's when it was, me and a friend worked on it together," Ye Xiu said.

"This weapon... it looks like it was made specifically for an unspecialized character?" Huang Shaotian said.

"That's right," Ye Xiu said.

"But when the third server opened, the level cap was updated, and the job awakening quests came out, the unspecialized class was completely eliminated."

Ye Xiu didn't respond. He didn't need to respond, because Huang Shaotian had a "talking to himself" function.

"So your weapon lost its value until the fifth server opened and the Heavenly Domain appeared. Unspecialized characters who hadn't awakened could gain experience and continue to level up in the Heavenly Domain. However, the level cap was also updated to level 60 at the same time. The Heavenly Domain challenge quests weren't limited by level, but they were level 60 difficulty. And the quests were all solo, you couldn't team up for help, so even then, unspecialized characters didn't revive. Besides, you were already using One Autumn Leaf to compete in the pro league, and your name as the Battle God had already spread, so you didn't bother going back to tinker with that." Huang Shaotian deduced a lot on his own.

"Yeah!" Ye Xiu finally gave a reaction.

"Are you planning to start over now?" Huang Shaotian asked.

"Yeah!"

"Then why did you have to retire? Just find someone to level up the account, and let the club work on the weapon, wouldn't that be faster? I don't get it, I don't get it. Why did you retire?" Huang Shaotian asked.

"You can think of it as 'the team's performance was poor, so the captain resigned to take responsibility'," Ye Xiu said.

"Nonsense, you didn't have to retire! Besides, I've watched your matches, and it's obvious that there are conflicts in the team, and you were isolated. Liu Hao must be behind it, right? That guy has the look of a treacherous person, you were too careless," Huang Shaotian said.

"When did you learn how to read faces?" Ye Xiu said.

"I didn't say that, Wang Jiexi said it," Huang Shaotian said.

"He has different sized eyes himself, and he's giving people readings?" Ye Xiu said.

"Don't say that! That guy's really a bit magical! Last time..." Huang Shaotian babbled on. Steamed Bun Invasion hadn't left yet, and he couldn't understand what these two were talking about. He was pitifully on the side.

"Steamed Bun, nothing else to do. Go to the arena or run dungeons yourself," Ye Xiu said.

"Okay." Steamed Bun Invasion left.

"Hey, right! Let's fight a match, I want to see how powerful your weapon is!" Huang Shaotian said.

"Just with your account?" Ye Xiu laughed.

"What's wrong with my account? It's level 27 just like you, the weapon's a bit worse, but it'll do!" Huang Shaotian said.

"My account is an unspecialized account," Ye Xiu said.

People who don't understand wouldn't get it, but Huang Shaotian was stunned as soon as he heard this. That's right, an unspecialized account, although at the same level, has a much bigger advantage. Why? Because any class account only has 7 skills at level 27, but an unspecialized account? It has 120 skills at level 20. The difference is too big. That's why so many people thought that the unspecialized class was king. It was because the unspecialized class took shape early, and had a huge advantage in the early stages, so much so that it was unbalanced. Challenging an unspecialized character with a swordsman with 7 skills was suicide. Huang Shaotian realized this immediately.

"It's possible if you use your Troubling Rain to test it out, with corrections turned on," Ye Xiu said.

"No way!" Huang Shaotian said nervously. "Wouldn't that expose me? How would I explain it if people saw me? Never mind, never mind, we'll fight another time! Do you have anything else to do? If not, I'll go back. By the way, what's going on with the retirement? Why didn't you answer me just now? Huh?"

"You... hurry back!" Ye Xiu was helpless, it was too noisy...

===================================

It's been a long time since I've written during the day, it's so... noisy... What's going on outside! It's even noisier than ten Shaotian students combined! (To be continued, if you want to know what happens next, please log in, there are more chapters, support the author, support authentic reading!)