Chapter 1 Rumors

"It's just a rumor, what's all the fuss about!" Ye Xiu and the others were quick to get up, and even quicker to return. A quick search on the computer revealed it was just a transfer rumor. And a pretty unsubstantiated one at that. The guy who couldn't wait to shout it out was just a brainless gossipmonger.

Chen Guo said, glancing resentfully around the internet cafe, trying to spot the culprit. Spreading rumors like this was a capital offense.

The others followed her back to their seats. Although they all jumped up to check the news, not all of them were that interested in the transfer. Su Mucheng and Tang Rou, for example, were ambivalent. Bao Zi was just curious and following the crowd...

But Mo Fan saw how concerned everyone was about this one piece of news, and how the entire internet cafe's Glory players were making such a fuss. He was starting to get curious about this so-called professional scene.

Zhao Yang's transfer was just a rumor, but it was normal to chat about it.

Zhao Yang was also an All-Star player last season, but he was definitely the most down-on-his-luck All-Star of all time. He and his Qigong Master character, Hai Wu Liang (Boundless Sea), played for the Team Seaside. Team Seaside was a typical mid-tier team that was neither great nor terrible. The playoffs or relegation seemed to have nothing to do with them.

No team with an All-Star player and character had ever been as unsuccessful as Seaside. Even last season's relegated team, Excellent Era, had been a glorious team in the past. And even after being relegated, they were able to attract an All-Star like Xiao Shiqin, which showed how extraordinary they were. But Team Seaside, with an All-Star player and character, never had any competitiveness for the playoffs, which was quite embarrassing.

Of course, Seaside had some arguments to make.

Last season, there were four teams in the league with only one All-Star player: Wind Howl, Seaside, 301, and Thunderclap.

The other three were all competitive for the playoffs, and 301 and Thunderclap even managed to secure a spot. 301 had their captain, Yang Cong, and his character, Scenery Killer, but their player Xu Bin was also a very distinctive player. In the industry, he was never rated lower than the All-Star Knight player Deng Fusheng, and some even thought he was stronger.

Thunderclap had Xiao Shiqin, a tactical genius who could make the team's teamwork particularly brilliant, making Thunderclap more competitive than Seaside.

As for Wind Howl, although they failed to make the playoffs last season, they had a great history. They were the team that competed with Excellent Era for the championship in the first season of the professional league. Their ace character, the Exorcist Sweeping Monk, had been a famous character since the beginning of the league, and was one of the first characters to be consecrated along with One Autumn Leaf and Desert Dust.

There would be few arguments that this character was stronger than Seaside's Qigong Master, Hai Wu Liang (Boundless Sea).

In comparison, Team Seaside seemed to have some shortcomings, and their poor performance seemed reasonable. But the team's All-Star player might not think so. With so many big transfers happening this summer, he might be thinking of switching teams.

The above was the evidence for Zhao Yang's transfer. It had to be said that this was possible, but to draw a conclusion from it was a bit of a logical leap. Ye Xiu and the others briefly discussed Zhao Yang's situation and didn't take the transfer rumor to heart. As expected, the next day, both Team Seaside and Zhao Yang publicly denied the rumor, saying that both sides were satisfied with the cooperation and had no plans to break up.

Of course, such public statements in the professional scene sometimes meant nothing, and might just be a bargaining tactic. In short, yesterday's rumor was unreliable, just a product of wishful thinking.

Another day passed, and it was the start of a new week. During the day, everyone was resting as usual, but new customers came to the internet cafe. Luo Ji, the owner of Meiguang, came to Happy Internet Cafe to report for duty after finishing a project for his tutor.

The internet cafe employee on duty knew that the boss was resting, but still went to call him. There was always a way to get in touch with the boss when there was something going on!

The people who were sleeping woke up when they heard the call. When they came downstairs, they saw Luo Ji leaning on the front desk. He wasn't very tall, was carrying a big backpack, and was neatly dressed. He looked around curiously, with an air of innocence.

"Meiguang!" Ye Xiu greeted him, using his game name first, out of habit. Unlike Deception, who also had never been called by his real name, Meiguang's game name had never been used much in the game.

"Oh!" Luo Ji, who was looking around, turned around, saw Ye Xiu, and smiled quickly.

"You're here." Ye Xiu came over and patted him on the shoulder.

"Yeah." Luo Ji nodded.

Then came the introductions. Luo Ji said "hello" three times in a row, and nothing else. After all, he had only started playing Glory after the opening of the tenth server, so even if he liked and admired some of the professional players, he wasn't as fanatical as Chen Guo, who had been a fan for so many years. Su Mucheng and the others didn't shock him that much.

"Let's go upstairs first!" he said, leading the way to the training room on the second floor as usual.

"This is where we train for now, the conditions are a bit basic," Chen Guo said as the owner, introducing the place. "The accommodation is in a nearby residential area, it's quite spacious, and there are four people living there now. You know Bao Zi very well, he's there too."

"Bao Zi..." Hearing this name, Luo Ji looked a bit like he was facing a formidable enemy, and said with a headache, "Please don't let me share a room with him!"

"Well, it's up to you... there's no fixed arrangement." Although Chen Guo said this, she suspected that Bao Zi might just grab Luo Ji's bag and take him to settle down, would Luo Ji even have a choice? Chen Guo also wanted to know.

"Do you want to rest first, or? Have you had lunch?" Chen Guo asked.

"Not yet."

"That's perfect."

The group had a simple meal together, during which Ye Xiu asked a question that made Luo Ji want to cry: "You haven't completed the challenges to get into the Realm of Gods yet?"

"Yeah..." Luo Ji replied a little awkwardly. He was still working hard on this task like many people in the guild. Actually, for a newbie, it wasn't surprising that he hadn't completed the task yet at this time. Even by December, when the eleventh server opened, there would still be many people in the tenth server who hadn't made it to the Realm of Gods yet. But Luo Ji was acquainted with some high-level people! Ye Xiu, who had completed the Realm of Gods challenges at level 50, didn't count. Tang Rou and Bao Zi were also decisively ahead of the crowd. Compared with these acquaintances, Luo Ji felt ashamed!

"Don't worry, take your time. Have you been practicing the things I sorted out for you?" Ye Xiu asked.

"I've been practicing," Luo Ji nodded. "But I don't have a lot of time."

"Now that you're on vacation, it's a good time to do some intensive training!" Ye Xiu said.

"Okay." Luo Ji had no objections. He was anxious about falling behind so much! In terms of academics, he could be considered a top student who was ahead of the crowd. No matter how humble he was, it was normal to have a little pride in his heart. But now he was really frustrated in the game. He was wronged when the strategy he initially researched was ridiculed by everyone. Later, he worked hard after being guided by Ye Xiu, and finally proved his worth. But when it came to actual combat, Luo Ji felt miserable compared to the people around him.

But in fact, within Happy Guild, Luo Ji's Meiguang was already quite ahead in terms of Realm of Gods challenges progress. After all, everyone in the guild started playing Glory from scratch like Luo Ji, but they didn't have the professional training methods that Ye Xiu was pointing out.

If Luo Ji couldn't become stronger than ordinary players by using these training methods, then the scientific nature and practicality of these training methods would be questionable.

The fact proved that these training methods were very helpful for Luo Ji's improvement, but he was still weaker when compared to gifted players like Tang Rou and Bao Zi.

After dinner, they returned to the training room, and Ye Xiu stood behind Luo Ji watching him work on the challenge quests. Luo Ji was extremely nervous being watched by Ye Xiu. He had never been this flustered even when his tutor, a world-class mathematician, was watching him do his project. After all, he was confident in that field of expertise. But in the game, Luo Ji knew that he wasn't particularly bad, but definitely not very good either, certainly not as outstanding as he was in his studies. And now he had to stand out from the tens of millions of people to enter the circle of super elites made up of only two hundred or so people. Luo Ji really felt that the degree of outstandingness might be even greater than his excellence in his studies, and he really didn't dare to slack off.

Ye Xiu also saw that he was nervous, so he didn't say anything at first, just waiting for Luo Ji to slowly get used to it, calm down, and stabilize before carefully observing his current level, his strengths and weaknesses in operation, and so on.

Soon, Ye Xiu noticed a very obvious problem with Luo Ji.

He was particularly focused on perfection!

He would have all the summoned beasts he would use appear on the summoning list, and then try to make each summoned beast play its greatest role, and then focus on working towards that goal.

This was like Blue Rain's Lu Hanwen, who insisted on perfecting the eight-shadow Sword Shadow Steps. This was fine in practice, but in actual combat, an imperfect eight-shadow Sword Shadow Steps was equivalent to a four-shadow one.

So Lu Hanwen retreated to second place in actual combat and used the perfect six-shadow Sword Shadow Steps to fight. But Luo Ji was now doing challenge quests, which were also serious battles, but because he was too focused on this perfect effect, he ended up neglecting one thing for another.

"Luo Ji, you're pushing yourself too hard," Ye Xiu finally said.