Chapter 37 Protagonist

The thirty-seventh round of the competition ended, and Luo Ji truly played the role of protagonist.

"How does it feel, kid!" After returning from the press conference, Luo Ji had his hair ruffled by Wei Chen.

"Great, great." Luo Ji's excitement was written all over his face. Best Player? Just a few rounds ago, he was worried about not being a burden to the team, but now, he had become the best player in the match, laying the foundation for the team's final victory… Luo Ji was too excited. He didn't care about the embarrassment of being surrounded by reporters, he only cared about being able to truly play a role in the team.

"Keep up the good work, the future is bright!" Wei Chen said.

"Yes, Old Wei!" Luo Ji responded happily, and then he was surrounded by young people like Qiao Yifan and An Wenyi, congratulating him. Baozi, as the boss, scolded Luo Ji in a rough voice, telling him not to be arrogant.

Youth is wonderful…

Wei Chen looked at these vibrant young people of Team Happy and felt a myriad of emotions.

To be honest, Luo Ji's level was nothing in Wei Chen's eyes. There were plenty of talented guys in this circle. But he also possessed something that Wei Chen envied the most: youth.

If he could be ten years younger, he would be willing to give up all his current skills and experience and start completely from scratch!

Skills can be practiced, experience can be accumulated, but youth, once lost, will never return.

Luo Ji still has a future, and he will continue to play a role in Happy's matches, but what about himself?

Wei Chen took out a cigarette, lit it, and took a deep puff.

Perhaps all that was left for him was these remaining matches.

One regular season match, and if they made it to the finals in the playoffs, that would be three rounds, with three matches in each round, making a total of nine matches, adding up to ten matches.

Ten matches…

Even if he played in every one of them, his professional career would only have ten matches left. Next season? Wei Chen didn't dare to think about it. If he stubbornly insisted on continuing, he would probably become a burden to the team.

Why did he retire in the first place?

Wei Chen suddenly felt a pang of regret.

Now, in his thirties, he was still persevering. Why couldn't he have continued back then? Even if he had just found any team, he could have had a spot. Six years… why did he waste these six years? Amidst the joyful laughter of the young people, Wei Chen sighed.

They were happy to make it to the playoffs in their rookie season, but Wei Chen was troubled that his professional career was dwindling with each passing match.

"Look at these young people, they're great." Ye Xiu suddenly appeared and patted Wei Chen on the shoulder.

"Damn!" Wei Chen was startled, and the cigarette slipped from his grasp, nearly poking him in the eye, giving him a second fright.

"There are ten more matches left," Ye Xiu said.

"What?" Wei Chen was stunned. He had ten more professional matches to play, which was a cruel thing for a professional player. Even if Ye Xiu was heartless, he wouldn't stab him like this, right? What did this guy mean by saying this, could it be that he was including himself in those last ten matches? Did this guy also want to retire?

"Don't regret it!" Wei Chen said.

"Heh heh." Ye Xiu just smiled.

The various comments after the 37th round of the competition began to pour out. The five teams vying for the top eight spots were still the focus of discussion. Hundred Blossoms, who reversed their defeat against Tyranny after losing three points, Thunderclap, who scored seven points against Samsara, and 301, who completely defeated Seaside, all received praise from various quarters. As for the score between Happy and Howling Wind, which ended up being 6 to 4, it was considered relatively close, so it was hard to say which side performed too badly. In the individual competition, Howling Wind's performance in chasing four points after falling behind by one point was still quite strong. As for the team competition, Su Mucheng and Luo Ji were, of course, highlighted for praise, while Liu Hao became the only player who performed poorly in the key battle of the thirty-seventh round, becoming the sole target of criticism from all sides.

In addition, even Tang Hao expressed his dissatisfaction with Liu Hao's performance at the post-match press conference, defining it as a disaster, so everyone had even more reason to criticize him.

Some media outlets with poor ethics directly quoted out of context. Tang Hao was clearly just commenting on the fact that Liu Hao's performance in this match was too substandard, like a disaster. But they used the headline "Howling Wind Encounters Disaster" and wrote about Liu Hao as if he were a tumor on Howling Wind. Clearly, Liu Hao's performance in Howling Wind this season had been very good, and he was trusted by the team and liked by the players. Otherwise, how could he have been appointed as the vice-captain and selected as an All-Star?

However, even the most impartial media outlets couldn't find anything good to say about Liu Hao in this round.

Looking around, the sky was filled with negative reviews. In Liu Hao's eyes, it seemed that everything he had worked so hard to build up throughout the season was collapsing because of his poor performance in this one match.

"I must make amends in the next round," Tang Hao silently gritted his teeth.

On June 5th, the tenth season of the Glory Professional Alliance finally ushered in its final battle. For half of the teams, it was the end of a season, but for ten teams, a new journey would begin after this. Some were fighting for the highest honor, while others were striving to redeem themselves.

The three most watched matches in this round were Happy vs. 301 at Happy's home venue, Samsara vs. Hundred Blossoms at Samsara's home venue, and Tiny Herb vs. Howling Wind at Tiny Herb's home venue.

The three matches would determine which three teams would make it into the top eight and start the playoffs. 301, Hundred Blossoms, and Howling Wind couldn't afford to be careless in this round. It had truly reached the point where every point would determine their final fate. And Happy, because these teams were bound to rise up, couldn't afford to be careless either.

"Let me play!" In the midst of preparations, someone in Team Happy was actively seeking a chance to play.

"Rest, rest!" The others said one after another.

"Leave it to us, no problem," everyone said.

"Don't! I haven't played a team match in a month. Please give me a chance to practice," Ye Xiu struggled to get a chance to play.

In fact, in the thirty-fifth round and the thirty-seventh round, if Ye Xiu had his way, he would have been willing to play. But everyone in Happy had actively kept him on the bench.

"You're so experienced, do you still need to practice?" Tang Rou said.

"Yeah, yeah, there's no need for Old Great," Baozi said.

"Rest, rest!" Everyone continued to say.

"I still need to, let me play!" Ye Xiu shouted.

Chen Guo was bewildered. The group was so noisy that she couldn't tell whether Ye Xiu's request to play was necessary or simply because he was lonely.

"Is it really necessary?" Chen Guo asked Ye Xiu.

Ye Xiu was about to cry: "Why wouldn't it be necessary? I haven't played in a month."

Chen Guo looked at Su Mucheng and Fang Rui, hoping for an answer from their professional experience.

"Listen to his arrangements!" Su Mucheng said with a smile.

Only then did Ye Xiu begin to deploy the next round, and the first thing he confirmed was his starting position in the team competition, causing an uproar in the room.

"Using public office for private gain."

Ye Xiu heard someone say. He began to deeply suspect whether these guys really wanted him to rest, or whether they wanted to squeeze him out and make room for someone else.

As the deployment continued, everyone finally put aside their joking attitude and seriously followed Ye Xiu's preparations.

"Three points are our guarantee for entering the playoffs, but we can't set our goal so low. We'll fight for victory with all our strength, and ignore 301's life or death," Ye Xiu said.

"Understood!" Everyone responded.

"Practice!" Ye Xiu waved his hand. The training for the next round of the match then began nervously.

The technology development department was also making a final sprint for the playoffs. As equipment was replaced, everyone hoped to get everything done before the playoffs started. The playoffs were a format where one mistake could lead to complete defeat, and suddenly replacing unfamiliar new equipment in the playoffs was not a wise thing to do. The deviations caused by equipment changes could lead to miscalculations or misjudgments in the match, and the playoffs, in a sense, were about who made fewer mistakes.

"36 pseudo-Silver equips, and the Myriad Manifestations Umbrella is also complete. Do we replace them now?" Seeing Ye Xiu come over, the people in the technology department excitedly asked. They were also looking forward to their handiwork being equipped on the characters to shock the entire league. Although the attributes of Silver equips were not displayed, the level was not hidden. When Team Happy appeared with a set of level 80 equipment, how much of a shock would that bring to the Glory scene? Just thinking about it was exciting.

"Let's wait until after this round to replace them all," Ye Xiu said. "Can there be more?"

"That's probably all for now," the technology department said. "Too many equipments can't achieve this kind of redundant complex structure."

The technology department called the structure used to upgrade those pseudo-Silver equips to level 80 "redundant." If it was just to make the equipment, far fewer materials would be needed. But in order to upgrade to level 80, they had to continue adding materials to the equipment, and these materials couldn't change the original attributes of the equipment. Many equipments couldn't withstand such additions and modifications, and these were the failures that couldn't be upgraded to level 80.

The main focus of Happy's technology department in this stage of research was to find out which equipments could be upgraded and which couldn't, and this also consumed a lot of materials. Fortunately, because the attribute requirements were lowered, the Silver equips were deliberately made with orange equip attributes, so the demand for rare materials was extremely low. And the output of dungeon materials was much, much greater. Almost all of the goods could be swept up on the in-game trading platform. The only thing that was tight was the drops from the top dungeons. With Wu Chen's organized coordination of the team at Happy Guild plus acquisitions, the needs of the technology department were finally met.

While developing the pseudo-Silver equips, the research on proper Silver equips was not neglected. After all, the pseudo-Silver equips were only a temporary measure. This batch had been directly jumped to level 80, but when the national level was updated to 80, it was unknown whether these equipments could still be upgraded to 85 using the redundant addition structure. Therefore, proper Silver equips were the truly sustainable path to development. The reason why Happy spent effort on pseudo-Silver equips was mainly because the materials consumed by pseudo-Silver equips and the most important rare materials for proper Silver equips didn't conflict much. Both sides didn't interfere with each other, so both could be grasped.