「you watching next round with us lil bro?」

「YAAASSSS QUEEN! ^^^^^^ WHAT HE SAYS!!! PLSSSSSSS,」

「That would be so cool! Please do it!」

「are you really good at shoutcasting too?」

Lin Feng scratched the back of his head and grinned. You guys! He looked in the camera and said, “Of course I’ll be here for the next round! We’ll watch Worlds together and I’ll be your shoutcaster!”

「sswweeettttttt!!!! i can finally watch this stream with the sound on!!」

「finally a good caster! beats those three buffalos on the official broadcast」

「Buffalos? Alright there, Chief Wigwam.」

「wowowwww Prophet Stone is awesome! But lil bro is definitely better! LEZ GO LIL BROO!!!!」

「I just wanna listen to lil bro!!! hes the best!!!!!!!!!」

“Yeah! You guys get it! We vibin’!” Lin Feng laughed. He gave a thumbs up to the camera and said, “I’m really good at shoutcasting too!”

“U-uh? What the fuck?” Su Xue muttered. She looked at the camera and then at Lin Feng. She saw his bright smile. He was talking to her viewers again. They were cozying up to him. Not her. Him. All he had to do was say a few words and they were all over him. They had completely forgotten about her! “Oh. I see how it is. If he’s shoutcasting and watching Worlds with you guys, what am I supposed to do?” she asked chat. That, of course, was the wrong question.

「just keep our cups topped off like the good maid you are!」

「we already suffered enough listening to your screeching excuse of a voice.」

「 please stop damaging our ears….」

「 ill have my lawyer come after your ass otherwise!!!!」

「FIRE HER! FIRE THE STUPID MAID! BAD MAID! BAD MAID!!!」

「his cup is still empty??? You guys seein htis? ITS EMPTY!」

✹

Su Xue decided that while Lin Feng was here, they should hold another fan in-house. Lin Feng agreed, which set off a buzz in the chat. Excited messages flooded in. They were more than a little excited at the chance to play a game with their favourite streamer! Lin Feng! Su Xue had timed this fan in-house perfectly. Her average viewer count had jumped up to 2,000. They were what was left of the people that found the stream when Lin Feng played with Nightsong and Hermes. However, though they stuck around, they couldn’t be considered loyal fans yet. There was still a way to go for that, and one way to do that was with this in-house! This was a great opportunity to make sure these people would keep coming back to her stream!

The custom game was created. Eight lucky viewers were selected through a lottery. Su Xue was the Blue team captain and decided to play Jinx. An ad-carry she’d come to really enjoy as of late. Lin Feng was the Red team captain. He also played in bot lane, but unlike Su Xue he was playing Support. His Champion of choice was Blitzcrank. A fast moving machine with an extendable arm!

At 4 minutes, Lin Feng looked up from his screen and at Su Xue. There was undisguised surprise on his face. “Wow, you’ve gotten better!” he exclaimed, shocked. He meant it as a genuine compliment, but to Su Xue and the viewers, it sounded like anything but. The chat flooded with messages making fun of Su Xue, while the person in question had her head burn red.

“Uh, no no!” Lin Feng said, waving his hands in front of his chest. “Not like that. I’m serious! She has gotten a lot better! Just look at how she’s positioning! And there, see? She hasn’t missed any CS yet! That’s so much better than it was. She’s really gotten a lot better!”

Su Xue had improved a lot. She still wasn’t at the level of a Diamond player, but she was better than the average player that just hit Platinum. Since the first day Lin Feng started coaching her, she’d worked overtime to try and soak up as much information as possible from him and apply it in the game. All that hard work was definitely paying off. Her reddened face warped from anger to joy, real quick. She laughed and said, “Of course! Who do you think I am? All I had to do was put my heart into it! Then nothing can stop me! Watch! Ima get to Diamond real lickedy-split-quick. But first. Tee-hee! I’m going to crush you guys!”

“Oh, I see…” Lin Feng nodded. His hands were back on his mouse and keyboard. He focused on the screen again. “Guess I should get a little serious too, then.” Graves, Malcolm Graves, was his ad-carry. A renowned mercenary with a big double-barreled shotgun! The Graves was last hitting minions and was just about to kill the one right in front of Su Xue’s Jinx. Lin Feng pushed down on his Q key as the last auto from Graves flew in the air. It was timed to perfection. The Rocket Grab passed over the minion in the millisecond after it died and grabbed the Jinx, then pulled her back!

Lin Feng hit the Jinx with a quick auto attack, then had his Blitzcrank charge up his fist and smash the Jinx airborne–Power Fist! He landed another auto attack while she was in mid air and also ignited her. The Jinx started burning, with every tick of the Ignite dealing true damage.

The Graves dashed forward, giving himself bonus attack speed–Quickdraw! The Jinx stood right in front of him. Point blank range. He raised his double-barreled shotgun and squeezed the trigger. Three large bullets shot out in a cone, all three smashing into the Jinx–Buckshot!

The Jinx was almost dead. One more auto attack would do it. The Graves was clicking on the Jinx, ready to kill her. But he was never given the opportunity. Lin Feng had his Blitzcrank go into Overdrive and raced in circles around the Jinx while the Graves peppered her with Buckshot, and then auto attacked her at the last possible second to take the kill.

《You have slain an enemy!》

《You have been slain!》

Lin Feng and Su Xue sat next to each other in Su Xue’s bedroom. The game sounds overlapped. One announcing victory and the other defeat. Lin Feng found himself with some extra gold, enough to buy himself something nice in the fountain shop, while Su Xue’s screen went grey. She stared at it, dumbstruck.

「hahhahaha lil bro >> maid knew it. always rated lil bro!」

「666666666666666!!!」

「serves her write for getting all cocky saying she gonna beat the lane」

「U TRIED BE A SIETSE THUNDERCOCK BT U TOO FLACCCCCCIIDDD!」

「that blitz was so sick lil bro. Like. so sick!」

Lin Feng leaned over a little towards Su Xue so he could read the chat. He grinned as he went through them and said, “I know, right? My Blitz is really good!”

Su Xue couldn’t take it anymore. First he told her she wasn’t good enough to learn Riven, after she’d made him dinner, and now he did this! It was too much! Too damn much! “LIN FENG! YOU BRAT!” she screamed, her nose twitching. “Would it kill you to go easy on me? Just once! Don’t try and run! This time I’ll get you! I’m going to teach you a lesson today or my name is not Su Xue!”

Lin Feng knew what this meant. He was a trained escape artist. A true master of all trades. He jumped up from his chair, putting it between himself and Su Xue. Then he ran to the far side of her bed. She ran after him, so he jumped up on her bed and held her off. She tried to run around the bed, to whatever side he was closed. But he’d just run to the other side. She jumped on the bed, and he jumped off, running back towards the computer and putting the two chairs between him and Su Xue. Su Xue almost fell down from the bed in her hurry to chase after him. A brief moment of lost balance. The short moment Lin Feng needed to escape her clutches and jump back on her bed.

“AARRGGHHHH! LIN FEENNGGGG!”

The perfectly calm fan in-house devolved into a game of cat and mouse. Jerry ran around the room while Tom tried to enact judgement! But Jerry was a slippery little bastard! And Tom never got to give his good slapping. The people watching Su Xue’s stream turned away from the game and only looked at the webcam feed, as did the eight actually playing the game. None of them cared for a game of League right now. This webcam feed was better entertainment than prime tv! Some viewers even started giving live commentary.

「xue xue has missed again! how many more times can she not catch lil bro! find out next time on DBZ!!!!」

「lil bro evading the maid with some sick positioning!」

「we can all learn from this! watch closely and apply it to your league games!」

「Oh! He’s going to jump through her legs again! They’re too long! It’s too hard to close them in time!」

「dang she almost had him…… COME ON SU XUE!!! I BELIEVE IN YOU!!! If anyone can do it, it’s you!」

✹

The second day of Week 2 at Worlds wasn’t anywhere near as spectacular as day one. There were no big upsets of any kind, nor were there any particularly great plays to watch. The teams who made it out of Group A and B were decided. In Group B, Hand of God did what their fans expected. They qualified for the next round with 4 wins and 2 losses. Both of these losses came against Fate. HoG couldn’t put up any resistance against this Korean powerhouse. A hard to accept reality for their fans. As for KG, they also did what was expected of them. They beat the wildcard team. It all came down to whether Legend would find a win over Flash. And they did. There was no suspension. They crushed Flash, which meant that Legend and KG made it through to the next round.

The final games in Group C and D were held at the end of the week. There was first a two day break at Worlds. The next part of the Shanghai 16 School Tournament was also held over the weekend. This gave High School 13’s esports team a couple of days to work hard on their game. Every day after school, they raced down the stairs and across the road to the NetCow Cafe, where they would rent a private booth. Lin Feng did the coaching and the other seven did as he instructed.

The three consecutive wins in the first round of the qualifier had changed their minds. Where before they were full of doubt, now they were eager to play against the strongest teams in the Shanghai 16 School Tournament. Because they believed they could. They finally, after a lot of struggling, had enough confidence in themselves that they weren’t afraid to face off against the best teams in the entire tournament. Ouyang had explained why to Lin Feng, the others nodding to his words. “We beat Tonji Affiliated High. Tonji was a semifinalist last year. That means we’re as good as a semifinalist! And we’re still getting better every training! We work hard and are awesome! It can only go better for us! That first place trophy is ours! We just gotta go and take it!”

✹

It was Friday. Worlds was back on. Today it was all on Group C and D to show the world what they had! Lin Feng came home early from training with the esports team at the NetCow Cafe to gobble down some dinner before helping Su Xue with streaming. But Su Xue had something else in mind. She’d decided to hold a mukbang! They would turn on the stream and eat in front of the camera. Maybe the viewers could eat with them from wherever they were! She’d laid out all sorts of delicious dishes and turned her stream on, smiling at the camera. They’ll love this!

「wtf…. friggin maid makes food for herself but not for us??? im out」　

「Can you also send me some food? I’m always here and nice to you, Xue Xue.」

「You should be honoured by my presence and send me some of your homemade food!」

「did you cook the rice in your bathwater??? can i buy some???」

「FINALLY! The maid is taking care of our lil bro…」

「 now if only she could also take care of us.」

「WE HAVE NEEDS TO YOU KNOW!」　

「ddaannnggggg that looks delliicciiiouuussssssss」

「so hungry. my mom is a shit cook. Pls come cook for me, love <3」

“Bathwater? Make for you guys? What? NO! You should’ve eaten before the stream! It’s already past 7! Not my fault you can’t cook.” Su Xue tried to hide a smile behind faked anger, but the joy in her eyes was hard to miss. They were practically shining. She turned to Lin Feng and said, “Come, sit! Let’s eat!”

Lin Feng didn’t need to be told twice. He picked up his bowl and chopsticks and made himself at home. There was nothing better than a good dinner! Not right now, at least. He smacked his lips and said, “Alright! I’m digging in!”

While Su Xue and Lin Feng were enjoying dinner and the viewers were enjoying watching their host devouring his food, Worlds began. The Chinese fans were most excited to see what’d happen in Group D. That was Dust’s group. But the first match was one in Group C. So they turned their attention to that.

Su Xue picked up a morsel of cabbage and said, “Group C seems pretty evenly matched up, huh?”

Everyone agreed that Group C had three strong teams and that any of them could make it out of Groups. Each of these teams had at least a King on their roster. The Assassins from Taiwan’s LMS had Read XIII. He was their Jungler, a master on Lee Sin and Evelyn. The pressure he could put on the lanes and the opposing Jungler was second to none! Then there was Spoon, a strong Midlaner. He played for Meteor from Europe’s LCS. However, the best player in Group C belonged to the third team. He was the second ranked Emperor and played for the North American team Season. Autumn. A God-tier Support.

Lin Feng rubbed his nose as he looked at the lineup for team Season. His eyes were locked on the name of their support. A name that brought back memories from four years ago. He pursed his lips and shook his head. It was a name that he knew intimately. The God-tier Support on his team back in Season 1 had the same summoner tag. Autumn.