Chapter 14: Our Consciences Are Clear

The next day at noon, after finishing lunch, Lin Wan headed toward the Maple internet café.

As soon as he walked out of the north gate, he saw Zhuo Feng waiting by the roadside. With his long legs, Zhuo Feng casually stretched one out to keep his bicycle balanced.

"Weren't you supposed to go ahead without me?" Lin Wan asked as he walked over.

"I told Han Jinsong to go first." Zhuo Feng held onto the handlebars and waited for Lin Wan to get on.

"I think I'll walk today. It'll be good exercise."

He was still a little bothered by the video from last night.

Zhuo Feng looked surprised.

"Are you still thinking about yesterday's game, when I didn't heal you?"

Lin Wan shook his head.

There was something about healing yesterday?

Why didn't he remember that?

"Then get on. Let's go."

Lin Wan thought for a moment before finally telling him the truth.

"There was a video yesterday. It caught you giving me a ride on your bike. Some of the comments were pretty nasty. I'm worried it might affect you."

Zhuo Feng smiled.

"What kind of comments?"

"What do you think?" Lin Wan blinked at him.

Zhuo Feng turned his head slightly and avoided looking directly into Lin Wan's eyes. He had already guessed what the comments were probably about.

He smiled.

"People can say whatever they want. Their mouths belong to them. But we shouldn't take those comments to heart. Don't let strangers ruin your good mood."

"Besides..."

"Our consciences are clear. We've done nothing wrong."

"Hey, Second Brother! Captain! Aren't you guys leaving?"

"We're heading off first!"

Just then, Yu Sen rode past on his bicycle with Ding Hanwei sitting on the back. After shouting a greeting, the two of them disappeared down the road in the blink of an eye.

Lin Wan watched them ride away.

They were doing the exact same thing.

Besides, he and Zhuo Feng hadn't done anything shameful.

So what was there to be afraid of?

He immediately sat down on the back seat and patted Zhuo Feng on the back.

"Let's go!"

"That's more like it." Zhuo Feng laughed. "How can an AD carry dare to go to lane alone without a support?"

"Heh. By the way, what was that thing you mentioned about healing?"

"Huh? Did I say anything?"

"You did!"

"No, I didn't."

"You definitely did!"

"You heard wrong."

When they arrived at the internet café...

Two teams were already playing an intense match in the competition area.

Lin Wan walked over to scout out the competition, but he lost interest after only a short while.

It wasn't that the two teams had almost no teamwork.

They had absolutely no teamwork at all.

Everyone was playing their own game, completely ignoring each other until a team fight happened.

He returned to the practice room.

Coach Chen Jie was holding a printed sheet showing their tournament group.

This year's campus tournament had a total of eighty teams.

Every five teams formed one group, making sixteen groups in total. Each group would play a round-robin format.

The scoring system was simple:

Win a match, gain one point.

Lose a match, lose one point.

Only the team with the highest score in each group would advance to the Round of 16.

"Our first match is at three this afternoon," Chen Jie announced after reading the schedule. "We're playing against... Team Top Villain."

The corner of his mouth twitched.

What kind of team name is that?

Maybe it wouldn't have seemed so strange back when he was still a college student.

But now he had already graduated. He continued reading the other team names.

"Whatever Team."

"Love Is Never Wrong Team."

"Two-and-a-Half Years of Practice Team."

"Please Don't Cut in Line at the Cafeteria Team."

He took a deep breath.

Students these days... their team names just keep getting weirder.

Unlike their team name.

It was classy.

Elegant.

Meaningful.

RSNDM Team!

The full name was Renaissance of Sovereign Nouveau Digital Monarchs.

What a meaningful and inspiring name!

Seeing the name of their first opponent, Lin Wan rubbed his nose.

Sun Mao's bold words from earlier were still fresh in his mind.

Maybe this was fate.

He was going to personally send Sun Mao home.

The team first played a warm-up game.

After that, following Chen Jie's instructions, everyone calmed themselves down and quietly focused on getting into the right mindset.

At exactly three o'clock, they walked onto the competition stage.

"My rank is Platinum, brothers! Just follow me and I'll carry everyone! No need to say anything else, we're definitely winning this one!"

Sun Mao confidently bragged to his teammates as they walked onto the stage.

But the moment he spotted Lin Wan sitting not far away, adjusting his equipment...

His eyebrows immediately knitted together, and his face fell.

Sun Mao... Sun Mao... you and your big mouth... We're doomed!

Both teams finished their preparations, selected their champions, and entered the game.

In less than fifteen minutes, the score reached 19–0.

Sun Mao and his teammates were desperately defending their base.

His energetic voice echoed through the headset.

"Brothers! Hold the line! If we can survive until twenty minutes, we'll count that as a moral victory!"

"The other team has no honor! They picked champions that counter all of ours! We didn't lose to them, we lost to the current meta!"

One minute later, their base defenses were destroyed.

The whole team retreated to the fountain, enjoying the movement speed boost from its healing area.

Sun Mao controlled his champion and stood right in the middle of the fountain, looking like an unstoppable king.

"Brothers! Kill that support! As long as we kill him, we'll count this game as a win!"

The five of them charged out of the fountain together.

Even though there were only five people, they rushed forward with the momentum of a huge army.

Just one second before their Nexus was destroyed, all five of them went all-in and finally killed Lin Wan.

Game Over.

The five members of Sun Mao's team jumped out of their gaming chairs and high-fived each other.

After one whole game, they had finally managed to kill one player on Lin Wan's team.

It wasn't a complete defeat.

Just a small loss.

Meanwhile, the five members of Team RSNDM looked completely confused.

They had won... right?

Right?

Then why was the losing team happier than they were?

After getting crushed that badly, they were still so excited.

Could they have some unusual hobby?

The two teams left the stage.

As Sun Mao walked past Lin Wan, he proudly snorted.

"Traitor!"

Then he turned to his teammates and shouted,

"Brothers! You all worked hard today! Let's go to McDonald's! My treat!"

Yu Sen hadn't heard what Sun Mao had said to Lin Wan.

But seeing Sun Mao acting so arrogantly after losing, he figured it couldn't have been anything nice.

He rolled up his sleeves, showing off his thick arms, and was about to walk over.

You lost and you're still bullying my teammate?

If I don't teach you a lesson, all these muscles are for nothing!

Lin Wan quickly stopped him.

"Brother Yu, calm down! He's my roommate! He's just joking with me!"

With fists as big as cooking pots, Yu Sen probably could have knocked Sun Mao out with one punch.

A second punch would just be hitting a dead body.

Back in the practice room...

Coach Chen Jie said, "There aren't any more matches today. We have two matches tomorrow and another two next Saturday."

As the biggest sponsor of the tournament, it was perfectly reasonable for him to arrange his own team's matches on weekends.

After that, Chen Jie had everyone play solo ranked.

Their teamwork was already good enough.

Now they needed to improve each player's individual skill so the team's overall level could become even higher.

………………………

After a busy afternoon, Chef Lin finally returned to school in the evening.

As soon as he entered the dorm, he smelled the delicious aroma of fried chicken.

The lights were off, leaving the room dark.

Sun Mao and Qiu Cheng were sitting together, staring at a horror movie on a phone.

In the movie, the main characters heard strange noises behind a door and decided to open it to investigate.

At that exact moment, Lin Wan opened the dorm door.

Seeing their own door suddenly open, the two of them nearly jumped into the air.

They even let out a perfect duet of dolphin-like screams.

Lin Wan swore that in nearly twenty years of life, he had never heard such unbelievably high-pitched male screams.

"What are you doing, Brother Wan?!"

"Holy crap! Brother Wan, don't you know people can literally scare others to death?!"

Sun Mao was curled up against Qiu Cheng, patting his chest as his heart nearly jumped out.

Lin Wan rubbed his ears.

"What are you two doing? I just walked in, and you both started screaming. You scared me too."

"Hey! What are you doing?" Qiu Cheng suddenly realized there was a heavy person leaning against him and shoved Sun Mao away with a look of disgust.

"I brought back fried chicken from McDonald's for you guys. If you want some, just help yourselves." Sun Mao stuffed a piece of chicken into his mouth. Right now, only fried chicken could comfort his frightened little heart.

"We were watching a horror movie!" Qiu Cheng also grabbed a piece of chicken. "Sun Mao and I made a bet. Whoever gets scared first is the grandson!"

"Oh? Is it good?" Lin Wan walked over.

"Nah, it's boring. Totally fake."

"Yeah! Not scary at all! I could watch something like this while laughing in a graveyard!"

Their mouths were tougher than anyone else's.

Never mind the fact that they had both jumped just moments ago.

A few minutes later...

The two-person movie became a three-person movie.

The three of them sat side by side.

Lin Wan sat in the middle, while Qiu Cheng and Sun Mao sat on either side of him.

The two cowards each hid half of their faces behind Lin Wan.

The movie continued.

As the characters kept making one terrible decision after another, the number of survivors slowly dropped until only one person remained.

Everyone knew what that meant.

Whenever only one person was left...

The biggest scare was coming.

Trying to ease the tension, Sun Mao spoke.

"When I went to McDonald's earlier, I met a little kid. He looked at me and asked, 'Big brother, why are you so ugly?' Guess what I said?"

"I told him, 'I'm actually Doraemon. I came back in a time machine. I'm the grown-up version of you!' The kid burst into tears right away. His mom couldn't calm him down no matter what she did! Hahaha!"

"The little kid had his mom to comfort him, but what about you?"

A fourth voice suddenly spoke in the dorm.

It was soft, almost like someone talking in their sleep.

"!!!"

"Holy crap!"

"Mom, save me!"

Sun Mao and Qiu Cheng immediately buried their faces into Lin Wan's back like two ostriches.

Lin Wan turned around.

"Old Zhang, can you at least make some noise when you walk?"

"Hahaha! With courage like yours, you still dare to watch horror movies? Come on, come on. Cry in your father's arms!" Zhang Dingding spread his arms with a proud smile.

"Get lost!"

"Stay away from us, class enemy!"

Sun Mao kept thinking about what Zhang Dingding had just said.

A wave of sadness washed over him.

Yeah...

Who was going to comfort him?

Sob...

He turned his sadness into appetite and started stuffing fried chicken into his mouth.

"Just because I have a girlfriend now, does that mean our father-and-son relationship is over?" Zhang Dingding held his chest dramatically and sang horribly off-key.

"My son has become rebellious... you've broken my heart~"

"Damn it! Old Zhang, let me tell you something! Love is a grave! Be careful or you'll end up buried in it!" Qiu Cheng gritted his teeth while glaring at Zhang Dingding's smug face.

"No, no, no! Love is a city! People outside desperately want to get in!" Zhang Dingding pointed at Qiu Cheng, then at himself.

"And the people inside..."

Qiu Cheng snorted.

"What about them?"

"They really know how to have fun!"

Clap! Clap! Clap!

Zhang Dingding applauded himself three times.

"Your dad's just back to grab his ID card. My darling is here to pick me up. You guys keep watching. I'm not coming back tonight!"

He grabbed his ID card, turned around stylishly, and before leaving, casually stole the chicken drumstick Sun Mao was just about to eat.

With a flashy wave, he said, "Bye-bye!"

He showed off and ran away.

Even stole a chicken leg while he was at it.