Chapter 115
Zhou Huo looked at Shi Luo and laughed quietly, "Shi Shen, this isn't a room card—this is Whisper's love letter..."
Shi Luo pinched the two room cards in his coat pocket and glanced sideways at Yu Sui, his lips moving slightly, but he didn't respond.
After checking in, Yu Sui, as team captain, still had some matters to handle. He signaled the officials to wait, then walked over to Shi Luo and Zhou Huo. "I have a solo interview and a photo shoot... originally scheduled for tomorrow, but I figure we'll be able to start training tomorrow, and that would waste too much time. I just discussed with them, and we'll just get it all done tonight, then start closed-door training tomorrow."
Zhou Huo frowned. "What kind of meaning does it have to tell the players directly? What media wants an interview, just interview?"
"Official game media. This is a fixed process for each team—can't turn it down. They mentioned it when I asked about tomorrow's schedule." Yu Sui rubbed his shoulder. "Either way, I can't sleep anyway. Might as well spend an hour or two getting it done."
Zhou Huo told Yu Sui to wait. He went to coordinate with the officials, and after confirming it was standard procedure and arranged around Yu Sui's schedule, Zhou Huo agreed. He gave instructions to the rest of the club staff and prepared to accompany Yu Sui for the interview.
"Go rest first..." Yu Sui's voice softened for Shi Luo. "I'll text you when I'm back."
Shi Luo抿了抿嘴唇 and nodded. "Okay."
Shi Luo went directly to Yu Sui's room. He didn't bother unpacking his suitcase—just took out his notebook from his peripherals bag to review past match replays of the other teams in their group stage group.
The teams in the group stage were far inferior in overall strength to FREE. Old Qiao hadn't even let the four of them waste time on these materials—just the team watched and wrote detailed summaries for each team, which they sent to the players. Only Shi Luo had copied a copy for himself, originally planning to watch during the flight when he couldn't sleep. Now he had the time.
Shi Luo sat on the bed, notebook on his lap, not a single light on. It was already dark outside—only the faint glow of the notebook screen visible in the room.
Shi Luo turned on 2x speed to watch the video, fast-forwarding frequently. A team's five-hour match video, he finished in less than two hours.
Shi Luo clicked on another team's video, had just started the 2x speed when his eyes suddenly lifted, and he quickly closed the notebook.
A few seconds later, the door made a "beep..." and opened.
The man who had just finished his interview opened the hallway light without any warning. He went to the bathroom to wash his face, grabbed a towel to pat it dry, then turned to leave—but he hadn't even made it out of the bathroom with the lights on before he was stopped by Shi Luo's fierce kiss.
Yu Sui froze for a moment, then relaxed his body and slightly spread his arms, letting Shi Luo do as he pleased.
Shi Luo pushed Yu Sui from the bathroom door all the way to the sink counter. Yu Sui didn't resist in the slightest. Whenever Shi Luo's hand pressed on his shoulder, Yu Sui simply retreated with him. The moment Shi Luo kissed him, Yu Sui parted his lips. When Shi Luo just touched Yu Sui's collar, Yu Sui himself pulled his jacket zipper all the way down to make it easier for Shi Luo.
In the dimly lit bathroom, only the two of them's slightly accelerated breathing could be heard.
Shi Luo put his hand at the hem of Yu Sui's hoodie, gripping Yu Sui's loose, soft hoodie. He hesitated for a moment, didn't lift it up—just placed his hand on Yu Sui's waist and continued the deep kiss.
After ten minutes of restrained yet wild silent kissing, Shi Luo let go of Yu Sui.
Shi Luo's lips were red, his voice low. "...You're not taking initiative."
Yu Sui heard this, closed his eyes, was quiet for a moment, then laughed helplessly, his voice slightly hoarse. "Baby... if I'm not taking initiative, I already want to do you so badly. If I take initiative... we might really not have training tomorrow. I would've just done that interview early for nothing."
Shi Luo thought of all the things during the short vacation, and his already restless heart was suddenly stirred again. He wiped his lips with the back of his hand and said nothing more.
After several deep breaths, Yu Sui's mind cleared a bit. But when he opened his eyes and saw Shi Luo, his heart instantly softened.
Yu Sui's lips moved slightly. "Want me to take initiative?"
Yu Sui gazed at Shi Luo, his voice low. "It's not impossible. I should be able to control myself... What do you want me to do?"
"You..." Shi Luo paused, then asked back, "If I tell you what I want you to do, you'll do it?"
Yu Sui smiled. "Within the premise that it won't affect your normal training tomorrow... I can satisfy you."
Shi Luo took a deep breath and said quietly, "Yu Sui... when you fall in love, do you have to leave people with no way out..."
Yu Sui didn't hear clearly. "Hmm?"
"Are you afraid I won't die in your hands or something?" Shi Luo ground his teeth and murmured. "Before I was even with you, fans warned me—I'm still young, don't get involved with you... If you fall in love with someone when you're too young, if you break up, you won't be able to fall in love again easily. Did you see that back then? Did you do this on purpose, so that I..."
Yu Sui looked deeply at Shi Luo, the corner of his mouth slightly raised. "Make you what? Shi Luo, make you what?"
Shi Luo couldn't hold back anymore. "Make me like you so much my heart aches. I'd恨不得把命给你, can't bear to leave you..."
Yu Sui listened to his little boyfriend's sickeningly sweet confession, his eyes filling with deeper and deeper laughter. He微微低头 and kissed Shi Luo on the lips. "That's right. Intentional."
"I intentionally... made you unable to bear parting with me for a lifetime."
Shi Luo was so thoroughly charmed by Yu Sui he had no bite left. He grabbed Yu Sui's collar and kissed him on the lips again. Yu Sui responded with measured tenderness. After a moment, Shi Luo released Yu Sui, his voice hoarse. "Okay... okay."
"Okay?" Yu Sui pulled up the jacket that Shi Luo had half-unzipped, barely containing his laughter. "Shi Shen, are you satisfied with your destruction of me? Will you give a good review? Coming again next time?"
"Like a block of wood. Not satisfied." Shi Luo turned to walk out. "...We'll talk after the tournament."
Yu Sui smiled, pulled up his own jacket zipper, and also walked out of the bathroom.
Shi Luo opened Yu Sui's suitcase in the outer room and quickly helped put away the luggage. That night, Shi Luo didn't leave. The two of them watched match replays until past midnight. When they felt a bit sleepy, they each drank a cup of hot milk and forced themselves to sleep.
The next day, the training room Zhou Huo applied for from the officials was ready. Everyone roughly followed their domestic schedule, just slightly moving the training time forward. They had breakfast around ten, then went to the official training venue. After a brief familiarization, they were at their computers at eleven sharp for practice matches.
Eleven AM in Germany was 4 AM in China—too early to schedule with domestic teams. Zhou Huo arranged practice matches with a North American team in the afternoon and a domestic team in the evening.
They didn't arrange a match with Holy Sword.
Naturally, Holy Sword wouldn't agree either. Their side was on high alert against FREE, refusing to schedule practice matches with any teams from the China region, afraid Yu Sui's side would gain any insight into them.
Zhou Huo coldly mocked, "Like it's not like our region's teams would agree if they scheduled us. Playing dirty, loves to mock—no one wants to pay attention to them."
During a break in the practice matches, everyone ate together. Zhou Huo kept complaining about Holy Sword's petty moves. Old Qiao patted Zhou Huo's shoulder and said quietly, "That's enough."
Old Qiao didn't say it out loud, but cast a glance at Shi Luo. Zhou Huo愣了一下 and realized Old Qiao was reminding him—Shi Luo and Holy Sword had a deep grudge. He shouldn't create an opposing atmosphere that would affect Shi Luo's mood.
Zhou Huo's tone turned abruptly. He smiled. "By the way, NSN is coming over in a few days. They're staying at our hotel too, so it'll be convenient to schedule practice matches with them."
Shi Luo pulled his napkin and wiped his mouth. "I'm done eating. I'll go look at the review video."
Shi Luo pretended not to notice anything.
Yu Sui was worried about him. His teammates were worried about him. Zhou Huo, Old Qiao... all the staff were worried about him.
Shi Luo was very clear about that.
Before the competition, he remembered clearly how the haters attacked him—they said he had no experience in major tournaments, said his mental state wasn't stable enough, said he was a liability to the team.
His first time at Worlds, he might even encounter his sworn enemy, Holy Sword. Everyone around him was worried he'd really mess up obviously, and that the tiny shadow in his heart would grow like a snowball with the overwhelming wave of doubt, bigger and bigger, until even he himself was brainwashed by the internet's doubts, lost his confidence, and truly became useless.
There were countless precedents. How many players had been saddled with slurs for just one mistake that didn't even determine the match outcome, then never managed to prove themselves again, truly becoming the trash the haters called them.
Shi Luo didn't want to explain anything, didn't want to tell his teammates he was fine, not to be so careful.
During a small domestic regular season, just because a commentator said "We're fortunate our region has the best medical twin stars, Whisper and Angel Sword," he changed his expression so drastically that all the watching players noticed his mental collapse—that废物, it was indeed him.
Now to casually say "I'm fine" would only make others think he was putting on a brave face, would make them worry even more. Shi Luo couldn't be bothered to cause others this trouble.
So Shi Luo quietly enjoyed Yu Sui's tenderness, quietly accepted the kindness from the rest of the team. The day before the group stage, when Zhou Huo said "It's fine to lose a few games in the group stage—as long as we make it out, we've won"—that kind of thing only a亲妈 would say—Shi Luo also said nothing.
The group stage officially began. Group A, due to the draw, became the opening match group. Double round-robin. FREE's first match was against the Thai team. The result had no surprises, as most people predicted—FREE won easily, taking the match in under twenty minutes. But unexpectedly to many, the MVP of the match was awarded to Shi Luo.
Shi Luo's performance that match was indeed outstanding. Moreover, there had always been talk in the community that when official technical staff selected MVP, sometimes they would give first-time Worlds players a one-time kindness bonus. The players and viewers who didn't understand the deeper mechanics thought Shi Luo might have been given preferential treatment as a rookie—it seemed reasonable upon reflection, new players needed some allowance.
In the post-match interview, when the host asked Shi Luo whether the MVP was for his impressive play or because of rookie preferential treatment, Shi Luo calmly said official preferential treatment.
But the foreign commentators couldn't help but defend Evil. "FREE winning easily wasn't surprising, but Evil player's performance as a rookie was a bit beyond expectations... His team has Whisper, winning MVP from Whisper's team—the difficulty is enormous... Of course, there's also the factor of the short match time with no prolonged stalemate phases, inherently not giving Whisper room to perform. But to overpower Chen Huo and Puppy is already very impressive. When fighting teams slightly weaker than themselves, players easily get carried away, lose their heads, and make big and small mistakes. But Evil didn't—he performed with such stability and beauty, completely unlike a Worlds rookie."
Because there was a half-truth saying that first appearances came with a guaranteed MVP once, even though the commentators passionately praised Shi Luo, the players didn't feel too surprised by his first performance.
But the next day, FREE consecutively faced the Japanese and Vietnamese teams. After smoothly winning both matches, both MVPs were still awarded to Shi Luo.
In just three BO1 matches, Shi Luo took three consecutive MVPs.
For the latter two MVPs, Shi Luo earned them purely through skill—stable performance, beautiful mechanics. The MVPs made everyone's hearts submit.
After the third group stage match, the discussion热度 about Shi Luo domestically and internationally multiplied several times over.
In the FREE team backstage lounge, in the small locker room with only Yu Sui and Shi Luo, Shi Luo pushed Yu Sui against the wall. After consecutively winning three MVPs, Shi Luo finally had the confidence to say to Yu Sui, "Were you worried I couldn't sleep well before coming to Germany? Do you know why I couldn't sleep?"
"Because I'm fucking finally finally finally able to come to this goddamn place and give Holy Sword's bunch of people trouble." Shi Luo's eyes carried a mix of provocation and hatred. "Two years ago... they looked down on me, didn't buy me, and you wouldn't let me come either... Now I'm going to make them see whether Little Master is worth it, whether they lost out by not insisting on buying me as a substitute back then."
Shi Luo said seriously, "I wasn't睡不着 from anxiety—I was excited... Finally having the chance to let others see clearly whether I can play at Worlds, whether I'll drag the team down."
Yu Sui leaned against the wall, thinking of the极限操作 Shi Luo displayed on stage, looking at him deeply, so enchanted he wanted to do something right there in the locker room.
"Why..." Yu Sui said quietly, "didn't you say so beforehand?"
"Not having a single achievement, saying it would've been pointless. And..." Shi Luo paused, his long-lost scheming showing through again. His voice grew softer and softer. "If I'd said it earlier... would you still have been that gentle with me?"
The young god's surrounding killing intent faded. His face showed a hint of embarrassment. "I like... you being so good to me."
"I just like... your playboy routine."
"Really like it."