Six years ago. A snowy night.
Snowflakes fell softly and quietly, the chill of the wind biting. Zhen Ning stood in front of the internet café, lifting his head to look at the simple, shabby sign that read “XX Internet Café.”
He stood at the entrance, his hand hovering just short of the greasy door handle that was nearly reflective, already catching a faint whiff of smoke wafting out from inside.
Zhen Ning disliked the smell of smoke, but in cheap roadside internet cafés like this, it was a given that there would be no designated smoke-free areas.
He withdrew his gaze and pushed the door open.
The café owner, a middle-aged, bald beta with a cigarette dangling from his lips, looked up when he saw Zhen Ning enter. He smiled and asked, “Same spot as usual? Overnight, right?”
Zhen Ning turned his face away, silently avoiding the cloud of smoke drifting toward him. He gave a slight nod.
The internet café was small, with only a few people inside. The air was thick with the stench of cigarettes, but Zhen Ning had been coming here almost every night for the past month.
Brushing the unmelted snowflakes off his coat, he walked to a seat in the corner and powered on the computer.
His phone vibrated.
The screen displayed: [Xiao Ning, I have some out-of-town business to handle next week. I probably won’t be able to come home again.]
And then another: [I’ll keep asking Auntie Xu to come by and cook for you. Don’t pretend you didn’t see this. Remember to reply to Dad.]
Zhen Ning stared coldly at the text. After a moment, he lifted his head, flipped the phone face-down onto the table, and clicked on the game icon for Forest of the Full Moon on the desktop.
Before starting ranked matches each day, Zhen Ning had a habit of heading into the training camp to practice last-hitting minions. It was his way of warming up his hands, but also a method to clear his mind.
During this time, he didn’t need to think about anything else. He could focus entirely on this one small task, and in the moment a minion was killed, he could savor the small satisfaction of seeing “+20 gold” pop up on the screen.
When he reached his 134th last-hit, Zhen Ning suddenly sensed something. He looked up.
At some point, a group of teenagers in school uniforms, who had not yet differentiated, had entered the internet café. Likely high school students from a nearby school that had just finished classes, they chatted noisily among themselves.
The smell of smoke was bearable, but what Zhen Ning couldn’t stand was loud noise. Yet, in an internet café, that was unavoidable.
He frowned.
The group sat down near him, still talking. A tall boy chose the seat next to Zhen Ning. Just before sitting down, Zhen Ning noticed the boy glance briefly at his screen.
“Hurry up and log in, let’s go, let’s go.” The boy pulled out his chair and plopped down next to him. Zhen Ning heard him say, “My mom’s out of town tonight, so I can play all night. Let’s get a few more rounds in.”
“Yan-ge, your main account’s rank is way too high.” Another voice, sounding extremely pained, asked, “I know I’m not skilled enough for these high-level games. Can’t you use a side account to play with us instead?”
“Don’t you remember? Yan-ge has his tryouts for Grilled Corn next month. They’re gonna look at his ranked win rate. Alt account stats don’t mean anything. Those are just games against noobs.”
“Yeah, true. Alright, just invite me to the room then… But Yan-ge, is Auntie finally okay with you going pro?”
“Not yet.” Zhen Ning heard the boy beside him give a muffled laugh. “Honestly, I haven’t made up my mind about it either. I’ll go to the tryouts first and see how it goes. I’ll decide after that…”
It was noisy.
Zhen Ning frowned deeper and turned up the volume on his headphones.
As the game progressed into the late stage, the waves of minions became denser and harder to clear. With his gear upgraded, Zhen Ning’s skill cooldowns shortened, and his speed in clicking the mouse and keyboard unconsciously picked up as well.
He became vaguely aware of the boy next to him turning his head again, glancing thoughtfully at his screen.
The group continued their noisy conversation, but Zhen Ning tuned them out. Focused on clearing the minion waves, he aimed to reach 300 last-hits before exiting the training camp.
He didn’t know how much time had passed when the boy beside him suddenly raised his voice in disbelief. “…Are you fucking kidding me?!”
“Yan-ge, I really can’t hold on anymore.” The chubby guy sitting next to the boy clutched his stomach, sweating heavily. “I seriously can’t take it. I have to go to the bathroom right now.”
“…You’re unbelievable.” The boy beside him spoke through gritted teeth. “You just couldn’t resist stuffing your face with that sketchy malatang, huh? And now you’re messing things up in the middle of such a crucial match? If you’d said something earlier, we could’ve just waited for you and not started this game. But no, the match is already on, and you’re leaving me alone in the early game?”
The chubby guy’s face turned a shade of green. “I thought I could hold it, but I really can’t. I’m about to explode. I—”
“Stop, stop, stop.” The boy waved his hand in disgust, then sighed after a pause. “Fine, fine, just go already.”
The chubby guy shot up from his seat and dashed off, disappearing in an instant.
A blue-haired guy turned to the boy with a worried expression. “What do we do now? Our comp relies on Mooncard as the core. With Tang Fangyuan running off, we’re done for. The other team might push to our crystal in ten minutes. Maybe we should just AFK in the fountain and surrender in six minutes to start the next match faster…”
Zhen Ning frowned again.
He wasn’t interested in their drama. Turning up the volume on his headphones, he let the background noise drown out their conversation and focused on farming the last fifty minions before exiting the training camp.
The next second, Zhen Ning suddenly felt something lightly tap his arm.
At first, he assumed it was just his arm brushing against nearby equipment or a cable connected to his headphones and paid no attention.
But a few seconds later, he felt another light poke.
Zhen Ning froze.
He turned his head and locked eyes with the boy next to him.
The moment he saw the boy’s face clearly, Zhen Ning was momentarily stunned.
The boy was young and brash, with strikingly handsome features. His expression was wild and flamboyant. Among teenagers, Zhen Ning had rarely seen anyone whose eyes sparkled so brightly, radiating pride and self-assurance without the slightest hint of concealment.
The boy wore a wide smile.
He pointed to his ear, signaling for Zhen Ning to remove his headphones.
Zhen Ning hesitated for a moment but eventually took them off slowly.
“Hi!” The boy greeted him openly. “I noticed you’ve been practicing kiting in the training camp but haven’t started any real matches. So, I was wondering—could you do us a favor?”
Zhen Ning didn’t respond.
“My friend who plays AD suddenly had a stomachache.” The boy pointed to the empty seat on his left, sounding helpless. “But we just started a game and really don’t want to surrender at six minutes. So… could you step in for him?”
A match in Forest of the Full Moon typically lasted about half an hour. However, after six minutes, players could initiate an early surrender.
Six-minute surrenders usually only happened when a teammate went AFK or when the gap between teams was overwhelmingly large.
It was often a last resort because as long as the team was complete, no matter how bad the teammates were, most players still preferred to fight until the very end.
The boy in front of him seemed to share this sentiment.
Zhen Ning remained silent.
The boy hesitated for a moment, then added, “I play support, and I’m pretty good at it. If we go bot lane together this game, I can—”
The blue-haired guy next to him couldn’t help but interject, “Not just ‘pretty good,’ okay? He’s top-tier, already got tryout invitations from several of the best clubs in the country. Even if the AD is a literal radish, as long as our Yan-ge is supporting, there’s no way bot lane wouldn’t lose…”
The boy turned his head and shot the blue-haired guy a vicious glare.
Blue Hair immediately shut his mouth, awkwardly turning away without daring to say another word.
After a long pause, Zhen Ning finally spoke. “Alright. But I have one condition.”
The boy’s eyes lit up slightly. He stared at Zhen Ning’s face. “Go on.”
“You’re too noisy,” Zhen Ning said flatly. “If I help you with this game and we win, then until I leave this internet café today, either you move to another area to sit, or you all stay completely silent, only speaking when absolutely necessary for in-game communication.”
He spoke bluntly, without holding back, and the boy was clearly caught off guard.
“Hey, what’s with that attitude? This is an internet café, not a hotel. Who plays games without talking?” Blue Hair behind them couldn’t hold back his anger and spoke up again. “And besides, Yan-ge, you don’t even know how good this guy is. What if he’s below Platinum and ends up dragging us down? Listen to me—let’s just surrender at six minutes, wait for Tang Fangyuan to come back, and start the next game.”
The boy addressed as Yan-ge, however, didn’t respond.
He looked at Zhen Ning’s screen. His gaze fell on the game timer in the top-right corner and the minion kill count next to it, deep in thought.
Ignoring Blue Hair’s comment entirely, he turned back to Zhen Ning with another question. “Do you play Mooncard?”
Zhen Ning: “Not very often.”
The boy hesitated and hummed softly. “This game, I picked Sunflower, the new support hero that just came out two days ago… Have you ever played bot lane with Sunflower before?”
Zhen Ning: “No.”
The boy’s expression became more complicated. After a moment’s hesitation, he said, “You know Mooncard’s W skill can cancel the post-cast animation with Flash, and Sunflower’s seeds can—”
Zhen Ning raised his eyes and glanced at him indifferently. “Didn’t you just say even a radish could play with you? Seems like you’ve got pretty high standards for a radish.”
The boy: “…”
Blue Hair, eavesdropping from behind: “…”
Zhen Ning didn’t have much patience for people who kept pushing their luck after asking for help. He hadn’t really wanted to help in the first place, so he turned back with an expressionless face and reached for his headphones.
But the next moment, he felt someone grab his wrist.
The boy’s palm was warm, the heat pressing against the cool skin of Zhen Ning’s arm.
“…You’re such a cold and stubborn person, aren’t you?” The boy stared at Zhen Ning’s face for a moment, then suddenly chuckled, unable to hold back his laughter. “Alright, I was just asking. Don’t get mad, okay?”
Zhen Ning’s eyelashes trembled.
“I believe in you.” He heard the boy say, “And I promise, if we win this game, I’ll make sure they all shut up tonight and won’t disturb you while you play.”
As if making a monumental decision, the boy took a deep breath. He pointed to the empty seat next to him, grinned widely, and flashed Zhen Ning a dazzling smile.
“Then please, take your seat, my AD.”
