A deathly silence fell, and the two of them froze in place.
Xu Qing wanted to slap himself the moment the words left his mouth. He had been so immersed in the game that he had developed a conditioned reflex. Seeing Pei Shiyu’s wide-eyed, shocked expression, Xu Qing dared not move a muscle, terrified that if Pei Shiyu realized he was the Red Hair who had just been flirting with him in the game, he might come over and start an offline confrontation.
Pei Shiyu, naturally, had no idea how many mental gymnastics Xu Qing had just performed. He simply felt that he must have been dizzy from gaming. Otherwise, why would the voice he kept hearing in his head come out of Xu Qing’s mouth?
Pei Shiyu asked with a hint of doubt and uncertainty: “You, did you speak just now?”
Xu Qing immediately shook his head and stuttered: “No, no I did not.”
The kitchen lighting was dim. Xu Qing already looked delicate and well-behaved, and at this moment, out of a guilty conscience, he deliberately opened his eyes wide. His moist, watery eyes blinked twice, making him look exceptionally innocent. Pei Shiyu, because of his earlier suspicion, inexplicably felt a surge of guilt.
Pei Shiyu shifted his gaze and, rarely for him, changed the subject: “Why are you still up so late?”
Hearing Pei Shiyu stop dwelling on that “Wild King Brother” comment, Xu Qing secretly breathed a sigh of relief. He felt a mix of guilt and secret joy.
Xu Qing replied: “I was a bit thirsty at night, so I got up to find some water.”
Pei Shiyu nodded and fell silent. He was never good at initiating conversations, and the two stood in mutual silence for a while. Pei Shiyu felt like a fool standing there.
Fortunately, Xu Qing spoke up: “Are you thirsty, or hungry?”
Pei Shiyu: “Both.” He had not eaten a late-night snack, and he had been playing later than usual. After being mentally tortured in the game and then putting his phone down to relax, he realized his stomach was protesting.
Xu Qing nodded, opened the fridge again, and found a bottle of unexpired yogurt and a pack of instant noodles.
Xu Qing shook the instant noodles in his hand: “Takeout, or this?”
“This one.” Pei Shiyu took the noodles: “I do not know how long takeout would take.”
Xu Qing stepped aside to clear the kitchen. Pei Shiyu turned on the faucet to wash his hands, then paused and looked at Xu Qing, who was sitting on a kitchen chair with no intention of leaving: “Do you want to eat too?”
Xu Qing nodded without the slightest bit of politeness: “Thanks.”
Under the dim yellow light of the late-night kitchen, Pei Shiyu kept his head down, revealing his slender neck. The steam rising from the pot softened his sharp features, making them appear blurred and gentle. After a while, Pei Shiyu placed a bowl of noodles in front of Xu Qing, topped with a perfectly cooked fried egg.
Xu Qing had not been very hungry, having stayed up simply because he had not figured things out yet and wanted to spend more time with Pei Shiyu. But seeing the bowl of noodles, he suddenly felt starved. Xu Qing took a big bite: “It tastes pretty good. I did not expect you to know how to cook.”
Pei Shiyu cleaned the pot and utensils he had just used, returning them to their places before sitting across from Xu Qing.
“It is just a bowl of instant noodles.” He was not very good at complicated dishes: “Boil water, add noodles and seasoning.” It only took two steps.
Xu Qing pointed at the fried egg in the bowl: “That is already very impressive. At the very least, I cannot do that.”
Pei Shiyu smiled but did not speak. Just as he was about to continue eating, he felt someone poke the corner of his lip.
Pei Shiyu looked up. In front of him was Xu Qing’s magnified smiling face, praising him unreservedly: “Just like that, smile more. You are very handsome.”
Pei Shiyu frowned. He remembered the last time he frowned and was poked by Xu Qing in almost the same way, so he bit his tongue and held it back. Xu Qing’s finger did not linger long before he pulled it back and continued to bow his head to eat. Pei Shiyu felt the skin that Xu Qing had just touched itching. He tugged at the corner of his mouth, feeling a muscle cramp.
For the rest of the time, the two ate in silence until they finished the noodles.
Xu Qing stood up to put both their bowls in the sink. Since he had asked for the noodles, he could not leave the dishes for Pei Shiyu. Pei Shiyu watched Xu Qing’s awkward dishwashing posture. He put the bowl on the dish rack, opened his mouth to say something, then thought better of it. Either way, the housekeeper would clean it tomorrow.
Xu Qing rubbed his slightly bloated stomach. Late-night snacks were like that: if you do not eat them, it is fine, but once you do, you eat too much. He said to Pei Shiyu: “Goodnight then?”
Pei Shiyu, who was not accustomed to saying goodnight to others, looked into Xu Qing’s burning gaze and spoke slowly: “Goodnight.”
The internet continued to buzz with Pei Shiyu’s scandal. After some time, because the Dawn team was training constantly, except for White Crow, none of the others had external accounts, not even an official team account. Everything about them gave off the vibe that they could disband at any moment. The Dawn Team felt completely like a Small Broken Team.
Sometimes, with internet trolls, the more you respond, the more arrogant they become. When you do not respond at all, they act like broken records, repeating the same things until they find it boring themselves.
White Crow looked at the comments under her posts, raised an eyebrow, and glanced at Pei Shiyu sitting across from her: “Captain, thanks to you, my haters have decreased.”
Pei Shiyu looked up but did not say anything, maintaining his icy expression. However, Xu Qing, who was sitting on the side, could sense Pei Shiyu’s confusion, perplexity, and lack of understanding. It was as if he were saying, “What does you having fewer haters have to do with me?”
White Crow looked at the stream of comments on her social media account. Before the match, she had anticipated how many people would be cursing her, but because of Pei Shiyu’s scandal, for every ten comments, only one was cursing her.
Xu Qing could not help but be curious: “Then what about the rest?”
White Crow said honestly: “They are advising me to turn back and quit the team.”
Xu Qing smiled politely: “Good for you.”
The only member of the Dawn team who loved browsing the forums, Wan Yi, looked at Pei Shiyu after reading another long thread: “Captain, did you run into Red Hair yesterday?”
Hearing the ship he was sailing being mentioned together, White Crow’s radar went off immediately, and she also stared intently at Pei Shiyu.
The only one out of the loop, Wan Li, asked: “Has not Red Hair been offline for almost two months?”
Pei Shiyu, stared at by several pairs of eyes, felt a stinging sensation on his back. He experienced firsthand what it meant to have one’s back pierced by stares and to feel a lump in one’s throat; he was utterly baffled.
What did Red Hair being online or offline have to do with him?
Xu Qing, as one of the parties involved, wore an impeccable smile, pushed his chair back with his feet, and moved silently further away from Pei Shiyu.
Who is Red Hair? I do not know him. What server-merge number one player? I do not play this game.
Pei Shiyu’s lips parted slightly.
The gazes of the others grew even more intense.
Pei Shiyu said coldly: “Time to train.”
The others: “…”
Wan Yi was disappointed: “Captain, how can your 36-degree mouth say things colder than your Arctic glacier face?”
Pei Shiyu shot him a chilly look, and Wan Yi’s voice grew quieter and quieter.
Training began, but one person was missing. Lu Xinyu’s seat was empty.
Pei Shiyu looked at Xu Qing: “Was Commander Yu not staying in the dormitory last night?”
Their tiny team of six consisted of a support and the only staff member, who happened to be a relative; they could almost be considered a one-third family-run company.
Xu Qing: “Lu Xinyu should be preparing his graduation things.”
A thirty-something-year-old graduate student, and this summer happened to be his graduation season.
No sooner had Xu Qing finished speaking than Lu Xinyu pushed open the training room door, panting and covered in dust: “Sorry, I am late.”
Although Boteng City was in the north, it was mid-summer, and the heat was only slightly lower than in the south; it was still hot. Lu Xinyu was sweating profusely. Usually, he only wore casual clothes, looking almost the same age as them. But now, he was wearing a white shirt under a dark gray suit, hair slicked with gel, and glasses perched on his nose. The age difference suddenly became apparent.
His tie was crooked from him tugging at it for feeling choked, and his suit was wrinkled; it was clear the owner was extremely uncomfortable in this attire.
Wan Yi looked at Lu Xinyu’s outfit with curiosity: “Dressed so formally, where did you go?”
Lu Xinyu leaned back in his chair, grabbed a handful of tissues to wipe the sweat from his forehead, took a large gulp of water, and slumped in exhaustion: “Went to a fall recruitment fair.”
Xu Qing looked out the window at the blazing sun: “Fall recruitment?”
Lu Xinyu: “Do not ask, that is just what they call it.” Regardless of whether it is mid-summer or deep winter, they call it Fall Recruitment.
He was actually late to participate. Many of his classmates had already been to countless ones since the Spring Recruitment at the beginning of the year.
Wan Yi: “Are jobs that hard to find for you graduate students now?”
Lu Xinyu sighed: “No choice, it is too competitive.”
For them, graduation was a watershed moment. No matter if you were a vocational college student, an undergraduate, or a graduate student, you all ended up becoming cows and horses in the workforce. Lu Xinyu was one of those who had gone back to school after working for a few years. Having tasted the bitterness of work, he had kept delaying looking for a job near graduation, trying to escape it. But the diploma had been issued, escape was no longer an option, and he had to face it.
Wan Yi looked around the room at the innocent faces that had not been beaten by society yet and could not help but sigh: “It is good that you do not understand.”
This kind of bitterness is best never experienced at all.
“Let us play. I am already half an hour late today.” Lu Xinyu, having recovered slightly, took the initiative to start training.
However, throughout the afternoon of training matches, Lu Xinyu was clearly out of his element. Either his operations could not keep up, his thought process was off, or he made several extremely low-level mistakes. An entire afternoon of training matches led to the rest of the Dawn team feeling uneasy.
Looking at the red, losing stat sheet projected on the big screen, this was their worst performance in a long time. Even when they were being cursed at the most on the internet, their training stats were better than today.
Pei Shiyu, as captain, said nothing, simply ending the practice session early.
“Everyone takes a break. Do not be too tense.”