"Welcome Machine 43, No. 96, a Challenger player from Ionia, to Wangyu Internet Cafe's Xinjiang Branch. Enjoy your game."
Xinjiang, Wangyu Internet Cafe.
"Xu, a lot of people are looking at us..."
His deskmate tried to contain his excitement, pretending to casually look around while secretly basking in the attention.
"Isn't this exactly the effect you wanted?"
Xu Cheng finished his "daily login quest" and held out his hand. "Hurry up."
"Hey, we agreed to settle up once a week..."
Even as he said that, his deskmate pulled out a red bill and slipped it to Xu Cheng. "We had a deal. I borrow your account to show off, and lately a bunch of girls have added me. I need to look impressive, so don't blow my cover."
"...You'll have to pay extra."
"Deal!"
Xu Cheng shook his head and stopped paying attention to his deskmate, who was already looking around for his next target. Instead, he opened his QQ chat window.
It was 2016, and League of Legends was taking the world by storm.
Xu Cheng had first tried LOL two months ago, thanks to his deskmate.
He'd liked the 5v5 competitive game from the moment he started playing.
In less than half a month, he'd climbed to Challenger with ease.
His deskmate had told him it was the highest rank in League of Legends.
Xu Cheng figured he had a bit of talent.
Even if he couldn't compare to the pros, he was at least better than the average player.
Of course, Xu Cheng was usually busy with schoolwork and had no idea that the record for reaching Challenger in the fewest games worldwide was held by Korean solo queue king Dopa.
Dopa had reached Challenger in 57 ranked games.
And that was with a hidden MMR.
Xu Cheng had beaten that record by five games.
"Playing normals again?"
Seeing Xu Cheng exit the game with practiced ease and start logging into another account, his deskmate asked curiously.
"No. I've got a boosting job, but the client didn't ask me to play on her account. I just have to play with her."
Xu Cheng answered casually, got in touch with the client, and started a ranked game.
"Okay. By the way, want some instant noodles? We could grab a late-night snack before evening study."
"Whatever you decide."
"Sure."
Watching Xu Cheng start chatting with the client in earnest, his deskmate was suddenly overcome by a wistful sadness.
Xu Cheng came from an ordinary family.
That was exactly why, after discovering he had some talent, he'd started taking boosting jobs in his spare time.
With League of Legends so popular, boosting was a pretty good side hustle. He'd managed to save up quite a bit.
A sophomore in high school, still so young, and already helping support his family—it left his deskmate feeling both impressed and envious.
Then again, whenever he remembered that Xu Cheng could play games every day and still keep his grades in the upper-middle range, sometimes even making the top five, he couldn't help feeling that the heavens were unfair.
Why were there geniuses in this world who could play games all the time and still get such good grades?
It was so unfair!
Xu Cheng had no idea his deskmate was harboring such envious thoughts. He played two games with the client in a row, took forty minutes, then logged off right on schedule.
Then it was time for his own fun—
Normals.
He'd discovered a long time ago that this was the perfect mode. It wasn't as tedious as ranked, and it saved a lot of time. No matter how busy he was with school, he could always squeeze in a few games.
As for whether stomping weaker players all the time got boring... Xu Cheng had his own solution.
He made the game harder on purpose.
For example—
He'd regularly leave base without buying starting items, deliberately play a full item behind, tank tower shots and try to turn around a fight on low health, pick random champions in all five roles, or use his usual support picks as the main carry.
He pulled all kinds of stunts that seemed absurd to anyone watching. But with his high level of skill and his opponents being so weak, he almost never lost.
"Today's opponent's pretty strong."
After deliberately tanking tower shots and failing to get the kill, Xu Cheng was genuinely surprised.
He felt like today's opponent was just a little stronger than usual.
Meanwhile.
At SKT.
Faker, at the peak of his career, stared blankly after getting solo killed yet again.
When he'd seen his opponent deliberately tank the tower, he'd assumed he was up against a beginner.
As he silently cursed management for caring about money and having no shame, he'd also thought to himself that normals really were a gathering place for clueless players—
Riot Games was about to overhaul the ranked system, which meant that for quite some time, high-ranked players, streamers, and pros from all the major regions would have to play normals.
To keep these skilled players from getting upset, the official team planned to invite Li Ge, currently the number-one player in LOL, to take part in a normals event.
They'd start with the LPL.
Li Ge was preparing for the event now. Late that night, he'd downloaded the Chinese client so he could get a feel for the LPL's normals scene.
And yet...
In his very first normal game, he'd experienced the cruelty of the world firsthand.
His opponent had left base without buying items. Fine. But how could he possibly solo kill Faker?
Was this the skill level of normal players in the LPL Region?
Or was the LPL organizing team deliberately messing with him, putting him up against a top-tier player?
No, that couldn't be right. Which of those scrubs in the LPL could beat him?
In S6, Li Ge had perfectly blended the sharpness he'd shown in S3 with the experience he'd gained by S6. His mechanics and game sense had reached the pinnacle. He was truly a whole era ahead, crushing everyone in the world from a higher dimension.
With his experience, he could even sense the humiliation in his opponent's nonchalant attitude—a feeling of being insulted!
That was right. His opponent was going easy on him, constantly pulling stunts, and still beating him senseless. It was a complete humiliation!
"Could the other side be a bot the officials sent out?"
He'd lost all interest in playing. He gave up on the game, already suspecting the officials had set up a bot to 1v1 him.
Xu Cheng finished his gaming session for the day.
On the way back to school with his deskmate, he was in a pretty good mood—
Today's opponent had been strong. For a moment, he'd even been tempted to abandon his "principles" and stop fooling around.
Luckily, he'd ultimately overcome the temptation, stuck to his usual style of messing around, and won the game.
"Could that have been a pro?"
Xu Cheng wondered.
If it had been a pro, everything made sense.
Maybe the player he'd faced in normals was only a junior academy prospect, not even a second-tier LPL player. But either way, he was a pro.
Xu Cheng simply assumed that anyone who could make a living playing games must have real skill.
Their talent and ability had to be far beyond his own.
"Too bad. The Esports Circle looks like it only has a handful of people, but the competition is fierce. With your talent, I think you could at least make an academy team."
His deskmate heard him and sighed.
For ordinary players like them, professional players were an insurmountable mountain.
"Go pro? Go play with yourself... By the way, how's your prep for the provincial competition going?"
Xu Cheng felt a lingering sense of dread. "I'd better prepare properly this time. If I don't do well, my dad's probably going to beat me again."
"Relax. I've memorized all the key points. I'll be fine."
His deskmate thumped his chest confidently.
He wasn't as good at English as Xu Cheng, but he was great at math. That was one of the few areas where he could get the better of his friend.
The two of them joked all the way back to school, and neither gave their earlier conversation another thought.
Going pro was a distant prospect for Xu Cheng.
He'd never even considered it.
For him—or most kids from ordinary families—studying was the only way forward they'd been taught about since birth.
Elsewhere.
While Xu Cheng was back at school for evening study, Riot Games finally made an announcement—
The ranked system would officially shut down next Monday, three days from now.
After that, everyone would have to play in the normals system.
The announcement sent shockwaves through the community.
S6 was League of Legends' most popular era. After EDG won the first MSI title for the LPL in S5, S6 was also the best time for climbing the CN Server ladder.
A certain dog had once said that the S6 CN Server leaderboard was packed with pillars of strength, making it the most prestigious ladder of all.
Looking at the years that followed, none of them could compare to this one.
Their skill levels were nowhere near as impressive!
"Isn't the streamer always going on about prestige? Come on, everyone, you know what S6 prestige means, right?"
"Come on, pull up the player list and look at everyone on the leaderboard."
"Jackey, Mala Xiang Guo, Ming, Ning... and me, Brother Long. Aren't we all men of great strength and reputation?"
"And don't even get me started on the pros. With all of us around, you officials expect us to play normals? Who do you think you're looking down on?!"
"Listen up, everyone. Let's all file complaints with the officials. They'd better give us a good environment for climbing!"
Dou Sha Live.
A certain dog was barking up a storm, rallying his viewers to file complaints against the officials.
The chat flew by in a stream of comments. Most viewers weren't even teasing Brother Long for once, aside from the ones hurling insults.
That was because Xuan Shen had spoken for them.
As everyone knew, League of Legends had its own pecking order.
Pros looked down on solo queue kings, solo queue kings looked down on skilled players, skilled players looked down on low-ranked players, and low-ranked players looked down on normals players...
Normals were at the very bottom of the pecking order.
After all, most people who played normals were beginners who'd only just started the game.
Making these well-known streamers and celebrity players play against beginners was, just as Xuan Shen had said, an insult.
Even bounty hunters who farmed kills in low-ranked games couldn't stand for it!
For a time, everyone was up in arms. Countless big-name streamers and pro players joined forces to demand an explanation from the officials.
The officials had prepared for this, of course.
They not only announced that Faker would stream himself playing normals on the weekend, but also promised that the system would match high-ranked players against the players with the highest win rates and strongest skills.
In other words, once they switched to normals, the pool of opponents would be smaller, and they'd still be playing against one another. They just wouldn't be able to gain rank anymore.
That was the end of the whole incident.
With the competition coming up, Xu Cheng unusually refrained from gaming that weekend.
He ignored the client who kept urging him to play.
Monday.
After school that afternoon, with some time left before evening study began, Xu Cheng went to an internet café by himself.
He found the familiar Machine 4396, sat down, set his schoolbag aside, and turned on the computer.
He checked the time. At an average of twenty minutes per game, he should have time for two games of normals.
He took a deep breath, logged into his account, and clicked Match.
Bzz.
The match popped instantly.
Before you continue