Su Hang focused completely on the game and stopped responding to the chat.
Glory 93 stars, first match: he played Sun Quan, went 12/0/6, and earned an MVP with a top rating, gaining three stars at once.
Glory 96 stars, second match: he played Sun Quan, went 15/1/8, and earned an MVP with a top rating, gaining three stars at once.
Glory 99 stars, third match: he played Sun Quan, went 18/2/4, and earned an MVP with a top rating, gaining three stars at once.
In those three high-star Glory matches, Su Hang felt some difficulty, as the difficulty of earning MVP had risen sharply.
The matchmaking system had kicked in. In all three matches, every teammate it gave him was a low-star player at 60 or 70 Glory stars, while every opponent was a high-star national server player with at least 90 Glory stars.
There was even no shortage of players with major national badges.
"Success or failure rests on this one match."
At that moment, Su Hang cracked his knuckles, fighting spirit blazing in his eyes. Whether he could reach Legendary 100 Stars with a perfect streak of MVP wins depended on this match.
He tapped the matchmaking button. This time, the wait was unusually long. It took six minutes before he entered the player-matching screen, and the silver-star emblems of Glory V10 nobles appeared on both sides at once. An ominous feeling rose in Su Hang's heart.
He entered the hero selection screen.
Su Hang was in the fifth slot, the counterpick position.
First slot [Prisoner Yang Jian on Crutches in Clash Lane]: Guys, I've got good news and bad news. Which do you want first?
Second slot [Practicing Jungle to Death]: The good news.
First slot [Prisoner Yang Jian on Crutches in Clash Lane]: Exalted Emperor, that skill streamer who's been really popular lately, is on our team. He's in the fifth slot.
Third slot [Loving Mother Guards Mid]: Oh ho ho ho, this one's in the bag! Big shot Exalted Emperor in the fifth slot, I'll let you take the mid-lane farm this match.
Second slot [Practicing Jungle to Death]: What's the bad news?
First slot [Prisoner Yang Jian on Crutches in Clash Lane]: The enemy jungler and clash laner are Nuanyang and Zimo from Beijing WB, a top Group S pro team in the KPL League!
Third slot [Loving Mother Guards Mid]: Huh? What the heck? I just successfully passed my tribulation to reach Glory 50 stars, and they match me straight against KPL pros at Legendary 100 Stars? You've got to be kidding.
Second slot [Practicing Jungle to Death]: What a heaven-defying matchmaking system! I'm a Glory 50-star jungler with a bronze badge, and you put me directly against a pro championship jungler? Isn't that just an egg smashing against a rock?
First slot [Prisoner Yang Jian on Crutches in Clash Lane]: Sigh, handsome guys and beautiful ladies, no doubt about it, that damn matchmaking system has set us up. I just reached 50 stars too. This match is all up to big shot Exalted Emperor.
"Just as I thought."
Su Hang narrowed his eyes slightly. "What was coming has finally come."
On Huya, in Nuanyang's livestream.
The chat was full of shocked comments.
"Holy crap! God Nuan really did get matched against Exalted Emperor!"
"It's not just God Nuan. Big shot Zimo got matched against Exalted Emperor too!"
"Doesn't that mean Exalted Emperor's dream of an MVP winning streak is about to go up in smoke?"
"I've disliked this Exalted Emperor for a long time. Perfect timing for God Nuan and big shot Zimo to teach this guy who doesn't know the height of heaven or the depth of earth a lesson."
"If god Zimo and God Nuan team up from top lane and jungle, won't they crush Exalted Emperor in the farm lane until he's useless?"
"There's no need for god Zimo at all. Our God Nuan was the Strongest Overlord of 2021. He can wreck Exalted Emperor all by himself!"
Seeing the livestream chat, Nuanyang's lips curled up slightly. "I wore out iron shoes searching for you in vain, only to find you without lifting a finger. Exalted Emperor, I've finally caught you."
He had also been following Exalted Emperor, the newcomer who had recently stirred up the King of Glory scene. First, he had defeated the number-one national marksman Gu Shi and risen to fame. Then he had taken down Zongshi, a major favorite for the jungle-lane Overlord title, making an even bigger name for himself and gaining over a hundred thousand followers overnight.
He was enjoying boundless glory.
Originally, Exalted Emperor had no quarrel or grudge with him. Well water did not interfere with river water, and their paths would never have crossed.
However, a phone call last night from Pei Qian, the manager of AG's recruitment department, had completely changed all that.
Pei Qian had told him over the phone that, just because he had been a little aggressive with his words when inviting Exalted Emperor to go pro, the other man had spouted wild nonsense, declaring that he would crush AG at the Overlord Feast!
Crushing AG meant crushing Yinuo!
Yinuo was his dearest friend, a brother in all but blood. Who in the entire King of Glory scene didn't know that Nuanyang and Yinuo were good brothers? To crush Yinuo was to crush Nuanyang.
How could he stand for that?
A wildly insolent fellow like that naturally needed to be taught a proper lesson. So he asked Pei Qian what Yinuo had to say.
The answer he got was, "I want to eat carp."
"I want to eat carp" was a code between him and Yinuo.
Back in 2020, before Yinuo had made a name for himself, whenever he got crushed in a public match or a pro game, he would ask Nuanyang out for a big carp dinner to ease his frustration.
At the time, Nuanyang had used his masterful jungling skills to defeat the assembled heroes at that year's Overlord Feast, earning a Gold Badge and the title of Strongest Overlord. His competitive gaming skills had reached their peak.
His good brother had been bullied to the point of eating fish to drown his sorrows, so naturally he had to stand up for him. Every time they finished a carp dinner, he would seek out the players and pros who had crushed Yinuo and crush them in the same way.
Later, Yinuo became famous beyond the gaming scene. Because he had to maintain his image and show the magnanimity of AG's new-era captain, even when players and pro competitors mocked and bullied him, he could only laugh it off without responding.
In reality, though, Yinuo badly wanted to give the people who had mocked and bullied him a tooth for a tooth.
So he had Nuanyang help him, using "I want to eat carp" as their code.
That way, even if paparazzi exposed their chat logs or phone conversations, they wouldn't leave any leverage behind.
"Hey, hey, hey, Captain Nuan, can you hear me?" Zimo's lazy voice came over the game's voice channel.
"I'm listening. Go ahead," Nuanyang replied, turning on his mic.
Zimo said lazily, "We've matched against Exalted Emperor. How do we do this? A slow simmer or a fierce stir-fry?"
A slow simmer meant torturing him gradually: deliberately dragging out the match and only ending it after tormenting Exalted Emperor until he had a mental breakdown.
A fierce stir-fry meant targeting him with intense pressure, aiming to give Exalted Emperor a super-godawful record in the shortest possible time, leaving him with psychological scars and even cracking his dao heart.
Compared with a slow simmer, a fierce stir-fry was crueler to a skilled player. After all, once a skilled player's dao heart cracked, a cliff-like plunge in skill would follow.
"Exalted Emperor is eighteen, at the age when a newborn calf isn't afraid of tigers. By rights, a slow simmer would suit him better."
Nuanyang chuckled twice, then his gaze turned sharp and fierce. "But he provoked someone he shouldn't have, so we'll have to use a fierce stir-fry to leave him with an unforgettable memory of his gaming life."
"Tsk, tsk, tsk." Zimo, who knew the inside story, said sympathetically, "That kid Exalted Emperor is really unlucky. Of all the people he could have provoked, why did he have to pick Nuozai? Doesn't he know Nuozai is your reverse scale, Nuanyang?"
Zimo paused, then grinned and fanned the flames. "Or does this Exalted Emperor just not fear you, the Strongest Overlord from five years ago?"
"Whether he fears me or not," Nuanyang said, his eyes full of hostility, "by the end of this match, I'll make the gaming name Nuanyang a nightmare that haunts him for the rest of his life!!!"