Chapter 85 (1)
Qing Dynasty’s official announcement created another small earthquake in the esports circle.
Everyone knew that the Qing Dynasty relied on Xu Tailun to win matches. Xu Tailun was the team’s engine, without their jungler the team would at best struggle to stay as a relegation team, but was more likely to drop back into the junior league……The decision to ban him from any matches was like carving out a big piece of muscle out of the team.
The announcement shocked the majority of the fans who thought all Chinese esports clubs would place their interests first. Most people thought that the Qing Dynasty would just give a superficial punishment to Xu Tailun, such as “giving him a demerit and delivering corrective measures” or a “pay deduction.” They didn’t expect the Qing Dynasty would go so far as to ban their Korean help for the entire season.
In general, most of the responses to the announcement were supportive of the Qing Dynasty. Even the media was reporting positively about it, say how the team was setting a good example for the esports business– —
[What goes around comes around. The club has made an example out of Xu Tailun. In any case, we support the Qing Dynasty in their decision.]
[The team is used to playing relegation games and not used to being third place in the major league at the time being. So they banned their carry so they could go back to being a relegation team! — –That’s how the Qing Dynasty’s management rationalized their decision.]
[Even a small team can make such a bold decision, some of the major teams in the league should take heed.]
[I hope everyone can support the Qing Dynasty with their actions. It’s not enough to just give them praise. The team will actually suffer some real losses ……]
[Oh, come on. A good reputation is also very important to a club. Next year, when the team finds a suitable jungler and forms an all Chinese team, as long as they can stay in the major league, they’ll be guaranteed to attract even more fans. You think management is full of idiots? At least I would become a fan!]
There were numerous similar comments. One famous esports forum on Tieba was flooded with related posts. Some were earnestly analyzing the current status of Chinese esports clubs, some continued to expose Xu Tailun. After careful research, they found out that Xu Tailun had more affairs with his fans, other instances where he insulted his teammates, and threatened not to play matches if the team wouldn’t follow his wishes. It was common practice of him to ask for luxury items from his fans– —
The post about Xu Tailun already had 5000 replies. Towards the end, most of the people posting were young fangirls of Xu Tailun who were usually much more active on these types of posts. Some of them posted [I was blind before, already not a fan]. Some posted [Very sad, don’t @me anymore, thank you]. There were a small group of them who remained silent from beginning to end.
Xu Tailun had officially become the public enemy in China’s LoL pro league.
……
In an empty room, a cell phone which had been discarded on the bed, was exploding with notification sounds from incoming messages and phone calls– —
The only young lady in the room, who had pulled her hair up and was wearing slippers, was stuffing the remaining clothings into the suitcase– –She didn’t seem to hear the constant chiming from the phone.
The room was a little messy, like someone had gathered everything inside the room in a hurry. The walls in the room were rather mottled; there were traces everywhere on the walls where posters or pictures had been torn down from where they used to be pasted……Some of the corners of the posters or pictures were left on the walls. On top of the mirror, there were several banners hanging over it with the slogan “Go, Qing Dynasty” on them. There were some player signatures on the banners……
The banners looked like they had been carefully preserved.
The young lady closed the suitcase, stood up, and coldly surveyed the already emptied room……Finally, her eyes landed on a huge trunk behind her– –Inside the trunk, there were several mobile hard disks on the top of the stack. Those disks were full of videos of streams by Qing Dynasty players in the past half year. Under those disks were all the pictures she had just taken down from the walls. In those pictures, there were five young men wearing the same colored uniforms; they were laughing, hugging, bowing on top of the stage, sitting behind computers, celebrating their victories, dejected from their losses……
These pictures had been taken carefully by a single-lens reflex camera, then picked out, photoshopped, and finally printed out.
Then they were treasured.
— –But now, they were all wrinkled and dumped at the side together with some wallpapers.
The cell phone on the bed was still ringing.
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