As a Captain, You Must Be Cold - Chapter 114
The national team’s training base consists of two villas in the Fourth Ring Road of Beijing. All the top players and coaches in the country gather here, with Old Tan and the IPL manager Feng Ge serving as the team leaders, working together to prepare for the World Cup.
The coaching staff was the first to be confirmed. Lu Youshan, the coach of the championship team and known as the “genius,” was suggested to take on the head coach role, and no one had any objections. However, he wisely declined the proposal.
After winning the championship, Lu Youshan’s psychological issues were somewhat relieved. Still, when faced with pressure, he couldn’t be as calm and composed on the field as Shine. He preferred being a simple technical coach. If the players had psychological problems, they shouldn’t come to him, as he would surely mourn along with them.
Finally, Alligator serves as the head coach to coordinate the overall situation, and Lu Youshan serves as the assistant coach and data analyst.
After half a month of trial training, the national team announced its World Cup roster.
Tank position: Farata [IPL], Clown[R.H]
Support position: Jiang[R.H], Cheese[R.H]
Assassin position: Timeless[R.H], Jam[IPL]
Long/gun position: Tide[Lawman], Archer[DSD]
Free man: Shine[R.H]
Starting and substitute, a total of nine players. During the World Cup, their club prefixes would be unified into two letters.
Once the national team’s roster was announced, various discussions erupted online.
[I say this is the most powerful lineup since the opening of Destination. Who disagrees?]
[Shine is going to play Free Man, quickly teach Timeless how to sleep[Shy]]
[Can the younger brother taste the wife’s milk(support)? Is the wife’s milk much better than Cheese’s?]
[The player roster is similar to what I expected, but Alligator as the head coach… if I remember correctly, he led the Guangzhou OLO’s situation.]
[Alright, half of the players are from RH, isn’t there something fishy? I don’t believe it.]
[The inside story is that they are the champions of the national invitational tournament, idiot.]
[R.H’s six-member team, Stone didn’t make it to the national team, feel sorry for Stone.]
[Feel sorry for Stone +1]
[Why can this traitor Tidal still represent the country in matches?]
[Is there a possibility that entering the national team only considers skill?]
…
The national team lineup was luxurious; any random combination of nine players formed a top-tier team. During the World Cup, the league was on a temporary break, and most of the national team’s training matches were self-arranged.
In the spacious and bright training room, a large banner with “Hard Training, Bringing Glory to the Country” hung above everyone’s heads. Although cliché, it was still inspiring.
In that day’s training match, Yuzhaohan and Shidu were on separate teams: Yu Zhaohan, Qi Xian, Tide, and Cheese formed Team A; Shi Du, Bi An, Jiang Di, and Archer formed Team B.
The new hero AI39, in its non-cloned state, wielded a beam emitter, with an attack range between long and short guns. Its ultimate skill, transformation, was the core ability. How much AI39 could bring to a team required repeated experimentation and validation.
The map randomly selected Sunset Boulevard. That day, Sunset Boulevard was sunny with good visibility. Yuzhaohan controlled AI39 and, together with Tidal’s Black Swan, formed a double-C composition, facing Shidu’s ninja and Archer’s archer.
Yuzhaohan’s AI39 had precise recoil control, and its charging speed was fast, making it the hero with the first ultimate among the eight players on the field, closely followed by Shidu.
In the first cloning, Yuzhaohan transformed into a ninja. His ninja first cut down Archer and then damaged Jiangdi to half health. Unfortunately, before he could finish the job, Shidu arrived in time, creating a mirrored solo situation.
After AI39 cloned other heroes, the charging speed was 65 times higher than usual. Yu Zhaohan and Shi Du had their ultimate moves almost at the same time. The two ninjas activated their ultimate moves together, and their sharp knives collided in the air, emitting a dazzling white light, reflecting on the young boy. Ninja’s eyebrows——
[Timeless killed Shine]
Yu Zhaohan was defeated, but Shi Du’s health bar was only left with the last small segment.
“So close!” Cheese said, “Just a little bit more!”
Yu Zhaohan said, “Three versus three, we can still fight.”
Lu Youshan, who was spectating in real-time, said, “Shine’s choice to transform into a ninja is probably not to match up against Timeless. He definitely knows he can’t win.”
Alligator analyzed, “He traded his life for Archer’s head and deceived Timeless’s ultimate. Normally, it’s a gain. But upon closer analysis, Team A lost their core, Shine, and Team B still has the crucial damage dealer Timeless alive—Timeless is a god in endgame scenarios. Unless Tide can exert its power and take out Timeless with one shot, it’s challenging.”
Alligator’s “unless” didn’t take effect. Timeless evaded Tide’s shot with his snake-like positioning and elegantly secured a triple kill, leading Team B to win the team fight.
Team B captured Target Point A, and the battle shifted towards Target Point B.
Archer’s archers have been ranked among the top two in the national server all year round, and when they felt explosive, they were comparable to Shine’s Black Swan. Although the damage of an archer’s headshot was not as high as Black Swan’s, Team B had Jiang Di, an output-type support, to supplement the damage. When the two met, Team A was left with only Yu Zhaohan and Tide.
Tide set up a sniper rifle on a high platform, and Yu Zhaohan avoided Archer’s gun line in a small room at the bottom.
Bi An commanded: “I’ll go find Tide, Timeless will take the macho guy to Captain Yu, and Archer will provide support from the back.”
No one questioned Bi An’s tactical arrangements. Even if Shine used a new hero with limited training time, it was worth the firepower of two people.
Shi Du and Jiang Di blocked Yu Zhaohan in a small room. Yu Zhaohan fought two against one and fell into a disadvantage as expected. His only counterattack bargaining chip was his fully charged ultimate move.
Alligator stared at the screen and said, “Will Shine transform into a ninja again?”
Lu Youshan shook his head, “I don’t know, but he definitely won’t fail twice in the same place.”
Pressing the Q key to release his ultimate move, Yu Zhaohan did not choose to transform into a ninja but cloned Jiang Di’s Support. With the sound of “it’s time to turn out the lights,” Shi Du, who was about to go forward for the kill, fell down. He lay on the floor and fell asleep.
IPL’s Assassin Jam yelled: “I know! The Support has a sleeping gun!”
Alligator said excitedly: “The key is, Captain Yu really put Timeless to sleep!”
Sleeping gun was the Support’s only life-saving skill. Its trajectory was relatively special, easily hitting a large tank but challenging when facing a nimble assassin like Timeless. A professional support’s hit rate was considered good at 50%.
Yu Zhaohan rarely played support, and this was Alligator’s first time seeing him play. Unexpectedly, as soon as he played as Support, he was able to put Timeless to sleep, whom the League of Support Moms called the “most difficult assassin to put to sleep” in history.
Yu Zhaohan: “At the door of the small room, Tide.”
Tide nervously said, “Understood.”
Even though Tide became entangled with Bi An, hitting an immobile assassin was a piece of cake for him. During his hectic movement, he scoped in for a quick sniper shot. Due to Bi An’s intervention, it only hit Shi Du’s body, leaving Shi Du heavily injured.
Tide gritted his teeth: “Damn.”
Yu Zhaohan: “It’s not a big problem.”
Yu Zhaohan transformed back into AI39, first taking down Shi Du’s head, and then facing Jiang Di in a one-on-one duel.
[Shine killed Timeless]
[Shine killed Jiang]
Lu Youshan and Alligator clapped in unison: “Beautiful!!!”
Yu Zhaohan relied on this wave of spiritual transformation to score a double kill. Team A secured Target Point B and the decisive battle shifted to Target Point C.
At this time, dark clouds suddenly gathered over Sunset Boulevard. The leaves of the palm trees on both sides rustled in the wind, causing visibility to drop sharply.
Archer: “Oh damn, is it going to rain?!”
Bi An: “The long/gun can’t be used anymore, change the hero quickly.”
Archer: “What should I change? I have basically never practiced the short/gun position, and my level is at most 3500 points.”
Shi Du: “Amateur.”
Archer: “…How many points can you score with your long/gun?”
Shi Du: “Thanks for asking, 4000.”
After a brief consideration, Bi An said, “Archer, switch to Western Cowboy and face the enemy with us.”
Archer: “Okay.”
The sudden change in weather had the same impact on Tide. Fortunately, in his hero pool, there was a Virus that he could reluctantly use. The only C-position hero unaffected by the weather was Yu Zhaohan, who played the Free Man.
Yu Zhaohan switched to the Light Hunter and teamed up with Tide, constantly attacking Team B’s backline. Jiang Di handed away one kill after another under the intense fire of the two assassins. The other three members of Team B likewise struggled without the support supply.
Team A relied on strong firepower to win the team battle, occupied Target Point C, and finally won.
Lu Youshan sighed: “In this version, he who gets the Free Man gets the world.”
At the end of the training match, Brother Feng walked in with a box in his arms and said happily: “The national team uniforms are ready. You can try them on when you go back. If it’s not suitable, tell me.”
The national team’s uniform was a classic Chinese red, very similar to Qi Xian’s hair color. When Qixian put it on, he became even redder, and Shi Du jokingly called him the Red Elf, Smurf’s brother.
On the front of the uniform was a pattern of auspicious clouds, with the national flag on the chest, and the back had the names and numbers of the players.
In the evening, Yu Zhaohan changed into the national team’s uniform in his room, standing in front of the mirror admiring himself.
Yu Zhaohan rarely wore such red clothes. The bright red made his skin appear a shade whiter. He stood upright, looking at the small national flag, wishing he could wear a bright red scarf around his neck.
After finishing his shower, Shi Du came out of the bathroom and happened to see Yu Zhaohan taking off his team uniform, carefully folding it and putting it away. Finally, he even reached out and touched it a couple of times.
Shi Du lowered his eyes and silently curved his lips into a smile.
Yu Zhaohan saw him and said, “You’ve finished taking a shower, then I’ll take a shower. Let’s review the evening training match together later?”
“Sure.” Shi Du had only a towel wrapped around his waist, and his black hair was still dripping. As Yu Zhaohan passed by him, Shi Du used one hand to stop Yu Zhaohan’s waist.
Yu Zhaohan leaned forward instinctively, fortunately being held by Shi Du, stabilizing his posture.
Yu Zhaohan smelled the refreshing scent of shower gel and looked up at Shi Du, asking, “What’s up?”
“Just holding you.” Shi Du said, “Just for a moment.”
Yu Zhaohan sensed something, feeling a bit aroused, “Just holding me, and… Can’t you be a bit more innocent?”
Shi Du almost died laughing: “We are not innocent enough. Will you get pregnant if I hold you for a moment?”
Yu Zhaohan looked down at his belly and stretched out his hands: “I probably can’t. Okay, you can hug me.”
Shi Du carried Yu Zhaohan into the bathroom and placed him on the sink. He picked up the toothbrush and squeezed out the toothpaste for Yu Zhaohan. He saw the beauty frowning slightly in the mirror and asked, “What are you thinking about.”
Yu Zhaohan sighed softly: “My ninja still can’t beat you.”
Shi Du: “…”
After a moment of silence, Shi Du said, “It’s normal that you can’t beat me. Each profession has its specialization. If you can beat me in solo with Ninja, then I still have a shitty career, so I might as well be a street kid.”
Yu Zhaohan said with a troubled expression, “But I am a Free Man. Free Men should be proficient in all heroes.”
“Then you can’t expect yourself to be the top in the league with every hero.” Shi Du attempted to reason with Yu Zhaohan, “That’s something carbon-based life forms can’t achieve.”
“I know, but at least I want to be at the top level in the league. Until I get all heroes into the top ten of the national server, I feel like I don’t deserve to have an extremely comfortable s*x life.”
Shi Du felt a bit choked, “Aren’t you pushing yourself so hard?”
Yu Zhaohan watched helplessly as it changed from a five-point hard to a three-point hard, and said guiltily: “Only when you have pressure can you have motivation. Do you support me?”
Shi Du said slowly: “I am quite supportive, but it doesn’t know.”
There were dozens of heroes in Destination until now, and achieving the top ten in the national server for each one was something even Yu Zhaohan couldn’t do in a short period of time.
In order to achieve his goal as early as possible, Yu Zhaohan had to take the initiative to train for two or three hours after finishing his daily training. The time when he got up in the morning remained the same. This resulted in him not getting enough sleep, and his eyes when looking at Cheese were not as cold and sharp as before.
Finally, during the holiday, Shi Du hoped that Yu Zhaohan could catch up on some sleep, but unexpectedly, he continued to sleep late and wake up early. He even put on dinosaur pajamas and asked Shi Du to play ball for him.
Once the ball-playing and dinosaur pajamas appeared, it meant that Yu Zhaohan’s psychological pressure had reached a point that urgently needed relief. The problem was a bit serious, and measures had to be taken
What should he do if Yuyu refuses to rest? Just trick him into going to bed and give him a good sleep. He’ll get tired after that.
After Yu Zhaohan finished a ranked game with a tank, he yawned and stood up to make himself a cup of coffee. After walking a few steps, he suddenly couldn’t move. He turned around and found that Shi Du had stepped on his dinosaur tail.
Yu Zhaohan asked in confusion: “Shi Du?”
Shi Du bent down to pick up his tail and held it in his arms, saying simply: “Baby, it’s time for some intimate time.”
Yu Zhaohan frowned: “I want to as well. But I’ve said it before, until I get all heroes into the top ten of the national server, I can’t let myself be too comfortable. I’m only ten tanks away from achieving that. Can you guys wait a bit longer?”
Shi Du explained reasonably and emotionally, “This is easy to handle. I only vent my desires on you and will not care about your feelings, so you will not feel comfortable.”
Yu Zhaohan thought about it and decided that this indeed didn’t break his vow, “Okay, then be more ruthless and don’t make me feel comfortable.”
Shi Du smiled and said, “Don’t worry.”
After reaching an agreement, Shi Du put the easily deceived dinosaur… to sleep.