Chapter 2: Friends from the Start, Opponents for Life (1)

December 3rd, Glory!

For a full month now, this logo, with its bold letters, crossed swords, and wings spread as though they would fly out of the paper, was grandly displayed almost everywhere you looked – TV screens, computer screens, physical posters and flyers in every corner of the city.

“One month? December 3rd, that’s exactly six weeks away, 42 days!” Su Muqiu spoke while scrolling through yet another Glory ad that had popped up on the screen. This upcoming game was invading everyone’s line of sight at any given moment.

Ka ka ka…

But the only answer he got was the sound of a keyboard and mouse, light but rhythmic.

Su Muqiu glanced at the one sitting beside him. The screen was currently displaying flashes from attacks and a river of blood, but the player himself wore a bored expression. Clearly, doing something like this didn’t require his full attention.

“Did you hear what I just said?” Su Muqiu complained. The fight clearly didn’t require his friend’s full attention, so there was no reason for him to be oblivious to the outside world.

“I heard, Glory, my ears are bleeding from hearing that word from your mouth so often, can’t you see?” said Ye Xiu. Ever since Glory had begun its advertising campaign, Su Muqiu had talked about this game almost incessantly. Heaven knew how much he was looking forward to it.

“It hasn’t been announced for too long, but with this kind of explosive momentum, this is enough. This is definitely going to be a successful game,” said Su Muqiu, ignoring Ye Xiu’s apparent disinterest.

“Mm,” Ye Xiu said noncommittally. He really had heard this too many times.

“I heard this game doesn’t use a username and password to log on, you need an account card to swipe.”

“Mm.”

“You need a specific card reader too, for it to work.”

“Mm.”

“But this card reader is still relatively cheap.”

“Mm.”

“But the system requirements for the computer seem to be pretty high!”

“Oh?” This finally got Ye Xiu’s attention – the rhythm of the keyboard got louder for a second, before stabilizing again. He turned to look with a serious expression. “What kind of requirements?”

Su Muqiu didn’t answer. He had two very old computers here; one was in slightly better condition, but even that one barely met the minimum requirements for running Glory. The other computer was so bad that it didn’t wasn’t even worth talking about. Ye Xiu was no computer expert, but he’d played on these computers for several months now, and Su Muqiu trusted that he didn’t need to explain.

“It’s time to exchange these,” said Ye Xiu, still with that serious expression. Although he wasn’t as excited for Glory as Su Muqiu was, he clearly didn’t want to lose the power of choice. To decide whether a game was good or bad, you had to play it yourself.

“Yeah, it’s time to get new ones, but money’s been a bit tight lately…”

Having lived here for several months, Ye Xiu was of course clear on the living conditions of these two siblings. They were orphans with no relatives, and their entire livelihoods depended on the income Su Muqiu earned from playing games. After Ye Xiu arrived, they now had a second person earning money, so their situation was a little better off. Still, although they didn’t struggle to get basic necessities, it would be a stretch to just pull out the cash for two new computers. Su Muqiu wouldn’t have put up with these two terrible computers if he had had that luxury.

“Looks like we’ll just have to go to Internet cafés for now,” said Ye Xiu.

“Yeah,” Su Muqiu nodded.

“You’ve already looked around for a good one?”

“Of course, I’ve been investigating for over a week now,” Su Mucheng said calmly.

December 3rd, midnight.

This launch time wasn’t very kind to the gamers. For most people, this was the time to log off and shut down the computer. But for an event like this, plenty of gamers were eager to sacrifice their normal schedules.

Six weeks, 42 days. Glory’s large-scale advertising campaign, as well as the well-timed release of the game’s details, had really succeeded in building up hype for this game, such that no one cared whether it was releasing at noon or midnight.

This night, countless people were gearing up for the launch.

This night, Internet cafés in all the major cities turned into lively “nightclubs.”

City H, Excellent Era Internet Café.

Ye Xiu and Su Muqiu had secured two computers in the café early on, and as the launch time approached, they became more focused and alert. Many people gathered in the café, but, seeing that there were no empty computers, became depressed and irritable. Unlike Su Muqiu and Ye Xiu, who went to an Internet café because they didn’t have advanced computers at home, most people went to Internet cafés just to hang out with other people. Playing games together in one location was often more enjoyable than playing online separately.

As midnight approached, the café was jam-packed, and those that had failed to get a computer could only leave in disappointment. The owner of the café, Tao Xuan, was very satisfied with this turnout. He’d invested a lot into this game, upgrading all the computers as necessary. None of the nearby Internet cafes had done the same; they were simply waiting and watching to see how successful the game would be. Although there was a lot of hype surrounding the game, who knew if it would end up a failure? After so many years, hadn’t there been many games that failed to live up to expectations?

Of course, Tao Xuan was quite anxious himself. He stared at the clock on the wall, watching the hands tick closer toward midnight. At 11:59, he extinguished the cigarette in his hand and sat down at the computer that he had prepared for himself earlier.

As a gamer himself, he wanted to try out Glory as well.

Midnight!

The lively Internet café suddenly quieted down.

Swipe a card to log on? This was a new mechanism, and people clumsily tried to figure it out.

Then, everyone sank into thought at the next screen. Account name…

“Let me, let me!” Su Mucheng had carried over a stool to sit between Su Muqiu and Ye Xiu. Seeing them reach this screen, she jumped up in excitement.

“And then go straight to bed, got it?” Su Muqiu said sternly.

“I know!” Su Mucheng took Ye Xiu’s keyboard and began typing in a name. She didn’t really play computer games herself, so this was the only way she would participate with Su Muqiu – and now, Ye Xiu as well – in these games.

Quickly, the name appeared on the screen. It seemed that she had prepared beforehand.

“One Autumn Leaf,” Ye Xiu read aloud. “One leaf heralds the coming of autumn” was a well-known Chinese phrase*, but, “Isn’t there a typo there?”

But Su Mucheng had already pressed the enter key.

“Alright!” Su Mucheng returned the keyboard to Ye Xiu, before taking over Su Muqiu’s.

“Hurry up,” said Su Muqiu, impatient to get started.

Su Mucheng typed quickly, and the name jumped onto the screen

“Qiu Mu Su?” Su Muqiu read aloud. “Hey hey, can’t you put a little more effort into this? I’m your blood brother!”

This username was simply the characters of his real name in reverse order.

However, when Su Mucheng pressed confirm, the system reported back: This name is already in use.

“Damn!” Su Muqiu glanced at the time on the computer. It hadn’t even reached 12:01 yet, and this name was already taken? How many people were playing this game at this moment?

Su Mucheng’s hands were fast. One name was taken, so her fingers danced to type another.

“Autumn Tree?” Now, Su Muqiu was speechless for good. The only thing different about this username was the second character, but it was still pronounced “Qiu Mu Su.” Once again, Su Mucheng hit confirm, and with that, his name was now Autumn Tree.

The young girl nodded, revealing a satisfied expression.

“Alright, it’s bedtime for you!” Su Muqiu reminded her. It was getting late, but their home was close by and the siblings were very familiar with the surrounding area. Su Muqiu wasn’t worried about sending his sister home by herself.

“In a minute,” the girl replied shamelessly, correctly guessing that her brother wouldn’t want to leave the computer to force her to go home.

“Just a minute!” Indeed, Su Muqiu relented immediately, and turned back to the screen.

“Hey, Ye Xiu, what class are you going to play? I thought about it a lot and decided on Sharpshooter. Why don’t you play Sharpshooter as well? I think two Sharpshooters could work together really well.”

“I’ll try things out first and see how it goes,” Ye Xiu replied.