Chapter 300 – Three Tickets
On the first weekend of every year, the Glory Pro Alliance assembled all of the pro players and host a gathering. The gathering would have many performances, especially the All-Star Competition. 24 pros would be chosen through a fan vote. It could be said that these 24 pros were the 24 most popular players, with the largest fan bases. Because of this Glory event, the gathering was also called the All-Star Weekend.
After the great success of the first All-Star Weekend in the Glory Pro Alliance’s third season, the event came back every year with a different Club responsible for hosting it. This year, Glory’s eighth season and sixth All-Star Weekend was hosted by Club Samsara. Club Samsara was located in City S. Once Ye Xiu heard Chen Guo say that they were going to City S for the weekend, he thought of this special day and understood what was going on.
“Are we going to participate in the All-Star Weekend?” Ye Xiu asked.
“Yup! I managed to get three tickets. How amazing am I?” Chen Guo exclaimed.
Even though the competitiveness during the All-Star Weekend might not be as great as a normal match, for the many fans, having the chance to watch such an exciting event was already worth the ticket price. As a result, the All-Star Weekend’s tickets were in very high demand. If you wanted to buy one, money wasn’t the only thing you needed. Luck played a huge part as well.
“Not bad, not bad.” Ye Xiu forced a smile.
All-Star Weekend…… With his status, he had been chosen as one of the 24 players every single year. Even this year, starting from when the votes started at the beginning of the season, the amount of votes he got was very high. It was only because he had retired mid-way that his name got wiped from the list.
For Ye Xiu, who didn’t want to be exposed in front of the public, the All-Star Weekend was an event that required a lot of interaction, so truthfully, it wasn’t an event he liked to participate in. The All-Star Weekend was a performance, so the competition there wasn’t very serious. The battles between two sides wouldn’t be in an enclosed area like conventional matches. The stage was set where the audience could directly see them. As a result, Ye Xiu always hid behind the stage. His computer would then be connected to the stage by a cord.
Ye Xiu was the only one who wouldn’t come up on stage. In the past, his invisibility was a part of the All-Star event and it had even turned into a type of joke. But All-Star’s Competition this time around would no longer have this part.
Ye Xiu had managed to escape from this year’s All-Star Competition with great difficulty. How could he have known that Chen Guo would buy a ticket and call him to go along. In the past, he had been a participant and this time, he would be a spectator. Thinking about this, he decided that it’d be fine and, as a result, he wouldn’t decline Chen Guo’s good intentions.
In Chen Guo’s mind, she didn’t think that anyone who played Glory would refuse this type of trip. That was why she had notified Ye Xiu. She didn’t have any intention of negotiating and didn’t notice Ye Xiu’s reluctance. She had already put in order the issue about the three not working at the Internet Cafe for the weekend.
Three tickets naturally meant three people. Ye Xiu, Chen Guo, and the other person was, of course, Tang Rou. Tang Rou already knew, though she displayed her usual boredness. She clearly wasn’t as crazy of a fan as Chen Guo was.
After Ye Xiu went online, he played for a bit and then saw that Su Mucheng’s Cleansing Mist had come online.
“I’ll be going to City S tomorrow!” Su Mucheng messaged. Considering Su Mucheng’s skill level, there was quite a dispute as to whether or not she belonged among the top 24 players. However, the invitations to the All-Star Competition weren’t chosen based on ability, but rather popularity. In this area, Su Mucheng was the favorite among Glory fans. From the very start of the event, she had been chosen as one of the 24 stars every time.
“Yeah, I’ll be going too.” Ye Xiu replied.
“Ah? You’re going too? They found you?” Su Mucheng asked.
“What? Who found me?” Ye Xiu was puzzled.
“For this year’s All-Star Weekend of course. Samsara hoped that you would be able to come on stage with a special invitation, so they contacted Excellent Era. The manager even came to ask me whether I could contact you. I, however, ignored him.” Su Mucheng replied.
“Oh, not that…… I have a ticket.”
“You bought a ticket….. How thoughtful!”
“Nah, it’s my boss. She got three tickets and asked me to tag along.” Ye Xiu said.
“Oh, oh, as a spectator!”
“Yeah!”
“It’ll probably feel very different, right?”
“Probably?”
“I want to be a spectator too.”
“Get sick again?” Ye Xiu suggested.
“It probably won’t work this time.” Su Mucheng sent a sad face. When she skipped the team’s Christmas activity, it was obvious that being sick was just an excuse. They just didn’t bother with her. As for this All-Star event, even though it wasn’t an official competition, it was definitely an official event. Sick? You’d need proof.
“Come on.” Ye Xiu obviously understood. This type of official event was quite difficult to escape from. Ye Xiu wasn’t the only one who didn’t want to participate in the All-Star event, but everyone still went anyways.
After chatting for a bit, the two continued to play. It was just the All-Star Weekend. They had gone many times already. There was nothing extraordinarily amazing about it. It was just that Chen Guo had only watched the streams before and she didn’t have any partners before, so she was too lazy to go. Now that she had Ye Xiu and Tang Rou to accompany her, Chen Guo got three tickets and prepared to join in on the excitement.
A day passed and Friday came. In the afternoon, the three flew over to City S. They arrived at the hotel Chen Guo had booked. She and Tang Rou would be in one room. Ye Xiu was lucky and got his own room to himself.
After packing up, Chen Guo shouted at them to get ready to leave. The All-Star Weekend didn’t only last one day. It would start from eight on Friday and would last for two and a half days. Chen Guo was already unable to wait any longer. She dragged the two out the door and studied the map the entire way there. After looking at it for a long time, she still didn’t understand the directions to the event. Ye Xiu was just about to say something, when Chen Guo suddenly made a decision: call a taxi.
But this taxi driver clearly wasn’t a Glory fan. In his mind, “Club Samsara” wasn’t a landmark. After hearing her, he stopped the taxi and repeatedly asked Chen Guo to confirm that those were the correct words. He then asked, at a loss: “Do you know how to get there?”
Chen Guo coughed blood. She had called a taxi because she didn’t know where it was.
“It’s not too far from here.” Chen Guo vaguely said. It was true that it wasn’t that far. She had booked the hotel near Club Samsara.
Ye Xiu wiggled into the conversation: “Go along Changde Road and take a left at Zhaojia Bridge. Once you get past the intersection, we’ll have arrived.”
“Oh, there!” The taxi driver heard and immediately understood. He stepped on the pedals and they went on their way.
Chen Guo replied stupidly: “Where’s that?”
“Club Samsara!” Ye Xiu said.
“You’ve come here before?” Chen Guo asked, when she suddenly thought again: “Oh, I forgot. Even though you were just a small character, you still had to be a part of a team, right? Have you been to all the Clubs?”
“Yeah, yeah……” Ye Xiu nodded his head.
“Then why didn’t you say anything earlier!” Chen Guo said.
“I was about to…..”
Once the taxi started moving, Chen Guo stopped arguing. The taxi went with Ye Xiu’s directions and, sure enough, it really wasn’t that far away. Just as they were about to arrive , the taxi suddenly stopped. The taxi driver stuck his head out the window and looked at the traffic. He opened his mouth, stunned: “Why’s the traffic so bad?” The taxi driver couldn’t understand the reason for the traffic jam.
“See the sidewalk up ahead? You can let us off there!” Ye Xiu said.
As a result, the three got off at the sidewalk. They looked at the traffic jam. Chen Guo wasn’t unhappy, but rather, she was excited: “Wow, wow! Is this all because of the All-Star Competition? How exciting! Look!”
“Yup!” Ye Xiu obviously knew the reason. Experienced fans wouldn’t drive to the event. They’d be stuck in traffic and it was highly likely that they wouldn’t be able to find a spot to park.
“Lead the way!” Chen Guo waved her hands. After knowing that Ye Xiu knew the way, she threw her map into the trash can.
Ye Xiu looked around left and right. He led the two and they soon arrived. The entrance had already been arranged. Amidst the crowd of people, the three quickly entered Samsara’s stadium.
The eSports stadium wasn’t any smaller than a conventional stadium. The biggest difference was that the stage in the middle of the stadium had many, many, many electronic screens.
Those watching the TV and Internet broadcast could only watch as the stream chose the scenes for them. But at the actual location, everyone had their own display screen especially for them. The spectators could choose to watch from all sorts of points of view. There were also slow-motion shots for them to look at. In this type of eSports arena, besides the atmosphere, they could watch from all around, which was something that those, who watching the broadcast, didn’t have access to.
Especially in the team competition, the ten characters were all fighting at different spots on the map. How the broadcast chose the viewpoint really made the internet watchers curious. Only those at the scene could fully appreciate the competition’s brilliance.