Chapter 47: Ah Bu's Realization, Chen Yan's Debrief, and the Arrest of Xiaohu

"Still not here?"

At the EDG celebration banquet, Chen Yan's seat remained empty.

Clearlove even went out of his way to reserve the guest-of-honor seat for Chen Yan, yet...

Clearlove smiled bitterly and said, "He said he needed to stream, to milk the family members, and told us to go ahead and eat."

"Streaming again!" Ailu's anger flared up. "That damn stream, can't we get past it?!"

There had never been a moment when Ailu hated the live-streaming industry so much.

At the same time, he felt a mix of frustration and disappointment that Chen Yan would not live up to his potential.

The more brilliant Chen Yan's performance, the more Ailu's heart ached.

However, everyone else at the table simply ate and drank, completely ignoring him.

Putting themselves in Chen Yan's shoes, if they were top-tier streamers now, it would be impossible to pass up the streaming money just to come back and be a lapdog for the club.

Besides, although Ailu kept shouting for Chen Yan to return to the club, he never showed any real sincerity.

If you want someone to come back, you have to bring money. Without money, no one pays attention to you; without money, you couldn't even boss around the cleaning lady downstairs, let alone a star player.

mouZ gave a naive chuckle and said, "Manager, let's eat first."

Seeing that the situation was already set, Ailu turned his grief and anger into appetite, stuffing his face in silence.

Suddenly, his phone rang.

He took a look—Chen Yan was urging him to transfer the money.

"One hundred thousand, Boss."

"Also, please reimburse my travel expenses for the round trip..."

With a dark face, Ailu transferred the money.

Doing a quick calculation, the money Chen Yan earned from playing these few matches was already higher than his signing bonus, and on top of that, he couldn't even boss Chen Yan around.

This wasn't signing a player; this was hiring an ancestral deity to sit on their heads.

After the celebration banquet, only Ailu and Clearlove were left.

Ailu still harbored deep resentment and wanted to vent to Clearlove.

However, when he turned his head, he found Clearlove staring at his phone and chuckling.

"What are you looking at?"

"The stream."

"Whose stream?"

"Xiao Yan's." Clearlove sighed while watching the broadcast. "You have to admit, Xiao Yan's stream is actually quite entertaining. No wonder so many people watch it."

"Hmph, neglecting his proper duties!" Ailu was extremely displeased. In his view, Clearlove should have stood on the same front as him.

"I think you should be celebrating."

At that moment, Clearlove suddenly put down his phone, looked at Ailu, and said solemnly.

Ailu frowned slightly. "What do you mean?"

"Exactly what I said," Clearlove said calmly. "You should be glad that Xiao Yan is still in EDG instead of another team. But if you continue to try and restrict Xiao Yan with your current mindset, you will only push him out of EDG."

Ailu came to his senses a bit, though he stubbornly retorted, "EDG isn't short of just one player."

"Are you sure?"

Clearlove looked at Ailu with a half-smile, and Ailu guiltily looked away.

"You should know how terrifying the strength Xiao Yan has displayed so far is. Whether it's a gradual accumulation of skill or pure raw talent, as long as he can maintain this form—not to mention surpassing Faker—becoming the number one mid laner in the LPL is an absolute certainty."

"You might not care about a single player like Xiao Yan, but other clubs are eyeing him with red eyes, dying to poach him. Who knows, there might already be clubs secretly making contact right now."

Ailu was startled into a cold sweat.

Actually, it wasn't that he didn't know Chen Yan's strength; it was simply that he had a deep-seated desire to control him.

After all, Chen Yan and iBoy were players he had scouted back in their youth training days, and he had watched them grow step by step.

Now that Chen Yan was out of his control, he naturally felt unwilling to accept it.

With Clearlove laying it all out on the table, Ailu undoubtedly sobered up a lot.

"Sigh~ You're right, I was just being stubborn."

"Given Xiao Yan's current strength, he deserves better treatment."

"I'll talk to the boss about how we can keep Xiao Yan in our team."

That's more like it.

Seeing Ailu regain his rationality, Clearlove couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief inwardly.

He was the last person who wanted to see Chen Yan leave the team.

After all, not everyone is qualified to be a father figure.

...

Meanwhile, back with Chen Yan.

The moment he stepped back into his villa, a profound sense of relief washed over him.

"East or west, home is best."

"There's really no place like your own pad."

After unwinding for a bit, Chen Yan ordered takeout and immediately started his stream.

Having just won the match, his popularity was at its peak.

The moment Chen Yan turned on his stream, his viewer count skyrocketed.

Without any beating around the bush, Chen Yan went straight to the point: "Gift me, starch stans, hurry up and gift me."

"If it weren't for your Brother Yan, would you guys even dare to type in the comment section right now? You would've had your heads stepped on by RNG long ago."

"So, gifting your Brother Yan is only right and proper."

The chat naturally erupted into a frenzy of complaints—

"Can you even stream? So desperate for gifts, go buy a pair of silk stockings and stream in the talent section."

"Hurry up and die, Yan dog!"

"Good, good, good! You guys grow a spine just because you won a match." While interacting with the chat, Chen Yan opened the match VOD.

Once his takeout arrived, he punctually began his review.

Eating his meal, he watched the match footage on screen.

"Look at this play! What is XiaOhU doing here? His Ryze is still in lane, no one knows what he's up to."

"Let me tell you guys, if no one takes the initiative to lead XiaOhU around, he never seeks out tempos on his own. But the champion Ryze only has meaning if you actively create tempos when you pick him."

"Did anyone count how many Qs Ryze missed? Good grief, I didn't even notice during the laning phase, how can XiaOhU miss skill shots like this?"

"That ignite Jayce in the second game is even more baffling. Ignite is useless, seriously, how could I possibly give him a solo kill opportunity?"

During this era, very few people in the professional scene dared to step forward and review matches publicly.

Chen Yan could be considered one of the first people brave enough to try it.

Consequently, the popularity of his streaming room at this moment was terrifyingly high.

However, his continuous targeting of XiaOhU's mistakes also sparked dissatisfaction among quite a few viewers.

"Do you have a personal grudge against XiaOhU? You're just fixating on XiaOhU's mistakes."

"Who doesn't make mistakes sometimes?"

"Didn't the rest of RNG make mistakes? Why not talk about the others?"

"Because I play mid lane myself, I review the mid lane more."

Faced with the questioning, Chen Yan remained calm and explained unhurriedly: "The other lanes had issues too, but they weren't major. For instance, Uzi getting ganked at level two was indeed a mistake, but Uzi still fulfilled his duty during the laning phase and suppressed our bot lane duo.

"Letme in the top lane was the sacrificial lamb, nothing could be done about that.

"Mlxg snowballed the jungle to the absolute limit.

"Only XiaOhU, despite the team funneling resources into him, failed to deliver the expected results. That is the core issue and the reason RNG lost the match. I am merely judging the matter on its merits.

"Of course, if you want to say I'm targeting the person rather than the issue, that's fine too."

At this point, Chen Yan's voice suddenly raised an octave: "Because your daddy literally stepped on their heads on stage! If you don't like me, go tell your Tiger Daddy to beat me next time, and I'll let you flame me all you want!"

"Streamer is awesome!"

"Should've flamed them sooner, haters have no logic."

"XiaOhU fans are just bad losers."

The chat violently stoked the flames.

Chen Yan didn't stop them either.

Because he needed to establish his authority.

During casual entertainment, people could say whatever they wanted, and it didn't matter.

But if people constantly questioned him during his match review, the review segment would lose all meaning.

The reason he made XiaOhU's fans his first target wasn't because he disliked XiaOhU, but rather because XiaOhU had the most fans—or rather, RNG had the most fans.

Kill the chicken to scare the monkeys.

When others saw that he didn't even spare XiaOhU's fans, naturally, they wouldn't dare to court disaster.

Just as Chen Yan expected, after he established his dominance, no more trouble arose during the rest of the review.

...

The review concluded.

iGcon's co-streaming request popped up immediately.

Chen Yan accepted the connection.

The moment he saw iGcon, Chen Yan was utterly dumbfounded.

"Wait, Cold, what on earth is that hairstyle?"