Chapter 49: Rushing Water Explosion, Sichuan Opera Face-Changing

Looking at the screen full of comments mocking him as a simp, iCOn realized that his cool, edgy, and arrogant persona cultivated over the years had thoroughly collapsed.

It had crumbled into cold leftovers, into a joke, into an abstract, comedic persona...

"Are you even human?"

Seeing that Chen Yan was still laughing with unbridled amusement, iCOn nearly cracked his teeth from grinding them so hard.

"A bet's a bet. Who told you to be so terrible at matches, and even worse at PK battles?"

iCOn was momentarily speechless.

However, he quickly retorted with a sneer, "No matter how good you are at matches, don't you still have to suck up to your teammates?"

"When on earth did I ever suck up to my teammates?" Chen Yan was dumbfounded, completely caught off guard by iCOn's sudden jab.

"Stop playing dumb," iCOn sneered. "During the post-match interview, when asked to rate your teammates, you gave them a full ten out of ten. If that's not sucking up, what is?"

"Boom!"

Instantly, the live chat exploded, filling the entire screen with the word "Boom."

Yet, those who had actually watched the matches knew that iCOn had a valid point.

Given the disastrous way Chen Yan's teammates had played, there was simply no universe in which they deserved a score of ten.

"Heh, I think you've misunderstood."

Chen Yan chuckled lightly. "Actually, what I meant was that the team's combined score added up to ten."

"Huh?"

This time, it was iCOn's turn to be bewildered. "You—"

The audience present was completely dumbfounded, and the live chat seemed to freeze for a split second.

The next second, the entire venue erupted.

"Holy shit! You can actually play it like that?"

"Absolute genius!"

"Brother Yan, truly living up to your name."

"I knew Brother Yan's emotional intelligence couldn't possibly be that high! If a stray dog barked at him on the street, he'd stop to argue with it for two rounds—as if he'd ever suck up to those mediocre teammates of his!"

The chat went wild, some of the comments even making Chen Yan break into a cold sweat.

"Hold on, hold on. If you guys keep spinning it like this, I'm going to have a falling out with EDG by tomorrow."

Chen Yan made a joking remark before smoothly changing the subject. "Cold Leftovers, are we doing another round or not?"

"Let's go! Whoever chickens out today is a dog!"

Immediately after, the two launched into another PK battle.

Without a doubt, iCOn lost the PK once again.

"Just name the punishment!"

On the screen, iCOn thrust his chin out defiantly, adopting a look of total indifference.

And to be fair, he genuinely didn't care anymore.

He had already done the handstand hair-wash and the turtle-swimming routine; iCOn felt that no punishment left in existence could faze him.

As soon as Chen Yan spoke, however, iCOn's face turned green.

"I won't make it too hard on you. Open up the anti-fans forum rating thread, and read me XiaOhU's score and reviews out loud."

(1/3)

***

Hahaha!

The chat erupted in roaring laughter.

"The streamer really knows how to play."

"Cold Leftovers' brain has short-circuited. How is he supposed to read that?"

"So evil. Once Cold Leftovers reads those, he's definitely going to get flamed."

iCOn hesitated as well.

In his eyes, this punishment was far more agonizing than doing a handstand while washing his hair or crawling like a turtle.

After all, while his relationship with XiaOhU wasn't particularly close, they still ran into each other all the time in the professional scene.

If he read out XiaOhU's brutal cyberbullying comments today, XiaOhU might very well treat him as an enemy from then on.

"Are you actually going to do it?"

"Chicken out, are you? If you're chickened out, just say so." Chen Yan looked at iCOn and said, "How about this: go squat in the corner, hug your head, and shout three times at the top of your lungs—'Brother Yan, I, Cold Leftovers, was wrong, and I'll never dare to run my mouth at Brother Yan again.' If you do that, I'll waive this punishment. What do you say?"

iCOn's expression flickered uncertainly, torn and unable to decide.

"Since you're so terrified of XiaOhU, then—"

Seeing how conflicted iCOn was, Chen Yan figured he would let it slide; there was no need to force iCOn into offending people.

To his surprise, however, that single remark about him being "afraid of XiaOhU" triggered an immediate stress response in iCOn.

"Who the hell is afraid of him? Read it is what I'll do!"

iCOn opened the anti-fans forum's rating thread and flipped straight to XiaOhU's page.

Average rating: 1.5.

Seeing this score, iCOn couldn't help but feel a slight sense of injustice.

"Wait a minute, I got a zero back then, what gives him the right to be a 1.5?"

However, upon scrolling down to the comment section, iCOn lost his composure at the very first entry.

The top comment was an image capturing XiaOhU's heavy expression during the decisive game.

At the time, everyone had claimed that XiaOhU was furious, so the caption accompanying the image read: *The Waking Tiger*.

Right now, however, the comments beneath the image told a completely different story.

*The Waking Tiger* ×
*The Salted Fish Awaiting Death* ✓

Some people even argued that XiaOhU was merely a hiss-spitting kitten.

"Read!" Chen Yan urged.

iCOn had no choice but to read straight from the comment section.

"XXX says: *XiaOhU, statistics simply cannot capture the psychological damage you inflict on your team.*"

"XXX says: *Brother Yan's MVP should have gone to you.*"

"XXX says: *This is entirely subhuman behavior.*"

"XXX says: *RNG still refused to substitute you? I'd believe you took a nuclear bomb for Bai Xing if someone told me.*"

As iCOn read on, sweat began to bead on his forehead; the later comments were becoming excessively vulgar.

(2/3)

***

Seeing that it was about enough, Chen Yan told him he didn't need to read any further.

This whole thing was just for a laugh; pushing it into overly toxic territory would produce the opposite effect.

iCOn let out a sigh of relief.

With these two rounds of PKs concluded, the tension between the two was no longer as hostile as it had been at the start.

Chen Yan struck up a conversation with iCOn about OMG's upcoming matches.

"Your next match is against WE. What's the plan? Weren't you saying you wanted to clash with me again? Surely you aren't going to lose to WE, right?"

To be honest, iCOn didn't have a lot of confidence, but in front of Chen Yan, he refused to back down. He thrust his chin out and declared that he would lead his team to victory over WE.

"You?" Chen Yan burst into laughter. "If you told me Big Horse could lead the team to a win, I might believe it for a split second. But you? Forget it. You'll be lucky if Xiye doesn't bash your teeth in."

"Just wait until the finals and see how I deal with you. Don't forget what we agreed on earlier—if you lose, you have to cup the Director's crotch."

As iCOn spoke, he failed to notice the sudden shift in Chen Yan's gaze.

The chat was flooded with comments chanting "Big Horse is here."

Chen Yan narrowed his eyes and fired back, "And what if *you* lose?"

"If I lose, I'll cup Big Horse's..."

Mid-sentence, iCOn abruptly felt a chilling breeze emanate from right behind him.

He turned his head to find SmlZ standing directly behind him, entirely expressionless.

"Whose crotch are you going to cup?"

"It's for the stream's entertainment value, purely for the entertainment value, ha..."

Moments later, iCOn abruptly ended his broadcast.

Witnessing iCOn's abrupt disappearance, the live chat went wild with laughter.

"The streamer is genuinely evil. He saw Old Thief approaching and deliberately baited him into it."

"I'm dying of laughter. The look on iCOn's face when he saw Old Thief had the exact awkward energy of a kid caught watching porn by their parents."

After iCOn went offline, Chen Yan streamed until he had fulfilled his required hours and logged off as well.

Checking his streaming revenue for the session, he saw it was around five hundred thousand—an absolutely astronomical figure.

Though such earnings couldn't be sustained every single day, it was still enough to turn anyone green with envy.

On the other end, iCOn was also checking his own streaming revenue.

Upon seeing that he had made hundreds of thousands as well, he instantly felt that everything he had endured was worth it, the corners of his mouth curving upward in a smile wider than an AK-47.

Watching this, the OMG coach couldn't help but chime in: "Spend less time hanging out with that Chen Yan."

To the coach's utter astonishment, however, iCOn grew defensive. "What Chen Yan? From now on, he's my Brother Yan!"

"What... what is going on with you two?"

"Never you mind that. Anyway, I've acknowledged this brother for life."

The OMG coach walked away wearing a look of sheer bewilderment, racking his brain to no avail as to how iCOn's dramatic flip-flop could possibly have been executed with such smoothness.

(3/3)