Meanwhile, in another room at H4 Club, GOG division team captain Pang Ling was streaming live and chatting with his fans.
The club had a strict schedule—players could only stream after completing their daily training or during weekend breaks, and it couldn’t interfere with their normal rest periods.
Generally speaking, though, the club encouraged players to stream.
For the players, an esports career was brief, and streaming, as an emerging opportunity, could be considered for post-retirement plans. Streaming more now, while their performance was good, would help them accumulate popularity and earn some income, preparing early for their eventual retirement.
For the club, player streams also helped boost the club’s reputation. When streaming platforms wanted to sign players, they had to negotiate with the club first, often signing entire teams at once, so the club stood to profit as well.
Although the H4 team’s GOG division had only achieved second place in the previous tournament, team captain Pang Ling had performed exceptionally well in the jungler position, winning many fans.
If their mid laner hadn’t been so terrible, they might have won the championship.
So, riding the tournament’s popularity, Pang Ling had rapidly gained followers, and with the streaming platform’s promotion, his viewership was skyrocketing.
These professional players had originally been high-ranked GOG players, and after officially turning pro, both their skills and understanding of the game improved rapidly, naturally widening the gap between them and ordinary players.
There’s a saying that you shouldn’t challenge someone’s livelihood with your hobby. Once any professional goes full-time, the gap with amateurs only grows larger.
After becoming a professional player, Pang Ling’s game understanding easily crushed high-tier players. Playing jungle, he could effortlessly pressure all three lanes while still having energy to talk trash. This naturally made him extremely popular.
After playing two games, Pang Ling chatted with viewers while waiting in line.
“Someone says it’s a pity we didn’t win the championship.”
“It is indeed a pity. We were just one step away in the end.”
“Someone’s asking if I felt desperate?”
“Not really, this is nothing like desperation.”
“Fighting five close games is just disappointing at most. If you want to talk about desperation, that would be getting swept 3-0, pushed over in 15 minutes, with absolutely no way to fight back—that’s desperation.”
“Haha, believe it or not, I’ve experienced that feeling. Our team couldn’t win even with six players against four—that’s true desperation.”
“After being stomped so many times, getting second place doesn’t feel so bad. We thought we’d be eliminated in the first round, but then we discovered other teams were just as bad as us.”
“Trash talk? I’m not trash-talking, these are facts!”
Pang Ling was speaking seriously about his personal experiences, but the viewers didn’t believe him.
“What the hell do you mean ‘second place but still got stomped,’ ‘pushed over in 15 minutes every game,’ ‘six vs four and still barely winning’? Who are you trying to fool? The best clubs in the country participated in the tournament. Are you talking about foreign clubs? Oh wait, GOG doesn’t even have international servers yet!”
“If there’s such an amazing team, tell us which one it is!”
“DGE? Aren’t those the two teams that played in the café tournament when Tenda Gaming Life Hall opened? Their skill level seemed decent, but being able to win six vs four is too exaggerated, right?”
“Don’t believe it unless someone from that team comes to confirm it!”
Seeing these comments, Pang Ling felt helpless.
He couldn’t help it—the situation did sound fantastical. Who would imagine an established club’s runner-up team getting stomped by a café team?
Pang Ling knew very well that DGE was no café team. They were wealthier and professional than any other club in the country!
“Whatever, believe it or not.”
“I’ll invite DGE’s second team captain to duo with me. When you see his skill level, you’ll understand how monstrous they are over there.”
“I can only say that as terrifying as he is, there are nine more like him over there.”
Pang Ling casually invited Huang Wang to join him for a duo stream.
Question marks immediately flooded the chat because Huang Wang’s account was only in Grandmaster rank.
It couldn’t be helped—DGE club members had very little time for solo queue.
Compared to other clubs, Huang Wang and his teammates had to spend 2 hours practicing custom games, another 2 hours at the gym, and then subtract time spent on scrims and match analysis between the two teams. The time available for solo queue was only about two and a half hours.
Meanwhile, players like Pang Ling played ranked for at least five or six hours every day, so naturally, there would be a difference in their rankings.
But in the professional world, a high rank didn’t necessarily translate to tournament strength.
Some players climbed ranks as easily as drinking water, yet their ranks remained modest, simply because they found drinking too much water pointless.
Some players thought their opponents were as unskilled as Diamond players, and regularly facing such opponents would make them worse, so ranked games were just for entertainment.
Pang Ling: “Carry me?”
Huang Wang: “Go!”
…
An hour later, the comments in Pang Ling’s stream had done a complete 180-degree turn.
Because the duo’s games were absolutely brutal!
Top-tier professional mid-jungle synergy in high-ranked matches perfectly demonstrated what it meant to do whatever they wanted.
The chat was still filled with question marks, but this time they weren’t directed at Huang Wang’s rank—they were about his trash talk.
“I thought Captain Pang talked a lot of trash, but compared to this new mid laner, he’s practically a shy kid!”
“What does he mean by ‘this mid laner dares to come and take experience’? Is that even human language?”
“How do you manage to talk non-stop while solo-killing the opponent?”
“Damn, this mid laner is too insane! Who is he? Does he have a stream?”
“Complete domination—the enemy team gave up after fifteen minutes?”
“If this mid laner had been in the finals, how could they have lost?”
“I now understand why Captain Pang always complains about his mid laner—they’re not on the same level…”
“This mid laner is such a chatterbox, he never stops talking.”
“Does he have a stream? Quickly share it! I want to see his first-person perspective!”
After a devastating streak of wins, Pang Ling’s viewer count exploded. The streaming platform was promoting them, and the duo queue queue-stomping high-ranking matches created great entertainment. With both players trash-talking like a comedy duo, their popularity kept rising uncontrollably!
Pang Ling noticed that the chat was all discussing Huang Wang, with hardly anyone talking about himself anymore, which left him feeling a bit helpless.
Fans! They’re all so fickle.
After a five-game winning streak, Huang Wang prepared to leave.
“Alright, I’m done. I need to go to the gym. We keep losing scrims and getting extra practice—I’m sick of it.”
Pang Ling quickly said, “Wait, many viewers are asking if you want to start streaming. They want to see your first-person perspective.”
“Streaming?” Huang Wang thought for a moment. “Probably not. I train every day and don’t have time to stream.”
Pang Ling: “It’s no big deal, just do it for fun. There are so many streamers who constantly cancel streams. You can just turn it on when you’re playing ranked—it’s not troublesome.”
Huang Wang thought about it and realized he had a point: “Fine, I’ll look into it after I get back from the gym.”
…
August 1st, Monday.
Pei Qian arrived at his office as usual, but this time he wasn’t humming a tune—instead, his face showed traces of worry.
How was he going to deal with Slackin’ Delivery?
Last week, Pei Qian hadn’t had much energy to manage other businesses and had been observing Slackin’ Delivery’s situation.
The more he observed, the worse things looked!
Slackin’ Delivery’s customer base was still expanding. Even many families who normally cooked at home had started ordering from Slackin’ Delivery!
Cooking at home also produced lots of kitchen waste that needed to be sorted and disposed of.
Many home-cooking families would order from Slackin’ Delivery when they felt lazy, saving them from having to throw away kitchen waste.
Many office buildings generate considerable garbage from daily meals. To simplify things, they encouraged employees to order from Slackin’ Delivery instead.
And the introduction of Food·Harmony had successfully met the high-end demands of a portion of customers.
Originally, many people were averse to delivery food, considering it unhygienic and unhealthy. But with this opportunity to learn about Food·Harmony and Slackin’ Delivery, those stereotypes were broken!
Even worse, Slackin’ Delivery seemed to be hurting the Managed Fitness gyms.
Slackin’ Delivery offered fitness meals specifically designed to complement the Managed Fitness program. Many people became curious about this and would look into Managed Fitness.
Although this trend hadn’t appeared on a large scale yet, the signs were there, and it couldn’t be ignored.
In short, the situation seemed to be getting increasingly unmanageable!
The microbial waste processors were still being procured. Given the large quantity needed, they would likely arrive gradually next week. However, after spending this money, Pei Qian felt slightly more at ease.
It wasn’t a huge amount, but it meant that opening each new Slackin’ Delivery branch would incur an additional cost of over one hundred thousand.
This was perhaps the only good news.
Pei Qian felt worried. He could sense the approaching danger, but couldn’t think of a way to save himself.
“Knock, knock, knock.”
While he was worrying, there was a knock at the door.
Pei Qian looked up and saw He Desheng, which made him frown.
“Hmm? Is there a problem with the Automatic Contrarian Machine?”
The Automatic Contrarian Machine was now Pei Qian’s carefully hidden treasure—it absolutely couldn’t be discovered by others!
Pei Qian’s requirements weren’t excessive. He just needed to hide it through this accounting period and lose a few million.
As for whether it could be hidden until the next accounting period, that would be a problem for later.
He Desheng didn’t know how to respond: “Uh, Zhang Wang should have already reported the Automatic Contrarian Machine issues, right?”
Pei Qian nodded: “Oh, so there’s no problem. Anything else?”
He Desheng looked anxious: “Of course! Mr. Pei, the Dyarco Group wants to buy our Finger Company shares, including the operating rights for IOI’s domestic server—they want to take it all back!”
Pei Qian frowned.
They came knocking?
Logically, they shouldn’t necessarily require 100% ownership, and why would they want IOI’s domestic server operating rights?
Pei Qian had already planned to make IOI’s domestic server his money-burning tree. If Dyarco Group wanted to acquire Finger Company, Pei Qian had no money to interfere, but now they were targeting his money-burning tree—that was outrageous.
Pei Qian frowned and asked: “Why does Dyarco want IOI’s domestic server operating rights?”
He Desheng hesitated before answering: “Dyarco Group and Finger Company both believe that we’ve performed poorly in promoting IOI’s domestic server, so…”
Pei Qian was exasperated: “Nonsense!”
Don’t you know the quality of your own game?
I’ve helped you so much and still couldn’t prop it up—shouldn’t you be looking for problems with yourselves instead of pushing blame onto us?
I gave you various improvement suggestions for IOI long ago, but you kept dodging them without making any changes. Now you’re saying we have operational problems?
Ridiculous!
Pei Qian had never planned to sell, and after hearing their attitude, he was even more determined not to sell.
“Neither the shares nor the domestic server operating rights are for sale!”
Pei Qian couldn’t be bothered to argue further with these foreigners.
He Desheng hesitated: “Um… Mr. Pei, Dyarco Group, says they’re willing to offer 50 million dollars. Compared to our purchase price, this is already quite profitable.”
“They also said it would be best for us to take the money and leave, otherwise if things get ugly, it won’t look good for anyone…”
Pei Qian: “?”
What did that mean?
Trying to use financial power against me?
Well, sorry, but I have a 99.9% resistance buff against financial power…
And what’s with that attitude? “If things get ugly, it won’t look good for anyone?”
No matter how powerful you are, you can’t swim across the ocean to fight me, can you? Tenda has hardly any international business!
Besides, if things get ugly would make me lose money, I’d make it ugly right now—why would I need you to come here and talk nonsense?
Pei Qian calculated: 50 million dollars was equivalent to about 400 million yuan. Keeping IOI’s domestic server as a money-burning tree would easily burn through several hundred million or even a billion yuan. They wanted me to give it up for a mere 400 million?
Not a chance!
Pei Qian’s expression darkened: “Give them my exact words: FUCK OFF!”
He Desheng was startled and quickly said: “Yes, Mr. Pei!”
…
After leaving Mr. Pei’s office, He Desheng touched his chest to calm himself.
He had been quite shocked just now.
It seemed like he had never seen Mr. Pei swear before.
But thinking about it, Mr. Pei was indeed no ordinary person.
If it were someone else, they would have at least wavered upon hearing fifty million dollars, right?
And the other party was a world-class giant like Dyarco Group—most people would be at least somewhat intimidated.
But Mr. Pei rejected them without a second thought, instantly responding with an F-word directly to their face.
Such boldness was truly impressive!
However, He Desheng was a bit worried because he knew Dyarco Group would be just as stubborn. Looking at how few companies had escaped their acquisition attempts, it was clear.
After being cursed like this, Dyarco Group would not let it go easily.
How this script would unfold from here was no longer something one person could determine.
“It’s rare to see Mr. Pei angry.”
“Normally, these are just standard business tactics. Mr. Pei has always been broad-minded—why would he be angry?”
“Perhaps… there’s a hidden strategy here?”
“Could it be that Mr. Pei is telling me to reply with an F-word, is also part of his plan?”
He Desheng thought for a long time but still couldn’t figure it out. He decided to honestly reply with the standard word that Mr. Pei had provided.
For this level of battle between giants, it was better to just watch from the sidelines rather than interfere blindly.
Just do as Mr. Pei said—that would never be wrong.