The Great Thief

Ruling Sword had achieved a great victory!

This caught many Ruling Sword members who were trying to comfort their team off guard.

They didn’t have anything to worry about anymore. After the night of confusion had ended, hundreds of people swarmed to the airport the next day. The excitement could be felt in the air and the crowd seemed a little crazed.

It didn’t matter what you were chasing, as money would come with it if you were successful. With another championship title, the team members’ positions were now even more valuable. Although Ruling Sword had a tough time, this would likely usher in a period of rapid development. The elite group was sure to have a promising future.

“Do you see this? Are you still going to leave?” a member of the elite group with a ponytail asked as he hit the elbow of a friend standing next to him. His friend had recently received an invitation to join another guild where he thought he would be treated better.

“Pft, only an idiot would leave this guild,” the friend rubbed his elbow and responded angrily. “I’ll fight anyone that tries to make me leave.”

“Well, I actually had a moment of hesitation, but now I don’t have any reason left to. Life is meaningless if you don’t have any dreams, and Ruling Sword will be a witness to my success,” the man with the ponytail said. He was much more rational.

“I also don’t know where this club will go, but when I’m old and the club is still around, I will be the gatekeeper of this guild. This is something I have always wanted to do since I was a child…”

“Didn’t you previously say that your childhood dream was to sleep with Zi Xia?”

“Get out of here!”

The airport had the atmosphere of a market as everyone was very excited.

The word ‘fans’ had been borrowed from the English language, but the concept of chasing celebrities had existed in China for a very long time. In fact, fans in the ancient times were also crazy. In the peak period of poetry in the Tang Dynasty, there were countless fans who would do crazy things to demonstrate their loyalty. The most insane ones would carve their favourite poems onto their bodies to express their worship.

Since then, there had been fans of poetry, painting, songs, celebrities and professional gamers. However, gaming only became truly influential at the beginning of the VR era.

Ruling Sword hadn’t been around for a very long time, but they had already gathered many fanatical followers. Although many were only fans of a specific player, they had no choice but to join and form a support group Ruling Sword.

The impressiveness of the Championship title had caused Ruling Sword to overshadow Lu Li for the first time. The guild had even overshadowed March Rain, Moonlight, Fat Monkey and the others.

The banners that were being carried today was also quite interesting. There were the classic ones with phrases like ‘Long Live the Champions’. Just from a single look alone, one could tell that these had been hurriedly made.

The other people at the airport had no idea what was happening.

They all assumed that some major celebrity had arrived in Jiangnan City, but they were even more confused upon looking at the crowd of people, reading the banners and hearing their shouting.

Lu Li’s name wasn’t that unusual, but who was Fat Monkey? Were they all cheering for a monkey? A fat monkey? Some of these people had brought their children with them, and these children all knew about the game, even if they didn’t play it. Their parents soon found out from them what Ruling Sword was all about.

They were just playing a game; there was no cause for public celebration.

The parents then found out that they had won a major tournament. Some of them reminisced about the time they had won a football competition while representing a city, but even they didn’t celebrate victory in such an exaggerated fashion.

When a group of lion dancers appeared outside the airport under the city’s banner, these people were surprised to see how much Ruling Sword was valued.

Generally speaking, if something important happened, there would be a brief city council member appearance. After this, the event would be left to the media reporters. Today, there was a very long line up of council members and several people that often appeared on TV were present.

Regardless of whether they were fans or not, they had all appeared in advance. These official figures had waited for the aircraft to land…

Lu Li didn’t expect so many people to be welcoming him and the lion dance was quite overwhelming. However, this was human nature and he had lived at the bottom of society long enough to know not to offend anyone. As such, he immediately made a very moving gesture towards the city council.

In all his years, Lu Li had never seen the head of the Jiangnan City TV station in person, but now, he was here.

“You’ve suffered to be here. Thank you.”

This man was in his thirties to forties. He was accustomed to getting up early in the morning, but not to go to the airport to wait for a group of young people after they had played their games.

Lu Li almost recklessly blurted out an indiscreet remark, but he stopped himself just in time.

“Everyone had worked hard for this, but there are still matches to be played. It’s too early to talk about winning or losing.”

“Don’t you know?” an acquaintance with gold glasses next to him asked. It was the secretary who often dealt with Ruling Sword. “Glory Capital already declared their loss this morning. Once the formalities are completed, you will become the champions.”

Lu Li was instantly dumbfounded by this revelation.

The matter was actually not that complicated. Lu Li announced at the press conference that he would choose the snow map again to prove to everyone that it wasn’t chance that had determined the result of the match. However, the odds were too great and Glory Capital felt as though they couldn’t make up the difference.

Once Ruling Sword defeated Glory Capital for the second time in the snow map, no one would be able to question their championship title.

Instead, Glory Capital decided to maintain their morale and admit defeat. They weren’t desperately in need of a win, and at least they had left some questions unanswered.

Glory Capital had no intention of allowing Ruling Sword to succeed either.

This morning, when Lu Li was on the way back, their spokesperson announced that they wouldn’t be fighting in the away matches.

How shameless!

Lu Li felt helpless. This giant guild had completely refused his challenge, and he felt like it was quite a petty move.