The national server title was something unattainable in the eyes of many, but for professional players, it actually wasn’t difficult.

Pro players didn’t go for national server titles simply because they didn’t have the time.

Every day they had to practice last-hitting, refine micro-mechanics, review matches, study opponents, and play scrimmages. Where would they find the time to play hundreds or thousands of ranked games with the same hero just to boost combat power?

In his previous life, Ye Shaoyang had also never obtained national server titles for many of his heroes.

Most national server titles were held by game streamers. After all, streamers had plenty of time every day to play ranked and climb combat power. The national server title was also an advertisement streamers used to promote themselves.

But everyone knew that for those few heroes, Ye Shaoyang was the one who played them best.

In this life, he wasn’t an esports pro yet.

He had plenty of time.

Ye Shaoyang took a taxi home and opened the door.

Xiao Rui immediately ran over and asked, “Ge, how did it go? Did you work things out with them?”

Xiao Bai also meowed and ran over to rub against his pant leg. Probably thinking he had returned from a hunt with something tasty.

Ye Shaoyang picked up Xiao Bai, looking calm: “The talks fell through.”

Xiao Bai tilted his head in confusion at his owner: “Meow?”

Xiao Rui’s smile stiffened slightly. After a few seconds of silence, he said quietly, “Ge, was Whale Live’s contract too harsh? If it doesn’t work out, should we switch platforms?”

“All crows are equally black. The contracts across major platforms are more or less the same.” Ye Shaoyang carried Xiao Bai toward the balcony while walking and talking. “I’m not switching platforms for now. I have several hundred thousand in gifts in my backend, and over two hundred thousand members. Switching platforms would be a huge loss, and it’d also let down the viewers who supported me with gifts and membership cards.”

Ye Shaoyang bent down to add some freeze-dried food to the cat bowl on the balcony.

Xiao Bai immediately buried his head in his meal.

Ye Shaoyang petted the foodie kitten’s head and said with a smile, “Anyway, if I don’t sign, they can’t take that money either. It’ll just sit in my backend. Sooner or later, they’ll come to me proactively to sign.”

There wasn’t a trace of anger or grievance from the failed negotiation on his face. Instead, he was calm and confident. Although Qin Rui didn’t understand why his brother had failed to reach an agreement with the platform, looking at his brother’s expression, it was clear he hadn’t suffered any loss. Thinking this, Qin Rui relaxed and asked, “Ge, are you still going to play ranked this afternoon?”

“I’ll play tonight. First, I’ll go practice a new hero.” Ye Shaoyang carried the full cat to the study.

He opened the game’s [Training Camp] and set the difficulty to “Nightmare Difficulty.”

This was the highest difficulty in the game’s training mode. The AI had full map vision— even if you hid in a bush, the AI could spot you immediately, automatically dodge your skills, and automatically lock onto you to attack.

Nightmare-level AI was even more变态 than pro players.

After all, pro players might still miss skills, but the AI had automatic targeting—every hit landed.

Next, the hero he was going to practice was [Illusionist].

Ye Shaoyang created a 1v1 training room, swapping in different heroes to face off against [Illusionist].

This training method had one advantage—by watching the AI’s movements, he could quickly familiarize himself with how [Illusionist] played against different heroes. For example, against [Frost Goddess], how should he dodge her freeze CC? Against [World-Ending Mage], how should he avoid his instant-kill ultimate?

Since training mode opponents could be freely chosen and swapped, Ye Shaoyang used [Illusionist] to duel against over twenty mid-lane heroes. He quickly familiarized himself with [Illusionist]’s mechanics and the key points to watch out for against different opponents.

He also calculated all of [Illusionist]’s skill damage. These skills dealt different damage to squishies versus tanks, because tank-type heroes had higher base defense.

Equipment and levels in training camp could be adjusted at any time.

Through repeated practice, Ye Shaoyang quickly found item builds that suited him.

His mouse flew through the item shop as he rapidly selected items, presetting two equipment loadouts for [Illusionist]. Qin Rui watched him pick items from the side until his eyes blurred: “Doesn’t the system have recommended builds? Ge, aren’t you going to use them?”

Ye Shaoyang said: “Recommended builds aren’t necessarily suitable for me.”

Qin Rui made an “oh” sound and sat down nearby to practice heroes himself. He curiously tried [Abyssal Lord], only to find that controlling three shadows was too difficult—he couldn’t figure it out at all. Qin Rui clicked into [Abyssal Lord]’s equipment tab and his eyes widened slightly: “Ge, the system recommended build for [Abyssal Lord] has a note: From National Server #1, Xiao Bai’s recommendation.”

Hearing this, Ye Shaoyang also opened [Abyssal Lord]’s hero page and took a look. Sure enough, in the recommended build section, it showed the equipment he usually liked to use, with a label reading: “Recommended by National Server #1 [Xiao Bai].”

Back when he was explaining his itemization思路 to his stream viewers, he had casually pressed the “Recommend Build” button. As a result, after obtaining National Server #1 today, the system had synced his equipment loadout to the game client, recommending it to all players across the server.

In the game, opening any hero’s profile page allowed you to enter that hero’s strategy section.

He clicked into the Abyssal Lord strategy section and found quite a few comments—

【Who is Xiao Bai? Awesome, taking the national server so fast.】

【Xiao Bai is a streamer on the Whale Platform. He’s been streaming Abyssal Lord tutorials these past few days.】

【Let me go search for him. I was just thinking of learning how to play the new hero.】

【This item build思路 is pretty good. I tried it out, and the实战 controls are incredibly smooth.】

…

Official recommendation was the best advertisement.

Gods’ War had over 200 million players in the China region. As long as someone was interested in the new hero, clicking on [Abyssal Lord] would let them see National Server #1 Xiao Bai’s name. Constantly, people would search for him and find their way to his stream room.

This afternoon, after the official recommendation refreshed, his stream had gained another 100,000+ followers in just a few short hours. Many people were also urging him to hurry up and stream ranked—they wanted to learn the new hero.

Ye Shaoyang wasn’t in a rush to boost his popularity.

He re-planned his upcoming schedule.

7:30 AM: Wake up, wash up, eat breakfast, feed the cat.

8:00 AM to 10:00 AM: Two hours in AI training camp to practice last-hitting, practice different hero mechanics, memorize damage numbers, item data, and master techniques for different hero matchups.

10:00 AM to 1:00 PM: Three hours of ranked games, streaming the climb for national server.

1:00 PM to 2:00 PM: Lunch break, feed the cat, play with Xiao Bai using a teaser wand.

2:00 PM to 6:00 PM: Watch professional league VODs.

As an outsider, he needed to quickly understand the draft counter-pick relationships in these high-level matches.

8:00 PM to 12:00 AM: Continue streaming ranked games.

This way, every day he had two hours to practice mechanics, including the most fundamental last-hitting, skill accuracy, positioning techniques, and so on—all of which could be practiced in training camp.

Four hours in the afternoon watching match videos to improve his macro sense and understanding of draft synergy.

Seven hours of ranked games every day to practice mechanics while accumulating实战经验.

The schedule was packed but fulfilling.

It was as if he had returned to his days at Team GD’s base, where every day was this kind of dull, tedious practice. He could repeat a single positioning movement hundreds of times.

This was the profession he loved; he had long since gotten used to it.

---

Qin Rui didn’t bring up duo-queuing with Ye Shaoyang again. His brother was getting stronger and stronger, already climbing into the King 30–50 star bracket. The teammates and opponents he matched with were all very skilled. Qin Rui really couldn’t play support at a high level and didn’t want to shamelessly drag his brother down. Getting carried to King by his brother was enough for him to show off in front of his classmates for a long time.

Thinking this, Qin Rui proactively said, “Ge, I won’t duo-queue ranked with you anymore. I’ll just play normal matches casually. Your stream room doesn’t have a mod yet, right? I’ll be your mod. If anyone comes to flame you, I’ll ban them.”

Ye Shaoyang looked at his brother with a smile: “Okay. Before you start school, help me be a mod for a while. When Ge earns money later, I’ll give you a big gift.”

Qin Rui said happily: “My major’s courses are supposedly pretty light, so I’ll have lots of time. I can keep being your fan club admin in the future too!”

That evening, Ye Shaoyang played a few more ranked games with [Abyssal Lord] and recorded a hero tutorial video, placing it in his stream room for new viewers to check out anytime.

Viewers also noticed that Xiao Bai’s stream room had gained a new mod named Xiao Rui.

Starting the next day, Ye Shaoyang implemented his new schedule.

At 8:00 AM he went to AI training camp on Nightmare difficulty to practice mechanics for two hours, then started ranked at 10:00 AM sharp.

He changed his stream room name to: [Abyssal Lord National Server Secured, Now Streaming Illusionist Climb for National Server]

Viewers who followed Xiao Bai’s stream room saw the green light come on at 10:00 AM sharp, indicating the streamer was online. Everyone clicked in to watch.

【The streamer is up this early?】

【The streamer is so dedicated, streaming at 10:00 AM every day!】

【Wait, I noticed the stream room name changed. Xiao Bai, you’re going for Illusionist’s national server title?】

【The current #1 Illusionist national server combat power holder is Brother Yu. Is the streamer going down the path of “slapping Brother Yu’s face” without return?】

【New streamers only know how to hype themselves, stepping on Brother Yu to climb up. Shameless!】

【If you’ve got skill, show your face! Putting a cat there to act cute, the streamer is probably too ugly to show himself, right?】

【Xiao Bai streamer has quite the big face, thinking national servers are so easy to get? Heh.】

—User [Yu Bu Po] has been muted by mod Xiao Rui.

—User [Angel Little Princess] has been muted by mod Xiao Rui.

Qin Rui muted several troublemaking IDs in a row.

The chat spammed: “Mod 666!”

Ye Shaoyang ignored those troublemaking haters and said, “This week I’ll use [Illusionist] to play ranked. I’ll get the national server title within a week, then switch to another hero next week.”

Viewers: “???”

【Damn, you really think national server titles don’t cost money, that you can just get them whenever you want?】

【One national server title per week, are you serious?】

【The streamer is so arrogant, I like it!】

【Young people should be wild! Who plays games politely saying, “Hello, may I kill you?”】

【Streamer, go for it! I believe in you. Take Illusionist’s national server title and make those dead fish fans shut up!】

Ye Shaoyang didn’t pay attention to the viewers’ banter.

He queued up and started playing seriously.

---

10:30 AM, Jingzhe Team base.

Coach Chen, with dark circles under his eyes, sat in front of his computer yawning as he opened Xiao Bai’s stream room.

Just then, the stream popped up with the word “VICTORY.” On the post-game screen, [Illusionist] had taken MVP with a score of 12/0/4. The comprehensive rating was so high that a single match added over 400 combat power.

Twelve kills in one match as Illusionist? That brutal?!

Coach Chen’s sleepiness instantly vanished. Rubbing his eyes, he said, “He’s not playing [Abyssal Lord] anymore, switched to [Illusionist]? And he’s going for [Illusionist]’s national server?”

Xie Yuan also walked over and sat beside Coach Chen, saying, “The current #1 Illusionist national server is streamer Brother Yu. Looks like Xiao Bai has latched onto Brother Yu and is slapping his face for all he’s worth.”

Support Li Yunmo said coldly, “Didn’t Brother Yu claim that Chinese region pro players are all a bunch of cowards who only know how to embarrass themselves at Worlds? Well now, he can’t even protect his signature hero’s national server title.”

Coach Chen pondered: “Slapping the same person’s face over and over, left hook then right hook? Xiao Bai’s follower count has skyrocketed these past few days. Many came over from Brother Yu’s side. Is he trying to step on Brother Yu to climb up?”

Xie Yuan smiled: “Back in the day, didn’t Brother Yu step on our entire esports circle to climb up? Getting taken down by a new streamer is karma, I suppose.”

In reality, Ye Shaoyang didn’t have any intention of “stepping on someone to climb up.”

He just wanted to get national server titles, that was all.

One [Abyssal Lord] national server title was far from enough to prove his strength.

The most crucial issue was—he was already 21 years old and still hadn’t differentiated.

He checked and found that in this world, most youth trainees started competing in their teens.

At 16–18 years old, when secondary genders differentiated, teenagers’ bodies and minds gradually stabilized, and their hand speed was at its peak. Players around 18 were the most likely to achieve results. Players over 20 were basically veteran ace gods of the esports circle, the mainstays of various teams.

If others heard that he was only starting to play competitively at 21, their first reaction would definitely be “too late.”

So he had to be many times better than the newcomers in the youth training camps to catch a coach’s eye.

It was impossible for him to join a youth training camp as a newcomer and start from scratch. By the time he officially played in matches, he’d be over 22. It was best to have him start as a main roster player next season.

But he also knew that for any team’s coach, letting a 21-year-old “never-been-on-stage” player directly into the starting roster was extremely risky. It was essentially bringing in an “old rookie.”

He couldn’t exactly tell people, “Actually, I played hundreds of matches in my previous life and have abundant experience”—soul transmigration was hard to explain clearly. So he had to rely on his own excellence to make coaches drop their prejudices against him.

Right now, he had no channel to prove himself through matches. The simplest and most direct method was to obtain national server titles.

As long as he secured national server rankings for many heroes and became a prominent “roadside king,” teams would naturally take notice of him and extend an olive branch.