Cheng Feng accompanied the netzine as she streamed three matches. After it ended, she went back to her dorm and took a short nap. In her dream, she counted up the day’s earnings. By the afternoon, her on-air skills had improved noticeably – she could even chat casually with the netizen and throw in a weird joke here and there.
Though the jokes were odd, the netizen was very pleased.
After finishing the afternoon matches, Cheng Feng said goodbye to the netizen and canceled the evening session, because Xiang Yunjian and the others had returned.
The four of them stood downstairs in the dorm building, their faces clearly made up, carrying a faint scent of perfume.
Yan Shen kept rubbing the back of his hand against his cheek, clearly uncomfortable with his appearance.
Cheng Feng discovered their secret. Their original intention hadn’t been to buy her a gift at all – they had gone to do some pre-match promotional event, and stopped by a shopping mall on the way back.
Jiang Linxia had lied to him.
“We got you something too, didn’t we?” Jiang Linxia said shamelessly. “You shouldn’t sweat the small details. You just need to focus on whether the program runs correctly. Bugs are unavoidable.”
He turned around and unlocked the transport robot behind him. The compartment door opened, revealing stacks of gift bags inside – large and small, no fewer than twenty or so in total.
Jiang Linxia leaned halfway against the robot, tapped its metal shell, and said smugly, “Well? What do you think?”
Cheng Feng stared for a moment, then asked in belated surprise, “Are they all for me?”
Jiang Linxia said, “Yeah. Touched?”
Cheng Feng tried picking up a white bag. It was very light. Still unable to believe it, she asked, “How did you even buy all this?”
Half-jokingly, half-seriously, Jiang Linxia replied, “We walked into a gift shop, and a sales assistant came over to ask what we needed. I said we were picking out gifts for a kid, so he gave us a sales list, and we just bought from the top down by popularity.”
He raised an eyebrow and smiled. “See? Even if you can’t win by quality, you can still win by quantity, right?”
Cheng Feng wasn’t sure whether to believe him. She started peeking into one of the bags when Jiang Linxia called out from across the way, “Who opens gifts right in front of people? You know that’s very rude in our planet, don’t you?”
Cheng Feng narrowed her eyes and caught a glimpse of the product tag through the gap. It was a large, light blue hat. The product photo looked very ladylike – fluffy and kind of cute.
There were also several bags from the same brand, probably clothes bought for her.
Cheng Feng felt a bit happy but also found it somewhat unreal. She put the bag back and said, “I thought you were going to give me a little owl plugin.”
“Why would we give you a little owl plugin for your birthday?” Xiang Yunjian said. “Haven’t you already bought everything it needs? You rarely buy anything for yourself.”
Cheng Feng murmured a vague “mm-hmm” and opened another bag. Inside was a light yellow dress. She asked skeptically, “Was this from the sales ranking too?”
“You actually believed that?” Jiang Linxia laughed unkindly. “Someone’s fact-checking skills really need work. These were all picked out for you by Auntie Chu Xuan. How would we know how to choose gifts for a girl?”
They had gone to film a promotional video in the morning, which happened to be near Chu Xuan’s company. After finishing work, the group stopped by to say hello and thought they’d ask her for some shopping advice. Mature women really are more reliable – she didn’t trust the fashion sense of this bunch of straight guys. Since it wasn’t April Fools’ Day, she took advantage of her lunch break to bring these overgrown tagalongs to a nearby mall to help pick out gifts.
Chu Xuan didn’t know much about military academies or leagues. She listened to Jiang Linxia ramble on and on, only grasping about half of it, and said, “She’s that impressive?”
“Yes, the violently inclined shorty,” Jiang Linxia said. “But I don’t know if she’ll make it through the preliminaries.”
Because she wasn’t skilled at it, everything was rushed. And since Cheng Feng refused to admit defeat, it looked like she was pushing herself – testing her own limits.
Chu Xuan picked up a piece of clothing, examined it from top to bottom, and said softly, “Actually, the impact of a different environment can be overwhelming. An unfamiliar world is terrifying, and ordinary people can’t understand it.”
Along with culture, technology, aesthetics, family and friends… all of it changes overnight. You have to relearn everything from basic habits and adapt to the new rules of survival in this unfamiliar environment.
But humans cannot regress to the infancy stage where they could absorb everything without judgment. The instinct to avoid making mistakes is deeply ingrained in almost everyone. Faced with cognitive dissonance and miscommunication, there seems to be no better way to cope than to push oneself too hard.
Chu Xuan sighed. She probably thought Cheng Feng had a tough time – and seemed a bit pitiful, with even her birthday being decided on short notice. So she bought a lot of things.
It wasn’t her money anyway.
Cheng Feng was overjoyed. This was her first time receiving birthday gifts, and both the quantity and the sense of ceremony brought her immense satisfaction.
She politely thanked everyone and, after organizing all the items, recorded them in the little owl’s database so she could return the favors in the future.
“No need to be so polite.” Jiang Linxia said with a grin. “Big shot Ye, if you ever make it big, don’t forget to carry us in the rankings. We want this year’s triple MVP gold trophy – especially the team event MVP!”
Cheng Feng stopped mid-stride, turned her head, and flashed them her little white teeth with a thumbs-up.
No problem. Defeating Tao Rui is everyone’s duty.
Jiang Linxia returned the same gesture. “Make it past the qualifiers. I believe in you.”
…
From 70 matches to 102 matches, at a pace of 9 matches per day, reaching the goal would take only a few days.
Perhaps due to the unexpected incident of Ji Ban’s surprise visit to the livestream, combined with the fact that Cheng Feng had originally set her sights on an even loftier goal of 150 consecutive wins, the moment the record was actually broken turned out to be much more subdued than everyone had expected.
Netizens seemed to have already grown accustomed to Cheng Feng’s winning streak. The next morning, when they opened the San Yao homepage and saw the massive honor announcement on the transition splash screen – “New Consecutive Wins Record Holder: Cheng Feng” – only then did they remember that such a major event had taken place.
Aside from a small, glittering gold ornament added after Cheng Feng’s ID to indicate her achievement, nothing else seemed different.
On the San Yao forums, netizens engaged in a heated discussion on the topic: “Why is the record-breaking so low-key?”
“Huh? Am I late? Congrats, Cheng Feng!”
“You’re not late, everyone just woke up. I remembered this thing the day before yesterday, saying I wanted to witness the moment Cheng Feng broke the record. Who knew that after waking up, this glorious moment would already be over?”
“Too bad San Yao later reformed their system and categorized the qualifiers by type, which made this consecutive wins record less significant. If someone had achieved 102 wins in the sensor mecha category, they’d absolutely become a legend in the united academies and get recommended for expedition.”
“If it’s mixed category, do you really think Cheng Feng could get 102 or even 150 wins? That’s a stretch.”
“San Yao’s reaction to this record feels pretty lukewarm too. They barely promoted it the past few days. Is it because the tournament schedule is too tight and they weren’t prepared?”
“You guys are too young. The low-key reaction is because Cheng Feng’s journey isn’t over yet – or rather, it’s only just beginning! Just wait and see. Given how hard San Yao has been promoting manual-operated mecha these past two years, they’re definitely planning something big down the line. They even brought in Ji Ban in advance – there’s no way they’ll just pretend nothing happened.”
“Bringing up Ji Ban, I think you have a point. It just doesn’t feel real yet.”
Cheng Feng didn’t really feel it either, because her opponent in the 102nd match was fairly ordinary. She went in with enthusiasm, pulled off some flashy moves at the start, and wrapped up the match in seven minutes. Afterward, she replayed it in her head several times but still found it a bit bland.
Mr. Kong, on the other hand, called her right on the dot, stammering a string of “Congratulations!” His intense reaction made it seem like he could finally breathe a sigh of relief and get a good night’s sleep – he probably wanted to call her “little ancestor.” It made Cheng Feng feel rather guilty.
But there was also some good news that cheered Cheng Feng up.
After the match, a San Yao admin messaged her privately, saying they wanted to make a special custom badge for her and asked if she had a preferred design.
Cheng Feng said she wanted a little owl. The admin quickly replied with an “OK” emoji, and then sent her a sample image just five minutes later – seems they had come prepared.
Cheng Feng opened the full-size image.
It was a metal badge with a dark blue-black base. Gold threads formed the image of a little owl perched in the center. Along the lower edge of the badge, following its contour, were the characters “Ye Guicheng.” And above that, there was a small blank space.
San Yao Admin: “If you permit it, physical versions of the badge can also be put up for sale, though the material will be different. San Yao will only charge for materials and platform fees. Netizens can also purchase an electronic version of your badge, which will appear next to their username across all San Yao platforms, alongside membership badges. The electronic badge will remain permanently effective until the next record is broken.”
Not even two seconds later, she received another message in her inbox.
111 Assistant: “@Ye Guicheng, your San Yao account has been upgraded! You now have exclusive special effects~ When commenting in livestreams, you can use starry effects, and when posting updates, you can use exclusive background themes. Go check it out~”
Cheng Feng replied to the admin, then immediately followed the tutorial to activate the special effects mode. She wanted to test it out but wasn’t sure what to post. She stared at the blank post panel for a long time before deciding to look for inspiration in the analysis group chat.
The analysis group was unexpectedly lively today. The moment Cheng Feng clicked in, she saw her own username tagged everywhere.
“Is Cheng Feng in the group? Does anyone have her alias?”
“Cheng Feng might not be here, but her friends probably are. Remember to send her the files. Our manual operation profession’s big moment in the spotlight depends on this. The upperclassmen can’t throw matches due to professional ethics, but hopefully Cheng Feng can keep winning on her own merit!”
“Cheng Feng, check out the tutorial ASAP. I stole it with my own hands, at great risk. Don’t waste it!”
“Place your bets – now that Cheng Feng has broken the record, how much promotional space will San Yao give to manual-operated mecha?”
“Let’s not discuss that for now. Cheng Feng needs to keep winning to maintain enough buzz. I seriously suggest she reduce the number of matches per day, stretch out the timeline, and leave room to attract public attention. Her current match schedule is still too packed!”
“Junior, recruitment season is coming up. The honor of our manual operation program rests on your shoulders!”
Cheng Feng browsed the group files with suspicion. The moment she saw the names of the front-row files, she was deeply shocked.
The file types had already evolved from the initial “Speculations on N Ways to Counter Cheng Feng” to “Detailed Analysis Profiles of the Top 30 Students in the Military University League’s Manual Mecha Division.”
When she opened them, sure enough, they were all spoils stolen from other analysis groups. The content had also been thoughtfully revised, incorporating Cheng Feng’s driving parameters and offering the best suggestions tailored to her from multiple perspectives.
Cheng Feng: “??” Had these people forgotten their own identities? How did it come to this?
Cheng Feng wanted to post a group announcement to sober everyone up. But when she looked up, she noticed that the previous very domineering slogan – “As long as the front wave doesn’t die, don’t expect the back wave to break through!” – had already been crushed by their own hands and replaced with a new, highly idealistic declaration –
“The duty of the predecessors: select the worthy and capable, foster trust and harmony! Unified front for manual mecha – a solid backing for Cheng Feng!”
Cheng Feng was silent for a long moment. She copied the first half of the sentence, pasted it into a search page, and only understood what it meant after translating it into plain language. She twitched the corner of her mouth, utterly baffled by these people.
…The virtue of predecessors, it seems, is knowing when to bend.
