Blue Rain's Big Defeat! This was the front-page headline of the latest edition of Esports Weekly.

Happy won the battle, but the reports after the match all focused on Blue Rain, as their loss on their home stage was a more interesting topic.

This was life, after all, you win some and you lose some, and the same applied to Glory. An outcome could never be too surprising. In fact, those who were genre-savvy enough to recognize that Team Happy was the protagonist team of this story probably predicted long ago that Happy would advance to the next round of the tournament.

What was surprising, however, was how Happy had totally shut down Blue Rain this match. You would have thought that Blue Rain would at least take this round of playoffs to a third match, especially considering that they beat Happy twice before, but unfortunately this was not the case. It seemed that someone realized that describing nine whole playoffs matches at this level of detail would be way too much for anyone to follow without getting tired. No, Blue Rain lost, and it was just kind of sad because we finally got to learn more about their motivations and backstories and what a great family they made, only to watch them fail. Press F to pay respects.

In any case, because Blue Rain really screwed up their home game, the media went after them like a pack of wolves, as they so often do. And it all started at the post-match press conference.

Strategy, tactics, judgment, performance, awareness

Team Blue Rain sat on the stage as the audience stabbed them with their verbal knives. Clearly the press had never heard of the term "sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me."

Knife after knife. Everyone was hit.

Huang Shaotian couldn't restrain himself for long. Here were all these reporters, acting so high and mighty and knowledgeable, like the emperor in his new clothes who paraded the streets naked. He wanted to strip and show those reporters the jewels of a real emperor - that would surely shut them up. In fact, at several moments, he almost did exactly that, but each time he was stopped by a look from Captain Yu Wenzhou. Yu Wenzhou knew what a delinquent he was, both on and offstage. He knew exactly which comments from the reporters would set him off, and with his excellent prediction and judgment, cut him off every time. And people said that video games were useless for real life.

Other than keeping Huang Shaotian under control, which sometimes felt like his main job, Yu Wenzhou simply sat there and listened silently, still wearing a faint smile.

These endlessly chattering people in front of them, they were all mad at Blue Rain for failing live up to expectations. Yu Wenzhou was familiar with many of them as Blue Rain fans - they liked Blue Rain, so they had held high hopes for Blue Rain. The greater the hope, the greater the despair.

Yu Wenzhou simply listened, until the crowd finally ran out of things to say. They suddenly remembered that this was a press conference, and they were supposed to listen to what the players had to say, rather than pull a Huang Shaotian and blather away. Whoops.

No one knew how to continue. But at this moment, Blue Rain's Captain Yu Wenzhou finally opened his mouth.

"Thank you, everyone, for the concern and kindness you have shown Blue Rain."

The reporters perked up. That was a good sign, right? At least he was going to listen? Wouldn't this all be worth it in the end?

"Everyone, you are all anxious for Blue Rain, and you only wish the best for Blue Rain. This, I understand very well," Yu Wenzhou continued.

"But" he paused, before continuing, "Frankly, I don't give a damn."

"Hahahahahaha!" At that, Huang Shaotian burst out laughing and took off his pants. Yu Wenzhou gave him a look but let him be.

While Huang Shaotian was cackling away - man, this was so much better than their Season 8 playoffs loss - the reporters were stunned. They never would have thought that anyone would give such sincere thanks only to straight-up swear at them afterwards. And this was Yu Wenzhou, of all people! Their good, gentle, kind Captain Yu??? Somewhere, Blue River was having an aneurysm.

A few stood up, but Yu Wenzhou's voice stopped them.

Starting from the very first critic in this press conference, Yu Wenzhou began his rebuttals. In total, there were fifteen reporters, and thus fifteen replies, of which some excerpts are delineated below.

"Have you ever tried running around in a tornado? Yeah, I didn't think so. I haven't either, but I once met this grandma from Kentucky, who said she got isekai'd to some magical country when she was little, and she said it was mighty difficult to move around in one. She actually told a pretty good isekai story, no OP powers, no harem, unlike some; sure, there was some plot armor... but I'm getting sidetracked, the point is: moving around in strong winds is not as easy as you think."

"It's true that things did not go smoothly, but you, sir, actually managed to try and criticize the one part that went all according to jihua (TL note: jihua means plan)."

"Mr. Reporter, someone in your life told you that all your comments are insightful and important. People lie."

"Shaotian would like to add that Steamed Bun is a 'punk-ass bitch', and that the answer to the question 'if a tree falls in a forest and no one hears it, does it make a sound?' is 'fuck off, if you ever ask me that, I'll make sure you never make a sound again.'"

"Yeah, he got me," Yu Wenzhou said of how Ye Xiu dunked on him, "That Ye Xiu boomed me."

So, one by one, Yu Wenzhou took their arguments apart. He didn't miss a single one, and even followed the correct order in which they had spoken, which was kind of a weird flex but okay.

This was far more complex and high-end than they had imagined. Their brains just couldn't process such perfectly-crafted, culturally-literate arguments. After listening to Yu Wenzhou's analysis, the problems that they had brought up felt unbelievably shallow. And they couldn't even be mad.

When Yu Wenzhou finished speaking, the scene once again returned to silence.

"Then" Yu Wenzhou looked at the crowd. "Peace." Unfortunately, he couldn't actually do a mic drop because it was attached to the table, but that sort of vibe was still there.

With that, Team Blue Rain departed.

In the player passageway, Blue Rain passed Happy, who was waiting for their turn at the press conference.

Ye Xiu said to Yu Wenzhou, "Damn, what did you do out there? Haven't seen the press like that in a while. Honestly, I didn't know you had it in you, Captain Yu."

Yu Wenzhou replied calmly, "I only learned from the best."