The Esports Big Shot Wants to Cuddle His New Teammate Every Day chapter extra side couple 5

Extra 1: Side Couple Warning!! Li Huanbin x Shen Xiao (5)

Usually, during the New Year period every year, Shen Xiao would either mix in with some streamer friends to fill his broadcast hours playing casual games or solo queue to kill time. But this year, for almost the entire holiday, he was stuck like glue to Li Huanbin—duo queuing.

With Secret’s solemn guarantee of climbing ranks, Shen Xiao’s score indeed shot up. Looking at his ranking leaping into the top ten on the leaderboard, he felt incredibly comfortable inside.

And after duo queuing for these few days, his view of Li Huanbin’s playstyle changed significantly.

Previously, he always felt Li Huanbin’s playstyle was too slippery, like an old fox smiling at you while constantly ready to stab you in the back.

But after really teaming up, Shen Xiao discovered that Li Huanbin actually changed and adjusted to coordinate with his teammates. Not just for him, but for other random teammates too. If a teammate was conservative, he would coordinate by playing slightly more aggressively. If a teammate was aggressive, he would become conservative instead. This way, even if the team made mistakes, he could make up for them as quickly as possible.

When wanting to advance, he was the sharpest spear; when wanting to retreat, he was the most solid shield.

Although their positions were different, the feeling Li Huanbin gave him was similar to Xie Wei.

Could it be that the captain position has some kind of magic?

“Seamy, Seamy!”

The shouting coming from the headset called back Shen Xiao’s consciousness. He snapped back to reality and let out an “Ah.”

“What are you dazing out for? It’s your turn.”

“Oh.” Shen Xiao clicked the mouse and rolled the dice.

Returning to the team today, training hadn’t officially started yet. Since he was idle, Shen Xiao pulled a few streamer friends together to play Monopoly. This game required no technical skill, purely luck, just for entertainment.

These streamers were all big streamers for Resist, with good traffic. Since they often played together, their audiences were familiar with each other and were happy to see them collaborate in games.

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The dice on the screen stopped. The little figure representing Shen Xiao walked five spaces, stepping exactly onto a bomb square. The bomb exploded; not only did he lose money, but he was also hauled into the hospital by an ambulance, skipping his turn for three rounds.

A uniform wave of “hahahahaha” filled the bullet comments.

Shen Xiao laughed too. “Damn, so unlucky.”

A streamer who specialized in playing Sniper teased, “Just God Xiao performing normally.”

“Bullshit,” Shen Xiao said. “When I perform normally, I earn over three hundred thousand in minutes, instant-killing all of you. Don’t bully the young for being poor. Wait till I go back to my oil refinery to collect tax money, you just watch.”

The Sniper said, “I think it’s tough.”

“I think it’s tough too,” another Medic streamer said. “Seamy only has three thousand bucks right now, yet he’s thinking of a comeback. Give it up.”

The Assault streamer had already gone bankrupt and become a beggar. “Yeah, just obediently come beg on the street with me.”

“You guys take it easy, don’t always pick on Seamy. What if he doesn’t play with us anymore?” The Sniper streamer said, “It’s been harder than ascending to heaven to play a game with Seamy these past few days.”

“Speaking of which,” the Medic streamer said, “I don’t know if something’s wrong with my eyes or if it’s a system display bug, but why do I see Seamy duo queuing with Secret every day in his match history?”

The Assault streamer said, “Must be a system display bug because I see the same thing on my end.”

Shen Xiao paused, then laughed involuntarily. “It’s not a bug, and your eyes aren’t broken. I have indeed been playing with him recently.”

“Oh?” The Sniper streamer’s tone rose high at the end. “What’s the situation? Confess honestly. Before, you two were mortal enemies. How come after the New Year, you started sticking together every day?”

“What sticking together? Are you gross or not?” Shen Xiao said, “Just happened to bump into each other by chance. Anyway, my coordination with him is pretty good. Climbing ranks isn’t shameful.”

“Oh—” the Assault streamer said meaningfully. “Understood, understood.”

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That tone sounds like you didn’t understand anything.

Shen Xiao always did things and made friends as he pleased, not caring at all what others said. But inexplicably, he just didn’t want to display the fact that he and Li Huanbin were on good terms to others.

He’d rather let others think he was a jumping shrimp than that.

Just then, three rounds passed. His character came out of jail. One roll of the dice, six points. The character landed firmly on a reward square. Savings doubled; three thousand became fifteen thousand.

Shen Xiao said proudly, “See that? I told you, don’t bully the young for being poor. Just wait for me to turn over a new leaf and become the master!”

The other three streamers were perceptive. Seeing he didn’t want to talk deeply about Li Huanbin, they cooperated fully, laughing and changing the topic.

The four played together until ten o’clock at night before disbanding. Turning off the stream, Shen Xiao picked up his phone. Li Huanbin hadn’t sent him a message today.

Normally at this time, there should be at least seven or eight unread messages on his phone.

What happened…

Shen Xiao scratched his hair, hesitated for a moment, and opened the chat box.

On the other side, at the WOF base.

Li Huanbin sat in the conference room, flipping through the contract in his hand expressionlessly. The gentle smile usually on his face was gone. At this moment, his eyebrows and eyelashes seemed frosted with ice, scary cold.

After a long while, he put down the contract and said with a faint smile that wasn’t a smile, “Ten million a season to renew Jin? Did I see it wrong, or have you guys gone crazy?”

“Captain Li,” hearing this, the manager revealed a troubled expression. “We don’t want to either, but… the team really doesn’t have any usable Assaults right now, and we’re right at the juncture of the playoffs. Jin’s skill is indeed average, but he’s played for WOF for so many years after all. My meaning is… just consider it giving him a retirement bonus and agree to it.”

“His current contract is only five million a season. A retirement bonus of five million? I didn’t know when WOF became so rich.” Li Huanbin smiled slightly.

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Seeing him smile, the manager thought his attitude was softening and hurriedly showed an ingratiating smile. “Then about this matter…”

“Rejected.” Li Huanbin stood up and patted the manager’s shoulder lightly. “Manager Chen, you’ve just turned forty. How could you do such a muddled thing?”

The oppressive force of a top-tier Alpha descended. A drop of cold sweat suddenly surfaced on Manager Chen’s forehead. “I was also thinking for the team…”

“You’re thinking for the team?” Li Huanbin scoffed lightly. “Then have you thought about what other team members would think if you give a high salary of ten million to a player whose value doesn’t match at all? That as long as they make trouble, as long as they tear up decorum, they can earn themselves a five million retirement bonus. With this example, wouldn’t everyone come and make a scene when retiring to get five million?”

Manager Chen was speechless. “This…”

“I also think we can’t do this.” Aside, the head coach who had been frowning in silence spoke up. “WOF doesn’t need such a villain.”

Li Huanbin nodded. “Mm.”

“Then, then what about the playoffs?” Seeing the two had reached a consensus and knowing he couldn’t stubbornly beat them, Manager Chen plopped down on the sofa.

Li Huanbin said indifferently, “Do what needs to be done. WOF won’t disband because of this one failure. At most, we come back next season.”

Manager Chen said, “Next season? Who should we field next season? We’ve waited for several seasons and there are simply no good seedlings. I’ve contacted all those Assaults on the field, and none are willing to come.”

Li Huanbin didn’t speak, but a name surfaced in his heart.

A name he had set his mind on for a long time.

“I’ll solve this matter.” Li Huanbin stood up. “Throw this contract into the shredder. Later, if Jin asks again, don’t reject him immediately. Bring him directly to this room for a detailed talk. Fish for his words, understand?”

Manager Chen nodded. “…Okay.”

The phone in his pocket vibrated. Li Huanbin took out his phone while walking out.

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Seeing the message, his expression instantly became gentle.

[Seamy]: What are you doing?

After Shen Xiao sent the message, he had been somewhat restless, checking his phone every little while.

Fortunately, Li Huanbin didn’t make him wait too long and replied quickly.

[Li Huanbin]: Sorry, something happened with the team today. Just finished dealing with it.

[Seamy]: Oh.

Anyway, it was another team’s business. Shen Xiao couldn’t ask too deeply, so he replied drily with one word.

Li Huanbin didn’t mind his coldness and continued typing.

[Li Huanbin]: Have you eaten? Are you getting ready to rest now?

[Seamy]: Yeah, just made up some streaming hours, a bit tired now.

[Li Huanbin]: Then rest well. I’m tired too; too many things going on recently.

Shen Xiao paused.

Perhaps because both were Alphas, Li Huanbin rarely showed weaknesses or negative emotions like fatigue and irritability in front of him.

Today was a bit different.

After hesitating several times, he still asked tentatively.

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[Seamy]: Did something happen?

Li Huanbin looked at the screen, a smile hooking the corner of his lips.

[Li Huanbin]: Actually…

He told Shen Xiao about Jin’s matter without reservation. In a few words, he portrayed himself as a pitiful figure caught between the club and Jin, attacked from both sides, showing none of the uncompromising dominance he had just displayed in the conference room.

In Shen Xiao’s heart, he had already categorized Li Huanbin as on his side. Hearing this, he immediately flew into a rage.

He typed, felt that text wasn’t enough to express the anger in his heart, and called Li Huanbin directly.

“Seamy?” On the other end of the phone, Li Huanbin’s voice was slightly hoarse, but the tone was still gentle. “What’s wrong?”

An indescribable emotion flashed through Shen Xiao’s heart. He suppressed his anger. “What’s the situation with your club? That guy made such a ridiculous request, and they just let him act up like that?”

Li Huanbin sighed lightly. “Can’t be helped. WOF hasn’t had any good Assault seedlings for several seasons. We’re in a gap period right now. If we don’t agree to him, let alone the playoff issue, what should we do next season?”

This was what Manager Chen had just asked him. Li Huanbin turned around and threw this question to Shen Xiao.

Shen Xiao choked up instantly, not knowing how to answer.

“However,” Li Huanbin said, “It’s only ten million. It’s not like WOF can’t afford it.”

“Ten million?! Signing that stupid c*nt? Are they crazy!”

Shen Xiao instantly raised his volume. “Does WOF have bubbles in their brain or too much money with nowhere to spend it? Eight figures to sign an old, weak, sick, and disabled player? Let’s not even talk about that thing’s character; even one million for those mechanics is too much in my opinion. Ten million! Bullshit!”

Li Huanbin smiled. The heart that was irritable because of this matter was greatly relieved amidst the young man’s incredulous scolding. “I think so too.”

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Shen Xiao was still not relieved. “How can there be such people in the world? It’s hard to believe I even played matches with this kind of person… Ten million. He doesn’t look at what level you are, and what level he himself is. All day long he’s just green with envy. For WOF to buy this kind of goods, might as well buy me!”

Li Huanbin’s heart stirred.

He remained composed, smiling, and spoke as if making a careless joke: “I actually do want to buy you. Are you selling?”

Shen Xiao paused, muttering, “Why do your words sound so weird…”

Li Huanbin stopped at that point. “Let’s not talk about this. It’s late, you should rest early.”

Shen Xiao’s heart was a bit chaotic. He gave an “Mm.”

Before hanging up, he heard Li Huanbin say, “Goodnight.”

Shen Xiao felt a bit awkward, but still replied, “Goodnight.”