CH 52

Jiang Song was troubled by his unconventional father and rubbed his forehead when he answered the phone. “Sorry, I went out for something just now and forgot my phone.”

His voice came through the receiver and caught Xie Yao off guard, making his ears tingle.

He had thought nobody would answer the call this time and was about to hang up. Xie Yao opened his mouth slightly, then moved the phone away and pinched his hot ear.

…That voice was too powerful.

He thought expressionlessly, then turned his back to the camera and spoke to the phone, “It’s okay, I just didn’t see you in the live stream earlier and wanted to let you know… I won.”

The little boy tried to sound casual and nonchalant, every syllable like he was saying it was just a trivial matter. But when he said those words, there was already a hint of smugness that made people want to smirk.

Like a weaned kitten, stepping on the soft blanket while tilting its head, every whisker carrying the air of youthfulness.

Jiang Song felt his heart was now like that blanket that was stepped on.

He didn’t speak for a while, but his tightly furrowed brows had completely relaxed, as if all the fur was smoothed down.

Not hearing any response from the other end of the phone, Xie Yao became nervous with the shallow breaths he heard. Facing away from the live stream, he tightened his grip on the phone and if Jiang Song didn’t say anything, he would have lowered his eyes and tried to change the topic with a smile.

“Today is just the first day of the finals, and I’m not sitting too securely in first place. There’s nothing to show off about…” Xie Yao stopped halfway through his words and felt dejected, “If you’re busy, I can hang up the phone…”

“Sorry.”

Before he could even hang up, Jiang Song finally spoke.

As Xie Yao grew closer to him, Jiang Song felt both troubled by the young man’s tendency to overthink things, but also enjoyed it.

He’s just a kid who hasn’t even turned twenty yet, so he should spend more time coaxing him.

“Sorry for zoning out earlier.”

“Yao Yao got first place today, really amazing.”

Jiang Song said, feeling like it wasn’t enough, and continued to affirm him.

“Amazing, really amazing.”

In a place where no one could see, Xie Yao’s face suddenly exploded, he turned red and his neck thickened, and it seemed like smoke was coming out of his forehead.

Afraid that if he didn’t speak, Jiang Song would think he was unhappy, Xie Yao was both embarrassed and tried to act calm.

“I’ll win the championship.”

His gaze drifted to the trophy placed in the center of the living room.

“When the time comes, can I give you the trophy?”

Jiang Song laughed on the phone.

“I’d love that.”

The rules of the final differ from the previous stages of the competition, just like how the top-ranked streamer in the donation rankings can now earn an extra bonus of five points per day.

It was the next day when Xie Yao found out about this rule from the crazy spamming of Zhou Tian. The new rule was announced by Shark TV in the early hours of the morning, but the effective time was from the start of the competition yesterday.

Xie Yao found out immediately and opened the official ranking list of the live competition. As he expected, the favored individual who he had previously been leading by a margin of four points had now surpassed him.

At that moment, Xie Yao’s first thought was that he had just told Jiang Song yesterday that he was in first place, and now he had been slapped in the face just after waking up the next day.

Xie Yao was angrier and more upset than ever before. He subconsciously opened the dialogue box to look for Jiang Song, but then let go and calmly approached Zhou Tian instead.

Jiang Song knew about this situation even earlier than Xie Yao did. He was used to waking up early and had been busy with the affairs of Cat’s Claw recently. The company had just embarked on the right track, and there were still many areas that required Jiang Song’s personal attention.

He had known when Xie Yao lost first place. But he knew more than the angry fans did.

Outsiders may not be aware of it, but those in the industry have noticed something was amiss with Shark TV lately. Two months ago, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. But since the King of Glory live competition started, internal conflicts within Shark TV began to arise.

The corruption among the upper echelons of the company was too severe. They played favoritism, formed cliques and factions. Since the previous boss retired due to illness a few years ago, this company, which was almost invincible in China, began to crumble.

Before Cat’s Claw appeared, things were still relatively okay. Even though some streamers were suppressed due to favored individuals, most people chose to grit their teeth and bear it, including Xie Yao. However, after Cat’s Claw appeared, the situation changed.

Jiang Song had a sharp eye and outstanding ability. He was extremely precise in identifying those popular anchors who were willing to switch platforms. While it was not a problem for other platforms, Shark TV simply couldn’t handle small anchors like Xie Yao. Jiang Song had no reservations when dealing with them.

He poached people, resources, and even teams. Despite the fact that Shark TV appeared to be in harmony with Cat’s Claw on the surface, no one knew how many disagreements were happening behind closed doors.

Shark TV had been on a downward trend for the past few years, but the higher-ups did nothing about it. Even some of the key figures were unwilling to get involved in the shady dealings, and they were even suppressed by well-connected people. It was like a dike that was crumbling due to ant holes.

The appearance of Cat’s Claw was the final straw that broke the camel’s back.

Recently, there have been rumors about Shark TV’s financial problems. Although it was just a small piece of news, it had spread to the ears of bosses in various companies, which added to its credibility.

In addition to the shady operations during the live broadcast competition, it only strengthened Jiang Song’s affirmation of this situation.

Xie Yao didn’t contact him all day. This had happened before, usually because the kid had overslept.

Recently, Xie Yao had become more and more natural in his coquettish behavior, and Jiang Song used to have the heart to make him get up and eat, but now he would just let him be.

He greeted Xie Yao as usual and explained his whereabouts for the afternoon before turning to his computer to start working.

When Xie Yao received Jiang Song’s message, he didn’t even notice it. At this moment, he was watching some stupid things in the live broadcast room, looking expressionless.

The live broadcast room was categorized as a gaming area, but there was nothing related to games on the screen. Instead, there was a man who exposed half of his body, chatting with the barrage.

The broadcaster had a short haircut and was dressed in a very punk style of clothing. His features were somewhat handsome, but he always had a greasy smile, as if his face was saying, “I know I’m handsome.”

“Oh, I’m not here to play games. The competition doesn’t start until tonight, and I’m just bored, so I started the live broadcast to chat with you guys.”

“It’s just average, hahaha. I don’t think I’m handsome, but everyone says I am.”

“Clothes? They were gifts from fans. I don’t know the price.”

“What? Thirty-eight thousand? Are you kidding me? Just for one piece of clothing?”

“Don’t send gifts, I’m not even playing games…Oh, thank you to my boss Wang for sending me a spaceship. He’s so generous.”

…

Xie Yao was hanging out in the live broadcast room, but he turned to open the official notification released in the early morning. The newly revised rules were placed at the top, making them very clear.

Zhou Tian was still sending him messages non-stop on WeChat.

Son: Damn, this idiot probably knew about the new rules in advance yesterday, right?

Son: Sharing video link.

Xie Yao opened the address that Zhou Tian shared, and the video started playing. Various gift effects were flying everywhere, but that wasn’t the most important thing. The IDs that were throwing the gifts were the real attention-grabbers – all of them were the pillars of SharkTV who are still there, including two professional players!

The influence of the anchors and professional players need not be mentioned. Xie Yao himself has received such benefits.

But what he cares about is the time when the gifts were thrown. All of them were thrown between eleven o’clock and twelve o’clock yesterday evening.

As we all know, the ranking of SharkTV’s rewards is settled at exactly twelve o’clock.

Son: All of these gifts were thrown between eleven o’clock and twelve o’clock last night, and the amount is too large. They directly surpassed you.

Son: You were originally ranked first, damn it.

According to the original rules, rewards are distributed weekly, and in the past few days, fans of various broadcasters have been holding back their spending, waiting until the last day to have enough funds to invest.

Fans like this one are rare, who start spending on gifts on the first day, especially at such a sensitive time approaching midnight.

Plus, those few broadcasters and professional players, no one believes they weren’t intentionally trying to gain an advantage.

Son: That idiot actually had the nerve to livestream outside of competition time, damn it!

This time the SharkTV competition had a loophole in the reward ranking, which not only counted rewards during the competition period but also included those outside of the competition. In simple terms, rewards given in all 24 hours of a day were counted.

However, there was an unwritten agreement among the broadcasters that if it was a gaming competition, they had to play games during their live streams, so that rewards would be rightfully earned.

But during the critical period of the finals, their state of mind was very important, so almost no one streamed during the day, except for Langyue Xingshu, who was temporarily ranked first.

Not only did he stream during the day, but the content was completely unrelated to the game and just consisted of “chatting”.

Xie Yao shifted his gaze over, watching Langyue Xingshu smiling greasily as he begged his boss not to reward him, but still thanked him. Xie Yao sneered and made a disgusted gesture.

The broadcaster on the screen was still speaking.

: Yesterday was close, I almost fell to second place, but luckily I had everyone’s support.

: Hahaha, I’m just an ordinary friend with the bigwigs from the LKD team.

: Really just ordinary friends, I don’t know how they came to support me yesterday, but I’m really grateful.

: Yao Yao…Princess, who’s this? Oh, oh, oh, I remember now, that little broadcaster who sells rotten goods with the boss, sorry I haven’t paid much attention.

: He’s pretty strong, but he only played against those who ranked low yesterday. I didn’t compete with him, and almost let him take first place. I’m ashamed.

Xie Yao’s WeChat buzzed.

Son: I can’t stand this idiot anymore, damn.

“I’m a straight guy, how could I sell rotten stuff? Don’t gross me out! But that anchor seems to be?”

“Look at him, fair-skinned, who… Thank you, thank you, ‘My Dad’ boss for the spaceship.”

“Boss Xie likes it, but you don’t need to give gifts at this time haha.”

Langyue Xingshu interrupted his speech, turned his head to read the list of thanks, and his smile never faded from his face.

The barrage was all filled with rainbow fawning, but suddenly, a very abrupt message appeared.

My Dad: Oh, I see. I sent it to the wrong person. Can you return the money to me?

Langyue Xingshu was stunned for a moment, but he quickly reacted.

“The gift has already been sent out, um…I can’t return it to the boss.”

My Dad: So, you asked not to send it, but you still received the gift. Are you trying to fool a fool?

My Dad: What a stupid thing, and it’s actually number one.

The barrage exploded.

Xie Yao glanced at Langyue Xingshu, whose expression was obviously strained, smiled, took a screenshot, closed the live broadcast, and sent a message to Zhou Tian.

Gad: Is this you in the picture?

Son: Of course it’s me! It felt so good to curse him out.

Gad: Just curse him out, why did you still give him money?

Son: Do you think I’m stupid? My nephew’s ID registered the account, he’s a minor, I just need to apply for a refund through the backstage!

Xie Yao’s mouth curled up.