You Boys Play Games Very Well

note: the emoji can mean “reverse the meaning of what I just said” on Weibo/WeChat

Chapter 74

@Peach: As non-local Fruit powder, I went to the north Hebei specially on trip to visit the legendary FRUIT base. Thinking, even if I couldn’t get in, I could take a picture outside the door and leave a message. Little did I think I’d unexpectedly ran into two people who looked a lot like the ones who said they were in long-distance separation @Lemon @Mangosteen, let’s identify them [picking nose]

[A picture of the true situation.jpg]

— @FanA: Blogger, this is your mistake, although the two men in the photo @Lemon @Mangosteen look exactly like them, the trustworthy anchor said they were in the middle of long-distance, that’s to say, different places. You just took a picture of passers-by who happen to look exactly like them, why are you sending out pictures of passers-by?

— @FanB: Blogger, this is your mistake, @Lemon @Mangosteen are pretending to be long-distance, they have to work so hard to pretend, why are you tearing them apart? Have you taken their intentions into account? You didn’t, you’re only thinking about yourself

— @FanC: Blogger, this is your mistake, @Lemon @Mangosteen for the sake of the million Galaxy single dogs, long distance on the surface, their actual hearts are constantly full of guilt and you’re tearing down their kindness, giving the single dogs a heavy blow, the Conservation Society won’t let this go

— @FanD: Blogger, this is your mistake, @Lemon @Mangosteen why did they show up at the FRUIT base at this time? Obviously they want to make big news about Mang God signing with Fruit for the new season. They wanted to surprise a large majority of e-sports powder and you destroyed this surprise. The e-sports mass media won’t forgive you

— @FanE: Blogger, this is your mistake, they’ve mentioned all the places where you’re at fault, I don’t know what else to say, anyway you’re just wrong

……

As soon as Ling Meng returned to Shan Zhu’s household, he was warmly received by Mama Shan:

“Are you all back? Have you eaten? Xiao Ling, you just came back to north Hebei, do you have a place to stay the night?”

Ling Meng’s smile was a little awkward so Shan Zhu interrupted her: “Ma, I told him all about it.”

“No need to do it, ah?” Mama Shan instantly cut into a housekeeping attitude, “I found MengMeng some bedding, the three of you go wash your hands and eat. Shan Zha, did you complete your summer homework? You went out and played for another day, so you aren’t allowed to play games today.”

Ling Meng: ……

Ling Meng ate back the 2 liang he had lost those past days. He rubbed his bulging belly and went into Shan Zhu’s room. Sure enough, he saw an extra set of pillows on the bed that hadn’t been there when he left.

“I think it’s a little awkward to sleep in your room as soon as I visit.”

“My household doesn’t have a guest bedroom. Or else you’ll have to squeeze in with Shan Zha.”

Ling Meng suddenly felt it was better to sleep here embarrassingly than to squeeze into bed with a rebellious child.

“Are you going to stream later? Wait until I find the camera’s blind spot. I won’t talk, as if I didn’t come back for the school term. Definitely must not slap our own faces.”

Shan Zhu brushed Weibo: “I fear they’ve already swollen into a pig’s head.”

Ling Meng:???

Chapter 75

Shan Zhu hadn’t yet begun streaming and the number of people online in the broadcast room had already reached its peak. Everyone was holding out for a good show, waiting to see how the long distance anchor was going to confess.

As the millions of water friends were rubbing their hands like flies in expectation, Lemon Daddy brazenly appeared in the frame of Mang God’s broadcast room.

— The long distance anchor also dares to appear? Did Liang JingRu give you courage?

— Is this shot to show us if your face has swollen into a pig’s head?

— Don’t think we’ll forgive you because you’re being adorable, we can give gifts for you being adorable separately!

Ling Meng’s response was also very reasonable, “Already came out of the closet, yet still afraid to appear on camera?……for the other cat food, please go to my room to brush it….the face didn’t swell into a pig’s head; for my whole lifetime, it’s never going to swell into a pig’s head; after all, I’m just a small lemon. Even if it’s swollen, it can only become a big mango.”

— (MengMengFace) I’m MengMeng’s face, he doesn’t want me anymore.

(t/n: literally face, figuratively reputation; slapped so hard he doesn’t want the painful face + such a liar he’s giving up his reputation)

— (MengMengDimples) He wouldn’t dare not want you. If he doesn’t want you, he couldn’t want me.

— (MengMengTigerTooth) If he doesn’t want you, I’ll give him a taste of the cold teeth without the lips.

— (MengMengAppendix) Don’t be sad, you still have me!

Shan Zhu opened the game without addressing it. Behind him was the bed, where Ling Meng was kneeling on the edge so that his elbow was on Shan Zhu’s shoulder and his chin was right above his head.

“I was going to return to school when the term started. If it weren’t for NILI Mang God’s illness, I wouldn’t have returned now.”

— WULI Mang God just had a cold, thank you, just a cold.

— I think you’re sick, late-stage love sickness.

— When I have a cold, my ma just makes me drink more hot water.

“Hey, you all don’t understand, people who care about hitting a sneeze can also be really worried,” Ling Meng pretended to be distressed and disgusted, shaking his head, “the Shan body limits your imagination.”

—????? Reported for personal attacks.

— Reported for personal attacks.

— In fact, everything about the long distance is a scam. Maybe there wasn’t any separation at all.

— Was carried back in Mang God’s luggage and tricked us by saying he just returned.

“I didn’t, I didn’t, don’t talk nonsense.”

— Lemon Dad denies it three times.gif

— Expression Pack reservation.

— MengMeng’s new bedroom – even more capable of packing.

“It’s true, I just arrived today. If you don’t believe me, you can ask Mang God!”

Shan Zhu pinched his throat and coughed, waving his hand again to signal that it wasn’t convenient for him to talk.

— Knowing that Mang God has a sore throat and can’t talk, but telling us to ask him, scheming Dad! 𝙛𝘳𝘦e𝓌e𝗯n𝗼ѵ𝙚l.𝒄𝚘𝑚

Ling Meng:???

You’ve changed! You weren’t like this before! You had plenty to talk about when you flirted with me in the broadcast room!

— What were you two doing at the FRUIT base today, a powder meeting?

“Ah? Was there a powder meeting today at FRUIT?”

— You were meeting with your powder.

Ling Meng responded after realizing they were talking about Xiang Jiao.

“…..don’t make a fuss. I went to find Xiang God to ask him to do me a favor. What favor? It can’t be said.”

— Who was that zhengtai together with you two?

“Can I say this?” Ling Meng tilted his head and asked; Shan Zhu nodded.

“The zhengtai is Mang God’s didi; don’t mention his good looks, he has a very bad nature.”

— What the fuck? Mang God has another didi? Is the Mang family really so teeming with didi?

— Together with the Legend of Legends meimei BUFF, is this the equally-famous Legend of the Galaxy didi BUFF?

— Mang God has MengMeng, VEGE doesn’t allow players to fall in love, so this old auntie’s ready to play and cultivate [smile]

“He’s only 14 years old, you all are completely crazy guys, pedophilia is shameful!”

— In that case, is the Electra Complex honorable?

— Mang God: Yes!

Ling Meng:???

Speak of the devil and he shall appear. Maybe because of the day’s excitement, but Shan Zha had decided to study hard in addition to playing the game. So, he came to talk to his Ge about a problem. He knew it was Shan Zhu’s stream time so he politely knocked on the door.

Ling Meng opened the door, “A math problem? Since your Ge is live, I’ll teach you.”

Shan Zha was very skeptical: “Can you do it?”

“I am, in any case, also a student of Yanshan. If you mock me, isn’t that mocking your Ge in disguise?”

Shan Zhu dubiously took him at his word: “Alright then……”

“A basket of lemons is divided up to three people, A, B, and C. A gets one-fifth of the lemons plus 5, B gets one-fourth of the lemons plus 7, and C gets half of the rest. One-eighth of the total number of lemons remain in the basket. Find how many lemons were in the basket in total originally.”

Ling Meng was lying on the bed, reading the problem over and over again, frowning. He read it again.

“You can’t do this, can you?” Shan Zha asked him impatiently from the sidelines.

“Rest assured,” Ling Meng moved away from the camera, “This problem can be solved by writing out a series of equations, let’s set up an X first…..”

The camera was blocked by Shan Zhu, so the people in the broadcast room couldn’t see the background view and could only hear the conversation between them.

— A basket of lemons to fail the lemon.

— The lemon calculates lemons, the lemon is sour (sick at heart), the lemon gives up.

— Mang God’s didi is a junior high school student, no doubt; I did this question a few days ago.

Ling Meng had been solving for this X for a long time and couldn’t find it. He complained angrily: “Is junior high school math so hard now?”

Shan Zha also didn’t hold back in ridiculing him: “Stupid Meng, your X has seven digits behind the decimal point. Are you going to slice up the lemon?”

“Wait, wait, I’m not done yet.”

Shan Zhu couldn’t listen to this anymore and, no longer pretending to be dumb, said, “MengMeng, come play for me, I’ll figure it out.”

“No way, I have to solve it.”

Shan Zhu knew his axel bearing had spooled up again and that he wasn’t going to give up without an answer. He handed the keyboard off to Shan Zha and went to help solve the problem himself.

Shan Zha took over from Shan Zhu’s position. The Cosmic God ranking tournament was going on, no one in these matches was a rookie. In the few moments it took for the handover, Shan Zhu’s forces were eaten up by a wave of units from the opposite side. Shan Zha, who was playing on his Ge’s behalf, went forth into battle while curling his lip in a rather disdainful manner.

The barrage inevitably brushed a small high tide wave:

— Mang God’s didi appeared in the frame! The camera is more clear and better than the photo!

— It looks like he’ll be a handsome guy in a few years, the Mang Family gene is extraordinary!

— Didi, look at me! I’m just a hot old auntie to play with.

— If you knew your opponent had been replaced with a junior high schooler, you’d laugh.

— It’s just one round of ranking, Mang God can make a comeback anyway if he loses.

……

Shan Zha completely ignored the barrage. After looking at his Ge’s tech tree, he quickly and easily reversed the defeat and the opponent’s base was blown up. In the final moments, he arrogantly commented: “Can this level also reach cosmic god? Power leveling, let’s go.”

By the time Shan Zhu solved the problem, there were question marks full of “meows” in the barrage.

— Is this a junior high schooler???

— Spinoff of The Strongest Primary Schooler (rebirth/cultivation novel): The Strongest Junior High Schooler

— This is fake, right? In fact, the keyboard and mouse are still in Mang God’s hands and didi just took a seat in front of the camera?

— That was as if I had seen a perfect mix of Lemon Dad’s poison tongue and Mang God’s skills.

— Daddy has a powerful poison tongue. Doesn’t have strength, just a poison tongue, he’s owed a beating.

— Suggesting Lemon Dad needs a spanking? Reported.

……

“Stupid Zha, come here, I figured it out,” Ling Meng called out to him proudly.

Shan Zha traded places with Shan Zhu again and listened to the math teacher explain the 1D equation. Although it was clear in the end, it didn’t win over Shan Zha’s respect for the teacher.

“My Ge taught you that, didn’t he? How did you get into Yanshan, as a specialty student?”

“……” Ling Meng puffed up his cheeks angrily, “Don’t you know I’m a non-local student, the entrance exam was a lot harder than your Ge’s!”

“So are you?”

Ling Meng had to answer anti-climatically: “Okay, I’m actually a sports specialty student, but Yanshan is also very demanding on the specialty students’ course requirements.”

“You’re a sports specialty student? Yanshan is recruiting hula hoop athletes now?”

Ling Meng: ……=_=#

“Shan Zha, don’t always bully your MengMeng-gege. He has a lot of powder.”

Ling Meng had lot of support from the masses and a lot of guts too: “That’s right, are you going to become the enemy of my global powder back-up?”

“Your powder? Isn’t it all black powder.” Shan Zha muttered.

“Says who, who says it’s all black powder? The broadcast room is not just my black powder minus 1!”

(t/n: he is the one, the broadcaster counts as one viewer)

— 22222222

— 33333333

— 66666666

Shan Zha was also astonished by this spectacular full screen (minus 1) barrage spam: “Stupid Meng, your black powder are really gelivable?”

“Shut up!” Ling Meng scolded him, then turned around and scolded the water friends, “Turning off the chat!”

— I checked MengMeng’s record and found out he played a match with a guy named Hawthorn today, SOLO, and he lost three rounds. That guy’s not going to turn out to be Mang God’s didi, right?

Everyone was inspired by this, so they all ran to check Lemon’s record, finding it was true. Not only that, but a little later, Hawthorn also lost to Guava with a 0:3 record. That would explain why their party of three were at the FRUIT training base.

— Mang God took his didi to FRUIT today. Is it so difficult to join youth training?

— Is the youth training test being personally screened by Xiang God? Then I’m going to enroll too, 3:0, I can do that on my own!

— (Little Paddle) Stop dreaming, to be able to play against Banana himself SOLO can only be reached through the idol anchor’s back door.

[Announcement] Housekeeper Mangosteen has banned user Little Paddle for 24 hours.

— Little Paddle, how old are you?

— 24 hours, Mang God is really strict.

— This lesson teaches us not to mention the words ** in front of Mang God.

— In particular, you can’t mention it together with a certain B-initialed pro player. After all, the green mango is very sour.

“Does anyone else want to join them?” Shan Zhu asked somberly with a slightly hoarse voice.

— No, no, we didn’t say the words we weren’t supposed to say. OxO

— Reporting to Mang God, I’ve pulled this key and that key off the keyboard, please rest assured!

— Actually I have a bad cold, I can’t say anything but ‘cough cough’!

— Ah? When did Mang God’s cold recover? Wasn’t he not able to talk when the broadcast started?

Shan Zha added fuel to the fire: “Look at my Ge’s reputation, then look at yours.”

“Go back and do your homework please!!!”

— 𝗳𝗿𝐞ℯ𝙬𝗲𝗯n𝗼νel.𝒄𝑜𝘮

Footnotes:

1. to slap one’s own face (打脸): slang, to be a hypocrite/behave in a way that contradicts your words, to have your words contradicted by the truth

2. swollen into a pig’s head (肿成猪头): swollen up really badly aka the cheeks have been slapped so much they’re swollen

3. Liang JingRu: famous Malaysian pop singer, also goes by Fish Leong, she wrote a song called Courage that won an online voting campaign to become the motivational song for newbies in a reality tv singing competition

4. tiger’s tooth (虎牙): slang for the canine tooth (usually used to emphasis cuteness of the teeth peeking out over the lips/showing when someone smiles); without the lips, the teeth feel the cold (唇亡齿寒): idiom, figuratively refers to things that are intimately interdependent, also means to share the same fate as something

5. hitting a sneeze (打一个喷嚏): comes from a common saying; when you sneeze once, your love is unrequited and you get scolded, when you sneeze twice, you’re lovesick and someone’s missing you, when you sneeze three times, you have a cold

6. zhengtai (正太): slang loan word from Japanese, cute pre-teen boy aka shota

7. to play and cultivate (玩养成): for an older partner to make someone emotionally and physically dependent on them and become their lover; aka sugar daddy/mama + grooming

8. Electra Complex (恋父): like Oedipus complex, for girls; basically daddy kink

9. power leveling (代练): paying someone to level up your account (common in gaming novels)

10. needs a spanking (欠揍): owed a beating (欠打) is used as a threat to naughty children to obey or get a spanking, so this is a joke based on the previous line in the barrage

11. gelivable (给力): Chinglish slang used by netizens, literally give strength/energy, can be sarcastic or sincere, adjective for something that can make you excited/gleeful/cheerful

—

>><< to see the solution to the lemon basket problem (solved by me)

previously Little Paddle was translated as “small strokes”, this is the same person that always gets banned by Shan Zhu for talking dirty about Ling Meng. the name means Little Slacker. it’s also a gaming term for people on a team who don’t contribute to the DPS (damage per second)