The Art of Clinging On [Esports]

==Starting this Friday, 10/13, the story will go premium from Chapter 26. A heads-up==

After the retirement of the "Killer Queen" Shen Xiao, gloom and despair descended upon the entire Dreamland esports scene. The age of assassins came to an end with her.

As for Shen Xiao herself, she took off her long dress, tossed away her wig, disappeared into the sea of people, and was never heard from again.

In truth, she had gone to college.

At long last, she had escaped her past and become herself again. College was going just fine until an upperclasswoman from the esports club dragged her in to fill a spot in a small tournament: the intercollegiate league, where the grand prize was a year's worth of tuition. It should have been a piece of cake for her.

She went.

Then she ran into a healer.

And lost. She lost.

She was a three-time champion assassin, a four-time season MVP, and the holder of the record for the highest damage dealt in a given amount of time...

Yet she had lost to a weird little healer!

Could she really have gotten this bad after just one year of retirement?

She refused to believe it!

So she logged back into the game.

And then that little healer latched onto her and wouldn't let go, no matter how hard she tried to shake him.

"Why do you keep following me?"

"Even the most virtuous woman can be worn down by a persistent man. Maybe one day you'll say yes."

"Who describes himself like that?"

"So you object to the 'persistent man' part, not the 'virtuous woman' part."

"I object to being stalked by a creep!"

Only later did she learn that the beginning of his relentless pursuit lay far back in a time she had never imagined. That one lingering glance had crossed the vast stretch of time to fall upon her. This had all been carefully planned, long in the making.

In their tenth year together, Ren Renyan's secret was discovered.

He came home from work, opened the door, and saw Shen Xiao lying on the sofa reading a book.

He knew that "book" very well. He had written and bound every page himself. The cover was neatly printed in bold, size-two black font, with an unbolded subtitle, all in proper academic-paper format:

The Methodology of Relentless Pursuit: A Case Study of How I Won the God of Esports

Shen Xiao tilted her head back to look at him upside down, her eyes curving like twin crescent moons. "So it was all a bunch of tricks?"

Ren Renyan didn't bat an eye. He calmly walked over to the sofa and kissed her until she was breathless, secretly taking the book away as he did. Afterward, he let Shen Xiao take off his glasses.

"Nonsense. It was all sincere affection."

The cool, elite top has mastered the art of relentless pursuit through self-study.

The retired esports legend bottom spent a year and a day studying hard, only to be forced to take a leave of absence.

Younger top, happy ending.

[Content warning]

The bottom has cross-dressed as a woman.

A completely unscientific, unbalanced keyboard MMO, my take on esports, and plenty of invented details.

The game draws on many existing games for inspiration.

Please take a moment to visit and follow the author's page!

Theme: Youthful ambition, passionate competition, the courage to pursue love, and a return to the top.