Xiao Yi sat on the edge of the balcony with his legs hanging over the edge while his body leaned against one of the poles for the railings. He had been in this position for an hour, just overlooking the view of the city as the sun set whilst occasionally smoking or taking a sip from his soda.

If one were to ask him if he regretted anything he did at this moment, his answer would still be a no.

The first time Chen Qiang brought up esports was the day he pulled Xiao Yi into a small little Internet cafe a ten-minute walk from their old middle school, excited about this game he'd seen a few small streamers play called 'Valley of Light'.

He thought it would be the 'coolest job in the world', hence, after they made the rest of their friends create characters together, they played relentlessly. This was before they could afford good computers of their own so the five of them would rush to the Internet cafe after their classes ended and stay until the sun fell or one of their parents called.

Other than the first five levels, the group main quested to 80 together, and then to 85, 90, 95, and finally 100 as the level caps increased throughout the years.

Xiao Yi smiled at the memories of those days.

None of the five boys were born to be esports players by any means. Back then, they were just new players and only Chen Qiang had the dream of entering the esports world. Even he, though, found it unrealistic so he often pushed it aside as a small idealization and they proceeded to just… Have fun.

When they were new, they'd spend hours watching streams and uploading videos detailing how to tackle dungeons, how to find certain areas, hidden areas, tips and tricks when they were home.

On days when there were patches, the boys would rush to the bustling internet cafe and go to the new dungeon hoping to be the first to clear it - only to find themselves at the respawn point time and time again as they attempted to learn the new mechanics, or, before they realized they needed better gear.

Despite their video-watching, the five of them were quite stubborn and wouldn't accept help from more experienced players which also led to them practicing their PVP skills against one another instead of honing them inside of the arena. The latter would have been the smarter move, but none of them wanted the 'humiliation' of being beaten to a pulp by strangers.

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With all that being said, one would think that they were seriously playing when 80% of their time online was spent traveling around the different continents, discovering beautiful hidden areas, and generally fooling around.

Mu Yichen even took over a business at that time, a small tavern on the second continent just to fool around in his free time.

The dream finally hit the rest of them when they were in high school.

[World]: [Congratulations to [??] for being the first to clear Oceans Abyss!]

[Neptune, Moon, Venus, Frost, Flame - Guildless - 27 minutes 54 seconds]

Five teenage boys sat in the internet cafe with their uniform jackets hanging off the back of their chairs and backpacks stuffed under their tables. Xiao Yi and Chen Qiang sat on one side of the table facing Li Hao, Tang An, and Mu Yichen. Usually, the five boys could sit side by side in one row but the internet cafe was unexpectedly busy on this Tuesday afternoon.

"Guys, how long do you think we took?" Chen Qiang, with newly dyed bright red hair stuck out like a sore thumb in the cafe as he leaned forward with his chin on his hands.

Li Hao stretched as he responded. "I don't know, thirty minutes?"

Xiao Yi shook his head and glanced at the loading screen, a black screen with rotating silver dragons.

The Ocean Abyss was like its name, a dungeon that took place in a large air pocket in an abyss near the first continent. It was not only a pain to get to, with no teleport market, but one had to hop on the ferry, jump off at the right moment, head to an abandoned island to set a resting point, fly over the ocean [or swim, it was much faster to fly, though], and then dive and hope you get there without losing too much air.

It took players four days to find after the patch notes were released and so far, no one had been able to complete it due to the spider web of air pockets the dungeons swept through, some of which with barely any room to stand, and the mechanics of the last boss.

The last room had continuous DPS and a boss that could stun. If he lost half his health, he would start rampaging in intervals, making it impossible to stay nearby.

It took them two days to beat it.

When the screen changed and they respawned on the island, Mu Yichen nearly fell out of his chair.

"We were first!"

Xiao Yi watched as the world chat exploded, and then as their screens filled with friend requests and guild invites by notable guilds.

The boys celebrated for a few minutes on their own, even getting the attention of the boss of the internet cafe whom they'd lovingly call 'boss-man', who gave them each a free bowl of instant noodles on the house even though he didn't quite understand their excitement.

It was only after they finished eating that Mu Yichen hummed and mindlessly said. "Well… Do you think if we tried, we could join an official team?"