For Ye Xiu winter was a season full of memories, full of emotions. It had been winter, when the first server of Glory had been opened. It had been winter, when he had created the future Battle God and started his journey. It had been winter, when Excellent Era had kicked him out of the team and forced him into retirement. It had been winter, when he had started all over again with a first server account that had been given up in winter many years ago. And it had been winter, when he had found love. Now it was winter again and he was waiting for his love to meet up with him, so they could start their future. In a few hours Glory would once again open a new server and they had decided to start over there. There was no particular reason for this decision and as someone, who had played Glory professionally for so many years, starting from scratches wasn't as easy as it sounded. The game wouldn't have any challenges for them, besides the one of enduring the early stages of it. Both of them were used to fight with high-end avatars against equally skilled and strong players. This wasn't given in the new server and would never be, because what could a bunch of normal player do against those, who were considered gods? Nothing.
With a lit up cigarette in his mouth Ye Xiu was already planning his first steps in the new server. He had decided upon a class and also already flashed out a blue print for his new silver weapon. Furthermore, he had decided to join guild Happy, after he bullied the other guilds a bit. After all guild Happy was still quite small and did not have many resources, so it was better to get the materials for the silver weapon from the bigger guilds. Therewith the growth of said guilds would be restricted, while he would help Happy out without asking for much. He just had to make sure that the others didn't know about him helping Happy for nothing in return. They would find out soon enough and until then he would exploit them. Hopefully is partner would let him do things his way, since their loyalty belong to different teams, thus to different guilds. One the other hand, was the other one really loyal to his guild anymore? Both of them were retired by now, hence what happened to the guild or the teams wasn't there business anymore. They were free from any kind of loyalty. Yet he was still too fond of his former team. Never would he admit out loud, how proud he was of them and how he had loved the feeling of seeing everyone growing up into fine pro players. Also seeing their small guild growing every day and becoming more and more of a threat to the well-established guilds, made him smile proudly. Still, they needed someone to help and guide them. Those guilds that had been created before guild Happy had more ways of getting materials, since they had more servers they could farm from. If Excellent Era hadn't kicked him out, he would have turned to the game and helped Excellent Dynasty out after his retirement. But he neither had been wanted by the club nor the guild.
Maybe he should message Qiu Fei sometimes? The boy also had grown up pretty well. He had done well in getting Excellent Era back on its feet after the disaster in the Challenger League years ago.
Dark clouds covered the sky and prevented the moonlight to light up the streets. The artificial light of the streetlights were barely enough. Thick snowflakes were falling down from the clouds – swirling through the air until they reached a ground, where soon either became a part of the mass or disappeared into nothingness. The streets and sidewalks were already fully coved in white. The snow was scrunching under the feet of those, who tried to get home from work, tried to get away from the freezing cold of the night. Everyone was wearing a scarf, a cap, gloves and a winter coat. Everyone expect Ye Xiu, who only had his winter coat, which he did not even close. He was freezing, just like all the other people on the street, but his mind was elsewhere, so he didn't thought of closing it. If he waited any longer, he surely would freeze to death. The snowflakes, which touched his skin, were ignored by him – he did not even feel them –, but he paid attention to those around him, those that silently fell on the water surface beneath the bridge. They were nice to look at.
His gaze never lingered for too long on the black water of the river. Somehow looking at it for too long made him uncomfortable, as if the blackness would grab him any moment and pull him down to the ground of the river, where he would never escape from – if he looked for too long he started to feel the ice cold water on his skin. His hands hold tightly on to the banister to make sure he wouldn't fall down unintentionally. His uneasiness, however, did not stop him to always go back to look at the water. There was nothing else to look at. The sky was just as dark as the water and the street was too bright for him, with the lights of the cars and the streetlights. His vision would only get blurry and cause him a headache. Maybe he was getting sick, which wasn't surprising considering how he was dressed up. How long was he already waiting for his future to arrive? At the moment he was between his past and his future and while he longed for the future, he feared to let go of the past likewise. To his right was his past, his time as pro player, as god of Glory. To his left was his future, a future as what? For now he was unemployed and had barely enough money for his cigarettes and a few hours of internet. His life fitted in a suitcase – a small black suitcase on wheels to be exact. Would his future also fit into a suitcase at the end?
Ye Xiu turned around after finishing his cigarette and scanned the area. There were a lot of people, despite the bad weather, but no sight of his partner. Differently than other people, Ye Xiu neither possessed a mobile phone nor a clock, so he couldn't look up the time. When he had left his home he had made a short calculation, how long it would take him to reach the meeting point. If his calculation wasn't completely off, he should have arrived about five minutes before the appointed time, but he was definitely waiting longer than five minutes. Did something happen? Snowy weather combined with darkness always led to unfortunate accidents. Maybe the other one happened to be involved in one of those unfortunate accidents? Hopefully not! Just thinking about this possibility made Ye Xiu's chest tighten. This kind of drama was the last thing he needed – he had enough drama in his past and he sincerely hoped his future was without this unnecessary shit. Nervously he tried to get his cigarette pack out of his pocket, which wasn't so easy because his hand were stiff from the cold. He should have put some gloves on.
Realizing his own slackness and indifference towards his own well-being, he zipped his winter coat and placed his hands in its pocket – he could smoke another one later. It got a bit warmer. Most of his life he had spent inside playing games, whenever he went outside it was only for a short amount of time, so he never had much of a reason to pay close attention to his clothing. Now that he had been in the cold for so long without moving, his body couldn't stand it anymore. As soon as he reached his new home, he would eat something warm and take a nice warm shower – and then play Glory. There was nothing better for his health than playing Glory!
To be real, there were many things that were better for his health than playing Glory, but he didn't care and most of those things already sounded annoying. He preferred it to keep things simple – it was simple to eat healthier, but it was not so simple in his eyes to always cook something healthy or buy the right ingredients. Instant food was more than enough for his body to work. However, he would never say no to something else, as long as he hadn't had to make it – his cooking skills were probably nonexistent, since he had never learned it or tried it out. Maybe he could try it out in the future? No, probably not. Why bother himself with such a thing?
Ye Xiu's stomach rumbled. When was the last time he had eaten something? Had he had breakfast or lunch? He definitely hadn't had dinner. Would he first starve or freeze to death? Both option didn't sound that nice to him. He preferred to stay alive and play a little bit more Glory before leaving this world – or was there Glory in the afterlife as well?
Since all those bright lights made him extremely tiered and hurt his eyes, Ye Xiu shifted his gaze back to the water. Watching into the black was somehow more interesting than starring into the nothingness of lights. Still, if he looked for too long he would start to shiver and feel uncomfortable, so from time to time he looked back up to the gray sky. More and more snowflakes fell down from there. He lit up his last cigarette.
"Ye Xiu?"
Without him noticing someone had approached him from behind. Not surprising, considering that he neither had eyes on his back nor was he paying attention at all. His thoughts had wandered around.
Slowly Ye Xiu turned around. A smile on his lips.
"You're finally here. Took you long enough", he greeted back, when seeing the other one.
If Ye Xiu had a phone, the other one would have sent him a message that he would be late due to work, but Ye Xiu hadn't had one and since he also wasn't online, there also was no way to send a message through Glory. Why had everything related to Ye Xiu be so complicated?
It had been winter, when Ye Xiu started his journey in Glory. It had been winter, when he had to start all over again, after being kicked out by his team. It had been winter, when he had found a new team. And it had been winter, when he had found love and a new future. Now it was winter and he was starting all over once more, in a life away from the professional Glory scene, with someone, who once had been his opponent on stage. Now it was winter and he planned on creating another god – or devil. Now it was winter and another memory was added to this season.