"Attention, Team 233, your preliminary match will commence at 10:30 on Arena A8. Additionally, your opponents for this match are Team 038. Please prepare in advance.
Best of luck!
— Quan City Cup Organizing Committee."
When Lu Wu received this message, both Dudu and Hao Zhijian went pale instantly.
The Quan City Cup served as a warm-up for high school league tournaments.
The competition was significant in scale, and it had its own dedicated official website.
On the official website, to warm up the competition, seed teams had been promoted since a week ago. Coincidentally, the team Lu Wu's team had to face, Team 038, was one of those seed teams.
Although it was just one of the lower-tier seeds, it was still a seed team.
Their information was available on the official website.
Team 038 came from the honors class of Quan City No.4 Middle School.
The captain, Zhang Ke, had a Summoned Beast of Black Iron Quality, the Jungle Wolf.
The other two members, one named Zhang Yong, had a Summoned Beast of Black Iron Quality, the goblin,
And another named Zhang Shan, had a Summoned Beast of Black Iron Quality, the goblin.
This was the information about Team 038. It wasn't much, but just based on this information, coupled with the official recognition as a seed team, it already brought immense pressure to both Dudu and Hao Zhijian.
After all, one of them was naturally timid, and the other was used to being bullied by Lu Wu.
They had just begun to feel a bit more confident, only to be pushed back down by Lu Wu.
Hao Zhijian had little confidence left after a month, and seeing that they were going to face a seed team made him extremely anxious.
The only one who remained calm was Lu Wu, but even he felt somewhat irked inside.
"Screw this, why did they have to start us off against a seed team?"
According to protocol, shouldn't they have thrown a few chaff teams at them first to let them warm up, accumulate some experience before challenging the seed teams?
This immediate arrangement of fighting a seed team put significant pressure on Lu Wu.
However, as the captain and the core of the team, he absolutely couldn't show his pressure; he had to exude confidence to reassure his teammates.
With no other choice, Lu Wu sighed and then took hold of Dudu's chubby hand, gently patting her head with exceptional kindness: "Don't worry, trust me, we can win this!"
With just one sentence, Dudu, who had been nervous, instantly relaxed and nodded vigorously.
After calming Dudu, Lu Wu turned to look at Hao Zhijian beside him. Hao Zhijian turned his head, gazing earnestly, hoping for some words of encouragement from Lu Wu.
Instead, Lu Wu's gentle expression immediately switched to a fierce one: "You can be nervous, but if you perform poorly and we lose, I'll twist your head off!"
Yep, that's typical Lu Wu, always double standards!
But this method was quite effective on Hao Zhijian, scaring him out of his fear instantly.
Or it could be said that Hao Zhijian's nervousness shifted to fear of Lu Wu.
After settling his two teammates, Lu Wu led them to roam around the training grounds.
The match was scheduled for 10:30, and it was still early, so Lu Wu planned to use this time to explore the training grounds.
Firstly to observe others' matches, and secondly to seize the chance to check out others' Summoned Beasts.
Since it was the preliminaries today, the training grounds were not open to live spectators; only participating contestants were present.
It was possible that some of them might be their next opponents, so gathering information in advance was essential. Even if not, as a quasi-professional Summon Beast Cultivator, Lu Wu needed to expand his knowledge of Summoned Beasts.
However, Lu Wu didn't have much luck in inspecting others' Summoned Beasts.
Firstly, the contestants present were highly wary of unfamiliar players chatting them up, fearing they were there to gather intelligence.
Despite his attempts, only girls were willing to talk to him.
Additionally, the event staff soon noticed Lu Wu wandering around, touching everything, and promptly warned him to either sit down and watch or wait at the designated competition arena, rather than wandering around and complicating their work.
Unable to do anything else, Lu Wu reluctantly led his teammates to the waiting area adjacent to Arena A8.
Upon arriving, Lu Wu noticed that quite a few people were seated in the spectator area of Arena A8.
However, their attention was not on the two chaff teams currently competing on Arena A8, but rather on the waiting area.
Naturally, they weren't here for Lu Wu's team.
Their interest lay in the yet-to-arrive seed team, Team 038.
Of course, with Team 038 not yet present, they did occasionally glance at Lu Wu's team.
After all, Lu Wu's team was Team 038's first opponent.
If possible, these players hoped Lu Wu's team would be strong enough to force Team 038 to show more of their strength.
But when everyone saw Lu Wu's team, they immediately dismissed that thought.
Some even hesitated whether to turn and leave.
Lu Wu's team gave off the vibe of a total chaff team.
The team's three Summoned Beasts consisted of:
One Little Skeleton and one Mini Pig—both recognized as particularly weak Summoned Beasts. Although Hao Zhijian's Frozen Bird was decent, it was merely decent, nothing outstanding.
Even if the Frozen Bird were outstanding, it couldn't make up for two weaklings!
So, most of the spectators firmly believed this would be an incredibly dull, one-sided match.
This kind of match wasn't what they wanted to see.
They would rather watch other seed teams compete.
If there was anything that might make Lu Wu's team memorable, it would only be Lu Wu's ordinary face.
Sure enough, Cheng Qingqing stayed precisely because of Lu Wu's face.
After seeing Lu Wu's team's Summoned Beasts, she had planned to leave, but then she glanced at Lu Wu's face and sat back down.
"Qingqing, let's go?"
Her teammate, Liu Qing, pulled her: "Nothing interesting to watch here!"
"I'm not leaving; it's quite interesting!"
"A Mini Pig and a Little Skeleton, what's there to see... Uh, alright, you're right!"
Initially focused solely on the Summoned Beasts, Liu Qing hadn't noticed Lu Wu's ordinary face. When she did, she was briefly stunned, then nodded firmly and sat back down with Cheng Qingqing.
Their behavior left the male teammate beside them bewildered. What's going on? When he too saw Lu Wu's ordinary face, his confusion turned to a pang of jealousy.
What made his jealousy worse was that this wasn't an isolated case; other teams with female members reacted similarly.
As more girls noticed Lu Wu, the atmosphere in Arena A8's spectator area turned peculiar...