The fight was covered by the big screen on the stage, and it ended fast without much suspense. The two used the same champs, but one was level three and the other was still level one.
The student who challenged the elite team member seemed to not work that hard last night like others did. In the end he failed to even deplete one third of his foe's health points before losing the match.
In Hao's eyes that wasn't even close to being unfair or a cheat. One worked his best all night and levelled up while the other played around and didn't take things seriously.
Such a mentality wasn't needed in the elite team for sure.
"Rick won," Cher took the responsibility to announce the winner. Just her voice made all the students here pay more attention to this challenge.
"I challenge him," yet before the lost student would walk down the stage, another one stood and pointed towards Rick.
"Sorry," Cher shook her head, "it's not feasible for a single player to fight two games in a row. He will take a break until everyone else is challenged or at least five games are played," Cher showed her fast wits at this point, improvising rules for this challenge out of thin air.
And Hao didn't find anything wrong about what she said.
"Next," Hil shouted, while Cher returned to her seat again.
"Good job," Hao whispered from the side, praising her actions just now.
"I learnt from the best," she teased him by saying that, and both only looked at each other before chuckling at the same time.
For the next hour, all the matches were won by the elite team. The students here were either rash in their actions or simply not familiar with the game.
Hao didn't follow their progress during the night, but it seemed they didn't do good at all. Most of them made huge mistakes in either decision making and even in executing their skills.
Cher sent for someone to fetch food and coffee for them. Even after this hour and all these defeats, the students here became more fervent about challenging the elite team.
Hao didn't stop them. In fact the elite team was facing a different playing style and getting more experienced at the game. They fought against aggressive players, tactic players, acting like monkeys players, and even the insultive ones who used their tongues as the main weapon against any foe.
This was a good chance to train. Hao ate his breakfast and drank his coffee in amusement, while the elite team began to feel more relaxed and confident.
During these challenges, they even started cheering each other and greeted the ones returning with victory like they were in a real tournament.
Of course this was like a bond being born in the team, something Hao noticed and could only nod in satisfaction towards it.
Gradually this contest turned into a heated up training session. Even those who didn't intend to challenge anyone before, decided to join and enjoyed the battles.
Hao watched all this from the side. He wanted to see if he missed anyone good or something like that.
However, out of all the students who played, Hao didn't find anyone special. He saw through many primitive mistakes those kids made while playing, most common of all was their loss of calm when getting overwhelmed at the beginning of the fight.
That was a constant feature in most amateur players. In these players' eyes, winning a clash was determined from the early moments in the fight.
That was indeed not true. For any good player, the fight wasn't over until his champ fell dead.
As long as the health bar was having even a single point, the fight wasn't over yet. Hao kept watching in silence while taking notes in his mind. He decided to write down something like a manual, helping these kids get better.
He didn't know how strong other guilds were. But he was sure his guild would lack in numbers compared to others. So the lack in numbers would be compensated by the difference of strength and skill.
Yet to make someone with such faults in playstyle mature and develop would take time. Also Hao realised part of some players' loss returned to their adaptation on playing with mouse and not the stick.
"You told me some members were poached by the academy's other guild, right?" as he spotted a few seeds that could be nourished better, he leant over Cher and whispered.
"Five left so far," she nodded, "you should have set the fee to break that contract five million or even ten."
"Don't be this greedy," he commented while shaking his head. He knew Cher was now regretting not raising such a fee. But from one side, this considerably reasonable fee in the eyes of those rich kids was the thing that encouraged them to poach these kids in the first place.
"That means we got five million?" he asked and Cher gave him a warning gaze.
"Don't ask for your share yet, or else I'll bring that contract matter right now."
"It's not about the contract," Hao knew she was just teasing him, "you know what we have between us goes way past such useless papers."
"You…"
His words held another dirty meaning that made her face slightly blush. "There is no such a thing between the two of us!"
"Isn't the guild like our kid? And we brought it together to this life, so it's our child," Hao kept teasing her and her eyes showed him how mad she was right now.
"Ok, ok, I was just joking," he had to take a step back, "I just want to buy more equipment for our members."
"Oh," he motioned his head towards the player fighting right now against Hil. he wasn't that bad, as he stood for almost more than one and half minute against her and yet his champ only lost two thirds of his health points.
He wasn't the only one who lasted this long against one of the elite team members. As Hao didn't find anyone with any worthy to note skill, he decided to change the parameter to focus on those who lasted longer in these fights.
After all this meant these students were just this close from the levels of his elite team. Despite having glaring issues, he knew there was room for development.
But talking about bringing game gears here wasn't that simple. After all, the market price of such advanced stations would reach one hundred thousand dollars per unit.
"With the money we have, we can go and buy fifty units," Cher thought for a second, "that means we can train fifty of these kids, right?
"We can't just throw away all the money we gained like this," Hao shook his head before adding, "first we don't have enough really good students to use these stations. And second we need to start saving up."
"For what?" she blinked twice as he said:
"We might need materials to buy, hire a few professionals in certain fields, or even save for the grand prize we're gonna pay for our boys at level ten."
"Aha… So?"
"I noticed almost twenty kids here worthy of our support. So we need twenty stations only," Hao paused before adding, "I'll ask Hil to rearrange the dorm. Rooms next to our elite team base will be the ones where these twenty students will live from now on."
"Starting to draw a clear border between the students… Ok, I like this idea. This way they will get motivated to move and join the elite sections."
"I won't call them elites," Hao paused before adding, "not at this moment at least."
"They finished," Cher motioned her head in the direction of the competing two, "you should stand up and say a few words then."
Hao looked up and saw that the fight ended with Hil's victory as he guessed.
"Give me the mic," as all the students finished their first round of fights, more wanted to repeat the fight with other students or the same ones they challenged and lost to.
Hao knew if he left this going, then it might go to no end. Gamers were the most intolerable towards defeat in the entire world. They would rather ask for a rematch until they either win their foes or break down doing so.
"I want to say a few words here," As Hao stood up and got the mic, he moved to the edge of the stage. Many shouts were spreading, asking for a challenge against many of the elite team members.
But with his presence and the words he just said, the entire theatre calmed down.
"I have to say that watching you play and fight was an eye opener for me," he gave such a big lie at the start, just to give these kids the confidence and pride they needed.
"As the saying goes, any good thing must come to an end. This will be the end of such a challenge…"
Before he could finish talking, the students booed and even few stood up shouting:
"We need a rematch!"
"It's our first time dealing with these gears!"
"We need to train just like everyone else!"
"Calm down, calm down," Hao had to control the situation before adding, "I know that. So I'm going to announce new rules to follow here… As your boss, and with the presence of our esteemed lady here, these rules will be guaranteed."
Saying his words like this, with the addition of his and Cher's statues, added more weight to what he said. Everyone returned to their seat, calmly looking at him in anticipation.
"I know that these gears look cool and advanced, I even have a thing towards that stick over there," he pointed at the direction of one station, making a few kids here chuckle and laugh.
"But I have to tell you this, the price of each gear is staggering to reach one hundred thousand dollars. And they were all donated to us thanks to our lady."
He pointed at Cher who simply sat upright without batting an eye. She and other informative people in the dorm knew this wasn't true. But as the man himself said this, no one dared to object or correct such a lie.
"One hundred thousand dollars?!"
"Sh*t!"
"That's a shit load of money, boss!"
"So we aren't going to play with these awesome gears again?"
Hao waited for the last comment to come before he resumed his talk once more.
"That's something we are working on to solve," Hao put a helpless look over his face, "as you know, we are a self made guild with no proper sponsor or source of income yet. But I can assure you, we are going to do our best to provide a few gears as a start. However…"
As he gave them a carrot, it was the time for the stick.
"As the gears are very few compared to all of you, then we can't let all of you have access to them. From the fights just now, we selected the most prominent students with talents and potential. Those will have the chance to play on the new gears once we will provide them."
"But boss… What about the rest of us?"
"Yeah boss, you can't just judge over us by one game."
"Can't we have another chance?"
"Of course you can," Hao firmly said, "from now on, a challenge like the one we just had here will commence once every three days. We will have the next challenge just after the official start of the game. During this, try to train and get in the best shape possible to have a chance in having such gears."
He paused intentionally for a few seconds before adding, "members of the selected students from here will be called team B. Anyone outside team A and B can have a chance to challenge team B members at every challenge meeting. As for team A, they can be challenged by team B only, and that will happen according to a different schedule."
His words landed and everyone went into silence for a long minute. He just added one last piece, saying that the names of those who got selected would be announced here in few hours.
As he said that, he returned to Cher, then left with everyone else. As for the students, they didn't even move a finger, waiting for the final assessment results to be announced before doing anything else.