Wearing high-heeled shoes, Xue Linxiang ran all the way to the players' apartment building and knocked at Tang Muzhou's door.
After a long while, Tang Muzhou opened the door with his eyes squinted, leaning against the door and yawning.
He worked and rested according to a strange schedule. For example, people tend to take a nap at noon, but he preferred to have a rest for an hour from 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. everyday, or he would be so sleepy that he would keep yawning.
When he saw Xue Linxiang, he was so sleepy that his eyes were vacant.
Xue Linxiang said seriously, "Xiao Tang, go and wash your face to clear your mind. I have something important to tell you."
With his eyes closed, Tang Muzhou didn't respond, instead, he fell into a sleep while standing there.
Xue Linxiang shouted, "Tang Muzhou!"
"OK." Tang Muzhou finally replied. He kept yawning when he turned back to wash his face. He was light on his foot as if he was sleepwalking.
At that time, the door next to his apartment suddenly opened from the inside. A little boy poked his head out of the crack in the door.
He had a chubby baby face, big and bright sky-blue eyes, and long and dense eyelashes. In the light from the hall, his hair had a golden gloss, which made him look like a doll. The boy hadn't gone through the voice change period and said in a clear and melodious voice, "Sister Xue, your shout scared me half to death… Are you displeased with my Shifu(a t.i.tle for and role of a skillful person or a master. The character 师 means “skilled person” or “teacher”, while the meaning of 父 is “father”)? How will you deal with him?"
Looking at the boy, Xue Linxiang said, "Shen An, come here. I have something serious to tell you."
Shen An, who had intended to watch the show, stopped joking and followed sister Xue when he saw her grim face.
When they stepped into Tang Muzhou's room, Tang Muzhou had washed his face.
Sitting on the sofa, Tang Muzhou looked relaxed and his brooding eyes showed that he had recovered to a wise, far-sighted and bright man.
Tang Muzhou changed tremendously after washing his face. Original translation from w.a.n.gmamaread.
In these past few years after he started out as a professional player, Tang Muzhou had won the individual championship and had been playing a stable role in the team events. However, his winning percentage was too terrible to look at when he competed with others from 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. Gradually, everyone knew his strange work-rest schedule. Some fans joked that legend Tang had made too many plant cards, so his habits became similar to plants' – in the afternoon, the sunlight was so strong that legend Tang would wither as plants did, therefore he had to sleep.
Fortunately, for the sake of high viewing rate, most matches of National Star Card League were scheduled on primetime between 19 and 22 p.m., which wouldn't cause a great impact on him.
By 5 p.m., Tang Muzhou was completely awake.
Seeing sister Xue and his apprentice coming in one after another, Tang Muzhou asked with concern, “Sister Xue, you look pale today. What happened?” Tang Muzhou glanced at his apprentice next to sister Xue, but the teenager shook his head to show that he didn't know.
Xue Linxiang kept silent while quickly opening the flat-panel optical brain.
In front of them, a virtual projection screen, more than two meters wide, appeared immediately. Nine identical cards were displayed on the screen, neatly arranged in a row, which looked very spectacular.
These were character cards. The beauty's face was bathed in tears, while she strewed petals in her delicate hands over the ground. This was such an elaborate painting.
Tang Muzhou stood up, walked to the card and then watched it carefully, “What card is it?”
“Hong Zhu bought them from the black market,” Xue Linxiang spoke seriously, “look at its data and skill.”
Health 100, Attack 0, Defense 15 – its base attributes were risible. Its skill was “Daiyu Burying the Flowers” – to inflict severe damage on flower cards, with a 10% chance for instant death.
Instant death? Specially targeted at flower cards?
Tang Muzhou raised his eyebrows and remained silent for a moment. Then he turned around and looked at his apprentice, saying, “Xiao'an, what do you think of it?”
Shen An raised his head to look at the card, calculating carefully, “The one-star cards have a 10% chance for instant death, which would reach 80% when they are evolved into seven-star cards. If these cards are strengthened with materials that could increase the probability, the chance for instant death can reach up to 100%. This kind of function cards are of little use to fight against other players, but to Shifu, it can instakill Shifu's trump flower cards – are these cards specially targeted at Shifu?”
Xue Linxiang was very pleased. Shen An was just a fifteen-year-old naughty boy, who followed everybody all day like a little child, but he was highly intelligent and savvy in the card game. He found the problem of the cards at a glance. He surely deserved to be Tang Muzhou's apprentice.
She was about to echo Shen An's view, but Tang Muzhou said coolly, “this card is directed against me? That's not necessarily so.”
Shen An was confused, “What do you mean?”
“Look at the image on this card carefully,” Tang Muzhou pointed to the image, “the decoration is too much.”
Shen An realized, “Yes! The background – these flowers and trees- is like a painting!”
Xue Linxiang also sensed something was wrong. She couldn't help but ask, “Xiao Tang, do you mean that this card is not directed against you?”
"Yes," Tang Muzhou looked at the girl bathed in tears on the card and answered calmly, "the real first-tier card designers know that the simpler the image is, the clearer the star card hologram will be. And the card will also be more powerful. This image contains too many messy decorations. In addition to the main character, there are trees, flowers, and a river… these elements make the card rich in content, but they actually greatly lowered the center character's strength.”
Seeing that both of them were listening carefully, Tang Muzhou patiently a.n.a.lyzed, “If he were a professional card designer, he would only have drawn two key elements: ‘character' and ‘flowers and plants'. Under this condition, a level-0 card's chance of instant death can reach 30%, and when it upgrades to level 70, the chance will be 100% without using other materials. But this guy don't know how to make a card at all, so his card's chance of instant death is only 10% at the beginning, and the data is terrible, which means that he has to pay dearly for upgrading his card to level 70 and raising the chance to 100%.”
Shen An nodded vigorously, “Shifu is right! The image on this card is so detailed, which is like a work of a student at some art academy. A first-rate card designer must know that drawing a bunch of ornaments on a card is the biggest mistake one can make when creating battle cards!”
Xue Linxiang frowned. After a moment, she asked, “Is this just a coincidence?”
Tang Muzhou nodded.
When Xue Linxiang was about to gave a sigh of relief, Tang Muzhou said, “I'm not afraid that someone creating cards directed against me – such a coincidence is just more horrible.”
Xue Linxiang was stunned, and then she quickly understood what legend Tang meant.
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