Chapter 5: Dumped
[Great Guy Xie Zhijin: Just do whatever you think is best, just don't tire yourself out.]
Jian Xingsong’s crocheting fingers paused. It had been a long time since a phrase like this had made him think of his grandmother.
Because only those who loved him would care whether he was tired or not.
His ex-boyfriend had never said anything like this before.
Thinking of Shen Jinye, Jian Xingsong let out another sigh. He set down his crochet hook, picked up his phone, and replied: [Mhm, thank you for caring!]
Worried that this sounded too formal, he deliberately searched through his sticker gallery and sent a sticker of a cute, lop-eared bunny hugging a bouquet of flowers.
Xie Zhijin had initially felt a slight pang of disappointment at Jian Xingsong’s distant politeness. But the next second, seeing that adorable bunny hugging the flowers, he couldn't help but press down on the bunny’s head on the screen and save it to his own gallery.
His WeChat sticker collection, which had previously been completely empty, now had a single addition: a bunny holding flowers.
He sent the sticker right back to Jian Xingsong, appending a short message: [Looking forward to it~]
Jian Xingsong stared at the screen, his face inexplicably heating up. He could almost imagine Xie Zhijin’s expression and demeanor as he typed that out.
He found it a bit hard to imagine how Xie Zhijin—a towering, 1.9-meter-tall guy with a cold, tough-boy image—could say something in such a playful, almost coaxing tone.
So weird. I need to look at it again.
Jian Xingsong’s thoughts were completely hijacked by his back-and-forth conversation with Xie Zhijin, entirely tossing Shen Jinye to the back of his mind for the time being.
Meanwhile, on a certain livestreaming platform, Shen Jinye put on his headset, stared at the games on his computer screen, and started his stream, muttering to his audience.
"What are we playing tonight? Honor of Kings? PUBG? Let's take a vote!"
His streams mainly revolved around these two games, though he occasionally played others to change things up.
He launched a poll in the chat, and a minute later, Honor of Kings won.
Shen Jinye picked up his dedicated gaming phone. "Alright, Honor of Kings it is tonight."
A flurry of comments instantly scrolled across the screen.
As a gaming streamer, he actually had a decent following. Currently, he boasted half a million followers, many of whom were highly active accounts. Therefore, during his streams, his viewer count usually hovered around three to four thousand, with excellent engagement. His popularity was fairly solid.
Upon entering the game, he noticed his regular gaming partner was also online. Shen Jinye saw Song Muchu’s ID prominently displayed. Out of habit, he scrolled through his friend leaderboard, skipped past Song Muchu, and looked further down until he spotted Jian Xingsong’s gray, offline profile picture. He paused.
The chat immediately noticed this.
[Is Ye not going to invite Croissant to play?]
[Croissant isn't online today, how weird.]
[Isn't Croissant Ye's boyfriend? No sweet duo queue tonight?]
Shen Jinye stared at the gray profile picture, the corners of his mouth unconsciously pulling down. "Why are so many of you asking for him today? He doesn't even like playing games. Didn't you guys also say he's bad at it and ruins the entertainment value of the stream?"
He glanced at his personal phone. There were still no messages from Jian Xingsong. His expression turned icy.
Playing the silent treatment, huh?
Fine, let's see who can hold out longer!
The chat, however, didn't let Shen Jinye off the hook.
[But isn't he your boyfriend? I'm just here for the ship.]
[But Croissant is really cute, and his voice is so soft and sweet.]
[Enough already. Ye is a solo queue player anyway. Croissant's absence doesn't affect the stream. Can we just focus on Ye?]
Shen Jinye sent out a lucky bag giveaway to the chat. "Let's just do solo queue today."
Right as the words left his mouth, Song Muchu sent him a game invite. Shen Jinye instinctively clicked it, instantly joining the lobby.
Song Muchu’s voice piped into the stream. It was distinctly the same boy who had been flirting with him in the private karaoke room yesterday.
"Ye's here? Hmm, is it just you today? Where's your partner?" The boy’s smiling voice rang in Shen Jinye’s ears, broadcasting clearly to the stream.
[...I thought you said solo queue?]
[Is Croissant mad? Why is Ye always playing with Chuchu?]
[Chuchu is way better than Croissant and makes it easier to rank up. It's totally normal for Ye to play with Chuchu, right? Plus they aren't duo queuing, aren't there other people in the lobby too?]
[...I'm outta here.]
A small fraction of the viewers immediately left the stream, mostly fans who shipped Shen Jinye and Jian Xingsong. After all, Shen Jinye’s initial rise to fame was largely due to the popularity of their romantic duo queue sessions.
Because of that, they had quite a few "founding shareholders"—shippers.
But as Shen Jinye gradually reduced their duo queue sessions, he "purified" his fanbase, converting many into solo stans focused solely on his gameplay.
Furthermore, since he now played with Song Muchu quite often—one intentionally seducing, the other intentionally indulging—some viewers naturally started shipping this new, controversial pairing.
[Don't let the door hit you on the way out~]
Before Shen Jinye could say anything, some of his solo fans had already clapped back in the chat.
Shen Jinye noticed that the viewer who had announced their departure still bore a "YeSong" shipper tag and was actually a very generous gifter. His expression soured for a moment. In a stiff voice, he explained to the chat, "Croissant might be tired. He's offline."
Assuming Shen Jinye was explaining it to him, Song Muchu let out a light laugh. "Really? I guess it's my fault too, for always clashing with his preferred roles. How about this—I'll play mid-lane today, and you tell your partner to log on and play Princess Yao. That one requires zero skill."
As Song Muchu’s voice drifted into the stream, the viewers reacted with loaded comments.
[Uhh... so fake.]
[If you know he's not good, why do you steal his role every single day?]
[So you DO know you're stealing his spot? Talk about shamelessly crashing the party.]
[I think the people above have said enough. You can only blame a certain someone for being trash. In esports, being bad is the original sin.]
[+1. You can't blame Chuchu. At least with Chuchu they win. Croissant just leeches free ranks.]
[Lol, not everyone is a tryhard slave to their rank.]
[Conveniently leaving out how Croissant goes totally silent the whole match because of this!]
A fight was practically breaking out in the comments. Shen Jinye hurriedly dropped a few more lucky bags to placate them, then picked up his other phone. "Stop arguing, I'll go ask Croissant. He doesn't really like playing games anyway... F*ck!"
Shen Jinye slammed his hand on the desk, knocking over the crocheted doll resting beside his monitor. He didn't care. He frantically fired off several more messages, but a glaring red exclamation mark accompanied every single one.
"He deleted me!" Shen Jinye was utterly enraged. "Why?!"
The viewers in the stream instantly perked up, and the viewer count surged dramatically.
[Oh snap, he got dumped!]
[Doesn't he totally deserve it?]
[I'm so satisfied right now, who's with me?]
[Isn't Croissant being a bit too petty?]
[Your own boyfriend constantly duo queues with someone else. Put yourself in his shoes—wouldn't you be petty?]
On the other end of the headset, Song Muchu quickly said, "It's not because of me, is it? I'm so sorry, Ye. I didn't know Croissant minded so much..."
[Gag, the 'pick-me' stench is so strong.]
[...Try acting a little better, please.]
[Bruh.]
Shen Jinye completely ignored Song Muchu and tried dialing Jian Xingsong’s phone number.
"Hello, the number you have dialed is currently busy..."
He called several times in a row, only to be met with the same automated prompt.
"He blocked me?"
Shen Jinye switched to countless different contact methods, but without exception, he had been blocked and purged from all of them.
A sudden thought struck him. He opened their in-game relationship tab, only to find a notification requesting to dissolve their "Lovers" bond.
"He's actually serious?!"
Shen Jinye was furious. Losing his composure in front of so many people made him feel deeply humiliated. Staring at the application to break their bond, he gritted his teeth. "Fine, if we're breaking up, we're breaking up."
In a fit of anger, he clicked 'Agree'.
[Damn!]
[My ship just sank.]
[Good riddance! Now Croissant doesn't have to suffer. And Streamer, don't play the victim, do you have no self-awareness of what you've done?]
[Is Croissant really mad this time? Are they just going to make up in a couple of days?]
[I'm just here for the tea!]
The livestream became even more boisterous, and the drama even spread outwards. At the very least, all the streamers in their circle were now aware that Shen Jinye and Jian Xingsong had broken up.
[A-Ling-A: God Jin, did you know? That punk Shen Jinye got dumped! It’s killing me hahaha, serves him right. Who told him not to cherish what he had!]
A-Ling-A sent Xie Zhijin a clip of the "famous scene" edited by Shen Jinye’s fans for his viewing pleasure.
Xie Zhijin clicked it open. When he saw an infuriated Shen Jinye click 'Agree' on the in-game relationship dissolution, the corners of his mouth curled up significantly.
Excellent. Now everyone knew that his Songsong was single.
Xie Zhijin unfollowed Shen Jinye without a moment's hesitation. He had only followed him to keep tabs on Jian Xingsong anyway. Unfollowing him now was only natural, wasn't it?
In an incredibly good mood, Xie Zhijin started his own livestream. By pure coincidence, he ended up queuing right into Shen Jinye’s team.
Bursting with rage, Shen Jinye was on an absolute killing spree—but fate had it that he ran smack into Xie Zhijin, who was also streaming.
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