Rebirth of an Anchor Ch. 4

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Everyone knew that "King of Glory" had already changed its name twice since launch, and still carried traces of other tower-pushing games. Players hated it to death, and no one could predict whether its future would be good or bad. Worst of all, King of Glory was a mobile game. How much traffic could a mobile game even bring them?

The atmosphere grew tense until "Streamer Ah Shu" unmuted his mic. His tone was calm and unhurried. "Why don't I go, then? We can't just leave a new section on the platform empty."

It sounded like a graceful thing to say—but it could be taken two ways. One interpretation was that he was selflessly sacrificing for the team; the other, that he was calling out everyone else for refusing to cooperate with management.

That made several big-name streamers fume. You've only got a little over ten thousand followers—what's the difference between you streaming League of Legends or a mobile game? But for them, it was different. They had hundreds of thousands of followers. If they switched over, they'd basically be starting from zero again, with no idea what the future would hold.

These streamers had all been around the internet for years—they could see right through Ah Shu's game. He'd already decided to switch sections; he was just trying to cozy up to the higher-ups and snag a few more resources while he was at it.

After a moment of awkward silence, the executive cleared his throat and wrapped things up. "Everyone, think it over. The King of Glory section will have its first small homepage feature in three days. If you switch before then, you can still compete for a spot."

The "small homepage feature" was the recommendation banner that hung at the entrance of the section within the channel. It stayed up for a week and was considered the best resource inside a category, capable of bringing a streamer a decent amount of traffic.

But that was only a small feature. For those with steady popularity, it wasn't tempting at all. Only the new or less-established streamers really cared about it—like Han Shu.

After the meeting ended, Han Shu closed the voice chat and started planning his next moves.

He actually didn't care about offending other streamers, since he had never intended to stay in this line of work forever. Streaming was just a side gig to him—something to help him get used to being in front of the camera, build some charisma, and gain a bit of popularity before moving into showbiz. Deep down, he didn't see "internet streamer" as a real profession. He had his biases against streamers and influencers.

He was the campus heartthrob of the Broadcasting Department at C University. That department's reputation in the industry was unquestionable. In the future, he would take the formal path into entertainment. In essence, he and the people in that meeting weren't even in the same league.

Still, even if this job wasn't part of his long-term plan, he had to do it well for now—because popularity and followers were exactly what he needed at this stage.

Half-distracted, Han Shu opened the Haiyou Live client and browsed the new King of Glory section to check out his future competition.

Liangchen Meijing, currently the top streamer of the gaming channel, held a steady three million viewers during his League of Legends streams. If he was playing "King of Glory" now, it was probably just a test run. A top-tier anchor like him wouldn't switch groups easily.

Yi Xiaoxiao, a high-priced female streamer who had been poached from another site for Haiyou's Entertainment channel. Her usual content was singing and dancing, and right now she was playing King of Glory with two rich fans in her chat—it didn't look like she was seriously switching over either.

Scrolling further down, Han Shu saw some new faces, none with better setups or conditions than him. Since "King of Glory" had only recently gone public, everyone's skill level was about the same.

After reviewing them all, Han Shu had a good sense of the situation. Switching groups would do him more good than harm. If nothing else, the upcoming small homepage feature in three days—he was confident he could grab that spot.

But just as he was about to close the page, his hand froze—

"Streamer Xiao Xie." Current viewers: 243. Stream duration: 3 hours and 26 minutes.

It was Xie Anran's stream. Han Shu immediately clicked in.

On screen, Xie Anran had his camera on. He wore thick-framed glasses and a plain white cotton T-shirt—completely ordinary. Compared to those streamers who dressed up carefully and turned on beauty filters, he looked utterly like a random passerby.

Only Han Shu knew just how stunning Xie Anran could be once he took off his glasses and put on a suit.

But the dazzling boy in his memory was nothing like the one in front of him now. His movements were stiff, and even when he answered questions, his tone sounded forced. It was obvious he was nervous—he clearly wasn't cut out to be in front of a camera.

The new stream's viewer count was pitifully low. The chat was nearly empty, but the few comments that popped up all said the same thing:

"Damn, that's some sick gameplay!"

Han Shu felt a strange unease. He shook his head with a self-deprecating smile, not even sure what exactly he was worried about.

Then, almost without thinking, Han Shu turned on his camera and hit the "Go Live" button.

Two hours later, Streamer Ah Shu's viewer count had stabilized at 11,000, ranking fourth in the entire channel—leaving Streamer Xiao Xie far behind.

Only then did Han Shu feel himself calm down. That familiar confidence—the feeling of being completely in control—returned to him. He couldn't help but look forward to two days later. When he got the small homepage feature, would Xie Anran agree to be his substitute player again?

Of course, Xie Anran also saw Han Shu's ranking. He quietly went over his first livestream in his head.

Stage fright—he could barely talk when facing the camera, even his gameplay felt restricted. Xie Anran knew himself well; he'd always been timid and shy. But he also knew he couldn't go on like this.

Turns out Han Shu wasn't wrong—doing livestreams wasn't easy at all. But if he gave up now, how was he ever going to bridge that gap between himself and Sui Yuan?

Xie Anran let out a long breath. Suddenly, he thought of a gimmick that suited him perfectly.

Two days later, the small homepage feature time-slot competition arrived right on schedule.

Normally, the homepage feature was assigned by the site itself, but since "King of Glory" was a new section, the first few were decided through a "time-slot competition."

All credit goes to the original author
Feel free to pinpoint us if there are any grammar error or typos
Please don't use Guazi's translations to re-translate in other languages

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