American Football: King of the Bay Area

”Welcome to the Rugby Superstar System! Reminder, the host has obtained five basic attribute points and has not yet allocated them! Reminder, please select an item to upgrade; reminder, please select an item to upgrade; reminder, please select an item to upgrade…”

Lu Ke felt like his head was about to split open. His mind was filled with a cold, monotonous mechanical voice. He couldn’t tell if it was an auditory hallucination or just static. A dull ache throbbed in his head, making him dizzy and blurring his vision. To make matters worse, that wasn’t the only sound. Logan’s incredibly hyped-up voice hammered against his eardrums like a drumstick. The relentless pounding wasn’t helping at all.

”Lu Ke, did you hear me? Three-on-three, a quarterback, a receiver, and a defensive player! Three-on-three! Let’s teach that arrogant bastard a lesson! Show them what a real pass looks like!”

”Reminder, please select an item to upgrade.”

”Passing! Passing without pressure, that’s your strong suit! Bambi!”

The noises kept overlapping, surrounded by a mess of other chaotic sounds, making Lu Ke feel like his head was about to explode. ”Logan, quiet! Quiet!” Lu Ke shouted. ”What’s going on? What the hell is happening? Why a three-on-three?” At the same time, trying to answer the voice in his head, Lu Ke carelessly yelled, ”Passing! Passing!”

Immediately after, the cold voice in his head switched its message. ”Please select a passing attribute: Short Pass Accuracy, Mid-range Pass Accuracy, Long Pass Accuracy.”

”Long pass!” Lu Ke rubbed his temples, trying to ease the stabbing pain in his head.

Back in high school, he was a quarterback, and his best skill was his long pass accuracy. He had often created miracles with it. But after entering college, his frail body and limited talent put him at a disadvantage in physical confrontations. In training and games, he would get knocked down before he even had a chance to show off his powerful long passes, let alone complete one.

Given the choice, Lu Ke picked long pass out of pure reflex. But the stiff, robotic voice in his head didn’t stop, repeatedly asking, ”How many points to add? How many points to add?”

”All of them! All of them! All of them!” Lu Ke roared, fed up and furious. Then, a series of notifications sounded in his head, ”Allocation, complete. System integration, first step, complete.” And that was it. The cold voice finally disappeared completely, and Logan’s excited, noisy voice gradually became clearer.

”Bambi? What? What are you even talking about? Are you okay? It’s not a concussion, is it?”

After the static disappeared, the headache also began to fade. Lu Ke slowly came to his senses. ”Piss off, I’m perfectly fine!” He raised his head again and opened his eyes, his vision gradually sharpening. ”What were you saying just now? Three-on-three, a showdown? Teach Kevin Price a lesson, right?” Lu Ke still managed to piece together the information from the fragmented words.

Although Lu Ke had no idea how things had escalated to this point—he was basically being forced into a corner with no way out—he had never been afraid of a challenge, and certainly not a confrontation. ”You’re saying I get to pick the receiver and the defensive player?”

”Yes!” Logan nodded repeatedly. ”Pick a receiver for yourself, and a defensive player for your opponent!” After saying that, Logan’s eyes went wide, and he started hopping on the balls of his feet, an eager, fawning expression on his face. He looked just like a puppy, all that was missing was his tongue hanging out.

Lu Ke was so amused he couldn’t help but laugh. He shook his head slightly, then his smile faded as he said seriously, ”Logan, can you be my receiver?”

”Of course! Of course!” Logan threw his right hand high in the air, then looked left and right, gesturing to a non-existent crowd like he was the Statue of Liberty. He then bumped Lu Ke’s shoulder hard and ran toward the field, shouting, ”Logan Newman, Lu Ke’s receiver! Raheem Moore, their defensive player!”

”An excellent choice!” said Kevin, who was standing in the middle of the field with a mocking expression. ”At least you’re picking two first-string players to increase your chances of winning. I suppose you really do need that kind of boost, because for you, this is a doomed attempt from the start.”

His headache now completely gone and his mind clear, Lu Ke walked over too, a smile on his face. ”Are you saying that you could complete the pass even if you picked two practice squad players?” No cursing, no taunting—just a simple, playful rhetorical question that immediately put Kevin in a bind.

Glaring fiercely at Lu Ke, Kevin clamped his mouth shut, turned away without a word of acknowledgment or response, and silently picked two other absolute starters from the first string—one as his receiver and one as the opposing defender. Securing the win was what mattered most! ’Practice players are just practice players. Trash will always be trash.’ Kevin wasn’t that stupid.

The three-on-three drill was very simple. The quarterback completes a pass, the receiver makes the catch, and the defensive player covers the receiver, trying to break up the pass. Before the play, the quarterback and receiver discuss the route and passing tactic. This not only trains the quarterback’s passing accuracy and Tactical Awareness, but also the receiver’s and defender’s spatial awareness.

It was a two-way training exercise.

Anthony Jefferson came forward. He was an assistant on the coaching staff, and in addition to handling daily practice schedules, he was also in charge of the practice squad. Head Coach Rick was absolutely furious, his temper still not having subsided. He stood fuming on the sidelines, arms crossed over his chest, silent. And so, the burden of officiating the contest fell to Anthony.

”Let’s start the drill. Kevin, you’re up first,” Anthony called out. His gaze then fell on Lu Ke’s shoulder behind him, and he couldn’t help but reveal a hint of helplessness and concern as he shook his head.

There was no need for a showdown like this. One was an official team member, the other a practice squad player; the gap between them was immense. But Anthony also knew that this duel, destined to end in failure, was less about winning or losing and more about getting this group of hot-blooded young men to cool down.

Sure enough, after Kevin took the field, he stood on the twenty-yard line on the right side. With no defensive player pressuring him, his footwork was as light as a fluttering butterfly, dancing freely on the field. After sighting his target’s route, he threw the football without hesitation. The ball carved a parabola through the air, streaking like lightning straight toward the receiver’s position.

As the defensive player, Raheem immediately closed in, trying to break up the pass, but he was half a step too slow. He could only watch as the receiver caught the ball. By the time he arrived and slammed his shoulder hard into the receiver’s, it was already too late.

Thirty yards. It was a full thirty-yard pass, effortlessly thrown from the twenty-yard line to the fifty-yard line, both accurate and fast. It was like a goalkeeper’s long kick in a soccer match, or a sharp sword streaking across the sky to pierce a heart, caught perfectly in the receiver’s arms. It was truly an impressive sight!

”Yeah!” Kevin threw his hands high in the air, unable to contain his excitement, and cheered. He then clenched his fists and roared with passion, bending over and arching his back as he let out all his strength, ”AHHHH!”

A thirty-yard pass! For Kevin, this was a rare, successful long pass! Fast, accurate, and perfectly placed—the whole throw was simply flawless. You could say he’d outdone himself!

After the earlier conflict and commotion, all his pent-up feelings were now completely released. ’That damned practice player is destined to be nothing more than a practice player! It’s not that I lack ability, I just had a momentary lapse in concentration. Even a tiger has to nap sometimes, let alone a normal athlete. That practice player is a lunatic, a reckless madman who treats practice like a real game. How utterly foolish!’

’There’s no way that practice player could make a throw like that! Absolutely no way! Now that piece of trash should understand that the gap between us is huge and unbridgeable! Goddamn trash!’

Leaving the field, Kevin lifted his chin high, looking down his nose at Lu Ke. His condescending, disdainful, and mocking gaze was completely unconcealed. He then raised his right hand, gave a thumbs-up, and, staring daggers at Lu Ke, slowly, ever so slowly, turned his wrist and pointed his thumb down.

After completing this series of actions, he let out a smug chuckle. He paid Lu Ke no more mind, turning to chat cheerfully with his friends as if the outcome of the competition was a foregone conclusion, not even worth watching.

Standing next to Lu Ke, Logan was constantly cheering him on. ”Buddy, don’t worry! It’s only thirty yards, that’s nothing! You can do it, believe in yourself, you’ve got this!” Logan clenched his fists, pumping them excitedly.

Lu Ke ignored Kevin, who was acting like a buffoon. He adjusted his breathing and gave Logan a confident smile. Physical confrontations weren’t his strong suit, but super-long passes were. ”Of course I know! Remember? That pass we tried back in eleventh grade? How about we give it another shot today?”

”What?” Logan’s eyes went wide with disbelief, but then he started cheering. ”You’re a madman! But I love that you’re this kind of madman! It’s no problem for me, of course, but what about you? Is your arm strength and accuracy up for it? We only succeeded once back then, and it was just luck. We kept trying to replicate it afterward but never managed to.”

”Then let’s bet on luck again today!” Lu Ke said boldly. ”Even if we don’t make it, we have nothing to lose.” Lu Ke shrugged nonchalantly. He was a practice player, and he would always be a practice player; things couldn’t get any worse. ”But I don’t like to lose! Let’s give it our all and complete this pass! You’d better run faster. Even faster!”

Logan winked at Lu Ke and slapped his own chest hard, making a THUMPING sound. ”Trust me! Buddy, I trust you too!” Without another word, Logan turned and ran toward the other end of the field.

Under the watchful eyes of all the players, Logan ran farther and farther. He passed the fifty-yard line, but his feet didn’t stop. By now, he had already run past the spot where Kevin’s pass had landed, and he was still going. Everyone was dumbfounded!