"Three years ago, they cheered her name.
Tonight, they wouldn't even recognize her face."
The flickering lights of the practice arena cast a faint violet glow over the worn keys of Zhao Mian's keyboard. Her fingers hovered, motionless, as the countdown timer pulsed across the screen: Match Start in 10 seconds.
Her new teammates were already speaking, laughing, planning, and throwing out strategies over voice chat, but she kept her mic muted.
This wasn't about making friends.
This was about survival.
"Star… you're mid-lane, right?" asked a cheerful voice, male, probably the youngest on the team. "Yo, nice reflexes earlier. Your snipe? Clean."
She flinched. Star the name they'd given her, unaware of its irony.
Back then, the gaming world knew her as "Starfire Archer." A prodigy. A phenomenon. A rising star who was snuffed out just as quickly.
Now, she was just 'Star', a low-profile recruit on a failing Tier 2 team called Nebula, clawing its way into the qualifiers.
Zhao Mian didn't respond.
Across the room, Li Zeyan leaned back in his gaming chair, arms folded, with his headset on but mic off. His obsidian eyes studied the screen, but his focus wasn't on the game.
It was on her.
There was something off about this "Star." The way she moved. Her split-second calculations. That intuitive rotation when the enemy flanked. These weren't beginner skills. This wasn't even a Tier 2 experience.
This was elite-level muscle memory.
He narrowed his eyes. "Where the hell did they dig her up?"
"Team Nebula wins. MVP: Star."
Applause erupted in the training room. The youngest, Chen Yu, practically leaped from his chair.
"No way! That was nuts! Did you see that 3v1 clutch at Baron?!"
Zhao Mian unplugged her headset and stood up quietly.
"I'm done for the night," she said, barely above a whisper.
And she walked out.
In the hallway outside the practice room, Zhao Mian leaned against the cold wall, heart thudding, not from the game, but from memory.
The way her name had once lit up the stage screens.
The way they had erased her overnight.
She would never let herself be seen again. Not fully.
Not until she was untouchable.
Back inside, Li Zeyan opened a private search tab.
He typed:
"Starfire Archer – banned 2022"
" Zhao Mian scandal esports"
Nothing came up. Scrubbed.
But he knew talent when he saw it. And if this girl thought she could slip into his team quietly.
She had another thing coming.