Huayu: Starting from retirement, sweeping across the domestic entertainment industry

Chapter 240 "Directing Traffic"

When Li Ran finished breakfast and came out of her house, the morning light had already bathed the streets of Shanghai in a golden glow.

Xiao Chen drove north, heading towards the LPL Shanghai home stadium.

The car stopped at the familiar venue entrance. When he got out, he saw that the huge posters hanging on the outer wall of the venue had been changed to new season promotional images, with the logos of the various teams lined up in a row.

He had played in this arena, stood under the spotlight and heard the cheers of the audience. Later, he left the arena and turned to the film industry, thinking that his connection with this place had come to an end. Unexpectedly, he has returned today—but in a different capacity.

The film crew was setting up the shooting set inside the venue. Staff members were moving around, the camera crew was adjusting the camera positions, the lighting technician was holding a reflector and looking for the right angle, and the props crew was fiddling with the keyboards and mice on the contestants' seats. The whole venue was filled with the busyness and noise of pre-shoot preparations.

Li Ran walked through the crowd and was about to reach the director's monitor when he heard a familiar voice booming from his side and behind him.

"Hey! You've finally arrived."

Zhang Yimou stood up from his director's chair, a storyboard rolled up in his hand, and walked towards Li Ran with a half-smile on his face.

It was a teasing reprimand from an elder to a younger person, with three parts reproach and seven parts joke: "Without the male lead, I can't film some of my scenes. The whole crew is waiting for you."

Li Ran knew that her leave of absence this time was indeed quite long.

I was away from the set for several days in a row. Although the progress could be made up by filming supporting roles, all scenes involving the male lead had to be put on hold.

He walked over, his tone sincere and his posture humble: "Director Zhang, I won't be taking any more leave. I'll stay with the crew until the end. I won't go home for New Year's Day either; I'll stay on set."

"That won't do."

Zhang Yimou waved his hand and laughed, "If you don't get a holiday, I do. The staff needs to rest too, right? If the whole crew gets a holiday, are you going to be acting alone here, just pretending to be thin air?"

Li Ran was momentarily speechless, but then he laughed.

He didn't dwell on the topic after he finished speaking, and handed over the roll of paper in his hand: "Alright, this is the script for the next scene. Take a look and familiarize yourself with it."

Li Ran took it and turned to the first page.

This is the opening match of the Spring Split.

The script clearly states that the Royal Never Give Up (RNG) team, where the character played by Li Ran works, is facing off against the SK team in a best-of-three (B03) format.

He continued reading, and the world-building and character relationships were concisely laid out in a few pages of the script.

Royal Club was the runner-up in last year's World Championship. Their strength and honors speak for themselves, making them one of the top teams in the league.

SK Gaming failed to even secure a ticket to the World Championship, falling in the final round of the qualifiers. They became the "ticket-selling kid" that was ridiculed by all the viewers back then—working hard for an entire season, only to send others to the World Championship while they watched the live stream from home.

Although SK has brought in jungler Li Ran for the new season, this is considered a major signing.

However, the bot lane featured a pair of rookies, two young men with no experience in top-tier leagues. In various ratings and predictions before the season started, SK's bot lane was rated the worst in the entire league by various commentators and self-media.

Before the match, there was a lot of ridicule, and almost no one believed that SK could take a point from Royal Club.

There is also a special person in the Royal Club team - He Yu, the Royal Club's current starting jungler.

He was benched by Li Ran for a whole year in the Royal Club, and didn't even play a single official match.

He finally got his starting position after Li Ran transferred away.

He harbored a complex and inexplicable feeling towards Li Ran—resentment, bitterness, and the anxiety of a substitute player who had finally made it to the top and was eager to prove to everyone that "I am stronger than him."

The script for the pre-match interview segment was highlighted separately.

Li Ran's gaze swept over the dialogue, and the corners of his mouth unconsciously turned up slightly—this scene was written quite scathingly, taking the e-sports scene to a whole new level.

The explosive tone of the previous trash talk was captured very well.

In front of the camera, He Yu's posture was relaxed to the point of arrogance, his tone carrying an undisguised contempt: "Beating SK..."

"Huh? Absolutely no pressure. What's there to study about last year's ticket-selling teams?"

The host followed up with, "SK's current jungler is Li Ran. Don't you feel any pressure playing against him?"

He Yu's expression subtly changed.

When the name "Li Ran" was mentioned, the muscles at the corners of his mouth tightened almost imperceptibly for half a second. That awkwardness of being hit where it hurt but refusing to show weakness was revealed in the few stage prompts in the script.

But he quickly regained his nonchalant attitude, his tone even more aggressive than before: "So what if he's Li Ran? I admit he's very strong individually, no doubt about that. But League of Legends is a team game, a five-person match. No matter how strong you are, you can't win if your teammates aren't good. No matter how strong you are, it's useless if your teammates aren't good."

He paused after speaking, then tilted his head closer to the camera, as if sharing a huge secret with the audience. His tone became mysterious, but a smug smile played on his lips: "By the way, let me give the fans a little tidbit—we haven't lost a single scrim with the SK team."

Upon seeing this, Li Ran instinctively scoffed.

Anyone who's been in the esports scene knows that scrimmages are incredibly inflated, like a sponge.

Some teams dominate in scrims but get dominated in matches; others deliberately sabotage you in scrims. Taking scrim results too seriously is a very unprofessional thing to do.

The script only describes the course of the match in a few pages because what really needs to be filmed is not the match itself, which will be done in post-production with special effects and editing, but the expressions, actions, and interactions of the contestants during the match, and the details that happen where the camera can't reach.

As expected.

The best-of-three series ended cleanly with a score of 2-0, and SK Gaming won the match.

The first game went fairly well, with both sides trading blows for over thirty minutes. SK secured the victory thanks to their superior team fight execution in the mid-to-late game.

But what truly shocked everyone was the second game. When Royal Club's main crystal exploded on screen, the game time was frozen at 15 minutes and 57 seconds.

1557

This number holds special significance in the history of professional League of Legends esports.

It means that this is not an ordinary win or loss, but a complete massacre, a suffocating situation in which the losing side is kept underwater from beginning to end without being able to surface for a breath.

For a team that was runner-up in last year's World Championship, being outplayed for 15 minutes and 57 seconds in the opening match by a "ticket-selling team" that didn't even make it to the World Championship is as humiliating as being slapped dozens of times in public.

Li Ran continued flipping through the pages and came across the script for the post-match interview.

Royal Club's top laner sat in the interview booth, looking as if half of his soul had been ripped out.

He stared at the table in front of him, his eyes unfocused, and every word he uttered carried a deep, heartfelt bewilderment: "I don't know either—during practice matches, I went in and got one kill with every shot, really, one kill with every shot. But after the first two minutes of today's match, I had no idea what I was doing."

He looked up at the host, his eyes so empty they were almost laughable, yet also pitiful. "I don't know who I am."

Li Ran closed the script and took a deep breath.

He certainly understood what the scene was about.

He knows better than anyone that training matches and official matches are two different things.

The reason you can take down opponents with one shot in scrims is because they aren't seriously playing against you in lane, or they're deliberately practicing unfamiliar heroes and tactics in scrims; winning or losing isn't the goal.

But once you get to the official competition stage, the spotlight shines, the audience shouts, your teammates' voices in your headphones become tense, your heart starts racing, and everything changes.

Those opponents who seemed docile and harmless in training matches suddenly turned into man-eating beasts, and before your hand holding the mouse could even switch out of relaxed mode, the match was already over.

He lowered his head and flipped through a few more pages of the script when he suddenly felt something block the light around him.

He looked up and saw Zhang Yimou standing beside him, looking at him with a keen interest.

"How's the script?" Zhang Yimou asked.

"It's pretty good." Li Ran rolled up the script and tapped it in his palm. After thinking for a moment, he added, "This post-match interview is particularly authentic. It's clearly written by someone who knows the e-sports scene very well."

"Nonsense, the scriptwriting team spent three months hanging out on various e-sports forums after listening to you. It would be strange if it wasn't realistic."

Zhang Yimou patted him on the shoulder and pointed to the head of the selection team not far away, "We'll go through the positions first. You sit over there, that's the jungler position for the SK team. He Yu is on the opposite side, and there's the entire stage between you. This spatial relationship is very important; the camera needs to show that sense of distance."

Li Ran looked in the direction Zhang Yimou was pointing.

Two rows of computers faced each other across the wide stage. The team logos of each team were already affixed to the players' seats, with Royal Club's gold and SK's dark red creating a subtle contrast under the lights.

He was very familiar with this location.

On the stage of the competition, the jungler plays the role of a jungler. His headphones are filled with the calls of his teammates, and behind him are the cheers or sighs of the audience. The mouse is so hot in his palm that every decision is made in a fraction of a second. The outcome of each team fight can determine the course of the entire game.

He had sat in this position before, winning and losing, hearing the cheers of the entire audience, and also the sporadic applause after the silence.

Now he's going to sit back down.

After filming the group shots of the battle on stage, the production crew and lighting team began adjusting the camera positions in preparation for the next set of close-ups.

Li Ran stood up from the contestant's seat, stretched his shoulders which had become stiff from sitting, and a scene suddenly flashed through his mind.

That was a famous scene he had witnessed in his previous life at the Valorant Masters Tournament.

After winning the game, Wolves player Xiaofei jumped up from his seat and gestured wildly with both hands towards the opposite side, his movements so exaggerated that it looked like he was directing traffic at an intersection, his arrogance reaching its very core.

That scene went viral on major esports forums and social media at the time, with screenshots, memes, and captions circulating online. The meme stayed popular for months.

However, the style of "directing traffic" doesn't quite fit the characters he plays.

SK's jungler is known for his calm and reserved personality. He might just smirk after a win, but he doesn't go all out and start attacking.

But the character played by Wang Junkai is young and impetuous, prickly all over, and when he wins, he wants to hold the keyboard above his head and show the replay to the other side.

This iconic scene is a perfect match for his personality.

Li Ran thought about it more and more and felt that this idea should not be wasted. Taking advantage of the break between scenes, he walked over to Zhang Yimou and briefly described the scene he had just thought of.

While he was speaking, his hands were also busy. He gestured a few times to demonstrate the "directing traffic" action, roughly showing the effect.

After hearing this, Zhang Yimou first raised an eyebrow, and then the corners of his mouth slowly curled up.

"That's a good idea."

He patted the rolled-up storyboard in his palm, his eyes shining with the kind of light a creator has when they hear a good idea. "It's like a competitive game with the passion of young people. If you win, you have to be a little wild. It's no fun if you keep it to yourself."

He turned and waved to the assistant director. The two whispered a few words, and the assistant director nodded and ran off to inform the camera crew to adjust the camera positions.

Zhang Yimou turned back and looked Li Ran up and down, his tone teasing: "You kid, you've got a lot on your mind, and you have a good eye for imagery. How about trying your hand at directing?"

"No," Li Ran waved his hand with a smile, "I only have flashes of inspiration occasionally. If you really wanted me to direct, I'd be good at it in three days."

It's going to break down.

"Alright," Zhang Yimou said with a smile, patting him on the shoulder. "That was a good flash of inspiration. I'll give you credit for it."

As a result, the production team temporarily adjusted the shooting schedule and reshot a set of close-up shots of Wang Junkai alone.

Wang Junkai sat back down in his seat. His stylist came up to touch up his makeup and straightened his earphone cord, draping it around his neck.

The camera crew set up their cameras on the opposite side, and the lighting technician adjusted the angle of the reflector so that the blue light from the screen would shine directly on his face without obscuring the details of his expression.

Zhang Yimou sat behind the monitor, holding the walkie-talkie to his mouth: "All departments, prepare." Wang Junkai took a deep breath, placed his hands loosely on the keyboard, and stared at the screen in front of him.

Although the screen only showed a blue background in standby mode, his eyes were already focused, as if he were staring at an enemy crystal that was burning.

"Action".

The crystal exploded.

At that moment, it was as if something exploded within Wang Junkai.

He shoved the keyboard with both hands, ripped off his headphones and threw them on the table, and jumped up.

His face flushed red, his eyes widened, and as his lips moved, a burst of pent-up energy finally found an outlet.

He pointed both hands at the opposite side, then began to gesture back and forth. His left hand pointed at the opposite jungler, his right hand drew a circle and swung it to the AD position. He switched hands, left hand raised, and his two hands crossed and swung in front of each other. His movements were so smooth that it was as if he was directing the vehicles at a crossroads. No one could get past him.

"Is this any good, Greyhound?"

The words he uttered were exaggerated to the extreme, each word sounding as if he were chewing up the other's last shred of dignity with his lips and teeth.

The sound engineer recorded a line of raccoon coins, but everyone knows that this line will be muted during post-production editing, leaving only a series of beeping electronic muting sounds.

However, even though the sound was muted, the audience wasn't blind or stupid; Wang Junkai's mouth shape was crystal clear, from the wide-open corners of his mouth to the closed lips.

The final accented note, every nuance of the sound, was crisp and clean. Any viewer who paused the video and watched it carefully could perfectly reproduce the entire line.

The insults were really filthy, but it was also really satisfying.

"Card!"

Zhang Yimou stood up from behind the monitor, a rare and uncommon smile of satisfaction on his face. "One..."

"Pass! Keep this track, and process the audio track as I just described."

Wang Junkai stepped out of character, let out a sigh, and smiled sheepishly. He then bowed to the empty audition room opposite him, as if to say hello on behalf of his character to the actor opposite him.

The staff around them also started laughing. The young female stagehand covered her mouth and laughed out loud. The cameraman, Brother You, carrying his equipment, chuckled and cursed, "This kid really knows how to curse."

Standing next to the monitor, Li Ran couldn't help but laugh as he watched Wang Junkai switch from arrogance to obedience in just one second.

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