Chapter 1 When Zhou Yi Appeared

When Zhou Yi appeared in the virtual training ground for the third day, Chu Ling was about to start her hostess-like opening remarks again, but Zhou Yi directly stopped her: "Can you modify it? Don't read this line every time I log in, it sounds really stupid."

Chu Ling breathed a sigh of relief: "Actually, I also think it's silly, but the default setting for the initial login prompt is turned on."

"Then turn it off."

Chu Ling lowered her head, and after two seconds, she raised her head again and asked, "Do you want to start team training directly?"

Unexpectedly, Zhou Yi waved his hand: "No."

Then he was silent for a while before asking, "Chu Ling, you said my total score of forty-one doesn't seem low, only nine points away from fifty. Why was my performance in training last night so bad?"

"Because your own strength hasn't reached forty-one points yet," Chu Ling said. "This total score is valuable for normal professional players, but you are not a normal player. You are a student player, you haven't received a single day of professional football training. Although you have a professionalized score, you are actually still an amateur player. So this score is meaningless to you, and it doesn't reflect your true ability."

"Then what can reflect my true strength?"

"Look at the individual data. For example, shooting, you must think your shooting skills are good, right?" Chu Ling asked.

Zhou Yi nodded. He had been playing as a forward since he was five years old. He had been a forward for eleven years, practicing shooting. His shooting skills couldn't be bad. Otherwise, how could he score so many goals and occupy the main forward position from elementary school, junior high school, to high school?

"But in reality, your shooting value is only thirty-one, and the full value is ninety-nine. Think about how much difference there is between them? Then you will know what your actual shooting level is. The confrontation intensity of campus football is low, the speed and rhythm are slow, and the close defense is not very tight. You can still calmly shoot in front of the goal. But if you go to the professional arena, even the lowest-level professional league, the defensive intensity you encounter will be unprecedented. At that time, your shooting skills may not even be able to发挥 (fā huī - bring into play) 50% of your usual level. If this scoring system is the standard for amateur football, your shooting skills may be seventy, but under the professional football standard, it will only be in the early thirties."

Chu Ling continued to explain: "And your total score looks like forty-one, which is not bad, because your vision has improved the total score too much. If you didn't have ninety-nine vision, the total score would definitely be lower."

After Chu Ling's explanation, Zhou Yi finally understood.

In short, his foundation was too poor, which was directly reflected in the various individual abilities.

In the final analysis, if you want to improve your strength, you must improve your individual abilities, and you must consolidate the foundation and carry out the most basic individual training...

Such as shooting, passing, stopping, and dribbling.

Before, Zhou Yi was excited and eager to train with his teammates, both in reality and in the virtual world.

But now he realized why Hao Dong wanted him to do two weeks of physical training first. That was also laying the foundation for him...

Now Zhou Yi has a clear goal in his mind. He wants to become a professional player. To achieve this goal, he is willing to do everything he should do, including boring basic training.

So he said to Chu Ling: "From today onwards, no more team training, I want to practice one by one."

Chu Ling smiled: "I thought you were going to be stubborn to the end."

"I'm not a fool, going down one path until it's dark. If this road doesn't work, don't I know to change to another one..." Zhou Yi rolled his eyes.

"Then do you need a coach?" Chu Ling asked.

"Coach?" Zhou Yi was a little strange. He had been training in this system for two days, all team training, and he had seen his teammates, but no coach had appeared. He thought that this system simply didn't have a coach setting at all.

"Of course. Didn't I say before? This is a virtual space that perfectly reflects reality. Since it can reflect players, it can also reflect coaches. If you want to carry out individual training, I think it would be better to have a coach to guide you."

"You should have said so earlier! Yes, of course!" Now, as long as it can improve him, Zhou Yi accepts everything.

"Please wait a moment." After Chu Ling finished speaking, she lowered her head again.

This time the waiting time was slightly longer. Ten seconds later, all the coaches that Chu Ling had seen on the training ground on the first day appeared in front of him, including the head coach Hao Dong, the physical coach Li Hao Rui, as well as the assistant coach, the offensive coach, the defensive coach, and... the goalkeeper coach.

"There's even a goalkeeper coach?" He was very strange. "Do I need to practice goalkeeping skills?"

"It's just to increase the realism, there's no need to deliberately remove it. Do you want to remove it?"

"Uh, leave it..." Zhou Yi waved his hand.

"Okay, now you can let the coach guide your training. I will temporarily hide myself. Please call me when you need me." After Chu Ling finished speaking, she disappeared.

And Hao Dong, who had been standing still, seemed to come alive, and said to Zhou Yi, "What are you still standing still for? Start training!"

The tone was exactly the same as the real head coach!

But Zhou Yi rolled his eyes—I don't know who was standing still just now...

"What to train?" he asked.

"Passing."

Only then did Zhou Yi realize that a circular target, slightly larger than a soccer ball, had appeared on the training ground grass about five meters in front of him.

"Ground ball, let the soccer ball hit this circular target," Hao Dong said.

"Is it that simple?" Zhou Yi felt that this kind of training was too simple, wasn't it?

So he kicked the soccer ball towards the circular target, but just as the soccer ball left his foot, the circular target began to move horizontally from left to right on the grass!

The soccer ball kicked out by Zhou Yi rolled towards the original direction of the target, but the target had already rolled to the right of the original direction. The soccer ball passed straight through, only touching the grass and the air.

Zhou Yi stared blankly at the target that was moving back and forth in front of him.

"Simple?"

Damn it, Zhou Yi felt that he could actually hear sarcasm and disdain from the voice of this virtual head coach!

"It moves!" Zhou Yi pointed at the still moving target and shouted.

"How novel, do you kick the ball standing still?"

Zhou Yi was now sure that this virtual Hao Dong was mocking him.

"Continue!" Hao Dong urged him after mocking him.

So Zhou Yi kicked the soccer ball towards the moving target again. This time, he also specially estimated the lead and waited for a while before passing the ball, but it was still off.

Zhou Yi stared at the still moving target in a daze. In his eyes, the circular target was not moving horizontally, but was twisting its butt and dancing to mock his incompetence.

At the same time, Hao Dong's stern voice rang out: "With this level, you still want to become a professional player and make big money? I don't think you can even be the lowest-level professional player! Go back to Europe and honestly go back to school and study, don't waste time and energy!"

Zhou Yi was scolded so hard that he clenched his teeth and became fierce: "Again!"

*Bang!*

This time it was even more off.

"Again!"

"Again!"

"Again—!"

※※※

A week had passed since Zhou Yi came to the training base. During this week, Zhou Yi had been following the physical coach for physical endurance and strength training every day.

The progress of this week was also very obvious. On the first day of training, Zhou Yi was as tired as a dog,趴 (pā - lying prone) on the ground, sticking out his tongue and panting.

And on the last day of this week, after finishing the training, Zhou Yi was still very tired, but at least he wouldn't 趴 (pā - lying prone) on the ground and unable to move.

Moreover, his body also looked stronger than when he first entered the training base. It wasn't that he had become wider, but that the originally inconspicuous muscle lines on his body had become distinct, and his body shape had become more compact.

During the day, he worked hard in the gym to strengthen his body, and at night he carried out various individual training sessions in the virtual system. He practiced different training items every night.

Because according to the time difference between inside and outside, one night for him was equal to a week of uninterrupted training in the virtual system. He couldn't feel tired in the virtual system.

Under his hard training, his various individual scores had also increased accordingly, but the increase was not large.

Chu Ling told him that this was because he had not yet carried out this aspect of training in reality, so relying solely on virtual world training could not bring about any qualitative leap in his individual abilities.

The so-called qualitative leap has a very intuitive expression in the virtual system—the color of the numbers representing ability.

Gray is naturally very poor, better than gray is white, and white is displayed only when it is above sixty.

Above white is blue, from eighty to ninety-nine, all are blue.

There are only three levels, but it is not easy to cross this level. It can be said that the higher the level, the greater the difficulty of upgrading. The cost of increasing each number is several times, dozens of times the cost required for gray and white numbers, and it also depends on talent. It is not said that you can definitely improve if you insist on hard training. A player who is talented in offense, even if he spends all his energy and time training defense, may not be able to do better than a person who is talented in defense.

Zhou Yi has been doing physical training in the real world for the whole week, so the value of his physical fitness has increased very quickly.

For example, in shooting, after a period of training, his value increased from thirty-one to thirty-seven, an increase of six points. But in terms of physical strength, it increased from the original thirty to fifty-five, an increase of twenty-five points, and the strength also changed from the original appalling eleven to thirty-nine, an increase of twenty-eight points.

This all shows that training in the real world plays a greater role in improving one's own abilities.

After a week of training, Zhou Yi tried to train with the team again. The performance was better than at the beginning, but Zhou Yi felt that he still couldn't achieve the effect he wanted, so he continued to carry out individual training.

※※※

In this kind of life of training during the day and training even when sleeping at night, time passed very quickly, and the second week passed in the blink of an eye.

When Zhou Yi came down from the equipment on the last day, Li Hao Rui handed Zhou Yi a towel.

This action surprised Zhou Yi a little—during the two weeks he had been training here, the physical coach Li Hao Rui had always given him the impression of being serious and very strict. Even if he was exhausted and趴 (pā - lying prone) on the ground, he would not kindly ask him if he was okay, he would only scold him: "Get up if you're not dead, the training isn't over yet!"

But now, the coach would actually take the initiative to hand him a towel and let him wipe his sweat, which Zhou Yi really couldn't have imagined.

Seeing Zhou Yi's surprised expression, Li Hao Rui smiled—this was the first time he had smiled in front of Zhou Yi.

"Anyway, you won't be accepting my training tomorrow, it doesn't matter."

"Why?" Zhou Yi asked reflexively.

"You idiot, your training with me is over!"

"Ah? Oh! Oh oh oh!" After Zhou Yi reacted, he was also very happy—he could finally get rid of this hell-like gym!

Li Hao Rui didn't mind the kind of emotion Zhou Yi showed, that he couldn't wait to escape. In fact, Zhou Yi being able to persevere under his training for two weeks had greatly exceeded his expectations.

But seeing the excited Zhou Yi, Li Hao Rui still reminded him: "Don't think that good days are coming, in fact, this is just the beginning."

Zhou Yi nodded: "I understand, coach."

"It's good that you understand. Keep going, train hard." Li Hao Rui reached out and patted Zhou Yi's shoulder.

Zhou Yi could also feel the coach's expectations for him, and also out of gratitude for the coach's careful guidance these two weeks, he stood up and bowed to the physical coach: "Thank you, coach!"