"God, can people not let others train?!"
"It's six in the freaking morning!"
"Ugh, where the hell is that noise coming from? My brain is ringing—I can't even train anymore. Feels like one of those large church bells in the towers continuously ringing for mass..."
It looks like the Los Angeles neighborhood committee sent Lin Yi, Curry, Griffin, Harden, Flynn, and DeRozan a nice little 'friendly reminder'.
"Bro, your shots can't land to save your life," Curry grumbled.
"Yeah, it's rough," Lin Yi agreed.
"I swear, DeRozan's the main culprit. Dude insists on practicing threes!" Griffin tattled like a snitch..
"You—you guys, that's not iron!" DeRozan protested, face flushing. "That's art! Beautiful, majestic art!"
The private gym erupted in laughter.
The summer training camp was officially on.
Lin Yi focused mainly on building up core strength, getting some extra muscle on his upper body, and cutting fat.
Curry? He was working hard on tightening up his shooting form and improving his defense.
Griffin, inspired by Lin Yi, was grinding on ball-handling and shooting drills, especially those sweet mid-range jumpers and arc threes.
Harden looked chill as hell but was secretly grinding, too. Lin Yi could tell—the dude had that "I'm gonna be a boss" vibe deep down.
DeRozan spent most of his time drilling threes from the right wing. Shockingly, he could hit them.
Flynn took the guys' advice: fewer reckless drives, more pull-up jumpers.
Basketball was like magic—you could forget everything else while playing.
... Fresh chapters posted on N0velFire.ɴet
A few hours later, just outside Griffin's gym, trouble was brewing.
A gorgeous blonde woman stood in the middle of the street, holding an ice cream cone.
Her beige dress clung just right to her curves and revealed a pair of beautiful legs.
All this plus a smile would have made the image perfect, but her face looked stressed.
Reason? She was stuck.
"Ugh. Why won't my stupid heel come out?!" she whined, tugging helplessly at her shoe jammed into a crack in the pavement.
Just as she was about to finally free herself—
Outta nowhere, a rogue baseball slammed right into her, sending her precious ice cream flying.
A whole moment later.
Her senses seemed to register the situation. Those big, beautiful eyes were filled with confusion and pain as the day seemed to become worse.
"My ice cream!" she wailed.
The people nearby looked around for the culprit of such injustice.
"Uh... sorry! How can I make up it for you?" came a sheepish voice.
The blonde blinked, looking up—and up—and up.
Standing there was Lin Yi, all 7'2" of him, looking guilty as hell.
"Sorry," he said, scratching the back of his head. "Didn't mean to knock down your ice cream. You seemed to be enjoying it too."
He stooped, picked up the baseball, and added seriously, "Really sorry for this, my friend didn't mean to hit it into your snack."
Seriously, damn you, Stephen! What's the point of hitting home runs if the ball flies into people's snacks?
"Youuu. Sigh. It is okay. Just got to clean and move on our ways," the girl relented after seeing Lin's sincerity.
" Hang on a sec! I will be right back," he said, sprinting off.
The blonde just stood there, confused.
Luckily, Lin Yi quickly came running back, holding a pack of tissues.
"Here! Wipe it off first," he said, offering it to her.
As she cleaned up, Lin Yi finally took a good look at her face, and his heart skipped a beat.
Meanwhile, the blonde was looking at homeboy pointedly, probably in shock at Lin's height and the whole situation.
Lin Yi apologized again. "Again, I'm sorry. I know a great ice cream shop nearby. Best in town. Coffee and caramel flavors—you won't regret it."
That was right up her alley.
After a second or so to think, she nodded.
Lin Yi let out a huge sigh of relief. "Awesome! C'mon, I'll take you."
He started walking, but noticed she wasn't following.
"Uh... hello? Didn't you say yes? Why're you just standing there?"
The girl's voice was flat. "My heel's... still stuck."
With some teamwork and a lot of yanking, Lin Yi finally freed her shoe from the evil sidewalk crack.
She stumbled a little, and as Lin Yi steadied her, she realized—holy crap, this guy's huge.
"Are you an athlete or something?" she asked.
"Yup. Basketball player."
Her eyes widened. Then she gasped, covering her mouth. "Wait! I know you! You're... you're Yao 2.0!"
Lin Yi felt his soul leave his body for a second.
Seriously? Of all the nicknames...?
Since most American fans were thinking of him becoming another dominant big like his predecessor, the nickname Yao 2.0 was given.
Better than Asian Durant for sure, but still..
"My name is Lin-Yi," he said, slow and clear.
As they headed toward the ice cream shop, Lin Yi finally confirmed the girl's identity, just like he'd suspected.
Baby-faced, stunning, future Scarlet Witch herself.
And damn... the rumors were true.
Beautiful girls really were temptations that could make you forget about basketball.
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