Inside the Wembley dressing room, the air was as stagnant as a pool of dead water.
Lin Yuan was smoked awake by a pungent, nauseating smell of ammonia. The scent felt like a red-hot iron wire being shoved straight through his nasal cavity and into his brain, forcibly dragging his consciousness out from the dark abyss.
He took a sharp breath, his lungs expanding violently, and then—
"Hiss—"
A muffled groan was suppressed in his throat.
As his consciousness returned, the intense pain—previously blocked by adrenaline and his blackout—flooded his nerves like a bursting dam with vengeful ferocity. Particularly in his right groin, it no longer felt like a part of his body, but like a mass of burning, rotten meat; every heartbeat brought a wave of tearing spasms.
"He's awake! Paco! He's awake!"
Anxious shouts rang in his ears, the voices somewhat distorted as if separated by a thick film of water.
Lin Yuan struggled to open his eyes.
His vision gradually shifted from blurry to clear. First to enter his sight was the pale ceiling light, followed by several large, anxious faces crowding over him.
Enzo Fernández's face, which had been covered in champagne foam earlier, was now streaked with tears, looking both comical and pitiful. The team doctor, Paco, was waving that damn bottle of smelling salts under his nose. Further away, Mourinho leaned against a locker; the iron-blooded manager's hand was trembling slightly, an unlit cigarette gripped between his fingertips.
"The match..."
Lin Yuan opened his mouth, his voice as raspy as sandpaper rubbing against rust. "Is it over?"
The surroundings fell silent for a second.
Then, Mourinho strode over. He pushed aside the team doctor blocking his way, his bloodshot eyes staring intently at Lin Yuan. The wrinkles at the corners of his eyes seemed to hide a thousand words, but in the end, they converged into a single, trembling sentence.
"It's over, son."
Mourinho reached out with his slightly rough hand and gently patted Lin Yuan's cheek, which was covered in cold sweat and mud. His movement was as delicate as if he were touching fragile porcelain.
"We won. 1-0. You are the champion."
Lin Yuan's pupils contracted slightly.
They won.
Those two words acted like a shot of the strongest sedative, causing his pain-racked, tense body to relax instantly. He exhaled a long breath of turbid air, his lips twitching with difficulty. He seemed to want to smile, but the stiffness of his facial muscles made the expression look more like a hideous grimace.
"That's good then..." he murmured to himself.
"Good my ass!"
Dr. Paco finally exploded nearby. While checking the shocking purple bruises on Lin Yuan's right leg, he roared almost hysterically, "Do you have any idea what your groin looks like right now? At least 30% of the muscle fibers are torn! There's also severe subcutaneous bleeding! When you fainted on the pitch just now, your heart rate hit 200 at one point! You almost worked yourself to death on that grass!"
Dead silence filled the dressing room.
The young players who had been celebrating wildly outside just moments ago—Jackson, Mudryk, Palmer—now stood in the corner like children who had done something wrong, not even daring to breathe loudly. They looked at their captain lying motionless on the treatment table; beyond awe, their eyes held an indescribable sense of shock.
This was the price.
To bring that damn trophy back to Stamford Bridge, this man had used himself as fuel and burned himself down to nothing.
"The ambulance is already at the tunnel entrance." Paco stood up, his tone brook no argument. "The stretcher team is coming in immediately. You're going straight to St. Mary's Hospital for an MRI. You must stay overnight for observation."
"I'm not going."
A weak but stone-cold voice rang out.
Paco froze and turned his head. "What did you say?"
Lin Yuan stared at the ceiling, struggling to lift his right hand to grasp at the air.
"I said, I'm not going to the hospital."
His hand pointed toward the large table in the center of the dressing room.
There lay the spoils of war they had just brought back—the League Cup Trophy. The silver trophy with its three handles reflected a captivating cold light under the lamps, still draped with blue ribbons.
"Bring that thing... over here." Lin Yuan stared at the trophy, his eyes filled with a nearly pathological obsession.
"Are you crazy? Your leg..."
"Bring it over!"
Lin Yuan suddenly roared. Though his voice wasn't loud and cracked from the pain, the murderous aura that erupted in that instant caused the temperature in the entire dressing room to drop several degrees.
It was the command of a tyrant.
Mourinho took a deep breath. He turned and walked toward the table.
The veteran manager picked up the heavy trophy with both hands and walked step by step to Lin Yuan's side.
"Give it to him," Mourinho said to Paco. "If he doesn't touch this thing, his heart rate won't go down even if you tie him up and take him to the hospital."
Paco was so angry he slammed his stethoscope onto the floor, but in the end, he didn't stop them.
Lin Yuan reached out both hands. They were still trembling slightly, his fingernails filled with black soil.
The moment the cold metallic sensation traveled from his palms, Lin Yuan closed his eyes.
The sensation was very real, very hard, and very cold.
But this coldness felt like a searing iron, burning all the way into his heart.
All the pain, all the verbal abuse, all the sweat swallowed alone in the gym—at this moment, it all materialized into this heavy weight in his hands.
"It's so heavy..."
Lin Yuan sighed softly, clutching the trophy to his chest like a long-lost child.
He reopened his eyes and looked at Mourinho, his gaze regaining its usual clarity and arrogance.
"Boss, I'm not taking the ambulance."
"What?"
"We're going back to London, back to Cobham." Lin Yuan gritted his teeth, enduring the waves of sharp pain from his groin as he spoke word by word. "I'm going back with the team. Even if I have to lie on the floor of the bus."
"This is our trophy. I'm taking it back personally, not being dumped halfway like some casualty."
Mourinho looked at this hopelessly stubborn disciple.
He wanted to curse, to say this violated medical regulations, to say he was gambling with his career.
But looking into Lin Yuan's eyes—eyes that still glowed like a wolf's even while lying on a stretcher—all words of dissuasion got stuck in his throat.
This was a soldier he, Mourinho, had trained.
Sending him to the ambulance now would be an insult to his will.
"Fine." Mourinho turned away, wiping the corner of his eye, his voice somewhat choked. "Then we go back together."
He pointed to Reece James and Enzo standing nearby.
"You guys, come here."
"The stretcher is too narrow; it lacks prestige." Mourinho waved his hand. "Carry him out. Carry him to the bus. Let the reporters outside see how our champion goes home."
...Five minutes later.
The mixed zone at Wembley Stadium had not yet cleared. Reporters were waiting anxiously for the Chelsea players to appear, everyone wanting to know what happened to the 'Iron Man' who had fainted at the final whistle.
Suddenly, a commotion broke out at the tunnel entrance.
"They're out! They're out!"
All the cameras and microphones were instantly aimed at the exit.
Then, they captured a photo destined to be etched into the annals of English football history.
There was no wheelchair, no medical staff in white coats.
Four Chelsea players—Reece James, Enzo, Palmer, and Gallagher—were carrying a simple stretcher out as if they were bearing a king fallen in battle.
On the stretcher lay the man wearing the number 44 jersey.
His right leg was wrapped in thick ice packs and a stabilizer brace. His face was streaked with blood, and the wound on his brow was still seeping, making him look incredibly battered.
But he was not unconscious.
He lay half-propped up, death-gripping that silver League Cup Trophy in his arms.
The moment the flashes went off, Lin Yuan turned his head slightly.
He didn't dodge the cameras, nor did he show a pained expression.
Facing the frenzied reporters and the lenses of the world, he slowly raised one hand.
That hand was covered in scars, yet it firmly gave a thumbs-up.
Then, the man with the blood-stained face pulled back his lips on the stretcher, revealing a grim, arrogant, yet profoundly shocking smile.
Click! Click! Click!
The sound of shutters merged into a white sea of light.
A veteran reporter from The Times watched the image in his viewfinder, his hands trembling. He had been a sports reporter for thirty years and had photographed countless trophy-lifting moments—elegant ones, passionate ones, tearful ones.
But he had never seen a scene like this.
So tragic, yet so glorious.
"The Coronation of the Tyrant."
The veteran reporter murmured to himself, deciding on the headline for tomorrow's front page.
Under the gaze of hundreds of reporters and amidst the heart-wrenching cheers of the Chelsea fans who had yet to disperse outside the tunnel, Lin Yuan was carried onto the team bus by his teammates.
Before the bus door closed, Mourinho stood at the entrance and said only one sentence to the cameras:
"Someone asked me what the price was."
The'Special One' pointed to the bus behind him.
"This is the price. But if you ask him if he regrets it, I'll tell you—he's already thinking about the next trophy."
The bus slowly started, rolling over the puddles from the rain at Wembley, heading toward West London.
And in the very last row of the bus...
Lin Yuan lay on a temporary cushion. The trophy in his arms was still cold, but his blood was burning.
[System calculating...]
[Milestone achieved: The Blood-Stained Throne.]
[Achievement gained: Spirit of Wembley.]
[Chelsea Fan Reputation: Worship (MAX).]
Lin Yuan looked at the text flickering on his retina and closed his eyes tiredly.
Did it hurt?
It hurt like hell.
But he knew this was just the beginning.
This was only the first one.
There were even greater wars waiting for this broken but hardened body to conquer.
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