walking in the dark scaring one of their teammates

reliably KO other volleyball players, with no consequence because apparently it "wasn't his fault". In real life, this would be extremely dangerous because KO'ing someone without any head protection means concussion, which is a serious life-altering event with permanent physical sequlae, even risking death. Of course, when MC does this on live television, the author doesn't take this into consideration despite their moralizing about so many other things. Because the MC's fighting skills are used to show off how he can't be bullied even though he's "short", he's not just a "weak Asian", the stereotype of "weak Asians" is just racism, MC is manly and sporty even though he's beautiful and cute, etc. Lots of extreme insecurity and of course above is repeated over and over again in asides throughout the story.

Fu Yiban (?) running into the mafia because he's in Italy and saving his teammates from a shooting.

Their insane language learning skills. MC becomes actually fluent in Russian basically from scratch in one season, while studying for exams and playing volleyball competitively and training.

ML who is 19 years old and has no real business experience other than being an idol takes over a billion dollar business and pushes out his bio dad (owner of said business) and his uncle. He passes the A-Levels, SAT, and gaokao with near perfect scores despite dropping out of highschool at age 15 to become an idol. And he's a master-level chef, and he plays like 6 different instruments, despite spending his childhood lifting refrigerators, amongst other things.

MC has some kind of special blood that can be made into a vaccine that will save everyone from coronavirus.

In short, there are two types of soulmate pairs and they can be identified by a brain wave scanner. There are dominant soulmates, where both parties will experience total color blindness until they met each other. And there are recessive soulmates, where both parties are pretty much normal humans until met their fated pair. A countdown mark will appear in random places of their bodies and they were not able to talk to each other until said countdown was over. The countdown time varies and will tick down as long as the pair were within a certain range (also varies) of each other. Keep in mind that this type of soulmate will be the one that mainly appears in the novel (tbh, I don't remember there's a soulmate pair with the first type either unless you count that lying b*stard who pretends to be one with ML's lil bro).

One thing the soulmate types share is that anyone one of them will be color-blind if their respective pair died. And keep in mind that being a soulmate doesn't automatically mean it's a romantic thing, which is where a second type grouping of soulmates is based from. Here we separate soulmates into 4 different dynamics: lover-soulmate, family-soulmate, friend-soulmate, and rival-soulmate. There's no exact way to determine this (except for the family ones, cuz y'know... they are most likely siblings) so the pair had to patiently discover their dynamic on their own. So yeah, not all soulmates are better off as each other spouse, there's even a case where a boy-girl soulmate pair were pressured into a relationship by the public and they ends up breaking up.

• • MC's older sister who are talented in many aspects and is a model student, but has a somewhat lazy temperament (lmao, her boyfriend and future husband basically dotes on her and does all the chores except washing her underwear, which she did on her own) yet still strict and wise to her younger brother if the situation needs to be (examples is, reminding MC of essential protection when she gets the news that he and ML were finally together lol)

• • MC's mother mostly does the child-rearing yet she was a mechanic and soon-to-be the owner of her own automotive company (MC's dad is a scientist so he is rarely at home, but when he does he takes care of all of the housework though).

• • MC's mentors, twin sisters who were supposed to be at the forefront of woman's volleyball but unfortunately one of them was diagnosed with cancer, thus technically only one of the sisters was MC's mentor in past lives, but the sick one can be said to be his spiritual mentor. MC inherited her wristband to pass on her unfulfilled will. Btw despite being terminally sick, the woman was a very fun person lol, she was a furry, made her own fursuits (which the ML later commissioned for his 'undercover'), and even writes web novels/fics, like jeez, how much talent did the gurl have XD

• • The mom of one of MC's teammates. She's a medical expert of an investigation team/government body who had been stalked and imprisoned (r*ped) by her stalker but fortunately saved by a policewoman that turned out to be her soulmate. After she sued the hell out of her stalker, she and the policewoman soon marries and decided to raise the unborn baby AKA MC's teammates. Loves dynamic we've peeked on their daily lives.

• • ML's non-biological sister, she's just a sweetheart tbh. Almost cried when she and ML had to eventually parted ways after the truth was out. I'm happy ML & MC found her a suitable happy home not soon after though (you gonna be surprised about who her new family gonna be :)

• • The diving athlete who was confessed with her ugly af photos on huge display in an airship lmao. She has quite a rough past too, but she overcomes it, which will be one of MC's driving forces to keep on fighting in his past life.

-ML's little brother x a certain team doctor (yes ML's lil bro become a top, it's funny cuz the doctor was also a top in his previous relationship lol). Lmao, their interaction is so f*cking hilarious every time they appear. Y'all gonna love this if you're into enemies-to-lovers and age-gap XD Their first meeting especially, like the whole f*cking studio were in turmoil in the discovery of the doctor's soulmate mark after so many failed relationships he had. They even almost want to call the city tv broadcast just to find his soulmate. And it turns out his (the doctor) soulmate is the brat he fought at the bathroom stall lol.

-An ace foreign volleyball athlete x a retired local volleyball athlete (btw this guy is an exotic beauty, with dark/tanned skin and tattoos to I remember right (or is it piercing?)). Love how they are both unsure about themself at first (even if they know how hot their self are) because of cultural differences, and then when the confession came they just laugh it off in the end. Chris (if the name of the foreign athlete was not wrong in mtl) has such a sweet mouth smh, so it was a surprise he planned to be a nurse after he retires, like, imagine a dashing man with god carved body running around in a hospital XD

-That polo ball pair-players (or is it table tennis?) who were a negative distance soulmates pair lol. These guys has more enemies-to-lovers energies than the lil bro pair, moreover, their distance is negative 15-20 cm lmao, not even a kiss will reach that, so... ;)

From his childhood, he had to bear the burden of his whole family by himself in a remote village, with a supposedly absent father, a mentally challenged mother, and a little sister who still needs his protection. At one point in time in his teenage year, he saw his mother getting "bullied" and decided that it is enough, and goes on to fight those men with a machete (it was uncertain whether he kills or not in this accident), then subsequently escape from the village into the city with his mother in his back and his sister on tow. Even after escaping that village, his life was still riddled with the darkness of society as he tries hard to survive and not be integrated into the filth.

After he realizes he likes ML, he directly shows his affection to ML by various romantic means. One of which I'm very moved about is how he'll wait for ML after work and serves his dinner as a waiter, y'know, with candles, roses, and all of that, like dayum, this guy has moves. Btw at first MC want to 'officially' confess to ML in a grand way at a theater, but the plan changed and their confession and first kiss were in a Lego shop lmao.

Yep ML will attend MC's competition in a sheep fursuit lmao. Bro is so desperate that one time he ends up with a high fever because of it.

Yeah, that's just one of the author's (minor) weaknesses. Sometimes she just adds outrageous settings to her main characters at the end for some reason. Though, I'm going to think it's because the author was going for something bigger. So, almost all of the author's work was set in the same universe, with the rebirth caused by the main characters' death in their previous life, while time travel happens because of unknown natural (?) phenomena. All of these novels were in a modern setting, logical, with no superpowers whatsoever (well, except for their time travel and rebirth). What was different though, in the author's newest novel, there's a hint of an actual god or at least supernatural existence in this universe. And you see, almost all of her main characters work in untapped territories of Earth that were the source of countless prototypes and urban legends (one MC works in a space station, while in this novel, Qin Chunxiao gonna works as a marine biologist in the artic). All of these point to a perhaps future plot?

- QCX is such a treat of a protagonist. He's spirited, driven, hard-working, considerate, and caring. Although he's blessed with natural athletic prowess and the foreknowledge that comes with rebirth, he never slacks off in his daily training or personal management. Furthermore, even though he often acts as the pillar of the teams he plays for, he respects both his teammates and opponents and never looks down on them just because he's a reborn person. He heeds the words of his friends, family members, seniors, and coaches and he is genuinely grateful for the wisdom and opportunities that he receives. I think the author does a wonderful job of portraying him as an emotionally mature adult because I've seen too many insufferable novels where reborn and transmigrated protagonists with adult souls regress into IQ deficient 12 year olds because they're in younger bodies.

- Since the story isn't too focused on romance, LXD is eclipsed by QCX as a lead but I also liked his character a lot as a romantic interest. Although LXD falls in love with QCX first, he pursues the latter thoughtfully and cautiously and never crosses any boundaries he shouldn't. For example, he goes to see QCX's games disguised as a mascot character in order to not disturb the surroundings as a public figure. His love is like a gentle stream that quietly polishes the edges in his beloved's heart. It was super heartwarming to see how they slowly transitioned from internet confidantes to friends to finally lovers. I adored the chapters right before they officially get together because they're so fluffy and sweet I almost died of envy.

- Besides our leads, there is a whole cast of colourful characters who are all incredibly endearing (this was very reminiscent of the cast of Haikyuu to me). I'm a big fan of Li Ling who is the best silly golden retriever best friend anyone could ever want. The side pairings were cute too.

- The volleyball knowledge was explained in a way that was relatively easy to understand and the matches weren't that hard to follow even through MTL.

- I really appreciated the fact that the author wasn't xenophobic because sometimes it's so hard to read Chinese sports/esports themed novels since all the foreigners are stereotypically depicted as ignorant and racist villains who deserve to lose every game they play and the Chinese are glorified as perfect superior underdogs. While there were still some moments where the patriotism jumped out, this is probably the only Chinese sports story I've seen where Japanese and Korean people aren't demonized.

- The mechanics of soulmates in this world is super confusing and hard to follow. The information is dispensed to readers sporadically and it's not until the very end that it is fully explained how soulmates work. Honestly, I don't think we needed the soulmate trope in this novel at all. It didn't really add to anything besides the fact that it gave the leads an excuse to meet each other. Had the author really wanted to use the soulmate trope I think she should've made it a bigger part of the story right from the get go.

- There were so many competitions and a lot of them had similar names which isn't really the author's fault because I think she referred to actual competitions. However, at a certain point I didn't know which trophy they were competing for anymore.

- QXC having a supernaturally good immune system to the extent that they could study his blood to develop a vaccine to prevent the spread Covid was a weird turn of events. It was nice to see a world where Covid wasn't a big problem but also just super bizarre.