Chapter 145 The Quarterfinals

Saturday morning, January 14th, Los Angeles time, early morning of January 15th, Jingzhou local time.

Today was the day for the IOI Global Finals semi-finals, and the FV team was ready.

At the hotel, Ye Zhizhou, Bao Xu, and others waved goodbye to the team members as they boarded the minibus.

The backstage area of the competition venue had limited space, not enough for everyone, and Ye Zhizhou, Bao Xu, and others had completed their data analysis work, so they could take a break.

Lao Zhou, as the coach, took some of the tactical team to the venue, while Ye Zhizhou and the others were free to do as they pleased.

Of course, if new tactics emerged after the semi-finals, they would still need to continue analyzing and providing tactical support for the FV team.

A week had passed since the quarter-finals. During this week, many European and American teams had sent invitations to the FV team for practice matches, but the FV team's response was consistent: Sorry, our practice matches are already fully scheduled.

This wasn't exactly a lie, as the FV team had indeed filled their schedule with practice matches against SUG and their own second team, training for more than ten hours every day.

It was just that the FV team was unwilling to change their training plan and play against these European and American teams.

"Want to grab a drink?" Ye Zhizhou suggested.

The others readily agreed and went to a small bar nearby. This bar would broadcast the IOI Global Finals live, making it the perfect place to watch the matches while enjoying a drink.

However, they didn't notice that in the corner of the lobby lounge on the first floor of the hotel, a Westerner with thinning hair was silently drinking coffee while paying close attention to the FV team's movements.

Eric looked at the FV team's massive support staff and couldn't help but fall into deep thought.

Some time ago, Eric's failure to promote the IOI national server had greatly disappointed the Dayak Corporation, so they replaced him with Cretian to be responsible for the operation of the IOI national server.

The domestic market was too large, and no multinational corporation wanted to give it up.

After taking office, Cretian made a series of bold changes, including modifying the gameplay of IOI and cooperating with Longyu Corporation. Currently, it was still too early to say whether it was a success or failure, but at least the momentum had been built up.

Therefore, Cretian's credibility was unprecedentedly solid in the eyes of the Dayak Corporation's senior management.

This was very difficult for Eric to accept.

He was also a senior executive of the Dayak Corporation and couldn't be directly dismissed. His job and position within the company were guaranteed.

However, everyone who could reach this position was ambitious. Seeing Cretian doing better and better in his former position, Eric certainly found it hard to accept.

Eric didn't give up. Instead, he chose to bide his time, silently monitoring the battle between GOG and IOI while waiting for an opportunity to strike.

Although the current situation was very disadvantageous for Eric, and it seemed to outsiders that he had no chance of a comeback, Eric didn't think so.

Because before returning to Los Angeles, he had carefully and thoroughly investigated Tengda's various methods of promoting GOG, and had even had a conversation with President Pei.

Eric was very clear that no matter how well Cretian was doing now, he couldn't succeed.

Because Cretian had no idea how terrifying President Pei really was.

Eric was very clear that the methods Cretian was currently using, including changing the game and holding competitions, were all things that President Pei had already used to death. How could you succeed by using President Pei's methods to deal with President Pei?

Obviously, President Pei's counterattack had already begun imperceptibly, and the FV team was the solution President Pei had found.

From the domestic IOI qualifiers to the FV team's series of "performances" in the World Championship, it seemed that President Pei's shadow was faintly visible. However, Eric didn't intend to tell Cretian or the senior management of the Dayak Corporation about his judgment.

For Eric, his own interests were far greater than those of the fingertip company. Handing over valuable intelligence now wouldn't win him the greatest leverage, and it might not even be adopted.

Eric took a sip of coffee and got up to leave.

After the IOI Global Finals, the second round of the confrontation between Dayak Corporation and Tengda Corporation should determine the winner.

…

At the same time, Jingzhou.

Pei Qian had already gotten up and was eating breakfast while waiting for the IOI Global Finals to begin.

After entering the semi-finals and finals, the competition schedule was much more friendly to domestic players. After all, only one best-of-five match was played each day, allowing for more freedom in terms of time arrangement.

"This opponent in the semi-finals looks quite fierce, hopefully they'll be of some use, right?"

"It wouldn't be too much to ask for you guys to win one small game against the FV team, would it?"

Pei Qian inexplicably had some small expectations.

There was still some time before the start of the match, and the screen was still looping through the FV team and their opponents' highlights from the quarter-finals to warm up the atmosphere.

Pei Qian ate breakfast while watching the live stream's comments.

"FV, give it your all! Add oil!" (Add oil is a Chinese expression of encouragement)

"We don't ask you to improve, just keep up the same level as in the quarter-finals, and another 3:0!"

"Add oil, add oil, add oil!"

But even at this critical moment before the start of the foreign war, there were still trolls constantly causing trouble, continuing to spam phrases like "GOG is just entertaining itself."

Pei Qian couldn't help but sigh at how dedicated these water armies were. Longyu Corporation must have paid them a lot of money.

Of course, there might be some people who weren't water armies, just pure trolls.

But the water armies were paid to do their job, while the trolls didn't get any money. Why were they working so hard? It was baffling.

Pei Qian had just taken a sip of his drink when he suddenly saw a comment that almost made him spit out all the drink in his mouth.

"Don't argue with the keyboard warriors, go argue with the Arguing Machine!"

"Aeeis Fully Automatic Arguing Machine, satisfies all your arguing needs!"

"The Arguing Machine is so much fun, I recommend every keyboard warrior get one."

"Are there still so many people being baited by the trolls? You're too young. Buy an Arguing Machine to train your mindset. After arguing with the Arguing Machine, you'll find that the trolls' skill level is too low, not even worth arguing with!"

Watching the direction of the comments inexplicably shift, Pei Qian was dumbfounded.

"What's going on? How did the topic switch to the Arguing Machine?"

"When I looked on Friday, I didn't see many sales?"

Pei Qian had been busy at the company for the past two days, checking on the work of various departments, and hadn't been paying attention to the Arguing Machine. As a result, something had happened without him noticing!

He quickly grabbed his phone, opened the store, and found that the mobile phone store alone had sold more than 300 units!

Moreover, this was just the number of purchases made by Otto phone owners. The fully automatic intelligent Arguing Machine was also sold on some other shopping platforms, and Otto Technology's official website was also selling it. If you added it all together, the sales were very impressive!

"Could it be that Chang You didn't listen to me and still promoted it?"

Pei Qian quickly searched online, but couldn't find any promotion for the fully automatic Arguing Machine at all.

"This is weird, it seems to have become popular inexplicably, and it seems to have started from the game forums?"

"Damn it! Old Qiao!"

After searching for a long time, Pei Qian finally found Qiao Liang's Weibo post, and gritted his teeth in anger.

But he looked closely at the comments and reposts of this Weibo, and they weren't high either?

Clearly, Qiao Liang had played a role in fueling the popularity of the fully automatic intelligent Arguing Machine, but it wasn't the main reason.

This thing seemed to have become popular naturally, without a particularly obvious broadcasting node, but everyone seemed to be particularly fond of it.

Pei Qian was completely clueless and couldn't understand why everyone liked this thing.

In Pei Qian's confusion, the match officially began.

The two commentators were also in top form, trying their best to drive the atmosphere in the venue and showering the FV team with lavish praise.

Although the FV team wasn't liked by the official IOI, they were after all the only remaining domestic team. If they didn't praise FV, would they praise the foreign teams? That definitely wouldn't be appropriate.

Pei Qian could only comfort himself: "It's okay, keep hyping them up, try to jinx the FV team..."

The match quickly entered the banning and picking phase.

On the FV team's side, coach Lao Zhou was holding a small notebook, his expression relaxed and calm. The team members were also chatting and laughing, seemingly without any pressure.

The pre-match mentality was very important. A serious and earnest attitude was certainly important, but being too tense could cause the team members to be restrained and underperform.

Moreover, the FV team had made thorough preparations in terms of tactics, and the team members were in excellent form, so of course they were full of confidence.

On the other hand, the opponent's condition was also full of confidence.

In particular, the opposing coach, standing behind his team members with a small notebook, looked like he was planning a strategy, with an air of high spirits.

This coach looked to be in his early thirties, with a neatly trimmed beard, wearing a suit and leather shoes. He looked very reliable.

Pei Qian breathed a sigh of relief. They had reached the semi-finals, and there were indeed no weak teams.

The quarter-finals were played a week ago, and the opponent must have repeatedly studied the match recordings and found ways to counter the FV team.

The banning phase was normal. The opponent banned the heroes that the FV team had performed well with in the quarter-finals. Then it was the FV team's turn to pick first.

Then, the FV team unexpectedly picked a hero with a zero percent appearance rate in this World Championship.

The camera focused on the opposing coach, whose expression changed from confident to doubtful, then to confused and bewildered.

He looked at the game screen in disbelief, almost thinking he was seeing things.

Then, he began to communicate frantically with his team members.

Although they were speaking in English, and the content of these exchanges wouldn't be released, the audience could still roughly imagine what he was saying.

"Can you deal with this hero?"

"Which lane does it go to?"

"This should be specifically targeting a popular system. Which system is it targeting..."

The coach was completely confused. He didn't understand why FV wanted to pick this hero, and they had never played against this hero in practice matches before!

The picking time ticked by second by second. The opposing team clearly hadn't figured it out, and finally chose two heroes they thought were strong in the current version, playing the tactics they were best at and most familiar with.

However, this seemed to be exactly what the FV team wanted. Lao Zhou, with almost no hesitation, had his team members instantly lock in two more heroes, specifically targeting the tactics that the opponent was good at!

This instant lock directly created a powerful psychological deterrent effect.

One side considered carefully until the time ran out before locking in the hero, while the other side locked in without hesitation, showing a clear difference in skill.

Pei Qian sighed with some melancholy, deeply worried about the fate of the opposing team.