Chapter 1 The Match Begins

The match started quickly. Ye Xiu's home game single-player map selection was, as always, simple and direct, just a head-on confrontation. This was actually quite baffling. For veterans, their greatest weapon was experience, and choosing maps with more varied changes would be more beneficial to them. But Ye Xiu didn't. Relying on his unspecialized class playstyle, he always chose maps crudely, but so far, no one could stop him.

In this round of the match between Team Tyranny and Team Happy, there was no tit-for-tat arrangement. Zhou Zekai's first appearance, as Li Yibo said, was a very ordinary arrangement for Team Tyranny.

The character data loaded, and the map was clear at a glance. What else was there to say? Charge!

"Senior, it's not good for you to keep winning like this! You have to leave some room for us juniors to surpass you!" Jiang Botao sent a message to Ye Xiu in the public channel. Regarding voice chat, the league said they were discussing it, but they still hadn't come to a conclusion. Currently, everything was still as before. The important thing for the league wasn't the rules. Why did the league initially ban voice chat? It was to facilitate television broadcasts. Players couldn't communicate verbally, only through text, so the audience could see the players' interactions, tactical commands, and so on. There were interesting things among them. But if it was changed to voice chat, it wouldn't be so convenient for broadcasting. If the channel was divided into each team's channel and the public channel, which side's voice should be broadcast? After opening voice chat, the players' communication would be complete, but the audience's presentation wouldn't be able to capture every detail of the communication like before.

It was like this match now. Everyone loved to see the dialogue between the players. But if it really became voice chat, it would all depend on the director's switching, and many things would be missed.

The league was still discussing the matter with the broadcasters, and there was no conclusion yet. For the current matches, everyone continued to communicate with text.

"Of course!" Ye Xiu actually agreed with Jiang Botao's view, surprising everyone, but he quickly sent another message: "That's why I didn't play in the first round! No matter what, I can only win thirty-seven rounds in a row. Look, I've left one round of room for you to surpass me!"

"Let's have the match..." Jiang Botao wasn't trash-talking. He was just someone who liked to communicate with people, but now, facing Ye Xiu's words, he couldn't even chat.

"Perhaps you can just GG to help me out, Senior?" Ye Xiu was still saying.

"Senior, don't joke around," Jiang Botao said.

"Anyway, the result is the same!" Ye Xiu said.

"But you always have to try!" Jiang Botao wasn't anxious or impatient. Facing Ye Xiu's mockery, he could still chat sentence by sentence as if it were a normal conversation.

After a few words, the two characters met. Ye Xiu didn't let his unspecialized class, Lord Grim, with his long-range attack methods, rush to fire. Instead, he continued to close the distance. When he was about to step into the mid-range that the opponent's Spellblade could reach, Lord Grim suddenly sped up!

Skill movement!

This had become a signature skill of the unspecialized class, Lord Grim. Ye Xiu obviously didn't plan to engage in a long-range battle with his opponent, but planned to directly deal with his opponent up close. All along, Ye Xiu's Lord Grim had been playing like this. Even when facing opponents who could only fight up close, he had never used a kiting strategy to entangle with his opponent. He always tried to seize the initiative to the greatest extent, using all the means he could, whether it was long-range or close-range attacks.

At this moment, Arc Flash lit up, and Lord Grim instantly moved several positions forward. Jiang Botao obviously judged Ye Xiu's intention as well. Wulang retreated instead of advancing. While jumping back, the blade of the silver weapon, the Short Sword of Heavenly Chains, flipped up, and Ground-Crack Wave Sword swept out!

Jiang Botao, the vice-captain of Team Tyranny, who had won consecutive championships with Team Tyranny, had been steadily gaining popularity. But when it came to his personal technical level, he didn't have the distinct characteristics of many players. His playstyle was like chatting with someone, ordinary, not surprising, but not too low-key, ending the match naturally.

In other words, Jiang Botao's matches usually didn't have attacking climaxes that took away a lot of health. Instead, he accumulated small advantages to achieve the final victory. Players who lost to him often had the feeling of being "just a little bit away" whether they were leading or lagging, but in the end, they lost everything.

Initially, some people thought that Jiang Botao's calculating ability was amazing, but gradually, everyone realized that it wasn't the case. Rather than saying that his calculating ability was amazing, it was better to say that he didn't miss any details.

Jiang Botao was such a careful player. This was true in team battles and in individual competitions. He would carefully deal with any possibility in offense and defense. As a result, it was difficult for either side to achieve high-level combos in the match. If you considered it from this perspective, Jiang Botao really seemed to be targeting Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu's current unspecialized class duels were all about uninterrupted continuous attacks.

And now, Lord Grim was rushing up aggressively, but Jiang Botao had already prepared his defense. At the same time that Lord Grim used his skill to move, Wulang also jumped back and swept out a Ground-Crack Wave Sword.

Instantly, Lord Grim didn't seem to be using Arc Flash to close the distance, but rather seemed to be crashing into the Ground-Crack Wave Sword.

Too late to dodge, right? Ordinary players would think so, but in the eyes of professional players, although both skills were fast, there was still room.

Left?

Or right?

Jiang Botao stared at Lord Grim's movements. Wulang had already prepared his stance while jumping back, waiting for Lord Grim to dodge before sweeping out another Wave Sword.

In the end, it wasn't left, nor right. Lord Grim was still rushing forward like this, but his arms shook violently.

Steel Bones!

Ye Xiu didn't choose to dodge, but activated this Fighter's defensive skill for Lord Grim at this time. Defense enhancement could reduce damage, but for Ground-Crack Wave Sword, which could sweep away its target, the unyielding status of Steel Bones was the most annoying. Lord Grim continued to charge straight through the rolling sword intent.

But even so, it couldn't stop Wulang from continuing to attack. However, this unexpected move still slowed down Jiang Botao's reaction slightly. After all, his attention was originally focused on both the left and right sides.

As the silver weapon, Heavenly Chains, was about to be raised again, Lord Grim had already raised his hand and quickly thrown something.

Poof!

With just a soft sound, the purple smoke quickly spread out. Jiang Botao's vision instantly lost sight of Lord Grim.

Ninja Tool? Smoke Bomb!

Jiang Botao's actions stopped.

Under the cover of the thick smoke, he couldn't determine Lord Grim's location at all.

The thick smoke continued to spread. Was there any unusual movement?

Jiang Botao carefully observed. If a character moved in this thick smoke, it would definitely disrupt the free diffusion of the thick smoke. The traces of movement could be captured in this way.

But, there weren't any!

No movement?

Impossible! With the cover, how could Ye Xiu not launch an attack? Then there was only one possibility!

Jiang Botao flicked the mouse with his right hand, and his left hand quickly swept across the keyboard. Wulang turned around, retreated, and the blade of the silver weapon, Heavenly Chains, flipped outwards, Rippling Sword!

It was Shadow Clone Technique. Lord Grim would suddenly appear behind him.

Jiang Botao judged this way.

Thus, Rippling Sword was unleashed, carrying the sealed sword intent, and swept away a space in the purple smoke, but it didn't hit any target.

No Lord Grim.

So Jiang Botao instantly knew: Bad news…

A blood arrow shot out from Wulang's neck. Lord Grim had indeed approached him at this time, and delivered a Heart Stab without mercy.

Was it Shadow Clone Technique or some kind of movement skill? It didn't matter anymore. Jiang Botao only knew that Ye Xiu had played a perfect time difference. He had completely guessed Jiang Botao's response.

After the Heart Stab, the dagger in Lord Grim's hand flipped again, directly following up with an Assassin's class floating skill, Rising Strike, sending Wulang into the air.

Silver Light Falling Blade!

Wulang used this low-level Swordsman skill the moment he floated up, suddenly falling down.

But…

Cross Slash!

Two bloodstains took shape behind Wulang. He avoided being launched into the air, but he didn't dodge the attack that Lord Grim followed up with. This attack chased so quickly that it didn't wait for Wulang to fully float up, as if Jiang Botao's quick response was exactly what he wanted.

The combo began here.

"Guess how many hits I can get?" Ye Xiu even managed to squeeze out a sentence, of course, it was aimed at Jiang Botao, who rarely got hit with high-level combos.

"I don't think it will be too high," Jiang Botao actually replied. In this situation, he still had the mood to chat.

"Indeed, hit count is just fluff!" When Ye Xiu sent this message, the hit count was interrupted and reset to zero.

However, this didn't mean that Jiang Botao had a chance to escape. Because Ye Xiu's unspecialized Lord Grim's combos never pursued the data of the combo count, but only the effect.

Pseudo-combo! The continuous attacks were still perfectly connected.

"He's really difficult to deal with!" Jiang Botao sighed.

"Too many details, right?" Ye Xiu replied.

"Yes... too many," Jiang Botao said with a headache.

Jiang Botao was a bit restrained by Ye Xiu? It seemed that this was just a misunderstanding. The real situation was that Ye Xiu's unspecialized class was restrained by Jiang Botao. Because there were too many skills, too many combo methods, and too many changes, Jiang Botao's rhythm was slowed down in terms of thinking, as he tried not to miss any details. This was an opponent with so many details that his brain couldn't fully calculate everything.

Jiang Botao was defeated.

Although there was still a lot of struggle in between, it didn't affect the final result.

"Next time, bring a different opponent," Ye Xiu smiled. He saw how difficult it was for Jiang Botao to fight him.

"There's a next time?" Jiang Botao wondered. This was the second time the two teams had played this season, and the individual matches had already been played. Where would there be a next chance?

"Oh, if you don't make it to the playoffs, there won't be a next time," Ye Xiu said.

This bold assumption that Team Tyranny wouldn't make it to the playoffs left people speechless again.