Chapter 126 Weeds

Hidden in the audience, carefully watching the match, were three players from Team Tiny Herb: Xu Bin, Liu Xiaobie, and Gao Yingjie.

Although the Liuli Song Stadium wasn't their home ground, B City was still Tiny Herb's territory. Finding so many people cheering enthusiastically for other teams in their own backyard made Liu Xiaobie, a native of B City and a Tiny Herb player, feel somewhat out of place.

"Happy's first elimination barely did any damage to the opponent. The following matches will be tough," Xu Bin, who had been paying close attention to the game, said. After all, he had only transferred to Tiny Herb a year ago and wasn't a local, so he didn't feel the same connection as Liu Xiaobie.

"Yeah, who would have thought..." Liu Xiaobie finally shifted his focus back to the match and sighed. Speaking of Soft Mist, who in the pro scene had more experience with her than the guys from Tiny Herb? Back when the tenth server had just opened, they had met this girl while using their level twenty-something alts.

Back then, Soft Mist was a complete newbie. And now? Less than a year and a half later... This experience made the Tiny Herb players not dare to underestimate Tang Rou in the slightest. In fact, if Tang Rou hadn't been such an anomaly among Glory players, she might have been Liu Xiaobie's teammate right now—what Glory player would refuse an invitation from the championship team, Tiny Herb?

"I wonder who Happy will send out next?" Xu Bin speculated. The players of Happy were not strangers to them at all. During the recent battle for the new Boss in the game, these pro players had taken turns going up against the Happy players, gaining a good understanding of them. A professional match would only offer two opportunities to face each other if both teams didn't advance to the playoffs. Yet, in the Boss battles, they faced Happy's players roughly once a week. And that was with all the teams rotating their players.

"Qiao Yifan probably won't be in the individual competition, right?" Liu Xiaobie said, glancing at Gao Yingjie. He knew that the two youngsters were very close, and he was also aware that Gao Yingjie had come today mostly for Qiao Yifan.

"Given Happy's current situation, they might put him in," Xu Bin said. He had arrived after Qiao Yifan had already transferred, so they hadn't met, but after Qiao Yifan rose to prominence in Happy, his name was mentioned quite a bit in Tiny Herb, and Xu Bin understood what kind of person he was.

"It's not Yifan..." Gao Yingjie shook his head because he had seen that the player who had stood up from Happy's bench to prepare for the match wasn't Qiao Yifan.

Mo Fan was making his second official appearance for Happy since the match against Team Mysterious.

"How does the atmosphere of a match like this feel?" Ye Xiu asked Mo Fan, who had stood up to prepare to go on stage.

Mo Fan had been ignoring everyone and was about to head toward the player booth. Hearing Ye Xiu's question, he hesitated and stopped. Without turning his head, he stood there for a long while before answering, "Too noisy." Then, he continued toward the player booth.

At that moment, Tang Rou returned from the player booth and brushed past Mo Fan. The two didn't have any deep conversation. Tang Rou said, "Good luck," and Mo Fan only nodded slightly.

Back on the bench, Tang Rou's face was naturally filled with frustration and unwillingness. Chen Guo racked her brain for a long time but couldn't think of how to comfort her. This match had been too embarrassing. Based on the amount of health remaining on Xiao Shiqin's Life Extinguisher, Tang Rou had suffered a crushing defeat. She couldn't even salvage it with a "noble defeat," which made things difficult for Chen Guo.

"How do you feel?" As she hesitated, she heard Ye Xiu ask simply and directly.

"Depressed," Tang Rou said.

"Hehe, it's nothing. A player of Xiao Shiqin's caliber, even in the entire league, no one would dare to say they could definitely beat him. There are always wins and losses in matches," Ye Xiu said.

"I know that," Tang Rou nodded. She wasn't so naive as to believe there was someone truly invincible. The hard truth of competition was that if you walk by the river all the time, you're bound to get your shoes wet.

"But I can't do anything against him," Tang Rou said. That was what truly frustrated her. She couldn't take the initiative at all in the entire match and was completely led by the nose by her opponent. That feeling of having power but nowhere to use it was just awful.

"If this problem could be solved with a few words, I would have told you before you went on stage. You're facing a player of the highest level in Glory. If he had some huge loophole that could be easily exploited, he wouldn't be where he is today. Work hard to improve, comprehensively strengthen yourself. From now on, there will be no more shortcuts," Ye Xiu said.

Tang Rou stared at the stage, where a replay of the match was being projected. But there were no intense or exciting highlights in this match. The one she created shortly after the start might have counted, but considering the final result of the match, the impact of that brilliant moment was naturally diminished.

"Glory... is really hard..." Tang Rou sighed, watching Soft Mist's figure on the field, unable to use her strength.

"That's what makes it interesting, isn't it?" Ye Xiu said.

"Yeah," Tang Rou nodded, her gaze already shifting to the second round match that was about to begin. One loss had struck her hard, but it would also inspire her to chase after victory. She had already started to learn from other people's matches.

As the projection screen appeared, the duel for the second match officially began. There wouldn't be a change of map in the individual competition; only the character's spawn point would change randomly, but overall, they would be diagonally opposite each other.

"Deception, huh..." Xiao Shiqin watched the second player that Happy sent out. Because this was only his second time participating, information on Mo Fan was naturally scarce. But in that single match, Mo Fan's characteristics had already been displayed vividly.

Xiao Shiqin had studied that match, but at this moment, he didn't dare to relax in the slightest.

In the previous match, he faced Tang Rou, a player who frequently played and who had enough data to be studied. In Xiao Shiqin's eyes, Tang Rou's style basically didn't have many tactical elements. It was simply using straightforward and violent methods to destroy the opponent's rhythm, and then re-establish a new rhythm. Once she succeeded in this process, her opponents would be quite passive. This girl's mechanical skill alone was already at the level of a professional player.

Xiao Shiqin believed that he had figured out Tang Rou's characteristics, but in the match against Tang Rou, he was still destroyed by Tang Rou's rhythm. The unreasonable and aggressive style showed an attitude that was far more forceful than Xiao Shiqin had expected. Fortunately, he wasn't some random passerby who hadn't experienced battle. After Tang Rou destroyed his rhythm, he was the one who re-established a new rhythm, not Tang Rou.

With this lesson, Xiao Shiqin had to re-examine his judgment. Was his evaluation of Happy's players still too conservative?

A Tang Rou with lots of data and who had been studied more thoroughly was already like this. So, was Mo Fan, who had only been observed through one match, also hiding even greater potential?

"Alright, the match begins now. Xiao Shiqin is still using tactical positioning. And his opponent, Happy's Mo Fan, has only had one appearance in this offline match, or rather, in the entire Challenger League. Director Li, I wonder if you watched that match?" Pan Lin opened the conversation as the match began.

"Of course, that match was quite memorable. It can be seen that the player Mo Fan has extraordinary patience, and his grasp of the timing for advancing and retreating is quite precise," Li Yibo said.

"Hehe, actually, just from Deception's character name, I think many viewers probably know that he's a well-known scavenger in the Heavenly Domain. Director Li, do you think his style and habits were developed during the process of scavenging?" Pan Lin said.

"I think it's possible to think of it that way," Li Yibo said eloquently. "Patience, seizing the opportunity, and escaping unscathed. These are indeed the qualities that a scavenger should have."

"However, we should talk less about this topic," Pan Lin said.

"Yes, yes, watch the match, watch the match." Li Yibo immediately stopped talking about it. After all, scavenging wasn't a commendable behavior, and it wasn't a good message to talk about the art of scavenging here.

The two sides in the match both adopted tactical positioning, circling towards the center of the map.

So, the place where the two characters should have met was now empty. Mo Fan's Deception was curled up on the roof of a building here, quietly peering in all directions. What about Xiao Shiqin's Life Extinguisher? He had stopped some distance away and hadn't revealed his character. Instead, he released a mechanical eye, which floated along the base of the wall.

The mechanical eye's field of vision wasn't as wide as a character's. Within the limited lens, Xiao Shiqin carefully observed the surroundings. Not long after, the screen flashed a burst of static, and the mechanical eye's perspective disappeared.

"Worthy of being a scavenger with keen observation skills!" Pan Lin exclaimed.

"Yes, to be able to see such a small mechanical eye, it's truly amazing eyesight," Li Yibo said.

"And such a long distance, such a small target, this shuriken is also thrown with great precision!" Pan Lin said.