Rise

This was the final hurdle! All High School 13 had to do was to win this best of three series against North High, and then they’d qualify for the Shanghai 16 School Tournament! Two games stood between them and their goal. They’d make sure it never even got to a third and deciding game! Two wins. Fast and clean. A stomp in game one to swing the series in their favour and then ride the momentum through the second game. Easy enough. But their opponents felt the same. North High wouldn’t let High School 13 walk all over them without putting up a fight. They would struggle for every inch! They would take game one and then game two! High School 13 wouldn’t win this series, they would! The players from both teams slowed their breathing as they zoned out everything but the monitor in front of them. Everyone but the players on their team. If they wanted to win, they had to find that competitive mindset and never lose focus!

《Welcome to Summoner’s Rift!》

Lin Feng and Tang Bingyao rushed down from the Red team’s fountain into bot lane. They stopped halfway in and ventured into the jungle. Opposite of the Blue buff camp was the Gromp. A lone monster. They waited for it to spawn and then killed it, juggling its aggro so as to take as little damage as possible. The experience from killing it would get them close to Level 2. A small advantage that could see them win the lane! Except for the fact that on the Blue team, North High’s Botlaners had the same idea. They were killing the monster camp closest to their bot lane, the Krugs; durable monsters of stone! This was a tactic often seen in professional play and was being copied more and more in regular games.

The minion waves in bot lane clashed. Lin Feng and Tang Bingyao had their Champions rush to lane to get as much experience as possible. While clicking towards the lane, Lin Feng looked over at Tang Bingyao and grinned. “Seems like they had the same idea. Doesn’t matter. Let’s crush them!” He didn’t care that the champion he decided to go with, Zyra, had fallen out of favour for a lot of players. They couldn’t do what he could! He would carry this game all the same!

“Mhm.” Tang Bingyao nodded. Her focus was on her screen. She was going to give it her all, like she always did. It was just… This stupid two-legged rat is ugly. Not cute at all. We have to end this game quickly. She’d started playing Twitch because Lin Feng told her to. He was the coach and she wouldn’t argue. But that didn’t mean she enjoyed playing Twitch. This stupid rat was one of the Champions she hated the most! I can’t let this drag on.

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Zeng Rui from Shanghai High School stood behind North High’s team. His gaze was firmly on their screens. This game had started normally. He looked at the Toplaner’s screen. He was fighting a Rumble with his Darius. Darius was a strong Champion in the current meta and had an advantage over Rumble during the early laning phase. But as long as Rumble followed two simple rules, he could still win. The first was to avoid Decimate, an ability where Darius would heft his axe and swing it around himself. The second was that Rumble needed precise management of his Heat, which was the resource that Rumble used to cast his abilities. If he kept to these two rules, then and only then, would he push the Darius out of lane and get an easy win.

Top lane could be fun to watch, but it wasn’t what Zeng Rui cared most about. That was bot lane. His evalutation of Lin Feng had gone down substantially after Lin Feng’s little outburst, but that didn’t change the facts. This cocky dumbass had played two games and carried hard in both of them. So Zeng Rui would devote some extra attention to the bot lane. He narrowed his eyes and focused on Lin Feng. Still grinning like an idiot… I can’t believe he’s any good… But. There’s that stupid word. But he did carry his team twice now. I should see if there’s anything I can learn from him.

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