Rise

The Beijing Esports Association had assembled a team of seven talented players for the Winter Collegiate Cup. None of these players needed any experience at the university level. They could skip straight to the LSPL! And that was precisely why the Beijing Esports Association had recruited them. Because only with a lineup like this could they clinch the Winter Collegiate Cup title and show to the Guangzhou and Shanghai Esports Associations that they were the strongest and most talented region in all of China!

Team Beijing had played a good number of games, including scrimmages against university teams and the first couple of games in the Winter Collegiate Cup. They won each of those games convincingly, quickly becoming a terrifying opponent for the other teams competing. But what really threw the teams in North China off was that Team Beijing was playing with their B lineup. Their two star players, the Midlaner and Toplaner, hadn’t played a single game yet! This was a tactic the Beijing Esports Association had come up with in preparation for the main tournament. No one would know just how good they were until it was already far too late to do anything about it!

The substitute Toplaner looked at Fan Yuan, the team’s manager, and shrugged. He glanced at his teammates and said, “I don’t know what you guys think, but…” He pointed at the replay they were watching on the projector. “That Toplaner is shit.” Why do I even need to spend time on this? I’m a Master in the Ionia server! And that Zhang Hao? Yeah, that dude is like Diamond… His Fiora sucked hard. Fucking waste of my time watching this!

Fan Yuan nodded and said, “Thanks for sharing your insights.” He then turned to the others and asked, “What about you guys? Anything to add to that?”

Team Beijing’s ad-carry stretched his back and rubbed the sleep from his eyes. He yawned and said, “I don’t know. Those Botlaners are a terrible match. It doesn’t really matter how good they are individually, they can’t play together for shit. All I could see were the glaring mistakes they kept making because of communication issues. If they play like that? We don’t even have to try.”

Fan Yuan slapped the ruler in his palm. He took a deep breath, looking at each of the team members in turn. “Stop this. Sit up straight. Watch the footage.” He slapped the ruler behind him, where the beamer was projecting the replay of Team Shanghai’s game against the East China University of Science and Technology for a second time. “Look at what they’re doing right! We’re not going to underestimate them! We’re going to study them, and then when we play them, we’re going to tear them apart!” He narrowed his eyes and added, “Don’t forget. They beat Shanghai University of Finance 2-0 a while back. That’s a strong team.”

“The way I see it,” Team Beijing’s Support started. He pushed his glasses up the rim of his nose, irritated, and then looked straight at Fan Yuan. “The way I see it, Team Shanghai tricked them. Their Support is Zeng Rui, yeah? He’s a Challenger and I’m guessing the captain of the team. He has a decent idea about shotcalling. Not at all strange that they won against the Shanghai University of Finance. And that university team most likely underestimated Zeng Rui’s team as well. There really isn’t a whole lot to it. Zeng Rui used the little skill he has to trick Shanghai University of Finance. I don’t see why we need to spend time on this.” He chuckled and added, “Can’t wait to kick that noob’s fat ass though.”

Team Beijing’s ad-carry glanced at his Support, surprised. What’s got him all worked up? He never talks this much… And what the fuck was that laugh? But, hmm, a Challenger Support? Team Shanghai is better than I expected then. We shouldn’t underestimate any Challenger. Fan Yuan is right to tell us we need to prepare. He looked at his Support and asked, “Zhang Hongyi, how good do you think he realistically is? A Challenger is impressive. We can’t just push that aside.”

Zhang Hongyi turned his head to look at his ad-carry and snorted. How good? Not good enough to worry me! I would’ve also been Challenger by now if there isn’t a hard cap of 200 players! I’m at the top of Master! Screw that noob’s fat ass! He finally said, “Don’t worry about him. I got this.”