Glory [e-sports]

translator: xiin

editor: apricot

The words ‘decisive game’ carried its own innate sense of thrill.

In a BO5 game, a fifth match greatly tested the players. It was a huge test of their physical strength, concentration, spirit, and even psychological endurance.

Each of the matches, including the BP segment, lasted for a full hour. After playing four matches, and taking into account the resting time, it would have already been four and a half hours!

At this time, they would be faced with the final decisive moment, the key to victory or defeat, the turning point where they would either be able to continue to battle on or end up making a lonely exit…

This physical and mental stress was enough to crush a person.

Not to mention, this was also a full-game BP model. If they relaxed even slightly, it might mean the difference between heaven and earth. It wasn’t just the players; even the coaches were nervous, worried that they would leave the team with regrets.

The commentators took advantage of this break to drink some water and moisten their throats, but their voices were still a bit hoarse when they spoke. Eurostar had been sitting on this small bench for five hours, and his waist was even starting to get sore.

Professional players sat on relatively comfortable chairs, but when watching this kind of competition, they would often end up tense from head to toe, which made it difficult for them to relax.

The audience who were watching the game were also very nervous. “It’s the decisive match; they’ll be too damned wronged if they lose!”

“Who would be wronged? FTW or L&P? Lu Feng or Yuan Ze?”

“Fellow sisters, talk if you want to talk. Why do you have to send out knives?”

The entire world was concerned, but the players in the arena who should have been feeling very tired were all full of energy.

FTW had just won a match, playing with so much enthusiasm it was like they’d been injected with chicken blood. It was likely that the four little ones had even forgotten that this was the decisive match and had forgotten that this was the last battle of the day.

L&P were obviously left dazed for a while after losing the fourth match, but it was unknown what had been said within their team that caused them to all sit up straight and look even more serious than they had for any of the previous four matches.

The commentators didn’t dare to say anything about L&P, but the audience commented objectively. “This is the style of a strong team. The more frustrated they are, the braver they are. They can still energize themselves and go all out when they’re forced into a desperate situation by the younger generation!”

Of course, there was no shortage of haters. “Haha, go all out? Forced by the FTW that had fallen to their knees at the finals last year to go all out? L&P should reflect on themselves. If a storm has weakened to this point, they might as well go back to grazing and milking on a farm!”

Amidst the tense breathing of countless people, the BP began.

It was already the fifth game, and there was no holding back despite the limited choices. The decisive match wasn’t a battle of freedom, but it had the feel of a battle of freedom.

Talents were released from the ban positions, and there was no way to compete over who took what. Fortunately, both sides had kept some cards in hand, and they were still able to pull out some strong talents even now.

When the line-up came out, it was like a fire had been lit up under the audience, too.

Take a look at FTW: death knight, shadow thief, spirit mage, elemental shaman, gun launcher.

Double dark plus double spirit (spirit mage and the agile gun launcher), paired with a top tier support, the elemental shaman. This followed the trend of bombing the arena!

L&P didn’t lose out much at all: berserker warrior, hidden thief, immortal warlock, holy priest, and storm hunter.

The ‘hidden berserker’ combo could use their ultimates to start team fights and could also make sneak attacks by stabbing knives in their enemies’ backs. It was one of L&P’s classic top-jungler combinations. The immortal warlock and storm hunter were a godly c-position pairing, one flying up in the sky and clouds as the other showed off with rain in the air. They were all dazzling, godly talents!

Then rounding it out with Mo’s holy priest, who could heal, control, look good, and fight (not really), made for a perfect line-up!

It was difficult for the ordinary members of the audience to calculate what talents had been used, and they’d originally thought that the teams would have a tough time in the last match––if the decisive match ended up being weak chickens pecking at each other, not only would the fans flame the coaches, but they would also head over to kill the competition committee.

What a stupid competition system; did they want people to watch the competition or not!

However the situation at hand proved that the coaches were badass and that the competition committee hadn’t underestimated the players.

The talent pool was full of tricks, and the five matches had all played out differently, making them more exciting to watch.

When they arrived at the decisive game, they had to dig out what was at the bottom of the box and really go all out!

Commentator Brother Mouth was a bit excited. “The death knight is up against the berserker warrior. There will be fighting in the top lane in this match!”

Eurostar smiled like a fox. “I heard that Close’s death knight was single-handedly trained up by Marshal.”

Brother Mouth was an old fan, too. “It’s true that the Team of Gods opened up a new path for the death knight as a jungler.”

The death knight was a relatively early stage talent. It had always been used in the top-lane before, but later, Close had used it to play jungler with the Team of Gods, opening up a new realm of possibilities.

No one knew why Close would have wanted to fight in the jungle with the death knight. At first, everyone thought that the Team of Gods was just being arrogant and not treating their opponents like people. Later on when their opponents were beaten into dogs, everyone changed their tune, thinking that Close just liked the death knight talent, so he used it to play jungler.

Did Close like the death knight talent?

Maybe he liked the top-lane position.

The commentator continued, “Speaking of which, the double dark combo was also formed in FTW.”

The double dark top-jungler combo that had once been popular all across the world wasn’t the Yuan Ze and Gary combo that was around today, but the one with Marshal and Close.

Yuan Ze now had his own double dark.

Close also had his own double dark.

Yuan Ze and Gary had won the third match. What kind of answer would Close and Wei Xiao respond with in the fifth match?

Everyone was looking forward to it!

The camera swept through, giving the audience a panoramic view of the scene. The ten heroes transformed into ten streaks of light before landing at their respective fountains. Lu Feng’s death knight was wearing the night death skin, while Wei Xiao’s shadow thief was wearing the legendary dead soul knight skin.

CP fans all started screaming. Although the game officials hadn’t stated it clearly, everyone privately knew that it was a CP skin set!

There was darkness in the death knight, and there was a knight in the darkness. Even the skin names matched up.

The officials did things in the dark, but the players were out in the light. The CP fans were infectiously exhilarated, and the panic everyone was feeling over the decisive match receded significantly.

There was a small Easter egg for the night death and dead soul knight skins. When they appeared in the same line-up and stood next to each other, they would say two sentences to each other.

Night death: “My dark night.”

Dead soul knight: “In the name of the knight.”

Then, the two of them would then say at the same time: “Defend the territory!”

The directors followed through to the end and provided a close-up of the two heroes. The two low voices sounded out, causing screams to burst out again and again in the venue.

Forget it, even if the great and little demon kings end up falling to their knees, this beautiful CP was locked in tight! The keys had been tossed into the Great Rift Valley and fed to the lanternfish of the deep!

The match began!

A system announcement rang out amidst the tense atmosphere: Full charge ahead!

The death knight and berserker warrior arrived at the top lane at almost the same time. This time, they didn’t go to help their own junglers invade the jungle. Instead, they went straight to their own lanes like they’d never done before.

At the same time, Ning Zhehan and VIVI encountered each other in the middle lane, and the two groups of two at the bottom lane also met up. Providing an overall view of the map was sufficient, and everyone had a sense of what was going on.

As for the two jungler kings…

The hidden thief and shadow thief shared a similar trait, which was their ability to become invisible.

However, the hidden thief’s stealth was stronger, and there was no limit on the time he could remain hidden. As long as he wasn’t attacked and didn’t attack others, his stealth wouldn’t be lifted. Of course, a real vision trap could detect his stealth, and there were also some other reconnaissance skills that could ‘find’ him.

The shadow thief’s stealth had a time limit, but his stealth was used more for skill combos. It was easier to attack from the back with the stealth effect, and a back stab would create critical hits. Additionally, it was easy to play out a set of explosive combos by using stealth to strengthen basic attacks.

The former talent’s invisibility was more subtle, while the latter’s stealth almost always meant entering into a fight.

Based on Wei Xiao’s understanding of Gary, Old G might as well rename himself Elder G if he didn’t invade the jungle with the hidden thief.

Note, this wasn’t as simple as just changing a form of address.

As Wei Xiao had expected, he’d only finished taking down his red buff halfway when a blade flashed out, aiming at his waist.

Wei Xiao always paid attention to the minimap, and he naturally knew the opponents’ movements: Yuan Ze was on the top lane, Mo was on the bottom lane, and VIVI had exposed himself while clearing his lane soldiers, so…

Old G had come by himself!

There were a lot of thoughts in his mind, but his actions moved faster than his thoughts! He turned sideways to dodge the dark blade. After fading into the night, he landed an accurate backstab, piercing the hidden thief’s stealth and smashing out a critical hit at the same time!

This operation was amazing, even for those who were watching from god’s perspective.

It had to be known that even with god’s perspective, what the audience could see was nothing but the hidden thief’s virtual shadow. It was almost entirely covered up by the bushes and couldn’t be seen without concentrating; Wei Xiao couldn’t see anything at all except empty air, yet he was able to accurately land a backstab. How had he done it?

The commentators provided the answer. “Quiet based his attack on the direction of the hidden thief’s dark blade. Although Gary’s hands were fast, and he hid immediately after he attacked, Wei Xiao’s dynamic vision must have captured the direction and allowed him to predict Gary’s positioning in order to hit him so accurately!”

The audience grew even more stunned with this explanation: They weren’t the same at all; they were really different from Little Lunatic Wei! He deserved to have won the national championship in the first year of his career after his debut and become famous all over the world!

But Old G didn’t panic. He’d soloed with Wei Xiao a lot ever since his team moved into the FTW base. He knew that this was part of the little lunatic’s routine operations, and he’d prepared for it. Although he’d been hit by a back stab, the hidden thief didn’t retreat but instead went forth to slice at the shadow thief’s throat with a heavy attack.

The damage dealt from different directions was different. The waist and throat were fatal, and there would still be a high bleed effect even without a critical hit.

Wei Xiao didn’t blink at all as he stacked up marks on the hidden thief’s head, connecting up his shadow attacks.

Once they started fighting, nothing else could nearly be as valuable as the First Blood in front of them! Not the red buff, not the stone men, not the three wolf creeps or even the five little bears!