After the game officially started, five champions appeared in the base.

“I feel like I can hear the audience screaming even through the headphones,” Yuan Qian said.

Xiao Bai said, “Qian-ge, next time you pick Teemo, and I’m sure the audience will be even more excited than they are today.”

Yuan Qian shook his head and laughed. “In that case, forget it. I still don’t want to retire quite yet.”

Naturally, Yuan Qian was exaggerating. In order to prevent the audience and commentators’ voices from influencing the players’ game judgments, the players all wore the best noise cancelling headphones. Jian Rong couldn’t hear anything except his teammates’ voices and the sound effects from the game.

After buying their items, the five of them simultaneously rushed out of the base and assumed the level 1 team fight positions.

Xiao Bai said, “Play well today, if we win let’s eat frog tonight!”

To avoid falling into a food coma during a competition, professional players basically wouldn’t eat anything right before the match.

Pine followed him closely. His voice was flat. “What if we lose.”

“Less of that unlucky talk.” Xiao Bai tossed a skill at him threateningly. “How could we possibly lose to Squid… isn’t that right, ge?”

Lu Boyuan never said much when gaming. A few seconds passed before he said, “The frog tonight is my treat.”

Xiao Bai: “Thanks boss!”

“Why aren’t you saying anything ah, Xiao Rong.” Yuan Qian glanced at Zed, who was standing in the middle zoning out. “Getting nervous?”

“He’s definitely nervous.” Xiao Bai said, “After all, it all depends on this round whether he’ll be seen as a god or a madman.”

Jian Rong noted down another tally on Xiao Bai’s account before he said, “I’m thinking about something.”

Lu Boyuan asked, “Thinking about what?”

Jian Rong opened the scoreboard and confirmed it again. He was silent for a few seconds. “I was thinking… about how nobody on the other team brought Exhaust.”

Exhaust was a Summoner Spell¹ that could slow an enemy champion’s movement speed by 30% for three seconds, and also reduce their damage dealt by 40%. It was a skill that was excellent for restraining assassin champions.

But in this round, not a single person in YY chose this Summoner Spell.

When the enemy was playing an assassin champion, but nobody in the team brought Exhaust—if it wasn’t an accident, then it was because they were looking down on Jian Rong.

Jian Rong felt like he had been offended.

He said expressionlessly, “Their ADC will take responsibility for this.”

Lu Boyuan couldn’t help but laugh. “…okay.”

Squid’s mid laner was playing Syndra this game, a champion who excelled at laning. Jian Rong’s Zed didn’t have enough damage or burst before level 6, so he could only hide behind his minions and carefully last hit the enemy minions.

“Tsk.” Squid’s mid laner laughed. “And here I was thinking he was all that… relax, I’ve locked this Soft down in mid.”

Doufu glanced at the middle lane. “How come you haven’t whittled down any of his health yet? Go up and use your skills ah, don’t let him farm.”

The mid laner said, “No rush, I can kill him soon. Nobody fight, let me have first blood.”

In the stadium, the commentators were in the middle of seriously analyzing the match.

Commentator A: “Syndra poked down Zed for a wave and released her ult—unfortunately, the damage was just off by a bit. Zed is in a very bad situation, he should be recalling to base now.”

Commentator B: “It’s pretty difficult for Zed to fight Syndra. If he continues to be suppressed like this, the champion’s advantage might not be able to display its full potential. As expected, Soft’s choice still isn’t good enough—”

Right as he said that, minimal-health Zed suddenly turned back midway and smashed his ult right into full-health Syndra’s face!

Everyone was startled for a moment, including Syndra. Before the commentator’s “isn’t he just going to end up feeding if he attacks with such low health” could even leave his mouth, he witnessed Zed calmly and proficiently unleash the maximum damage output that the champion was capable of. At the same time, Zed also beautifully and nimbly adjusted his position as minutely as possible, avoiding all of Syndra’s skills—if even a single one of those skills had hit him, Jian Rong would have died on the spot.

Jian Rong released his last auto attack, maximizing his DPS, before recasting his ult and returning to his original position. He then confidently and mockingly returned to base on the spot.

The next second, following the unique explosion sound of Zed’s ult, the Syndra behind Jian Rong responded by toppling to the ground—

“First blood!”

The entire stadium roared!!

“…beautiful!!!” Commentator A instantly found his voice again. “Heavens, that combo of Zed’s was too gorgeous! I can say this without hesitation—Soft brilliantly utilized those three seconds of Zed’s ult! He unleashed all of the damage that this champion is capable of doing!!”

“Even in that situation, he still dared to turn back? Still dared to attack??” Commentator B said, “Although Syndra didn’t have her ult anymore, any one of her skills could take his life. Does – does he have that much confidence in himself??”

The player cam switched to Soft. The blue-haired teenager was controlling his champion, looking utterly unperturbed, with none of the excitement or happiness one should have after counter-killing the enemy mid laner while possessing very low health. It was as if he had long since planned out this kill.

At that moment, the amount of comments in the livestream barrage exponentially increased—

[Correct, he’s just that self-confident.]

[Damn, that outplay killed me, isn’t this Zed way too slippery??? He can even dodge Syndra’s attacks?]

[I saw it just then. 389 HP, with 389 HP he turned around and went to kill full-health Syndra… I’m guessing that YY’s mid laner is also stupefied right now]

[It’s normal gameplay for him, I’ve even seen him double back and team fight with 23 HP before, and he fucking won too.]

[Where did you see that? Begging for a video!]

[There are replays in livestream room #4404708. If you go look, remember to follow my dumbass son, that way in the future when he streams you can be the first to insult him.]

[This little brother is so handsome ah.]

[Girlfriend fans don’t bother, this dumbass is underage, Dad doesn’t allow him to date early.]

…

After getting the kill, Jian Rong returned to his base to replace his items. When he went back to his lane, the sound of a kill notification came through his headphones.

Lu Boyuan had solo killed the enemy jungler, and in the other person’s jungle too at that.

Not only did Lu Boyuan not leave afterwards, he also started to eat the enemy jungle’s resources.

“Their mid respawned,” Jian Rong warned. “He’ll probably go to find you.”

Lu Boyuan said, “Okay.”

Then he continued to eat the enemy’s red buff.

When the enemy mid laner appeared in the jungle, Lu Boyuan just finished eating the other side’s red buff. With one blink, he avoided the enemy mid laner’s sphere knockback CC, and shot a bullet into Syndra. Syndra… instantly lost a quarter of her health.

Jian Rong was stunned.

When laning, he very rarely paid attention to what his teammates were doing. Upon seeing Lu Boyuan’s damage, he couldn’t help but open the scoreboard and take a peek—

Lu Boyuan was a jungler, and his CS² was the highest across the board.

This meant that Lu Boyuan had consumed nearly all of the resources in Squid’s jungle.

Ten seconds later, Squid’s mid laner was pitifully chased by Lu Boyuan all the way from his own team’s jungle to the second turret. He even ended up having to toss out a flash in order to run away.

Lu Boyuan spoke succinctly. “Mid has no flash, can kill.”

After that, he continued to eat the enemy jungle’s raptors.

“…too tragic.” Commentator A narrowed his eyes and shook his head. “Someone who didn’t know better would think that TTC had two jungles…”

“To tell the truth, I just knew that this would happen after God Lu took out Graves. This champion Graves is too powerful when invading the jungle. What’s more, the person playing him is also Road…” Commentator B said, “However, it’s not like Squid doesn’t stand a chance. Because of his champion advantage, Doufu is fighting pretty fiercely. Even though he isn’t getting burst kills, he hasn’t fallen behind in terms of last hits at all.”

After Jian Rong finished clearing minions at mid, he finally got down to business.

He walked towards the bottom lane and asked, “Can bot push the tower?”

Pine: “I’m at low health.”

“Their bot lane champion does too much damage, we just finished clearing a wave.” Xiao Bai immediately reported. “I think we probably can’t push…”

Jian Rong said, “I think we can.”

Xiao Bai: “…”

“Help me by tanking the turret aggro?” Jian Rong snuck into the brush to the left of the bot lane tower. “Just once is fine.”

If he had already had his heart set on pushing the tower, what the hell was the point of asking just then?

Xiao Bai gritted his teeth. “Fine, just once okay? You should go kill the support, his health is pretty low. Let me know before you attack…”

Before he could finish talking, Jian Rong had already used his ult and rushed over onto Doufu.

Xiao Bai: “………”

Zed fluidly tossed out a combo, smashing it all unerringly towards Doufu. The support, Nautilus, wanted to protect his ADC, but Xiao Bai controlled Lulu and turned the enemy support into a sheep first. Pine immediately flashed and followed up with damage!

Doufu was ganked without warning, and he swore. Before dying, he turned to kill Jian Rong, wanting to drag the other person down too on his way out.

Draven’s DPS wasn’t low, and combined with the tower’s damage, Jian Rong’s health bar was clearly about to empty out—

“Thunk!” Jian Rong used his Stopwatch, rendering him invulnerable to all damage for 2.5 seconds.

Two seconds later, Xiao Bai went forward and helped him tank the tower briefly, allowing Jian Rong to successfully escape with a thread of health. He then stood where the enemy’s turret couldn’t hit him—and danced at Doufu’s “corpse.”

Simultaneously, Lu Boyuan succeeded in counterganking the enemy’s jungler at the top lane. With Yuan Qian’s coordination, they effortlessly got a double kill.

“Fuck!!” Doufu let out a curse. “He must be crazy! Using a Stopwatch while playing Zed!!!”

The audience and the commentators all thought that this would be the end of the battle between Soft and Doufu.

They never expected it to be just the beginning.

Even low ranked players knew that Zed couldn’t be allowed to farm too comfortably in the early game, or else there would be nothing but death in the mid game when they ran into him.

Jian Rong had two kills. Not long after, he bought his first core item.

And thus began Draven’s nightmare.

Under the tower, in the jungle, even on his way over to the bot lane, Zed was everywhere. He only needed three seconds to kill Draven, and Draven didn’t have a single chance to counter-kill.

It was one thing if it was just being killed, but every time, Jian Rong would also dance and flash his team icon on top of Doufu’s corpse.

Commentator A: “Ah, this…”

Commentator B laughed dryly. “Of course, this is merely normal interaction between friends!”

After being solo killed and taunted twice in a row, Doufu was so angry that he was almost spouting smoke. His mouse creaked with how hard he was gripping it.

“Don’t get mad, don’t get mad!” Knowing Doufu’s temper was bad, the support instantly said, “I won’t go scout, I’ll just follow you.”

The jungler quickly said, “I’m also nearby. There’s no way he’ll still dare to come over…”

Zed still came over.

Along with his jungler.

Lu Boyuan was playing Graves, and with one gun, he could tear down several large chunks of the tanky Nautilus’ health bar.

In the enemy jungle, they chased the three enemies with the imposing manner of an army a thousand strong. Graves only put away his gun after the three people on the other team were all at low health, and Jian Rong took all three heads.

“Triple kill—”

“Badass, Jian Rong!!” Xiao Bai blurted out his praise. “It turns out you haven’t been practicing for nothing all this time after all. You’ve grown taller! And you’ve become stronger!!”

Jian Rong: “.”

“Doufu is at 0/6 now, that feels way too good hahahaha!” Xiao Bai said, “Why aren’t you saying anything?”

Jian Rong said coolly, “I don’t want to cross the line.”

Xiao Bai: “No way, is it not enough that you kill him six times already? You still want to go beat him up?”

Jian Rong said, “I want to beat up my teammate.”

Xiao Bai shut up.

The first round ended in twenty-seven minutes with TTC easily taking the win.

Doufu’s final score was 1/8/3, and when he walked off stage, his face was as dark as the bottom of a pot.

The two commentators glanced at the excessive gap between the two teams’ gold, before they glanced at the ridiculous kill count comparison of 24:4.

“Am I commentating on the spring season?” Commentator A was speechless for a few seconds and asked, “I feel like I just witnessed an Ionia³ Diamond ranked game…”

“I recommend that Squid bans Road’s Graves for the next round. His invading is… too powerful.” Commentator B restrained himself and swallowed his other “might as well ban Zed too” recommendation back into his stomach.

Jian Rong followed his teammates off stage to rest. The entire way there, cameras were following him.

After returning to the break room, he took back his phone from a staff member. Right after he finished reading Love Doufufu The Most’s reply, Ding-ge confiscated his phone again.

“You can have it back after you’re done with the match. I’ll hold it for safekeeping for now.” Ding-ge slipped the phone into his pocket and said, “You guys got it all out of your system now after this round, right? Can we use a team comp that’s actually viable for the next game?”

The intermission break was only ten minutes long. Ding-ge gave a few simple instructions before the staff came in and told them to get ready to go on stage again.

Jian Rong took a sip of water. After he stood up, he saw that Ding-ge was hunched over talking about something with Lu Boyuan—

Ding-ge’s voice came in intermittent spurts, and it was a little indistinct. “Your hand… still okay?”

Professional players were too sensitive towards the word “hand.” Jian Rong abruptly came to a stop and turned his head to listen closely, his eyebrows unconsciously furrowing.

This eavesdropping was a bit too obvious. Originally, Lu Boyuan was going to respond, but he discovered Jian Rong’s gaze the moment he looked up.

Lu Boyuan raised an eyebrow. Half a second later, he withdrew his hand from his pocket and lazily uncurled his fingers in front of Ding-ge and Jian Rong.

“I said it was fine, don’t worry so much.”

Two minutes later, the players took the stage again.

The director first gave Lu Boyuan a long camera shot, before moving to Jian Rong and finally Doufu.

Doufu’s face was covered with water, and it was evident that he had just washed his face. His expression was also much worse than it had been before they went off stage, so he had probably been lectured backstage.

The game entered the pick/ban phase. Commentator A joked, “This round won’t be another Diamond match, right.”

With a dark look on his face, Doufu picked a conformist champion that was extremely good at running away: Ezreal.

Actually, Ezreal was an ADC suited for the current meta, but to choose him now…

[Dumbass, admitting your cowardice? Keep picking your Draven ah?]

[Why such a long face? If I were his teammate, I’d resent him for bringing bad luck.]

[Why aren’t the Doufu fans yapping away anymore? Come out and circle around some more again.]

[Sure enough, the fans reflect their idols, TTC’s fans have no inner qualities to speak of. Have you never won a match before? And also, this is a BO3 game. A passerby would’ve thought that TTC had already won.]

It was Jian Rong’s turn to pick a champion. During his preselection, Jian Rong lit up a Draven for everyone.

The two commentators: “…”

The audience: “…”

The last second before the pick phase ended, Jian Rong leisurely switched to LeBlanc and locked her in.

Commentator A forced a laugh. “Soft really knows how to joke around with us…”

Commentator B gave a fake smile and nodded while thinking, Like hell that was a joke. That bluenette’s choice was no different from constructing a cannon here and incessantly launching mockery into Doufu’s face.

This round, Squid chose a very standard, meta team composition, so everyone thought that they would probably stand a fighting chance.

But they were all wrong.

Ever since TTC had changed mid laners, people had always viewed the exchange pessimistically, causing everyone to forget something—before this, TTC and Squid had never even been on the same playing field before.

Twenty minutes in, Lu Boyuan ganked Squid’s bot lane, Jian Rong solo killed the enemy mid laner for the second time, and Yuan Qian destroyed one of the enemy’s towers in the top lane.

Twenty-three minutes in, TTC grouped together. Pine got three kills, and they wiped out Squid before they took Baron.

Twenty-six minutes in, TTC pressed straight towards the enemy base. The moment before they demolished the other team’s Nexus, Jian Rong charged into the enemy fountain and instakilled Doufu before using a Zhonya’s Hourglass in the fountain—

The game ended. TTC crushingly won the competitive match with a final score of 2:0.

Jian Rong removed his headphones and went over with his teammates to shake hands amidst the stadium’s cheers.

Doufu’s face was ashen, and his mouth was stretched tight. He glared viciously at Jian Rong.

Doufu was thinking, right now they were all wearing recording mics, so if this bluenette troll dared to insult him again, he would definitely report him to the LPL immediately and let the LPL suspend him.

Unexpectedly, Jian Rong walked over to him, smiled, and shook his hand, before he languidly said in a voice that everyone around them could hear, “—you play Draven so well.”

The sound of some people trying their hardest to muffle their laughter floated over from nearby.

Doufu: “………”

Dammit!!!!

After they finished shaking hands and exchanging bows, TTC’s members packed up their peripherals and went off stage.

“Hahahaha Doufu’s ‘ate shit’ expression was way too freaking funny!” Xiao Bai said, “Speaking of which, has he become weaker recently? Before I thought that it was still a little interesting when facing off against him in the lane, but in the second round just now, I thought that I was playing a Gold ranked game…”

Yuan Qian laughed. “He was dumbfounded by Xiao Rong’s playing. It was like he was sleepwalking during the second game.”

Xiao Bai thought of something and turned his head. “Ge, the frog tonight—”

Lu Boyuan had already put on his hat, looking ready to depart at any time. “Already ordered.”

Jian Rong had just put on his coat when a staff member suddenly pushed open the break room door.

“We’re about to conduct the post-match MVP interview.” The staff member swept a look around the break room before he smiled and asked, “Soft, is now a good time for you?”

Usually when water friends watched the competition livestream, they would just exit out of the video once the match finished. Only a few players’ fans would stay behind to watch the MVP interview.

But today, for the spring season opening match’s MVP interview segment, the number of viewers in the stream increased instead of decreasing.

The camera switched to the scene of the interview, and a teenager with dyed blue hair appeared in everyone’s view.

The one in charge of this interview was Tang Qin. She smiled and said, “Okay. Right now, I’m interviewing the MVP from today’s match—TTC’s Soft. First of all, congratulations to TTC for their win today. Soft, this is your first time playing in a competition. Did you feel nervous, or were there any parts that you weren’t used to?”

Jian Rong blinked and said, “No.”

[You won’t even smile during an interview stinky son??]

[?? Are you very cool? Stop posturing!]

Tang Qin also paused, but she maintained her smile. “Today TTC competed against the LPL’s veteran team Squid. Did you guys make any special preparations before the match?”

“No.” Jian Rong looked up at the camera, his tone of voice lazy. “We were just playing casually, we didn’t expect to win so easily.”

“…” Tang Qin restrained a laugh. “In that case, we also saw you take out Zed in the first round and create an excellent advantage. If you don’t mind me asking, do you also really like ganking the bottom lane normally when you play ranked with Zed?”

Jian Rong: “It depends. The main thing was that Draven looked too much like 300 pieces of gold⁴, and I got too into the game and couldn’t hold back, so I kept running to the bot lane, my fault… I wasn’t purposefully targeting Doufu, I hope he’s doing alright.”

Tang Qin nodded. “As a new professional player, do you have any expectations for or are you looking forward to any of the upcoming matches?”

Jian Rong thought about it. “I hope that I can come across an opponent that’s a little stronger.”

[I’m really going to freaking lose it hahahahahahaha]

[He’s repeating what Doufu said in his stream hahahaha, Jian Rong are you a grudge-bearing spirit???]

[‘I hope he’s doing alright’ hahahahaha]

[In the future I absolutely cannot miss any of TTC’s MVP interviews.]

[Damn Soft wake up, this is the fucking post-game interview, not the trash talking segment!!]

Tang Qin could no longer control her smiling expression, so she could only control her tone of voice. “Okay, thank you very much, Soft, for accepting our interview. Then, as the interview wraps up, do you have anything that you want to say to the water friends or fans watching the stream?”

Tang Qin thought that he would answer “no” again.

But she saw the teenager suddenly flash a smile. “I do have something that I want to say.”

Jian Rong looked into the camera and asked, extremely politely, “That online friend with the Weibo user ID ‘Loves Doufufu The Most,’ I got the MVP position, and I also killed Doufufu many times… my team’s address is on the official website, may I ask when you’ll be mailing your head over?”