Chapter 256 - Hard to Face Stage Fright

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation  Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

“Well then, Blood Eagle, who is the man who could defeat even Hades?” Qi Qiao pushed for an answer.

Qi Qiao couldn’t wrap her head around the fact that she had no information on this legendary esports player. It seemed as though she had heard about someone like him before, but she could not recall from where exactly.

“He used to be a person worthy of respect, but now, he’s just a coward who ran away, we don’t need to bring him up!” Tinghua smiled coldly. You could hear from his voice that he harbored negative feelings for this certain person.

Coward! A runaway soldier!

Luocheng had lost track of the times he had heard those words scolding him.

This time, he clearly heard the voice, and he felt as if something had pierced through him, it was a horrible feeling.

“Alright, I guess our Blood Eagle here has some grudges to settle with someone… Oh, since we talked so much, it seems like the second match is about to start. Both team’s bans are already out.” Qi Qiao said with her vision turned to the big screen.

This time, Team Skycrown didn’t hesitate to ban Tristana. Siyong could indeed control Tristana incredibly, there was no way they were going to let him use her again.

In the second match, Fudan University’s team had a rough estimate of Team Skycrown’s overall strength, and they started to bring out a few special circumstances.

“Great, Fudan University’s mid laner is Twisted Fate. Twisted Fate is one of the most picked champions, will Fudan University’s Huang Lin bring out a different style of him?”

Twisted Fate’s appearance was followed by a round of cheers.

From everyone who had come, other than watching a heated match, they had also hoped to see their favorite champions being played.

Twisted Fate was being picked less gradually in the LPL and the national competition, but this did not mean that he was loved any lesser.

In the beginning, when Luocheng had still been in Lecheng, his gameplay of Twisted Fate had created the meta at that time. Almost every match, there would be someone trying to play Twisted Fate, because no one could forget that elegant figure slaughtering his enemies!

“Alright, now let’s see who Fudan University has chosen as their Jungler…”

“Nocturne was chosen, nice. Fudan University’s Jungler is Nocturne, this is one of the stronger jungling champions there is.” Qi Qiao said.

In the early game, the strongest champions in the jungle would be Lee Sin and Pantheon. If you met either one of those champions with a level three Nocturne, you wouldn’t need to worry about the jungle, the two champions included.

Nocturne also had surreal ganking capability, especially with his horrifying initiation. It was basically the same as using a sharp knife to stab straight into their enemies hearts!

When Nocturne had been locked into position, the arena burst with cheering!

Soon, it was time to pick the top laner.

Fudan University’s pick for mid lane was exceptionally fast, the spectators could see that Fudan University had completely no hesitation at all and immediately picked Shen, the Eye of Twilight.

Twisted Fate, Shen, and Nocturne!

The combination of these three champions were enough to make the crowds go wild!!!

“Is… Is this the rumored whole map roaming tactic?” Qi Qiao was so shocked she couldn’t keep her jaw from dropping open.

She had not realized it during the picking phase until the whole picture had been filled. The champions from the top lane, mid lane, and jungle, all had global support skills!

You could already imagine what could happen at the bottom lane when these champs had all reached level 6!

Twisted Fate would use his ulti, blood red eyes hanging over the champions, and consequently, the sky would turn dark, the utterly terrifying sound of Nocturne echoing through the arena just like the booming sound of thunder. This would all be followed up by Nocturne’s shadow blade, a shield appearing on his body, swirling, as he slowly landed on the ground…

It would become a 5v2 from an initial 2v2! How crazy was that!

Fudan University’s strategy had gotten everyone on the edge of their seats.

They had definitely practiced this lineup before, otherwise, they wouldn’t be that confident when picking champions.

It was already hard enough to get two global heroes, not to mention three!

Team Skycrown’s lineup was restrained.

You could tell that they obviously didn’t have the amount of confidence that Fudan University had after they lost the first match.

…

“Against these three global champions lineup, what do you think Team Skycrown should do, Blood Eagle?” Qi Qiao asked.

“This type of lineup has both strengths and weaknesses. Their strength is only strong when they have all reached level 6. It does not matter which lane the fight happens as it will not make much difference anyway. The downside to this tactic would be that their laning power will be significantly decreased. They are great at supporting others, but not that great by themselves.” Tinghua replied.

Just when the both of them were commentating, both teams had entered the arena. As five-man teams, both teams met in the jungle!

Shen immediately cast his E-skill, Shadow Dash, on Syndra! Just as he had almost taunted Syndra, she Flashed out at the very last second, barely surviving!

“Wow. Team Skycrown’s Mid has inhuman reactions and execution speed! Everyone should know that the Shadow Dash skill had just been released and the chance for the taunt to work has greatly increased. Not just that, when the skill is used, he immediately dashes to the target area and the skill is very hard to evade. Team Skycrown’s Mid still managed to use his Flash to escape under these circumstances, he is truly a skilled player.” Qi Qiao exclaimed.

In the team fight, both teams had only exchanged a Flash, this wouldn’t affect the match that much.

…

Both teams entered a very stable laning stage. Wu Sen controlled Zyra and headed toward the bottom lane while giving Xiao Bei a meaningful look.

Xiao Bei controlled his Ezreal and walked right into their lane. Although his hands were not showing it, Wu Sen could feel that Xiao Bei was undergoing a lot of stress right now.

Luocheng could just barely see Xiao Bei from his position backstage.

Xiao Bei’s facial expressions and body language appeared to be very stiff, his gaze showed that he was nervous, hesitant, and uncertain altogether. You could see small droplets of sweat forming on his forehead.

Stage fright…

Xiao Bei must have gotten stage fright.

The past few matches were not open for all to see, and there had only been a small amount of people watching. During those moments, Xiao Bei might have been careless, but he had never done this bad.

However, in this open match, this qualifying match to be in the LPL had given Xiao Bei huge emotional pressure. If he were to tilt his head slightly upward from the screen, he could see the thousands of faces who were watching his match.

Xiao Bei had never been in such a situation before!

When a professional player has made a name for himself and climbed up the ladder, they would definitely be faced with stage fright. Some people might adjust to their situation quickly and go back to how they were playing before, but others might be frozen still and unable to adapt to the situation given the circumstances. Their strength would not be used to its fullest, and thus, a life-threatening error would occur.

At the start, Luocheng had thought that Xiao Bei would adapt quickly to the match, not thinking that the blunder Xiao Bei had made in the first match would affect him this much.

Xiao Bei was still beating himself up, sulking over the fact that he had messed up the first game. He was immensely scared, scared that the second match would be a repeat of what had happened.

Wu Sen, Lin Dong, Zhou Yan, and Da Luo had already experienced important matches like this, you could say that it would be a breeze for them.

Xiao Bei on the other hand had made quite a name for himself in LOL, but he normally stayed in the shadows. He never really stepped out onto a professional stage, not to mention being watched by thousands of people while playing a match…

This type of stage fright couldn’t be helped, it was very hard to provide emotional support to him, and he could only rely on himself. He needed to conquer the fear inside of him, conquer his own weakness, and most importantly, conquer himself.

The only thing that Luocheng could do was to not pay any special attention to him until the second match ended.

Just one minor problem, with Xiao Bei having such terrible stage fright, would this match be a repeat of the previous one?

If that was the case, there would be a huge emotional burden on Xiao Bei if he dragged his team into the mud in this game too!

…

“It looks like Team Skycrown’s bottom lane isn’t doing too well, they are already behind by 20 creeps. Even so, it reinforces the fact that Fudan University’s Siyong is definitely a force to be reckoned with.” Qi Qiao commented.

The same thing was happening again. Team Skycrown held the advantage in all the other lanes, but the suppression on the bottom lane was unbelievable.

Following the appearance of the global supports, both Wu Sen and Xiao Bei had been slain at the bottom lane, losing both their tower as well as the dragon.

The loss of a tower and the dragon had put Team Skycrown’s advantage in the other lanes to waste, not to mention, the kills had all gone to Siyong, making the gap between both team’s ADCs even more obvious.

…

Being behind on creep score, slow reactions, weird movements, missing his skills…

Xiao Bei’s skill on Ezreal did not seem to be the same as when he played it some time ago. This made Team Skycrown’s supporters increasingly nervous. No matter how great everyone else played, it would all be for naught if the ADC himself was useless.

“Team Skycrown’s ADC is such a noob. Their Top, Mid, and Jungler have all given everyone a show of their skills. Too bad the bottom lane is in a horrible state. The Jungler had gone to help a few times, but in the end, the tower was lost and their gold income was slowed.” There was a round of cheering in the arena.

“So true, I feel that a diamond-ranked ADC can play better than him. He wants to be an LPL player? Dream on!”

“If this goes on, Team Skycrown will really lose. Their Support is skilled, but it’s too bad that their ADC is an idiot.”

The impression made on the audience would definitely be remembered, what they saw now was assumed to be what they would see in the future.

They didn’t know that in actuality, Xiao Bei’s palms were sweaty and his hands had already gone numb! He really wanted to do his best like he always did, but his hands would not listen to him, his mouse and keyboard were also unresponsive!