Chapter 122 (4)
Tong Yao’s hand which rested on her mouse was suddenly covered by a big hand. She confusedly looked up and met Lu Sicheng’s eyes. Lu Sicheng hadn’t put on his earphones yet but lifted the earphones up to talk to the mic: “Your hand is so cold.”
……Nervous.
Tong Yao mouthed to reply.
Lu Sicheng had a frustrated look on his face.
He lifted his hand to pat Tong Yao’s head, then switched his hot tea with her iced coffee and said to her: “Warm up your hand.” He then put on his earphones and adjusted them– –All the players were now ready at their seats and the match started with the ban & pick phase.
Tong Yao was the first one to ban and banned Jhin without a second thought.
With the earphones on, Tong Yao didn’t know what people other than her own teammates were saying. But she noticed that all the YQCB players turned to look at Pope at a loss– –Pope didn’t pay any attention to his own teammates but turned his head to fix his piercing eyes at Lu Sicheng across from them.
The look in his eyes was as complicated as it could be.
But one could tell from the look to conclude that he was saying: You cheater.
Tong Yao could tell from the dumbfounded look on the faces of YQCB’s players that they seemed to have put a lot of effort into practicing a strategy with Jhin but now Jhin had been mercilessly being banned. She felt speechless: “…………………………………………Captain, you are treacherous.”
Lu Sicheng: “There can never be too much deception in war. Just to teach him a lesson. Besides, it’s not like he has no other choices. Don’t ban Sivir in the next round then, let him have it.”
Tong Yao: “……”
Lu Sicheng: “Am I kind enough?”
Tong Yao: “…………………………………………….”
The ban & pick phase continued– –As Lu Sicheng had said, the ADC on both sides had deep champion pools. They could play almost any champion they picked (*except for Lu Sicheng who didn’t know how to play Draven that well.) Soon enough, the players of YQCB also recovered from their initial shock and quickly banned Old K’s Nidalee followed by Azir.
Azir was a strong champion that could keep Ryze in check. YQCB’s banning of Azir probably was to prepare for choosing Ryze as one of their champions. Therefore, when it was time for Lu Sicheng to ban, he banned Ryze also without a second thought. Tong Yao couldn’t help but to look across: Most of the players of YQCB looked like they were really thinking of jumping up to give the calm looking Lu Sicheng a good beating.
YQCB in the end banned Tong Yao’s Leblanc.
Little Fatty then banned Rek’Sai.
The banning phase thus ended.
Then it was the picking phase.
Just as Lu Sicheng had expected, after they chose the strong Vladimir for Tong Yao, YQCB quickly took Sivir and Braum. This combination of champions provided the ADC strong support in the early game, ensuring the development of the ADC……
Lu Sicheng took his time to take Ashe, then Little Fatty chose Janna.
Later, Old K let Little Fatty lock down Kindred for him.
ZGDX’s lineup looked quite random at the moment, both the commentators and the audience were puzzled– –Since ZGDX’s pick of Janna was quite unexpected, YQCB gave up on figuring out ZGDX’s strategy during the ban and pick phase and focused on picking the champions they had planned beforehand.
Finally, the lineups of both sides were settled– —
YQCB:
Ban: Nidalee, Azir, and Leblanc.
Pick: Ekko, Khazix, Victor, Sivir, and Braum.
ZGDX:
Ban: Jhin, Ryze, and Rek’Sai.
Pick: Maokai, Kindred, Vladimir, Ashe, and Janna.
Then the game started, all ten champions spawned at the fountain at each base……Tong Yao lifted her hands from the mouse and keyboard to move her fingers around, took a deep breath, and looked over her computer to see all the people in the audience who were looking up at the big screen– —
When all the champions left the fountain, everyone in the audience was attentively watching the champions run into the map.
They all widened their eyes and held their breath, looking forward to a brilliant showdown.
Commentator A: [– –How are you, everyone in the audience. This is the last game day of the fifth week of the League of Legends Professional League Competition in the China Region. We’ll be watching the first match of a best of 3 between ZGDX and YQCB in the cross group phase of the competition! Will the traditionally strong team ZGDX, which has an all-win record up till now, keep their continuous winning streak or will the black horse of the summer season, YQCB, terminate ZGDX’s legendary path. Let’s wait – and – see!]
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