All-Round Mid Laner

The previous game could be considered 'smooth sailing'. This type of game was commonly seen in tournaments. The team with an advantage pushed their way straight to victory. After that pentakill over the grand dragon, the mental states of NTG's players were probably starting to crumble.

Was the pro league really this terrifying?!

NTG had just advanced to the major leagues from the minor leagues, and they were wiped out in a pentakill in their very first game? NTG's players had all gone a bit pale. This feeling… wasn't it a bit like being a Bronze-ranked player who'd suddenly stumbled into a King-rank game, only to be blown up like a fish in a barrel?

NTG's coach watched the game from below the stage. His whole face was full of bewilderment.

The second game was set to begin soon. He returned to the soundproofed room and carefully considered his words. He finally gave a forced laugh and reassured, "This is fine, our opponent is Team Tianhuan, after all. Chi Shuo is a world-class jungler. Losing to them is normal…"

But the problem was that Chi Shuo hadn't gotten a pentakill in that game. It had been Tianhuan's new omega mid laner!

If they had been wiped out by Chi Shuo, everyone may have had an easier time accepting it. Chi Shuo was a world championship-level player, after all. But being wiped out by a new player who had just debuted? How were they, NTG, supposed to face the world after that?

The coach took a deep breath and said, "Okay, okay. The last game is already over, don't think about it anymore. Everyone, hurry up and pull yourselves together. Let's prepare for the next round!"

Meanwhile, in Tianhuan's soundproofed room, Coach Lin was finally wearing a relieved smile after gravely marching through the past few days. He lightly patted Ye Shaoyang on the shoulder and said, "Well done."

Cheng Xing also excitedly cheered, "My Yang-ge is awesome!"

Chi Shuo turned to look at Ye Shaoyang, meeting Ye Shaoyang's bright and faintly smiling eyes. Getting a pentakill was something that would make anyone elated, but Shaoyang's expression was still fairly calm…

He really was remarkably easy-going.

The corners of Chi Shuo's lips quirked up slightly. He softly said, "That battle just now. You were awesome."

"Everyone worked together well," Ye Shaoyang said.

Coach Lin smiled and said, "Of course. Everyone's contributions allowed us to win. So, how shall we play the second round?"

Chi Shuo said, "Let's continue with the double carry comp. I'll keep being a support jungler."

Coach Lin looked at him. "You won't take a jungler core?"

"There's no need to pull out a mid/jungle duo comp when we face off against teams in Group B," Chi Shuo said. "It's better for us to take the opportunity to work on Qu Jiang and Cheng Xing's teamwork. In this next game, let's focus on the bottom lane."

Coach Lin agreed, "Mm, I was thinking that too."

Cheng Xing hadn't been too dazzling in the first round. Ultimately, he only did around 20% of the damage. His performance couldn't be considered outstanding. The main reason was that his hero in the previous round, the Yuki-onna, typically flourished and became very strong in late-game. But ultimately, Ye Shaoyang finished things with a pentakill before the game even reached the late-game stage.

Pushing straight to the enemy base after wiping out their heroes was a sort of 'sudden death' that didn't just catch NTG's players off guard. Tianhuan was actually a bit surprised as well. Originally, they'd planned on fighting until the thirty-minute mark, but they ultimately wrapped things up in twenty minutes.

The second round began.

Tianhuan was playing as the red team this time, with NTG playing blue and getting the first ban.

NTG's coach dedicated their first ban to Chi Shuo's namesake hero, the Bloodstained Assassin, without hesitation. Tianhuan continued to use their first bans on support heroes. Then, for NTG's second ban… the coach hesitated.

And after a moment of hesitation, NTG chose to ban the Abyssal Lord.

A gasp rippled through the crowd. The commentators laughed and started to discuss.

"The Abyssal Lord made it onto the ban list after all! With that pentakill in the first round, Tianhuan's new mid laner has shown us that he's very adept at playing this hero. It's very ordinary to use the second ban on him!"

"He sent the Abyssal Lord onto the ban list after just one round. It's easy to see that Ye Shaoyang performed very well!"

"But with that, the jungler cores Chi Shuo is good at are free!"

"That's right. NTG has let the Stealthy Rogue out. This is one of the heroes Chi Shuo is best known for playing!"

The bullet comments filled up with jokes.

[NTG's coach is thinking, 'Can I get a few more bans?']

[Hahaha, they don't have enough bans to go around! Everyone always targeted Chi Shuo like crazy, but now they're realizing that Tianhuan's omega mid laner seems to be a bit awesome. Better ban a mid laner!]

[Playing against Tianhuan is going to be rough in the future. What should people ban?]

[Tianhuan-Lieyang's fan club here, reporting for duty!]

[The little omega gege only used the Abyssal Lord in one round and already got him banned. This little gege is too cool?]

[Waiting to see Captain Chi's jungler core~]

However, Tianhuan didn't rush to pick a jungler. Just like before, they chose a bottom lane duo first.

In this round, they took the classic combo of the Forest Envoy and the Divine Archer for the bottom lane. A healing support plus a marksman that flourished in late-game—it was obvious with just these picks that Tianhuan intended to drag the game out this time.

Their third pick went to the top laner again. Qin Yizhu once again took the Black Dragon Knight, which he felt pretty comfortable with.

NTG's coach was a bit confused. He had practically trembled with fear when he left one of Chi Shuo's powerful jungler cores unbanned, but then Tianhuan didn't choose a jungler! So, was it true that Chi Shuo's condition was declining, and he could no longer play jungler cores? Or was Tianhuan saying… they didn't need a jungler core?

Once more, Tianhuan waited to pick their jungler and mid laner last. Chi Shuo ultimately continued to choose the Brawler as a support jungler, while Ye Shaoyang chose a more traditional mid laner—the Frost Goddess.

Their lineup in this round was quite similar to their lineup in the last round. The main difference was that the Frost Goddess had been played as their support in the previous game. She'd mostly focused on freezing enemies to assist her teammates. In this round, the Frost Goddess would be played as a mid laner. She could become a mid lane core. If she was properly geared, she could be a mage who dealt terrifying amounts of damage. One ult could decimate the sky and earth.

The mid laner facing off against Ye Shaoyang took the Storm Goddess, who could control the skies.

The game began.

Once again, NTG's mid laner felt an extreme amount of pressure in his lane.

Ye Shaoyang's movements with the Frost Goddess were incredibly diabolical. Even when NTG's mid laner unleashed three tornadoes at once, he couldn't control his enemy's movements. However, Ye Shaoyang could lock down NTG's mid laner, using his W skill to freeze him in place!

Just like in the previous round, Ye Shaoyang received the best treatment. He was given every blue buff in the game, reducing his skill cooldowns so that he could freeze an enemy every ten seconds. NTG's mid laner couldn't even think about fighting back against the enemy hero. Even clearing minions was a challenge.

In the first wave of minions, NTG's mid laner missed one. In the third wave, he missed two…

Many viewers didn't understand the importance of these small details like tiny differences in creep score. But to professional players, falling behind in terms of creep score could be a life-threatening thing! Since NTG's player was missing minions, Ye Shaoyang's Frost Goddess would always have more gold than him.

The difference grew and grew. In the blink of an eye, a gap of 200 gold had opened up between the two mid laners.

Neither of them had gotten any kills, and neither of them had taken a minor dragon. Just from facing off in the middle lane, Tianhuan's mid laner had gained such a significant advantage over NTG's mid laner. This made the difference in the two mid laners' skill levels more than evident.

NTG's mid laner opened up the game info panel and saw that the Frost Goddess had already equipped cooldown time reduction boots and an attack power boosting staff. Meanwhile, NTG's mid laner only had the cooldown boots and a small necklace… how was he supposed to fight like this?!

He could only grit his teeth and call his jungler over for help.

The two of them lurked in the woods. NTG's mid laner originally wanted to summon his tornadoes behind Ye Shaoyang, in order to blow the Frost Goddess towards NTG's tower and kill her there. However, just as NTG's two players suddenly moved to ambush the enemy mid laner, the Frost Goddess flashed away and escaped—like she could predict their every move!

The commentators gave their praise.

"Beautiful!"

"That flash was very clever. He must have sensed that the enemy jungler was waiting to ambush him."

NTG's attempt to gank on the middle lane was fruitless, but a kill was taken down on the bottom lane—

First Blood!

This kill had been taken by Cheng Xing.

Chi Shuo had gone down to the bottom lane. With a single Q skill, he'd stunned the enemy marksman. Cheng Xing fired his shots swiftly from a great distance, quickly felling the low-health enemy marksman!

NTG soon realized that Tianhuan's style of play in this round wasn't quite like their style of play in the previous round.

In the last round, their assassin mage mid laner had set the rhythm and quickly started roaming the map after leveling up. He'd provided support on the top and bottom lanes, and once he gained a huge advantage in resources, he wiped NTG out with a pentakill in a team fight.

In this round, the Frost Goddess was a more cumbersome hero with a slower movement speed, so Ye Shaoyang didn't roam much. He primarily focused on clearing minions on the middle lane and putting pressure on the enemy mid laner.

Chi Shuo took care of wandering the whole map, primarily giving assistance to the bottom lane. As a support jungler, he didn't need to get any kills. He just needed to provide timely support and stun the enemy so that Cheng Xing could do his damage.

Qu Jiang's Forest Envoy could heal and provide crowd control. Chi Shuo's Brawler was highly mobile, with plenty of movement skills, and he could provide crowd control as well.

Cheng Xing essentially had two bodyguards protecting him throughout this whole game. He couldn't have been more comfortable!

Among all marksmen, the Divine Archer had the longest range. Enemies couldn't even touch Cheng Xing. Plus, Chi Shuo could race in and stun the enemy, after which Cheng Xing could mindlessly fire away without even aiming.

Double Kill!

Two more kills for Cheng Xing!

Cheng Xing was so excited that his eyes flashed with light. He got more and more into the groove.

Tianhuan spent that whole match focused on the bottom lane. The top laners could basically just sit back and watch the show, while Tianhuan's mid laner ferociously assaulted the enemy's mid lane tower. By the ten-minute mark of the game, NTG's bottom lane outer tower was down, and their middle lane outer tower had also been battered to its last sliver of HP by Ye Shaoyang.

Things weren't looking good for NTG.

After destroying the bottom lane tower, Tianhuan grouped up and started to push down the middle lane.

NTG wanted to defend against this first wave, but then—Qin Yizhu charged into the range of NTG's tower and used a Black Dragon's Roar to taunt two enemy heroes. Ye Shaoyang immediately followed up with a Deep Ice to freeze those enemies.

Cheng Xing fired away from afar. In the blink of an eye, those two frozen heroes were dead on the ground!

The Divine Archer was extremely terrifying after gearing up. He could take down a glass cannon with three arrows, and he could destroy a tank with six arrows. Cheng Xing had gotten quite a lot of kills on the bottom lane. By now, he'd already obtained some attack speed boosting and damage boosting gear.

NTG's players couldn't even find Cheng Xing. They could only watch as he shot an endless barrage of arrows at them, landing hit after hit!

Double Kill!

Two more kills for the marksman!

NTG's middle lane outer tower was destroyed as well.

One commentator sighed and said, "NTG is on the ropes in this round. The Divine Archer has developed well. If they can't take care of him, his damage output will be even more explosive in late-game. Plus, his attack range is extremely long. NTG will have to send an assassin after him!"

"But since he has the protection of the Forest Envoy, even an assassin would have a hard time killing him. In order to defeat the Divine Archer, teams have to make sure this hero doesn't develop well in early-game. Or they have to choose extremely powerful top laners and junglers to take him down."

"NTG seems to be a bit scrambled in this game. Their enemy is running a comp centered around the Divine Archer, and they also have a jungler who can help out on the bottom lane. NTG should have immediately focused on the bottom lane, instead of trying to gank on the middle lane at first…"

"But we can't blame them for that. Tianhuan's mid laner has been putting so much pressure on the enemy that NTG's mid laner can't even leave his tower. Plus, we can't forget about the pentakill from the last round. As soon as the Frost Goddess becomes powerful, she'll become very difficult to deal with in late-game as well. She could get a team kill with one ult. It's understandable for NTG's jungler to help out on the middle lane!"

"Being a jungler sure isn't easy! When they go help out the middle lane, the bottom lane collapses. When they go help out the bottom lane, the middle lane collapses!"

"Tianhuan's double carry comp is working better than anyone could have imagined."

The two commentators had hit the nail on the head.

In this second game, NTG was forced into an extremely uncomfortable position. Their mid laner couldn't shake off the enemy's control. If he didn't get some assistance from his teammates, he would have no way to defend his lane. So the jungler could only go to the middle lane. But then, the bottom lane was left vulnerable!

The jungler didn't have three heads and six arms. He couldn't be in two places at the same time.

Ye Shaoyang was able to fend off two enemies all by himself, holding his own in a 1v2. Chi Shuo stayed in the bottom lane to create a 3v2 fight, destroying the enemy's defenses. Once NTG found themselves at a disadvantage, the resources in the jungle were swiftly swept clean by Tianhuan.

During a mid-game team fight, NTG realized despairingly—Tianhuan hadn't only allowed their marksman to develop. Their mid laner had developed as well!

That mid laner who was capable of getting a pentakill had cooldown boots and three pieces of attack boosting equipment now. That fully-geared Frost Goddess was scary as hell!

Ye Shaoyang once again showed the enemy what it was like to face off against a demon.

In a 5v5 team fight, the Frost Goddess sent out a precisely aimed wave of ice that immediately froze three enemies.

Without any help from his teammates, Ye Shaoyang had accurately predicted the enemy's movements and frozen three opponents at once. Then, he immediately followed up with his ult—a blizzard howled through the air, instantly battering the frozen enemies and earning the Frost Goddess a triple kill!

The remaining two enemy heroes wanted to flee, but they were sniped to death by the Divine Archer who was lurking very far away.

A full team wipeout!

NTG's five players were all stupefied.

Were the major leagues really this scary? Maybe… they should go back to the minor leagues?

The match ended.

The commentators excitedly announced, "Congratulations to Team Tianhuan for taking a 2-0 win over Team NTG! They've taken a win in their first match of the regular season!"

"The MVP of this round is—Tianhuan's Fanxing! The title goes to the marksman!"

"Little Xing did indeed perform very well in this round, doing 38% of the damage. He didn't die a single time, and he got two double kills. But in my opinion, the mid laner was very eye-catching as well. In early-game, he kept pressure on the enemy mid laner and persistently pushed at the mid lane tower. He fended off two enemy heroes in a 1v2. Then, in a mid-game team fight, he instantly froze and killed three of the enemy heroes to secure Tianhuan's victory. The mid laner could be considered the MVP as well!"

"That's exactly right. Tianhuan's two carries both performed very well in this game. Let us give them another round of applause!"

Thunderous applause filled the stadium again.

As the commentators said, the title of MVP could have gone to the marksman or mid laner in this game. These two players had both filled their roles, demonstrating a true double carry comp!

Cheng Xing was so excited that his eyes were starting to redden. He'd finally gotten a damage output rate of 38% in a game as a marksman. It really hadn't been easy!

And he'd even been named the MVP. He was really so happy that he wanted to cry!

Ye Shaoyang took off his headset and patted Cheng Xing on the shoulder. "You did great in this round."

Cheng Xing hoarsely rasped, "It's all thanks to my master and Qu-ge, for helping me this whole time."

If he couldn't perform well with two top-tier professional bodyguards watching over him, then he should just retire immediately!

Qu Jiang smiled merrily and said, "Our Little Xing didn't die a single time in this round. I won't have any new material for my next '100 Ways to Die' highlights reel."

Cheng Xing was dumbstruck. "You want to make a sequel?!"

Qu Jiang said, "I'll make a whole series for you, as mementos."

Cheng Xing was speechless.

Then I guess I have to thank you!

Qin Yizhu suggested, "You can make a highlights reel of Shaoyang's kills too, with some happier background music instead of the sorrowful tracks from Little Xing's '100 Ways to Die' video."

"I'll start as soon as I get back!" Qu Jiang exclaimed.

Chi Shuo stood up. He cast his warm gaze over his teammates and said, "Alright. Let's go shake hands with the other side."

Tianhuan had won matches before.

But today's two wins had been exceptionally smooth.

Last season, they'd constantly been under pressure. They had plenty of battle tactics that they couldn't even use. Every match was a bitter struggle, like they were completely tied up with ropes and couldn't exercise their might at all.

Chi Shuo hadn't felt this relaxed in a long time.

Shaoyang's arrival had indeed changed Tianhuan completely.

Cheng Xing was swiftly growing up as well.

They could run a support jungler with a double carry comp, or a team based around a mid/jungle duo. This season, Tianhuan would be beyond flexible. Their strategies and tactics would be rich and varied as well.

Cheng Xing had been abused for three months in a row. Now, during his debut match, he'd finally done the damage a marksman was supposed to do. The poor marksman featured in Qu Jiang's '100 Ways to Die' highlights reel hadn't died a single time in today's game.

Chi Shuo was proud of him.

As for Shaoyang…

He'd made a splash with his debut, taking a pentakill with the Abyssal Lord in his first game and instantly making a name for himself!

This was the all-new Team Tianhuan that would be entering Season 10.

To them, today's 2-0 victory was only the first step on their road to the championships.