Although the match was scheduled for seven in the evening, TES boarded the team bus at four in the afternoon.
Mark and JackeyLove sat in their seats looking extremely excited, brimming with energy and eager to try something new.
—
Ever since they tried a game of Heimerdinger support the night before last, combined with Lin Fan's hands-on teaching, it was like a whole new world had opened up.
It turned out that Heimerdinger support was far stronger than imagined. From level one, there was basically no lane combo that could contest him. You could pair him with almost any ADC and still produce oppressive, dominant pressure.
So over the past two days, it felt like they were cheating—eighteen ranked games with only a single loss. Both of them gained nearly two hundred points, another huge climb. Their Korean server rankings had already reached the top fifty.
They had just mentioned it to the coach as well, hoping they could pick it in an official match.
Luo Sheng was naturally happy about this. The support champion pool expanding—especially with a non-mainstream pick like Heimerdinger—meant far more tactical options. He agreed to consider it depending on the situation.
After all, Mark hadn't used this combo in scrims yet. If it were Lin Fan, there'd be no hesitation at all—Luo Sheng had personally seen Lin Fan's outrageous Heimerdinger performances in scrims. His E skill never missed from start to finish, repeatedly securing lane kills and perfectly threading the team's tempo together.
If only Heimerdinger had been showcased at the start of spring split, there'd have been no need to buy Mark at all.
But things never go the way you expect. Lin Fan now seemed to have returned to his original position.
And that made another problem even more of a headache—how should Knight be handled?
At this moment, Knight was quietly fiddling with his phone.
…
The first two matches of the day ended fairly quickly.
WE played steadily but were cleanly swept away by OMG, extending their losing streak to eight straight losses.
Before the BLG match, their official Weibo hinted heavily that Uzi would be playing.
But something seemed to go wrong. After two games, Uzi didn't even appear in the waiting room, and he wasn't on the active roster at all.
It was obvious BLG had played everyone for fools—haters and fans alike were all deceived.
The "god" never made his first appearance since returning.
The fervent GSL fans didn't get their true god descending, haters had nothing to flame, and spectators had no spectacle to enjoy.
As a result, even though BLG cleanly 2–0'd AL, their official Weibo still got swarmed.
Fortunately, both matches ended 2–0, so by 7:15, TES was fully prepared to enter the arena.
On the commentary desk today were Wang Duoduo, 957, and Gugu.
Under host Yu Shuang's introduction, both teams' starting lineups appeared on stage one after another.
As the teams entered the preparation area, the match was about to begin.
"The schedule has reached Week Four and is almost over. TES seems to have found a starting lineup that suits them—top Zoom, jungle Tian, mid Knight, and the bot lane duo JackeyLove and Mark."
"Mm. Dine, who performed very well last round, isn't in the starting lineup," Gugu said softly.
"True. I originally thought he'd start today, but considering TES's current situation, the coach probably has more in mind. After all, New Moon's coaching level has always been among the best in the league." 957 said this with a simple, honest smile.
As a former pro, he was qualified to say such things.
"Yes. A one-win, six-loss record really isn't great. Compared to Rate-of-Land Bro, Knight is indeed more trustworthy—he's been fighting in the league for so many years."
"And the opposing mid laner today is an old rival, Yagao. After this match, we'll also see who truly is Pingxiang's number one mid."
"The top lane matchup between 369 and Zoom is also very interesting. After swapping teams, what kind of effect will they produce? There are plenty of highlights to watch." After five seasons of casting, Guan Zeyuan handled the hype effortlessly, easily getting the crowd excited.
Amid the cheers in the arena, this week's featured match officially began.
—
Backstage, Lin Fan had headphones on, listening to a Guo Degang crosstalk collection.
Not being in the starting lineup caused him no distress or dissatisfaction at all. Instead, he swayed his head happily.
Luo Sheng observed this and nodded in satisfaction.
For a pro player, this kind of mentality was good. If his champion pool were a bit deeper, there would definitely be a place for him as a mid laner.
Of course, his professional attitude still needed work. He basically never trained—if it were any other coach, he'd have been kicked out long ago.
He snapped back to attention just in time to see Tian successfully gank JDG's bot lane, getting JackeyLove a kill. The tempo looked solid.
At last, after the storm came the calm—TES's so-called galaxy battleship finally began to fire.
But Kanavi wasn't about to play nice. Coordinating with Yagao, he dove mid and killed Knight, pulling one back.
Luo Sheng's heart skipped. Why was Knight's form fluctuating so wildly? A man has his ups and downs, but how was he just going straight down?
Fortunately, JackeyLove didn't waste Tian's help. At eight minutes, using item and level advantages, he secured a solo lane kill, then leveraged bot lane priority to take the Infernal Drake.
Kanavi kept making moves mid as well, answering blow for blow by taking the Rift Herald and knocking down TES's mid turret. JDG's tempo immediately took off.
By twenty-seven minutes, the kill score had reached seven to four.
In a crucial dragon fight, Knight's Viktor mispositioned and was instantly blown up. JackeyLove's Zeri delivered a god-tier performance, repeatedly dodging lethal control from JDG and forcefully cleaning up the fight, completing a triple kill that echoed through Summoner's Rift.
They immediately turned to Baron, flipping the entire situation.
Using Baron-empowered waves, they successfully destroyed JDG's base at thirty-five minutes, securing the win in game one.
It could only be called a narrow victory—fans watching were sweating bullets the whole time.
Damn it!
Knight was sleepwalking all game, every teamfight a negative impact, playing like he was wielding a hammer in a nightmare.
Luckily JackeyLove stepped up and carried. A win was a win…
—
Before anyone could savor the joy of victory, game two dumped a bucket of cold water on the fans.
Mid lane became the breakthrough point, and Kanavi quickly discovered this "wealth code."
Once at four minutes, again at eight.
This game, Yagao picked Ahri, a champion with extremely strong playmaking. After gaining an advantage, he directly radiated pressure to the side lanes, pinning JackeyLove's Zeri down early.
By twenty minutes, TES was already eight thousand gold behind.
There was no comeback angle whatsoever.
At twenty-two minutes, as TES got wiped, JackeyLove let go of his mouse and took a sip of water.
"I want to play mid! Your mom's ass!"
TL: If you want to read ahead by at least ten chapters, patreon.com/EdibleMapleSyrup