Chapter 62
It is normal to train new players in scrims, but with the regular season imminent, swapping in a rookie carries a very different meaning.
Hearing Lu Yuan pull a long face and tell him to enter the scrim room, Shen Yanjin was stunned for a moment, not reacting immediately. It was Mao Qiude saying “might as well” from the side that pushed him in.
The positions were arranged in the order of Top, Jungle, Mid, AD, and Support. Shen Yanjin hugged his keyboard and walked to the station next to Tans, turning on the computer, connecting, and taking a deep breath. Although it was just a training match, it was still a match. Since it was a match, Shen Yanjin held a natural nervousness and reverence for it.
He didn’t look at anyone, quickly adjusted his equipment, logged into the tournament server, and joined the game room.
“Ready?” Duan Mingyue adjusted his jungler loadout. Playing Jungle-Support roam with Sliver as support, he could be even more reckless. “Start if ready.”
Shen Yanjin tapped the keyboard, habitually rubbing his right wrist. “En, start.”
Both of their tones were very plain, even distant. If Kai didn’t have ninety percent certainty that these two had something going on, right now he would really think they were just ordinary teammates.
Kai had sworn to be a mute. He had a pile of words in his heart but kept his mouth shut. This actually made Tans much more comfortable. He saw it—Sliver could cure Kai’s “big auntie” mouth—and his fondness for Shen Yanjin rose significantly.
Entering the pick phase, Duan Mingyue first secured a strong character for Song Yuan: the Centaur. Song Yuan, having been a blue-collar worker for a long time, was flattered to suddenly receive resources. “Fighting on the frontline this game?”
“En, fight brute force with brute force.” Moreover, playing a purely operational game would expose too many tactical reserves. Duan Mingyue said, “If countered later, flex this role to Kai.”
Kai immediately pulled a face. Playing a fighter-type character in mid lane meant being kited by long-ranged opponents, forcing him to constantly roam for support, which didn’t fit his personal style.
The opponents seemed to realize the possibility of this flex pick and cautiously secured a strong Jungle-Support duo first: Ascetic Monk paired with Mermaid. Sliver’s ID appearing made it obvious they were playing Jungle-Support roam.
When it was KW’s turn to pick again, Duan Mingyue said, “Pick Bladesman and Ice Witch.”
“Ice Witch?” Kai was presumptuous for a moment, thinking it was picked for him, and hesitated slightly. “If this character goes mid, won’t the disadvantage be too big?”
Duan Mingyue said, “No, because it’s not going mid.”
Confused, Kai locked in the Ice Witch, face full of blankness. Not going mid? Then where to? To the sky? The ground didn’t seem to have space to accommodate this evil thing.
FTK also fell for this trick, thinking the flex picks were over with Ice Witch mid. They unhesitatingly locked in a top lane character that completely countered the Centaur, and didn’t focus much on mid or top for the last two bans.
As a result, KW picked Sword Immortal last, banned strong mid laners, and took a late-game hyper-carry AD. FTK’s mid and top were countered instead.
Kai admitted this draft was indeed excellent, pitting the opponents, but just holding this Ice Witch thing made his hands feel hot. Who did Duan Mingyue pick this hot potato for?
The one who finally applied to swap roles with him was Shen Yanjin, Sliver.
It could only be Support.
Outside the game room, Lu Yuan watched the match with Mao Qiude with a sullen face. Seeing the Ice Witch appear in the support position, both showed shocked and puzzled expressions simultaneously.
Scrim BP (Ban/Pick) had always been handled by Duan Mingyue. He rarely made such unconventional choices. What was this?
Lu Yuan even put down her heart for mocking momentarily. “Ice Witch support?”
Mao Qiude said, “Should be… testing a strategy.”
In the voice channel, Top, Mid, and Bot all wanted to ask but didn’t dare. Only Shen Yanjin calmly adjusted his runes and loadout, reciting a number in his heart.
Twenty-third match.
This was the twenty-third game he and Duan Mingyue fought together with the Bladesman-Ice Witch combo, and also the first time they brought this combo to the competitive arena—even if it was just a scrim.
Game loading. Shen Yanjin exhaled. He looked at the four teammates beside him on the interface and his own ID: KW-Sliver, and smiled slightly.
It was all in the past. Now beside him were no longer those match-fixers who maliciously sold him out, but his teammates, and…
RedMoon.
Finally, standing on the same side as this ID.
Choosing something like Ice Witch, which meant either you explode or implode, was naturally impossible for Shen Yanjin to use back in HG. So counting it up, he actually hadn’t used this character for a long time. Occasionally picking it in RANK required friendly interaction in the chat box for half a day.
Duan Mingyue obviously knew this too, so although he didn’t say anything, his gameplay still looked out for Shen Yanjin a bit.
Shen Yanjin saw it, paused, and whispered, “No need.”
Duan Mingyue said, “Okay.”
Only the two of them understood, like playing charades.
Kai played the Centaur very aggressively, hammering the opponent under the tower despite taking long-range poke. After all, he picked a counter role and had to be effective.
If anything happened in the jungle, he had to support faster than the opposing Mid laner; otherwise, if the Bladesman-Ice Witch fell behind, it would drag down the whole team.
After pushing the wave, Kai returned to his tower ready to recall. Hearing this headless and tail-less exchange from his Jungle-Support duo, a question mark slowly appeared above his head.
But he wasn’t puzzled for long because immediately after, he heard the sound of a Flash. Shen Yanjin’s Ice Witch flashed from the triangular brush in mid lane into the opponent’s tower, rooting the opposing Mid laner under the tower with a super close-range combo.
Duan Mingyue’s Bladesman used skills to wall-hop, following up with damage. He built pure damage items from the start, zero defense. Two slashes killed the opposing Mid laner. First Blood erupted three minutes into the game. The pace was so fast Kai was dumbfounded. The kill happened in his lane, yet he didn’t even get an assist, still recalling under his own tower, looking very silly.
Shen Yanjin walked out from under the mid tower with a sliver of health. Instead of going home, he chugged a potion and drilled into the opponent’s jungle with Duan Mingyue again.
Yes, with. The Ice Witch walked in front, and the Bladesman just followed her. The rhythm of the jungle invasion was clearly in the hands of the Support. This was unprecedented in KW’s matches.
“Enemy Jungle-Support is in Blue side.” Shen Yanjin placed a ward. The Red side was empty, with only a group of golems near the top lane. “After clearing camps, they might go straight to bot. Bot lane be careful.”
“…En.”
Tans quietly pulled the wave back. Kai noticed from the corner of his eye that his expression was also a bit subtle.
What made people feel even more subtle was that not long after Shen Yanjin spoke, the opposing Jungler’s figure actually flashed past the vision in the bot lane.
It couldn’t help but remind people of the evaluation major regions gave Sliver when he first debuted—”Eagle Eye.”
His awareness was so good it was creepy.
Shen Yanjin was obviously very accustomed to this situation. Confirming the opposing Jungler’s position, he said, “Circle, can you tank the tower? Two hits.”
Song Yuan’s Sword Immortal, being a counter pick, was already pressing the opponent. Although still a bit unused to Sliver’s command, he gave feedback quickly. “Can do three hits; my parry is still up.”
“Go.”
The Sword Immortal, robes fluttering, stabbed forward. The Bladesman entered the fray. Lend sensed something wrong and used Flash very timely. However, he absolutely didn’t expect that this wasn’t a 3-man gank, but a 4-man party! The fourth person, the Ice Witch, had her freezing slow off cooldown, releasing it right under his feet with the last bit of mana!
Lend was killed by the Bladesman again. The last tower shot hit Song Yuan’s parry—invalid damage.
The Mid laner had just respawned and couldn’t support top; the Jungler was too far away in the bot lane. Shen Yanjin and Duan Mingyue, the Jungle-Support duo, took a layer of turret plating money with Song Yuan before walking back to the brush to recall. Very arrogant.
Lend was forced to use Teleport to return to lane to farm. Being on the disadvantaged side, Teleport was even more important. Now forced to use it early, he would inevitably lose minion waves when wanting to recall for items later.
Unlike Song Yuan in the previous game, his character wasn’t a slacker but a split-pusher. Being suppressed was truly tragic; he would become invisible in team fights.
Top, Jungle, and Support recalled. Shen Yanjin continued, “You build split-push items…” He stopped here, realizing Song Yuan wasn’t that weak-minded top laner from before who would mess around if not hand-held through item builds. He hurriedly stopped. “Sorry, I’m used to it. My apologies.”
“It’s fine.” Song Yuan wasn’t familiar with this new support and even held a bit of prejudice due to his past “glorious” history, but these two waves of brilliant plays truly convinced him. In esports, skill speaks; whoever is strong is Daddy. “Split push it is. This wave is called learning from barbarians to control barbarians.”
Shen Yanjin was still a bit uneasy.
Esports players each have their own style. Even non-pros rarely liked someone constantly nagging about their operation and build from the side. Teaching people how to play the game really invited dislike.
Honestly, if those dogs at HG weren’t so trash, he wouldn’t have bothered to waste these thoughts and words.
In KW, he at least wanted to leave a good impression.
At this time, Duan Mingyue smiled. “It’s fine, the commanding is good. We’ll just follow your rhythm.”
Shen Yanjin gave an “En.” He spoke much less, keeping his mouth shut if he could just ping.
Duan Mingyue and Shen Yanjin had played many combos, but only with Bladesman and Ice Witch did Shen Yanjin take the rhythmic command. After all, all control and initiation of this combo relied on the Ice Witch. So even though he wasn’t familiar with the KW team, he didn’t hand the command back to Duan Mingyue.
FTK’s Top and Mid were caught at the start and countered in the draft; their lives were simply miserable. As for the bot lane, Tans unexpectedly had a very comfortable time. Logically, his choice of a late-game scaling AD meant he would suffer a lot from ganks in his “childhood.”
But Shen Yanjin’s vision control was too good. Duan Mingyue controlled the Scuttler Crab in the bot river, signaling bot occasionally. Every time Tans received a signal, he shrank back, giving the opposing Jungle-Support no chance at all.
Mid lane Kai doggishly brought Cleanse and Flash, not afraid of the Mermaid and Monk gank at all. Bot lane camped for a while with no harvest.
Alan and the Jungler returned to their own red side empty-handed. No vision in the brush. Alan made a mistake, face-checking the brush, and was frozen by Shen Yanjin hiding inside, followed by an Ultimate—he and Duan Mingyue were a full level and a half ahead of the opposing Jungle-Support and had unlocked Ultimates early.
Actually, strictly speaking, this couldn’t be considered a mistake. After all, who could have thought this duo acted like bandits? It was only ten minutes, turret plating hadn’t fallen yet, not only did they invade the jungle, but they were also camping here!
Mid and Top wanted to support, but they were mud bodhisattvas crossing the river—unable to save themselves, let alone others. They could only watch as the Bladesman and Ice Witch took two more kills.
How terrifying is a Bladesman with four kills?
One slash, one kid. No exaggeration.
Under KW’s offense, FTK showed signs of total collapse. Fourteen minutes in, a 5v5 team fight in the bot lane ended with KW trading zero for five. All of FTK’s outer towers were broken, and the economic lead reached ten thousand.
The five grouped up to push mid like it was a RANK game. Twenty minutes, the training match ended. Kill score 16-0. KW gave the newly strengthened, high-momentum FTK a buzzcut (shutout).
Kai mixed in a bunch of assists in team fights, looking more like a support than Shen Yanjin, and won the game in a daze. Tans, a scaling AD, didn’t even have time to scale. Only Song Yuan built a major split-push item, which played a key role: The Bulldozer, just pushing towers and that’s it.
“Is this Jungle-Support roam?” Kai took off his headset, feeling like he was in a dream. “Holy crap, twenty minutes? Finished in twenty minutes?”
Song Yuan also hadn’t quite processed it; the stomp was too thorough. “Awesome.”
When the group returned to the training room, the scorn and disdain on Lu Yuan’s face had disappeared, replaced by an extremely ugly expression.
She was a pro player after all. Even if unwilling, she had to admit: This was called Jungle-Support roam; this was the effect Jungle-Support roam should have.
Back at his station, Kai sent messages in the three-person small group chat.
[Kai: ? Is this Sliver himself?]
[Tans: .]
[Tans: Awesome.]
If Tans was willing to grace the group to say “Awesome,” then it was truly awesome, hugely awesome.
[Kai: So why did such a support play in HG for five years?]
[Kai: And played like trash.]
[Circle: Maybe the person really changed.]
[Circle: Changed from HG-Sliver to KW-Sliver.]
[Tans: Indeed.]
[Kai: But I thought about it.]
[Kai: If we at KW can have Lu Yuan, why can’t HG have Sliver?]
[Tans: Indeed.]
[Circle: Indeed.]
Comparisons kill people; comparing goods means throwing goods away.
Shen Yanjin’s Ice Witch blinded the eyes of everyone in KW, and also made Lu Yuan’s support look even more lackluster.
This nearly crushing fast-paced scrim also made everyone realize once again—the strong version of Jungle-Support roam had truly arrived. Protective supports had completely exited the stage.
At the same moment, silence reigned in the TWG Team base. No one spoke, only the sound of keyboards tapping.
Outside the coach’s office, in the dim corridor, Shi Feng leaned against the wall, quietly lowering his head to smoke.
Inside the door, Song Aiyu’s voice drifted out: “…Coach, I apply to withdraw from the first team.”
Sparks flickered, a sharp pain at his fingertips. Shi Feng snapped back to reality, finally realizing the cigarette had burned to the end.
He stubbed out the cigarette and left without looking back.
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