Yun Qi returned to backstage, looking utterly dejected. KRO had already taken the stage, and the commentator was regaling the crowd with the team’s legendary exploits.
The coach spotted him and asked, “Did you find it?”
Yun Qi raised his hand and clipped the chest badge onto his team uniform. “Mm,” he replied.
“Good,” the coach said, giving his shoulder a light pat. “Get ready.”
No sooner had the words left his mouth than the commentator’s voice boomed from up front: “Let’s welcome the team you’ve all been waiting for—SK!”
Yun Qi trailed behind the rest of the team, mounting the stage in a daze. He was back in this cutthroat arena once more. In the center of the stage, the players went through their introductions amid roaring cheers from the fans before settling into their seats.
Yun Qi couldn’t make out the commentator’s words over the din, only the microphone’s echo filling the arena. His mind lingered backstage. Straight ahead loomed the KRO members, tweaking their setups and warming up. Heads occasionally bobbed between the screens as they huddled in hushed strategy talks, no doubt plotting a swift takedown.
Liu Ying, KRO’s jungler, sat opposite Chen Xia. Liu Ying’s fan lights swept the audience like a tidal wave, outshining everyone—just as they had back in the day. The player he’d personally mentored commanded insane popularity.
SK were championship contenders, but they paled next to KRO. The whole team’s hype didn’t match a single KRO star. The manager had pumped up Yun Qi plenty, but raw strength always won out in the end—fans gravitated to the true powerhouses.
Junglers always stole the spotlight. The National No.1 Support and National No.10 Jungler were no match. Supports got overlooked too easily, and Liu Ying was the undisputed No.1 Jungler on the domestic leaderboard. In pro play, any hero he touched struck fear into opponents.
Hero select opened, and SK dumped all three bans on junglers—a blatant target on Liu Ying. They dreaded his jungler-core comps, that dreaded Pig Farming Strategy. True to the coach’s orders, they banned him out first. Handing over every ban slot showed just how much he loomed in SK’s nightmares.
Liu Ying’s go-tos got gutted, forcing a Siren pick. She wasn’t meta-strong, barely scraping T2. The crowd groaned as he locked her in; SK exhaled in relief. But they’d rejoice too soon.
Three minutes in, Liu Ying’s Siren plunged into the enemy Jungle. Siren lacked punch, but KRO’s mid Goddess and bot shooter packed early-game nukes. Even SK’s trio couldn’t hold the Jungle against that, playing right into the coach’s prediction: KRO would counter-jungle no matter what.
Red Buff fell, so Chen Xia swung for an invade swap. KRO had anticipated it—their top laner rotated back fast, Liu Ying right behind. The swap flopped. Chen Xia slunk to Mid to farm, momentum shattered. “We’re cooked, brothers.”
Yun Qi’s Snowman dove in after, but Lang Xian lagged by seconds. Jiu Shuang lumbered too slow early and couldn’t rotate. Xue Yan’s bot shooter had no prayer keeping red-zone counter pace. Chen Xia and Yun Qi got pinched in enemy red. No first blood was lost, but battered, they B’d back. First rhythm snowballed away.
Four minutes, seven seconds: Bot’s First Tower crumbled.
Xue Yan snapped, “How the hell do we fight this? Ziwu’s bot! Jiu Shuang, get down here!”
Jiu Shuang ate it in their own red en route. He’d warded the bush early, but too late—Liu Ying counter-squatted and snagged first blood.
“Damn, that reaction…” Jiu Shuang’s face twisted. Pro match—he bit back the rant. “Not on Qiluo; they camped Jungle hard. Why no rotate?”
The blame landed on Yun Qi out of nowhere. Liu Ying’s Siren blinked off-map. No time to argue; Yun Qi pinged over comms: “Top.”
Lang Xian ran Death Angel, meta bully with dashes and tankiness. He peeled instantly. Good call—one second later, enemy mid and jungler tower-dived. He’d have melted tower and all.
“Fuckin’ Liu Ying…” Jiu Shuang eyed Top, then to Chen Xia: “Bot gank, stat—they’re vision-blind. Counter-push bot!”
The Snowman hero possessed powerful team control skills, but its downside was its fragility—even with stacks of defensive items, it couldn’t withstand two hits from a shooter. This was a common weakness of soft supports, so players couldn’t hesitate when using this hero. Yun Qi noticed the situation on the top lane and realized Liu Ying couldn’t arrive in time. He turned around, flashed in aggressively, and forcibly froze the enemy support and shooter. Xue Yan followed right behind him, while Chen Xia flanked from the rear to encircle them. By the time the enemies reacted, it was already too late, and this skirmish helped them regain some momentum.
The kill announcement blared out—Chen Xia and Xue Yan each secured a takedown. Yun Qi recalled to base on the spot, quickly purchased his equipment, and joined the enemy’s third wave of team fighting, which they had forcefully initiated in mid lane.
KRO’s playstyle was highly aggressive. From watching their past match videos, it was clear this esports team favored an unconventional wild path, and they had the skill to make it work. KRO had always built around a dominant jungler core; no matter the opponent, they invariably invaded the enemy’s jungle. Although SK had anticipated this scenario, they still fell into a disadvantage and couldn’t defend against it at all. Their lineup consisted entirely of heroes that weren’t strong early on, yet they were completely dragged into the enemy’s rhythm.
This was an issue of individual skill levels, as well as team coordination.
In just one match, SK exposed countless internal weaknesses, while KRO was a seasoned esports team with years of experience in battles big and small. Facing them felt like professionals crushing amateurs. Jiu Shuang was already a highly valued mid laner, but after this game, his market value was likely to drop significantly. Only at this moment did SK finally realize they weren’t fit to be KRO’s opponents at all.
SK had defeated every opponent they’d faced that year; all the dark horse teams had been sent packing by SK. Yet against KRO, they displayed utter powerlessness. This massive skill disparity made it impossible not to wonder just how much stronger KRO had grown this year—and what kind of team could even trade blows with such a powerhouse.
At the ten-minute mark, the high ground tower exploded. The red health bars loomed like a nightmare over the SK players’ minds. This match, targeted squarely at Liu Ying, still ended in a total loss without any chance to fight back. The instant they removed their headsets, it felt like waking from a dream—even the audience hadn’t processed it before the match was officially declared over.
The commentator’s voice echoed through the arena: “As expected of KRO—they’re still as terrifying as ever after all these years. Ending the game in ten minutes—congratulations to KRO on taking the first game with ease!”
This was only the first match, but it left everyone utterly speechless. Jiu Shuang said nothing, and Chen Xia did the same, sitting silently in his seat as the audience’s belated cheers rang in their ears. Yun Qi looked up and saw the KRO players showing no reaction whatsoever, as if it were all routine for them.
SK had foreseen this outcome. Their coach knew there was a massive gap between their team’s level and KRO’s, so he hadn’t piled on the pressure in the two days leading up to the match. But having a game ended in ten minutes was a brutality that was still hard to stomach.
Unknowingly, Yun Qi recalled the scene he’d witnessed in the rest room: Eidis sitting leisurely on the sofa, chatting and laughing casually with league staff, utterly unconcerned about the match ahead. Was it because he knew deep down that his team simply wouldn’t lose?
SK had no business competing with KRO, and the tirelessly practicing Chen Xia had even less right to challenge Liu Ying as an opponent. Only that level of unshakeable confidence could allow someone to remain so relaxed and carefree, completely tension-free.
The second game started quickly. Losing this one would end SK’s run for the year. Everyone knew they couldn’t afford another loss, but they also knew this game was destined to be one.
They no longer fixated on Liu Ying. The bans targeted Goddess and Shang based on the previous game. Chen Xia clutched his forehead, seemingly at a loss for what to pick, as the coach whispered advice to him. In the end, he locked in Crow Dog.
Crow Dog was Chen Xia’s highest win-rate hero. This niche jungler had an appearance rate below 30% in the current patch—frighteningly low—and Chen Xia rarely touched it even in practice scrims. He probably hoped to catch the enemy off guard. But Liu Ying locked in Andre, and it was common knowledge that Crow Dog hard-countered Andre like no other, perfectly shutting down all his skills.
“Andre! Liu Ying’s got something cooking here. Everyone knows Crow Dog counters Andre the hardest, but picking Andre into it is downright baffling!”
Wasn’t this confidence in its own right? Locking the hero you’re most afraid of. The polite term was “confidence”; the blunt one was “not taking you seriously.”
In truth, Liu Ying wasn’t targeting just Chen Xia—he was targeting every jungler in the game.
The current national server #1 jungler unleashed an incomparably ferocious momentum. First blood slipped away inexplicably, Jiu Shuang got ganked early and mid lane imploded, the jungle held defensively but the rhythm was completely lost.
They moved like puppets jerked around on strings, completely toyed with by KRO. There shouldn’t have been such a massive gap between professional teams, but the enemy coordinated too flawlessly, their skill level simply too high. This year, they seemed even stronger than in past seasons—SK was the last grindstone in the domestic league.
SK wasn’t shut out in this match, but it might as well have been. The second game dragged to a passive end, and with that, the Grand Finals were over, crushed beneath KRO’s terrifying dominance.
SK’s fans filed out in disappointment. This game was sure to hit the hot searches. The team had been so hyped up before—now they’d face a torrent of backlash. Losing wasn’t the worst part; it was their utter lack of fightback.
Meanwhile, KRO’s commercial value kept skyrocketing. Every match just inflated the team’s worth even more.
Once the Grand Finals wrapped up without suspense, Jiu Shuang and Chen Xia started bickering in the rest room. It stemmed from that first blood in the second game—Chen Xia was stewing with resentment, throwing the first game’s ganks in the jungle back at him. They usually got along fine, but this match had tanked everyone’s morale.
Xue Yan hadn’t expected much from the start, so he stayed mostly unfazed. The head coach sat there with a defeated look on his face, like he’d just been eating dirt. Yun Qi watched the argument drag on before slipping out—he hated fights like that.
“Andre was supposed to be the one getting shut down, not you. How’d they get such a huge econ lead? You didn’t even lose jungle control.”
“Are you saying that first blood was my gift to Liu Ying? Is it my fault the pace fell apart?”
“Wasn’t Brother Yan farming bot lane a bit slow? No need to die hugging that first tower—the river skirmish was totally counterable.”
“Qiluo shouldn’t have babysat the jungle in game one. He needed to dive straight into counter-jungling with Chen Xia!”
“I’ve been saying it all along—how do you coordinate with such uneven skill levels?”
“Just bring Danwan in already!”
“What a disgrace. These two games… I don’t even know what to say.”
Winners patted themselves on the back; losers pointed fingers at teammates. It was SK’s perennial problem. Other teams might have the same issues, but none as bad as SK.
Yun Qi listened to the commotion behind him without a word. He leaned against the door in silence for a long moment until a little boy suddenly entered his view. The child stood at the end of the hallway, staring at him blankly all by himself.
Yun Qi recognized him—the one kid who’d caught him peeking. He walked over. The boy didn’t flinch. Yun Qi glanced around, then crouched down. “Hey, little guy, what are you doing here all alone?”
The boy clutched a Transformers toy, fiddling with it on his own. In a soft, childish voice, he said, “Waiting for Brother.”
Yun Qi knelt lower and ruffled the kid’s doughy cheek, mimicking his babyish tone. “What’s your name?”
The boy didn’t look up. “Weiwei.”
“How old are you?”
Weiwei shook his head. Yun Qi was about to ask more when a cold voice cut in from behind:
“Brain clogged with pig fat? A four-year-old can’t even speak properly?”
Yun Qi froze. Still crouched, his fingers went rigid on the boy’s cheek.
The little boy darted past him. Yun Qi’s back was to the newcomer, his legs heavy as wet cement as he slowly straightened up. He turned and saw the man whose thigh Weiwei was now hugging.
He stood there in a sharp casual outfit, worlds away from the school uniform of their first meeting. His presence was steady and aloof, his expression distant and icy, radiating a natural barrier that made people want to back away.
“New CP blowing up online, and you don’t recognize old flames anymore?” The man’s tone was frigid as he challenged him.
Yun Qi stared at the hand resting on the boy’s head. Abruptly, he blurted, “You… got married?”
That gleaming ring on the man’s finger burned itself into Yun Qi’s mind. Three years later, he should have said something normal like “long time no see.” Instead, this personal question slipped out, betraying his thoughts.
“Married,” the man said. “Found a girl who suits me, had a kid. Living that normal life you always talked about.”
The boy grabbed his hand, climbing all over him like a koala, clearly dependent.
“Did you want to hear me say that?”
Yun Qi met those eyes—no longer soft and tender. Despite all his mental prep, he faltered right then.
“Just kidding.” The man took Weiwei’s hand and scooped him up effortlessly, his strong arm securing the boy. “Why would I live the life my ex wants to see?”
Yun Qi pressed his lips together, saying nothing.
“Match go south?” the man asked, stepping closer. His Martin boots nudged between Yun Qi’s sneakers. Yun Qi nodded honestly.
“Par for the course. SK’s no good.” Yun Qi blinked, staring at the intruding shoe tip as that familiar scent filled his nose. He started to pull back, but the man closed in, grabbing his chest badge.
Those fingertips that had delved into his body several times before now roamed appreciatively over his team badge. They rubbed and pressed repeatedly over the words “Shanghai SK Qiluo.” Moments later, a voice brimming with piercing clarity rang out, gentle yet laced with sharp sarcasm: “Lang Xian is even worse.”
