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The third round of Season 10 finished.

Samsara stood at the top of the point rankings with 28 points. Blue Rain and Tiny Herb were second and third respectively with 27 points. Wind Howl was fourth with 26 points. From the point rankings, these four teams made up the first tier. After them was the fifth place team Misty Rain with 22 points. Thunderclap was sixth with 21 points; their start was looking quite good. In seventh was Void. After a mediocre first and second round, they finally pulled off a dominating performance in the third round, winning against Seaside with a perfect 10 points, placing them at seventh. At eighth place was Tyranny with 19 points. Compared to last season, Tyranny had taken the largest step back.

Outside of the currently qualified playoff teams, the points dropped. Team 301 was at ninth with 14 points, Royal Style at tenth with 13 points. Parade, Happy, and Hundred Blossoms were eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth respectively with 12 points each. Speaking of which, the ranking for these three teams was quite complicated. Usually, if two or more teams had the same number of points, the teams were temporarily arranged in alphabetical order, by pinyin. If two teams had records against each other that season, they would be ranked according to who had the better record. For these three teams, Hundred Blossoms (Baihua) was first alphabetically. However, Happy had won a match against Hundred Blossoms, so Happy should be ahead of them. But in terms of alphabetical order, Happy (Xingxin) should be behind Parade (Hewu).

It was impossible to reach a consensus just from these three conditions. In the end, Hundred Blossoms’ alphabetical advantage was removed and they became the bottom of those three teams. Of course, it was just the start of the season, so it didn’t matter too much. But at the end of the season, when accurate rankings mattered, this type of impossibly muddled situation would usually be decided by an additional match. Using something like alphabetical order shouldn’t decide a team’s final ranking.

After Hundred Blossoms were the lower tier teams, who were all grouped up together. In last place in the relegation zone was Seaside, who had eaten two zeros in two consecutive matches, and currently had a heroic 2 points. Heavenly Swords was in second to last place with 5 points, but the team ahead of them, Miracle (Shenqi), was also at 5 points, only beating out Heavenly Swords (Yizhan) through their alphabetical advantage.

The point rankings as well as the performances of each team in the third round were reported and analyzed.

Happy! Happy again!

In the third round, Samsara and Tyranny was clearly the highlight match. Happy faced a mediocre Radiant, but how come they still made it to the headlines?

The mighty Tang Rou had achieved a 1v2 in the previous round. Why did she lose so badly this round?

Right after this crushing defeat, she claimed that she would achieve a 1v3 within five rounds? And if she didn’t she would leave the pro scene?

Damn, this sister’s so domineering!

Damn, this sister’s so arrogant!

Damn, this sister’s so bold!

Damn, this sister’s so egotistical!

She had a brilliant victory in the second round, but an embarrassing loss in the third round. Yet even so, Tang Rou was still the most followed player in these two rounds. It was just like Wei Chen said. Whether the attention was good or bad, the attention towards Tang Rou was sky-high right now. After the 1v2 in the second round, quite a few reporters had wanted to interview Tang Rou. After the crushing defeat in the third round, even more reporters wanted to interview Tang Rou.

Seeing how popular Tang Rou was, quite a few people started asserting: promotion. This was definitely the media promoting her.

And the Esports Time reporter Ruan Cheng, who had challenged Tang Rou in the press conference and had Tang Rou make such an arrogant claim, had written a long, flowing article in a magazine calling this all a farce. So what if Tang Rou made such a promise? No one could force her to leave the pro scene. As long as her skin was thick enough, she could endure the pressure of public opinion, and she could give herself a classic excuse like ”I can’t give up my passion for Glory” or ”I’m willing to endure anything for my fans” and so on… As a girl with indisputably good looks, she could definitely win quite some support.

Ruan Cheng’s article generated a huge response. In terms of print media influence, the Esports Time was only slightly inferior to the Esports Home’s weekly issue.

Those familiar with the Esports Time immediately understood after seeing that it was Ruan Cheng’s article. This guy had set his targets on Tang Rou. His article had been written with for a purpose. It was to seal off Tang Rou’s retreat path. Having given predictions for her retreat path, if Tang Rou still went along it, she would undoubtedly be viewed as someone with skin so thick that it couldn’t be saved. She would receive a huge amount of criticism for it. Under this kind of public pressure, it would be hard to imagine what type of person could continue to survive.

After this article, many reporters tried all sorts of ways to reach Happy, hoping that Tang Rou could say a few words about it. However, Happy blocked them all. Tang Rou seemed to have disappeared. She gave no response to the criticism or the support towards her.

These days, Tang Rou was practicing like crazy.

In Tang Rou’s loss against Radiant, the problems showed by Tang Rou were actually Ye Xiu’s two biggest worries for her.

The first problem was that if the match wasn’t enough of a challenge, she was unable to feel enthusiastic about playing and couldn’t bring out her full potential. This sort of mental problem couldn’t be described with numbers. It was an issue borne from Tang Rou’s personality. In the game, she could still win those non-challenging battles because of the huge disparity in skill between the two sides. But in the pro scene, that huge disparity didn’t exist. Facing Radiant’s half-health player, Tang Rou still had to concentrate. However, the situation was very different from when she faced Yu Feng and Zhu Xiaoping. In addition, Radiant studied Tang Rou’s battle against Xiao Shiqin in the Challenger League and developed a strategy specifically to target her. In the end, the half-health Radiant player beat the full-health Tang Rou.

In the team competition, because Tang Rou felt guilty and ashamed for losing in the group arena, she really wanted to win. This sort of mentality ignited her fighting spirit, thus leading to Ye Xiu’s second worry: if her fighting spirit burns too hot, she is unable to exercise restraint.

Both of these two points were issues stemming from her personality. Trying to reconstruct someone’s personality was harder than climbing the heavens. These were something that she couldn’t control. They came and went subconsciously.

The only way to resolve these issues was to improve her skill level.

It was just like in the game. Even if she couldn’t display her full capabilities, she could still win. What she relied on was superior skill.

Understanding this point, Tang Rou focused on being aware of her mentality, while also increasing her practice.　

Morning, afternoon, night. Apart from eating, sleeping, and the appropriate amount of exercise, Tang Rou practiced crazily day and night.

”Is this okay?” Chen Guo was a bit worried and asked Ye Xiu.

”It’s always good for young people to practice more. The problem is only whether you have the motivation to persevere,” Ye Xiu said.

”So you intentionally gave her the goal of completing 1v3 within 5 rounds, so she has enough motivation to persist with this high-intensity practice?” Chen Guo said.

”No… I’m afraid that her eagerness to win will go over her head and she’ll win next round. That would be troublesome.” Ye Xiu laughed bitterly.

”Even so, why didn’t you give her more room? Even ten rounds would have been better!” Chen Guo said.

”If I say more, with her personality, what do you think she would do?” Ye Xiu said.　　

”Cut it down until she felt like it was right…” Chen Guo said.

”So if I say too much, she’ll say she won’t need so many rounds and she’ll do it in just one. What then?” Ye Xiu asked.

”Fine...” Chen Guo surrendered.

”But what if, I’m saying what if, she can’t do it. What then?” Chen Guo looked towards Tang Rou, who was hard at work, and whispered the question to Ye Xiu.

”Yes…” Ye Xiu said.

”What does that ’yes’ mean?” Chen Guo was puzzled. Ye Xiu didn’t explain, though. He looked at Tang Rou as well. This guy was pretending like he was being profound again. Chen Guo thought to herself angrily.

While Tang Rou was solving her individual problems, Happy also had other problems to fix. Their loss against Radiant in the group arena could be considered as Tang Rou’s fault, but their loss in the team competition couldn’t be blamed on any one individual. The team competition was fought as a whole. If any one part wasn’t working properly, the other parts needed to take on some of that responsibility. And in the team competition against Radiant, Happy had done a very poor job here, even if there was Ye Xiu, Su Mucheng, and Fang Rui playing. When Tang Rou came apart, these three All-Stars failed to properly adjust the team’s rhythm. In the end, Radiant seized an opening and beat them fiercely.

These three All-Stars were unable to adapt to the situation when facing Team Radiant. It sounded hard to believe, but in reality, there was a serious issue between these three All-Stars - they were still getting used to playing and coordinating with each other.

Fang Rui obviously required time for him to grow accustomed to his new Qi Master class. Apart from that, it was his first time playing with Ye Xiu and Su Mucheng. He needed time to get used to their rhythm and their habits. Even Ye Xiu and Su Mucheng, these two Best Partners, needed time to synergize with each other in a high-level competition.

It wasn’t because the two were suddenly unfamiliar with each other after a year of not playing together. It was because Ye Xiu had changed classes.

The unspecialized, the Myriad Manifestations Umbrella, and the unpredictable skill combinations gave headaches to everyone in the Alliance. None of them were able to keep up with such rapid complex variations.

And ”everyone in the Alliance” included his teammates Su Mucheng and Fang Rui.

They weren’t all-class experts. They had never partnered with an unspecialized before. Their situation was actually the same as their opponents. The only difference was that because they couldn’t grasp the unspecialized’s rhythm, they couldn’t properly coordinate with Ye Xiu.

In the first round, facing Samsara’s powerful sweep, there wasn’t enough time for this issue to come up.

In the second round, through the map Broken River, they never really had any direct confrontations facing Hundred Blossoms.　　

In the third round, facing the proactive Team Radiant and Tang Rou falling apart, the three All-Stars ran into a serious problem, where none of them were able to coordinate well with one another.

Before even killing any enemies, Lord Grim had dealt a fierce blow to Happy’s teamwork.

”It looks like we need to practice harder too,” Ye Xiu said after carefully reviewing their match against Radiant.　　

”Yeah!” Su Mucheng’s expression was exceptionally resolute. Failing to coordinate with Ye Xiu, how could that be acceptable?

”Damn, I have to keep up with the pace of 120 short cooldown skills. I can already feel my golden right hand crying,” Fang Rui said.