Chapter 298 – China VS Italy

Two days pa.s.sed quickly and all members of the national team once again took the arranged bus to the venue of the World Compet.i.tion. There was no doubt that this match was packed. The Italian team and Chinese team had very high popularity and many fans came here to cheer for their country.

Li Cangyu took the players through the verification process and went directly to the backstage lounge.

This morning there had been a match between Group D's French team and the British team. They happened to meet the French team in the backstage corridor. Captain Stein took the initiative to come over and shake Ling Xuefeng's hand. "Today we unexpectedly met in the corridor. I hope we don't meet in the quarter finals."

Ling Xuefeng replied lightly, "Then you have to defeat the British team."

Captain Stein was the face of the national team. He had the typical blond hair and blue eyes. His nose was high, his facial features handsome and he had the sculptural silhouette of a European man. This appearance was definitely enough to captivate thousands of girls.

In addition, he had the romantic cells of a Frenchmen. It was said that during the training period, he often bought flowers for the training room. He said it was to adjust the air and make the training full full of a sweet fragrance.

Stein had many fans in France and many people liked his face and personality.

He heard Ling Xuefeng's words and smiled slightly. "I hope we can all hear!"

He turned away while everyone in the Chinese team were in a daze. Cheng Wei had a wors.h.i.+pful expression. "Captain Ling can speak French?"

Xie Shurong went to Bai Xuan and asked, "Did you understand?"

"I don't understand. My second foreign language is Portuguese."

Li Cangyu glanced over at Ling Xuefeng and his eyes obviously said, 'Give me an honest explanation!'

Ling Xuefeng explained, "Didn't I play in the US server for a while before returning home? At the time, many world servers weren't opened. People in many countries used proxy servers to make an account in the American server. Stein was one of them and we added each other as friends on the Internet. We have been familiar since then."

Li Cangyu smiled. "Oh, you have a good friend whom you know longer than me?"

Ling Xuefeng was busy clarifying. "We are just acquaintances. I had very few contact with him after I returned to China. I only knew that he established a team in France. Now that I think about it, his age is similar to us."

Li Cangyu asked lightly, "Is it? he was able to recognize you after a few years?"

The rest of the team were standing to the side in an embarra.s.sed manner, collectively frozen. Why did it feel like Cat G.o.d was questioning Captain Ling's feelings? Everyone was too afraid to come out. If they died, they would probably be killed by these two men.

Ling Xuefeng reluctantly explained, "I'm not even friends with him."

Li Cangyu nodded. "Yes."

Ling Xuefeng was silent for a moment, somewhat unsure until he lowered his voice and asked, "Are you jealous?"

Li Cangyu quietly replied to him, "There is a match. Let's not discuss this now."

He was laughing in his heart. It was rare for this anxious expression to appear on Ling Xuefeng's abstinent face. Looking at his attempt to clarify, Li Cangyu already softened. The fact that he could make such a strong man lower his head showed that Ling Xuefeng really cared about him!

Li Cangyu naturally wouldn't be small-minded enough to eat this type of vinegar.

When he first met Ling Xuefeng in the online game, Ling Xuefeng was a master who had come back from abroad. He had played on the US server for more than a year and naturally knew players from other countries on the US server. This was normal and there was nothing to care about.

All he cared about was that the person called Stein looked dangerous and was one of the world's top three bard players. It was best for the Chinese team to not compete with the French team in the quarter-finals!

***

The match would soon begin. The Chinese team walked into the soundproof room while Kou Hongyi and Yu Bing introduced the players on both sides. Yu Bing specifically emphasized, "The maps for this match are likely to be changed. According to the matches of other groups, the probability of repeating previously used maps is very low."

Kou Hongyi explained, "In other words, the Chinese team previously played on Mechanical City and Mount Huangshan Plank Road. These maps shouldn't come out again and there should be new maps. The same thing will be applied to the Italian team. It seems that the league has adjusted the odds to deliberately let new maps appear."

The audience heard the explanation and were excited.

Countless comments appeared in the live broadcast room. [Seeking the country's national treasure, the pandas! Did they submit a panda map?] [Australia has koalas, Spain has bulls so we should have pandas!] [I think monkeys are more reliable. Monkeys can directly pull players into trees!]

The netizens racked their brains to guess the map of the national team. The players in both soundproof rooms quickly debugged the keyboard, mouse and other equipment.

The Chinese captain Li Cangyu and Italian captain Alberto were sitting at the command post.

The referee announced the start of the match and triggered the random lottery program. The audience stared nervously at the big screen. Finally, it stopped and the system chose the order of the game. The Chinese team was first and Italy second.

Li Cangyu calmly pressed a b.u.t.ton on the screen and soon two maps appeared—Venice and Florence!

The audience became excited and in particular, the fans of Italy burst out screaming.

The two maps weren't present in previous matches. Based on the name of the maps and the logo on the left corner, they knew these maps were those submitted by Italy.

A moment later, the Italian captain also pressed the b.u.t.ton and the big screen showed—Bamboo Sea, Suzhou Gardens.

The two maps were both garden maps. Bamboo Sea's thumbnail showed a large number of bamboo pillars while Suzhou Gardens looked more complicated.

After the captains had randomly chosen, the remaining three maps were s.p.a.ce-Time Illusion, Blood Castle and Wilderness Tribe!

These three were official Miracle maps. s.p.a.ce-Time Illusion was a maze and Blood Castle was a death map. Wilderness Tribe seemed simple but it was the hardest to fight due to the wind and sand.

At this time, Li Cangyu was first and had the privilege of disabling two maps.

Out of the Italian maps, Venice was probably a water battle map while Florence was unable to be judged. Based on the thumbnail, it should have a complex terrain with traps.

Li Cangyu thought for a moment and disabled Florence.

In the previous Australia and Spain matches, he released both maps of the other side because he was confident he could beat both teams. However, this game was absolutely important in determining the Chinese team's rank in the quarter finals.

Of the remaining three maps, Li Cangyu directly banned s.p.a.ce-Time Illusion.

Kou Hongyi was surprised by this. "He didn't ban Wilderness Tribe! Why didn't Cat G.o.d ban the most difficult map?"

Yu Bing calmly a.n.a.lyzed, "The accident factors in this map is too big. The wind and sand can change the field and there are too many barriers. It is very unfavorable to the illusion flow. Cat G.o.d did this to force Italy to ban the map."

Kou Hongyi suddenly realized. "Yes! Cat G.o.d is really witty!"

In the map selection section, it wasn't necessary to ban the map they weren't good in. Li Cangyu banned the s.p.a.ce-Time Illusion map that the other side was relatively good in, forcing the other party to ban the Wilderness Tribe. In the end, only the death map Blood Castle would be left of the Miracle official maps.

This move by Li Cangyu forced the Italian captain into a bit of a dilemma.

He could only ban Wilderness Tribe since this map was truly too difficult to fight on.

However, he didn't want Blood Castle!

The problem was that out of the Chinese team's two maps, he could only choose one to ban. The Italian captain suddenly felt that he didn't have enough brain cells.

In the previous two matches, the Chinese team was always second and Li Cangyu continuously released the two maps of the opposite side.

In this game, he had the lead and Alberto felt pressure from the selection stage alone. The Chinese captain's thinking truly wasn't simple and forced Alberto to ban the map he wanted to ban. Really too tricky!

After some deliberation, Alberto had to point his map and ban Wilderness Tribe and Suzhou Gardens!

Li Cangyu saw this and his lips slightly curved.

Things had developed as he expected.

The last three maps left were Bamboo Sea, Venice and Blood Castle.

However, did they think that Bamboo Sea was simple enough to only have bamboos? They were too naive!

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Chapter 299 – China VS Italy (Unexpected Situation)

After the two captains chose the maps, the system judged it. In the end, Blood Castle was chosen for the arena, Bamboo Sea was used for the economic war and Venice was chosen for death racing.

As usual, the maps were shown before the game. From a G.o.d's perspective, Blood Castle was a very dangerous death map. The castle towered into the clouds, the terrain inside was complex and there were many scary blood pools. Players had to fight on a narrow road. As long as they placed one step into the blood pools, not even their bones would be left.

This map was released in the sixth season of the Miracle Professional League and professional players all over the world were familiar with it. This map looked dangerous in appearance but it was less difficult than the disabled s.p.a.ce-Time Illusion and Wilderness Tribe.

The map finished showing and the names of the players on both sides appeared on the big screen.

The Chinese team sent Su Yu in the first stage of the elimination game while the Italian team sent an archer and white magician.

The Italian team's melee strength was average but the level of their ranged players was very strong. These two players weren't as famous as their captain but they were very popular G.o.ds in Italy.

Su Guangmo took Yu Pingsheng to the players' seats and sat down with a relaxed expression. "Brother, please protect me later."

Yu Pingsheng nodded earnestly. "Yes."

There were no humour cells in this guy's body. Every time Su Guangmo smiled at him, Yu Pingsheng would just stare with wide eyes before saying 'yes', indicating that he heard.

Su Guangmo looked at him in a joking mood and lightly patted his hand. "Refuel."

"Yes!"

The man stared at the computer screen in a serious manner. His eyelashes were long and thick while his beautiful jawline looked extraordinarily soft under the illuminated lights.

In every match, Su Guangmo would never feel nervous as long as the quiet as a ghost Yu Pingsheng was sitting next to him.

Su Guangmo smiled at the thought and placed his hands on the keyboard.

***

The opposite side was ready and the countdown to the map loading appeared on the screen. Both sides soon refreshed in two corners of Blood Castle.

The roads of Blood Castle were extremely narrow but Su Guangmo and Yu Pingsheng were very familiar with this map. They quickly crossed the castle, completely ignoring the surrounding blood pools.

The two players of the Italian team also reached the centre of the castle at an extremely fast pace, both sides meeting at the central square.

There were five scattered fountains in the central square of Blood Castle. Unlike other squares, the water in the fountains was red and had the same effect as the surrounding blood pools. Once they accidentally stepped in, they would be forced to scream.

The Italian archer saw the two opponents and immediately fired the bow as he used Quenching Arrow!

Quenching Arrow was one of the archer's few control techniques. It had a certain probability of activating the frozen effect and the other side would be frozen.

Yu Pingsheng saw the sharp ice arrow approaching him and his finger pressed on the keyboard. The berserker on the screen took a step to the right and avoided the control skill in a thrilling manner.

The opposite side's white magician followed with G.o.d's Seal!

This control skill was still aimed at Yu Pingsheng. As a result, Yu Pingsheng flexibly moved left and once again evaded the white magician's sealing skill!

In just three seconds, he relied on his flexible walking to avoid two skills in a row. Even Su Guangmo couldn't help feeling admiration. This operation was too delicate!

Kou Hongyi couldn't help exclaiming, "Vice-Captain Yu is a very strange berserker. He is very wild and heated up when attacking but he is very careful when defending. Don't look at the huge and awkward appearance of the beast berserker. Our Vice-Captain Yu can repeatedly moved his berserker in a flexible manner to avoid the opponents' skills!"

He just said this when the large axe in Yu Pingsheng's split apart the ground. It was Mountain Chop!

The image flashed green and a straight ditch extended to the red central fountain, blocking the displacement route of the archer.

The Italian archer had to move to the left side. Meanwhile, the white magician's knowledge was very good. He saw that G.o.d's Seal was wasted and directly used the skill Holy Seal!

A single control skill was directional and didn't lock onto the target. This made it easy to be avoided. However, a group control skill had a wide range and was difficult to avoid. Sure enough, this skill accurately set Su Guangmo and Yu Pingsheng in place. The white magician was happy and moved around the blood pool, casting the big group attack G.o.d's Belief!

The archer also followed up with Death Arrow Rain!

The two big moves fell and Su Guangmo lost half his blood while Yu Pingsheng had higher defense and only lost 35% blood.

The two men stood in place and were beaten, making the domestic audience members feel distraught. [What the h.e.l.l is going on today? Captain Su is just standing there and not acting!] [Captain Su's usual style of play is very active. Today he is being pa.s.sively beaten behind Vice-Captain Yu. Does he have a bad stomach like Daddy Bai?]

On the screen, Su Guangmo was beaten to half blood by this wave. At this moment, the big screen suddenly paused and the referee turned on a red light, signalling that something was wrong with the game.

Kou Hongyi wondered, "Surely he wasn't disconnected?"

He just finished speaking when he was sent a message. There was a problem with Su Guangmo's computer. He pressed the keys but there was no response.

Yu Bing frowned. "No wonder why Captain Su didn't move for a few seconds. It was a network fault and he couldn't operate his character. Everyone should be patient and wait for the referee's result."

The screen moved to the Chinese team's soundproof room. They could see Captain Li Cangyu and Vice-Captain Ling Xuefeng walking over to Su Guangmo. Ling Xuefeng was negotiating with the referee in English.

According to the rules, if an official failure affected the game then the captain could apply for a replay. However, it was a bit of a nuisance to start again from the selection stage since it would once again be a random selection.

The choices in this match had advantages for the Chinese team.

However, it was true that the network fault directly knocked out half of Su Guangmo's blood.

Ling Xuefeng looked over at Li Cangyu. "What do you think? Do you want to restart?"

Li Cangyu touched his chin and thought for a moment before making a decision. "It is best not to replay. It is half blood but I believe the players afterward can catch up. Captain Su, what do you think?"

Su Guangmo replied, "No problem."

"Then it's decided. We will continue the game."

He and Ling Xuefeng went back while the referee motioned for the game to continue.

Kou Hongyi was very surprised. "This… if we keep playing, the network failure will obviously make our players suffer!"

Yu Bing was also a bit unhappy. "The US Internet can actually fail?"

The Chinese audiences sent out a row of disdainful expressions but they saw the green light and could only swallow their words.

Su Guangmo was finally moving!

The network fault was resolved and the terran swordsman immediately forcibly removed the seal control. He bypa.s.sed two or three fountain pools and jumped to the other side of the white magician, using the gorgeous Light and Shadow Rotation!

The big move used by Su Guangmo always gave people a feeling of tyranny. He was a well-known unrestrained player of China. Whenever he cooperated with Yu Pingsheng, he could play his style to the extreme.

The weak white magician lost 30% blood from this big move and his casting was repeatedly interrupted.

He just wanted to turn away when he was controlled with Spirit Lock!

Su Guangmo set him in place and then left him, turning to chase the archer. He used Breaking Bone Sword and Devouring Soul Sword to hit the archer to half blood.

He seemed to be telling people all over the world about his power. If it wasn't for the network failure, how could he so easily drop to half blood? The Chinese G.o.ds were the strongest champions and could catch up in seconds!

The previous blood gap was narrowed in an instant and both of Italy's players were frightened by Su Guangmo.

However, Su Guangmo could only explode this wave. After all, the duration of his movement skill was limited. Once it ended, he was hard for him to catch up with the ranged archer and white magician.

The two people of Italy took advantage of this opportunity and attacked Su Guangmo from the other side of a blood pool.

—Voice of Combat, G.o.d's Light!

—Precise Shot and Seize Life Shot!

Their skills. .h.i.t one after another and Su Guangmo was beaten to residual blood in one breath.

Yu Pingsheng saw his brother's blood gauge flas.h.i.+ng red in warning and immediately turned to block in front of him. He used the berserker's thick skin to block the key Shock Shot!

However, Italy's white magician and archer also had a very tacit cooperation. The archer kept attacking from a distance while the white magician moved around the fountain and used Tidal Surge!

He killed the residual blood Su Guangmo.

Yu Pingsheng raised the giant axe and released two big moves, World Without Justice and Cut Through Thorns.

The murderous berserker rushed to the other side of the fountain and hit the white magician and archer to residual blood.

The white magician looked for a chance to cast G.o.d's Seal to control him. Then the archer took advantage of this time and kept firing at Yu Pingsheng to kill him.

The battle was fought quickly. The Chinese team's Su Yu combination was beaten but no one blamed them. Instead, they started to collectively bombard the network of the arena.

[The game network must be a poor quality brand. How can it fail?] [The staff didn't do a good job investigating. We suffered from this!] [What are you afraid of? There are other great G.o.ds. We can still win after even this loss.]

Kou Hongyi was indignant. "Captain Su couldn't move at the beginning. He was at half blood but managed to recover so much of the blood volume. If it hadn't been for the network failure, we would've won!"

Yu Bing was very calm. "We don't have to be anxious. Since Cat G.o.d sent Su Yu first, there might be a big G.o.d in the guard stage. In any case, Su Yu have already hit the Italian archer and white magician to 30% residual blood. This gap isn't difficult to reverse."

Kou Hongyi also calmed down. "Sister Bing's words aren't wrong. If we still win the arena after being defeated at the start, it will demonstrate the strength of the Chinese team even more! The pressure might be bigger for the players who play later. I hope they will refuel and recover from the disadvantage."

Su Guangmo and Yu Pingsheng were very calm when the walked back to the rest of the team. This wasn't the first time they faced failure. It was just that they felt somewhat reluctant about this defeat.

Still, there would always be various situations in the game. Now wasn't the time to be emotional. Su Guangmo gently patted Xie Shurong's shoulder and said, "Ah Shu, I will give it to you."

Xie Shurong stood up from his seat, a rotten smile on his face. "Rest a.s.sured Brother."

'Two brothers, you suffered in the game. I will personally get it back for you!'

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