Chapter 21: Congrats in advance to TTC for joyously finishing in S11's Top 16.
The scheduled practice match was a best of three format. TTC consecutively won two rounds, so they didn't need to play the last round.
By the time the game finished, MFG's jungler had died eight times. When the base was being breached, he had even ended up selling all his equipment, extremely dejected.
The moment they withdrew from the custom lobby, Xiao Bai subconsciously turned his head and looked past Pine to explain to Jian Rong, "MFG's jungler today was originally their starting jungler, but because his attitude was too bad, he ended up becoming a substitute in less than one season. He has this old habit of ganking the lane with the biggest disadvantage, which is usually fine when playing ranked or in laid-back practice matches, but he always ended up being hammered by those operation-focused teams in competitions..."
Jian Rong took off his headphones and tilted his head when he heard Xiao Bai speak, listening to him quietly.
"One time in a regular season match, he also ended up ganking our bot lane four times in less than ten minutes, freaking useless..." Only Xiao Bai finished his nonstop babbling did he realize that his relationship with this person didn't seem to be at the point where they could mutually roast other teams' players yet.
Thinking that Jian Rong would, as usual, let out an indifferent "oh" or straight up walk away, Xiao Bai shut his mouth and prepared to preemptively end the conversation.
"En." Jian Rong unplugged his headphones. "He is pretty trash."
Xiao Bai: "!"
Ding-ge leaned against the door, replying to messages. Seeing Xiao Bai and their new mid laner interact with each other quite nicely, he thought that at least this practice match wasn't completely useless.
He lowered his head and responded to the WeChat message that MFG's coach sent.
[MFG Coach: Another match next time?]
[D: No, there's no point if you're just going to let a water dispenser player go up during a practice match.]
A water dispenser player referred to those substitute players who sat in the backstage room watching the water dispenser and very rarely had a chance to play in a competition.
This jungler was a bit more tragic than that. During the last Worlds, he didn't play a single game, and even MFG's fans joked that if the starting jungler hadn't broken his arm, the team wouldn't have let the substitute go on stage at all.
Once this season ended, perhaps this jungler wouldn't even be a substitute anymore.
[MFG Coach: That's not it, it's not like I wanted to either. Our starting jungler went back to his hometown to take care of family matters and won't be able to return for some time. Next time, next time the entire team will be starters for sure.]
[D: Then let's talk about it again next time.]
[MFG Coach: Ok. Speaking of which, your new mid laner is pretty strong, where'd you find him?]
Ding-ge knew that the other person was trying to fish for answers, and he answered gleefully.
[D: Don't know, Road recommended him, if you want to know then go ask him]
Ding-ge locked his phone and knocked on the door. "Road, come with me to the meeting room. The rest of you are dismissed."
TTC had a room specifically used for practice matches, and the members sat in the same fixed order as they would during a competition. As the mid laner, Jian Rong sat in the very middle, with the jungler and ADC on either side of him.
