Starting with Zaozi Ge, a dream lineup

Chapter 290 Three Stars
"Aha!" The camera suddenly focused on Wu Wukai, and seeing his bewildered expression, all the viewers in the live stream burst into laughter.

"Well, Faker's skill is undeniable, but many people have already seen Caps' performance on the Korean server this year. Apart from losing three games against Uzi, he has won all the others. Overall, his record is even more terrifying than Uzi's!"

"Oh?" Upon hearing the news about Wu Wukai, PDD immediately perked up and said.

"Yes, Caps is in great form lately. Skt's mid-jungle duo might not be able to beat Fnatic. My team, YM, has also been matched with players from these teams in ranked games. According to them, they are all very strong, and at least their form is definitely not an issue."

SKT vs. FNC.

The outcome of this match has generated even more interest from viewers around the world than from the top half of the draw.

Of course, except for the LCK region.

Including FNC fans, everyone agrees that even if they face SKT this year, they should avoid RNG. After all, RNG's record speaks for itself. SKT can still put up a fight, but RNG is in serious trouble.

"But I still feel SKT can win!"

"???" Seeing Wu Wukai's confident expression, everyone present immediately thought, "Oh no!"

as predicted.

"After all, that's SKT!"

Upon hearing Wu Wukai's words, the entire audience fell silent, seemingly unsure how to refute or respond. The live chat also hesitated for a second, choosing to skip over Wu Wukai's statement.

No matter how much these people praise FNC, Caps, and Rekkles, if FNC and SKT face off, without a doubt, SKT will win!
Because he is SKT!

Having played this far, no one doubts FNC's strength. Even in the semifinals, it was considered by the audience to be a top-quality clash between two strong teams.

On Weibo and Baidu Tieba in China, and on Twitter and forums abroad, countless League of Legends fans gathered to discuss the topic, creating a storm of public opinion.

Of course, with S8 now at this point, RNG also only has one last match left before it's completely over.

RNG's glorious year is about to be realized in the final championship. If they win this game, RNG will immediately become the undisputed No.1 team in China.

The ultimate honor of defending the S-series championship will break the esports history of League of Legends and leave its own mark. At this critical juncture, while domestic fans are focusing on the battle in the lower half of the bracket, they have not forgotten to turn their attention to the RNG players.

The next day, early in the morning, the RNG members ate the breakfast provided by the hotel and sat down in the training room to begin their training.

However, apart from Li Luo, the others were a bit distracted today. The reason is simple: RNG's final opponent is about to be decided.

Even though they knew that being nervous and excited wouldn't help, the thought that RNG's chances of winning the championship would be greater after FNC eliminated SKT made them get excited.

When the match started at 2 PM, Li Luo, who was still in ranked, had to finish his ranked game and come to the viewing room to watch the match. By then, everyone else had obviously been watching for a long time.

SKT vs. FNC.

Right now, the game has reached the point where the Baron Nashor is about to spawn at the 20-minute mark.

A 5v5 skirmish is underway on the middle lane.

This stalemate didn't last long. Suddenly, an elusive Ekko emerged from SKT's blind spot in the rear, dealing terrifying damage and appearing out of nowhere. The devastating impact on the backline completely shattered SKT's formation, demonstrating what an assassin truly is.

With Ekko's initiation and engagement, FNC won this team fight exceptionally easily, almost like RNG winning against Rw, without encountering any resistance.

As expected, SKT became cautious again after losing a team fight.

Three minutes later, FNC took advantage of a blind spot in the vision and started attacking Baron Nashor the instant SKT cleared their vision. By the time SKT reacted, FNC had secretly rushed down Baron Nashor.

Seeing that the opposing team had the Baron buff, SKT wanted to take advantage of FNC's disorganized formation and make a push to eliminate as many of them as possible.

Unexpectedly, Caps' Ekko seized the opportunity and used his W to stun four people, resulting in a 0-for-4 exchange for FNC, a near-perfect team fight.

This team fight had an impact not only on losing Baron Nashor and the mid-lane inhibitor, but also on taking over SKT's entire jungle.

At 31 minutes, the second Baron Nashor spawned, and the entire FNC team assembled and instantly killed the Baron. The SKT members who came to engage were no match for them in close combat due to the equipment difference.

Fnc took a 1-0 lead, securing their first victory in the best-of-five series.

"Wow, Caps' Ekko is amazing! He's even getting an advantage against the meta!" Xiaoming exclaimed with wide eyes, looking surprised. "This guy's talent seems no less than Faker's. How come he didn't show how strong he is last year?"

Caps was born in 1999. At this point in time, many people find it hard to believe that he is 19 years old, but he is only 19 years old when he made it to the semifinals.

There's a saying circulating in the League of Legends esports scene: LPL is known for producing AD carries, LCK for producing top laners, and EU for producing mid-lane mages.

Indeed, in every World Championship, everyone has witnessed one strong mid-laner after another from the EU region: Alex with his pentakill with Master Yi, xPeke with his Kassadin backdoor, Febiven with his solo kill on Faker, and Perkz, who is known as the patriarch of Europe.

But now, as the first player in the four major leagues to achieve six consecutive league titles, Caps is undoubtedly the strongest mage in the EU region.

2018 was a year in which Caps began to shine. After acquiring a strong top laner, Bwipo, and a support, Hylissang, FNC made a strong run, finishing first in the Spring Split and entering the playoffs. They then defeated their arch-rivals G2 in the Spring Finals to win the championship in Caps' hometown.

Due to version updates, he took on more carry responsibilities for the team during the Summer Split and expanded his champion pool, frequently picking unconventional mid laners.

"He has never been afraid of facing difficulties in the draft phase," the narrator said in the personal documentary produced by Riot Games for him.

In the third game of the Summer Split semifinals against MSF, Caps even suggested picking Vayne for mid lane. After Vayne was fully formed at 28 minutes, he began to take over the game, reversing the situation and helping the team secure match point.

This is a formidable player who dared to pick Vayne mid even in a meta like S8. After accumulating enough confidence, he could even dominate the lane against the Demon King.

For professional esports players, age is a symbol of strength. Even if a 19-year-old professional player and a 25-year-old professional player have the same level of skill on paper, in real competitions, the younger player is bolder and can make some unconventional but incredibly strong decisions.

There's a saying in the League of Legends community that a professional player's career starts to decline from the age of 22.

Considering that Uzi was 21, Faker was 22, and TheShy was 19, Caps had also reached the peak of his professional skills.

In China, players of Caps' age are basically just coming out of youth training programs, but he has already won a league championship. The difference between them is like heaven and earth.

Historically, Caps has lived up to the title given to him by his fans: "World's Best Mid Laner." This "best" may not be the most prestigious in terms of honors, but in today's context, he is undoubtedly the undisputed best mid laner in terms of skill.

A player who could force even Ap to go to the bottom lane, and who in S7 created a monster by leading his team to the knockout stage with a 0/4 score, is simply the perfect candidate for the protagonist of a novel.

"This guy is in such good form, especially his eyes. I haven't seen that kind of determination in the eyes of the so-called European King of Law in a long time."

After carefully confirming, Xiaohu said with certainty:
"His strength lies in his understanding of his own hero during the laning phase. He doesn't even calculate what cards you have, whether there are other people around, or whether you can counter-kill him. As long as he believes that his health and skills are enough to kill you, he will come up and kill you!"

"His understanding of minion waves and his perfect adaptation to the team's system and tactics in this game were remarkable. If SKT had a particularly strong laner who could dominate them in a single lane, his performance might not have been so outstanding. But unfortunately, SKT's Faker can't step up right now, and nobody can!"
-
Neuroscalpel!

Upon hearing Xiao Hu's insights, Li Luo, who had been standing behind, came up and sat on the sofa.

Xiaohu's analysis is exactly the same as Caps' playstyle in S9 and S10, especially after he transferred to G2 and formed a mid-bottom duo with Perkz, his personal style became even more obvious.

In S9, G2 was in the same group as Griffin. Because Jankos was taught a lesson by Tarzan with Lee Sin and Qiyana, G2 advanced as the second in the group. When facing DWG, G2 used roaming to help each lane establish an advantage and defeated DWG 3-1. In the semifinals, G2 faced SKT again. Jankos played Orianna and Syndra and perfectly carried G2, defeating SKT 3-1 again.

Some people might argue that Faker couldn't beat Caps because he wasn't playing seriously, or that Faker is too old. But this also shows that these people aren't unwilling to acknowledge Caps' strength; rather, they don't want to see Faker fall from grace.

Before his rebirth, Li Luo had watched quite a few matches of G2, the team known for its unconventional and quirky gameplay.

FNC's entire team is highly skilled; even their weakest player can achieve world-class performance, while their strongest player can reach four-fifths of TheShy's mechanics in S8.

If we have to say that SKT can beat FNC, it would require Faker to completely dominate Caps in lane, but is that even possible?

"FNC won again!"

Not long after, as Caps continued his outstanding performance, this time, even though everyone hoped SKT would win, SKT was now backed to the brink of defeat.

FNC beat SKT 2-0. At this moment, even the audience felt that FNC could easily finish the game 3-0, just like RNG.

"I know there are many fans of SKT here, but the current situation tells us that SKT has lost the match point to FNC!" Looking at the bloody 2-0 score on the screen, Guan Zeyuan opened his mouth but didn't know what to say.

"Yes, SKT has exposed too many problems right now. Although Wolf's presence prevented SKT from losing their early game rhythm, there is a very obvious problem that needs to be solved: who is actually in charge for SKT?"

"In advantageous games, it's fine, but in disadvantageous games, Faker and Wolf easily argue over shot-calling. Skt isn't RNG; Faker hasn't realized he no longer has the same dominance as Uzi to influence the team. He needs to make a decision regarding shot-calling in the next game."

"Whether to give command to Faker or Wolf is Kkoma's responsibility, and it's also a question in the minds of all the SKT supporters here!"

Would Faker be willing to hand over the outcome of the final game to someone else? Even if that person is Wolf?

Guan Zeyuan and Ji De both clearly see SKT's current problems, and naturally, the SKT team cannot pretend to be ignorant.

The commentators raised questions, and even many people who don't play League of Legends couldn't resist joining in the discussion.

Just like every time the World Cup is held, even people who don't usually watch football will post on their social media about how they watch the World Cup, which team they support, and how they condemn the Chinese national football team!
Some viewers who watched even a little bit of the show would immediately start praising players they knew, saying things like "Suarez is awesome" one minute and "Messi and Ronaldo are awesome" the next.

The current situation of League of Legends is exactly like that.

Countless people's social media feeds are filled with condemnations of SKT and Kkoma, with some even suggesting that Wolf should be ousted and power handed over to Faker.

These people may not have even watched the match; they just saw a trending topic on Weibo and rushed to stir up trouble. Unfortunately, Riot Games is happy to let them do so.

Many people are familiar with the term "god-making plan." Since tasting success in Season 3, Riot Games has tried to create gods many times.

From Faker in the beginning, to Uzi, MaDatou, BDD, and Clearlove later on.
But in the current S8, the "god-making" plan has also caused Riot Games to suffer a setback.

The previous attempts to create a god-like figure were just mindless hype. Anyway, if he played well, he became a god; if he played poorly, it didn't matter. Just consider it a fallen genius.

Now, for a new god to rise to the top, it's not just about boasting; they need to produce solid achievements for the audience to accept.

In today's match, everyone, including Riot Games, wants to see FNC's Caps defeat Faker, or even better, end RNG in the finals!

"Sang-hyeok, is there anything you want to say?"

The SKT break room backstage was deathly still.

In South Korea, a country with a very clear hierarchy, seniors are seniors and juniors are juniors. Even if a junior is more capable, they must still be respectful to their seniors.

Faker, Wolf, and Bang remained silent, as did Kkoma, so naturally no one else dared to speak.

In the end, it was Kkoma who started talking.

"I think I'd have a hard time beating him in lane; I don't think I can."

The fact that Brother Li, who was always so steadfast, was now wavering made the people sitting on the stools turn pale.

Even the team's star player has lost confidence, let alone the rest of the players.

Faker has no confidence against this FNC team and against Caps?

"No, you can do it, how can you not?" Kkoma remained gentle and mild-mannered, seemingly never to get angry.

"This is your SKT, this is SKT's territory, you are the king of SKT, you can have whatever you want, even if you lose, but I want to say, don't leave yourself with any regrets!"

"Don't leave yourself with regrets?"

"Pity?"

What are my regrets?

Following Kkoma's gaze, Faker was momentarily stunned.

Hanging behind Skt's rest area are Skt's team uniforms.

On the upper side of the baseball jersey, where the Skt logo is printed, three stars seem to shimmer with a dazzling light under the illumination of the lights!
(End of this chapter)