Chapter 305 The Crash (1/2)
Li Ge was very happy for suddenly becoming a hot topic among the players. Some even started to bet on his and Hao Tian's match.
Although Li Ge had made it to the top sixteen, his main strategy revolved around slowly grinding opponents to death with his Esper abilities, and it was not all that entertaining. The vast majority of the bets were also made against Li Ge.
Frenzied Sword was matched with Thunder Storm's Rainy Kim. Rainy Kim was also not an opponent to scoff at. Not only was she a pillar of the Thunder Storm battle team, she was also a great beauty.
It was not uncommon for attractive female players to be well-liked, especially in the esports scene, which was dominated by male players. Rainy Kim's popularity was through the roof, and many of her crazed fans even went to Rivervale club's official page to bash and threaten Frenzied Sword, saying that if he won, they would never forgive him.
Han Xiao had been waiting at the top of the mountain for seven to eight days, and the pros had already finished their first round of matches. Li Ge had surprisingly won the best of five against Hao Tian three to one, winning three straight rounds after giving Hao Tian the first win.
In the match recordings, Hao Tian was able to finish off Li Ge after the latter kited for ten whole minutes. Li Ge actually used the first game to analyze Hao Tian's fighting style, and starting from the second game, Li Ge played much more proactively, as if he had seen through all of Hao Tian's moves. His Esper abilities were also perfect for this kind of combat, and Hao Tian, like a prey caught in a spider's web, lost three consecutive rounds.
Li Ge was actually quite a talented player. His career as a pro gamer was not long, but he had obtained many accolades. Han Xiao had even thought about adding him to his list of spare tires.
The media immediately moved its attention to Li Ge, who had now stolen all of Hao Tian's previous popularity. He had now advanced to the top eight, and his next opponent was the one who had clinched victory over Rainy Kim, Frenzied Sword.
Frenzied Sword had barely won his fight and was able advance to the top eight. It was supposed to be a happy thing, yet Rainy Kim's fans were relentlessly bashing him on the forums. The voices of Frenzied Sword's supporters were drowned in a flood of hate comments. It was not until Rainy Kim herself came out and asked her fans to stop that they finally stopped this behavior, albeit feeling wronged by the person whom they were supporting.
Frenzied Sword had won the match fair and square, but all that meant nothing in front of Rainy Kim's crazy fans; it also was not as if she could just openly denounce her fans, and she was only able to secretly apologize to Frenzied Sword about this. The two were more or less familiar with each other as they had me during the beta testing of the game.
Frenzied Sword felt helpless. He had won with his own skills, yet he had now gained a bunch of haters.
However, in the end, results were the most important when it came to these tournaments. The majority of the audience saw the match and believed that Frenzied Sword deserved the win. The excessive hate on Frenzied Sword even triggered a bunch of the more neutral players, and many rose up to become Frenzied Sword's supporters, allowing Frenzied Sword to somehow still gain popularity despite all that.
Fame often came with trouble, and it was often hard to say who would gain the most out of those kinds of things. In Han Xiao's opinion, most of the audience and fans were just looking for someone to flame and to argue for the sake of arguing.
When these anti-fans found out who Frenzied Sword was up against next, they started to laugh behind his back.
”You deserve this!”
”Haha, so this dumbass can only get this far.”
”Boss Li Ge will definitely stomp all over him.”
Frenzied Sword had won about fifty percent of the practice fights against Hao Tian. Han Xiao thought that things were not looking good now that he was up against Li Ge, who had won three rounds in a row against Hao Tian. There was no way that both of the players that he had raised were going to be defeated by this Li Ge, right?
…
”Sir, the satellites have discovered an unidentified object that's rapidly approaching the atmosphere.”
The observatory of Raylen in the Northern Continent was suddenly in alert.
The satellite showed a light dot approaching Planet Aquamarine from outer space.
”Is this a meteor‽”
”Target appeared on our scanners three minutes ago before. If it was a meteor, our scanners should have noticed it much earlier. Moreover, meteors should be more affected by our Planet's gravitational pull.”
”Don't tell me it's an alien spaceship?”
”The target has increased in velocity. Estimated landfall in eight minutes!”
”Coordinates? Is it an unpopulated area?”
”Target is estimated to land in a barren mountain range in the Northern Continent. The specific location is right by our country's border!”
The professor in charge of the Observatory immediately gave out the order. ”Report this to the higher ups now. Request for troops to head to the landing site!”
…
Huang Jian was bored out of his mind. He had already been waiting in this darned wasteland for ten days with Han Xiao, waiting for god knew what. But due to how legendary his boss was, the felt that Han Xiao was definitely there for a purpose, and he was curious as to what it could be.
Han Xiao was standing in the snow when he suddenly looked up in the sky. He then immediately turned around and headed for the helicopter and took out his equipment.
Something's finally happening! Huang Jian was elated and asked, ”What're you doing?”
”It's here,” Han Xiao answered without even looking up and quickly put on his gear.
”What's here?” Huang Jian did not get it.
Just as he finished asking the question, an ear-piercing sound came down from the sky, causing Huang Jian to look up. A fireball flew down from the sky, and one could more or less make out the shape of an aircraft amid the flames.
Boom!