Chapter 648: It

When the big screen fully displayed that face of the character from the animation, the nearly ten thousand on-site audience at the Kaohsiung Exhibition Hall started shouting chaotically:

Jiao Shen is awesome!!

Faker is the best!!

Electric Wolves rise!!

Ahhh!! Yan Bao is so handsome!!!

VG, go on! Kill them!!

SKT is number one in the world!!

Anyone can tell at a glance that this 2D handsome guy appearing at the very beginning of the promotional video is none other than the currently hottest star player worldwide, Firrrrrre.

The main person himself, however, was lying on a hospital bed several kilometers away from the venue, crunching a bite of crisp sweet peach, a smile playing on his lips, avidly watching himself on television.

VG team leader Wang Liangyi pulled a small stool and sat beside the bed, looking up at the TV on the wall, then turned his head to look at Liang Yan half-lying on the bed, also hehe smiling.

"Brother, I have to say, even if you're 2D‑ified, you're still that handsome."

Liang Yan nodded calmly: "That's right."

The close‑up of the 2D Liang Yan's face froze for a full three seconds, then the picture suddenly shifted, the camera pulled back, he turned and pushed the door open with a creak, striding into the hall.

Inside the hall, a large crowd of demons and monsters had gathered, each wielding shield and blade, glaring ferociously at the "protagonist" who entered, but the "protagonist" ignored them, simply strolling lightly toward the throne at the highest point.

This scene actually admits two interpretations.

One interpretation is that they are guarding the gate, and these people in the hall are all the king's subordinates.

Another interpretation is that they are storming the gate, and the people inside are enemy generals trying to stop him from ascending the throne.

Either way, it's up to how you interpret it—just depends on which side the audience's butt is on.

Because the region is indeed poor, the opening ceremony actually has nothing; putting together a promotional video over four minutes long of decent quality is already their limit. As for the earlier speculation by LPL netizens that LMS might invite some local stars—like Jielun, Yushen, and Jolin Tsai—to hype the opening ceremony, that's impossible; they simply don't have that budget, and the substantive content of the opening ceremony is just playing that promotional video…

After the promotional video ends, they go straight to the player entrance segment.

The hosts on stage are two: one is Ren Dong invited from LPL, the other is the local female host Li Anna from LMS.

By the way, this female host's name is quite similar to Tang Anna; even her ID is Anna, just one is Anna·Lee and the other Anna·Tang.

Also, there's the difference in appearance.

The camera cuts back to the venue, and the full view of the arena is finally revealed.

Honestly, the venue decoration is a bit low‑class, giving off a vibe of "although I'm poor, I'm still Jiahao," which feels rather weird. However, for the local audience it's nothing surprising, because LMS's home venue is also like this.

Figure: Intercontinental Tournament venue 1

Figure: Intercontinental Tournament venue 2

Immediately after the player entrance, the three regions introduce their seeds from First Seed to Fourth Seed in turn; after the teams come out, they walk along the stage edge in a circle back to both sides.

When VG appears, Ziezotai wears an obviously overly loose jacket, shivering and shrinking, hiding at the back of the team, walking to the front.

This jacket is Liang Yan's……

The weather is quite hot; aside from the opening‑ceremony team introduction, normally going on stage to play doesn't require a jacket, and Ziezotai didn't expect that as an emergency substitute he'd also need to appear in the opening ceremony, so he didn't bring one.

As a result, Liang Yan was sent to the hospital by Fu Lan Duo; Ziezotai, pressed into service, had to take the stage—what to do? He had no choice but to borrow Liang Yan's jacket and wear it.

And VG's uniforms are tailor‑made; Liang Yan's height and shoulder width are much larger than Ziezotai's, so his jacket on Ziezotai naturally doesn't fit.

Some people in the audience snickered, making Ziezotai's face even redder.

He lowered his head, slumped his shoulders, pressed his legs together, standing on stage like a lackey.

In the hospital room, the two covered their faces, unable to bear looking.

"It's hard on my brother Tai…"

"Hmm…"

"By the way, Tai's family seems pretty wealthy…"

"Hmm…"

"Really, it's hard on my brother Tai…"

"……"

After several minutes, all twelve teams had finished their introductions; then ten teams left the stage, leaving only the two teams for the opening match.

LMS first sent out the region's Third Seed JT to test the waters, while LCK sent out a strong player, the region's Second Seed SSG, evidently aiming to give the local powerhouse LMS a warning.

"Feels like it'll be a one‑sided beatdown."

Wang Liangyi, who often sits behind Teacher Liang during training to observe and learn, and who has now stabilized at Diamond rank, made this judgment.

Liang Yan stroked his chin: "Then you're seriously underestimating JT."

Wang Liangyi, hearing that, looked astonished: "Could JT possibly kill three stars?"

Liang Yan shook his head: "I mean JT's lower limit will be even lower."

"Ah?"

"LMS claims to be one of the five major regions, but it's actually on par with North America; only the top two teams are barely watchable—North America has TSM and C9, LMS has Flash Wolves and Red Rabbit Horse, the rest are on par with wild cards. You know what wild cards are: although they've improved a bit these two years, facing three‑star teams they're hardly different from bots."

Wang Liangyi: "……Brother, you really know how to talk. Which team is Red Rabbit Horse?"

"AHQ, huh? You didn't notice their logo is just a red horse?"

Wang Liangyi quickly searched on his phone.

"Holy cow, really! But wait……AHQ actually means this?!"

Liang Yan: "emmm……"

AHQ's logo is pretty imposing, right? However, "Red Rabbit Horse" etc. is actually a nickname AHQ later adopted to whitewash itself.

"The name "AHQ" was coined by their team boss; its meaning is very simple, just "Ah Q"."

Because the AHQ team boss believed that the "Ah Q spirit" represents an attitude of not giving up, striving upward, never admitting defeat—very positive, one could say.

This is the loss from lacking culture, or put another way, the education on Treasure Island is skewed.

After AHQ was formed, Wikipedia updated the team introduction page, and on AHQ's encyclopedia page, the first few paragraphs contained such a merciless evaluation:

【Ahq's boss thought the Ahq spirit represented not giving up and striving upward, so he named it ahq, but the original meaning of the Ahq spirit is not like that.】

They lost face abroad, and the netizens despised AHQ for embarrassing themselves; at the time they almost wanted to expel it from the region, and on the rural forums they called AHQ the 「Spirit Victory Method」 team, or the Ahq team.

AHQ's boss couldn't take it anymore, thinking he had picked an incredibly inspirational team name, only to find that the name actually represented a coward who consoles himself after losing!

Then they started buying online commentators and hot searches on the LMS network, and ultimately, relying on pay-to-win power, they whitewashed AHQ into the 「Red Celestial Horse」; altogether pretty ridiculous.

Getting back to the point.

Over the next half hour, the development of this opening match was roughly as Liang Yan had said, appearing almost like a human versus machine game.

Immediately afterward, VG welcomed its first match in the Intercontinental Tournament.