Chapter 854: Timeless Classics (Two-in-One)

Tomorrow D Group has a rest day, so VG has no match.

But C Group has a match, so Tang Anna cannot return too late.

Past twelve in the early morning, the two walked back to the training hotel under the dim streetlights.

In the elevator, Liang Yan pulled down his own mask, then pulled down Tang Anna's mask, leaned in and kissed her.

Warm breath left her lips; Tang Anna opened her eyes, breathed lightly, looked at Liang Yan, her gaze a little dazed and a little annoyed:

"Last time you were also this sudden……"

"Last time?"

Liang Yan thought for a moment before realizing which time she meant; a hint of teasing appeared in his eyes as he looked at Tang Anna: "You didn't react in time, huh? Then let's do it again."

Tang Anna lightly bit her lower lip, still undecided whether to agree.

With a ding, the elevator doors opened.

Each went back to their own room.

Tang Anna tossed and turned in bed until midnight before falling into a drowsy sleep.

……

Past seven in the morning, morning light spread across the land.

As the sun gradually shifted from orange‑red to a blinding gold, rising from the tops of skyscrapers to the zenith of the sky, the second day of the S7 Group Stage schedule began.

Yesterday G2 came to the venue to watch VG's opening match; today VG returned the favor, also coming to watch G2's match, which happened to be the opening match of the second day's schedule.

Unfortunately, the intensity was too low.

G2 faced North America's second seed IMT; the whole match could be summed up in two words:

Domination.

On the red side, IMT banned Berserker's Greaves then banned Lu Xi An; with one ban left they hesitated before finally banning Ornn. G2 first picked Syndra, gave Xayah and Rakan to IMT, then with their second pick they locked in Miss Fortune and Jesper.

Jesper top lane was a decoy; Expect had grown into a more well‑rounded all‑round player this year, but he still wasn't suited for an aggressive top laner, so Tang Anna gave him Jesper this game—not to play it seriously, but to serve as bait, letting Perkz share the firepower.

What followed was a performance by Perkz and Jankos.

In terms of pacing, it was almost identical to yesterday's VG domination over AHQ—a complete crush from start to finish, with IMT showing no resistance whatsoever.

The European audience was pleased, Ka Lao Si was pleased, and he posted a tweet celebrating:

{Thanks to NA brothers for the first win, and congratulations to NA on harvesting three straight losses! }

North American fans burst out cursing.

But although they cursed, even North American fans know that the NA region has now been completely outclassed by EU.

Perkz accepted a post‑match interview from the European official.

Sjokz finally threw in a fun question, asking Perkz to predict separately how the three EU teams and the three NA teams would fare in this year's S Season.

Perkz gave no direct answer, just smiled at the camera and said: "Believe me, NA won't just lose three in a row—at least five, possibly even six."

North‑American netizens broke down again, rushing to Perkz's personal Twitter to send blessings.

Besides fervently wishing blessings upon Perkz's ancestors, NA netizens also seized on his sore point, mocking him as a thief who stole the FMVP, and at the same time jeering that G2's championship was a theft from the LPL—because Firrrrrre ought to have been an LPL player.

Perkz didn't tweet a reply; he probably felt a little stung too.

His FMVP trophy had long been tossed—he threw it into the trash, and now nobody knows which European landfill it's buried in.

But this remains a permanent thorn in Perkz's heart.

He somewhat regrets throwing away the trophy; he should have personally "returned" it to Liang Yan.

But it doesn't really matter.

As long as he reaches the finals, he'll give it back.

……

The Western buzz hadn't yet reached LPL netizens, but LPL fans soon had their own hot topic.

On the sixth day, the second match was EDG versus SSG.

This was EDG's S7 debut; to win this game, EDG pulled out their secretly developed overnight weapon—mid laner Lu Xi An.

Liang Yan, a veteran, knew the infamous story of EDG losing a 10k gold lead, but that match had EDG facing SKT and occurring on the third day of the group stage—EDG's second group game. Everything had changed; although Liang Yan wasn't optimistic about EDG, he didn't think history would repeat, so he had little interest in this match. Others found it exciting and stayed to watch, but Liang Yan left after the G2 game.

As a result, back at the hotel training room, Liang Yan opened the stream, glanced at both lineups, and his heart skipped a beat—he thought: "Bur, bro?"

Afterwards, Liang Yan, with mixed feelings, sat alone before his computer and watched the match destined to go down in history.

EDG lineup: top laner Naafiri, jungler Rek'Sai, mid laner Lu Xi An, bot lane Xayah plus Rakan.

SSG lineup: top laner "Big Bug", jungler Prince, mid laner Orianna, bot lane Twitch plus Rakan.

Aside from the top lane and jungle, EDG's other positions were exactly the same as yesterday's VG game—a blatant copy‑paste.

And SSG's lineup……

was exactly the same as SKT's lineup in that match which could be called a timeless classic.

Liang Yan had admired that match many times, remembering not only the lineup but the whole course of the game. Yet the match he was now watching did not start out similarly.

In that historic game, EDG began with a three‑minute Changzhang mid‑lane flash‑top catch of Faker for first blood, then kept winning team fights to pick up kills, and before fifteen minutes they had built a gold lead of over four thousand.

But in this game, although first blood also went to EDG and the first kill likewise occurred in mid lane, it happened much later, and it wasn't Changzhang who ganked and killed Crown; instead, Meiko returned home after five minutes, then a miraculous roam by the soft support helped Scout secure the kill.

Seeing this, Liang Yan relaxed a little.

After Scout's Lu Xi An snagged the first kill, he played spectacularly—within two minutes he also landed a solo kill.

Ambition thought the mid lane couldn't be allowed to collapse completely, so he came to gank, but lacking damage he was dragged out by Scout until Changzhang Meiko arrived; EDG then unleashed a zero‑for‑two mini‑surge and simultaneously took down SSG's middle turret.

By this point, EDG had successfully established a gold lead of over three thousand.

Liang Yan glanced at the clock and stared—it was still under fifteen minutes.

Then he glanced at the dragon pit and his heart skipped again—the first dragon, an earth drake.

Liang Yan felt it was strange, like watching a plagiarized drama where the actors are completely different but the plot outline is eerily similar.

As the match time progressed, this feeling grew stronger.

At 23 minutes, EDG aggressively picked off the laning Crown's Orianna that had moved to the top lane to develop, and SSG came to help like the Calabash Brothers saving their grandfather, but EDG pulled off an astonishing zero-for-three.

EDG then took the first Baron.

Next, EDG advanced with the Baron buff, while also having the tower-push bonus from two Earth Dragons, marching forward nonstop and taking down several of SSG's outer towers.

However, when the Baron buff faded, EDG only managed to break one of SSG's base walls—and it was the mid lane base wall.

Liang Yan shook his head in disbelief.

Among the outer towers of the three lanes, the middle tower has the highest value and greatest strategic importance; taking down the enemy's middle tower early in the game is undoubtedly a huge advantage.

But among the three lane base walls, the mid lane base wall is the least important; indeed, sometimes destroying the enemy's mid lane base wall brings only harm and no benefit, because breaking the base wall gives the enemy super minions to farm for gold.

With one Baron buff and two Earth Dragons' tower-push bonus, EDG only broke a single base wall—clearly inadequate, and choosing to break the mid lane base wall was absurd, absurd to the point that even VG's second team wouldn't make such a mistake.

At 27 minutes, EDG's gold lead reached 9,000.

At this point, the live audience had already erupted; no LPL fan expected to see, in their lifetime, the amateurish EDG crush an LCK team on the world stage—it was simply delightful!

EDG fans were even more excited beyond words.

Liang Yan, however, merely glanced at the game timer and thought, "It's almost over…"

Sure enough, it came.

At 28 minutes, EDG finished a push and everyone went home to rest.

SSG remained calm under pressure, took the opportunity to push the minion wave, cleared EDG's vision in the jungle in an orderly manner, and pushed the minion waves of all three lanes across the river.

After EDG's players finished regrouping, they left together as a group and advanced from mid lane, seemingly aiming to end the game in one fell swoop.

SSG set an ambush around mid lane using their vision advantage and laid out an encirclement.

At 29:03, SSG's five members almost simultaneously engaged.

CoreJJ's Rocket Grab ultimate flash engaged, lifting toward the five EDG players who oddly clumped together in front of the minion wave; except young iboy, who reacted and flashed his ultimate to avoid being controlled, and Mouse at the formation's edge, the other three were lifted into the air.

Crown's Orianna pulled back her ultimate.

The instant iboy's ultimate landed, he flashed to escape the hellish situation.

Cuvee's big bug Q stepped, flashed, roared and silenced, then also controlled three people.

Ambition the Prince flashed in with his E-Q and launched three more people into the air……

Meiko's Lulu and Scout were instantly melted by SSG's ultimate crowd-control combo; Changzhang, after breaking free of crowd control, was low on health, he flashed out, Ambition followed up with an ultimate that slammed down, killing Changzhang and also catching iboy.

EDG was wiped out.

Despite leading by nearly 10,000 gold, EDG was hit by a zero-for-five from SSG.

The audience's gasps rolled over like thunder.

The chat flooded with question marks and "holy shit".

When SSG's support initiated the fight, the LPL commentary desk was still filled with laughter and cheer, casually commenting on the teamfight in a laid-back tone; only when they saw the big bug and the flash kick three people into the air did they involuntarily exclaim, then Meiko and Scout were instantly killed, and as they watched helplessly, Changzhang brought Ambition over and trapped iboy together, personally breaking EDG's never-wiped curse, and only then did they begin to feel panic.

SSG took down EDG's middle tower, then moved to the river and secured the second Baron.

Wang Ji remained silent for a long time; seeing the director switch to the gold chart panel, he snapped out of his shock: "This wave……SSG earned back a lot of gold!"

From the start to 28 minutes, EDG's gold curve climbed steadily, peaking around 29 minutes with a prominent number marking the peak:

9769

Then at 29:03, this ten-thousand-meter peak seemed to be cleaved by a blade, and a steep cliff appeared on the other side of the summit.

This strike cut straight to the mid-slope, leaving EDG's gold lead at under 4,000.

At the 30-minute mark, the game officially entered the late stage; EDG's lineup would inevitably begin to decline. Previously EDG had a huge advantage, so these roster flaws weren't obvious, but now that the lead had shrunk, the problems started to surface.

A 4,000 gold lead is nothing in the late game.

And it wasn't over yet; another blow was coming.

Around 33 minutes, although still behind by over 3,000 gold, SSG had seized map control and began a slow 4-1 split push, with Cuvee's big bug taking the top lane while the other four grouped up and pushed from the bottom lane.

EDG knew they couldn't delay any longer, decisively engaged, and won a zero-for-three teamfight, but because all minion waves were pushed under the base walls, even winning the fight they could do nothing, ending up with only a single small dragon—the third small dragon, an Earth Dragon.

Having won a teamfight, the situation seemed to improve again.

EDG pushed out the minion waves, attempting to reorganize an effective offense.

At 36 minutes, Scout oddly ran to steal SSG's F6, and miraculously used his only mobility skill, Relentless Pursuit, only to be slowed by Crown's Orianna ultimate explosion ball hidden in the brush; then iboy, dazed, charged forward, and Orianna pulled back with her ultimate, leaving Scout and iboy each at half health.

EDG's remaining players rushed to assist, but were blocked at the narrow jungle entrance by Cuvee's big bug alone; Ruler's mouse, hiding behind the hulking big bug, unleashed a barrage of rockets, and EDG's health bars drained away……

After this, EDG's gold advantage vanished completely.

Liang Yan saw this and turned off the stream.

Because the historical trajectory had completely overlapped here, there was no need to watch further.

A few minutes later, Tang Anna, who was in the venue's backstage lounge, sent Liang Yan a WeChat message with a teasing tone, likely a response to Liang Yan's earlier teasing of FNC:

【Is your third seed really playing this aggressively in the LPL too? When we scrimmed them a couple days ago, they weren't like this.】

Liang Yan wasn't in the mood and replied with six.

Not long after, the VG folks who had finished watching the documentary 'New Legend Classic: EDG's 10k Gold Three Earth Dragons Overturned by SSG' returned to the hotel, each one beaming with excitement, eagerly describing to Liang Yan how exaggerated the match was.

Liang Yan gave a few perfunctory replies, then turned to Gao Tianliang standing at the back, smiling and asked:

"Xiao Tian, why do you think EDG lost this game?"

Gao Tianliang, although he had been brought along on the expedition and even secured an emergency substitute spot, actually knew full well that in this team he was merely a fringe member; if it weren't for Liang Yan seemingly holding some ineffable regard for him, given his gloomy, introverted nature, he might not even have made the fringe.

In response, Gao Tianliang felt grateful, usually staying out of trouble; after arriving in Wu Han he kept to himself, aside from sleeping he buried himself in training, striving to perform and earn playing time; today, if Zhu Xiaolong hadn't insisted on dragging him along, he definitely wouldn't have come to the venue.

Never expecting Liang Yan to suddenly ask him, Gao Tianliang froze.

Everyone knew Liang Yan's question had a special purpose, and immediately fell silent.

Gao Tianliang, however, did not panic.

He not only watched the whole match attentively, but also while observing thought: "If it were me, what would I do? If it were Jiao Shen, what would he do?"

Just as Liang Yan asked, Gao Tianliang thought for a moment, then spoke seriously:

"I think... EDG being overturned isn't a matter of the players' performance."