Chapter 43 Words in Action

At the 3rd minute of the match, after finishing the red buff, Ailoli bypassed the Krugs camp and emerged from behind WE's bot lane, setting his sights squarely on the Malzahar, who had no Flash.

The sudden Level 2 gank caught the WE duo completely off guard, and EDG effortlessly secured First Blood.

[EDG, Ling has slain WE, Zero.]

Seeing the kill notification on the screen, Condi knew his warning had come too late. With a heavy heart, he turned around and fiercely pounded the Krugs to vent his frustration.

At the caster desk, Guan Zeyuan spoke up: "Just like the previous game, WE clearly had a lot of intricate setups in the early stages. But this time, EDG didn't show the laxity they had in the last match. They completely anticipated the opponent's sequence of moves and counter-acted, achieving a resounding victory."

"That's right. The Lee Sin definitely has stronger early-game skirmishing capability compared to Vi, so WE wanted to establish an early advantage through invasions. However, the experienced EDG saw right through it and never intended to contest the red side jungle. Taking advantage of the fact that the WE bot lane hadn't warded the blue side jungle, they decisively deep-invaded the red side to gank bot, completely disrupting WE's game plan."

Haokai said with a solemn expression: "Varus securing First Blood right now is the worst-case scenario imaginable. For the rest of the laning phase, WE's bot lane can only be described as walking a tightrope."

The Sivir's wave-clearing ability is decent, and in the early game, she could normally contest lane priority slightly against EDG.

After this gank, however, any room for struggle was completely eliminated.

Having picked up First Blood, Lin Ruo recalled to purchase items. When he returned to lane, the WE duo was reduced to passively absorbing pressure.

Ailoli's frequent appearances in the bot lane earlier only added insult to injury.

Fortunately, mid laner Xiye's LeBlanc was overtuned enough. Just as she hit Level 6, she utilized her double chains in tandem with Condi's gank to take down Scout.

Once that pressure was established, EDG could no longer effectively execute large-scale dives in the bot lane.

With Sivir and Malzahar possessing relatively strong wave-clear and self-peel capabilities, EDG, despite holding lane priority, repeatedly failed to convert it into concrete advantages.

The game momentarily fell into a standstill.

By the 13th minute, EDG orderly pushed down the bot lane tier-one tower.

Ailoli controlled the first Earth Drake, while WE traded for the Rift Herald.

Both teams once again swapped the mid and bot lanes, and LeBlanc began roaming the bot lane with impunity.

With Lee Sin assisting, Scout was completely suppressed and failed to execute smoothly as envisioned in the draft phase.

Seeing LeBlanc step up with her double chains, instantly chunking Ryze's health bar to below half, followed by Lee Sin arriving to secure the kill, Haokai let out a scoff and commented: "LeBlanc is still way too overtuned after her rework. As long as she steps up for a combo and lands her chain, Scout basically has no room to play."

"It leads to a situation where Scout isn't thinking about pushing the lane anymore, but rather just surviving. In hindsight, EDG shouldn't have carelessly let LeBlanc through in the draft just to test the waters."

"Well, what if in this scenario, LeBlanc goes mid to catch out the super-fed Varus? Wouldn't you say EDG would collapse?" Guan Zeyuan suddenly had a whimsical thought.

In his mind, he had already envisioned the scene of LeBlanc instantly vaporizing Varus.

Back in the WE voice comms, Xiye seemed enchanted as he began continuously drifting toward the mid lane.

"I want to catch Varus out. Otherwise, our mid tower is going to fall."

"No need. Just pressure the side lane, push down the tier-two tower, and we'll keep rotating. EDG won't be able to play," the rational 957 disagreed with that view.

Yet Xiye's figure had already untimely appeared, lying in wait inside the mid lane brush.

"Did Varus use his ultimate?"

"Yeah, he used it for poke, and his Heal is gone too," Zero replied.

The low-health WE duo had already recalled to base and had no intention of continuing to defend the tier-one tower.

Varus stood alone, escorting the minion wave up and preparing to take the tower down.

He assumed that Zyra and Vi must be in the Baron pit warding and weren't nearby.

Xiye timed it perfectly and stepped out of the brush. Closing the distance, he used Flash followed by Distortion to leap forward, preparing to chain two Qs together with the E ability Phantom Chains, topping it off with Ignite to achieve an instantaneous one-shot on Varus.

With this kill method, it wouldn't matter even if Varus pre-emptively flashed to dodge the W ability; the dual-cast Q locked-on skill was guaranteed to hit, unless Varus could somehow dodge the E ability with movement alone.

Xiye was brimming with confidence; his E ability had never missed.

For EDG to dare let LeBlanc through was pure suicide.

LeBlanc's figure leapt forward. Lin Ruo reacted with extreme speed, instantly flashing backward to dodge the point-blank distortion stomp, but the dual Sigils of Malice still struck him from afar, chunking a massive chunk of his health bar.

Everything was under control. Xiye watched Varus take two steps and with absolute resolve released his chain, waiting only for the follow-up damage and Ignite. The kill was practically in the bag.

Yet the next moment, his sweet dream shattered. The chain missed entirely, grazing right past his target...

"What kind of toxic positioning is that?" Xiye couldn't believe his eyes.

Immediately afterward, he saw a deep red chain lock onto his own champion, with a circular ring abruptly appearing underneath him.

Oh no, Vi's ultimate!

Panicking profusely, Xiye hurriedly double-tapped W to retreat, but he failed to create much distance.

Vi still tracked him all the way, pinning him to the ground and pounding away.

A flash of golden light—it was Zyra's Flash. Thorns erupted from the ground, crowd-controlling and knocking him airborne, leaving zero possibility of escape.

In the distance, Varus casually finished him off with a single Q.

[EDGLing has slain WE, XIYE.]

At the caster desk, Haokai looked strangely at his broadcast partner: "Just as you wished, Xiye went in, and then he got instantly deleted."

Guan Zeyuan scratch his head in vexation: "This isn't what I envisioned at all! But please believe me, with Malzahar on the team, we will definitely get to see LeBlanc instantly delete Varus in this game."

As the match progressed to the 21st minute, WE once again initiated their familiar four-man group-up to forcefully siege the top tier-one tower.

Behind the tower, Lin Ruo precisely flashed and pressed R, sending a Chain of Corruption soaring through the air to attach itself to the over-extended Lee Sin.

Ailoli seized the opportunity to want to R in for chain-crowd-control, but the moment he flashed out, he was suppressed by Malzahar.

Xiye, arriving fashionably late, used W to step up and attempted to dish out a combo, only to see the Ryze on the bottom-right suddenly flash forward and lock him down with W.

Having shaken off the suppression, Ailoli altered his direction and unleashed his ultimate toward LeBlanc.

"Xiye is standing frozen in place, Xiye has been instantly deleted again! EDG zero for three, at almost the exact same major pacing timestamp as the last game—Baron is wide open now!"

Haokai finished his passionate commentary and inadvertently cast his gaze toward his companion beside him.

Guan Zeyuan smiled awkwardly and said very sincerely: "I feel like we can start congratulating EDG on a 2-0 victory. Trust me, there is absolutely no way there will be any more accidents this time."

At the 25th minute of the match, EDG heavily forced a fight in the mid lane and demolished WE's base in a single push, signaling the end of the game.

In the current split featuring Groups A and B, right before the Lunar New Year holiday, EDG successfully claimed the top spot in Group A with an undefeated streak of two consecutive wins.

Guan Zeyuan stood at the caster desk, letting out a sigh of relief, and shamelessly said: "Well, we have to congratulate EDG on taking the match. Actually, I feel like WE's early-game pacing in both games was quite decent; it's just that in the mid-game, they always seem to have some inexplicable over-extensions or mistakes. They should head back and properly make adjustments—looking forward to WE's performance in their next match."