Money-Bringing Boy! Weakling Mark! Who Was the Boss of Lingshi Road?

Weibo erupted into hot discussion, sounding the opening note of public opinion for this LPL Spring Split.

Before long, posts published by numerous esports media marketing accounts climbed to the trending lists on major forums.

#The Battle for Number One on Lingshi Road—Who Was the Strongest on Lingshi Road?#

#Poor AJ—He Carried IM for a Year, Yet He Couldn't Compare to a Rookie!#

"Holy crap, who was stirring things up? Why did they drag AJ into this?"

Chu Ran was somewhat taken aback. He had not intended to start anything with AJ, since he did not know much about him.

Still, AJ had performed well last year. As EDG's second team, IM had stepped on 957 and made it straight to the World Championship.

The moment Abu saw that Weibo trend, his face darkened, as though another sister had died at home.

He was not particularly afraid of the other controversies, but claiming that they had abandoned AJ and selected Chu Ran for EDG was genuinely disgusting. Could it have been deliberate work by Imperial trolls?

AJ had been playing perfectly well at IM, and his style was not what Abu wanted anyway. What would be the point of bringing him onto the main roster?

AJ might not have had any thoughts about it at first, but after seeing a trending topic like this, who knew what he might start thinking.

As everyone knows, as long as a seed was planted in someone's heart, it would slowly sprout under the watering rain and grow into a towering tree.

"Little Ran, don't worry about this controversy. Use your skill to crush them. What did you do wrong? EDG is your strongest support. Just train properly these next few days."

"Oh, okay!"

Chu Ran secretly laughed. He had never felt any psychological burden in the first place. Looking at his more than forty thousand Red Temperature Value, a smile spread across the corner of his mouth.

It had to be said, Imperial trolls and some Zz1tai fans were truly helpful.

One livestream plus Weibo had brought him even more than the last time he started something with Uzi in that interview.

Chu Ran immediately began another cycle of allocating points and drawing traits.

More than forty thousand points gave him two stat points and two trait draws.

Mechanical Ability: 78→80.

Once he finished allocating the points, Chu Ran felt his mind become even clearer. Deep Blue stat allocation really was satisfying.

With a thought, white light flickered before his eyes once more, only to abruptly stop several seconds later.

Money-Bringing Boy: You are a god of wealth. When your opponents use champions such as Gangplank or Malzahar, they will uncontrollably become Money-Bringing Boys, increasing your gold and growth.

Description: A man cannot become rich without windfall wealth. Praise the Money-Bringing Boy!

Weakling Mark: When your opponent calls someone over to gank you, you will gain unrivaled confidence, increasing all attributes by 10%.

Description: Did this guy call someone over because he couldn't beat me? Marked as a weakling!

"Uh, Weakling Mark was somewhat useful, but did this Money-Bringing Boy trait mean I was supposed to play champions with stacking passives, like Sion or Nasus?"

Chu Ran scratched his head. He could already imagine it: playing Nasus while the enemy Malzahar constantly delivered minions to him so he could stack Q.

That was kind of interesting.

"Brother Ran, your apology letter went viral. Everyone is calling you the Head Disciple of the Sarcasm School now."

Hearing Meiko's roar, Chu Ran jolted in fright.

"Why are you yelling so loudly?!"

"I saw it!"

Chu Ran replied to Meiko, then continued scrolling through Weibo.

With the hype reaching this level, Snake Esports officially joined in as well. They declared that their first match would prove which team was the strongest on Lingshi Road. Their words excited many Snake Esports fans.

At that moment, they had only two thoughts.

Green Garlic!

Green garlic!

Along with the Imperial trolls, they only hoped the LPL Spring Split would begin soon. They wanted to see Chu Ran get beaten up on stage.

At the same time, at the RNG Club base.

Xiao Ming and the others found Chu Ran's Weibo posts both amusing and exasperating. Xiao Hu even laughed so hard that he slapped his thigh. "Why is this guy such a clown? I'm saving this meme first. It's fucking hilarious."

However, as he spoke, Xiao Hu noticed Uzi's expressionless face and immediately stopped smiling. They heard Uzi grit his teeth and say, "He's just a clown who knows how to ride trends. I hope Snake Esports sends him back to the bench. I don't want to see that disgusting thing in the LPL."

Mala Xiang Guo rolled his eyes beside him, fiddling with the stock-trading app on his phone as he complained inwardly.

This was disgusting?

Why didn't he reflect on himself?

Mala Xiang Guo had not even mentioned how disgusted he had been this year by Uzi's inability to play Jhin.

Letem smacked his lips. He truly envied Chu Ran's courage. At the very least, he would not dare post on Weibo like this every day.

After joining RNG, he finally understood why Chu Ran had been sent to the bench by Uzi back then.

There had been a scrim recently where he had TP'd one second late to protect bot lane, and Uzi had immediately judged him for it. He had nearly received Divine Punishment.

Thinking of this, Uzi felt that he should support Snake Esports. He promptly posted on Weibo.

UziQAQ:

Snake Esports, good luck. I hope you perform well in the match a few days from now and let certain people see that there is always someone stronger. Don't treat a Solo championship as capital for arrogance. In the future, learn to respect your elders and care for the young.

Sure enough, the moment he posted it, he received strong support from many Imperial trolls, along with furious abuse from Uzi Haters.

So an AD without a championship could act arrogant?

Hahaha, Mad Little Dog, you really had some nerve. What championships did you have? Why were you so arrogant?

Of course he could be arrogant. It didn't matter whether he went to Worlds or not, and then he got kicked away like a stray dog by the roadside.

I'm dying. So arrogant that he played Lucian Jungler, huh?

Following Uzi's Weibo post, the trending topics on several LPL forums never stopped during the days leading up to the Spring Split.

Aside from joking about all the drama, more people were discussing how Chu Ran would actually perform.

After all, Chu Ran was a rookie who had never appeared in the LPL, yet he already had such enormous popularity and traffic. Naturally, he drew the attention of many people.

Chu Ran, however, did not take it to heart.

Instead, he opened Notepad on his computer.

January 15, 2017, sunny.

The great World's Number One ADC publicly supported Snake Esports and said Zz1tai would beat me up.

When Meiko leaned over and glanced at it, he discovered a whole list of entries above it. His face instantly turned pale with fright.

Fuck, that was terrifying!

What professional player kept a diary?

From then on, Meiko had one thought in his heart: he absolutely could not offend Chu Ran. He was afraid Chu Ran would write him down in his little notebook.

Time passed like a galloping white horse. Several days slipped by quietly, and soon it was January 19, 2017. The Spring Split regular season was being held at Shanghai Super Brand Mall, so Chu Ran and the others had remained at the club base.

Abu and the others were very satisfied with Chu Ran's performance. They had all thought he could remain silent in the face of those trending topics, but they had not expected that Chu Ran had merely been building up momentum.

"Little Ran, how about playing something like Maokai or Nautilus when you go on stage?" Nofe walked up to Chu Ran and asked tentatively.

Before Nofe could say anything further, Abu flatly rejected it. "No. Play Fiora, Jayce, and champions like that. Little Ran, find time to practice more Camille."

Nofe froze and let out a soft sigh.

He felt that with EDG's current lineup, it was enough for mid and bot to carry. Top lane should really play a tank instead. Did Abu not understand that?

Of course Abu understood.

But why had he brought Chu Ran to EDG?

Before Chu Ran came to EDG, their top laner played Maokai. After Chu Ran came, their top laner was still playing Maokai.

Then hadn't he fucking come for nothing? Why not just put Mouse in?

Since Abu had spoken, Nofe said no more. Anyway, if top lane ran into problems later, the blame would not be on him.

"I can play tanks too."

Chu Ran's words did not attract much attention from Abu or Nofe, but Mouse, standing off to the side, felt his body tremble.

Bro, don't mess around.

Just play your damage champions properly. Leave tanks to a professional like me.

"Gather up. There aren't any issues with tomorrow's lineup, right?" Abu looked at his notebook. "Top, Little Ran. Jungle, Zhiming. Mid, Yuanshuo. AD, Hekui. Support, Meiko. Substitute, Scout."

"Snake Esports isn't weak. Especially tomorrow, Little Ran, your opponent in top lane will be Zz1tai. Flandre has something to deal with, so Zz1tai will be filling in at top. Personally, I think Zz1tai is better at top than he is at mid. Communicate more tomorrow."

"Okay."

Chu Ran was also somewhat taken aback. He had not expected his first opponent tomorrow to be Zz1tai. How had he ended up in top lane again?

Had he failed to compete with Duke, wanted to return to mid, but Invictus Gaming already had Rookie in mid, so he ran off to Snake Esports?

Was it really for revenge?

Chu Ran rubbed his chin and fell into thought.

Meanwhile, Snake Esports' official announcement that Zz1tai would appear as their substitute top laner tomorrow stirred up a wave throughout the entire LPL. Many people's eyes lit up.

Holy crap, then tomorrow's EDG versus Snake Esports match was a must-watch.

Interesting. Zz1tai had benched Holy Spear Brother. Was he going to get revenge on Easy?

Who knew? There was drama anyway. Nothing else mattered—go stock up on sunflower seeds and peanuts first, and prepare to enjoy tomorrow's grand feast!

Nice! The most correct episode. I hope Zz1tai crushes Ran Chu so badly that our Little Dog won't have to make a move himself later.

Zz1tai might not be that strong, but beating a rookie shouldn't be a problem, right? This Ran Chu guy only knew how to play a few champions. Did he dare play Fiora in an actual match?

Exactly. What a joke. If he had the guts, he'd pick Fiora in a match. Would EDG let him?

He'd probably pick Maokai and start coasting. He didn't even have the courage to lane against Zz1tai.

What was EDG doing? Why was my Rui Can a substitute? Were they sick? Trash mid laners like Pawn thought they deserved to compete with my Rui Can for the starting mid position?

Learn from your mother and get lost! Stinky Pawn!

The next day, the sun shone brightly.

Chu Ran put on EDG's team uniform and left the hotel with everyone else, arriving at the venue center to find it already a sea of people. Fujii had done it for the traffic.

On the first day of the LPL Spring Split, there was not only EDG's match, but also RNG versus OMG and Team WE versus LGD.

The Big Three had all arrived. Along with the wave of public opinion caused by Chu Ran, and Fujii's promotional push, the traffic had truly been maxed out.

"So many people."

"Don't be nervous. Once you're on stage, just treat it like your normal training Ranked games." As someone with experience, Deft patted Chu Ran on the shoulder.

Chu Ran grinned. "I'm not nervous. The ones who should be nervous are the opponents."

"..."

"Then what kind of situation would make you nervous, Brother Ran?"

Hearing Meiko's question, Chu Ran pondered for several seconds before slowly answering, "The moment seed resources I'd saved for years stopped working."

"6." Meiko and the others were stunned. They widened their eyes and gave Chu Ran a thumbs up.

Ming Kai, watching from backstage, immediately laughed. "Have Ah Guang give you some good ones later. At your age, you really shouldn't be dating."

"Kai Ge, he's a gamer. All he needs are games and his hands."

After saying that, Chu Ran began registering. When he turned around, however, he suddenly spotted the Snake Esports players. The EDG members immediately greeted them.

Chu Ran locked eyes with Zz1tai, immediately flashed his white teeth, and walked up to him.

"Hello, Player Zz1tai. I'm your fan. You've always been my idol. Can we take a photo together?"

Fuck you!

Zz1tai was dumbfounded. This Lord was your idol, yet you had played Twitch and kept catching This Lord?

Was that how someone treated his idol?

However, upon hearing the word "idol," Ming Kai's body trembled as though by conditioned reflex.

Because during last year's World Championship, Little Peanut had also said Ming Kai was his idol.

And then—

Then came 4396!

Still, Chu Ran and Zz1tai did not have much of a conflict, so taking a photo together was fine.

After both sides finished registering, they entered the Backstage Lounge. In Snake Esports' backstage area, Zz1tai was answering Crystal Brother's question.

"I'm scared of his Fiora? You clearly haven't seen my scrims these past few days. This Lord's Gangplank was sucking up farm like crazy. I'd go up and get one shot, one kill!"

"Ran Chu posted on Weibo."

"What did he post this time?"

Zz1tai opened Weibo on his phone and took a look. The smile on his face instantly vanished, and his pupils suddenly contracted!

EDG-Easy:

Thanks for the invitation. I'm at the Shanghai venue preparing for the match. The moment I arrived, I ran into my idol, Zz1tai. I grew up watching his matches. In this game, I'll let you witness the LPL's Little Peanut!