LOL: Can’t I play other games professionally?

Chapter 420 Can I still be competitive after not playing Go for more than a month?

After the MSI tournament concluded, the champions spent a short rest in Paris, France.

They were supposed to go out and explore, but perhaps because they celebrated too late last night, everyone was a bit listless today.

Abbreviation: lying in bed.

This is partly due to the release of pressure after winning the championship. It's normal to need rest after suddenly relaxing one's tense mind.

Well, this concept doesn't apply to Lin Ruo; he doesn't feel any pressure.

If there is any pressure, it's only the pressure of being a responsible and dedicated broadcaster.

The morning after winning the championship, Lin Ruo still started her live stream around 10 a.m.

At 2 PM Beijing time, the number of viewers in the live stream was quite substantial, and the chat was still as familiar as ever.

Besides the "We are the champions" meme flooding the screen, many more comments were about "Lin Gou is an easy win dog," clearly indicating that the meme had spread even more widely overnight.

So what could Lin Ruo do? Of course, he joined in the fun with the memes and changed the title of his live stream to "Lin Ruo's Live Stream: The Lazy Winner".

This amused the viewers in the live stream.

Although Lin Ruo didn't play in the finals, everyone knew that the real match, equivalent to the finals, was the semi-final against KZ.

Without Lin Ruo, there would still be no three-time world champion EDG. It is an undeniable fact that Lin Ruo is now a god of EDG.

"Which championship skin should I choose? I don't know. I'll accept any championship skin Riot gives me if we win MSI."

"When are you going back to Shanghai? I'm going back tomorrow. There's nothing fun to do here." Lin Ruo answered a few questions briefly in response to the comments.

There will be a new round of summer tournaments in early June, including the Demacia Cup in Zhuhai, so I definitely won't be able to make it back then, since I only have three or four days to prepare.

The players clearly need more leisure time, and besides, this isn't the same EDG that was extremely eager for results last year. The Demacia Cup is insignificant and doesn't need to be taken too seriously.

Therefore, Abu requested that the second team play, and Lin Ruo knew only one of them.

EDG's reason for wanting to go back early was simple: there's really nothing fun to do in Paris.

Early in the morning, Lin Ruo calmly continued to climb the ranks in StarCraft 2. He had already reached the next level by reaching the Diamond rank.

The ranking system in StarCraft jumps much more dramatically than in Dota 2. As long as you perform well and win enough, it's not difficult to reach the Diamond rank in just a few days.

The biggest problem facing Lin Ruo right now is probably just time.

That's right, it's about time. After playing only two games, Lin Ruo logged back into FoxGo. Just as netizens have said, he's going to start preparing for the main tournament in June.

After nearly a month of not logging in, he received dozens of game invitations on Wildfox Go, but he was completely unable to respond since he was not online at all.

On the right side of the main interface of the FoxGo PC client, there is also an entry for "Go Friends Club", which is a discussion about Go moves and strategies.

Students can hone their skills and exchange ideas with other chess players here.

During the initial period after logging off Yefox Go, Lin Ruo almost always looked for opponents here. Since matchmaking required climbing the ranks from low to high, it was better to find people here, add them as friends, and then invite them to start a game.

You might even find a lot of strong players to compete against, which is definitely more interesting than solo matchmaking.

However, Lin Ruo doesn't need this anymore. His rank is already very high, and he can find good opponents directly through matchmaking.

Meanwhile, with the rise of AI in recent years, FoxGo has also launched human-computer battles. This is not a beginner's level in League of Legends, but a game mode that best tests the strength of players.

With 25 difficulty levels, covering everything from beginner to full professional ranks, the challenge is self-evident, meaning that even amateur players can compete against AI-generated professional players.

After browsing briefly and clicking "Match Complete," Lin Ruo quickly entered a match with an opponent of the same skill level.

For him, this shouldn't be called preparation for war, but rather a last-minute attempt to cram for the worst.

The main tournament in June is just around the corner. People who haven't played Go for a long time suddenly started playing several games or even several days in a row. There is obviously no better way to describe this than cramming at the last minute.

For others, last-minute cramming might not be very useful, but for Lin Ruo, it is extremely useful.

My last day in Paris came to an end.

On the morning of the third day, the entire EDG team packed their things, left the hotel, and took a taxi to Charles de Gaulle Airport to board a direct flight to Shanghai Pudong International Airport.

The entire journey takes about 12 hours, which is neither a long nor a short time. For those who have experienced 24-hour flights, there is naturally no reason for them to have any trouble.

On the flight, in business class.

The EDG members took their seats in order. There weren't many passengers in the business class. Lin Ruo, who was wearing headphones, was the last to board and noticed something that piqued his curiosity.

A well-dressed European man in a suit had already taken his seat, and on the small table in front of him was a small chessboard. The man was stroking his thinning hair, clearly deep in thought.

His receding hairline, resembling a Mediterranean style, makes this man, who looks to be under 30, appear to be approaching 40.

But that wasn't what Lin Ruo was focused on. What he was naturally focused on was what the man was doing, engrossed in playing Chinese Go, not the international chess that foreigners preferred.

However, Lin Ruo had no intention of responding. She glanced at him and headed towards her seat, which was on the other side of the aisle opposite the man.

The man looked up and stared at the chess pieces for a long time, his gaze seemingly drawn to them. Then, his face showed a slight excitement, so much so that he withdrew his left hand from the chess pieces he was fiddling with.

After taking out his phone to search and staring at Lin Ruo several times, the man finally spoke hesitantly, as if in disbelief.

"Excuse me, are you Lin Ruo, a first-dan student?"

"Um, hello."

Surprised to be recognized by the man, Lin Ruo nodded subconsciously and greeted him politely in English.

Foreigners are not only obsessed with Chinese Go, but they also watch Chinese Go matches, to the point that they know him who has been the most talked-about person in recent months.
This should be considered quite a rare occurrence.

"No way, he didn't get to know you through watching a League of Legends match, but through a Go match." Mingkai, who sat down next to him, couldn't help but lick his lips.

The MSI finals have just ended. If a foreigner recognizes me, it should be because it's related to League of Legends. I didn't expect it to be Go.

Is Go more popular than League of Legends abroad? That's highly unlikely.

Mingkai quickly dismissed the idea. Go wasn't nearly as well-known in Europe and America as League of Legends, after all, they couldn't even establish a proper professional league. "Hello, hello, I didn't expect to meet you here. I'm your opponent, Matthäus Sulma. Do you remember me?"

The European man was extremely excited and kept introducing himself to Lin Ruo.

Mingkai, whose English level is at a beginner level, didn't understand anything except for "hello".

Lin Ruo quickly responded: "That's a coincidence, huh? So you were my first-round opponent."

When the preliminary rounds of the April Dream Lily Cup came to an end, the group draw for the main tournament was also released. Lin Ruo certainly remembered that his opponent in the round of 64 was Mateusz Sulma, a first dan player from Europe.

The only player in this tournament to directly qualify for the Mlily Cup main tournament through the European quota.

Like him, he is one of the few professional players at the same rank as him among the many players of the eighth and ninth dan levels in this tournament.

Judging by their ranks alone, it seems like a battle of noobs, but Lin Ruo had previously defeated professional 9-dan player Park Young-hoon to advance to the top 64 of the Dream Lily Cup, so it's quite obvious who is stronger.

This match became the least suspenseful one after the group stage.

At the time, many Go enthusiasts joked that after advancing through the tough preliminary rounds, Lin Ruo was guaranteed a spot in the top 32.

"I never expected to meet you here. I'm really looking forward to our duel."

Surma was so happy he was momentarily speechless. The 24-year-old is an avid Chinese Go enthusiast.
He participated in the 2nd World Go Team Championship (Golden Dragon City Cup) in 2015 and represented Europe in the 22nd Samsung Cup World Go Masters Championship in 2017.

This is the third international world championship he has participated in.

He was overjoyed when he learned that his opponent in the draw was a junior professional player.

Thinking that the organizers were quite considerate of him by choosing an evenly matched opponent, he was surprised when he learned how Lin Ruo had advanced to the main tournament of the Dream Lily Cup.

Surma couldn't help but question the organizers' apparent favoritism towards him, wondering if they had some grudge against him.

A professional Go player who is capable of reaching 9-dan level but is also a 1-dan level player—should he be called a 9-dan professional Go player or a 1-dan professional Go player?

Regardless of the stage, Surma felt that his journey was dangerous.

Of course, he never thought he could actually achieve good results in the Mlily Cup. After all, Europe is a wildcard region, or even a region that should be called a region that focuses on participation.

It's a tournament with very few participants, so being able to break through from Europe and participate in the Mlily Cup is already a huge success.

Sulma viewed this journey as a process of gaining experience. He was looking forward to sparring with Lin Ruo, the strongest genius of the year, as it was at least a learning opportunity.

Meeting Lin Ruo on this trip is an even more rare opportunity.

The two quickly sat down next to each other, and Surma had many questions she wanted to ask.

Lin Ruo was naturally not impatient. He was worried that there was nothing to do during this journey, so discussing Go was a feasible idea.

At first, he thought they were fans, but now he realizes they are his so-called rivals.

"After learning that you were my opponent, I did some special research. The game you played against Park Young-hoon was really wonderful and completely exceeded my expectations."

With his emotions still running high, Surma was reviewing Lin Ruo's final match in the qualifiers. He was also thinking about the key move in that game, how Lin Ruo dug a huge hole for Park Young-hoon.

Lin Ruo, who hadn't paid much attention to the chessboard layout, only then realized that they were actually studying him.

It shouldn't really be considered research, but rather learning from his methodical approach, because Lin Ruo's tactics were quite novel.

The two talked about Go for about half an hour, and then the story began to gradually go off track.

Sulma was like a walking encyclopedia of questions, asking all sorts of questions about Lin Ruo from beginning to end.

Of course, this is partly because Lin Ruo's experiences along the way have been so outrageous.

"You only started learning Go at seventeen? You've become this strong in less than two years? God, that's impossible!"

"And I heard that you are also an amateur professional Go player. It's unbelievable that someone as terrifying as you is not a proper professional Go player."

Lin Ruo simply nodded repeatedly, knowing that further discussion was pointless and that his opponents certainly wouldn't believe him if he said he had added points to Deep Blue.

...

Twelve hours passed in the blink of an eye, and the flight arrived smoothly at Shanghai Pudong International Airport.

It was nearly 2 a.m. Beijing time, so there weren't many passengers. After saying goodbye to Sulma at the airport, the EDG team got into the club's van and headed back to the EDG eSports Club, which they hadn't visited for more than ten days.

During the time spent in the car, Lin Ruo first booked a plane ticket to Beijing, the capital city.

The main tournament and the preliminary rounds in June will remain the same, still held at the BJ Go Academy, with the same location and different participants.

The round of 64 has garnered a lot of attention, and Lin Ruo saw many familiar names on the player list.

These are all figures he didn't previously pay attention to Go, but was still able to learn about through other channels. Jaguar, who likes to jump, goes without saying, and Shin Jinseo, who later dominated the Go world, is currently still in the rising stage.

There's also a highly anticipated clash in the round of 64: the China-South Korea showdown between Wang Xinghao and Park Jung-hwan.

As a player who has stood out in recent years, South Korean Go player Park Jung-hwan is currently at the peak of his strength and is the biggest favorite for South Korea to win the championship.

There have been many predictions on the online media regarding the list of the top 32, but Lin Ruo is definitely not included, because his advancement does not require any prediction.

The match against Surma is roughly the same level as Lin Ruo's professional ranking tournament last year.

If they fail to advance, it will undoubtedly be the biggest upset of this year's Mengbaihe Cup.

The only possible exception is that Lin Ruo hasn't played Go for more than a month. Will he become rusty from just practicing in the last few days before the competition?

This is indeed a good starting point, but not many people really care. The effect of a genius learning for a few days is always much greater than the effect of an ordinary person practicing hard for half a year.

"Brothers, I'm back! See you tomorrow morning at 10 AM in live stream room 4396."

Lin Ruo returned to the club at nearly 3 a.m. and posted a Weibo message to warn others of the disturbance before washing up and going to bed to adjust to the time difference. Before leaving for Beijing, she still had to do her live streams for the next couple of days.

(End of this chapter)