From Pokémon to The International, Dota 2

The next afternoon, the Blade Zone Pokémon event started promptly at six o'clock as usual.

Gu Ran ate a cheap meal—Orleans-style roasted meat rice bowl with an unknown beverage—while browsing the horse selection interface. It only cost twelve yuan, a great value for money.

He had been playing solo queue all night and during the day today, and occasionally managed to enter the first-person perspective he had yesterday. He summarized that each time he entered first-person perspective, it took about two minutes, and after exiting, he experienced a dizzy state for about ten seconds.

He usually enters the first-person perspective when he is very focused or excited, and so far he has not found a way to reliably enter the first-person perspective.

By the way, I feel a lot more confident since I solo-killed AXX yesterday. I gained 300 MMR in one day and I'm now at 10300.

During the horse selection phase, Gu Ran was snatched by AXX (meaning he was the first one selected) and joined AXX's team.

"Firefly, right? You played really well yesterday. Today you'll play mid and I'll play offlane. We'll play a fast-paced, aggressive style."

As soon as we entered YY, Captain AXX gave the order: today, the team's first pick is the second position, the captain is the third position, and the first position is a Pokémon with a ladder rating of around 6,000. So if we want to win, we have to rely on the second and third positions to put in the effort.

The charm of Pokémon lies in the fact that your teammates change every day; yesterday's opponent may become today's teammate.

"Okay, let's choose the early to mid-game lineup."

After confirming their strategy, they easily won the first two rounds and advanced to the finals on the second day.

This time, the opponent is Shikamaru's team, a 19-year-old prodigy who plays the fourth position. Generally speaking, in Pokémon mode, even if the mentor usually plays a support role, they will switch to the first, second, or third position because the effect of Pokémon relying on resources is definitely not as good as that of the mentor.

However, Shikamaru still played the position 4, and he actively roamed in the early game to influence the overall situation. In addition, he chose some position 4 players who were more focused on farming, which gave his team an extra core in the late game to defeat the opponent.

In this match against Shikamaru, the pressure on the mid lane will be greater because he will consistently gain an advantage and then secretly gank the enemy mid laner. In the previous two games, their rhythm started by roaming and disrupting the enemy mid laner.

"Should I play mid and you play position 3?"

AXX took the initiative to ask, and she was also worried that her mid laner would be overwhelmed by the roaming, leading to a collapse in the early game rhythm. Essentially, both of their teams are teams that focus on the early and mid-game.

"I'll play mid. I'm not very good at position 3, so I'll play a bit more conservatively."

Gu Ran's skill level in position 3 is not high, and he is not very afraid of the opposing mid laner who has around 8,000 points. At most, he just needs to pay more attention to the situation on the side lanes when playing.

With the positions finalized, the draft results showed that Gu Ran picked Puck, while the opposing mid laner countered with Void Spirit.

Puck, the Fairy Dragon, is a very agile hero. Her first skill, Illusion Orb, is similar to the Flying Thunder God Technique of the Fourth Hokage in Naruto. The orb deals damage to enemies in its path, and pressing the skill button again during the orb's duration will teleport her to the orb's location.

Puck's second skill, Crescent Moon, allows him to dash in place or within a small area and then release fairy dust, dealing damage to surrounding enemies and inflicting a silence effect (preventing them from using skills).

Puck's third skill, Phase Shift, allows him to briefly teleport to another dimension, during which he becomes completely immune to all damage. Similar to the "Golden Body" in Honor of Kings, this is Puck's life-saving ability. Combined with his innate skill—which restores a percentage of his maximum health and mana whenever he dodges an attack or skill projectile—Puck is a very skillful hero (with a high skill ceiling).

Puck's ultimate ability, Dream Binding, creates a magical area at the target location, dealing initial damage to all enemy heroes within the area and applying a binding effect. If bound enemies attempt to leave the area too far, the binding will break, stunning them and dealing additional break damage. This is Puck's teamfight essential, capable of both locking down enemies and disrupting enemy formations.

Just as they had chosen their heroes and were ready to start the battle, in the live stream room of YYF, the top streamer in the Dota 2 section.

"Fans, the Gaodao finals are coming up soon! I feel relieved to see the Konoha brothers in the commentary booth."

"This game depends on Shikamaru's Ziggs rhythm. If he can roam around axx's mid laner, the game is basically won."

YYF assessed the situation. At the same time, Brother Diao's voice also rang out from YY.

"This Shikamaru is something else. He just took me down. He wiped out our mid laner who was seventh in gold at six minutes, and then at eight minutes he brought four people to gank me and completely destroyed my lane."

"Oh, so Brother Tai is also a victim."

As the commentators chatted, the mid lane matchup began, with Puck facing off against Purple Spirit. In the first wave of creeps, Puck had a 4-1 lead (four last hits and one deny), while Purple Spirit had a 2-0 lead.

"Firefly's laning phase is pretty good."

"He reported 10,000 points, but I feel he has the skill of 12,000. The other side only has 8,000 points, so he will definitely be suppressed. It depends on when the Bomber comes to help."

Gu Ran felt that his last-hitting skills were very good, and he was steadily ahead of Purple Cat. When he drank the magic bottle, he looked at the minimap and saw that all five enemy heroes were on the minimap and none of them had missed (disappeared).

At 3 minutes and 40 seconds, and at 4 minutes, a Holy Water Rune will spawn on each side of the mid-lane river. This rune allows an empty Magic Bottle to regain two uses, making it a key point of contention in the mid-lane. If there is no support to help, both mid-laners will usually take one rune.

"Bomberman missed."

Gu Ran's position 5 player felt a little apologetic. They hadn't won their lane against the opponent, so he couldn't help the mid laner with the rune—if he left now, his team's position 1 player wouldn't be able to farm.

Gu Ran glanced at the minimap and saw that the Ziggs had indeed disappeared. There were no wards or vision points on either the mid or side lanes, so it was impossible to know where the Ziggs had gone. He might have roamed to the mid lane or used a portal to attack another side lane.

Gu Ran chose to control the Holy Water Rune on the side furthest from the Bomber's line. He was on high alert, his finger hovering over the Phase Shift skill button, ready to vanish into the void at any moment.

—The first-person perspective is triggered again.

Puck controlled the Holy Water Rune in front of him, and nothing happened. The Bomber was probably off attacking his own other side lane.

Back in the mid lane, Gu Ran felt his last-hitting was more precise after transforming into Puck. His control over the projectile trajectory was accurate to the millisecond, allowing him to steadily secure all last hits and occasionally deny a few. The opposing mid laner was getting tilted by the last hits.

Just as Gu Ran was focused on finishing off the enemy, a gust of wind swept in, and he reflexively used Phase Shift to disappear into the void.

Just as his figure disappeared, a figure crashed into the spot where he had just been—the Bomber's explosive launch, which would stun anyone hit, and then kill them with a follow-up combo.

The Bomber was a little confused. He had cleared the vision in this area before roaming, and he was quite sure that this Puck had no vision. Without vision and being able to react and press Phase Shift the instant he saw himself being blown up while last-hitting minions, was this a human?

Holy crap!!!

"Is this puck open yet?"

Countless comments flooded the screens in several live stream rooms, and YYF immediately used the spectator function to switch to Puck's perspective to observe.

"This puck skill is definitely impossible to dodge without vision, it's too overpowered."

Purple Cat was a little taken aback by what he saw. He had originally planned to use his Residual Shadow Control after the stun effect ended when he blew Puck up, but the situation was a bit sudden. He was a few beats late in releasing Residual Shadow and aiming it at Puck's position.

Residual Shadow, Purple Cat's first skill, releases a phantom of herself. The first enemy unit hit by the phantom will be attracted and controlled for 1.5 seconds. This skill can be placed at the location where Puck uses Phase Shift. Puck will be attracted when the skill ends, which is why Purple Cat counters Puck.

In those few moments of hesitation, Puck dodged the Bomber's explosion and immediately emerged from Phase Shift mode, then unleashed his first and second skills in quick succession, targeting the Bomber who was already within the attack range of the mid-lane turret.

The moment the lingering shadow appeared, Puck's second skill, Crescent Moon, was already unleashed. Puck's small dash was barely managed to catch the enemy, and now the Bomber was in trouble. Already being attacked by the tower, the Bomber was further weakened by Puck's damage, leaving him with no choice but to die on the countdown.

First Blood!

Firefly defeated Shikamaru and gained 362 coins.