Pretending to get hit… everyone was taken aback. There were only things people couldn’t think of. There was nothing Fang Rui couldn’t do. His genius went below everyone’s bottom line.
But then again, successfully tricking someone in a pro match was not an easy task.
When an attack missed, pro players could feel it intuitively. Health loss was also not something that could be faked.
Lu Hanwen must have overlooked both of these points for Fang Rui’s trick to succeed.
Lu Hanwen had two years of experience as a main roster player. He had far more experience than most second-year rookies, yet Fang Rui dared to cheat the kid. It succeeded too, and not without reason.
Lu Hanwen had been focused on Boundless Sea’s movements. He hadn’t been paying attention to Boundless Sea’s health. It had been a tense moment, and his offense had been quick. Falling Blossom Form had extremely high priority too. Just getting grazed was enough to knock the opponent down, so the feeling of landing the hit was difficult to notice. Lu Hanwen had been trying to speed up the tempo and had indeed been a bit negligent.
These reasons showed that Fang Rui wasn’t just playing dirty for the sake of playing dirty. He was using his brain when making decisions.
The damage dealt by Dragon Wave wasn’t low. Everyone thought that given this opening, Fang Rui would have Boundless Sea run away. But to their surprise, Fang Rui had Boundless Sea follow up with another attack.
“Is Fang Rui really planning on fighting Lu Hanwen face to face?” Pan Lin cried out. No one dared to guess what Fang Rui was thinking.
Spiral Qi Rush!
Boundless Sea appeared to be ready for a fight. Qi spiraled out of his hands as his character rushed forward fiercely towards Flowing Cloud.
Flowing Cloud could use a skill like Falling Light Blade to change directions in the air, but Spiral Qi Rush had a wide AoE range. All possible paths using Falling Light Blade were blocked by it. Falling Phoenix Slash covered a longer distance, but Flowing Cloud had just used it and it was still on cooldown.
Without any moment for delay, Lu Hanwen displayed his extraordinary reaction speed. Flowing Cloud stepped on the tree behind him and raised his greatsword up.
Rising Dragon Slash!
Flowing Cloud borrowed the height of the tree to leap up instead of fall down.
Boom!
Boundless Sea’s Spiral Qi Rush crashed into the tree. Leaves fluttered down as the entire tree shook violently.
Boundless Sea had turned around. His hands were pressed together, accumulating qi. He waited until Flowing Cloud started descending after the Rising Dragon Slash before pushing his hands outward.
Spirit Reaches to the Rainbow!
The dense qi coming out from his two palms formed a bridge as it flew towards Flowing Cloud.
Lu Hanwen knew that after dodging Spiral Qi Rush with Rising Dragon Slash, getting back to the ground wouldn’t be so easy. As soon as he finished executing Rising Dragon Slash, Flowing Cloud swung his greatsword down.
Falling Light Blade!
In the end, Flowing Cloud used this move to rapidly descend from the sky. Fang Rui had predicted Lu Hanwen’s reaction. He moved his mouse rapidly, causing the Spirit Reaches to the Rainbow to curve downwards towards where Flowing Could would land.
But…
Flowing Cloud dropped down and disappeared.
Boom!
The giant tree struck by Spiral Qi Rush had been shaking violently when it was hit again by the Spirit Reaches to the Rainbow.
When Flowing Cloud had used Falling Light Blade, he had controlled it to position him behind the tree. Although Fang Rui had adjusted his Spirit Reaches to the Rainbow, he had no way of looping the qi around the tree. Before the attack could strike Flowing Cloud, it hit the tree.
Crash!
After being struck twice, the tree swayed even more violently, the sound of rustling leaves seemed to never stop.
Fang Rui wasn’t discouraged. He had Boundless Sea step to the side, ready to catch the falling Flowing Cloud. But when he looked from this new angle, he didn’t see Flowing Cloud.
How?
Fang Rui was stunned. Flowing Cloud had landed behind the tree. How could he have disappeared? Was it magic?
The audience members were able to see it. Pan Lin and Li Yibo were praising Lu Hanwen’s cleverness.
“The Rising Dragon Slash was a set-up for the Falling Light Blade,” Li Yibo said.
“The angle of the Falling Light Blade was very precise. After hiding behind the tree, he cancelled the skill and pushed off the tree to change angles again.”
Blue Rain’s playoffs seemed to be interconnected with trees. Last round, Huang Shaotian’s Troubling Rain had lost half his health due to a tree. This round, Lu Hanwen’s Flowing Cloud used the tree to escape from Fang Rui’s follow-up. His move was clever and unexpected. Fang Rui didn’t know how he had escaped. He was carefully exploring the terrain to try and figure out the secret behind Flowing Cloud’s disappearance. When Boundless Sea took his next step, he was met with a sword! Meteor Form!
The sword came towards Fang Rui extremely fast, and he wasn’t able to react in time. Blood blossomed in the air.
“Go go go go!” The crowd cheered.
Fang Rui, the master of playing dirty, an expert at ambushes, had been ambushed by their own player. It was too exhilarating!
Fang Rui had no way of dodging the attack, but he had time to respond after getting hit . Borrowing the force of the blow, Boundless Sea slid back, but sword light was already in pursuit!
Sword Draw!
After the maxed Meteor Form, a low-level Sword Draw followed. Both these attacks were extremely fast. The two sword lights intertwined, almost as if the two attacks were a single skill.
“He’s using a greatsword too…” Li Yibo liked to remind everyone that Lu Hanwen’s Flowing Cloud wielded a greatsword. If he was using a tachi or a lightsaber instead, just how fast would it be?
Fang Rui couldn’t dodge this follow-up either. A streak of blood flew into the air when the sword light hit. Boundless Sea stumbled backwards.
Had he lost his balance?
No!
He was faking it!
This time, the director saw through it. The moment Boundless Sea began to stumble backwards, qi had begun to circulate around his hands, which then quietly swung outwards.
Qi Blade!
He used a Qi Blade at this distance.
Lu Hanwen had been chasing after Fang Rui, when he saw the dense fog bundle together and fly towards him. He immediately rolled to the side.
Downwards Qi Flow!
The stumbling Boundless Sea suddenly jumped into the air. With his palms directed towards the ground, qi crashed towards Flowing Cloud like a waterfall.
Flowing Cloud, who was mid-roll, slashed across with his sword.
Sky-Plunging Blade!
The skill came out as Flowing Cloud stood back up.
Boom!
The turbulent qi slammed into Flowing Cloud, but at the same time, his bright sword light tore through the sky and struck Boundless Sea.
Flowing Cloud wasn’t able to stay standing after getting struck by the force of Downwards Qi Flow. On the other hand, Boundless Sea was knocked down by the Sky-Plunging Blade and rolled twice to negate the momentum.
The two characters were both injured, but after taking each other’s attacks, they stood back up and continued to fight.
“Fang Rui didn’t run, but his playstyle…” Pan Lin said.
“Playing dirty doesn’t just mean scurrying around and guerrilla warfare!” Li Yibo said.
“Yes,” Pan Lin nodded his head.
The dirty playstyle encompassed many styles. It was similar to direct fights, there were many ways of going about it. The dirty playstyle had many paths branching off from it.
Fang Rui and Lu Hanwen fought. Pretending to be hit, pretending to lose balance and then retaliating were undoubtedly extremely dirty moves.
Playing dirty wasn’t a a technique, but a mindset.
And for Fang Rui, as the representative of the style, it didn’t matter if he fought face-to-face or indirectly, all of them contained an air of dirtiness.
In this map, Lu Hanwen’s acute perception and reaction speed were effective against the usual dirty playstyle. As a result, Fang Rui fought directly against Lu Hanwen, showing off his creativity in this battle…
Pretending to fall down, pretending to be off-balance… no one knew what other surprising tricks this guy had in store.
“Fang Rui isn’t really utilizing the features of this map, making it so that Lu Hanwen’s exceptional eyesight and reaction speed aren’t as useful,” Pan Lin said.
“But by not using the terrain, Fang Rui’s capabilities are also restricted,” Li Yibo said.
“It’s evenly matched!” Pan Lin sighed.
Yes, evenly matched.
Both sides had found their own rhythm and were in their peak competitive states. Both sides were going all out, using all the tricks they had at their disposal.
The two went back and forth, trading blow after blow. The only outcome was damage dealt by both sides, with neither side gaining an advantage. When Lu Hanwen found an opportunity to attack, Fang Rui might retaliate with a weird trick. When Fang Rui tried to combo, Lu Hanwen would often neutralize it forcefully.
Under these circumstances, Fang Rui’s 74% starting health became a disadvantage that could not be erased.
In the end, Lu Hanwen’s Flowing Cloud was able to win with 23% of his health left. Blue Rain had taken back a point. It was now an even 3-3.
However, of the two Blue Rain characters remaining, Flowing Cloud only had 23% of his health left, while Happy had two characters at full health.
