The battle between Throne of Gods and Fried Eggplant with Fish was extremely fierce and closely followed by the players. Throne of Gods was the target throughout the competition, both individually and in the group stage. Not even the other teams from other countries suffered as much focus as Throne of Gods, but the guild was not weak, instead, being nurtured in Hell, in addition to receiving hidden support from many other countries, it managed to advance this far.
The battle took place outside the sanctuary, just like the other group battles. Their team was well-balanced, thanks to Han Xiao. There was even a mechanic, Hephaestus, a mechanical Pugilist who possessed one of the Purple-grade Rollerblades that the guild had spent a fortune buying internally.
It was one of Lena's many works, in which she had greatly improved her research, the inferior versions were sold in Hell, and this was truly one of her best works.
Hephaestus, a burly man, was extremely mobile and difficult to fight with them. Combining attack, defense, and movement, they advanced against the Fried Eggplant with Fish team, who also had a mechanic, but this one fought like Han Xiao, using electromagnetic boots and a precision rifle.
Unfortunately, even with the support of Hell's equipment, Fried Eggplant with Fish still proved superior in terms of skill and teamwork, causing Jupiter to grit his teeth and activate his final card, the Character Summon Card: Aurora. Aurora's figure appeared behind Jupiter, surprising many players and civilians, especially Aurora herself watching the game.
Character Summon Cards had become a common sight during the game, but rarely did someone of high rank from Hell appear. Aurora wasn't very well-known outside of the game, so the little girl's appearance wouldn't startle people as much.
But when the effect was seen, even if only by the players, they were still speechless, and the forums went crazy.
Is this serious?
-You son of a bitch! That's cheating!-
-Holy shit! Who is this girl?! How does she have such a strong ability?!-
...
Even Han Xiao was speechless when he saw this, his lips trembling, sensing that the Fried Eggplant with Fish was doomed.
Just as he expected, although the Fried Eggplant with Fish players were still stunned, Jupiter himself didn't stand still. He advanced through the enemy lines, ignoring all damage and dealing as much damage as possible. He ended up killing Eggplant Sun, captain of Fried Eggplant with Fish, first. He managed to kill another player before the effect ended.
With two players down, including the captain, the game turned around immediately.
When Throne of Gods won the match, the forum was quiet for a moment before exploding with boos, celebrations, shock, there was everything. The most shocked were the Fried Eggplant with Fish fans, the most excited were the Hell players, and the most angry were all the Chinese players, who had the loudest booing voices.
Fortunately, there was still some truth to it, although some still accused it of cheating, most didn't complain, after all it was completely valid to use Character Summon Cards, however it still left a horrible taste in their mouths.
Ringo, who was in Aquamarine at the time of the game, was also a little surprised. He didn't know where those players got Aurora's Character Summon Card. Aurora would hardly give missions to the players, at most, she would have them play with Jack and Will randomly, so it was most likely a blank Character Summon Card that was used on Aurora.
Ringo avoided giving missions to the players so as not to unlock any missions that would grant any of his permanent abilities, and he also rarely appeared in front of them, so the chances of them using them on him were very low, but Aurora was constantly wandering around, along with Will and Jack, and she was quite visible. Although she's not very well known, whoever used this card on her was probably a novice or casual player.
Sure, Aurora would probably become very famous now, especially among gamers.
Of course, Ringo himself had so many abilities that he acquired from other races that he had lost count, most were common, though useful. If they were useless, he would have gotten rid of them long ago through his control over his body.
Things like heightened perception, improved vision, enhanced cellular immunity, parallel thinking... while useful, would hardly be as game-changer as Aurora's ability.
But if they were lucky enough to acquire a truly good ability from Ringo, something like his degeneration, precognition, nightmare blade, or demonic flames... it was practically giving a missile to someone who was going into a fight against people with sticks.
The surprises didn't end there, the battle between Profound Heaven and the Dynasty was extremely close, until Admiral King used a Character Summon Card from Li!
Yes! They managed to get a Character Summon Card from old Li. Ringo had no idea how they got it, Li almost never appears. They probably bought it from a lucky Hell player.
Li's abilities were very limited, though powerful, but Admiral King struck gold, the ability he acquired was precisely the steel body that Li had spent over a hundred years of continuous training cultivating.
It was a passive ability, merely a defensive enhancement, but the enhancement was so strong that it even negated true damage.
Admiral King copied Jupiter's move, but instead of regenerating health, he took almost no damage with a defense that even made Hao Tian, normally serious and expressionless, twitch at the corners of his eyes.
It was a bloody battle with an ending that left the audience excited, the Dynasty won.
Jupiter was lucky in his subsequent fights, managing to win 6 matches, leaving only the fight against Profound Heaven and Dynasty. The fight against Profound Heaven, where everyone thought Hao Tian would finally be able to defeat this annoying 'underdog', surprised everyone again when, right at the beginning of the fight, Jupiter used his trump card.
Character Summon Card - Price
Its effect? Simply increasing personal power by 10% for each nearby team member, in addition, it increased each team member's power by 5% for each nearby team member.
It lasted half an hour.
The increase wasn't simply focused on attributes, but also on all types of skills, cooldowns were reduced, power and critical hit rate increased, even luck increased, making buffs last longer, debuffs shorter, and debuffs for enemies longer... it was truly an absurd increase when you gathered enough people.
Price's power was essentially in saying that unity is strength.
The final triumph of Throne of Gods left everyone speechless once again.
Many players knew Price, not only in Hell but also outside of it due to all the memes featuring him, but that's all it was, memes, it was only now that they learned about this guy's skill.
Price, who was watching the games with his friends, was also stunned, recognizing his Esper power flowing through the Inhumans team. If he hadn't already known about the Inhumans' strange ability, he would have thought they had some kind of copying ability.
The next moment, the players discovered what a group of adults beating up children looked like.
The players of Profound Heaven weren't weak, instead, they were very skilled, even using their own Character Summon Cards, but nothing was quite as absurd as this.
It was truly like watching adults hit children.
In the end, the Chinese players on the forums were quiet for a moment, then a series of funny messages appeared.
-I really can't watch it, I tried letting my dog watch and tell me the ending, but he couldn't watch it either...-
-Damn, that reminds me of when I 'borrowed' my dad's Baijiu.-
-RIP x1 -
...
RIP x101.203
...
As everyone expected, Profound Heaven lost, meaning that even if they lost to Dynasty, Throne of Gods would still qualify.
The result left everyone speechless, but the number of fans for Throne of Gods grew significantly because of it, players went from being persecuted to being worshipped.
Sure, just because of the Hell players, the vast majority of Chinese players still hated them, but in the end, it was well worth it for Throne of Gods, they qualified and the club had already informed them that they would receive full support as a top-tier club!
Besides Dynasty, who qualified with them in Group A, Temple of Gods also qualified in their own group. Only two of the biggest clubs in China qualified, which made the Chinese even angrier with Throne of Gods.
The decisive matches, that is, the world championship, would only take place at the end of version 1.0, which would still take quite a while.
The Top Eight in Group Stage: Four Chinese teams: Dynasty, Thunderstorm, Temple of God, Mystic Nine. Four foreign teams: Throne of Gods, Son of the Wind, Beast, Golden Orange.
The Top 16 of the Individual Key: King Admiral, Eggplant Sun, Hao Tian, Li Ge, Frenzied Sword, Rainy Kim…
Throne of Gods itself focused on group events and failed to qualify for individual events, which was a shame for foreign players.
On the other hand, Han Xiao was also excited about his harvest from that period and was preparing to finally enter the Galaxy with the information Ringo had given him.
He had already realized that Ringo had probably entered the Galaxy long before him, but he hadn't yet grasped the full extent of it, he just thought Ringo had only spent some time there and grasped the basics, without actually doing anything significant.
Well, he was wrong, very wrong, but although Ringo wasn't famous, seeing Hila and Eva's faces in the Floating Dragon's information would be really interesting.