Chapter 53

Basically, the City Core is designed to be a position that handles support, assassination, information gathering, late-game damage, and playmaking.

But as you’ll realize when you play the game, you don’t always have to stick to the textbook to win, right?

That’s why these days, the City Core has shifted away from playmaking and instead focuses on solidly handling support, assassination, and late-game damage.

Of course, this only applies to solo queue where communication is nonexistent. In tournaments, the City Core still has to do everything.

Anyway.

Arena tightened her grip on her sword as she entered the City Core.

‘Amano Yukiko.’

Arena’s main character, often classified as a sword character.

The hallmark of sword characters is high risk, high reward. If they don’t grow properly, they underperform in team fights.

It was an unconventional pick for a female player. Aggressive characters like this were usually played by men.

In this way, Han Yoorim and Arena were somewhat similar.

If you break it down, ‘Thierry’ was capable of proactive play from the start (though it was very difficult), while ‘Amano Yukiko’ was passive until fully grown, making them quite different. But people didn’t really care about those details.

They just thought, “Oh, they both play strong carry characters? Sword character users?”

Arena knew Han Yoorim’s playstyle very well.

Even if she didn’t want to, the recent MTube algorithm and video donations forced her to learn.

Plus, she even watched her streams for intel. She was practically a fan at this point.

Han Yoorim preferred aggressive plays.

The kind of abnormally aggressive plays that made you think, “Can you really do that with Thierry?”

She’d pressure objectives with Thierry as early as level 3.

She’d make plays with Thierry in tier 3 objective team fights.

Sometimes, she’d even employ early-game stalking strategies with strong characters.

Every character and position has a designated role.

<Eternal World> is a game where simply understanding those roles can earn you a championship trophy.

Thierry’s designated role is mid-to-late game carry.

She’s absolutely not meant to create early-game advantages or gather resources.

Of course, it’s great if she can. But if you do something you’re not supposed to, the game explodes.

Like when the main carry tries to make plays—it’s a disaster.

But there’s usually a reason why you’re told not to do something.

It’s either too difficult or, if you fail, the game blows up in your face.

Yet Han Yoorim ignored all that and mechanically executed aggressive plays every time.

When Han Yoorim first started pulling these stunts, people didn’t think much of it.

The textbook exists because it has the highest chance of winning.

Those free-win plays were bound to be countered and shut down eventually.

In fact, as soon as Han Yoorim became famous, people expected someone to put her in her place.

And yet.

Even with countless snipers targeting her, Han Yoorim kept pulling off those free-win plays.

Arena is a Challenger in <Eternal World>. To become one of the top 100 players, you need to know the game inside and out.

Now, Arena understood.

What Han Yoorim was doing wasn’t a free-win play.

It wasn’t some high-level strategy either.

She was just doing it because she could.

There was no deeper meaning.

Level 3 pressure with Thierry? For Han Yoorim, it’s a play with a high success rate.

Level 6 playmaking with Thierry? For Han Yoorim, it’s a play with a high success rate.

The textbook is the play with the highest win rate.

In that sense, the plays Han Yoorim had shown so far were, from her perspective, no different from the textbook.

To beat Han Yoorim, several conditions needed to be met.

First, you couldn’t fall behind in growth.

Han Yoorim was strong in early-game farming skirmishes, but in team fights, she was practically a disaster.

To shut down Han Yoorim’s creative playmaking angles, you needed to match her level.

Honestly, this was the same as saying, “Hit your crowd control skills at angles the enemy can’t avoid.”

Anyone can say it.

The hard part is executing it, and succeeding requires meticulous planning.

Arena called the Guardian into the City Core at risky timings.

She didn’t need to keep doing this. She only needed to babysit until Amano Yukiko’s power spike at level 6.

After that, she could match Han Yoorim’s growth even without support.

As expected, Han Yoorim held back from diving into the enemy City Core as soon as the Guardian showed up.

Arena hit level 6 and released the Guardian. If she held onto it any longer, the growth gap between Guardians would become unmanageable.

One minute later. Tier 3 objective team fight.

Han Yoorim performed well, but not as well as usual. After all, Thierry is a late-game character. There wasn’t much she could do before her power spike.

The kill trade at the tier 3 objective was 3:3.

The enemy stole the tier 3 objective because our Guardian fell behind, but Arena took all three kills.

The game was practically in her hands now.

Even Han Yoorim couldn’t handle a late-game character like Amano Yukiko snowballing with kills.

Arena ruthlessly infiltrated the enemy City Core, suppressing Han Yoorim’s growth.

She didn’t manage to secure kills since Han Yoorim was great at escaping, but she achieved enough.

The tide of the game had turned halfway in their favor.

14 minutes in. A [Rift] opened in the center of the City Core.

The effects of the Rift varied each time, and this one granted gold to the team that captured it.

Gold in <Eternal World> was incredibly valuable.

Knowing this, even the sluggish outer solo players shuffled their way to the City Core.

A 6v6 team fight before the tier 2 objective spawned. A rare sight in solo queue.

Arena internally cheered every time her team’s main carry’s long-range skill shredded the enemy’s health.

They had this in the bag.

Was Han Yoorim Arena’s superior version? Was Arena washed up now?

With thoughts of crushing all that nonsense, Arena tightened her grip on the enemy.

Just before they were fully surrounded, the team’s Guardian and Support unleashed area crowd control on the enemy.

At the same time, Han Yoorim charged at Arena.

Arena steadied her stance. *Clang.* The sword connected more firmly with its sheath, gathering power.

Amano Yukiko was a character with top-tier growth potential, sometimes even out-carrying the main carry.

Arena had no intention of losing.

She raised her head.

Gugu-gung! A wall of earth surged up where Han Yoorim gestured. It was a clever position to block the allies’ support.

So, you want a pure 1v1?

That’s exactly what I wanted.

Han Yoorim quickly closed the distance. 3, 2, 1. The moment she entered the skill range, Arena drew her sword.

[Ultra-Fast Draw]

It was Amano Yukiko’s first basic skill.

The moment I thought, “Got her,” light enveloped Han Yoorim’s body.

It was Thierry’s second derived skill of the light element.

The casting time was long, and getting hit would cancel it, making it hard to use in combat unless timed perfectly. Seeing her use it so casually made me chuckle.

But it’s fine. Thierry isn’t a character with strong individual skills. In terms of damage exchange, Arena had the upper hand.

All I had to do was repeat what I just did without panicking.

Arena sheathed her sword again. [Draw Technique]. It was Amano Yukiko’s passive skill.

Han Yoorim summoned a bunch of water soldiers. If it were any other Thierry user, it would’ve been laughable, but Arena had already seen Han Yoorim and Rumen’s summon battles through video donations. Her lips didn’t even twitch.

Are you planning to drag this into a muddy brawl?

That wasn’t a good situation for Arena.

The current balance between Arena’s team and Han Yoorim’s team was roughly like this:

Outer Solo: Han Yoorim’s team advantage

Scout: Han Yoorim’s team advantage

Guardian: Han Yoorim’s team advantage

Main Carry: Arena’s team advantage

Support: Arena’s team advantage

City Core: Arena’s advantage

In this situation, a well-fed Arena going head-to-head with Han Yoorim?

It felt like I was just doing everyone else a favor.

But if I turned my back here, I’d just get caught from behind.

There was only one answer.

Finish Han Yoorim quickly and regroup with the team.

Zap! A powerful lightning gathered on the sword firmly connected to the sheath.

Arena charged forward. Han Yoorim charged too.

A bright yellow light seeped from Arena’s sheath. It was the signal for Amano Yukiko’s ultimate skill, [Song of the Kirin], to activate.

And at the same time.

The earth wall that had been blocking the team’s vision crumbled.

“Huh?”

Arena was stunned.

The distance to her allies was closer than she had imagined.

Thierry is a character who can freely use 32 skills derived from 8 elements.

Water, Wind, Fire, Earth, Lightning, Ice, Darkness, Light.

Each of these 8 elements had a different role.

Water: Summoning

Wind: Buffs

Earth: Area control

Lightning: Single-target damage

Ice: Debuffs

Darkness: Hard crowd control

Light: Purification and healing

And Fire.

It was responsible for AoE damage.

Thierry is a melee damage dealer. So, even though her AoE damage was powerful, the conditions were tricky, and activation was difficult.

But.

That’s why the payoff was huge when it succeeded.

Whoosh. Flames roared fiercely.

A flaming sword appeared in Han Yoorim’s hand.

The sword, made purely of flames, was called [Laevateinn].

A derived ultimate skill of the fire element, its damage increased based on the number of enemies hit. It was Thierry’s best AoE damage skill.

Whoosh!

The flames fell right in the center of Arena’s team, which had gathered so neatly that it was unclear when their formation had broken.

The flames of doom descended.

*

[Defeat]

Arena closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

It was a matchup she absolutely couldn’t lose, but she lost.

Anxiety crept up.

What if her viewers started leaving because of this?

She sneakily checked the chat.

———

Han Yoorim is insane

Her teamfight design skills are on another level, right?

Can you see the future or something?

———

It was all praise for Han Yoorim.

Arena felt the urge to turn off the stream.

If it were her character, maybe the haters would let it slide.

Just then.

A video donation came in.

<InfinityZero’s 11,000 won Hororok>

-(A video of Han Yoorim playing Amano Yukiko when Thierry was banned on MTube)

“Arena, with your mechanics, you could play more aggressively. You’re being too passive. I’ve attached an example video.”

———

True

Even if her brain is middle-school level, her mechanics are insane

For real

———

The chat shifted back to praising her, so Arena sighed in relief and reacted.

“…Han Yoorim is really good.”

<InfinityZero’s 2,700 won Hororok>

-(A video of Han Yoorim eating barbecue with an AR filter on)

“Arena, wanna try this sometime?”

“I’ll try it someday.”

The unfamiliar nickname kept donating, and Arena regained her composure.

That’s right. For every person who leaves, there’s someone new coming in.

Don’t get too caught up in every little thing.

<InfinityZero’s 3,600 won Hororok>

-(A video of Han Yoorim using a Bunny Run avatar and acting crazy)

“Try this too.”

…They seemed a bit weird, but still, they’re a viewer.

Arena coolly reacted and queued up for the next game.

Hoping she’d run into Han Yoorim again.

*

“As expected, you’re a rabbit. You’re really fast.”

———

No wonder you took a nap during the race lol

———

Right after hitting Master, I turned on Bunny Run’s stream, but she changed the title to [Screaming] and ended the stream as soon as I typed in the chat.

Well, there’s nothing I can do. I’ll teach that arrogant rabbit a lesson next time.

I opened the ranking page to check Pape’s rank.

82nd?

Just you wait.