[Champion support Mark gets flamed by four players—teammates deliver justice and get revenge!]
[Brother Infinite Borders says the CN server environment is a disaster. Tencent needs to step in and clean it up.]
[Mark incident exposes CN server reality—rotted to the core. How do we save it?]
Early the next morning, a bunch of public accounts popped up, publishing their takes on what happened last night.
"I really miss S3–S4. When we were behind, everyone would say 'it's fine, we'll try together' and then come back. Now you can never find that feeling."
"CN server is just rotten. Even a toilet has a cleaner mouth than your teammates, even firecrackers have better temper than your teammates! I quit ages ago."
"Can this environment still produce new blood? It's always just those same few players. Does Tencent really have no clue?"
"Why does Korea have so many young players? Besides huge capital investment, the Korea server environment being better is also a fact."
Why is the Korea server environment so much better than CN server?
It's actually understandable. After all, in Korea, games are a key economic industry. They have to build a good training environment for pros, so the official enforcement is heavy.
But CN server talks about "cleaning up" every day, yet the seriousness is always weak.
The account bans mostly target skin plugins… and they don't even deal with cheats consistently, let alone flaming, AFKing, and match-fixing actors. So the overall vibe is horrific.
The Mark incident happens every day on CN server. It only exploded because he's a pro, the heat was high, and he'd just won MSI.
Add teammates voicing support, fans flooding big streamer chats, and—
Wen Dog already had a terrible reputation. He lived off clout-chasing and heat-farming.
So it all detonated.
Those four became street rats—everyone wanted to beat them.
And more got dug up: Caitlyn's account was bought, mid was a match-fixer who had "acted" against Doinb before.
Of course, the club wasn't going to let their player get bullied like that.
They submitted a formal report request to Tencent.
Before the officials even responded, Huya moved first and banned Wen Dog's stream immediately.
Reason: in yesterday's broadcast, he used vulgar and highly aggressive language, causing a negative impact on the platform, violating the streaming contract.
Result: one-month ban.
As soon as that announcement dropped, the comments were full of praise.
"Huya always hits hardest!"
"Nice. No wonder it's the biggest streaming platform right now. This handling speed—officials can't compare."
They absorbed a big wave of goodwill.
Douyu's pressure shot up. Huya's move also won them a lot of favor with TES players…
As for the officials, at 1 p.m. they finally posted on Weibo.
They banned the four accounts involved for one month.
They also said they would implement stricter CN server management going forward.
Since Korea server still hadn't responded, that ban could last a while. So CN server had to be improved to give pros a comfortable training environment.
Maybe this was even a chance for everyone to return to CN server for practice.
Only a high-level training server produces high-level players.
That's why pros worldwide like queueing Korea server.
When the announcement dropped, some streamers said it was a shame.
If they could queue into them and target-kill them on stream, the heat would be maxed out.
They didn't expect the official response to be this fast—but it did satisfy everyone.
Then at 6 p.m., Teamfight Tactics officials posted the Worlds cheer-up announcement.
First seed: dine, listed at the very top.
Then they released the schedule: TFT Worlds would start June 3 at 6 p.m., and end June 5.
Three days total.
The format was different too.
Day 1, Round 1: based on region rankings, split into four groups, each group plays two games.
Round 2: all 32 players are regrouped by total points using a snake-draft grouping, split into four groups again, each group plays three games.
No one is eliminated on Day 1.
Day 2: based on Day 1 totals, snake grouping again. Play two games, then regroup again based on totals, then play three more. After that, the top eight advance to finals.
Finals format: the 18-point system. Reaching 18 points "activates" your championship opportunity—designed to increase intensity.
The prize pool was also richer—up $150,000 compared to last year.
First place: $150,000. Second: $75,000.
That naturally lit a fire under the competitors.
At the bottom, they highlighted the grouping of the six participating Chinese players with images.
Everyone immediately searched for Lin Fan's group.
Nice—Group A right away.
Looking at that group, there didn't seem to be anyone scary. Brother Infinite Borders would definitely hard stomp.
Advancing to finals shouldn't be too worrying, right?
After MSI, everyone's attitude toward Lin Fan playing TFT changed completely.
If he could win Worlds too, wouldn't that create a record among pro players?
Who could compare?
And it'd be a great topic: a League pro winning a TFT world title—just imagining it was funny.
People wished the tournament started immediately, and they spam-promoted it like crazy.
After all, not many people follow TFT's official Weibo.
Especially with so much happening lately, it really needed people to shout it out. Even Lin Fan only noticed because viewers mentioned it in chat—then he finally realized.
He found the official post and took a look.
"Mm. The tournament starts tomorrow. Staff will probably contact me tonight."
"Honestly, I'm pretty excited. I get to compete with players from all over the world."
As he spoke, he found the installer and began installing the TFT tournament client.
"I remember our region is always a favorite to win, right? As first seed, in groups I should at least take first place, right? Setting 'just advance' as a goal is too low."
"Haha, kidding. My first seed still feels a bit shaky. A lot of it was luck. My understanding of TFT isn't as deep as theirs."
Hearing that, viewers couldn't hold back and started typing.
"Lucky streamers don't go far, but Brother Infinite Borders is the CN champion—you can't explain that with luck."
"I lean toward: Brother Infinite Borders is Daeja's husband. Besides your wife, who else lets you freeload nonstop?"
"Ahem. In my opinion, Brother Infinite Borders is at least better than Shen Chao at TFT."
"Shen Chao has been washed forever. Let him play Goose Goose Duck instead."
"Speaking of Goose Goose Duck, hasn't Brother Infinite Borders not played in ages? Kill one game!"
"League, too. Yesterday you only played one game. Not satisfying."
"Brother Infinite Borders, how about dual-tasking—League on one side, Goose Goose Duck on the other?"
"I think it works. DNF and Infinite Borders don't require much hands. League plus Goose Goose Duck would be better."
Lin Fan glanced at chat and answered immediately.
"Stop dreaming. I can only stream until 7 p.m. Tonight we have scrims scheduled. If I slack any longer, I'm logging off."
"Brother Infinite Borders plays scrims?"
"I thought you just played games based on mood—if you're not in the mood you play nothing."
"Are you kidding? Brother Infinite Borders actually does scrims?"
Seeing chat get that outrageous, Lin Fan couldn't take it.
"Damn, you guys are ridiculous. As a pro, of course I have to scrim.
If I don't scrim, how do I build coordination with my teammates? Not just scrims—I attend meetings and VOD reviews too. You people saying I do nothing should reflect."
He paused.
"Scrims are earlier this year than before, mainly because I'm going to TFT Worlds.
That's three days. I probably can't scrim those days—maybe only small sets. So the coach scheduled a big scrim set."
"It's fine. It's not tiring. Beating SKT was too easy. And I rested yesterday."
"I don't have much time anyway. I'll play some CrossFire."
Ever since that cheating scandal, he hadn't logged into CrossFire for a while.
Mainly because the environment is awful—too many cheaters. If you don't cheat too, it's hard to play.
Northern big stage—no cheats, don't go.
And it turns into "whose cheat is stronger."
But during this time, with Lin Fan bringing heat, the official anti-cheat crackdown got stricter.
After all, a big reason a game declines is cheating.
Cheats change the whole flavor.
With crackdowns tighter lately, there were fewer cheaters, the environment improved, and more returning players came back.
Lin Fan logged in and jumped into a solo demolition match.
But current CrossFire was still too easy for him.
Out the door, sprint forward—mouse up, quick and clean, one shot one kill.
Mainly fast reactions, plus strong dynamic vision.
Right now, worldwide, there weren't many who could match him.
So most opponents didn't even see a silhouette before losing control and dropping dead…
They could only shout at their screens and teammates that the other side was cheating.
It was too outrageous.
Step out from a corner, and before you even see the enemy, you get headshot.
Nobody would believe that was pure skill.
One small streamer even told his viewers:
"He's 100% cheating. I didn't even see a shadow and I got headshot. I'm telling you—even if it were N9 or Chong'er, they couldn't do this!
With CF cracking down so hard lately, there are still slip-throughs."
As he said that, he pressed report.
"I'm telling you, in a bit the 'report confirmed' message will come. Latest tomorrow.
He's definitely cheating. If someone's really that strong, why isn't he in pro league?" The streamer was extremely confident.
But then someone in his chat started explaining.
"That's Brother Infinite Borders. He even hard-stomps cheaters. Beating you guys is easy. Forgot Lin 'Big Hammer'?"
"Holy crap, Brother Infinite Borders is live? Haven't watched him play CF in ages. Didn't even check his stream. Didn't expect it today."
"I'm out, I'm out. Streamer you played well, followed—but I want to watch Brother Infinite Borders."
"So many games—finally it's CF. Damn it, thanks for the info!"
The guy who dropped that message saw a bunch of people leaving to watch Lin Fan and smiled in satisfaction.
"Twenty minutes until he ends stream. Can't let me be the only one suffering."
…
At 6:50 p.m., Lin Fan chose to end early.
If he started another game, there wouldn't be enough time. Making people wait would be rude.
But then he looked at JackeyLove still playing League. They'd only been in-game ten minutes. If it stayed even, there was no way it would finish in ten more.
"Scrims start in ten minutes. Why are you still playing?"
"We're scrimming EDG today. If it doesn't finish, they can wait," JackeyLove said, shaking his head as he played Zeri.
"If we can't finish, tell Meiko to wait."
He even took a moment to stretch.
"No wonder. EDG. I heard Luo Sheng say this morning it was between JDG and EDG. So it ended up being EDG."
"Alright, then I'll watch you play ranked for a bit."
They were close, so this was basically a joke.
In reality, JackeyLove was playing ultra aggressive.
Either the enemy lane suddenly exploded, or he got blown up—two words: speedrun. Accelerate the game.
And he actually pulled it off.
Two plays set a huge tempo, and instead of collapsing, he snowballed the lead.
EDG only waited about five minutes—not long.
The scrims were fairly relaxed.
Both sides mainly focused on tactics and staying warm.
Especially EDG—after getting eliminated immediately in spring, they hadn't played high-intensity matches in a long time.
So they agreed to play all five games.
They played until around 11 p.m. before finishing the five.
Even without high pressure, everyone was exhausted.
"Meiko has huge problems. He chased me down to engage every time. I'm speechless," JackeyLove said. Today's experience was awful—every teamfight he got engaged on.
"Who told you to be so cocky? You're practically becoming EDG's ultimate team tyrant. As captain, if he doesn't target you, who will he target?"
"Hahaha. Anyway—Fan-ge, do you have confidence for Worlds tomorrow?"
"Half and half. Taking first shouldn't be an issue. I'm here to win the championship."
As he spoke, Lin Fan pulled out his phone and checked messages.
Sure enough, staff had sent a notice.
Tomorrow's online TFT Worlds starts at 6 p.m. Players must enter the lobby thirty minutes early. If you aren't on time, you forfeit eligibility.
JackeyLove rolled his eyes.
"Honestly, in terms of being inflated, I'm nowhere near you. I only made EDG wait for scrims—meanwhile you're going to crash the whole tournament. Aren't you afraid you'll get beaten up?"
TL: If you want to read ahead by at least ten chapters, patreon.com/EdibleMapleSyrup