Winning the season opener was absolutely something worth celebrating for TES.
It meant they finally broke the curse.
The moment they won, the club had already arranged it—everyone was going out for a big meal to calm down and unwind from the off-season pressure.
After all, anyone who sees Lin Fan start grinding League would feel pressure.
Even Brother Infinite Borders, a guy who never plays ranked, was getting up every morning to queue because the patch changed.
That alone showed how huge this update was.
If even Fan-ge was like that, then the rest of them—even if they were "just mixing" in matches—had to mix with clear awareness.
So everyone started grinding ranked nonstop, then scrimming at night.
Honestly, the workload was not low.
But opening day victory was the best harvest.
The club had booked a hotel dinner package, but the players stood them up.
Under Lin Fan's lead, everyone charged straight to Haidilao instead.
JackeyLove said he'd eat until he was full, ordering expensive and good stuff.
But the moment the menu arrived and an overly enthusiastic server came over, he got spooked and turned stiff, instantly handing the tablet to the others.
"Your mom's kiss—looks like this Haidilao server is your fan. You know you're paying tonight, so you're boosting me, huh?"
"You're the social butterfly. Why are you scared of this tiny scene? What's wrong, skinny dog?" Lin Fan raised an eyebrow.
"Next time, next time. When we go eat seafood, I'll slaughter you. Next time I'll be smart and take an allergy pill first, then I'll eat you into the ground!"
"Man, are you really that ruthless? Why do you keep trying to milk someone whose annual salary is half yours?" Lin Fan calmly fished up the tripe JackeyLove had just tossed in, dipped it in sesame-peanut sauce, and swallowed it in one bite.
"Huh? Where's my tripe? The tripe I just put in—how is it gone?"
"Probably you didn't do seven up eight down, and it just boiled away."
"Bullshit! Fan-ge, you didn't secretly eat my tripe, did you?"
"Definitely not me. If I eat, I eat openly. How could I secretly eat?" Lin Fan said righteously, showing no flaw at all.
JackeyLove looked suspicious, but without catching him red-handed, there was nothing he could do.
Everyone watching couldn't help laughing.
With the vibe this good, the Haidilao meal was incredibly satisfying.
After that, they got on the team bus back to base.
At 9:30 p.m., they arrived at TES.
Lin Fan went straight to the training room and started his stream.
Like always, chat was still a wall of text. Even before he went live, the room's viewership stayed around three million.
A lot of people couldn't understand it.
How can you keep so many people just staring at a black screen?
So many female streamers even looked down and touched their "thickness." Even with small hands, they couldn't hold it all.
With things half-hidden, how could that not be popular?
But in the end, their traffic still couldn't beat a pro player who only plays games—especially when he wasn't even live.
It made them sour.
If men don't even watch female streamers anymore, what hope do they have?
Of course, if there's no match, a black screen wouldn't keep people.
These viewers just knew Lin Fan would come back and go live. Even if he hadn't returned yet, they could chat about TES's match in his room.
"JackeyLove got a quadra but missed the penta. It felt like IG. I'm dying—his face was so funny."
"It's fate. Who would've thought Galio could one-punch Kayle?"
"Brother Infinite Borders is actually hilarious. TES wins through bot lane. Bot lane strong, I'm arrogant! Earlier JackeyLove said mid is too strong so he can win casually and he's lying down into osteoporosis. Today Brother Infinite Borders reclaimed the stage in the interview. It's funny."
"TES dual carries: love and kill."
When the black stream suddenly lit up, Lin Fan appeared in the bottom-right.
"Hello, hello. You've waited a while, right? I'm back, I'm back. Tonight we keep fighting.
"Naraka: Bladepoint has an Elite Cup in early June. I'm planning to sign up for the solo tournament, so these next few days I need to train and find my form."
"Trio tournament? I don't have teammates. And most of the teams registered are pro squads. If I just grab two randoms, I won't get far.
"And you'd have to practice coordination every day. Not necessary. Solo tournament, I go by myself. That's good."
During this stretch, his room was still mostly League fans. Hearing this, a lot of them couldn't accept it.
Big bro—didn't you just say in the interview you want to tie the win-streak record? And now you're starting to slack again?
But after getting slapped in the face too many times, people didn't dare spam as much.
Only the Naraka fans were excited and started talking to him.
"Solo tournament probably has a lot of pros too, right? The prize is good. And NetEase even avoided conflicts with league scheduling. No reason pros wouldn't sign up."
"Just grinding ranked feels kind of mid. Since the officials are hosting a tournament, might as well enter."
"Solo tournament prize is 200k RMB. That's really good."
Some haters, though, got excited.
EDG losing was "good death," because after winning Worlds they didn't train, so their decline was natural.
Otherwise, they wouldn't have been eliminated immediately in spring. That proves EDG is only a playoffs-level team now.
So TES beating EDG was normal. Even with patch changes, TES hard-skill gapped EDG, so 2–0 was expected.
Especially with EDG's stupid strategy—making Flandre carry on Kayle. That's basically donating.
So the opener didn't prove much. If you want to see patch impact on TES, you have to watch them face real strong teams, like top-four playoff teams.
Not yet… but Dine beat EDG and got inflated again—now he wants to enter Naraka?
Hahaha. If you want someone to perish, first let them inflate.
Right now you shouldn't show aggression. You should mix into his fanbase—then you can better "dance" them into attacking him later.
But plenty of viewers supported him too.
"Support, support. This is also an incredible honor. If you can win in League and still take other titles, that's amazing."
"Yeah. Two-bloom into three-bloom—this would be a miracle in esports."
"Duke is also a miracle in esports. He won a title in StarCraft, then swapped to League and won two Worlds. That's true peak in two games."
"But Duke didn't play League while he was doing StarCraft… Brother Infinite Borders is the real monster. Top-tier game talent. Not like that Tangmen mid who played Tianya Mingyue Dao and ruined his career with a backward arrow."
TL: Tianya Mingyue Dao - 天涯明月刀 is a Wuxia MMORPG
"From today's match, Brother Infinite Borders' form is still great. If he keeps this up, Worlds this year is definitely possible."
"Exactly. If TES wins, it's an all-Chinese roster title! Then Korea-biased fans can't scream 'Korean dual carries' anymore!"
Some people believe: regardless of roster, if the LPL wins Worlds, it's worth celebrating—region honor.
But some believe: after the region has already won Worlds, the next goal should be an all-Chinese roster title.
RNG always shouted "all-Chinese roster" too and got a lot of fans for it.
But as results kept disappointing year after year, the slogan stopped working. Then contract scandals exploded and the club fully stank.
If not for the players still being those players, RNG wouldn't have support.
You could predict: once Xiaohu and Ming retire, RNG will basically be dead in name.
And now there are already rumors: with results and reputation this bad, sponsors are pulling funding. At this point, even running the club becomes difficult.
If they still don't win something this year, next year they'll probably get sold.
Especially after losing the spring finals to TES, a string of wage arrears news hit the internet.
The most classic meme image was: someone who looked like Uzi kneeling at the club entrance with a sign, demanding back pay.
Most hilariously, Uzi had taken leave from streaming that day.
Connect the two and people really believed Uzi went to the club to demand wages…
After all, Uzi's post-retirement contract drama was huge. And there was also Letme's contract.
Mlxg even completely tore the mask off and filed a lawsuit, taking the club to court.
If he had any other way out, he wouldn't do something that extreme.
So everyone's attitude toward RNG is clear:
Management deserves death.
The players are a tragedy. But that's normal—contracts back then depended on whether the club had conscience.
Clearly, their club didn't.
Play well and your salary doesn't go up—you get trapped by contract clauses.
Now Xiaohu and Ming leaving RNG is basically dreaming.
If they push too hard, the club won't let them go. Uzi and Letme's path could repeat on them.
Voluntary retirement vs forced retirement is totally different.
How deep the water is, anyone who knows, knows.
Back then, were they really unplayable at that age?
And after retirement, Uzi kept thinking about returning, but kept getting interfered with.
The more you think, the scarier it gets.
Finally he returned, and there was still so much drama.
Most insane part: for every BLG game Uzi played, BLG had to pay RNG.
No one knows if it's true, but given BLG's awful spring results and how little they played Uzi, it's probably real.
"This guy has something. His thinking is clear—bait parry, jump attack, then rising dragon. Too bad he ran into me. Otherwise he might've actually pulled it off.
"But this shows Naraka has real pros. So I think this Elite Cup will have a lot of strong players. It'll be fun."
After a brutal final-circle fight, Lin Fan outplayed them. Even 1v3, he seized a decisive advantage and took first.
Final stats were terrifying: 11 kills, 47k damage, and 12k healing.
Chat spammed again.
"If Brother Infinite Borders weren't a League pro, I'd seriously advise you to enter this tournament. But it's summer split now, and a good start leads to a good end. Brother Infinite Borders should focus on League."
After twenty minutes of fermentation, Weibo had already started discussing it, slowly climbing trending.
So TES fans who got notified rushed into the stream.
No matter what, they wanted to press this "wrong idea" back down.
A pro player shouldn't be thinking like this.
TFT already planted too many strange ideas in his head.
Back then, they should've been firmer. They shouldn't have been scared by public opinion and forced the club to ban him from the TFT China finals.
Then maybe none of this would've happened.
Post-match entertainment is fine.
But actually entering tournaments is too much.
Competitive games shouldn't be allowed near him.
At this rate, Genshin and Infinite Borders look way more pleasant.
He can play those all day and it's fine.
No big tournaments. If he doesn't enter, he can't become a "god" in so many games.
Then it won't disrupt League's pro schedule.
And in some sense, it even makes TES stronger.
Like when he was speedrunning and TES 3–0 RNG to win spring.
"Off-season finally gave us hope… why start summer by smashing that hope? Please—go all-in on pro League."
"Why are you people like this? Has TES lost yet? No. They're MSI champs. So what if he enters another event? I think it's fine."
Chat started arguing again.
Lin Fan felt a headache.
Ever since he won, every stream had nonstop drama.
It was always noisy before too, but never this big.
Normally, next day match win and it's fine.
But now, one sentence and chat explodes.
The more people argue, the higher the traffic.
Without realizing it—
"Brother Infinite Borders plans to enter Naraka tournament" had climbed into Weibo trending top ten!
TL: If you want to read ahead by at least ten chapters, patreon.com/EdibleMapleSyrup