Kevin was silent for a moment, but only for a single moment. "She got lucky!" He immediately retorted and began typing away, his two index fingers hopping from key to key, making loud clicking noises with each move.
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/all hashing_it_out (Joan of Arc): god job Cleo! ill get you next time!
/all hashing_it_out (Joan of Arc): *good
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But before Kevin's Joan of Arc even left the base, another equally-dead teammate had come to join him. And without any items again, the two triumphantly marched off. Only, this time, the other ADC, the sniper Thomas Plunket decided to join Kevin in the mid lane as well.
A two-on-one must have seemed to be a better strategy to the two, but neither of them realized that they would be doubly behind Cleopatra if they split both the XP and the gold.
Plus, who would last hit the enemy soldiers and get the gold? But before long, Yu Pengkai's burning question was answered.
In fact, it was quite simple, so very simple that he wondered why he hadn't thought of it in the first place. Of course, neither of them would look to secure the last hit!
As flying holy swords soared past bullets, it seemed as if the two champions were both equally happy at chunking away at the enemy soldiers' health bars. Perchance, one of them would hit a dying soldier just at the right moment, but the probability was next to none.
Meanwhile, the enemy Cleopatra seemed content enough, playing a bit back next to her tower to avoid fighting in a one versus two scenario.
Now, the best case scenario would be to slowly poke her down using their auto attacks, but instead, they threw every skill in her direction as their mana bars slid lower bit by bit.
Since the two ADCs were pushing the soldier wave up by continually attacking the enemy soldiers, they soon arrived once again to the point where Cleopatra hid behind the tower, right out of range.
And once again, almost like history repeated itself, as soon as Thomas Plunkett tried to land his bullet by stepping forward, the Cleopatra strode closer, tossing out a charm.
This entire time, it seemed as if Kevin was unaware of his teammate's horrible position because he made no efforts to go help him and instead continued chunking away at the cannon soldier.
By the time he cleared the wave, he finally noticed that his ally had fallen onto the floor, half-folded into himself, dead.
And once again, one charm, he too was dead meat. Although Yu Pengkai wasn't connected to the computers' auditory systems, he could hear the ringing announcement in the back of his mind: "Double Kill!"
The Cleopatra seemed to be enjoying this immensely, flashing a thumbs-up emote gleefully above her head as she walked over their corpses. In fact, she purposefully swung in a circle as she stepped over the fallen allies.
"Dammit, how is she so lucky!" Kevin cursed, his playful expression crumpling. "I just can't even get close to her to hit!" He redirected his attention back to the screen, wailing, "How am I still one thousand gold away from my first item!"
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/hashing_it_out (Joan of Arc): Joan of Arc (Level 4)
/ hashing_it_out (Joan of Arc): Joyeuse (Missing 988 Gold)
/ hashing_it_out (Joan of Arc): Cleopatra (Level 6)
/ hashing_it_out (Joan of Arc): Cleopatra (200 Gold Bounty)
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Meanwhile, the other lanes seemed to be struggling as well, although definitely not as much as those two in the mid lane were.
Josh was surprisingly managing to stand his ground against the assassin and the support, who both also did not seem to understand the meaning of buying items. While his skill was far from perfect, he at least tried to dodge some of the attacks they threw at him.
Looking back at Joan of Arc and Thomas Plunkett trudge back to lane, even their animated characters seemed to be less lively than they were at the beginning of the match. Or perhaps, it was just the 300 ping working its magic. These were school computers from 2009 after all, no match for the PC Battlestations at professional clubs or even gaming computers from internet cafes.
Cleopatra was chipping away happily at the ally tower, a full wave of soldiers by her side, and she looked almost eager to see the two ADCs come back to lane. Even though Yu Pengkai couldn't see the inventory screen, judging from her newfound confidence, he knew that she must have completed her first item.
Seeing the two ADCs approach, Cleopatra strutted out of the tower range, and the familiar animation began. Now that she was no longer afraid about running out of mana, the golden orb of magic in her palm swirled bigger and bigger as the enemy player held the Q key instead of immediately letting go.
She released it, and the orb flew straight towards the two champions who barely just got back to the lane.
Subconsciously, Yu Pengkai had balled his fists in anticipation. "Side-step," he blurted out, but it was already too late.
The orb flew through Joan of Arc and barely scraped Thomas Plunkett, chunking a substantial bit of health from the both of them. This time, it seemed as if they had learned their lessons, and they did not seem to stray too far from their tower.
"Yo, Josh, you wanna come down and help really quick?" Kevin suddenly asked, a look of worry weaving into his expressions. "This Cleopatra's skills are so broken! Literally, one ball of hers does half my health bar!"
He began to gnaw on his lips in frustration.
"Yea sure, I'm coming," Josh replied, making his way slowly down from the jungle. "I have my Ult up."
Yu Pengkai hadn't noticed anyone placing any vision wards this entire game, so it seemed to be a reasonable move to play. Plus, he doubted that anyone from the top lane would notice Alexander the Great to be gone and decide to ping their team.
Before he knew it, Alexander the Great crouched in the bush flanking the mid lane, readying his curved blade.
"Ready?" Josh asked. Without waiting for a reply, he began mounting a newly materialized horse and charging, his Ultimate kicking into place, granting him and those around him temporary speed boosts. However, despite his best intentions, the timing seemed to be a bit off.
By the time he was in front of the Cleopatra, neither Joan of Arc nor Thomas Plunkett had caught up and were thus excluded from the attack and movement speed boosts. He struck anyways, stabbing Cleopatra firmly in the stomach.
Joan of Arc and Thomas Plunkett both finally caught up, each summoning their own spells to use. Of course, neither realized that their auto attacks dealt more damage.
But nevertheless, it was a one versus three situation, one that would have been unfavorable for the enemy champion in any other given scenario. However, the enemy champion was a Cleopatra.
Yu Pengkai could almost sense the invisible smile again as she raised both hands up into the air to call upon her Ultimate. Three streams of golden scarab beetles flew out from her staff, rushing to each of the three charging champions and simultaneously charming all of them.
Being at already low health, Joan of Arc went down without a fight.
Another golden orb took Thomas Plunkett out.
And while Alexander the Great struggled for a moment, when the second charm from Cleopatra's normal W hit him, he too was a goner.
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/ hashing_it_out (Joan of Arc): Cleopatra (Level 8)
/ hashing_it_out (Joan of Arc): Cleopatra (500 Gold Bounty)
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"Let's just call it quits for this game," Josh sighed, pushing his mouse away as he collapsed onto his chair, waiting for his champion to respawn.
Yu Pengkai took a deep sigh.
"Here, move over and switch spots with me," Yu Pengkai's voice was unwavering as he looked Josh in the eye, a polite smile on his face. "I think I've gotten the hang of this game. Let me try."