BAM! Lars’s third shot assuredly hit the drone and elimi.

  However, he couldn’t see any of it. Why? Because his entire s was covered in pure white!

  "This is kinda bad, yo!" Lars shifted his attention to Yuel's s in order to see what was actually going on. It was even worse than he expected!

  As soon as the light exploded, Winner summoned a drone behind his bad advanced on Lars. The AbsoluteDudes were pnning to double-team Lars all along, yoooooo!

  "Don't worry, I got your back." Yuel cast Gaia's Prote on Lars. At this early stage of the game, the shield could absorb more than a couple of hits.

  "Thanks, my dude!" A fident griuro Lars's face.

  With a thicc shield proteg him, he didn't have to worry about the enemy’s duo attack. However, that didn’t mean he was in any position to fight back against the AbsoluteDudes.

  "Okay, I'm out!" Lars announced his pn to retreat. "But, before I go..."

  BAM! He fired one more shot while backpedaling from the danger zone. His target? The drone dude who was chilling behind Winner’s back.

  Bullseye! Lars grinned in satisfa. He fired that shot from a perspective that was far from ideal, but he was used to shenanigans like this. After all, he and Yuel practiced situations like this plenty.

  Against csses that could cover up Lars's s, he trained himself to immediately switch to Yuel's monitor. And, Yuel was also used to these situations.

  I have to remember not to turn around. Yuel slowly backpedaled from the se, making sure to keep the enemies within his field of view. He was Lars's eyes right now, so he had to make sure Lars could catch all the importaails.

  ZAP. ZAP. WHISH. The enemy spared no time assaulting Lars. The Droid and his drone fired sers, and the Lumimancer backed them up with balls of light.

  All three attacks struck against the defensive branches c Lars. But, even with all their powers bihe hits weren't enough to pee Gaia’s Prote.

  Obviously, that didn't make the enemy happy.

  "Man, this shield!" Ronald ranted. "Cheapest thing I've ever seen, word!"

  "Yeah..." William gave a half-hearted response.

  Of course, he didn't appreciate the shield blog his damage either. However, his attention was focused elsewhere, on something far more troubling. And, that something became even more ing in the moment.

  BAM! Gunz fired in William's dire again. However, the bullet wasn't aimed at William himself. Instead, it targeted the drone floating behind him.

  And, the shot ot on! After these two hits, the drone was on the verge of falling apart.

  He just hit my drone. Again. It was an undeniable fact. Gunz hit the mark twi a row.

  Of course, that’s to be expected from that sharpshooter under normal circumstances. But, this situation was different.

  He should be blinded. William frowned. How he aim like this without seeing?

  And, the mystery extended beyond just shooting accuracy. As William, his drone, and Ronald were about to shoot Gunz again - the guy rolled away in the nick of time! It’s almost as if he saw the shots ing and waited for the best moment to make his move.

  "What the-!?" Ronald gritted his teeth. Was that just a lucky guess? No, that doesn’t seem right...

  ce? Luck? Could vague cepts like that truly expin the feats Gunz ulling off?

  BAM! Gunz fired once more, right after rec from the roll. And, this shot also headed in William's dire!

  No, you don't. William repared this time. He moved to the side the moment he saw Gunz taking aiming.

  For the most part, it was a timely response. If Gunz’s bullet were aimed at William himself, then he would have successfully sidestepped it in time.

  Unfortunately, like before, the bullet didn't target William. Instead, it went after the Assault Drohat was following behind William.

  Since William moved aside, the drone followed suit. However, the drone’s as always had a small dey to them. Therefore, in the end, the drone wasn’t fast enough to sidestep the shot.

  BOOM! The drone exploded behind William's back.

  "Wait, what!?" Ronald excimed. "I thought he was shooting randomly, but he actually took down your drone!?"

  "grats for finally notig," William said. "Yes, he nded every shot on the drone."

  "What the actual heck? He's supposed to be blinded!"

  "Yes, I'm sure he is. But say, what do you usually do when the enemy blinds you?"

  "Welp, if I'm pying alohen I just gotta suck it up. But, if somebody is close by, then I'll check out their s."

  "And there you have it."

  "Wait, so you're saying he used his partner’s s to nd these three shots?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Well, that kinda expins things, but at the same time, it totally doesn't. Like, you really nd three accurate shots like this from a totally different point of view?"

  "Gunz , apparently."

  "That's hax! We even caught him by surprise and all! He was supposed to be mad fused about the situation."

  "Looks like he maintained his cool just fine. Anyway, we're done here." Wilim issued a retreat.

  With both drones destroyed, the duo didn’t have much leverage against their ne oppos here. The enemy minions were still very much alive and still targeting Ronald.

  We have to clear out the fodder first. Wilim trated his fire on the enemy bowmen first, as they were squishier and had the higher DPS.

  Meanwhile, Ronald fired balls of light at the swordsmen who were hot on his trail. He didn’t have the luxury to shoot the enemy bae because that would require pausing, and he sure didn’t want to do that right now, not with this entire brigade chasing him down.

  And so, the two brothers fired basic attacks at the two different sides of the enemy wave, all the while retreating deeper and deeper into allied territory. It was a det pieique, but their progress ainfully slow.

  Maybe I should’ve rolled Gunz’s st shot. William thought irospect. It might’ve made the drone move along faster, though it’s hard to say for sure. After all, the rea speed on that scrap of metal is garbage tier. Hmph. On sed thought, maybe I made the right call there, after all.

  Rather than salvaging the dro robably better to hold onto Dodge Roll in case the enemy nning to mount a ter-attack. Especially, the Druid's pull was dangerous CC, so Wilim stantly had to keep watch.

  Fortunately, this time, the enemy disengaged nicely without making Wilim’s life needlessly difficult.

  Well, it makes sehey didn’t bother ter-attag. William thought. They rather py the long game with Pirate. The Druid could go out of his way to tihe fight and pressure us with his CC, but he chose to prioritize the Pirate’s safety.

  Essentially, this Druid existed solely to supplement his Carry at the moment. Pirate wao take things easy and rack up gold until the mid-game, and the Druid utilized his strong shield to make that sailing smoother. And so, the two csses synergized very well in that sense.

  Oher hand, my Support… William made a face. Well, it’s not like there’s no synergy at all. Ron’s fast clear definitely helps out my own slow clear, but it’s very fwed and Chessmaster has already exposed it.

  As a ne clearing tool, Ray of Light was ky. It was a spell that was easy tainst the Lumimancer himself.

  Aeromancer suffered from a simir issue in Mid, but his Whirlwind scaled much better with power and its DoT ticked faster. In addition, Whirlwind also slowed down the Movement Speed of the e hit, which made it harder to step in and out of the spell’s AoE without getting hit multiple times.

  This small but important difference was the reason Lumimancer was far less viable as a Mid Laner. And, Ronald’s “solution” of dishing out more immediate damage with Blinding Light didn’t remedy the situation at all. It was nothing but a waste of MP that was going to burn him out.

  “I hope you learned your lesson this time,” William said.

  “Yeah, yeah, I get it.” Ronald sighed. “They not gon me farm so easily, and burning more MP isn’t a real solution.”

  “My, it sounds like someone is finally developing a brain,” Cato interjected. “I thought I already expined all of this the first time, but it looks like you’re the type who has to get burned once before you learn to stop pying with fire.”

  "Hey, o rub salt, okay?" Ronald pouted. "Yeah, I didn’t make the right read on how these guys will py, I get that now. Let's move on already."

  "Yes, it's always good to move on as long as you uood the mistakes you made.”

  “Yep, yep.”

  “But really, you’re setful,” Cato said. “I always have to remind you to keep better tabs on your resources, be it HP or MP. trary to what you like to think, these resources don't belong only to you; they're a part of the team's eock. So, when you waste them, you're wasting the eeam’s resources."

  "Yeah, yeah. You've told me that like what, a billion times?" Not that I agree with any of it, but okay.

  "I'll keep repeating it over and over until it sinks in. Because so far, I feel like it hasn’t."

  Hah, you preach it all you want. Ronald shrugged. I’m not gonna join that religion.

  That weirdo Cato had a cult-like approach to resource ma. Acc to this preacher, nobody's resources were truly their own. Everything art of the team's "shared pool of the resources", or some shit like that. Basically, it was like unism or something.

  Sure, I kinda get the overall idea behind it. Ronald thought. Basically, he’s saying that my as have team-wide sequences. Like, when I spend MP, it’s actually a bigger deal than just losing some points from my MP bar.

  Stuff like that usually had bigger implications than it initially seemed. For example, the more MP Ronald burned during ning, the earlier he’d have to recall to base in order to recharge.

  In turn, it also meant he’d have to leave his bro all alone in the that time. And, 1v2 uation like this always had the potential to go south.

  So yeah, in a way, that preacher has a point. Ronald admitted. It sure guilt trips me when I think of things through these goggles.

  Cato’s unistic religion would surely n Ronald to hell for his careless as. Acc to this nonsensical bible, wasting just a little bit of MP was going to drop the apocalypse oire team.

  It's such a hyperbole. Ronald shrugged. If everybody analyzed games the way Cato does, then they’d be stu analysis paralysis. I mean, pretty muything you do in this game has a ce of backfiring or messing something up. Bleh.

  And so, there was no good reason to believe that wasting a little bit of MP will prove SUPER MEGA ULTRA FATAL for the eeam. Ronald’s mistakes will surely have some short-term sequences, but that's about it.

  However, Cato didn't see things that way.

  Seriously, that fool. Cato sighed. No matter how many times I expin it to him, he never learns.

  Perhaps, Cato's approach to resouralysis was a tad too advanced for some. heless, any self-respeg petitive pyer had to be aware of sualysis, especially if they wao py on ae team like the Leopards.

  Regardless of opinions, it was an objective fact that every pyer's as had team-wide sequences. Some pyers didn’t like admitting to it, but that didn’t ge the facts.

  It’s like chess. Cato thought. Even a small step forward with a pawn may have great implications for the rest of the match.

  All pyers were like pieces on the same chessboard, and every move they made had the potential to cause a ripple effect that’ll spread throughout the rest of the board.

  For example, Ronald wasting MP will assuredly lead to an early recall. As a result, the uation in Bot will temporarily turn into a 1v2. Even for Wilim, these were extremely unfavorable odds, as his ne oppos were Stratus’ fi.

  But, there was more. With Ronald stuck at the base, the entire game board would temporarily turn into a 4v5. Therefore, this had rger implications than just Bot’s situation.

  More than likely, Yuel would try to take advantage of a situation like this. There were many avaible lines of pys that this schemer could go for, and it’d be up to Cato to ter such ploys.

  Look at this kid, adding more work to my pte. Cato shook his head. He probably thinks this is just some “butterfly effect” talk, but it’s a very practical analysis.

  Every blunder affected the eeam in one way or another. And, such mistakes easily accumuted over time until they snowballed into one big defeat.

  It was just a question of time. Ronald's iive power build and irresponsible MP ma were bound to e back to bite the team ter. Hopefully, the sequences won't be too dire in this case…

  DarkestCymore