After a long silence, Yuel finally respoo Nia's fession. "If I had to guess, you were too preoccupied with killing the Orc, right? That's why you didn't notice the Viking."

  "Um, well, I didn't focus on him THAT much, but..." Nia tried tue but her voice grew dimmer with every word. Who am I kidding? I thought about nothing but killing that scary guy back then.

  Apprentece was a scary fellow. His mere preseerrorized not just Nia but the eeam. Therefore, she really wao sy that demon.

  Not to mention, she had a personal beef with him. The way that monster tered her first ga a scar. It was a horrifying experience she wouldn't fet any time soon.

  The sed gank was Nia's opportunity to settle the score so she pursued it strongly. Toly, in fact. The desire to kill the scary monster blinded her to her surroundings.

  And, that wasn't the only thing. Nia admitted. Even before that, I made a mispy because I was too focused on killing him.

  After Nia hit Appreh Force of Reje, she then proceeded to fire a shot at him while he was stunned

  It was an impulse. Nia admitted. I just wao get revenge on him. I think I ossessed back there. Scary.

  Sadly, that otle revenge shot was a grave mispy. Nia should've targeted the surviving minions instead. If she did that, then she would've elimihe minions faster, and theurret would’ve beeo shoot Apprentece much earlier.

  So, to answer Yuel's question truthfully...

  "Ok, yeah, maybe I was a little too focused on the Orc..."

  "Figured," Yuel said. "It must've been a stressful situation, given how much HP you had left."

  "Very stressful," Nia said. "I felt like I might die at any moment."

  In fact, even now, she was still shocked she even agreed to that scary py. Normally, she'd run away from suicidal ideas like this?

  But, not this time. Nia agreed to attack Top despite being on the verge of death. Yes, she wao get back at Apprehat badly.

  "If you executed the gank fwlessly," Yuel said. "Then you could’ve ered Apprehat much harder. But, it was unrealistic to expect fwless execution uressful ditions like that."

  "R-Right, it was unreasonable, wasn't it? Yeah, totally unrealistic. Mhm." Nia nodded repeatedly. Despite ing forth and admitting her fault just a moment ago, she was now back to dodging responsibility. Ehe.

  "As for Ben," Yuel said. "I don't think you did anything particurly wrong. You arrived on time as I instructed and protected Nia. You did your job, all things sidered."

  "But, I couldn't protect her from the Viking..."

  "Given that Nia overextehere, there was only one py you could go for to help her out."

  "Yes, I could the Viking right as he blinked in."

  "Correct." Yuel nodded. "But, that's a highly advanced py with a lot of room for error. Only pyers with exceptionally high meical skill pull it off on the spot.”

  “I see…” Ben wasn’t sure whether to feel up or down about this statement. On one hand, it sounded like he didn’t disappoint Yuel with his performance. But oher hand, it meant that Yuel wasn’t expeg much from him in the first pce…

  “Anyway,” Yuel tinued. “her of you pyed optimally, so we’ll definitely review the specifi more detail during match review.”

  “Yikes…” Nia made a face.

  “But anyway, you don’t have to worry about it. All the responsibility lies with me.”

  “Eh?” Nia blinked. “How so?”

  “That entire idea was a mispy, a bad call on my end,” Yuel said. “I misread Apprentece. I was sure he wouldn’t rely on his teammates for that push. It’s a clusion I drew based on minimal data, and it turned out to be wrong.”

  Looking ba it noas Yuel so vihat Apprentece won't rely on his teammates? The game had barely started, so Yuel couldn't have possibly gathered enough data to profile Appreh aainty.

  Actually no, that was wrong. Yuel started profiling Appretnece before this game even started.

  I put too much trust in Howard’s intel. Yuel realized. I doubt he was trying to mislead me, but everything he said was ultimately based on just two games. And, these were games against pros to boot.

  It's not like Howard had actually seen horenteally pyed alongside the Leopards. The circumstances here were totally different from Howard’s observed data.

  For example, in the pro scrim, Apprentece pyed alongside unfamiliar pyers. Perhaps he wasn't too keen on cooperating with strangers, so he tried to handle everything by himself. Also, maybe he purposely tried to reveal as little as possible about himself to his unfamiliar teammates, After all, he khat StormBlitz was the Leopards’ enemy.

  So, I definitely should've taken all that data with a grain of salt. Yuel criticized himself. I made sure to profile Apprentece as much as possible by myself, but Howard’s intel just made me jump to clusions.

  Some of Apprentece's aade him look like a self-suffit lone wolf, which perfectly matched Howard's description. Therefore, Yuel did 1 + 1 right away, without waiting for more reliable data. It was a hasty clusion.

  … or, was it?

  Nia did e dangerously close to killing Apprentece back there. Yuel thought. Their Jungler was clearly on standby but it took him a while to get to the se. I wonder why they didn't just cooperate from the get-go?

  That would have made far more sense as a joint operation. Winner was already around Top La the time, so inviting him to join the push should’ve beeimal py.

  A, Apprearted the push alone. And, it seemed like he inteo finish it alooo.

  It's as if borrowing the Jungler's help was a "st resort" for him. If that’s true, then perhaps Yuel’s profiling wasn't that far off the mark. Maybe Apprentece really didn't like relying on his teammates unless it was absolutely necessary.

  But, it doesn't ge the fact that he relied on Winner in the end. Yuel thought. So, it was still a pse of judgment on my end.

  That's what he expio Nia and Ben as well. However, they weren't nearly as critical about that rash shot call.

  "Was it really that bad?" Nia tilted her head. "I mean, it was scary and kinda crazy for sure, but it almost worked out."

  "Yes, I agree," Ben said. "We were very close. And, if I just pyed a little better, I probably could’ve rescued Nia from the Viking."

  "Is that so." Yuel had mixed feelings about their words. On one hand, he was gd that they trusted his shot-calls to the point of accepting occasional mess-ups like this. Oher hand, their words highlighted a core problem with Yuel's shot-calls.

  Nia was scared of the pn and only relutly went along with it, whereas Ben didn’t have the fideo go for a difficult py during a stressful situation. These were psychological barriers that Yuel didn’t properly sider in his simutions.

  In the end, no matter how Yuel twisted it, the majority of the fault y with him…

  DarkestCymore