In the Cssmancers Club of St. Mary’s, practice started off with thh warm-up exercises. The routine involved physical exercises as well as warming up to the game’s trols. Most of it was based on the practices of pro pyers.

  It might have seemed excessive, especially sihe girls were only going to py some Ranked matches. The average online pyer jumped straight into games with zero s or preparation, so pared to that the Valkyries’ routine was clearly an overkill.

  With that said, as pyers aiming to excel in the petitive se, the Valkyries had to duct themselves professionally. They had to get used to the idea of preparing their mind and body for every uping battle, no matter how big or small it was. High-level py was all about minimizing mistakes; Fiona wao make that cept as natural as breathing for the team.

  Not to mention, a solid warm-up also helped the pyer to improve during practice. The better their dition was, the better they observed everything around them. This directly tributed to learnier from mistakes. Therefore, even though these exercises ate away at the already g time for practice, Fiona insisted on dug them regardless.

  After the extensive was over, the team logged into the game and pyed against oppos in Rahis ability to easily arraches with pyers around your skill level was great for improving, especially for a team sport that needed 10 pyers to hold a game.

  Unfortunately, the matchmaking system was far from perfect. Assigning a simple rank to each pyer was oversimplified. Such a system struggled to take into at the teamwork quality between pyers, a factor that varied greatly depending oher the teammates were familiar with each other.

  But, that is to be expected. Fiona thought. Most types of ranking systems are fwed. This is a on design problem that seems very difficult to solve.

  Fiona entered simir issues in many sports. It was always difficult, if not ht impossible, to accurately evaluate a pyer's skill using simple math. There were far too many factors involved in that equation.

  To sidestep all that headache, most sports used simple ranking systems that awarded points based on matd tour results. These were far from accurate, but they were simple and funal, and that was what mattered.

  Cssmancers’ ranking system was rgely the same. After every match, it awarded the most points to the winners.

  However, the system also tried to be a bit more than that. It gave the pyers extra points based on various achievements, such as sg many kills, getting many assists, having few deaths, and so on.

  It sounded great on paper, but naturally, there were problems with this system. You could often find pyers pining about how most of these extra achievements favored aggression over defense. For pyers who preferred a slower and more methodical pystyle, it was very difficult to score any bonus points with this system.

  Unfortunately, there was not much that could be done about this. A ranking system was bound to be imperfect as long it was invited by humans.

  At the very least, in Fiona’s case, the bonus points from achievements served her well. Evehe team lost a game, if Fiona performed well the rewarded with enough points to mitigate the penalty.

  For one game, the impact of the bonus points was almost negligible. But, aany games, the bonus points accumuted and propelled her rank forward.

  In particur, ohe team started fag Ptinum rank oppos, their progress became very stifled. Fiona was the only one making progress these days thanks to her solid performance, which was how she had already reached Ptinum I despite all odds.

  At this point, only Karen was above Fiona in rank. She had a big head-start on Fiona because she had been pying for a couple of years now. However, Fiona was slowly but surely catg up. She was in Ptinum II while Karen was in Diamond IV. The

  Unfortunately, as a whole, the team’s current win rate iinum division was right around 50%, which was not ving enough to climb higher on the dder. It was quite disheartening, as Cato said the Leopards were pying in the Challenger division; they were so far ahead.

  But, it ot be helped. We do not have enough experienced pyers. Fiona thought. That includes me as well, unfortunately.

  In fact, in terms of sheer pytime, Fiona's was on the lower side in the club. Karen, Andria, and Lua all pyed Cssmancers before joining the club. However, only Karen actively pyed Ranked. Lua said she avoided Ranked because she had nobody to py with, whereas Andria cimed that grinding Ranked was her fun nor rewarding.

  With a team like that, anybody would rightfully mock Fiona for even dreaming of winning the regionals. heless, she believed it was very much possible.

  This newborn team had undeniably less time to prepare for the regionals than other established ones. However, "time" was a retive cept in this text.

  For example, Andria and Lua both clocked more time in Cssmahan Fiona. However, the two of them did not pursue the petitive se as seriously as Fiona did. As such, they did not spend much time in Ranked before joining the club, which meant their level of experience did not measure up to the actual amount of time they spent in the game.

  Oher hand, Fiona rushed to Lv. 50 as soon as she created an at. She unlocked Ranked in her first week with the game and had been grinding it together with Karen even before establishing the club. Thanks to that petitive mi, she had already passed Andria and Lua in rank.

  Essentially, Fiona's progress during her “brief time” with the game was likely twice, if not thrice, the average speed. Especially, since she also hired various coaches to professionally tutor her. Thanks to all that, she had already reached Ptinum I, which was sidered very good for a pyer with less than a year uheir belt.

  As, she had a hard time climbing any further at the moment. The reason for that y not so much with her but with the rest of the team. As long as their win rate was stuck at a hard 50% iinum division, it was difficult for Fiona to climb to Diamond.

  To make any progress uhese circumstances, she had to outdo herself in very specific ways and earn the bonus points the ranked system offered.

  However, that bee a trap in its own way. Fiona realized soon after she started appealing the system. It handsomely rewarded her for various aggressive as, especially for killing enemy pyers. As a result, she sometimes found herself chasing difficult kills that she had no business chasing, blinded by the potential bonus points.

  This led to bad habits, something that Ruez was quick to point out when coag her. Thankfully, that advice saved Fiona from crippling her own development.

  Fiona’s ultimate goal was to improve her skill and win in the petitive se, not infte her rank. So, even though it was statistically easier to climb the ranks by being aggressive and proactive, a truly petitive pyer should value minimizing errors far more than that.

  And so, Fiona focused on pying her best and hoped the system would naturally reward her for perf well. It made the climb slower, but the system heless took notice of her various achievements and slowly pushed her rank forward.

  Holy, I would rather see the eeam climb the ranks at this pace. Fiona thought. As, the time goes by, I am ing to realize it might be an unreasonable expectation.

  The other members exhibited great growth in the club’s first few months, but they soon reached a point of stagnation. This was a familiar feeling for anybody who ever tried their hand at sports. It meant they "hit a wall".

  Fiona ran into tless such walls throughout her career. Some walls were harder than others, but she usually succeeded in breaking past the first wall with the help of professional coag and focused training.

  But, that was just the first wall. After every wall, there was a short period of growth, followed by the wall. And, this new wall was usually rger and sturdier than the first. And, after that wall y yet another wall somewhere in the distance. Such was the natural cyproving at any petitive sport.

  Fiona and the club had already broken through multiple such walls sihe day the club was formed, but they still had a long road ahead of them.

  Acc to Fiona’s research, all the best pyers in the region were in Challenger rank by now. So, that was the level everybody in the Valkyries had to aspire to.

  As, Karen was the only one in Diamht now, the others were Ptinum or below. So, there was still much more climbing for everybody to do, and the first Ranked game of the day was definitely not helping them with that...

  DarkestCymore