Somewhere in the city, a small and dimly lit room inside an old building was filled with noise. Loud chatter echoed from the four corners of the room.
At the far corner, where the smell of old wires and energy drinks lingered, two screens flickered in sync. Out of the six computers in the room, only two were powered on.
And on both screens, the game Rise of Legends was showing.
On one screen, a sleek figure moved quickly through the jungle. He wore dark and lightweight armor against his bare body. In each of his hands were curved blades that glinted faintly under the game's lighting.
It was Kairo, a fast jungle assassin. And above the moving hero lies the player's name. It was KaiZen.
The player behind the screen had his fingers resting calmly on the keyboard, casually flicking through the minimap to show different parts of the lanes occasionally.
On the second screen, a tall woman in an armor stood at the bottom lane. She carried a heavy-looking hammer. Her armor looked sturdy but light enough for movement. Her face was half-covered by a sleek mask, and her eyes glowed faintly.
It was Mira, and above her was the player's name, Tetsu.
The two screens glowed brightly as their heroes moved in perfect rhythm,
KaiZen and Tetsu were fighting their way through the Arc rank. They disguised themselves behind low-ranked alt accounts.
The game had already begun to shift into the mid-to-late stages.
Both teams were grouped more often now, and the laning phase had long ended. The map was more dangerous with vision being fought over around every major jungle spawn.
The tier 1 top towers were down for both teams. All the red team's mid tower stood tall, while on the bottom, the red team's tier 1 tower fell down already.
KaiZen leaned forward slightly in his seat, his eyes focused on the screen. As a jungle, he knew that his job was to secure resources for them in the jungle area and also help in ganking.
The two were chilling, but they knew they had to somehow focus on the game. Their early lead has been crushed during a badly timed team fight on the middle lane. That one mistake allowed the enemy team to close the 4k gold gap down to nearly nothing.
And they haven't recovered yet.
Still, the game was even.
In fact, it was only just beginning to get interesting.
On screen, KaiZen moved through the jungle like a shadow. Tetsu hovered near their carry, always at a safe distance in case they wanted to engage.
Despite their casual movement, the way the two of them played spoke volumes. It was clean. Methodical. Controlled. There was no hesitation in their rotations or skill use, as if they were very familiar with the game.
They can't believe they're losing in this rank. However, that didn't shock them. Instead, what surprised them most wasn't the enemies.
It was their midlaner, Red, who was using Seryn.
As far as they know, Seryn was already a forgotten mage hero. She was rarely picked in Classic and Ranked now. But whoever was behind that account didn't just use Seryn. Red played as if he knew the hero very well.
The way he weaved his combos, timed his rotations, and followed up their setups with perfect spacing. It was as if Red could read them.
Tetsu glanced over at KaiZen, raising an eyebrow. They were in the middle of the team fight. A 5 vs 4, with the members in their favor.
"Damn, man. Are you seeing this? That was clean."
"Too clean," Tetsu muttered, blinking. "Most Arc kids can't even combo Seryn right. Most of them don't even pick her."
"She's not meta," KaiZen said. "But he's playing her like she's top-tier."
KaiZen's eyes were still locked on the screen, watching as Red blinked forward and landed a flawless Voidlash combo on the enemy marksman, right after Tetsu's knock-up landed.
A second later, Kaizen dashed in to help his teams clean up.
[Red has slain PlumTart.]
[KaiZen has slain Eclipze.]
[Double Kill!]
[Red has slain SaviosMain.]
[Red has slain miNAO]
[Triple Kill!]
[Quadra Kill!]
"Woah… He's moving like he's on comms with us," KaiZen finally muttered, agreeing with Tetsu. His voice was low with surprise lingering on it.
"I know, right?"
"Most just feed and follow. Then most are braindead but understandable," KaiZen's eyes focused on the screen as he killed a small monster in the jungle. "But this guy… he's actually not bad. I'll consider him good."
"Yeah, we've been smurfing in Arc for a while now, but I don't remember anyone matching our tempo this well." Tetsu gave a small laugh, sitting back.
That wasn't an exaggeration.
The two of them weren't just casual high-elo players who wanted to smurf. They were actually professionals. They were members of one of the teams competing in the Rise of Legends Pro League.
KaiZen and Tetsu had long since climbed past the Ascendant Rank. They sit comfortably in Celestial, while occasionally hitting Celestial, the highest rank that a player can achieve in the game.
Smurfing in Arc was something they did only on off days. It was a way to unwind and mess around, far from the pressure of tournaments, team schedules, and scrimmages.
Most of the time they play boring games, some were fun wherein they can trash talk some player. Still, the players in the ranks were sloppy and brain-dead.
But today?
Today felt different.
"Do you think he's a smurf too?" Tetsu asked, his eyes narrowing slightly at the screen.
KaiZen just sighed. For a few seconds, he watched as Red rotated back mid, clearing the wave without missing a single last hit, then immediately warding deep into the jungle again.
"I think so. His gameplay is not Arc quality." he finally muttered. "Not even close."
"Yeah," Tetsu nodded. "Either we ran into a retired veteran that just came back to the game, or someone's seriously underrated."
"Pft, why does that sound so serious," KaiZen laughed it off.
The two went silent for a moment as the game continued on.
The scoreboard flashed for a moment. Red was sitting at 7/1/5. He had the highest damage on the team. He also had the highest gold. And most surprisingly, he only had 1 death when they all died earlier in the middle lane.
"Seven-one-five. Man's farming kills. I think he wants to get out of this shitty rank." Tetsu let out a low whistle, tapping the side of his keyboard.
"He might be, for all we know. This rank is cursed." KaiZen chuckled.
Tetsu leaned back and crossed his arms, watching the screen with a grin. An idea suddenly popped in his head.
"Bro, what if we try and party with him later? Just send him a friend request after the game. See if he accepts."
A playful smile crossed KaiZen's face.
"Damn. That was smart. I'm down, Man. Worst case, he ignores us. Best case? We just found a cracked midlaner who actually knows how to play Seryn."
"Watch him be a 14-year-old prodigy," Tetsu laughed as he joked around. "Or what if he's an old grandpa?"
"What if he's someone's secret alt," KaiZen added.. "Wouldn't be the first time a pro got bored and surfed."
They both laughed at that, knowing that it could be the case. Just look at them.
In the competitive scene, many pros created smurf accounts to practice without scrutiny.
The two kept playing while talking. Another fight broke out near the jungle, and once again, Red's positioning was perfect. He held back until Tetsu's Mira hit her knock-up, then dashed forward with Equinox to unload a rapid-fire combo.
The enemy's carry didn't even have time to blink.
[Red has slain PlumTart.]
[Shut Down!]
[Red is on a Killing Spree.]
"Yup," Tetsu said, pointing at the screen with both hands as if he was excited for it. "We are adding this guy."
"I'll send the request right after the victory screen pops up," KaiZen nodded before grinning.