Chapter 163: 163 Mount Flower VS Crying Angels 3_1
[[What’s going on! Has Mount Flower’s coach lost their mind? Not banning new cards is one thing, but daring to let Maria through too?]
[Didn’t they also let the Holy Beast Association’s ace deck through before? They still won, didn’t they...]
[This isn’t just about winning or losing. It’s said that the Maria card was specifically designed to target Yunxia People. They’ve already suffered because of it several times; are they falling for it again? Do they even care about the players’ futures?]
[That card is indeed sinister. The A-Level player who retired after the Broken Heart incident is reportedly still unable to compete normally. Players who have faced this card in the past haven’t fared well either.]
[Since its debut, Maria has appeared in five matches, three of which involved the Frost Moon Association. Even an association as headstrong as Frost Moon later didn’t dare to let this card through. It’s also the only card the Empire has intervened to prohibit associations from selling.]
[Mount Flower is so awesome, unbelievably so!]
[Hilarious! So they don’t see their opponents as human, and they don’t take their own team members seriously either?]
[Watching your heated discussion, I’m suddenly getting a familiar, strange feeling.]
[I’m missing the Liu Bang, Grand Ancestor of Western Han, and Sun Quan, Grand Emperor of Eastern Wu, cards for my set. Does anyone want to trade? I have plenty of Qin Shi Huang and Wu Zetian cards.]
[Anyone in the bullet comments with Qin Shi Huang cards, hold it right there! Let’s trade! I want to trade!]
[Damn it, people trying to trade cards, scram!]
At this moment, Tang Qian was at the venue. She knew without checking the live comments how intense the backlash against Mount Flower was. As a coach present on-site, she wasn’t allowed to use any devices.
Although cheating was not allowed in the matches, this rule was also to prevent coaches from making other moves.
It’s probably for the best—if I can’t see the live chat’s reactions, then if we win, I won’t have to read those comments anyway.
By now, Tang Qian had also learned to keep her cool.
Facing Wen Jiang, an incredibly skilled player who also enjoyed stirring things up, she felt rather helpless.
But it was glaringly obvious to her that the Crying Angels’ members and coach were grinning from ear to ear, never expecting someone would actually be bold enough to play the dreaded Maria card.
Frost Moon and a few other A-Level Associations had been just as foolhardy in the past. Well, they learned their lesson afterward.
Mount Flower secured the first ban prerogative. Since only one of their core cards was banned, Tang Qian thought for a moment and had Chen Runyu pick one of Mount Flower’s strong offensive cards.
[July Butterfly].
It was a rare Butterfly Card, but its theme wasn’t actually butterflies.
The July Butterfly was a new type of plant that had emerged due to evolutionary changes in this era, a type Wen Jiang had never encountered before.
The July Butterfly looked like clumps of wildflowers growing on roadside embankments, predominantly light purple. Its petals were small, uniform, and tightly interwoven.
It didn’t look threatening at all, but the problem lay with the butterflies it attracted.
It seemed to have forcibly altered a natural pattern. The flower’s scent attracted butterflies. When they came into contact with the flower, they would be covered in its pollen and seeds. When these butterflies flew elsewhere, they would automatically draw nutrients from the new location and drop the seeds. As a result, new July Butterflies would emerge, taking the place of the original plants, a detrimental process.
It’s beautiful but needs to be controlled.
It seemed like a late-game card, similar to Dandelion, but because this card proliferated without restriction, it also had spiritual power limitations.
The July Butterfly could grow its main body at any location on the field. After the butterflies gathered pollen, they would take to the skies, scattering pollen everywhere.
Pollen wasn’t restricted by location and could even land on an opponent’s Card Spirit. The key issue was that the butterflies were too small and hard to capture. The more pollen there was, the more the July Butterfly could grow. Its growth depended on absorbing its controller’s spiritual power. As long as the main body of the July Butterfly remained, it would cause the opposing Card Spirit to continuously lose health—in other words, have their spiritual power deducted. The closer a Card Spirit was to the pollen, the more susceptible it was to these effects, and if flowers kept blooming, the impact would be even greater.
This card was similar to the Crying Angels’ negative status cards. However, it could sustain itself for extended periods and harm the opponent by absorbing their spiritual power. It was a powerful offensive card, rarely seen, and thus had never previously appeared in Mount Flower’s competitions.
The reason it wasn’t banned this time was simply that there were too many new cards, making it impossible to ban them all.
Moreover, their daring to leave Maria unbanned suggested they anticipated the opponent’s new cards would have specific counters and felt prepared. However, Tang Qian wasn’t worried. Of course, a powerful card, once available, is meant to be used.
With the July Butterfly in play, both burst damage strategies and drawn-out battles were viable.
The Crying Angels, seeing their choice, weren’t surprised and almost couldn’t wait to snatch up Crying Maria.
The Crying Maria card was stunningly beautiful, with a typical Western aesthetic. A golden-haired, blue-eyed beauty in a lavish European court gown, her hands were poised as if in prayer, gazing up at the sky. Two crystal-clear tears fell down her pristine face, as if she were grieving over something, compelling onlookers to feel heartbroken too.
Although associations were prohibited from selling this card to others, its merchandise was very popular. After all, it was both powerful and beautiful, and it had topped the charts for card merchandise sales.
After revealing this card, the faces of the Crying Angels’ team members almost all bore confident, triumphant smiles.
The live comments were now too chaotic to read, but the players on the field were entirely unaffected.
A domestic live commentator for the A-Level competitions remarked with regret, "Unfortunately, the Crying Angels have, as expected, brought out the Crying Maria card. Historically, this marks the sixth appearance of this card."
Even the commentator couldn’t understand why this card had to be played, his tone carrying a touch of subtle grievance as he added, "If anything happens to the Mount Flower players, I believe their coach should take full responsibility."
After all, the coach was responsible for tactical arrangements. Since Mount Flower didn’t ban this card, their coach bore the responsibility.
What they didn’t realize was that the proposal hadn’t come from Tang Qian; instead, all the players had agreed to it.
For the second card, Tang Qian had Ruan Chunen pick Ghost Wood. It was a sizable, sturdy healing card that paired well with the Seven-Star Butterfly, which could spread everywhere.
The opponent chose the new card Succubus Ducana for their second pick.
In the final selection of three cards, Shi Qi took the Assassin Card [Clueless Dame].
The Clueless Dame was an insect similar to a cicada. It wasn’t very fast but possessed considerable destructive power. It had a peculiar ability: it could blend in with anything it touched, rendering it nearly invisible.
However, under normal circumstances, its movements were easily detected by perceptive players, often leading to failed assassination attempts.
It was chosen to synergize with the Seven-Star Butterfly.
The butterflies of the Seven-Star Butterfly would scatter seeds everywhere, and Clueless Dame could coordinate with this to achieve a stealthy Stab effect.
The fluttering butterflies and widely dispersing seeds could effectively obstruct the opponents’ vision.
Dou Yuan still went with the River Maiden.
Such a wide-range Control Card, if available, was a definite pick.
Now, four cards had been chosen. The opponents had opted for an entirely new lineup. Only after Wen Jiang made her choice would the opponents be able to decide on their final card.
Wen Jiang’s lips curved into a slight smile as she suddenly said, "I’ll use Su Daji."
Everyone was momentarily stunned.