With the Russian-Filipino derby concluding in a close and tantalizing 2-1 win for Medevdev and his team, it was now time for the other series to commence.

Featuring Brazil’s QUE OTA, composed of six of the most vocal and skilled young guns in the game, and Lebanon’s Silent Hill, commanded by Adeline “STRYKER” Yusop, the world’s top female War Robots player, Polar Pro knows that the winner of the said matchup will become their erstwhile rivals in the Grand Finals.

Both teams gave their respective pre-game interviews and surprisingly, the Brazilians did not verbally abuse the Lebanese team members on the outset.

The maps chosen were Powerplant, Canyon and Springfield, with the Lebanese aiming to try to end the match on the first map in a quick fashion before the Brazilians get their momentum in the second map and take control of the series themselves.

STRYKER knows that their team only had a slight chance of winning against the mechanically and vocally talented QUE OTA side; thus, they decided to play their most comfortable setups, which happened to be composed of Rhinos, Ancilots and Griffins.

On the Brazilian side of things, Joao Costa, the captain of QUE OTA, just wanted to go for one strategy. He wanted to play as close as possible, thus opting for Bulgasaris, Ancilots, Rhinos and Carnages in order to execute his plans properly.

Then, he asked each one of his teammates what they thought about the strategy.

“Sounds good.”

“Well, that would play into our strengths.”

“Let’s do it!”

“I want to smash their faces!”

“This is a nice strategy.”

Once each one of his teammates spoke, Costa simply said, “Let’s do this!”

Unlike their previous match against China which was defined by aggressive plays and excessive trashtalking, QUE OTA waited patiently for the Lebanese to do some mistakes. De Costa knows very well that STRYKER is an extremely good player; thus, he was hoping to bank on a strategy which has helped many teams overcome hyper-carry players.

The Brazilians planned to focus on the beacons that are far from where Yusop was advancing; after all, they figured that while they were not her equal on a one-on-one situation, they can go up together on her teammates, whom they scouted to be considerably weaker than her.

“Gentlemen, she is going for the far side of the plant! Four of you, go portside and pressure the beacons!”

With this containment strategy, de Costa ensured that his team would have local superiority against a limited lienup, most especially if Yusop avoids going towards the port side. In any case, the worst that they could have is a 2-3 disadvantage, whch is still more than enough for them to buy time to either change the beacon odds or just simply play into their faces and force them to mech out.

Meanwhile, Adeline decided to go for the GG push, which involved her and four of her squadmates going for the strong flank at the far portion of Powerplant, hoping to lock them down inside their home beacon and mech them out before the Brazilians get away with the game.

De Costa, with a quick eye, noticed the plan and commanded his team to go toe-to-toe, with one Carnage going around the back and capturing beacons or cutting any new bots from deploying away from their spawn.

Adeline and her team took out a lot of the Brazilian bots and kept the game close by also capturing a lot of beacons; however, it seemed that De Costa’s team was also destroying their backlines at the same time.

To make matters more complicated, the conquest bar was closer than usual in the final few minutes of the matchup. At this point, Yusop simply prayed for a miracle.

Then, with both teams down to their last drops, the time run out.

The win sign appeared for the Lebanese, saying “Your team held the strategic advantage.”

Adeline and his team just let out a small smile for themselves, knowing that if they can’t win their own pick without bleeding to death, they would be having a hard time in the succeeding maps of the series.

Still, the STRYKER congratulated her squadmates for a job well done. After all, reaching top four with what they had is already a miracle in itself.

You can read the next chapter here! As for the previous one, you can always go back!