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Chapter 227: Matchday 38 [1]

Chapter 227: Matchday 38 [1]

[English Pro Alliance:]

[Matchday 38:]

[Cross Guild vs Echelon]

[Time: 6:00pm]

...

[Avalon Sovereign vs Cerberus Core]

[Time: 6:00pm]

...

[Cyber Squad vs Pendragon Esports]

[Time: 6:00pm]

...

[Phoenix Rising vs Shadow Dominion]

[Time: 6:00pm]

...

[Stormborn Esports vs Steel Dominion]

[Time: 6:00pm]

...

[Helix Nova vs Nightfall]

[Time: 6:00pm]

...

[Crimson Crow vs Oblivion Knights]

[Time: 6:00pm]

...

[Juggernaut vs Blazing Gryphons]

[Time: 6:00pm]

...

[Imperium Tyrannus vs Scarlet Rose]

[Time: 6:00pm]

This was how the fixture list for the final matchday of the 12th season of the English Pro Alliance looked like.

...

Matchday 38 Eve, inside Club Echelon’s World...

The air at Club Echelon’s headquarters in London was thick with a strange cocktail of calm and tension, the kind of eerie quiet that only comes before a storm.

The once-lively, glass-paneled club building had dialed itself down into a sanctuary if focus,

Inside the training hall, the monitors were now off.

The last match replay had been reviewed, annotated, debated, and then closed. No more theories. No more tweaks.

What’s left was instinct, reflex, and rhythm.

As for the players?

They did their thing, trying to relax, while failing spectacularly with style.

Noah, as always, was the eye of the storm.

He sat alone in the strategy room, headphones on, a steaming cup of tea in hand. The lights were low, just the holographic map of the game world hovering in front of him.

He wasn’t reviewing tactics; he was mentally walking through the battlefield.

Each lane. Each terrain shift. Each potential trap. Each arena that was likely to be used for their final game of the season.

Looking through it all, his expression didn’t shift. Only his eyes moved.

In the lounge, Aria and Benjamin were doing their best to not think about the match. Aria was flipping a dagger between her fingers, barely listening to Benjamin who was mid-way through a monologue on which fruit best represents each rival team.

"No, listen, Cyber Squad is clearly a lemon. Looks cool, but bite it and your face twists".

"Juggernaut? Mango. Hard to cut through but worth it. Phoenix Rising... damn, durian".

Aria chipped in without looking up. "If you compare us to a fruit, I will end you".

On the opposite couch, Caleb had his laptop open, casually simulating match scenarios. Not because he needed to, but because math helped him relax.

He muttered probabilities under his breath like bedtime poetry.

Despite the fact that they were long used to him and his shenanigans already, it was still creepy to know that such a big guy was so obsessed with math.

Meanwhile, the two substitute players, Jeff and Rosalind, hovered somewhere between awe and anxiety.

When both of them joined Echelon, they joined it mostly for passion, then money. But most importantly, they joined it for God Noah.

They wanted to play alongside the player widely recognized as the G.O.A.T in the English Pro Warstar scene. They wanted the opportunity to observe him, and learn from him.

They didn’t fully buy into the narrative that God Noah and his friends were old from the very beginning.

Despite all their excitement and expectations though, none of them expected to be where they currently were in the English Pro Alliance.

Technically, they already won the league title since they loomed ahead of Phoenix Rising, the 2nd-placed team by more than 3 points.

Not just that. This season, Echelon was unbeaten.

This season, they deserved whatever trophy that they managed to lay their hands on. They were undisputed winners.

During the beginning of the season, Jeff and Rosalind never expected this. And now, at this stage with all the attention of the league on them, the pressure was finally getting to them.

They weren’t starters, but like usual, they were traveling with the team.

They knew they might be called in during the course of the game, and the weight of that possibility had both of them clicking through their builds for the hundredth time.

The anticipation in the air was charged.

There was no pep talks, o battle cries, just quiet momentum. Everyone knew what tomorrow was.

Tomorrow was the D-day, Matchday 36.

The final match of the season. Everything on the line.

The culmination of a year of sacrifices, late night training, heartbreaking draws, triumphant moments, and gut-wrenching near losses.

The possibility of winning the English Pro Alliance title hovered like a golden thread just out of reach.

Everyone had a different way of coping. But deep down, they all felt the same thing:

This was it.

By late evening, the club’s armored black bus rolled out of the underground garage. The players boarded in silence, bags slung over shoulders, gear secured.

Outside, a small group of fans stood in the twilight, waving glow sticks and holding banners.

One read:

["BRING IT HOME, ECHELON."]

Another read:

["ONE MORE GAME. ONE MORE WIN."]

The team gave quiet nods and tired smiles. No autographs, no photos; not tonight.

The flight to Bristol City was smooth. Charter jet, minimal crew. No noise except the hum of the engines and the occasional rustle of gear bags.

Halfway through the air, Aria broke the silence.

"You guys realize... if we win tomorrow, we’re legends".

Benjamin grinned. "We already are. We just need to remind the world that we never stopped being legends. They just need to catch up".

Noah didn’t say a word.

He just looked out the window, eyes locked on the glowing horizon where the night would meet the dawn of Matchday 38.

Tomorrow, everything would be decided.

An hour later...

The plane touched down just past midnight at Bristol City International Airport, a smooth descent into what felt like enemy territory.

But Echelon knew this wasn’t just a city; they were stepping into the warzone of Cross Guild’s home ground.

As the team descended the steps of their private jet, they were greeted by blinding flashes; not from paparazzi, but from a mob of Cross Guild fans.

Dressed in obsidian and crimson, they stood behind airport barriers with chants like war drums.

"DEATH TO ECHELON!"

"LONDON DOGS GO HOME!"

"CROSS TO CONQUER! ECHELON TO FALL!"

The energy of the fans was borderline crazy.

A massive banner unfurled from the upper mezzanine of the airport.

["WELCOME TO BRISTOL, WHERE LEGENDS COME TO DIE."]

Security had already formed a tight human wall around the Echelon players, but it did nothing to mute the venomous chants and mockery flung from all sides.

Plastic bones were tossed toward their path; a jab at Noah’s infamous ’Godfather of Warstar’ nickname.

Benjamin laughed it off.

"Wow. They rolled out the red carpet for us; red with their own tears, I hope".

Even Genevieve, ever composed, muttered under her breath. "They’re really scared of us to go this far".

"You can’t blame them," Noah said calmly. "After all, they’re battling against relegation".

The night passed fast. In a jiffy, the next morning arrived.

The team bus rolled through Bristol City like an armored convoy. Streets lined with Cross Guild supporters, eyes blazing, middle fingers raised.

Riot police stood at every intersection; not to protect the crowd, but to protect Echelon from it.

The stadium loomed into view, a beast of concrete and noise.

The Crucible – Cross Guild’s legendary fortress.

As the bus turned into the final tunnel toward the stadium gates, things shifted from loud to violent.

Fans banged on the windows, showering the bus with black feathers, symbolic of Echelon’s supposed fall from grace.

One idiot went as far as trying to climb onto the roof, only to be pulled off by security. The entire tunnel was painted in Cross Guild’s blood-red colors, with "NO WAY OUT" sprayed across the walls.

Inside the bus, no one flinched.

By now, after going through 37 matchdays of an unbeaten streak, every Echelon player was more or less used to treatment like this sometimes in enemy stadium after they admitted their inferiority.

It didn’t matter though.

Noah stood up. He didn’t raise his voice, neither did he look back at the others.

"We knew it’d come to this," he said. "Good thing we didn’t come to play". He grinned subtly. "We came to bury them".

Silence. Then Caleb spoke, voice low, confident.

"Time to turn the Crucible into a coffin".

...

[English Pro Alliance:]

[Matchday 38:]

[Cross Guild vs Echelon]

[Time: 6:00pm]

The moment of truth.

The locker room was dim, only the pale stadium lights flickering above.

Each player suited up, not in armor, but in their Echelon black and electric blue jerseys, the uniform of ice-cold executioners.

Commentators outside were already hyping the match to the heavens.

"This is it, folks!"

"Matchday 38. 1st vs 18th. One game with potential finishers for two races, the title race, and Cross Guild’s relegation battle".

"You can cut the tension with a plasma blade. Noah vs Kazimir, London vs Bristol. Winner takes the crown".

From the tunnel, you could see the flash of cameras, the roar of the crowd; 60,000 rabid fans in the Crucible, bloodthirsty and ready.

And yet, when Team Echelon stepped into the tunnel, they didn’t look like men and women walking into hell.

They looked like executioners walking onto the scaffold.

Benjamin tossed a grin over his shoulder.

"Let’s go ruin their season".

The light at the end of the tunnel exploded into brightness.

The crowd erupted.

And the final battle of the 12th English Pro Alliance Season was about to begin.

[LOADING...]

[FIRST ROUND: INDIVIDUAL BATTLE]