“So, are we ready to go down the stage and face our coach?” Cato asked with his usual impish smirk. “The real roasting is about to start, haha...”

“A nice finisher for a motivation speech, bruh.” Ronald made a face.

Reminding the team about Rodriguez put a damper on their mood all over again. Nonetheless, they were a strong bunch, so they overcame this within seconds and dragged themselves down the stage.

Cato’s speech had already helped them to move on after the crushing defeat, so being roasted by the coach didn’t feel like such a big deal at his point. They overcame the first challenge, so they’ll overcome the second one as well.

Besides, an unexpected defeat on the competitive stage was a first for the Leopards, so naturally, it rattled them. On the other hand, getting roasted by Rodriguez? That was a daily routine.

So, everybody was more than ready to face Rodriguez’s armor-piercing questions head-on. Though, to their surprise, Rodriguez didn’t hit them as hard as they expected.

“I see it took you a while to gather the courage to come down the stage,” Rodriguez said. “So, I take it you’re ashamed of this defeat? You shouldn’t be.”

Everybody lifted their heads upon hearing these unexpected words. Instead of beating them down to oblivion, Rodriguez actually started off with nice words. Though, knowing the guy, this only made things scarier...

“The enemy caught you off-guard,” Rodriguez continued. “They placed many traps during the drafting phase and they drafted a very unconventional lineup. Especially, that Jungle DK was something else.”

It was an abnormally soft analysis of how things went down, especially considering the team had just suffered its first defeat on the competitive stage since its debut. Everybody prepared themselves for an earful, but so far, Rodriguez hasn’t scolded them much. At least, for now.

"With so many unexpected factors, it's not too strange for you to drop one game,” Rodriguez said. “No matter how strong a team is, nobody is immune to the surprise element. So, if losing to a 'meme' team is what's bothering you, then it shouldn't."

A few breaths of relief resounded in response to these words. The team expected to get roasted to death, yet Rodriguez let it slide. It was unusually kind of him.

In fact, his words resembled the little speech Cato gave earlier in order to revive the team's morale. This similarity between the two further boosted the team’s spirits.

But, they should have known better than to rejoice so early. After all, they had been Rodriguez's pupils for over two years now, they should have known that one of Rodriguez’s favorite tactics was to start with praises before moving on to bombard them with criticism.

"However." That's how it always started. Everybody straightened their backs at the mere sound of the word. "There is one thing you did do horribly wrong in this game and you have to reflect on. Anybody wants to wager a guess?"

He laid his eyes on each of them in order, like a hawk staring down his prey. One of them will have to speak up, that's the message he was sending. This lecture won't proceed forward until somebody provides an answer, regardless of whether that answer will be correct or not.

As usual, Rodriguez's demands were met with silence at first. Rarely did anybody volunteer to put themselves on the chopping block so early. Especially, this time, the riddle was seriously difficult, too.

"Eh, anybody got any idea?" Ronald whispered. "I'm totally stumped on this one."

But, nobody responded to his question. Not because they were ignoring him, but because they were genuinely unsure what to say.

Normally, when Rodriguez posed his armor-piercing questions, the answer was somewhere on the tip of their tongues. Basically, his questions were more like tests that forced the players to look deep inside and ask themselves the important questions.

But this time, things weren't as straightforward. Or rather, their denial of the matter was far stronger than usual, to the point that most of them really believed they didn’t know the answer.

In truth, most of them realized the answer toward the end of the game, as did Cato.

Do I come out and say it? Cato glanced at the others. They seemed lost in thought, trying to find an answer to Rodriguez's inquiry.

Only William had a troubled expression on his face. He had probably already figured it out but he didn't want to put it into words.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

And honestly, it was perfectly understandable. Cato also danced around this topic back when he was giving his motivational speech.

The answer to Rodriguez's question required admitting to some rather embarrassing inadequacy on the Leoaprds' end. It was an issue that everybody must've realized at one point or another.

So, nobody? Okay then. Cato took a deep breath and steeled himself. Looks like I have to do everything myself, huh. Welp, I'm responsible for how this game turned out, so I'll bite.

"We underestimated our opponents to an extent."

"Oh?" Rodriguez nodded. "Does everybody feel that way?"

"Hmph." William nodded quietly in affirmation.

"Oh, I suppose we did..." Sonya chewed her lips as she realized how simple the answer was.

"Yeah, sounds about right," Matthew agreed.

By looking inwards, they realized that the signs were all over the place. The reason the enemy’s “surprise element” worked so well was that deep down the Leopards were underestimating their foes.

For example, if StormBlitz were to use a joke lineup like this, would the Leopards underestimate them? Maybe a little, but not nearly as much as they did with Stratus.

From the get-go, Stratus registered in their minds as a "weak team" that the Leopards will "definitely" crush. It was an image that wasn’t fully erased from their minds, not even after playing against Stratus in the flesh.

No matter how strong Gunz proved himself to be, or how sharp Chessmaster's shot-calls were, Stratus had failed to ever register as a "real threat" for the Leopards until now. Somewhere at the back of their heads, the regional champions were underestimating the team that was previously known as the “weakest in the region”.

Though, one of them wasn't so quick to admit to any of it.

"Did we really underestimate them that much?" Ronald asked. "I mean, sure, we let our guard a little. But, who wouldn't? These guys had a DK Jungler, of all things! It was hilarious, haha!"

"Then, let me ask you, this" Rodriguez started. "Suppose you weren't playing against Stratus but against an A-League pro team that just happened to use a DK Jungler as well. Would you still let your guard down in that case?"

"Eh, that’s quite the scenario." Ronald crossed his arms and knotted his brows. "I mean, if they're a legit good team, then yeah, I guess I'd take them seriously regardless of the wild DK pick."

"So, you're saying Stratus isn't a 'legit good team'?"

"Welp, I mean..." Ronald scratched his head. "Hrrrrrm."

“My, you're sure straining that little brain of yours~" Cato smiled impishly. "I can't believe that you, of all people, have the gall to argue here. Do I need to remind you how you overextended at game start and almost got killed?"

"Hey, it wasn't that BAD. I mean, yeah it was a little risky and all, but I knew what I was doing. Like, I survived that whole thing and even placed the ward I came to place. Ez game."

"But also," William added. "You got yourself hospitalized for five years thanks to all the damage you took. That gave them an opportunity to steal our ogres and double-team me in Bot."

"Weeeelp, haha..." Ronald wanted to argue back but he didn't have a single good argument at hand. At least, he didn’t have anything that could possibly sway his big bro.

"I'm glad you’ve brought up this particular topic by yourselves," Rodriguez said. "We don't have time for thorough game analysis, but there are a few plays I wanted to touch upon and this is one of them. Ronald, you seriously messed up that opening, probably more than you even realize."

“Oh boy…” Ronald braced himself for a sermon.

And so, Rodriguez unleashed tons of criticism about the play but he did so in a sharp, concise manner.

The team was definitely going to discuss this point in more length during the official match analysis. But for now, Rodriguez only focused on the most important points. Namely, the value of early-game advantage for a hyper-aggressive team.

At a glance, Ronald’s early overextension didn’t seem like a first-degree crime. It was a terrible misplay that set the team back but it happened in the early-game, where mistakes were the most forgivable.

So, it wasn’t so bad, right? Wrong! That one misplay was a huge setback for the team. It was difficult to even comprehend the entire scope of its consequences without sufficient experience against teams like that.

The entire goal of a hyper-aggressive comp was to capitalize on any opportunity that presented itself in the early-game. Therefore, what seemed like a small “early-game advantage” for a regular team was actually a huge deal for a hyper-aggressive team.

It wasn’t an exaggeration to claim that Ronald’s innocent blunder played a key role in allowing Stratus to gain the momentum that ultimately led them to victory. If not for that strong opening, then Stratus wouldn’t have been able to execute the many other strong plays that followed.

Yes, Ronald’s one little misplay had that big of an impact. It was the kind of mistake that he absolutely wasn’t allowed to commit against hyper-aggressive opponents. And, Ronald wasn’t the only one guilty of this.

“I believe I’ve chewed out Ronald enough,” Rodriguez moved on. “There was another early blunder committed by somebody else here. It had as much gravity as Ronald’s overextension, if not more. Anybody wants to take a guess what play I’m talking about?”

It didn’t take them long to figure this one out. After all, there was one notable misplay that escalated the situation all by itself. It was no exaggeration to say that this play allowed Stratus to push to victory with their full strength without any regard for risks.

However, nobody said anything yet. In situations like this, it was best to let the culprit confess their own crimes. Doing so scored them some forgiveness points with Rodriguez because he appreciated players who were mature enough to recognize and admit their own mistakes.

Alas, silence lingered for a while longer some after the question was posed. The culprit turned stiff, surely aware that they were about to get exposed. And yet, they refused to testify quite yet...