Chapter 96: Tick Media

VSW was currently the most popular Esport in the world. It was nearly impossible to go on the internet or turn on the TV without hearing about some type of news that happened to surround the game.

Of course, most of the media consumed these days were done on the internet through live broadcast and many TV stations had caught on and slowly made internet Channels of their own. This also included a particular news channel named Tick.

Tick like everyone else covered the big games in the sport. The professional matches and world cups. They would even cover university teams as many of the players would be scouted into professional teams.

Of course, the scene was competitive, not only was every Tv station covering these things already but they also had to compete with internet personality stars. Year after Year their ratings would drop as they struggled.

Tick had to do something and decided to go for a gap in the market and cover school games. They wouldn't cover every game but only the last few matches of tournaments and so on. Their plan worked as their ratings had improved and there was no one to compete against.

They got even more popular when writing specific articles about certain players. They even wrote about how good Hastam was in a tournament before he turned pro. Hastam also repeatedly promoted the TV broadcaster in his live streams.

Currently in the Tick office building, a scruffy looking middle-aged man with a beard was lying head down on his desk. This man's name was Josh and he worked as a reporter for Tick. His job was to go to scout the matches in person and give live commentary.

He was also the man who discovered Hastam. while watching Hastam play a match Josh knew he was special. During the live broadcast, Josh kept talking about how special this person would be in the future and it turns out he was right.

After that Day Josh had a following of his own and they were all waiting for him to spot the next big person.

Josh was in charge of covering news for the Berkshire district and currently had four sheets of paper on his desk. Each paper was information on the four most likely candidates to be in the semi-finals this year. Westgate, Baylis, Eastwood and Hershal.

Josh let out a big sigh as he looked at the information on the four teams.

"Looks like the only special one out of all of them is Lucas from Westgate but that's so boring!" he yelled out loud.

It was already obvious to everyone that Lucas was good, after all, he was the son of number one player in the world. People were already following him and knew he was good. In fact, most people thought Lucas wouldn't have bothered with a small tournament like this and continued to practise with pros.

Lucas didn't interest Josh a single bit. He didn't want to give attention to a superstar he wanted to find hidden Gems. Diamond in the ruffs that would disrupt the pro scene but it looked like this year he just wasn't going to get that.

Just then a woman wearing a short office skirt and blazer top came over to Josh's desk. She had big round glasses and her hair was tied back. Her name was Cindy and she worked as Josh's partner. She was new to Tick so they decided to assign her to a long time veteran on the field so she could see how he worked.

Cindy then handed Josh a piece of paper.

"What's this?" Josh asked.

"It's all the info I could find on Montem."

Josh paused for a second as he was trying to process why Cindy would hand him information about another school. He thought perhaps she had made a mistake as she was still new and handed him a team of another district.

Cindy saw the strange look that Josh was giving her and started to explain.

"I guess you didn't hear? Hershal lost their match."

Finally, Josh understood why Cindy had handed him the piece of paper but he couldn't believe what he had just heard. Hershal had managed to enter the semi-finals of the tournament every year without fail.

When looking at the tournament bracket, Josh was sure that Hershel wouldn't meet anyone troublesome until the semi-finals and Cindy was telling him that they had lost before even entering the quarter-finals.

Josh started to slap his cheeks. It was a technique of his that he did to wake himself up. He then took the piece of paper out of Cindy's hand and started reading immediately. At this point, Cindy decided to stay by Josh's side and watch him.

She had never seen Josh act like this in all the time she had been shadowing him. She was beginning to think that Josh had only gotten lucky a few times but for the first time ever, he seemed focused.

"How is this possible" Josh said, "four of them are completely brand-new players to the game and their all bronzes."

After reading over the information Josh immediately went to watch Montem's games. Once he finished watching the games, he watched them, again and again, trying to figure out how on earth Montem was able to beat such strong teams with complete noobs.

He wanted to do more research into their lives. This meant he would need to meet every member in person. He hadn't been this excited in a long time.

"Is there anyone in particular you're interested in?" Cindy asked.

Josh lifted up two fingers.

"There are two people to look out for on this team. The first one is whoever their captain is, I suspect it is this Alex person. He is the only one who has experience in the game compared to the others. From the games alone you can tell the captain has done his research but the sad thing is he doesn't have this star quality. He didn't do anything special in the games to make him stand out so his skill will go unnoticed."

"I think I know who you're going to say the second person is." Cindy had been watching the matches along with Josh and there was one person who stood out to her.

Josh then pointed at a player on the screen.

"Her, this girl Ashley is going to be my diamond."