Chapter 23
“We’re screwed. If we lose this team fight, the game’s over, isn’t it?”
With the Elder Dragon on the line, the situation was on a knife’s edge, and after a fierce battle, victory seemed destined to go to the opposing team.
In the second game of the promotion match, they once again chose the Asteria-Lulu duo, only to be thoroughly countered during champion select, resulting in a difficult game that remained deadlocked for forty minutes.
However, the team fight began when their top laner made a somewhat reckless engage at the Elder Dragon’s pit, and Sia had no choice but to join in.
But their positioning, formation, and difference in growth all favored the enemy, and the battle they could never have won from the start proceeded exactly as expected.
The enemy team still had their well-fed ADC, top laner, and jungler alive.
Their ADC in particular was a monster who could bring down an allied stronghold in no time with just a few casual attacks.
“Ah... I knew we’d lose eventually, but why did it have to be...”
-I seriously want to kill our top laner
-Does it make any sense that we have to lose this game because of our braindead top side?
Of course, the opportunity to reach Master still remained.
It only meant losing the 500,000-won donation.
Honestly, it would be a lie to say I hadn’t gotten my hopes up. Until now, even a perfect win streak had seemed easy as long as I was with Name.
But Name’s Asteria, who had barely survived, leaped over the enemy jungler and immediately charged into their base.
The mid lane was the only place where they could end the game, so the sharp-eyed enemy jungler was guarding it in case Asteria interfered with the soldiers’ advance.
But her decision was to go bot.
“Is she going to backdoor?”
Their inhibitor was already destroyed, giving them an advantage in the siege, but we had one person while they had three.
A battle of nerves began.
“Hey! We’re getting backdoored! What do we do? Ignore it and just hit the base?”
“We’re faster. Tank the damage and hit the fortress no matter what.”
“Asteria has 3.0 attack speed right now! We have to defend the base!”
“If we can’t end it now, we can’t win. Then have just one person go and stall her.”
“I’ll defend the base.”
Baokai, the top laner with a guaranteed binding ability, recalled to stop the Asteria who feared nothing under the heavens.
Recalling had definitely been the right decision.
With her possession rate maintained at nearly 90%, Asteria’s demolition power was also absurdly strong.
Just as the jungler had said, this was a situation where they could lose a game they had already won to a backdoor.
But no matter how good Asteria’s mobility was, she was utterly helpless against Baokai, who could bind an enemy without fail.
A single W-Q combo would buy at least one second, no matter what.
One second was more than enough time.
The mid laner and support, who had died valiantly in the team fight, seemed to have caught their breath and no longer issued orders.
Asteria circled the fortress, doing her best to stay outside his range.
But Baokai had anticipated this as well. During the brief instant of his recall, he sold his items and bought three movement-speed items, allowing him to catch up with her.
The moment he entered her 525-unit range.
Baokai charged ferociously toward Asteria.
But, strangely enough, Asteria had maintained 99% possession without attacking champions or minions in order to preserve her maximum attack speed.
[La Asteria Shalein Xsetan]
At the final moment, she struck Baokai with an autoattack and used Supernova.
Supernova was neither unstoppable nor untargetable. Its ultimate damage also did not apply to the fortress.
Baokai thought she had sensed her defeat and was making one last desperate attempt, but.
At that moment, a wave of minions poured out from the fortress.
“Huh?”
Within Supernova’s range, Asteria swung her blades at blinding speed.
Because she moved faster, she kept teleporting along star-fragment paths that avoided being caught by Baokai’s unstoppable charge.
As a result, the minions in her path took the ultimate’s full damage, triggering the item’s built-in effect that dealt area damage around a target whenever a skill hit, and the fortress began to crumble.
“That’s impossible! Isn’t this a bug?”
Asteria delayed the binding from Baokai’s charge with her ultimate.
Asteria’s kill score was 18/0/3. She was level 18, and all her item slots were already full.
Baokai despaired as he watched the fortress crumble so easily from nothing but the surrounding area damage.
“Great, we wo—?”
The enemy jungler and ADC were about to let out a roar of victory after turning around their disadvantageous game and winning.
“What a fucking bug-ridden game.”
[Defeat]
All they could do was stare vacantly at the fortress, which had been left with only one final hit.
* * *
[Victory]
-NoNameIsGodNoNameIsGodNoNameIsGodNoNameIsGodNoNameIsGodNoNameIsGodNoNameIsGodNoNameIsGodNoNameIsGod
-Wait, can the game really interpret it that way?ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
-Asteria is definitely mdcㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
-Isn’t it a bug that the ultimate’s splash damage applies to the fortress?
-It is a bug, yeah. Probably because she’s a new champion.
-There is no god besides NoName, and Asteria is NoName’s apostle.
“500,000 won... It might not be a dream.”
As if possessed by something, Sia changed the stream title once again.
[One True God NoName: Master Promotion Match V V _ _ _]
It had truly been a difficult game. If I hadn’t known during the game that the ultimate could damage the fortress, we might have lost right there.
The enemies, true to their Grandmaster-Challenger ranks from the previous season, made only the best decisions after the team fight without making a single mistake.
For example, the enemy jungler did not charge straight toward the stronghold, deliberately keeping himself out of sight while guarding the advance of the enemy minions.
They immediately sent Baokai, who had the lowest damage potential and a guaranteed binding ability, back to defend the base.
Even while rotating the camera, I saw that the enemy ADC had used every item passive efficiently and dealt the best possible damage to the stronghold and fortress.
Things might have been different if Baokai had recalled from the beginning, but then I would have had no reason to backdoor in the first place, so it would have evened out.
In short, I was simply lucky.
With both me and the enemies making the best possible choices, the heavens had chosen to favor me.
“Woooooow, NameName!!! What are we supposed to do if you even win games like this?!”
“I can’t breathe, Sia... I don’t have time, so let’s queue for the next game already.”
“Oh, right, right!”
A high-elo ranked queue took at least ten minutes just to find a game.
The clock had already reached five in the afternoon, so there was barely enough time left for one final game.
[Game Found!]
[Battlefield of Valhalla · Ranked · 5v5]
[Game Accepted]
“But how did you think of using your ultimate to deal damage in that final situation?”
“When the enemy Asteria dove us last time, I saw that our stronghold took a little damage when she had Tiamat.”
“Your observational skills are incredible. I never would have thought of that. Wow, it’s already the last game. I’m nervous, so nervous.”
Sia was already celebrating as though my fifty-game win streak and reaching Master were guaranteed.
“That kind of flag makes me nervous.”
I didn’t believe in fatalism, but there were certain things people said that inevitably drained the energy from a situation.
For example, a soldier proposing to their lover before leaving for war, saying they should get married when they returned, or someone proclaiming that the Demon King was weak and that now was the perfect chance to defeat him.
The soldier never returned from the flames of war, while the Demon King remained alive and laid waste to the empire.
Of course, all that mattered was having the confidence not to lose to fate.
“Here, adventurer seeking your inheritance. It’s expensive, so take care not to lose it.”
Leaving the Minotaur gatekeeper behind, I set out onto the battlefield.
But Sia’s complexion looked troubled.
“What? The enemy ADC is Pathos?! And their support is Sauron?”
“Why? Do you know them?”
“What do you mean, do I know them? They won last year’s Worlds! You don’t know TK Pathos and TK Sauron?”
“So they’re professional gamers...?”
“Oh, come on! Why is all this bad luck piling up? Why are we still here, guys?!”
-Maybe it’s because they finished Diamond after going to Worlds lol
-That makes senseㅋㅋㅋㅋ So they’re starting in Diamond I
-Those usernames are seriously intimidating
Sia said that if she had known they were Pathos and Sauron, she never would have played the Asteria-Lulu combination.
The enemy bot lane had the traditional Lucian-Nami combination, which hadn’t shown the slightest sign of being nerfed in five years. It was far too brutal a matchup for Asteria-Lulu to withstand.
“We’re screwed... We’re completely screwed.”
“Wow, can our bot lane really hold?”
“Top is Miroking’s alt too. Why did we get matched into this queue? We got completely outdrafted.”
“Then swap with me.”
The allied team’s morale was already falling before the game had even begun.
As they said, top lane was Kalista, with no late-game carry potential, against Mirocell, the traditional counter to ranged top laners.
Bot lane was Asteria-Lulu versus Lucian-Nami, with Asteria-Lulu getting beaten one-sidedly from level three until just before level eleven.
“You want to swap?”
“I’ll go top. You play ADC with Lulu.”
“You want me to play top-lane Asteria? Are you insane?”
“That’s what we have to do if we want to win.”
“Hey, Name, are you serious?”
“Mirocell is difficult even for Kalista, but on Asteria you’ll get ganked 108 times without fail.”
Time continued to pass.
In the end, Kalista gave in to my stubbornness and formed a pact with Lulu.
“Damn it, don’t blame me if bot lane gets destroyed, okay?”
“Kalista-Lulu is much stronger at low levels, so it’s worth trying. Let’s do our best.”
The wastrel who had become a prince set off on a journey with Sia, while I walked alone down a solitary road.
Break through or be broken through.
In the lonely battle at top, Mirocell remained holed up in the stronghold without revealing herself.
“What? That isn’t Kalista top. Did she really bring Asteria top?”
But the moment Mirocell confirmed my appearance, she came out to the middle of the lane and began a battle of nerves.
“So Pathos and Sauron came running because they were scared? But I’m no pushover either.”
“Mirocell could never beat Asteria, not in a million years.”
“Wow, that’s way too rude. Time for a manners lesson.”
Even if Asteria had short range, she was still a ranged champion through and through.
Mirocell, a melee champion whose only mobility skill was her ultimate, could hold the advantage until level six.
The only variable was a level-two gank.
To cut that possibility off at the source, Sia secretly came all the way to top and placed a ward, lighting up our vision.
As expected, despite being a scaling jungler, the enemy came rushing over to harvest the delicious fruit known as ‘top-lane Asteria.’
Our jungler had started with the standard buff, while the enemy had done a reverse buff, so although bot lane had the advantage, they couldn’t easily force a trade.
I put on the performance of my life to make the enemy jungler descend even a little later, but he kept measuring a distance that was awkward both for me to follow up on and for him to leave from, so he returned to his jungle without hesitation.
His quick judgment and instincts were unfortunate, but we had survived the early crisis for now.
“How did you know? Was it a ward?”
“Who knows? Looks like some kind-hearted soul left one.”
“What a shame. I thought you wouldn’t expect a level-two gank.”
Mirocell backed away again, maintaining a safe distance from Asteria.
But even so, she was still within the autoattack range increased by Asteria’s possession rate.
If this had been a low-tier game, I would have assumed Mirocell had overlooked the fact that Asteria’s range changed from moment to moment and misjudged the distance, but.
Flash.
Flash.
I reacted to Mirocell’s only follow-up tool, E-Flash, with Flash, and at the same time, Rexar sprang out from behind me.
“Mirocell, you couldn’t hit that? I only went to take one jungle camp, and now I’m screwed!”
“No...!”
Miroking looked visibly flustered.
Unable to calm his anger, Rexar huffed and actually left, and I sent a mocking sneer after him.
“Aren’t you going to ask whether it was a ward this time?”