Chapter 46
“Give me fifth pick.”
“Pardon?”
“I’ll dance with my blade to my heart’s content.”
After coordinating with Haebin.
I boldly requested it from our team captain.
I asked for fifth pick, saying that if I got the last counterpick, I was confident I’d play well no matter what.
“Uh… are you sure?”
Team captain Jeongin asked cautiously in response.
And understandably so, since we were in a situation where defeat seemed nearly certain.
Trying something conspicuous in a situation like this could easily get me singled out as the culprit.
But when the time comes, you have to do what needs to be done.
“Don’t worry.”
Besides, this wasn’t an unfounded attempt.
There were several reasons I’d made this choice.
-Kyaa, the confidence
-Is that really the right pick here??
-He’s playing Fiora here?
The biggest reason was that even if I played a tank, we were going to lose anyway.
The enemy wasn’t investing in top, either.
[First Blood!]
-???
-That was a kill angle?
-Kyaa
-He got that kill
More importantly, the enemy C-rank top laner wasn’t very good in lane.
In the previous set, I’d solo-killed him and taken his tower even while playing a tank.
How much more damage would I do if I picked a carry champion?
“Should I gank right away?”
“Girl! Hurry over here!”
And besides, I wanted to carry a game in the tournament for once.
I’d been bragging so much normally.
What kind of disgrace would it be to play a dull tank, get swept, and go out in the quarterfinals?
[Double Kill!]
[An ally is unstoppable.]
"That’s it!"
"Kyaa!!"
"Our top is good!"
-They can’t stop this anymore
-That damage is insaneㅋㅋㅋ
-Is this really going to be a top carry??
Anyway, as a result.
The strategy of investing in top worked beautifully.
“Are you guys okay down there?”
“Yeah, yeah, we’ll hold on. Ah, we’re dead.”
Bot lane gritted their teeth and held on while keeping their deaths to a minimum.
“Both of them have no Flash. I kited them.”
Mid lane even kited the enemy jungler, giving us a huge advantage.
Wait, weren’t we even ahead of the enemy in gold?
I guess they weren’t a Challenger for nothing—they were actually suppressing the enemy Master mid laner even with the jungler nearby.
“All right, here we go, here we go, off to college!”
So I comfortably accepted the attention and kept growing.
In LoL, a lane that receives heavy investment is commonly described as going to college.
In that sense, I was practically getting into an elite university overseas right now.
-Let’s go to MITㅋㅋㅋ
-Taking down Daechi-dong by farming lectures for cashㅋㅋ
-Is he really going to show us?
It had already been a winning lane, but actively bringing Haebin into the action completely destroyed the matchup.
We dove them endlessly and controlled their experience.
"I can’t see their support!"
Even when the enemy jungler came, there was no answer; the enemy sent their support up from bot lane, but—
[Double Kill!]
[An ally is rampaging.]
We sent them straight to the Lord’s side.
They can’t stop this now. I’d hit my stride.
-Even the enemy ADC is here now?
-Oh, they’re all coming
-How far is this bastard going to go?
-He’s about to get clipped againㅋㅋ
And so.
The enemy team’s ADC, their captain, finally came top to stop my inevitable ascension, but—
No matter how large the tier gap, sheer growth beats everything.
I tore through the enemy jungler and top laner before charging at the ADC, who left their support behind and fled.
-???
-Wow, he’s fucking strong
-He turned that into a reverse kill angle??
“Heh heh….”
I couldn’t help smiling as I watched the Grandmaster ADC use every spell they had to escape.
Yeah, this was what a top carry felt like.
Was it because I’d been hunched over and playing nothing but tanks?
Playing a carry and receiving all that investment made my blood run hot.
Ah, is this what entering the zone feels like?
I’d heard F1 drivers entered this zone regularly.
This was exactly how I felt right now.
I could see everything the enemy was about to do, and my field of vision seemed to rise endlessly.
Under heaven and above earth, I alone stand supreme.
There was now no way to stop me in this game.
[An ally has been shut down.]
-?
-??
-This bastard suddenly went into demolition mode
-He got fed and started acting upㅋㅋ
Hmm… maybe not?
**
To be honest, a top carry wasn’t all that easy in modern Legend of Legends.
After all, team fights were five-on-five battles.
And the ADC still had the highest damage ceiling in Legend of Legends.
Even if I was fed, forcing my way through became difficult in the late game.
The enemy ADC was even their captain.
They were the opposing team’s primary carry, a Grandmaster who had received the same investment I had.
They’d even picked up a shutdown kill, so getting hit by them really hurt.
That was why….
[A tower has been destroyed.]
I simply went to a side lane and pushed steadily.
“Hey, hey, back off! We can’t see them!”
Whenever the enemy disappeared, I backed off.
I could push back two of them before retreating.
-Wow, this guy even watches the map in the side laneㅋㅋㅋ
-He should’ve done this from the start
Even I had to admit I was moving nimbly, constantly returning to the side lane.
Whether the main group was getting pushed back or our jungle was being horribly slaughtered.
“Die in my place!”
“Aaaagh, you fucking bastard!!”
Even while the support thrown out by the ADC was hit by the enemy ultimate and erased from the world, I kept pushing steadily.
"Jeongin, I’ll push this lane out."
"Ah, okay. Should we try to stop them from recalling too?"
Even in that situation, our mid and ADC were more than earning their tiers.
The two of them had blocked the lanes like vacuum cleaners.
On top of that, they kept the enemy from going home.
So all that remained before me were the two Nexus turrets.
And I could see the enemy top laner, who had rejoined the main group and recovered some of their lost growth.
[He doesn’t even flinch!]
So you’re going to stop me, huh.
That guy was impressive, too.
Hadn’t he done nothing but hold out throughout the scrims as a C-rank top laner?
Even I was only Diamond (for real), though.
There were Grandmaster and Challenger top laners in this tournament.
Those monsters had often broken even me when I couldn’t hold out any longer.
I advanced toward the comrade who had held out alongside me against those monsters.
[An ally is on a killing spree.]
-Ddddddd
-Kyaaㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
-Wow, he just dove them
I split him in half and killed him on the spot.
Sorry, but I had a long way to go.
“Push!”
Now there were only two turrets and the Nexus in front of me.
To a late-game top laner, a turret was like tofu.
Boom!!!
[Victory]
-Kyaaㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
-Wayo wins!! Wayo wins!!
-He pulled this off??
-I acknowledge this monster top laner..
“Aaaah!!
“Waaah!”
The moment the game ended, Haebin and the support both shouted at the same time.
“We won that?”
“Tsk, not bad.”
The mid laner and ADC looked somewhat dazed.
And understandably so—wasn’t I a low-tier player from their perspective?
It must have been surprising to see someone who’d only had to hold on take resources and carry.
“Phew, heh heh.”
Yeah, this was Wayo, and this was top lane.
“I seriously thought we were going to lose every match….”
“It’s a relief that we won at least one now.”
As I smiled in satisfaction, I overheard the captain and ADC talking.
Look at these guys.
“Why are you satisfied?”
“Pardon?”
“Think about our scrim win rate.”
-For real
-The odds-on favorite was us making the semifinals
-Is he really going to show us now?
We weren’t a team that should be satisfied with just one match win, were we?
Until now, we’d had only one plan, so the enemy had immediately countered it and beaten us.
“Now we have two plans, right?”
Now things were different.
So, shall we see what the enemy does?
[L L W W W]
Wayo’s team advances to the semifinals.
**
We miraculously defeated our opponents with an L-L-W-W-W reverse sweep and advanced to the semifinals.
[All right! The semifinals are starting!]
The next match took place after a one-day break.
“They’ve started targeting top.”
Seeing my main champions get banned one by one in the draft gave me a strange sense of pride.
“Heh heh.”
-Kyaa
-The great Wayo is getting target-banned
Of course.
They weren’t considering me the greatest threat simply because they banned my main champions.
No matter what anyone said, our team’s greatest strength was our captain in mid, and our second greatest was bot lane.
We were essentially a double-carry team with mid and ADC, while top was a joker pick.
“They want to play a standard game.”
It was obvious they were trying to eliminate the variable by banning my most-played carry champions.
They probably just wanted to face us head-on with a standard composition.
“Hmm, I suppose so?”
However, the enemy had made a major mistake.
They’d been distracted by that quarterfinal game and forgotten about the scrims.
How dare they ban top champions while leaving a mid meta pick open?
Our captain was the best mid laner in this tournament.
We happily grabbed the mid meta pick first, then completed our bot-lane composition with picks two and three.
-They’re giving us this?
-Those guys really haven’t come to their sensesㅋㅋㅋㅋ
Then we banned the remaining difficult champions.
Our fourth and fifth picks were filler picks to complete the composition.
That had always been our role.
Wasn’t the best we could hope for from Haebin and me simply not to tap-dance on a log?
“All right, I’m buckling my seat belt tight.”
-ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ
-Tank mode on
-This bastard really is a tank playerㅇㅇ
As I’d said time and again.
When it came to standard play and raw team strength, our team was among the very best in this tournament.
[W L W W]
We advanced to the finals.
*
After breaking through the semifinals.
We finally met our opponent in the finals.
Personally, I wouldn’t hesitate to call them the best team in the tournament.
They were a team where a former-pro jungler ruled the game as its commander.
“They’re countering us again?”
“Tsk, looks like it.”
Unlike the previous team, this one thoroughly banned mid meta picks and secured a strong bot composition.
They looked just like the quarterfinal team, targeting our mid and bot lanes.
“Heh.”
No, in another sense, it was even worse.
They banned three mid champions, then gave their own mid laner a roaming champion designed simply to survive.
They were refusing to contest us in mid at all.
On top of that, they picked a non-ADC bot lane that was good at holding out, while their top pick hadn’t appeared yet.
They were probably planning to decide the game through top.
“Look at this.”
-They’re challenging us
-You’re okay with this??
“I can’t let that slide.”
There was rationale behind their decision.
After all, their captain was a jungler, and the opposing top laner was an A-rank talent.
Even so, they were taking this Wayo far too lightly.
I could say this with certainty: if I entered the next tournament,
Wayo would probably be promoted to A rank.
Our skills were essentially equal, so if I simply played well, I could counter them instead.
“Can I pull out a carry champion?”
“Go ahead. We’ll support you.”
“All right. Looking at their bot picks, even Wayo won’t be able to catch them here.”
And our team’s morale had risen to its peak after the previous victory.
Our faith in one another had grown stronger, and our form was also at its best.
“I can skip the buff and gank, right?”
“Yeah, come gank, get a kill, and take Scuttle.”
-Where did all their viciousness go??
-They’re only getting along because the prize money’s right in front of them..
It said everything that even Haebin and I were chatting and laughing together.
“All right, let’s do our best for just one more day.”
“Fighting!”
And so, in an excellent atmosphere, we began the long-awaited finals of the do-or-die tournament.
About an hour and a half later.
[Defeat]
In an atmosphere like a funeral parlor, I stared at the Nexus exploding for the third time today.
“....”
[Ping me and I engage 1/8/2]
-<<The culpritㅋㅋㅋㅋ
-The worst match in history, fuck
-This bastard really is B rankㅇㅇㅇ
The enemy Master top laner had beaten me black and blue all match, and the game had fallen apart.
Fucking hell, he was insanely good. Was his tier faked?
-They should’ve just funneled everything into midㅋㅋㅋ
-I acknowledge that he carried the quarterfinals, but after that, hmm..?
-The Great Wayo threw the gameㅋㅋ
-Did he really have to go to the side lane late game??
-Clearly a B-rank topㅋㅋㅋ He can’t even breathe against an A-rank
"What...."
It was true that we’d lost because top had exploded.
…Was I the only one who played badly?
Second place is still good.