Chapter 261: Hexagon Jungler

Liang Yan looked at the mid lane again.

Viktor's health and mana were about equal, the minion clash stayed near the middle lane, though Perkz had a slight advantage in minion health—a state where he could push the lane and support at any time.

Moreover, before laning, Perkz sneaked into SKT's lower jungle and placed a ward at the F4 camp.

Liang Yan was somewhat surprised at the time; now looking at the mid lane minion situation, he felt AP was playing really finely this game.

Liang Yan had planned to invade and steal blue from the start; after confirming the jungler's opening route, he discussed with Lao Zhang and had Lao Zhang push the bottom lane ahead.

But he made no demands of Perkz.

All of this was Perkz's own detailed adjustments to match the jungle rhythm.

In fact, AP used to play rather solo; when Liang Yan wanted him to cooperate on something, he had to spell it out directly, otherwise Perkz would basically just focus on his own play—if he wanted to farm minions, he farmed; if he wanted to roam, he roamed; he seldom made plans to specially coordinate with a teammate.

This game, however, quietly saw some changes.

Liang Yan didn't know what AP was thinking, but this change was clearly a good thing; he felt relieved, and after Smite took the red buff, he headed straight for the river.

The time just hit three minutes.

If someone had statistics on Olaf's jungle clear times from the S5 World Championship, they would find that, on the same jungle route, Liang Yan's red buff take was about six seconds faster than average.

Meanwhile, Blank's Mang Seng, to match Faker's minion-clear rhythm and help Faker take the blue buff, chose to clear the three wolves and then head straight to the Stone Armor Beetle before looping back upward.

This jungle path for Mang Seng is not common in the current patch; it was Blank's own invention. The advantage of starting with this route is that when his Mang Seng finishes F4, the time is around three and a half minutes, Faker will just have finished clearing the fourth wave, while the fifth wave has not yet arrived in lane, so Faker can come over and they can take the blue buff together.

But Blank hadn't expected that, although he hadn't revealed this jungle route in scrims against G2, Liang Yan, via Perkz's ward in the F4 camp, saw that the blue side's F4 remained uncleared for a while, and thus guessed Blank's intention.

Liang Yan even ate a river crab along the way, then calmly wielded his double axes into the blue side's upper jungle, swung an axe at Blank's untouched blue buff, followed by a reckless swing and then unleashed brutal strikes at full force.

"Oh wow! Coming over to counter‑jungle the blue? Jiao Shen's playing pretty aggressively this game—half‑health plus a bit; if caught, it'd still be a bit dangerous!"

"But he's clearing fast!"

When Liang Yan's axe struck the blue buff, the timer just passed 3:30.

At that moment, on the blue side's lower half, Blank had just finished clearing a camp of F4, while mid lane Faker's Viktor was still one ranged minion short of clearing this wave completely.

Blank finished F4 and headed up, while pinging his own blue buff camp to signal Faker to come take the blue.

The director's view switched back and forth between the two perspectives and the blue side's view, with the camera moving back and forth between Olaf and Mang Seng.

The crowd erupted in cheers.

"It feels too late—I'm about to be counter‑jungled!"

To cut his travel time, Blank threw a Golden Bell Shield over the minion wave that had just passed mid‑second turret.

Even so, it took Blank over ten seconds to run from the lower‑area F4 camp to the upper‑area blue buff camp.

This time was enough for Olaf with Smite to take a blue buff (in this version Smite has two charges; it starts with one charge, begins converting to the second charge before monster respawn, and can cast a third Smite at 3:30).

When Blank arrived, he happened to see Olaf running out with his axe, a blue buff with only about one‑third health left chasing him toward the jungle exit.

Damn!

Blank, both startled and angry, unleashed a Heavenly Sound Wave kick.

Of course, he kicked the blue buff, not Olaf.

Olaf was already level four, while Blank's Mang Seng was only level three, and Golden Bell Shield was on cooldown; if he dared to hit Olaf with a second‑stage Q kick, he'd likely get his Flash cleaved by a few axe swings.

Faker, seeing that, had no choice but to turn back to mid.

Liang Yan, after taking the blue, returned directly to his own upper jungle and then went down to clear; at that moment, the second wave of monsters had begun to respawn.

While he was taking the blue, the bottom lane also exchanged a wave; no one died, but due to the skill gap G2 was slightly behind, and Shan Zi Ma used an extra Flash.

"But G2's tempo in this game is right!"

"Yes, Jiao Shen's early jungle is very smooth; if he keeps developing at this pace, this Olaf's mid‑game presence will be huge."

Unlike the previous game, in this match G2's top lane has lane priority, the mid lane will cooperate, and naturally the jungler's experience is completely different.

In such a game, the jungler will play very comfortably.

Liang Yan timed it, after clearing the three wolves he again headed straight for the blue side's lower jungle, crouched for a few seconds in the patch of grass at the river's center, timed his wall‑climb, turned the corner, and just caught sight of Mang Seng hitting F4.

And at a glance you could tell Mang Seng had just started, because he obviously had just put a shield on himself, and his white shield hadn't been fully broken by the monsters yet.

Liang Yan didn't waste words—he swung an axe in, closed in, and kept chopping.

The young jungler was beaten up, his head swollen, and only thought of fleeing.

Mid lane Faker's support position was locked down by Perkz's Viktor, the two tangled together and couldn't join the fight for a short time.

Liang Yan timed the bottom lane support's disappearance, the third axe triggered Mang Seng's Flash, and he immediately hit Swiftness to dash toward the river and escape.

After a few steps he suddenly twisted, easily dodging a vine that rolled out from behind the red buff camp's grass, then turned and plunged into the river, disappearing in a cloud of dust.

"He counter‑jungled another camp, and swapped a shorter‑cooldown Swiftness for a longer‑cooldown Flash—Olaf's still coming out ahead!"

"Jiao Shen as a player really is……"

"How so?"

"Old‑crafty and deep‑calculating? He's pretty young, so maybe…… scheming."

"That's a derogatory term; the proper praise is 'expert at calculation'! But I think that's just one of his strengths—his best trait is his legwork!"

"Well, indeed I only realized after the previous game that Jiao Shen is actually a player with superb mechanics; compared to his earlier performance, although he's also quite flashy, there's a feeling that he doesn't show off his mountains or reveal his waters."

"Enough with the nonsense—just one sentence sums it up: Hexagon Jungler!"

"Oh! That's good!"

The chat flooded the screen with 666.