Chapter 677: How strange!

Although Wang Ji vehemently denied that the person who gave RNG advice was Liang Yan, when Su Xiao Yan gave the correct answer, his first reaction already said it all.

The barrage exploded instantly, the whole screen filled with question marks.

On Tieba and some forums, netizens also kept up with current events, posting threads to discuss.

【Holy shit, was it Jiao Shen who put Letme on?】

【Regardless of skill or reputation within the circle, Jiao Shen indeed has this qualification; for example, just like Faker's advice on the LCK side, it would certainly be carefully considered.】

【But Jiao Shen really missed the mark this time; can Letme take on Khan? He doesn't have that ability, you know he can't pull it off!】

【Khan is just a blowhard, in the LPL he was purely a deadweight……】

【As a player, Jiao Shen's skill is undisputed, but if you talk about him as a coach or his eye for talent, that's a matter of opinion.】

【No, there are still people who don't realize that Jiao Shen actually counts as half a coach whether he's with G2 or VG?】

【It seems many new players have joined recently; they only know Jiao Shen is awesome in matches but don't know he's also skilled at managing a team.】

【LMAO, does 'being skilled at managing a team' refer to his debut where he kicked four?】

【LMAO, I never expected there would be people whitewashing the 'Ruhua' player.】

【Some teams just like to pick up any trash and bring it back in bulk; Jiao Shen is aiming for the championship—wouldn't clearing out the trash mean he'd have to associate with garbage?】

The barrage's topic went off-track, but the vast majority of comments were questioning whether letting Letme play was appropriate—and that point is correct.

In fact, although RNG accepted Liang Yan's advice and let Letme play this game, even picking Shen for him in the BP, after leaving the stage, RNG's head coach FireFox still harbored doubts—not because he distrusted his own team's players, but because he knows Letme's level too well, and thus felt Liang Yan was mistaken this time.

FireFox even felt that if they were to lose, the problem would most likely lie in the top lane, with Letme very likely becoming the opponent's breakthrough point.

Of course, FireFox didn't voice those thoughts.

After the BP, the lineups for the first match of the finals were set.

In the LPL livestream, Guan Zeyuan pondered a moment, then began commenting on RNG's lineup: 'emm... actually it's fine; I think RNG's lineup is quite complete, and they didn't let Cuzz get his signature excavator, which I feel they did very well on, but as for this Shen... how to put it, it feels a bit off‑meta.'

Changmao, half‑asleep, said 'yeah,' and Miller immediately jumped in: 'I also think Shen's popularity plummeting in this patch isn't without reason; Shen's utility is unquestionable, but his strength can no longer support him holding the top lane against all the overpowered monsters of the current meta.'

'And what I find hardest to stomach is—some of what I say might sound harsh, but everyone knows Letme tends to crumble when facing a player like Khan, and then you give him Shen, a champion that is inevitably weak in lane this patch… well, let's not dwell on it; the lineup is locked anyway, whether we win depends on the players' performance, the game has already entered Summoner's Rift, so let's keep talking while we watch.'

Guan Zeyuan shifted his tone, and Summoner's Rift appeared before their eyes.

The second match of the Asia Confrontation Tournament finals officially began.

From any angle, everyone thought RNG would have a very tough game, with a win chance not exceeding fifty percent, after all their opponent is LCK's rising powerhouse Dragon Pearl.

After replacing the veterans in the top, mid, and jungle positions this summer with two prodigious teenagers and a former underachieving 'small‑town test‑taker,' Dragon Pearl's entire roster was transformed, their strength leaping forward, rocketing upward—from a spring‑season fish‑ belly team that couldn't even reach the playoff cutoff, they instantly became a super‑strong LCK squad that could slay gods and buddhas. Facing such an opponent, anyone would see RNG as doomed.

Yet, from the early game onward, this battle repeatedly defied expectations.

RNG actually had little research on Dragon Pearl; in fact, all their concrete knowledge of Dragon Pearl came from VG.

Including:

Cuzz likes to gank mid and top, not bottom;

Bdd is strong in lane but actually a downgraded version of Crown, a mid laner with a severe earth‑bound spirit attribute;

Khan likes to suddenly go aggressive in lane, but he always leaves some room; when he starts frantically looking to trade blood with you, it's definitely the jungler arriving;

The bottom lane's two veterans, Xuanming Er Lao, have only their reputation left; their mechanics are terrible—even someone like Kryst4l, a 'trashy bot,' can bully them twice (mainly thanks to Xiao Duan, uh……).

In the actual match, Malaxiangguo just remembered two points: Bdd is an earth‑bound spirit, and Cuzz likes to gank mid and top.

Oh, I already know how to play this game as Malaxiangguo.

Fast! Camp mid‑top!

Malaxiangguo is just that dry; in this game, as the red side for RNG, Malaxiangguo's jungle only took two buffs and the Stone Armor Beetle, F6 in the upper half of the jungle, completely ignoring the three wolves and toads, focusing solely on the two monster groups in the upper half of the jungle to farm, and spending the rest of the time crouched somewhere near mid‑top, doing nothing but holding position.

So, guess what happened?

Hey! His level actually managed to catch up to Cuzz, who, upon realizing RNG's jungler was counter‑jungling and thus gave up acting, kept his head down and farmed nonstop!

Why is that?

Jungle experience catch‑up mechanic!

In this patch, no matter how fiercely you farm, as long as the enemy can safely take the two jungle monster groups that respawn each round, their level can keep pace with yours (early game)!

This is why, despite Kai'Sa receiving many buffs, nobody uses him—aside from the fact that his post‑rework mechanics are complex and hard to grasp, the main reason is that jungle‑core champions simply aren't viable in this patch!

This is a patch where tempo‑oriented junglers (mostly utility players) run rampant!

And Malaxiangguo's personal playstyle happens to fit the patch environment perfectly!

In the LCK livestream, the Korean commentators hadn't yet realized the seriousness of the situation; they just widened their eyes in surprise:

"Whoa! How strange, he farms the jungle so little, yet his level is on par with our Cuzz?!"

"Yeah, it looks like he didn't even take lane experience—why is this happening? This is really weird!"

"It seems like Riot changed it a while ago to prevent the side that gets counter‑jungled from losing all chance to fight back, specifically crafting a jungle experience mechanic for certain individuals."

"Huh? Is that really the case?"