Chapter 7: Where Did They Say the New Hero Was Invincible?

"Catastrophe!"

"Oh no, better play safe—after all, there's an 80% chance we'll lose; if we can't even make it into the LPL preseason, it'll all be for nothing."

Seeing QX lock in the Shadow Assassin, Jiang Ming, still thinking to play it safe in his first match, settled on a counter-engage mage for his mid-lane.

"Take the Barrel," Jiang Ming tapped the back of his mid-lane chair. "Remember to take fixed armor runes!"

Both teams picked their compositions quickly.

Blue side NXG: Top Juggernaut, Jungle Blind Monk, Mid Barrel, Bot ADC Ashe + Support Sona.

Purple side QX: Top Dragon Queen, Jungle Olaf, Mid Shadow Assassin, Bot ADC Corki + Support Ruby.

The final lineups were locked in. Jiang Ming twitched slightly at the corner of his mouth—he'd overlooked one thing: at this stage of League, even professional teams, without dedicated coaching staff, picked heroes based purely on meta strength or personal mains, with almost no strategic thought involved.

On the other side, in QX's voice chat.

The Shadow Assassin mid-laner, who had instantly locked in his pick, cheered: "Brothers, crush these No. 1 district dogs—let them see the power of our Institute of War!"

"Hehe, my big blade is already starving for blood."

"Facing us is their misfortune—yesterday, if the internet cafe hadn't lost power, we'd have been #1 in the ranked queue."

"Give me your full focus—this is our first step on the pro path. Fame begins today."

"My Olaf will crush the Blind Monk!"

"Watch me, top lane Dragon Queen, tank up and chase that Juggernaut down!"

"Bot lane? Pure men—no cap!"

The headphones filled with a flood of bold boasts. As captain, the mid-laner waved his hand and mimicked the game's system voice: "All units, advance!"

…

Ten minutes later, the laughter in the room faded, as if the air conditioning had been turned too high—five faces grew redder by the second.

Jiang Ming and his NXG team gave these five youths, who dreamed of becoming pros, a serious lesson in internet addiction.

At 1:17, the blue side's trio stepped through the river shadows to invade the red buff zone.

Support Pang Ran's ward in the F4 brush perfectly tracked Olaf's movement—this was Jiang Ming's specialized "90-degree vision blockade," exploiting the edge of the fog of war to create blind spots.

As Olaf helplessly watched his Smite cooldown still at three seconds, Stone's Blind Monk had already secured the monster and fled with the buff.

"Min-ge's ward timing method is divine!" AD player Sorry stared at the minimap in awe. Each of them carried a handwritten "Ward Timing Sheet," its edges stained by instant noodle broth, with notes like: 【Red Buff Spawn: 1:55, Disappear: 4:10】.

After Olaf went silent in the jungle, NXG pushed all three lanes simultaneously.

Top lane Juggernaut was executing textbook minion control. Every time Dragon Queen tried to last-hit with E【Flame Breath】, Juggernaut used Q【Tyrant's Strike】 to auto-attack minions and heal—this was Jiang Ming's "Harm Exchange Economics," learned from watching top-tier top laners and pro matches.

After several minion waves, Dragon Queen's last-hits stalled at 23, while Juggernaut had pushed the wave and begun trading damage with the tower.

With his health and mana low, Dragon Queen's last-hits fell further behind—but NXG's teammates had no intention of letting him off easy.

After clearing the red buff in his own bottom jungle, the Blind Monk returned to top lane, coordinating with Juggernaut to kill the level-three Dragon Queen under the tower.

The bot lane's dimensional crushing was even more brutal.

Level three burst?

Fuck, we were out of steam at level two—what burst could we possibly have at level three?

Ashe set three traps at the edge of the minion line, forming the standard "Triangle Minefield." When Corki was forced to dodge them with E【Quickdraw】, Sona suddenly cast Weakness—

"What the fuck, is he insane?"

"I'm at full health and he gives me Weakness!! …"

Corki stared blankly at his Flash, now gone, swapped out by Sona's Weakness.

QX's captain watched his prized Shadow Assassin, now a clumsy puppet. Every time he used W【Shadow Step】 to dash in, the Barrel would gulp down a swig of liquor (W【Drunk Rage】), the damage reduction making his shurikens feel like tickles. And just as the Shadow Assassin's energy neared zero, that damn fat bastard always tossed out Q【Rolling Barrel】 at the perfect moment.

"Wasn't the new hero supposed to be invincible?!" he slammed his keyboard in fury!

Less than ten minutes in, purple side was completely behind.

"Is the AC maybe turned up too high?" QX's mid-laner wiped sweat, asking the support in the corner.

"Huh?" The Ruby player looked up. "Captain, it's winter—22 degrees is too hot?"

"I feel cold in my feet too…"

"Then is your face hot?"

"Uh… yeah, a bit."

…

"Hmm, S2 turrets really are weak."

"Shadow Assassin was strong on release, but he couldn't stand up to the even more ruthless Gragas—0.9 AP ratio on Q, anyone who faces him gets pregnant."

"After the nerf, Ruby and Corki's burst is gone… and their range is too short…"

Jiang Ming, standing behind them watching the match, almost laughed—not just because he'd been overly cautious in the ban/pick phase, but also because he pitied QX's five players.

No lane could win, and they had to endure the entire match experiencing pure game understanding domination—with zero mechanical skill.

Once dreamed of wielding a sword and roaming the world—now dead twice before leaving the village gate!

QX's guys meeting them in their first pro match—was it luck, or misfortune?

"Feels like the enemy is weak!"

Song Yuan scratched his head, staring at the Dragon Queen he'd farmed thirty last-hits ahead of.

"It's not that they're weak—it's that we're strong. More accurately, Min-ge taught us deeper game understanding," said Support Pang Ran calmly. "They have zero wave control awareness—just raw mechanics, no feeling."

Corki, the short-ranged bot, had been controlled for nearly three minutes—Olaf never came to help. If it were them, Shi Zhenyu would've been screamed at to death by Min-ge.

"Then let's play slow—better to practice our coordination. The further we go, the stronger the opponents will be."

"Fine. Buy extra wards when you can afford it—lighten my load. Insight Stone isn't implemented yet, and I'm broke."

The teammates' chatter reminded Jiang Ming of a retired pro's remark from his past life: "In S3, supports weren't placing wards—they were buying them."

In the early days of League, support was pitiful—no gold income, forced to constantly spend resources on vision, so you'd often see a support who reached late game still wearing only one or two core items. No wonder the saying "No support on floor five" was born in public matches!