Dining with Master Scrubs

Ten wins in a row.

Once again, the enemy surrendered before the twenty-minute mark — a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠record set in exactly five hours and twenty-four minutes.

"Whoa... you put up sixty thousand damage by yourself?"

Han Byeori kept marveling at the post-game scoreboard.

Freeze the lane against a Grandmaster top, call the enemy team over, win the two-on-one, and blow the game wide open. If the enemy team had no intention of coming top, just walk into their jungle and wreak havoc. Doing that for ten games straight without a single mistake.

Han Byeori's current LP sat at Master 190. A goal that had seemed impossible was showing real hope after just five hours.

Are we actually going to hit Grandmaster?

With a giddy heart, the next game locked ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠in.

The moment they entered champ select—

The player locked into support suddenly started raging.

Sensing something off, I typed the support's name into a match history site.

Tier: Grandmaster 700 LP. But looking at the history, they'd been on a six-game losing streak.

You tank your own MMR with a losing streak and then take it out on us?

Part of it was para's MMR being absurdly high, and Han Byeori's MMR was looking solid from the win streak too. Getting matched with 600–700 LP players when you'd just crossed Master 100 wasn't all that strange.

And when I looked back at champ select, para had been given ADC instead of the usual top lane.

Judging this one as hard to win, Han Byeori sent para a private message.

Every fiber of her being wanted to hit the leave button right then and there, but para's oddly confident message made her miss the timing.

"Ah."

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

And so the game began with a support who had locked in Lee Sin.

They're actually playing Lee Sin.

Still, maybe they weren't planning to throw. The moment the game started, Lee Sin bought a support item and ran off to defend against an invade.

They even spammed danger pings at the jungle and top, who were AFK in fountain — probably on a smoke break.

Sure enough. They'd picked Lee Sin, but a support was still a support.

So the early game opened with a perfectly ordinary laning phase.

Lee Sin took Q at level one, landed it, and flew straight at the enemy — handing them first blood.

What kind of nonsense was that?

If Lee Sin went to lane instead of jungle, they were strong at level one — that much was true. But this was bot lane. Alone, it wasn't a lane.

They're up against Ashe and Renata. Dive at level one and you die. Obviously.

From the match history I'd checked before the game, Lee Sin was a genuine support player. And yet pulling stunts like this was just a child acting out their feelings.

After typing in chat for over ten minutes and getting zero response from me, Lee Sin stopped coming bot after their seventh death.

Good riddance, honestly.

A Lee Sin who mindlessly shoved the wave was better off not existing. The late-game carry potential of Aphelios — the champion I'd picked — was near the top among marksmen.

I planned to farm CS slowly and carefully...

A flood of pings lit up mid, and the enemy Yone vanished from the map.

An early mid-jungle two-on-two had swung hard in the enemy's favor. Against a lone Aphelios, there was only one play they'd make.

Three waves stacked, including a cannon. Dive.

Diving — the act of walking into an enemy turret to kill the champion hiding under it. Dives were usually attempted when the enemy had a large minion wave, so the payoff on success was huge. You got the gold and XP from the kill, while the enemy lost out on all that minion gold and XP, blowing the gap wide open.

So they think I'm a sitting-duck ADC, huh?

Aphelios's defining traits: only two offensive skills including the ultimate, and zero mobility — a pure sitting duck. The trade-off was being able to choose from five weapons suited to any situation, which was a massive strength.

And the weapons I was holding right now were Severum and Infernum. Severum for lifesteal and move speed; Infernum for heavy area damage.

Right on cue, as the enemy minions reached our tower, the lurking Yone appeared. Behind him, Ashe's ultimate — Enchanted Crystal Arrow — came flying in.

My summoner spell was Barrier, not Cleanse, so I used my remaining Flash to dodge the crystal arrow. At the same time, Renata dumped every skill she had on me.

Did they not check my spells? Apparently not expecting me to Flash the crystal arrow, Renata poured everything into empty ground. Naturally, Yone followed up with his ultimate on me too.

No way to dodge that one. I had to take it.

Diving without even backing first? That's crossing a line.

Yone's only item was a pair of Berserker's Greaves — tier-two boots. That alone couldn't one-shot me while I was holding Barrier.

The moment Yone's ultimate airborne ended, I used every skill I had left. Infernum R, Infernum auto, Infernum Q. The Yone and Renata who'd walked into the turret both ate the ultimate, and the burst damage was catastrophic.

The double kill landed cleanly. Ashe, who'd been lobbing W from outside the turret, froze mid-movement — mental boom, apparently.

A clean triple kill, just like that.

Everything after was easy. Having vacuumed up kills from the early game, Aphelios pulled The Collector and Infinity Edge at sixteen minutes and became a god. After a few teamfights, even Karthus seemed to have mentally checked out — selling every jungle item and charging mid.

With a satisfied heart, I typed a single chat message.

"Haa..."

Was it the stream that had stretched past eight hours? Or running into a preseason Challenger Yone? Or maybe Karthus, who'd sprinted mid the second he took the enemy blue buff?

Han Byeori's Zoe was down seventy CS and two levels to the enemy Yone.

"Ah."

Yone shoved the entire wave and vanished from mid in an instant. She hurriedly dropped pings, but this was high-elo queue — the enemy Yone was already showing bot.

Teleport had a hundred and twenty seconds left on cooldown. Knowing that running bot right now would accomplish nothing, she cleared the wave fast and offered a brief prayer.

Then glorious news thundered up from bot lane.

Not dodging the dive — reversing it and wiping the entire enemy bot. Aphelios shoved the turret and started climbing mid to spread influence.

Past the twenty-minute mark, after Aphelios took the enemy jungler, the call came to hit Baron.

Nashor Baron — Baron was one of the hardest objectives in the game while granting an overwhelming buff. People even said that starting Baron was handing the enemy a chance to throw the game back.

But the enemy jungler was dead, and Aphelios's weapons were optimized for objective hunting. Nobody was about to argue with the Aphelios who'd been carrying the game by the scruff of its neck. Everyone started the Baron.

But the moment the enemy Karthus respawned and ulted, our team's HP got shredded. To make matters worse, Renata landed a sudden engage and three allies exploded in an instant.

All that remained was Han Byeori's Zoe at about half HP, and para's Aphelios.

Thinking at least the ones who could live should live, she started to peel back — and in that same moment, Aphelios fired his ultimate and charged into the enemy team, yellow sparks flying.

The ultimate he'd used was the Crescendum ult. Nine more joined the four Crescendum he was already holding, and thirteen crescent-blade phantoms materialized around Aphelios.

.

.

.

"Insane."

Aphelios tore through the enemy team, spewing absurd DPS, and wiped every last one of them.

With Karthus — not a bad wave clearer — still alive, it seemed like the game wouldn't end just yet.

The enemy Karthus threw the game, and it was over.

Aphelios sent one last chat toward Lee Sin.

The Lee Sin who'd been whining since champ select couldn't get a single word out.