I Just Wanted to Play Together (5)
“Ugh, ranged tops piss me off so much.”
Already in a foul mood, Yu Dahye stomped her way up to the top lane, fuming.
Still, if she could just hang on, Akeli had excellent carry potential. The enemy had broken their comp for Calister. All she had to do was survive. Just survive.
But once you started falling behind against a champion like that, the snowball could get completely out of control.
And as much as she hated to admit it, the enemy top laner was terrifyingly good, which only made her more anxious.
“Ah…”
It was the absolute earliest stretch of the game, the only window where she could still hold her own. But when her skillshots started missing one after another, Dahye’s irritation leaked into her expression.
“Guys, it’s still early game.”
Dahye shut down the chat window’s sudden backseat-driving energy, then forced herself to focus again.
“That hurt, didn’t it? Who told you to bring that into top.”
After a few misses she finally landed a shuriken, followed up with a full combo trade, and immediately reclaimed the upper hand — and her smile along with it.
“Nice! Let’s go!”
Good news from bot lane. Dahye smiled — the laning phase wasn’t going badly at all.
“Our team is winning, why are you reacting like that.”
Dahye scolded the chat even as she laughed. Kassadin’s level sixteen was scary, sure, but with no tank in the enemy comp she was confident they could figure out a way to win late.
“Huh?”
Both tops finished their recalls and returned to lane — and when her skillshot missed, she ate a completely one-sided trade from the enemy Kali.
Dahye clamped her mouth shut and tried to hold on. But while she crouched under tower, the enemy Calister danced around poking her relentlessly with that razor-sharp spear.
“Can you just come already?! The wave is this shoved.”
LeeSin didn’t answer. She knew he had his own ideas, of course — but right now Dahye just wanted the Kali in front of her gone.
Tower gold was getting ripped away. As a melee champion on Akeli, she couldn’t help dropping CS one by one, and before long the gap was steadily widening.
“Could you have come a little sooner.”
LeeSin finally started dropping on-my-way pings. Even with Calister’s power level toned down, without jungle intervention it was a brutal one-on-one. Belatedly, the ultimate counter to the enemy champ — a gank — was finally starting.
LeeSin appeared on the top-side map. Akeli was already too low to help. But Calister wasn’t at full strength either, and she’d overextended too far to escape.
“Ah…”
The sonic wave missed. They were still close enough to close the gap, but—
LeeSin’s skillshots kept missing while Calister beat him with spear after spear. She’d taken Ignite specifically to anti-carry, and LeeSin looked like he was thrashing around on fire.
“What are you doing?!”
“…”
Dahye almost typed something back, then just muted LeeSin’s chat entirely. Fighting with him would only make her lose her mind.
“Hey, don’t say stuff like that.”
Dahye sighed as she spoke. Keeping a broadcast from spiraling into extremes was part of a streamer’s job.
“Ah…”
After ult, it should have been Akeli’s time — but she couldn’t hold against Kali’s growth after the enemy had rushed a core item so fast. She also had to admit she’d gotten a little heated herself, and the calm skill combos just weren’t coming out.
Dahye started locking in. Unlike the toxic LeeSin, the rest of her teammates were playing hard and staying calm.
“Ah, this is— ah…”
Enemy Kassadin escaped with two HP left, and while her teammates overcommitted they ate CC from Lux and Zyra, losing the teamfight.
Her second tower went down to Calister.
“…”
Ezreal seemed to find his footing and started making plays. Kassadin’s level kept climbing.
Dahye closed her eyes and pressed a hand to her forehead.
“Haa.”
Their carefully planned sneaky Baron. Stolen by the enemy Zyra’s flash-smite.
She almost pinged LeeSin, then realized it was pointless.
“…”
Dahye stared blankly as the nexus exploded.
“Next game.”
She soothed a heart wounded by solo queue… with more solo queue. It was a classic symptom of people deeply addicted to ranked.
“Oh come on, for real!”
Dahye, who had been holding a deadpan face, let out a scream — then immediately calmed down.
“Wait, what? He’s on our team?”
The user whose nickname wished for his mother’s happiness had been placed on their top lane.
“…”
“Huh. He answers well.”
Dahye suddenly snorted a laugh.
“Hey, don’t say weird stuff.”
At the suspicion that the other side might be a truly awful toxic player, Dahye’s face went serious.
“Yohone?”
She flinched at the top laner’s first pick. A champion countless players aspired to play — and just as many weirdos gravitated toward. Yohone.
“Let’s go.”
Even after taking five straight losses to that guy, Dahye forced herself to try and enjoy the game.
“Ooooh, nice, nice.”
A solo kill announcement made Dahye beam. Bot was also pressuring with Caitlyn-Lux, so the game was actually fun.
“Whew…”
A second solo kill. It was still a rough Renekton matchup, so Park Jimin let out a breath of relief.
Thank god.
Running into Dahye as the enemy five games in a row — it barely felt real. When the self that said he should stop already collided with the self that still couldn’t give up, he’d queued with the resolve that if he matched her as an enemy again, he would just close the client.
But this time the heavens had finally answered, late as they were. He’d landed on her team.
And more than anything, what mattered was putting up a good performance this game and winning. So far, the flow was excellent.
“Hoo…”
Thoughts about wanting recognition, about wanting to play together — those had all faded. Just win. Absolutely win. He shut out every other distraction.
A grin. Of course this kind of joy still registered — that was only human.
“Huh?”
In an instant, Jimin’s face went white.
“What the hell.”
Dahye exhaled roughly, dumbfounded.
“Come back, this is seriously not okay.”
Unbelievable pure malice. Dahye called endlessly for him to reconnect, but he wasn’t coming back.
His teammates desperately needed Yohone’s empty seat. The unfilled hole was already starting to show.
“Haa…”
In a normal game you could hope the person would reconnect, but this was a user acting out of malice — there was no expecting that either. If he was coming back, he would have already.
“Huh?”
The moment Yohone came back, he apologized.
Click-click-click-click.
Jimin was buying items, holding back tears that threatened to spill any second. The AC was on, but his back was already soaked in sweat. Time had felt completely frozen.
An incomprehensible error window. A client that wouldn’t work no matter how many times he reconnected. At least he’d found a fix online relatively fast. Who would have thought searching the exact error message on Google would actually give him an answer.
He clenched his fists. He knew full well that leaving his seat had cost his team enormously. At the very least, this much wasn’t his fault. It was so unfair.
But… even so, he had to give everything. Just like he had poured his whole soul into fighting against Dahye.
“…”
On the side lane he ran into the enemy mid Orianna. Of course she was further ahead than him. Knowing that, she charged at him — a mage with no escape tool, diving someone who should have been running.
Just like when he’d gone insane trying to rejoin the game, a level of focus completely different from before. Enemy skills looked impossibly slow. His hands reacted first to whichever skill was most correct.
He landed his ultimate and chained skills one after another, scrambling her completely.
“Ah!”
Enemy jungler Rengar appeared to protect Orianna. By the tiniest margin, he dodged the CC.
Orianna went down first. He was low himself. But the continuous dodging and precise skill usage kept him alive. Ally Sejuuni arrived late, vaulted a wall, and landed ult on Rengar to buy time. Without a shield at the last second he would have died — but he lived.
And yet…
Even after a super play, the game was already tilted. He was recovering incredibly fast, but a Yohone who should have crushed the enemy’s will to fight with overgrowth early on was, at best, just recovering. In a full 5v5 teamfight the helplessness showed even more.
In front of Baron, a four-man ult airborne. But Bigdor failing to follow up properly was a shame.
“No! No!”
He bolted out of fountain and tried to fight however he could.
“…”
Reality was reality.
“Haa…”
She’d worked hard on Caitlyn, but it was a bitter game. Dahye closed her eyes and let out a long sigh. When she’d started streaming yesterday, Diamond 1 promotion had been in sight. She opened her eyes to Diamond 3.
“…”
Nothing came out but sighs. Otherwise she didn’t know what she might do with the rage rising in her chest.
“What the hell, for real?”
But not venting was impossible.
“What is he doing? I didn’t even complain when he kept sniping and harassing me. If you land on the same team you should play properly.”
Dahye finally boiled over. At some point a sob had entered her voice.
“Is it fun? Are you doing this to watch me get mad? Or are you just an attention whore?”
Normally she would queue while talking, but right now Dahye just sat still and tore into the other person.
“I’m done. I’m done.”
Dahye closed solo queue. Unlike last time, though, she didn’t end the stream.
“I’m not playing solo until that guy drops. I’ll just do Infinity Return.”
The strike declaration left her viewers in a panic.
“…”
Just aggro? But strangely, Dahye didn’t ignore the chat.
“If you think you were last game’s Yohone, verify it on the cafe.”
“Huh?”
A post went up on Dahye’s official cafe.
It was a screenshot revealing his account: HopeMomIsHappy. And when she checked the chat, the cafe nickname matched the guy who had introduced himself as Yohone earlier.
Cafe rules required matching your Jijik nickname and cafe nickname exactly.
“Alright you little shit, caught you.”
Dahye’s eyes turned sharp.
“Get in Discord, you little shit.”
Dahye left solo queue alone and opened Discord.
“I’ll leave a link in a secret comment, get in.”
She began summoning her target.
“You came.”
Jimin didn’t continue typing.
A short silence settled.
Dahye fired at him sharply.
“Hey, explain yourself.”
A cold voice came through the broadcast.
“Are you joking?”
Dahye’s voice turned frightening.
“……Fine, we’ll talk about that later.”
Dahye decided bickering over this was starting to feel pointless.
“Where’d that chat go.”
She started searching for the sniper’s chat who had verified himself on the cafe.
“Hey you — this is annoying so just type anything in the stream chat real quick.”
The moment the words left her mouth, the nickname she’d been looking for appeared in chat.
“Alright, let’s dig through the chat history.”
She decided to check his usual behavior.
“……What. Why is this so clean.”
Dahye, who had been expecting toxic chat history, was thrown off.
“Hmm.”
The hearing continued.
In the Discord chat he showed the screenshot of the message he’d googled.
Chat reactions were split.
“Hmm……”
Dahye’s mouth twitched. She was torn.
“Please kick anyone crossing the line in chat.”
She ordered chat moderation first. It had started as venting, but somehow it felt like there was more to do now.
Is he sincere?
Dahye tilted her head. He was a little strange. Why would someone who self-reported and came in this submissive do something like that?
The same words over and over. Did he mean he wanted to meet her and carry? Holding onto someone who said no and sniping over something that small?
“…”
Looking at chat, even without swearing the reaction was negative. Suddenly she felt a little sorry for him?
He was even making promises.
“Haa.”
Is he an idiot?
There was something a little clumsy about him. His playstyle had looked completely ruthless, but.
No reply came right away.
“No, it’s true, I got demoted so what are you going to do. Does saying sorry make my lost LP go back up?”
Dahye grumbled while looking at chat. Of course, by now her anger had long since cooled.
Dahye suddenly proposed a duo.
“Chat, he said with his own mouth this is his main right? He’s got nothing to say right?”
“You don’t want to?”
Dahye hovered her mouse over Jimin’s Jijik account.
“If you listen this well, why did you do all that? Hm?”
Dahye smiled, thoroughly satisfied.