Give Me Back My Rank (2)
“Hmm….”
Dahye scratched her head with a finger, laughing awkwardly.
“Don't say weird stuff like that.”
Dahye was at a complete loss for words.
“If only everyone listened this well.”
Before long the queue popped, and this time both Jimin and Dahye managed to land last pick.
“Irelia first pick?”
Dahye's brow furrowed. It was a champion neither her team nor the enemy particularly wanted to face. Of course, the moment she remembered who was sitting next to her, that tension dissolved.
“Can you play Renekton?”
“Lock it in.”
Dahye's order came through, and Jimin didn't take long to choose.
“Wait, Amumu?”
Dahye's champion select didn't take long either.
A classic top-jungle pairing beloved even in the pro scene.
“Duoing like this once in a while is pretty nice.”
Dahye, who usually preferred streaming and playing alone, was savoring a rare change of pace. Syncing up with a player this skilled at the same tier was remarkably comfortable.
“He'll figure it out on his own.”
Nidalee was one thing, but Renekton was a champion most top laners could handle, so Dahye didn't doubt Jimin's play for a second. Even if she'd heard the truth—that he'd only played five games on the champion—she probably would have waved it off as a joke.
“Hey, don't say it like that—you're making me nervous.”
Whether it was humility or genuine lack of confidence, the ambiguous wording made Dahye laugh in mild panic. By Jimin's standards, “I'm good” wasn't a phrase he handed out lightly. It was fortunate his friends had recommended Renekton to him so often that he'd tried it a few times.
“Uh— aaah!”
Dahye let out a sharp cry.
“Ah, fuck! Seriously.”
Going for an aggressive early counter-jungle, Dahye had gotten caught by the enemy jungle-support duo and died.
“Why is Leona even there?!”
Viewers who always loved a good fire to stoke began questioning the enemy player's sportsmanship.
“Oh, what?!”
Separate from Dahye dying on her counter-jungle path, good news came flying in from top.
“I'm going, I'm going.”
Having locked onto her prey, Dahye moved top. The Irelian who had recalled on teleport was now giving up free trades on one side of the lane—and a cannon minion wave was rolling in.
“Flash W!”
In an instant, Renekton's signature kill combo—Flash into Ruthless Predator—detonated.
“Nice!”
The stun into Nidalee's spear follow-up. They delivered a bone-crushing, unrecoverable death to Irelia.
Nidalee, who needed to keep rolling the snowball, had died early—but she'd taken a kill top and tower gold to boot. The enemy's topside jungle camps were as good as hers now.
“Ahhh… ah, I'm so happy!”
After devouring the enemy's Gromp and then the red buff, Nidalee smiled in pure satisfaction. The irritation that had flared up when she died on that first counter-jungle was long gone.
“Wait, wait.”
Irelia was casually walking back to top lane.
“That's it!”
Once again Renekton and Nidalee tore the enemy champion apart. Nidalee's second kill, half of it free.
The overwhelming gap between the two top laners. Nidalee had properly cashed in on that fruit, and a carry game was set on the table—with no disasters breaking out in the other lanes either.
“Hey, hey, hold on, hold on!”
Their Silence versus the enemy Arin in the mid matchup. Sensing the game tilting away, the enemy Arin had gotten impatient and walked all the way up to the tower hunting a solo kill. With some solid skillshots, Silence was on the brink of death.
“Nice! That's it!”
Dahye cheered in a voice thicker than usual. Right before Silence ate the solo kill, he'd received Nidalee's heal—and Arin had died to the Nidalee that appeared out of nowhere.
The Herald fight was Renekton's personal stage. When the massively fed Renekton popped his ultimate, a living hell unfolded for the enemy champions.
“Yes, thank you all for the compliments.”
Dahye was grinning with ease to spare. What showed on screen was a clean 3/1/5 KDA, and what was starting to show was a two-game win streak. The enemy jungle Amumu was already busy running the moment their eyes met.
“What, Renekton's good too!”
The enemy had even sent their ADC down to cut off the sidelane Renekton with Irelia, and still lost. Suddenly the enemy team champions were nowhere to be seen.
4 votes for, 1 against
“Aw, what? I just finished my Rabadon's.”
She said it like she was disappointed, but Dahye never lost her smile.
“Ah, that was so much fun.”
Honor votes poured onto Renekton. Dahye tossed in one of her own.
“Oh my goodness, thank you!”
At the high-value donation, Dahye expressed her gratitude with proper courtesy. For all her usual rough language, knowing when to show manners was one of the secrets to her popularity.
“Alright, everyone.”
Dahye didn't queue up again.
“That's it for today.”
And she declared the stream over.
At some point, a name—and a strange little tag—had stuck to Jimin.
“I went on a five-game loss streak and I'm only at two wins, you know that? Come at the same time tomorrow.”
And then Dahye called out to Jimin.
“Bye.”
As always, Dahye said only what she needed to say and hit the end-stream button without delay.
“Haa….”
Jimin, who had made Dahye cry and laugh all day, collapsed onto his bed. He hadn't even played that many games, but it felt five times more exhausting than usual.
“……”
Of course, the first thing that came to mind was joy.
I actually played with noona….
A wish had come true. He'd played on the same team as Dahye, and he'd even put on a good performance. Before he slept, he absolutely had to watch the VOD of Dahye enjoying his plays. Out of habit, the moment the Rift loaded he'd turned the stream off and just played.
“Whew.”
Covering his face with both hands, he could feel the heat. An eighteen-year-old's rational curiosity toward a woman three years older and overflowing with sexual appeal. The dizzying thrill and the sheer embarrassment of the day came rushing in together.
If noona hadn't forgiven me….
In the end he'd been put in the position of having to restore her rank, but duo queueing with her was pure, peak happiness either way. He was simply grateful she'd papered over his mistake. That catastrophe born of excessive obsession and fixation—the moment he'd felt it, he'd been sure everything was already over.
“……”
Jimin rolled onto his side. The chilling memory made him shudder all over again. He still couldn't believe how shocked he'd been when the game suddenly shut off. Looking back now, it was something he never wanted to live through a second time.
Hey, turn on Sol.
He snorted. Still, he was lucky a lifeline had been thrown down to him. For the first time, Jimin had gained the power to move someone else at will. Summoners of Legends—a game popular the world over. Somewhere along the way, he'd come to possess the ability to ruin something in that domain.
The eighteen-year-old boy had been a safe kind of guy since childhood. As a kid he'd been told he was good, that he listened well, and he'd always yielded. At the very least, he'd been nothing like the kids classified as troublemakers.
Then, in his third year of middle school, the height that had always been small suddenly shot up until he had to stand in the back row for class photos. By then, using your stature to intimidate anyone was already being treated by boys his age as increasingly childish and pathetic.
He clenched his fists.
Alone, Jimin's emotions tended to swing a little. The future that might have unfolded instead still made him dizzy. This talent for Sol that had slightly dulled the shock of dropping out of school. A power his friends appreciated—and that, in this very moment, might make the girl who shook his feelings more than anyone else smile.
It had nearly been wielded for something ugly, nearly been recognized as a curse, before he was pulled back from the edge.
“Huh?”
Jimin sat up on the bed. Some kind of sound was coming from the computer. He hadn't turned it off because he'd planned to watch the VOD later, but…
“Hm?”
It was Discord.
“Ah—!”
The moment he registered it, he dropped straight into the chair. Only one person came to mind.