Let's Climb the Tiers (1)
"Aaah, way too fast."
"·····"
Jayce's shockwave detonation, fired the instant he cleared the Acceleration Gate. Park Jimin hadn't managed to dodge Lee Jonghyun's attack, and the disappointment was plain in his voice.
It was the first hit he'd allowed all game. And he'd only taken it because he'd been standing next to a minion when it went off.
Is this even real?
Ever since Jonghyun first picked up SOL, people had always told him he was good. The proof was right there: even as a hobbyist, he'd held Diamond both last year and this one.
That same Jonghyun had first-picked Jayce, the champion he was most confident on.
And now he was struggling against a complete beginner who'd been asking, right up until they tried things in practice mode, why this champion didn't have an ultimate.
It wasn't perfect play by any means. There was still a slight awkwardness in how Jimin used Jayce's skills—the core of the champion.
But when Jonghyun went in to trade, he couldn't land a hit. When he tried to dodge, there was nowhere to go.
Before he knew it, the early-game lead he'd built through trading was getting eaten away.
"Ah!"
"Whoa whoa whoa!"
Yoon Sangcheol, sitting beside them, flinched in alarm.
Jimin's skill combos were getting smoother and more natural by the second—and Jonghyun, the one who'd been pressing forward, was the one taking the beating and forced to back off.
"·····"
Sangcheol stole a glance at Jimin.
Those eyes were so sharp with focus that it was hard to believe this was the same mild-mannered friend he knew.
"Huh?"
Jonghyun tried a simple little trick—aiming a Hammer-form Q meant for the minion wave at the enemy champion instead—but Jimin slipped it with a light sidestep and once again forced a trade in his favor.
"Dude, dude, I'm gonna die."
"Hoo·····"
Jonghyun backed off.
One more Q through an Acceleration Gate and he might just faceplant into the dirt.
"·····"
Thankfully, he just barely slipped Jimin's accelerated Q. The opponent was closing in slowly.
"Huh?"
Suddenly Jonghyun's Jayce topped up on health—a biscuit, chomped down on the spot. Jimin, who was still completely clueless about runes, hadn't even considered the possibility.
"Aigoo."
"So close."
On top of that, Jimin accidentally stepped into turret range, and in the split second of panic Jonghyun dove in and unloaded a full combo.
The result: a solo kill for Jonghyun. This one-on-one went to him.
"Whoa, Jonghyun really is cracked."
"Haha·····"
At least he'd managed to preserve his dignity as a Diamond player.
"This is seriously ridiculous."
"Hm?"
Jonghyun stared at the monitor for a long moment, then let his whole body sink back into the PC bang chair.
He looked completely drained, like someone who'd forgotten how to breathe and only just remembered.
Actually going one-on-one against him·····
That tired old line about not being able to breathe had never fit better. It was just too stifling.
The movement was so unreal he had to wonder if they were even using the same champion, playing the same game. Had he ever felt anything like this before?
And the most absurd part was that Jimin's champion mastery was clearly not that high.
Even so, right up until the solo kill landed, Jonghyun could feel him improving at a terrifying rate.
"Jimin. You're not just 'talented.'"
"What?"
Jonghyun's praise left Jimin looking blank.
"For real—watching from the side, it's even more insane. That dodge on the accelerated Q coming from out of vision earlier? Straight chills."
"I-Is it that big a deal?"
"You don't even know the champions' skills yet. That's the kind of stuff you only learn to dodge after you've played a ton and faced it a ton."
Sangcheol, next to them, was even more worked up.
Jimin didn't know it, but even if Sangcheol ranked lower than Jonghyun in solo queue, his theory was far stronger—which made his take the more trustworthy of the two.
"So then·····"
Jimin opened his mouth carefully.
"I can make it to Diamond too, right? And·····"
He still hadn't properly said it to his friends, but this part mattered a lot.
"I can be good there, too."
Getting matched with Yu Dahye while she was live. Playing with her. Getting told he was good.
Right now, nothing mattered more than that.
"Diamond? Dude, Diamond's nothing."
"Huh?"
Jonghyun sounded almost incredulous.
"After playing against you myself—you're not stopping at Diamond. You can go way higher."
"Higher?"
"Yeah."
"How high?"
"Uh····· well·····"
Jimin's question left Jonghyun struggling for words.
The reason was simple enough.
"I don't know."
"Huh?"
Because he'd never been to that realm himself.
Sure, he'd watched players he thought were really good cross over into the heavens above. But his friend Jimin was in a completely different category from those types.
Predicting the ceiling just wasn't possible.
"Oh, nice."
"He's climbing insanely fast."
"Heh·····"
As the enemy champion fell and the tension eased a little, Jimin smiled at his friends' praise.
"Smurfing?"
"Jimin, just turn off enemy chat so you can't see it."
"Why?"
"Trust me, it's better that way."
The first step to genuinely enjoying SOL: the less you used the chat function, the better.
Team chat was still worth leaving on for Jimin, who was a total beginner on the theory side—but all-chat was pure poison.
Jimin, always the good listener when Jonghyun got serious, switched off all-chat.
"Oh, we won·····"
His first solo ranked game of his life. And a win.
Three solo kills on the enemy from game one, and a victory to go with it—Jimin felt dazed.
His two friends were watching from beside him, sure, but this was still a game he'd played alone against nine complete strangers. And he'd won.
"Check this out?"
"Huh? Damage dealt to enemy champions?"
Sangcheol showed Jimin an unfamiliar graph.
"You're first by almost double."
"Ah·····"
"I expected even more, honestly. Still lower than I thought."
Jonghyun said it with a grin.
From level one, he'd been beating the enemy K'Sante senseless with Jayce, then snowballed so hard that his relentless poke and gravity fields had completely broken the other team's will to fight.
"Alright, let's hit game two."
"Watching from the side, this kind of feels like a smurf stream. It's fun."
Sangcheol, who'd been watching SOL streamers since elementary school, looked thoroughly entertained as he settled in for Jimin's second placement match.
On the desk in front of them sat the empty container of the PC bang's signature chicken gangjeong.
"Ah, so close."
"Aigoo."
In game two, Jimin locked in Rumble—and died to a gank from the enemy jungler, Kha'Zix.
"It's fine. Rumble into Yone is a solid matchup."
Jimin had died once, but he still had teleport. Nothing to panic over yet.
"Uh-oh?"
"No way, he's coming again?"
Kha'Zix came back and locked down Jimin's Rumble a second time.
Because Rumble had been pressing Yone hard all laning phase, Jimin's body was leaning too far forward—and his team's vision control hadn't been great either.
"Ah, this game's gonna be rough, huh? Spells are down too."
"Nah. You need games like this."
"Ah·····"
A helplessness he'd never felt across yesterday and today combined. Jimin didn't bother hiding his frustration.
This is why it's solo queue.
SOL wasn't a one-on-one game. Jimin had been crushing the enemy top laner in trades again, but that alone didn't guarantee a win.
Still, experiences like this stacked up one by one into real assets·····
"Ooooh, he hit it again."
"Hm?"
Sangcheol was buzzing with excitement. Jonghyun looked a little sheepish.
Jimin landed three harpoons on Yone in a row.
Meanwhile he was slipping most of Yone's damage, keeping his health bar steady.
Jimin's Rumble was sitting at 0/3/0 against a Yone at 1/0/2—and yet they were the same level, and Jimin was twenty CS ahead.
"Ooooh, clean slip that time."
"This one's big."
Enemy jungler Kha'Zix and Yone dove Rumble two-on-one, but Jimin's well-timed ultimate forced them both to burn spells and retreat empty-handed.
They'd abandoned their jungle camps for that, and left bleeding hard—a pretty painful loss.
"Our Karthus is huge, right?"
"Well yeah, he's been playing RPG. Of course he's big."
Nothing disastrous had happened bot, and the allied jungler Karthus had been quietly farming his jungle into a solid lead.
"We won·····"
"Oh, that Zhonya's timing was perfect."
Ultimate down, Zhonya's activated, flamethrower open.
It was the perfect teamfight setup for a Rumble who'd only built damage items.
"Carry! Easy mode."
"Hoo·····"
Listening to Sangcheol's nonstop hype, Jimin smiled, proud.
"You see Conqueror?"
"No—go with this."
"Huh?"
Game three, Jimin's champion was Aatrox.
Sangcheol had been about to walk him through a Conqueror build, but Jonghyun pulled up Electrocute instead.
"Electrocute Aatrox isn't way too squishy?"
"The damage is disgusting. And it's hard to play around."
"Okay, fair, but still·····"
Sangcheol wanted the safer Conqueror build, but Jonghyun was pushing the high-octane Electrocute route.
Looking at Jimin's mechanics and the growth-and-recovery he'd shown last game, this felt right.
"Watching how Jimin plays, I think going hard and climbing the ladder fast is the play."
"Yeah?"
No matter how confident you were in theory, rank still reigned supreme.
Jimin, who didn't really understand what either of them was talking about, scratched his head and took the runes the winner—Jonghyun—picked out for him.
"Whoa, what the hell—is this Electrocute Aatrox?"
"Aatrox feels like the one he's most comfortable on."
"That so?·····"
Jimin said it after instantly deleting the enemy ADC and jungler on a side lane.
Two solo kills, a three-item snowball Aatrox—and a perfect combo that obliterated enemy champions who hadn't even been allowed to grow, greatsword and all.
"·····"
"Eventually you should stop looking at team chat too."
Jimin quietly nodded.
"Three games, three wins? That felt good."
"If we finish placements tomorrow, we should be set."
"Hehe·····"
It was time for Jonghyun to head to his part-time job, and just like that, their hangout wound down.
"Ah·····"
Jimin had turned on his computer wanting a bigger screen—and was immediately crushed.
After hanging out with his friends, he'd come home ready to watch Yu Dahye's first live stream of the day. And then this.
"Mmm. Well, my rank is still low anyway."
Watching her live would have been fun, sure—but the bigger dream was running into her in-game.
There were still videos on YouTube he hadn't watched yet, so he'd soothe the disappointment with those.
"Enemy Lee Sin came three times—what's our Master Yi even doing?"
"Weird."
Jimin still couldn't get used to it.
Wasn't the jungler supposed to help the laners? In that case, shouldn't everyone cheering for Dahye be roasting Master Yi together?
"Ah, right!"
Jimin hit pause on impulse.
Then he went looking for the video he'd watched yesterday.
Not to rewatch it.
"·····"
Gulp.
Why on earth was he this nervous over something like this?
Did she see it?
The long comment he'd left yesterday. He'd poured his whole heart into it.
Honestly, he thought it might have been a little childish····· but he still hoped she'd read it.
He carefully scrolled down.
He'd been so scared of being disappointed that he hadn't even checked since this morning·····
"Huh?"
Huuuh.
Jimin clapped a hand over his mouth.
A heart on his comment, even.
And looking closer—the comments the YouTuber had replied to weren't showing up anywhere else on this video!
"Uuuu·····"
What do I do.
This girl he already liked more than he could understand had just become someone he liked even more.