Fireball
Fireball
Even as my hands were soaked in sweat and my lance slipped from my grip, even as I could no longer stand, I would fight. You would never break me… I would throw this lance straight at your face!
Listening to Pantheon’s oath as it poured from the mouth of the player when the game began.
I moved Pantheon along with our team to the jungle camp.
On the top lane, it had always been enough to focus solely on my own line matchup and bury myself in beating the opponent.
I had taken plenty of plays to claim nearby bushes for myself right from the start, just so I could snatch my own advantage.
But the mid lane was never the kind of line where that kind of play worked.
After all, the vast central attack path had no bushes generated naturally.
Short bushes that let you hide your body might exist on the river, a bit away from the attack path.
So before minions spawned, fights rarely broke out at the very start unless the enemy was deliberately looking for trouble.
That was why, to stop the enemy from pulling any tricks,
or to create variables on our team,
we would usually drop in to join the allies or steal vision from the enemy jungle camp on the opposite side.
Jungle camps, just like the minions, only spawned a little while after the game started.
So there was always the strategy of ganking the enemy jungle camp just before they spawned.
That was basically scouting against their gank.
[Team] Mermirigoni: That looks intense.
[Team] Mermirigoni: I’ll red, blue, and red again.
But when our level-1 comp was the weaker one,
there was also the option of messing up the enemy jungler’s path like our own jungler did.
Our team followed suit and moved quickly.
The ADC and support stayed in the bushes near the bot lane camps, watching the path so the enemy wouldn’t enter.
I followed the jungler into the jungle camp near the top lane.
It was possible because, as I said earlier, the mid lane position let you rotate to either side.
It wasn’t some random saying that all strategies came from mid.
It was a lane so important it could be compared to your waist.
Of course no position was completely unimportant, and losing one player really did widen the power gap, but
the flip side was that more involvement from other lanes became likely.
That I could go there meant the enemy could go there too.
So I never let my guard down.
Unlike top where I could pour 90% of my attention into the enemy’s movements,
mid was the lane where every ounce of focus mattered.
I had to constantly check where our jungler was,
predict the enemy jungler’s movements,
and keep an eye on the bot duo’s setup and current state.
Ideally I would keep top in mind as well.
And before any of that, the most basic thing was lane pressure.
I had to perform all those duties with the leader of the hunting dogs, Napi, at the front.
Napi was surely more experienced than me at handling this kind of role.
He would gather information and make plays with less mental drain than me.
Especially since I only had one eye, I had to pay even more attention to the minimap.
So we had also picked Pantheon with the plan to end the game quickly.
A classic Fireball champion.
When you kept playing after getting an advantage, it would snowball like a rolling ball of snow.
Fireball kept feeding itself more and more wood.
Otherwise the flame would go out.
Of course, post-remake Pantheon was changed so it would still have influence in the late game,
but even so, a champion’s stats and skill set inevitably weakened toward the end.
So I planted my shield high, looked up, and glared at Napi as it appeared with the minions.
I acknowledged that you had more experience than me,
but I wasn’t afraid of that.
I would do everything I could and win the game.
The ADC, support, and jungler would all be here.
If it was top lane, sure, but to expect the mid laner to take the lead pick?
Was this really Grandmaster rank?
But Seung-hwan swallowed that thought and didn’t complain aloud or in chat.
What could he do? He had to pick the highest-win-rate pick in the current meta.
And Napi had a high win rate.
A champion Seung-hwan had practiced before.
Well, even if a counter pick came out, he would just push the lane and roam.
So he pulled Napi without any burden and prayed.
“Please don’t pick Irelia.”
Irelias in this tier were all monsters.
Usually champions built around basic attacks fell off in the late game,
but these crazy artisans somehow created their own setups and won teamfights.
Especially since Napi had the trait of resetting the dash skill cooldown every time it killed a minion, it was a real burden.
But fortunately the ban phase was over.
The enemy mid laner had revealed to be Pantheon.
“Banté? Ah, it’s not bad at all.”
Of course Pantheon had a skill that let it take damage for a while by raising its shield,
but compared to Irelia who just cooked the enemy like raw meat with her stats, it wasn’t a bad matchup.
Seung-hwan had plenty of experience fighting Pantheon.
People usually said Pantheon’s invulnerability was good against assassins.
But from what Seung-hwan had experienced, it wasn’t that much of a threat.
After the targeting stun, you just had to keep distance for the follow-up combo.
Invulnerability? More importantly, assassins’ poke skill cooldowns were shorter.
Napi’s stun throw was much longer than Pantheon’s spear poke.
If Pantheon kept throwing the same spear after the range difference annoyed him,
Pantheon’s Q only had a short cooldown after the poke, and the cooldown after throwing was very long.
Then it would be an instant stun and invulnerability, and I would be Napi’s prey.
Pantheon’s invulnerability only blocked damage from the front; Napi could go around and bypass it.
“Q-stalling half HP and diving in is a guaranteed kill. CS? You can miss a bit. Just take the kill and pay it back.”
Most assassins had eaten up Pantheon that way.
So I thought I would do the same to the Pantheon I faced this time.
“……?”
Pantheon’s movements were unusual.
I threw a basic attack at the minion and then a perfect stun.
But Pantheon dodged it all, not once but over and over.
Feeling confident after dodging all the skills,
Pantheon actually pushed forward, claiming this was its own territory.
Naturally, after seeing that, Seung-hwan who didn’t want to rush in for Pantheon’s spear poke backed Napi off,
so Napi didn’t get proper farm and was left behind in the rear.
Seung-hwan vented that frustration in chat.
[Team] tmdghks0229: Hey, isn’t this guy hacking?
[Team] tmdghks0229 (pointing at Noel): Moving is one thing, but predicting and dodging? Every single Q he reacts like a computer and dodges?
[Team] Challengerclimbing: He’s not hacking but he’s such a bastard, doesn’t even get ganked and just dodges everything.
[Team] Challengerclimbing: Go roam or something.
[Team] Mommanmi: What, that careful? He’s at full HP.
[Team] Mommanmi: I thought this was Banté support and called it out, but the trash just stood there doing nothing and got clapped.
[Team] Mommanmi: Just eat a bit more, when you’re at half HP you can kill it, right?
[Team] tmdghks0229: That’s why it’s not working.
[Team] Mommanmi: If it’s this hard, come roam bot later.
The teammates didn’t even acknowledge the frustration and just told him to give up on mid-lane pride.
The allied jungler had given up on mid intervention and just jumped between top and bot.
Did that make sense?
Pantheon was suppressing mid like this.
Just come over and farm, I could have stunned first and taken it easily.
Even when trying to steal the last minion around the turret, I couldn’t because Pantheon was planting and poking.
Napi was barely alive, but Pantheon’s HP was still full.
How was this gap possible in Grandmaster?
This had to be using a hacking skill that made Pantheon dodge.
[Team] tmdghks0229: Even so, not hacking?
[Team] tmdghks0229 (pointing at Noel): Pointing at Noel.
[Team] tmdghks0229: How is it possible to dodge all the Qs?
[Team] Gladious: He explained it on his Grandmaster kancho broadcast, and he was in the pro 1v1 event last time.
[Team] Gladious: Just stack Hydra and use the empty skill and roam.
[Team] tmdghks0229: If he can’t even farm CS and dies, how does Hydra come out?
[Team] Gladious: Just Q-stall and farm CS.
[Team] Mommanmi: I’ll just kill him anyway because Banté has shields.
But the teammates kept saying Pantheon wasn’t a hacker user.
Unfair, but what could he do? He had already been broken in five minutes.
CS was already thirty behind.
Napi and the minions were starving, ribs visible, while the enemy had stolen the last minion without losing any.
From the first recall, the item gap already felt terrifying.
That judgment made Seung-hwan take a risk.
Just plant around the turret and fight before the level gap widened.
Charge straight at Pantheon and unload all his skills.
But because of the assassin’s itemless trait, his damage was far too low to kill Pantheon who had the warrior’s bulk.
In the end, only Napi’s life was barely hanging on, while Pantheon had half HP left.
It would have to be considered lucky just to survive and escape.
In the end, Seung-hwan reluctantly rode on the teammates’ strategy.
For no reason of his own.
“Ah. That was dangerous.”
Just as I was glancing at the other lane situation,
Napi suddenly started a fight and almost caused an accident.
How had I noticed I was watching the other lane?
Was it because of movement?
My instincts as a born mid laner must be sharp.
Especially as an assassin user.
I barely reacted in time and used Pantheon’s shield rush to block the damage,
but if my reaction had been a second slower,
I would have been killed by Napi while I was clearing the minions and attacking the turret.
- Tti-hwak-jjit: Ttenrean, stop spinning the screen.
- SilverPantheon: Bro is too dizzy.
- MwmWm: Did you guys not watch Joker’s broadcast? Joker is even more of a rollercoaster than this, you have to accept it lol.
- DsKon: I got trained watching Joker’s broadcast… damn guy… I get dizzy from that too so I only listen to Joker’s broadcast as ASMR…
- MwmWm: No no I get motion sickness just from watching it lol.
But the viewers said nothing about that play.
They only had complaints about me continuously spinning the screen between top, jungle, and bot.
“Ah, I have no choice. I only have one eye, so I can’t see the minimap well. I have to watch other lanes even if I’m conscious. And honestly Napi is too strong so no kill opportunity comes up. I have to keep watching for roams.”
- Tti-hwak-jjit: You’re using Nori to take a walk… ugh…
- NoriVariableRobber: Ugh I’m studying eye surgery at med school so I can learn how to prevent those Nori excuses…
- Harumanjina: Then you should study starting right now?
- NoriVariableRobber: I’m taking a make-up class right now.
- Grandfall: Then why not use the True Silver Sword and study instead lol.
- NoriVariableRobber: I have to do one hour of hobbies every day… I can’t even play games for long because I’m Silver.
“Ah, I really have to keep watching only for the lane push and roam times. I should stack the Tear of the Goddess and get boots first.”
If this kept going, Fireball would be extinguished.
Pantheon, burning its own body from the very start, had to either stop all enemy growth or become a monster itself.
It didn’t mean anything unless I stopped Napi from growing.
Anti-carry was only possible on top.
Even if an assassin didn’t grow, instant damage was guaranteed.
If it picked off low-HP enemies somewhere and accumulated kills,
it would suddenly grow.
The enemy assassin who had been left half-dead in lane suddenly swallowed our ADC whole and rose.
That alone had already turned the trade into a win.
So I had to spread this influence across the whole line.
On top you could just call everyone into your lane,
but mid wasn’t like that.
Pantheon couldn’t be like that.
The urgent matter was mine.