Line Control
“The match will begin shortly. Please prepare yourselves.”
At the referee’s call, Sanwang rose first, followed by Hwarang, Kang Malsuk, and Shin Yong-jae in turn. Lee Hye-jung took her place last.
Cheers erupted from the second team behind them.
“Team leader, fighting!”
“Unnie, fighting!”
“Noona!”
“We’re watching!”
Lee Hye-jung waved energetically before turning away, but she pressed her feet firmly into the floor to hide the trembling in her legs.
‘It’s fine, Lee Hye-jung. You’ve got this, Lee Hye-jung…….’
She had walked onto this stage without a second thought last year, yet today her nerves were frayed.
That was when Sanwang, Kim Jong-phil, approached her.
“Nervous, Hye-jung?”
“A… a little.”
“You know it anyway. You can’t waver.”
“I know.”
The first lesson Kim Jong-phil had taught her: a commander must never waver, no matter the moment. Not in the thrill of victory, not in the depths of despair, and even when defeat looms, she must plant her feet and hold the line.
“Your role is huge. How you handle the first set will determine everything—even if it’s just one set.”
“It’ll give our kids more chances too.”
“Exactly.”
Only when Second Team Leader Lee Hye-jung proved herself could the rest of the second team see more playtime. Touched by her resolve, Kim Jong-phil gave her shoulder a light pat as he passed.
“If you’re still shaking, think of that cocky guy. Picturing those ridiculous glasses of his should calm you down.”
“Ah……”
He was right. The moment she pictured Professor Lee—Lee Shin in disguise—her trembling legs steadied and a smile crept across her lips.
— “Lee Hye-jung, you are weak.”
Professor Lee always stressed self-objectification. Know yourself and know your opponent. Understanding yourself is the starting point of everything.
— “Your physical attack power is bottom-tier. Your magic is nothing to speak of. That means ‘offense’ has vanished from your kit.”
— “Your defense is bottom-tier too. That ‘delicate jade hands’ trait of yours only manifests at the cost of a glass body. That means ‘defense’ has vanished as well.”
Attack and defense—the two most fundamental pillars of a Hunter—were unavailable to her.
— “At best, your stamina is average, your mobility is decent, and your footwork is above average. But we’re talking about a teamfight, not a raid. This is relative evaluation, not absolute.”
— “At the major level, mobility like yours is everywhere. Even your highest stat—agility—becomes a liability compared to other Hunters in the same role.”
It was a crushing assessment. Brutally cold. Yet Lee Hye-jung no longer felt the old sting of sadness. This ridiculous professor always gave her an answer.
— “You have no option to patch your weaknesses. You must cover them with your strengths—nothing else.”
— “So let’s find them. What are Lee Hye-jung’s strengths?”
Professor Lee folded two fingers as he spoke.
— “Your head.”
And—
— “Poison.”
If the body is lacking, the mind must work harder. If abilities are insufficient, poison will fill the gap.
— “Forget about fighting. Never engage directly. The weak have their own way of fighting. Use the lane’s control to your advantage! We’ll hold the tower and only clear minion waves.”
Clearing the lane quickly with poison was the first step.
— “Watch the enemy. Read the jungler. Map out their paths in and out. Once you see their movement, secure vision and deny theirs. You used to be a jungler—this should be easy, right?”
Designing paths and joining the vision war through aggressive roaming was the second step.
— “Once the board is set, there’s one final step.”
She couldn’t attack. She couldn’t defend. Even her former strength—mobility—was now a liability. If her physical presence was revealed in a match, she would lose. So the answer was simple.
She wouldn’t fight. She wouldn’t clash. She would break formations, flee before the enemy arrived, and harass them so relentlessly that “coward” would be the only word on their lips.
— “Line control. That is your role.”
The referee signaled for them to enter.
Lee Hye-jung turned her head. After locking eyes with her cheering teammates, Second Team Leader Lee Hye-jung donned her goggles.
“I can do this.”
* * *
— “The match begins. Lee Hye-jung Hunter is heading mid. No lane swaps or position changes apparent.”
— “Lee Hye-jung, currently known as Mamang as the second team leader, was once a starting jungler from League 4 all the way to League 2. She was a cornerstone of Mir Guild’s legend. I was personally disappointed when she was benched.”
— “The key point is that she used to be a jungler—and now she’s in mid. What exactly have Representative Lee Shin and Sanwang prepared? Minions are spawning, lane phase is starting…… huh?”
— “Eh??”
— “Poison…… fog?”
— “It seems so.”
·
·
— “Lee Hye-jung releases poison fog and runs. The minions caught in her fog are melting. The enemy midlaner tries to chase, but she clears the wave and retreats. Meanwhile, the volcanic duo has arrived at top!!”
— “Haha, I see it now. I understand completely.”
— “What do you mean?”
— “Her role. Watch her. She clears the lane fast, either hugs the tower or slips into the enemy jungle to secure vision, drops poison fog, then runs.”
— “So what……”
— “She never intended to lane in the first place! She has no intention of fighting!”
— “As I speak, Lee Hye-jung is moving! She’s angling toward bot.”
— “It’s a roam!!”
·
·
Lee Hye-jung slipped into the enemy jungle, brushing past the brush. She shattered the enemy’s vision ward with a dagger and planted her own in its place, not forgetting to leave behind one of her signature poison traps.
Her hands moved so fast they blurred, matching her speed. In an instant, the lower jungle became her domain.
She soon arrived at bot.
“Zone secured. Beginning side push.”
— “Copy. Need backup?”
“No. Just keep the calls clean.”
— “Copy.”
Sanwang’s voice carried a note of pride. Lee Hye-jung was executing her role perfectly.
Between her fingers rested a slim flask—the poison crafted with painstaking care by Choi Yeosim of Choi Family Pharmacy, now a major corporation thanks to Woongjindan. A single bottle cost a fortune, but Mir Guild was a big club.
‘He told me not to worry about money and just use it.’
Green poison fog spread from her, instantly blanketing the entire bot lane. The advancing minion wave vanished. Line clearing, when fast enough, became a weapon in itself—and Lee Hye-jung had sharpened it.
She melted the enemy minions as quickly as possible and delivered her own even faster.
Where to?
‘The tower!’
She relentlessly harassed the second tower. Dagger, kicks, and corrosive poison tore into the structure.
Fast wave clear, aggressive roaming, and side pushing—this was the essence of line control.
Once this setup was established, the enemy was forced into a choice: attack the main force, or come stop her?
Lee Hye-jung already knew the answer.
‘They’ll come for me.’
Even with her low stats, that only mattered in a 1v1. With fast wave clear, she could create 2v1 or 3v2 fights, or dismantle towers through side pressure. She was a serious threat.
As expected, urgent calls flooded in.
— “Mid is missing.”
— “Jungle not showing.”
— “Support too!”
Lee Hye-jung kicked off the tower, back-tumbled, and sprinted away.
Vision expanded instantly, as if she were looking down from the sky. In that moment, a ward she had placed in the jungle disappeared. Traps triggered.
Proof that the enemy was closing in.
As expected of a first-division team—their reaction was swift. They weren’t about to sit back and take it. Three players—mid, jungle, and support—had formed a pincer to hunt her down.
Their intent to kill was clear.
— “Lee Hye-jung, need help?”
She answered Sanwang’s question without hesitation.
“No!”
Line control was ultimately about gaining advantages through numerical superiority. The moment three enemies committed to her, only two remained for the rest of Mir Guild.
Two enemies trying to stop Mir Guild’s four—especially with the volcanic duo among them?
It was a guaranteed win. So she had to draw them in.
She expanded her thinking.
‘Whirlwind, thrown hammer, earth spike…….’
Deadly crowd-control skills flashed through her mind. She calculated their trajectories and paths. Just as Lee Shin had said—if the body was lacking, the mind had to work twice as hard.
She lacked Park Su-bin and Hwarang’s defensive power, or Yu Ri-ra and Baek Yeon-woo’s reaction speed……
But Lee Hye-jung had her head and her legs.
‘From the stage.’
Pop—! Pop——!!
A different shade of poison fog spread around her. Though low in damage, it was a neurotoxin that dulled reflexes. Combined with her “Poison Step” trait, her speed surged even higher.
The pursuers arrived right on cue.
“Cough, cough—what kind of poison……”
“Careful, she’s laid traps everywhere like a madwoman.”
“Her attacks are nothing. Just watch the poison. Close in from range!”
“She’s running again—don’t give her an opening!!”
“Throw CC and go in!”
With the shouts, raw magical energy surged from the enemy. Wind howled, weapons glowed with power, and the earth rippled outward in concentric waves.
It was dangerous. But……
Beneath her goggles, Lee Hye-jung’s eyes were locked on the path ahead.
‘I can do this.’
She sidestepped the whirlwinds with precise stutter-steps. A thrown hammer was deflected mid-air by a flung dagger. Rising earth spikes missed her by a hair’s breadth. She tanked what she could and kept moving, her mind burning hot as she calculated every angle.
She placed herself exactly where she needed to be.
And just as she desperately escaped—
Kim Jong-phil has slain Kim Jeong-su.
Shin Yong-jae has slain James Reel.
Wave clear. Roaming. Side pushing.
And line control.
The ultimate goal of it all.
‘Win without fighting.’
·
·
— “She’s dribbling! She’s…… through!! Lee Hye-jung has escaped the encirclement!”
— “Lee Hye-jung’s relentless line control worked! It worked!! The enemy is taking massive losses! They can’t farm, they can’t contest objectives!”
— “Ah, and in that time—the towers are falling. The damage is piling up!”
— “And right now, Hwarang and the bot duo are diving the enemy hugging mid tower!”
— “Yes, they’re caught…… wait! Top too?”
— “Sanwang is diving! Ah, their health was already low! They’re dead!”
— “Meanwhile, Lee Hye-jung is calmly retreating behind her poison fog!”
— “Sewoon Guild is being completely toyed with! They haven’t even had a single proper teamfight and they’re already losing!!”
* * *
“How satisfying.”
In the staff waiting room, Lee Shin gazed contentedly at the scoreboard on the monitor.
2:0
Mir Guild had swept the first two sets with overwhelming momentum. The camera focused on Lee Hye-jung, the star of both victories. Her stats read 0 kills, 4 deaths, 8 assists.
For the MVP, the KDA looked dismal—yet Lee Shin clapped in delight at the zero kills.
“She executed my instructions at 120%. She’s grown so much.”
“Really.”
Even after all her growth, the consensus had been that she had no place at the major level…… yet she had done it.
Chae Dong-ha replayed the footage on his pad, clearly impressed by her performance.
“Fast wave clear with poison to gain tempo advantage. Using that tempo for aggressive roaming to spread influence across the map.”
“Decent mobility, wide vision, a sharpened mind, and the uniqueness of poison. All of it used perfectly.”
Once the laning phase was erased, the map became a minefield of her wards and poison traps.
“Here’s where the representative’s detail shines.”
“Heh, the old man secures vision while Hye-jung denies it. Two commanders reading the entire board—that’s the real advantage.”
Having two shotcallers on one team was usually a liability. Too many cooks spoil the broth, and conflicting calls could tear a team apart.
But master and disciple—Sanwang and Lee Hye-jung—had no such worries.
“By erasing the laning phase and pressuring through side pushes, they force the enemy to hesitate. Going for her costs them. Ignoring her costs them even more.”
“At this point, the game’s already over.”
What could they do when forced into a no-win scenario?
If they targeted Lee Hye-jung’s lane, the main force would crush the other side. If they focused the main force, her lane would snowball out of control.
Thus—
“They never get the fight they want.”
“If they can’t force a teamfight at all……”
“They win without fighting! Hah!”
It wasn’t just the enemy formation being controlled. The main force had to track how far the side push had advanced, while the side laner had to read the main force’s position to know exactly how far they could push.
That was why it was called “line” control.
Mir Guild’s dual-commander line control.
And when such a strategy succeeded, the next step became possible.
Just like this.
— “Those were two matches with exceptionally high strategic depth, wouldn’t you agree, Analyst?”
— “Absolutely. That was the kind of line control you usually only see in Europe. EU teams are fearless when it comes to strategy and tactics.”
— “The momentum has completely shifted to Mir Guild. Now only one set remains—the final set.”
— “The last set…… huh?”
— “Hold on. Both teams have made roster changes for the third set.”
Sewoon Guild had gone all-in during the first two sets, fielding a roaming midlaner, an assassin jungler, and a mobile support to counter Lee Hye-jung’s line control.
But Mir Guild’s response was—
— “Lee Hye-jung and Kang Malsuk have been subbed out. In their place are the classic mage dealer Ahn Jong-su and Second Team’s initiator tank Choi Soo-pil.”
— “Sewoon Guild got completely played! A standard mage mid and an initiator top—that’s textbook! Mir Guild is bringing out the standard composition instead!!”
Lee Shin was smiling.
Just like Sanwang on the screen.
“Trick Show. Fun, isn’t it?”