The Sad Truth

The duel ran on the official one-versus-one rules. Score the first kill, or be the first to take down a hundred CS, and the win was yours. A single recall was permitted, and the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠bushes above and below the mid lane marked the boundary—cross them and you lost. Summoner spells, runes, and items were all fair game.

A heavy tension hung over the match. For the sake of seeing the bit through, I had put Teemo in Soldier's hands, but the truth was that Teemo was hardly a pushover in a straight one-versus-one. And this was no ordinary Challenger, either. This was Teemo ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠in the hands of Soldier, a former pro with a World Series title to his name. An off-meta pick meant his mastery would sit well below his usual standard, but letting my guard down was out of the question. So, into Teemo, I locked the single best champion I could actually play.

Annie. She came with a good memory attached—the champion I had picked in the final round of my one-versus-one against Mia, and won with.

The viewers' read was mostly right. Malphite is generally known as Teemo's counter, but that story only holds in the lower ranks. Climb high enough, take the jungle out of it, and leave the two of them in a true one-versus-one, and Teemo is the one who wins more often than not.

Malphite's usual path to a win is to shave Teemo down with Q poke, then look for a kill window after level six, once the ultimate is online. In the upper tiers, though, he loses health to the auto-plus-Q trade, and even when he tries to gamble everything on the ultimate, Teemo simply Flashes it more often than not. Plenty of Teemos also slip in a Ruby Crystal to fatten their health pool against a surprise one-shot—and if they take the mythic Riftmaker on top of that, the omnivamp means a trade barely dents them before they are full again, so a kill window never opens in the first place.

Factor in the gap in raw mechanics between Soldier and me, and Malphite was no answer at all. So what was I supposed to lock in? I already knew. Annie. From the mechanics of her kit on up, she was the champion who simply sat on Teemo—his true counter.

When the two of them trade, Teemo can land an auto and a Q. Annie can land a Q, a W, and an auto, with Electrocute damage piled on as a bonus. And the reason that works at all is Annie's passive: her fourth spell stuns the target. That passive is what turns the exchange into a small miracle.

The matchup is simple. If Annie walks in with her passive primed and refuses to spend a spell, it is already over, and Teemo has nothing he can do. Their Qs reach almost the same distance, so the instant he tries to poke, Annie's Q is already flying back. He is stunned, and then he has no choice but to eat the W and the auto that follow. Three hits in a short window, and Electrocute triggers—that part is just the bonus. One lonely Q, even if he works for it and sneaks in an extra auto, comes back as three hits plus rune damage. After level six an ultimate with monstrous damage joins the sequence, and the moment the stun lands, Ignite turns the whole thing into a one-combo delete.

There are probably naive souls out there thinking you can just trade once she spends her spells on CS and the passive drops. But this was a one-versus-one with no jungle to intervene, and if Annie simply walked forward with her stun stacked, Teemo had no choice but to give ground. It was one of those peculiar matchups whose unfairness you cannot really feel until you have played it yourself.

The game began under the viewers' hesitant anticipation, and the result came out more blandly than anyone had expected.

"......Is this me? I might be stronger than I thought."

Soldier had nothing to say. The first kill, though, was unmistakably mine. After two trades or so he realized that playing like this meant death, and he buckled down and played with painful care—but the result was the same either way. The moment I hit level six I committed with Flash-Q, and unlike Malphite's ultimate, Annie's targeted Q struck Teemo dead-on. What followed—W, ultimate, Electrocute, Ignite, and an auto—roasted the obnoxious little poison badger where he stood.

"Soldier? I think I won."

"Yes. That's correct. Congratulations."

He still showed nothing you could call an emotion, and the viewers' chat began, little by little, to wilt. That would not do. I had burned a full three hundred points upgrading my abilities just for today's broadcast, and I was supposed to let it end like this?

Not a chance.

I set my jaw and turned the aggro on. A point-blank taunt, aimed at nothing less than a World Series champion.

"Soldier, please don't take it too hard."

"Sorry?"

"......Ha!"

The chat detonated.

The effect of you're up against me was more tremendous than I had expected. I had won by leaning on a champion matchup, yes, but the symbolism of beating Soldier in ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a one-versus-one was even larger than I had thought, and thanks to that the YouTube video uploaded late that afternoon was a smash. Views, obviously—but the subscribers jumped as well, and before I knew it I was staring down forty-five thousand.

There was something even more encouraging. Soldier, having taken the bait, fired back with one more game!—and even in the second match, Teemo could not get over Annie's wall. As expected, the pinnacle of Teemo deletion was Annie. Once the result landed that way, Soldier, who was not the type to make excuses in the first place, could not muster even one, and ended up the sacrificial offering for my next piece of content: an educational one-versus-one series built around top-lane champions.

Soldier did not touch YouTube at all, but the fame of a World Series winner was enormous, and his fans had been thirsty for a long time. Word spread fast. On the rumor that you could finally see him not in old broadcast VODs of official matches, but in footage of what he was doing now, my subscriber count had been climbing at a steep angle since early this morning.

It was a stroke of luck I had not seen coming at all. Even the goal I had been quietly doubting—a hundred thousand YouTube subscribers before Mia's birthday—was starting to look possible.

"So, for that reason, I'm skipping today's workout."

"What? You leave out everything that came before and just say for that reason—how am I supposed to know what that means?"

"If you're curious, watch my YouTube videos without missing a single one!"

When the tide comes in, you row, so I canceled every other schedule as well. For the time being I was all-in on content with my sacrificial lamb. As promised, the one-versus-one lesson with Soldier would go live today at five.

The viewer count broke its own record two days running. Yesterday it had touched fifteen hundred. Today it cleared seventeen hundred. I still remembered the baptism of Water Balloons that had poured down like a waterfall the moment I beat Soldier on yesterday's broadcast. My heart loosened on its own, and I filled right up with the spirit of fan service. So I tried adding a little something to how I addressed him.

"Soldier oppa. Please look after me in today's lesson."

"......Y-yes?"

Well, well. That reaction was a little... I had just found a weakness I never saw coming.

As Legend of League caught on, I started paying attention to it, and with time I became a fan of quite a few pro players. Even among them, of course, there was an order. Fake, the mid laner known in name and in fact as the greatest in the world. Wonder, retired now, once called the god of the jungle. And third, Soldier, dominator of the top lane.

I called myself a fan, but I was not the fervent kind who knew their little habits and hobbies. I simply liked the level of their play and the flash of their mechanics, and I liked the effort and the passion that had carried them to the very top. Which was why the Soldier I ended up ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠broadcasting with, brought together with me by nothing but chance, came as a considerable surprise. Put it in a cheaper, blunter word, and I suppose you would say he broke the spell.

Twenty-eight. Watch the way he played in his prime and he was always up in the top lane, holding it down, a presence that simply did not fall. So I had imagined the man himself would match: a big frame, few words, a blunt and square-jawed man's man. Reality was something else entirely.

"Uh, um, so... the..."

"Oppa?"

"Y-yes?"

Soldier was not a blunt man's man of twenty-eight. I cried, and every viewer watching the broadcast cried with me. He was twenty-eight years old, and he had been single since the day he was born.