Volume 1 Chapter 16 - Please Don't Feed!

Mental breakdown.

At times, when Tuan Zi and Lu You were commentating, He Yu would listen to them describing the situation. Most commonly, the term ‘mental breakdown’ was used in the phrase, “Under such circumstances, I would have already had a mental breakdown”. Usually, a comparison was made using oneself in contrast to the opponent being hard to defeat.

Therefore, He Yu’s understanding of this term was an expression of feeling depressed, hopeless, and irritated. It must really be negative and a burden to bear.

At that moment, He Yu felt like he was at the brink of it.

Two mages and two marksman heroes. No top laner, no jungler, no support heroes. What role should he play? With the experience and knowledge he had gathered from watching KPL, He Yu realized there were no solutions to his problem. Regardless, due to his cognition of the game, he decided to analyze the situation calmly.

I should be….a jungler?

In the end, He Yu decided to play jungler. He thought it would be a waste if no one was to gain experience or gold through the jungle.

The only issue was the choice of heroes available……

Other than the free hero Arthur and the hero Genghis Khan he purchased, the other four heroes that he got from the beginner’s package were Luban, Lady Zhen, Liu Shan, and Zhuang Zhou. Of these four heroes, none was suitable for jungle.

So what was there to consider? Without hesitation, he locked in the hero Genghis Khan. Now his team consisted of two mages and three marksman heroes.

“I’ll jungle.” He Yu sent in the game chat room. He then selected the summoner’s ability ‘Smite’ – for junglers to use on jungle monsters. That was his most reliable option of summoner’s ability among others. He was new and his game level was low, therefore the popular summoner’s ability ‘Flash’ was locked.

The game loaded and their opponents were revealed. They were the heroes Arthur, Angela, Hou Yi, Luban, and Ake.

Among them, Angela was a mage, and Hou Yi and Luban were both marksman heroes, so all three were damage output heroes. Compared to his team, with five damage output heroes, it was arguable that they had a winning chance. However, what concerned He Yu was the hero Ake.

Ake was an assassin hero, entirely aggressive and explosive. Squishy heroes feared the existence of this hero. Looking at his team, with all of them being squishy heroes, He Yu realized what nightmare the hero Ake could cause. Ake could just roam from lane to lane collecting kills after bursting down every single one of them.

How should I play?

He Yu felt that his years of knowledge accumulated had just gone to waste. He had no idea how to play this Bronze rank game.

The game started with the system sounding, “Welcome to the King’s Glory.” It was supposed to make people excited. But He Yu was having a headache due to the team composition.

He Yu’s teammates were enthusiastic. The two mages went mid lane while the other two marksman heroes went bottom lane once the game started. Sure enough, no one jungled…

But…no one bothered to go to the top lane either?

He Yu could not believe it. Top laner was a role played to control the pace and held huge responsibility, yet none of his teammates could be bothered to fill the lane.

“Attention to protect ally turrets!” He Yu sent an in-game voice command, hoping someone would go top lane. As if they were in their own world, his teammates ignored him. How was it possible to play this game?

How do I play this now?!?

He Yu was mind-blown. The jungle could be left untouched, but someone had to be in control of the top lane and guard the turrets. Just like that, with the summoner’s ability meant for jungling, He Yu proceeded to the top lane.

Thirty seconds passed and minions had spawned, and the mid laners rushed to clear the minion wave. He Yu hid in the bush to observe the situation instead of rushing to clear the minions. It was to play safe, as his laning opponents might be Hou Yi and Luban, two marksman heroes. If they were to engage in a fight, He Yu was definitely no match against the two. So He Yu’s plan was to play safe.

Even after some time, his opponents were still not to be seen. He Yu guessed they were clearing jungle monsters and he wandered to the river nearby to clear the small monster.

This was one of the tactics used by top laners. To clear the small monster while the opponent was clearing the red sentinel for the red buff.

As his opponents were two marksman heroes clearing the red sentinel, they would definitely clear it faster. However, with the summoner’s ability smite and having stored two charges of his second skill, He Yu was confident he could clear the small monster faster. His second skill was a trap he could set up at an allocated place that lasted 120 seconds. Any hero that stepped on it would have their movement speed reduced and receive damage. This skill was able to store up to two traps and every 12 seconds a trap would be ready. He was thinking of using these two stored traps to clear the small monster. This shouldn’t be a problem.

While analyzing, he used his hero to basic attack the small monster. At the same time, he observed other lanes through the minimap.

Mid lane and bottom lane are doing fine but where are the top laners?

He was just wondering when the opposing hero Hou Yi appeared from the opposite jungle.

That was fast, how did they manage to get red buff using such a short time?

He Yu quickly turned back to retreat to his turret. Then, he saw that behind Hou Yi were Arthur, Luban, and Ake.

Wow, four of them?

Now he understood how they got red buff that quickly. However, he was too late, he couldn’t retreat to safety in time. He had thought he was going to jungle, so he had bought the jungle dagger item. His opponents had bought the item ‘boots’ and the four of them had an extra movement speed of 30. They attacked He Yu…

First Blood!

He Yu’s hero was slain, giving the first kill to the opposing team. He was extremely pissed. At this point, his teammates finally reacted.

“Don’t feed, thanks.” His bottom lane teammate Hou Yi sent.

Feed?

He Yu was exploding with anger.

How could his teammate say that he fed? It was a gang kill! Even if one was a top player, there was no way one could escape that ambush attack. It was so unpredictable.

After he respawned, He Yu rushed back to his top lane. The opponent’s four-man gang at level one had pushed the lane and almost hacked his turret down. The first minion wave was not strong enough and the four had to back off.

He Yu went to kill the small monster, finally getting his hero to level two. He learned his first skill—Eagle Eye. He launched the skill in the opponent’s direction and got vision of enemy hero Luban dazed under its turret. Hou Yi was hiding in the bush while Arthur and Ake were nowhere to be seen.

Although his lane was left with two enemies, he didn’t dare to play aggressive, hiding under his turret’s protection to farm minions. When his first skill was ready again, he released the skill and saw Ake farming the jungle. Arthur was now seen at mid lane, clearing up the minions, and then heading for the bottom lane.

He Yu used the in-game quick notice function and warned his teammates in the bottom lane.

However, Arthur did not approach the bottom lane in the way he had expected. Arthur went in from his territory and He Yu’s bottom teammates let loose skill shots onto Arthur, forcing him to retreat. He Yu felt like his warnings were redundant.

The third time, He Yu released his first skill towards the opponent’s Blue buff monster. He saw that the opponent’s jungle was fully cleared, and looking at his own jungle, he felt wasted.

Then, he got vision of Ake heading towards the bottom lane through the river. Once again, he warned his teammates to be aware of the river bush.

Nonetheless, He Yu’s teammates were still putting pressure on the bottom lane, playing aggressively, totally ignorant of his warnings. He Yu could not withstand it anymore and typed into the game chat room, “Ake headed for the bottom lane!!”

Just as he finished, Ake jumped out from the bush and used her ult. She became invisible and got behind He Yu’s teammates. This would trigger her passive which dealt more critical damage when attacking from the opponent’s back. Both of He Yu’s teammates Luban and Hou Yi did not have time to react and were both dropped to the ground within seconds.

Upon his teammates’ death, He Yu typed into the game chat box, “Don’t feed, thanks.”