A Matter of Time

Around the nineteen-minute mark of the match, the kill score between the Blue and Purple teams was already 25 to 10.

Of the 25 kills secured by the Blue team, 10 belonged to Tu Dou's Top Caitlyn, while 5 went to the Mid Syndra and ADC Graves.

The remaining 10 kills were claimed entirely by Lin Xiao's solo Jungle Annie.

With such an extraordinary scoreline, only 10 kills on the entire map had nothing to do with him.

Such an unconventional Jungle Annie playstyle, when placed in Lin Xiao's hands, displayed a power and efficiency that left everyone dumbfounded.

If nothing else, at this point, a single combo from Lin Xiao's Annie could easily burst down any champion on the Purple team in an instant, as simple as eating or drinking water.

On the other hand, although the Blue team's draft looked extremely bizarre—almost like they were just trolling—once they secured an absolute advantage on the field, it actually produced a miraculous effect.

When sieging turrets, Caitlyn and Annie, both having extremely long auto-attack ranges, were responsible for chipping away at the turret's health.

In teamfights, the burst damage from the two mages, Annie and Syndra, could almost instantly delete any of the enemy's squishy carries.

Then there was the burst from Graves, the sustained long-range damage from Caitlyn, and the Support Leona, who could both engage and peel, acting as a frontline after building enough tank items.

Conversely, the Purple team was having a massive headache dealing with this unconventional draft.

To put it this way, if they wanted to win a teamfight, their best bet was to quickly assassinate the enemy's main damage dealers, with the ADC and Mid mage being the most obvious targets.

But now, their Blue team opponents had four main damage threats, excluding the Support Leona!

Did Graves deal high damage?

Not just him, there was also a Top Caitlyn happily dealing damage from afar.

Did Syndra have high burst?

Apologies, but the enemy's Jungle Annie possessed massive AoE damage with terrifying scaling.

The Purple team's Jungle Lee Sin was also very conflicted. If he wanted to dive the enemy's backline, who exactly was the best target to kick back?

It seemed kicking anyone wouldn't make much of a difference!

Truth be told, facing a multi-threat lineup like the Blue team, the only thing the Purple team could exploit was that their opponents were relatively squishy. Under such circumstances, it should have been easy for the Purple team's Top Fiora to showcase her prowess.

With one ultimate, she could probably shave off nearly half the health of all the enemy squishies, harvesting them like grass.

Unfortunately, the Fiora player's scaling was simply too poor.

She was shut down three times in the early game, then solo-killed once by Caitlyn, and subsequently suppressed by Caitlyn's range to the point of being unable to function. Up until now, the Fiora player hadn't even finished a single major item.

Furthermore, in reality...

He didn't even have a chance to make a move.

...

At the 20-minute mark, the Blue team grouped up to push the enemy's Mid inner turret.

Relying on his highly enhanced mana pool, Lin Xiao didn't even wait for Tu Dou's Caitlyn to chip down the turret. Instead, seizing the perfect opportunity, he directly used Flash to engage.

Annie's small figure charged forward like lightning in a flash of golden light.

Her small, delicate hand lifted—

Ultimate, "Summon: Tibbers"! The roaring fiery bear crashed down from the void, slamming right onto the Purple team's Top Fiora and Support Nami.

Stunned!!

Quickly following up with a W "Incinerate", the squishy Purple Support Nami was instantly vaporized under the massive AoE damage of Annie's two skills. The Top Fiora couldn't hold on much longer either; hit by Annie's Q "Disintegrate", her health bar instantly dropped to zero.

"Double Kill!!"

Just like that, in the blink of an eye, Lin Xiao secured a double kill.

Having lost their main backline threat, the remaining three members of the Purple team could no longer pose any threat to the Blue team.

In the end, it was a clean ace.

Before the Blue team could even destroy the Nexus, the Purple team collectively voted to surrender.

Lin Xiao and Tu Dou easily and efficiently won their very first duo queue match on the Korean server.

...

As Lin Xiao was preparing to queue for the second match with Tu Dou, his QQ chimed.

Since they could only use pinyin to chat on the Korean server, which was too inconvenient, Yu Ge chose to message Lin Xiao via QQ.

Opening the chat window, Yu Ge sent an excited message:

"This footage is usable, excellent!"

Lin Xiao was surprised: "This can be used? It's only the first game, right?"

He still remembered when he first recorded footage for Yu Ge's "CN Server's Number One God Hook" video, it took a lot of effort and many ranked games to complete.

In the production team's office, looking at the message from "Hui Qi Lian Dao" in the chat window, Yu Ge smiled and typed:

"Yes, the footage of your Jungle Annie and your friend's Top Caitlyn in this match is highly outstanding. Such an off-meta draft is very gimmicky and will attract a lot of attention."

While explaining to him, Yu Ge also felt a bit of admiration in her heart:

Using off-meta champions to gather footage wasn't the main point; it mostly depended on the player's skill to make the footage exciting enough.

Then again, she had collaborated with many high-elo CN server players to record videos, but none had an efficiency and quality as high as "Hui Qi Lian Dao"... He was truly one of a kind.

Seeing Yu Ge's explanation, Lin Xiao scratched his head and typed: "So does this mean the task is complete?"

Yu Ge: "Hmm, consider it half-complete. For this special episode, we plan to compile footage from multiple ranked games. After all, this match ended a bit too quickly. This footage will be for the lower-tier segment. For the second segment, it would be best to have a high-elo match."

Lin Xiao understood and asked: "High-elo, meaning Challenger tier on the Korean server?"

Yu Ge: "Hmm... Actually, Diamond tier footage would already be ideal, but if you can climb to Challenger, that would be even better."

Hmm, Challenger on the Korean server...

Lin Xiao thought for a moment and replied honestly: "I might not have time to climb to Challenger recently. I need to study for my exams."

These words were completely genuine.

But such a message in the eyes of Yu Ge's production team left everyone, including Yu Ge, speechless.

Not climbing to Challenger on the Korean server... simply because he didn't have time?

Tou Gu said with a dumbfounded expression: "Holy crap, this Hui Qi Lian Dao has a massive ego. According to him, if he had enough time, reaching Challenger on the Korean server would be child's play?"

Tao Zi's beautiful eyes sparkled as she praised: "What a great excuse! I love a confident man!"

Miao Miao reminded her: "Tao Zi, I think Hui Qi Lian Dao is still just a middle schooler..."

Tao Zi waved her hand dismissively: "No big deal, big sister likes younger guys!"