TCWSITD – Chapter 40.2

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Chapter 40.2 – Witnessing Lin Jiang At His Peak

In the break room, Li Qian finally showed a satisfied smile. Beside him, Fang Luxing kept praising Li Qian for his accurate judgment of people, then went on to commend Lin Jiang for his exceptional performance today.

“Exceptional performance?” Li Qian almost laughed.

For Lin Jiang, this was just his normal level of play.

It seemed this old fox had hidden himself well. Even the coach who’s with him day and night couldn’t fully see all of Lin Jiang’s depths.

After losing the first game, YIG decisively banned Lin Jiang’s LeBlanc in the second game. Midway, they also pulled off a flex pick, using Lucian mid to counter Lin Jiang’s Galio.

Coupled with YIG’s seamless jungle-support synergy, OT regrettably lost the second game.

In the third game, OT had first pick, forcing YIG to ban both LeBlanc and Lucian.

Fore, unwilling to give up, locked in Zed once again.

This time, Lin Jiang’s Galio was left open. He seized it without hesitation, ending the game with a nightmare of full-map support.

Fore’s Zed was indeed well-played, but he couldn’t stop Lin Jiang’s roams. With Lin Jiang’s precise timing, both top and bottom lanes were carried to victory.

The jungle-support synergy was effortlessly dismantled by him. Just one game on Galio, and it was enough to terrify YIG into never letting it through again.

After the three games concluded, OT had secured the match point.

But the key still lay with LeBlanc.

In a situation where they could neither ban nor leave LeBlanc open, Fore made a bold decision: “First-pick LeBlanc.”

He still wanted to try one more time.

Seeing this, Old Mao blurted out, “Fore is done for.”

The live chat asked: [Done for? What are you talking about?]

“Lin Jiang’s LeBlanc is untouchable.And you think someone else can outplay him with his own signature pick?”

Thinking it over carefully, it actually made perfect sense.

When your signature champion was taken by the enemy team, it means you already know everything about them—their damage output, cooldown timings, and every possible combo they can throw at you.

For Fore to outplay Lin Jiang with LeBlanc, he’d have to be even better than Lin Jiang.

But Lin Jiang’s LeBlanc was internationally recognized. He was the first domestic player to own a LeBlanc championship skin.

The next second, OT immediately locked in Zed the Master of Shadows.

The audience roared in astonishment. Even the commentators were shaken by Lin Jiang’s boldness. “Both sides have swapped their first-game picks. Is river aiming for a teaching match here?”

A “teaching match”[mfn]教学局 (jiào xué jú) – slang; it refers to when a more skilled player humiliates or dominates another by using the latter’s usual champion, flipping the table to “teach” them how it’s really done. In the context of the story, Fore’s Zed couldn’t beat Lin Jiang’s LeBlanc in the previous game. Now that Fore picked LeBlanc, Lin Jiang chose Zed to defeat him, showing him how it should be done.[/mfn] refers to a match where you defeat your opponent with the very champion they once lost to you with.

It was a display of dominance that typically only occurred when the skill gap between two players was undeniably vast.

For Lin Jiang to turn this into a teaching match, it would mean one thing—his skill level had to completely overpower Emperor F.

Fore was infuriated by Lin Jiang’s arrogance. Good. It had been years since anything got his blood boiling like this.

Then let him see—just what kind of moves Lin Jiang could pull off.

Both sides skipped the Level 1 fight and headed straight to lane.

At Level 1, LeBlanc had the advantage of range and mobility, so Lin Jiang avoided direct confrontation.

He waited for minions to drop low, then used his Q to secure the last hits.

Fore tried to replicate Lin Jiang’s play from the first game. But the moment he raised his hand to cast his W, Lin Jiang had already backed off—if Fore dared to step forward, Lin Jiang would hit him with a shuriken.

The minion wave forced Fore to hold back. The pressure on the lane was too much to risk a reckless engage.

He hit Level 2 first and immediately went on the offensive, ready to land a quick combo on Lin Jiang.

But to his astonishment, Lin Jiang replicated Fore’s own play from the first game—instantly killing a minion, upgrading to Level 2, and swapping positions in seconds!

But when it came time to turn back and re-engage, he made a completely different choice.

Instead of turning back to land a double Q, he stood among the minions, testing Fore’s reactions.

Fore was trapped—he managed to land a mark, but there was no way to trigger it. He couldn’t retreat, and there was no opening to escape. In the end, he had no choice but to take the full brunt of Lin Jiang’s double Q combo.

By this point, many viewers had already figured it out.

Fore’s LeBlanc wasn’t above Lin Jiang’s. In fact, from the very start, every step he took had played right into Lin Jiang’s hands.

And Lin Jiang’s Zed might actually surpass Fore’s—his reactions and decision-making clearly led to more favorable outcomes!

In a duel between masters, victory is decided in an instant.

Perhaps earlier, Fore still held onto a sliver of wishful thinking but at this moment, he understood—Lin Jiang’s mastery over LeBlanc had already reached extreme.

He had never witnessed Lin Jiang at his peak, unable to imagine the dominance of his prime.

But after these last two games, he finally understood what it meant when people said Lin Jiang once made opponents tremble at his name.

When both hit Level 3, Lin Jiang’s pressure only intensified.

Rather than stubbornly fight back, Fore made a rare and clear-headed decision—he acknowledged his shortcomings and chose to pivot.

He held back and shifted his attention to OT’s bot lane.

The commentators couldn’t help but nod in approval. “As expected of Emperor F—he knew when to yield. If you can’t win in lane, don’t force it—target their other lanes instead.”

Forcing Fore to retreat was Lin Jiang’s first step .

This move disrupted YIG’s jungle-support synergy.

The second step was to defeat them in team fights.

As the mids and junglers from both teams raced down to the bot lane, the commentators burst into excitement. “All four players are here! A 4v4 is about to break out near the dragon pit!”

No sooner had he spoken than YIG’s support initiated an attack.

At the same time, both top laners activated Teleport!

The commentators went wild again. “It’s 5v5! A full 5v5 team fight! Oh my god, this is insane!”

Very few teams dared to commit a 5v5 fight over the first dragon. It just showed how ferocious both teams were today.

Everyone was ready to go all out—no holding back.

During the four seconds of channeling their Teleports, Lin Jiang and Fore swapped lanes almost simultaneously.

Fore went straight for Shen Ju, attempting to burst him down. Shen Ju, mid-combo, sensed the danger and instantly Flashed, dodging the crucial chain and barely escaping with his life.

Lin Jiang pulled off a flawless sequence—casting W, Flash, and his ultimate all at once, weaving past the enemy support’s crowd control. The moment he landed, he shredded the enemy AD carry in an instant.

With two more blinks, he narrowly avoided two crucial skills and successfully returned to A’Deng’s side.

Someone still tried to kill Lin Jiang, but A’Deng kicked them away with a single strike!

Both top laners landed simultaneously, reigniting the team fight!

Fore had already lost the initiative and could only retreat. Meanwhile, Shen Ju, with his critically low health, went on a rampage, whittling down all their HP to dangerous levels.

Once their cooldowns reset, Fore readied himself to reengage. But then, a shadow flickered across his vision. He instinctively shifted to dodge a crossing double Q combo.

To his horror, Lin Jiang suddenly snapped back to his original position—and unleashed a double Q combo from his real form!

This—!

Fore’s eyes shook in disbelief!

The “true form double Q” is a technique where Zed uses his W to pivot his real body, changing the direction of his main Q attack so that both Q projectiles overlap perfectly—dealing double damage!

The hand speed required for this move was absolutely inhuman!

Fore had attempted it countless times in training, yet his success rate never exceeded 40%. So how on earth did Lin Jiang pull it off flawlessly on his very first attempt?

The blades landed, blood splattered everywhere.

After killing LeBlanc, Zed left behind a chilling remark: “Only the worthy will survive.”

Without looking back, he vanished into the shadows.

The screen turned gray, clearly reflecting Fore’s shaken gaze.

He had always believed he’d mastered his assassin champions to near perfection. Even after being solo-killed by Lin Jiang’s LeBlanc, he refused to accept that Lin Jiang was truly above him.

But that “true form double Q” just now—

It forced him to concede defeat!

His mind kept rewinding the moment, watching Zed in Lin Jiang’s hands as if it had a life of its own, every movement infused with human-like intelligence.

He couldn’t help but wonder: had he ever truly mastered Zed himself?

What were the exact conditions to pull off that “true form double Q”?

And what profound insight had Lin Jiang discovered within Zed?

Too many questions loomed over the battlefield like a crushing shadow, mercilessly shattering Fore’s confidence.

A terrifying thought struck him—

How much more terrifying must Lin Jiang have been at his prime—several times over?

The teamfight ended; YIG was wiped out. OT was left with only low-health Lin Jiang and Shen Ju, who took the dragon and cleared the minion waves.

Calm, composed, unstoppable.

As if they were savoring the banquet of victory.

YIG…

Could they really lose to OT?

The stadium fell into stunned silence. The audience held their breaths, eyes locked on this clash of the century.

After that team fight, it was like YIG had been drained of all strength. They no longer dared to initiate. OT, on the other hand, charged forward like a war hymn, ruthless and relentless.

The outcome of the game was something Old Mao had predicted long ago. He said, “A sly old fox like Lin Jiang must have tested Emperor F’s strength before daring to pick this champion. If he wasn’t sure, he never would’ve locked it in.”

From the moment Lin Jiang locked in Zed, it meant Fore was no match for him at all.

He cut the enemy’s vision, blinked in with Flash and W, opened with his ultimate.

Three Qs instantly killed the enemy AD.

And then, without a word, he turned and walked away.

The kill lasted less than two seconds. The enemy AD had only enough time to pop Heal—then dropped dead on the spot.

In front of the camera, Lin Jiang slowly smiled.

As if telling Fore—this is the true way of the Master of the Shadows.

To kill without a trace.

The game wasn’t over yet, but YIG’s defeat was already certain.

Fore’s forehead was drenched in cold sweat. For the first time, he felt that a game could be this suffocating.

When the hunter becomes the hunted, that feeling of giving your all yet being completely powerless, makes every nerve in his body throb violently.

Lin Jiang had changed.

In his playstyle…

…there was a trace of something hellish in Lin Jiang’s playstyle.

Fore had once crawled up from hell himself—he knew that feeling all too well. Lin Jiang had the same scent about him.

Having been infinitely close to hell, he understood the taste of defeat better than anyone. Wasn’t this battle for dignity also a battle for survival?

Only blood could quench the thirst of sharpened blades.

In the final team fight, Fore desperately tried to burst down Shen Ju—only to have Shen Ju dodge with a perfectly timed Flash again!

Was this the reaction speed of a new-generation AD?

He could already sense it—Shen Ju was a player people had seriously underestimated.

The moment he hit the ground, Fore already knew his fate.

Defeat…

YIG had completely lost.

Numbness spread from his fingers to his heart. Watching his teammates fall one by one as the Nexus slowly shattered, Fore weakly accepted it all

Amidst the roaring applause and blinding stage lights…

He looked at Lin Jiang again, still unable to comprehend. What exactly had changed about him?

Within Lin Jiang’s usual calm demeanor, he’d glimpsed a face of hell.

During the handshake, Fore gripped Lin Jiang’s hand tightly and couldn’t help himself from asking, “What’s your success rate for triggering the ‘true form double Q’?”

Lin Jiang smiled, leaned in to whisper a few words in his ear, then straightened up and walked away.

Fore stood frozen, his whole body rigid.

As Lin Jiang stood on stage, basked in dazzling light, bowing gracefully to the cheering crowd—

Fore could still hear his words ringing in his ears:

“One hundred percent.”

What kind of hand speed would it take…

To trigger it with one hundred percent certainty?

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