Chapter Eighty-Seven: Head-On Clash!

“Why is Montague’s little soldier showing up again?”

“I swear, I was completely stunned.”

“Does anyone here know what’s going on?”

Lin Hao glanced at the lively chat room, coughed twice, and began to explain.

“This is a little trick for Montague. You could call it the hidden-troops technique.”

“Montague’s ultimate can be aimed in different directions, and most players probably don’t know that.”

“As long as Montague is pressed against a wall, with the skill wheel at a right angle to the wall, he can activate his ultimate.”

“At that point, the soldiers tuck themselves right behind the wall, effectively clipping through it.”

“Of course, it has to be a sturdy wall. Besides the edge of the canyon, the wall behind the three little pigs in the red side jungle, above midlane, also works.”

“At that moment, the enemy had either just finished a midlane team fight or had only just respawned from base. In any case, they probably didn’t see the move where I summoned the ultimate.”

“So I simply stood between the second tower and the wall at the edge of the canyon, back to the wall, and started taking down the tower. Once Angela came over, I just smashed him with a full combo.”

“I imagine Angela must have looked utterly bewildered.”

After Lin Hao’s explanation, the viewers finally understood.

“You can play it like that?”

“Nice move, tipping now!”

“I’m going to try this in the canyon!”

“Haha, those three went from hunters to prey. They must be furious!”

Lin Hao also received rage points from the three of them, not many, only two or three hundred each.

Probably more confusion and doubt than anger, though.

Doubt over when Montague’s soldiers had appeared.

...

After that fight, the enemy’s momentum was completely broken.

At first, when Nakoruru and Red Swordflower rushed over, they only managed to catch a Sun Bin who had no time to escape.

The main tempo-setters, Little Farm and Firecracker, had already tucked in their tails and fled at full speed with a boost.

Instead, Lin Hao’s side picked up the pace again.

After taking a moment to reset, Lin Hao followed his teammates straight down midlane to press the advantage.

From there, the rhythm became simple.

After forcing down the second mid tower, Lin Hao immediately rotated to push top lane.

The enemy jungler, Warm Sun, could only silently start farming.

Their early-game rhythm had been smooth, but once it met Montague, it kept running into walls.

They wanted to shut down Montague’s development, but he turned their pressure into a stunning counterkill with unbelievable play.

“I never saw the enemy’s Montague this disgusting in KPL matches,” Warm Sun muttered as he glanced at Lin Hao’s build. “This kind of aggressive build, and he still tanks so much damage. This hero is ridiculous. Why hasn’t the balance team nerfed him?”

Of course, Warm Sun was only venting in private. He knew Montague had severe limitations.

But in this match, Montague had become an unstoppable force.

The tide had slowly turned. Under Lin Hao’s lead, his teammates followed him in a relentless advance, pushing from top lane all the way through and taking the second tower along the way.

At ten minutes, Lin Hao’s side took the Overlord and continued the siege.

With Lin Hao leading the way, Little Farm’s tempo also began to build. Once Little Farm entered its own rhythm, that high-pressure tower siege would leave the enemy with no room to breathe.

Warm Sun had already seen that the wind had changed. Before the enemy could continue pushing, he abandoned any idea of creating tempo and instead focused on catching up in gold.

Now his economy had climbed to first place across the canyon, opening a huge gap between himself and his teammates.

“As long as I catch one chance to win a team fight and snowball off it, I can still bring the tempo back.”

Warm Sun quietly told himself this.

But Lin Hao gave him no opening at all. With a Dragon Soldier and lane pressure already in place, they went straight to storm the high ground.

This newly added Dragon Soldier was a feature introduced this season in Glory of Kings. The player who defeats the Overlord can choose to release a Dragon Soldier down one lane, along with a shockwave. The shockwave clears out all enemy minions in its path, after which the Dragon Soldier emerges from the fountain immediately, without conflicting with normal minion-spawn timing.

The enemy’s crowded mid high-ground tower was packed with bodies, and Firecracker tossed a cat bomb straight in, blowing away about a third of the backline’s health.

At that moment, the timing was especially awkward: the Dragon Soldier was already marching up, and the enemy had no choice but to defend.

Flowerblade stood in front, switched to heavy sword form, and braced himself while Angela’s skills all flew into the Dragon Soldier.

Clearing the wave is, of course, the most important part of defending a high-ground fight. If the defenders clear the minions, they can halt the enemy’s push.

For the attackers, the higher the level of play, the more they know to hit the tower first. Charging in recklessly under the tower is dangerous; if they fail to catch the enemy’s damage dealer and get pulled apart instead, their formation will break, and they may be turned on in an instant.

But Lin Hao had no intention of focusing on the tower.

In most cases, wherever Flowerblade and Angela stood, everyone else would keep clear. But Lin Hao simply activated his ultimate, maintained the wild-geese formation, and charged straight into Angela and Flowerblade’s faces, tanking the damage head-on.

Montague’s rage meter filled up quickly, and he thrust his spear!

Angela and Flowerblade’s health dropped in a flash!

At the same time, Little Farm’s ultimate came down and knocked Angela into the air.

“To deal high DPS in team fights with Montague, you have to learn to anticipate your rage!”

This was a straight-up beam clash, with little room for footwork. Even so, Lin Hao could still spare some attention to continue speaking amid the chaos.

“Look at my every spear thrust. They’re all fully charged!”

Montague drove his spear forward again and again!

Angela was the first to collapse and flashed away!

Just then, Firecracker’s second bomb came down, instantly taking Angela’s head and then Flowerblade’s as well, still stubbornly hanging on.

“Damn, that Sheepy’s playing like a rat in the grass!”

Lin Hao shouted in surprise, but his hands never stopped moving. Montague sidestepped like a crab, thrusting with his spear at the same time, and Lin Hao pressed flash to shift position instantly.

Ha!

In the distance, Genghis Khan was struck by the spear from Montague’s five-man formation and fell to the ground!

To be honest, Genghis Khan had it rough as well. Though he had crushed one lane early on, his kills and farm were both split up by Nakoruru. His midgame tempo was poor, and he kept dying in midlane team fights, leaving his economy only in third place.

He took two bombs from Firecracker in this high-ground fight, then got speared to death after Lin Hao’s attack into flash.

At that moment, Warm Sun’s Nakoruru finally found a sliver of opportunity.

After circling around from the enemy’s top high-ground tower, Nakoruru entered from the flank!

His target was the lumbering bear, Little Farm, paper-thin without its main body!