Chapter 61: Red Potion Renekton, Level 3 Tower Dive!

Not building up fury, and not knowing how to coordinate?

That was precisely the effect they wanted. After all, a Renekton with fury was terrifying, while a Renekton with average fury was just a minor crocodile. Knowing the red fury was stacked, Kennen would instinctively exercise a bit more caution.

"Besides, nobody said we were going for a direct kill right away."

Shi Zhenyu emerged from the river, executing a lightning-fast Safeguard onto the minion wave to close the distance to Kennen, slamming his Iron Whiplash into the ground to deal damage while quickly applying the secondary slow.

"Hehehe—everyone must die!"

Swish! Swish!

Now at level two, Song Yuan instantly learned his E ability, pressing both dashes of Slice and Dice in quick succession. The moment the second part of his E clipped the corner of Kennen's clothing and his giant axe landed a basic attack, his crimson fury instantly surged past the halfway mark.

Splash!

[Dominus]

As an ability boasting a lavish 1.0 AD scaling, the modern Renekton fully embodied a beauty known simply as raw stats.

Kennen's health bar plummeted, blooming with spurts of blood.

"Oh crap, I'm dead, I'm dead."

A second ago, the BLQG top laner had been feeling quite smug about his ability to outplay a Diamond player from a Challenger's height and slowly grind the crocodile down, but now he was seized with sheer panic.

Fortunately, faced with the joint dive from the NXG top and jungle duo, he didn't completely lose his composure. While activating his E to create distance, he kept his eyes locked firmly on the Blind Monk's animation.

"Here it comes, I see it, Sonic Wave!"

Kennen felt as though his reaction speed had reached the absolute peak of his life.

"Hah!"

Bang!

Two flashes of white light flickered. Because the top lane was simply too long, Kennen's E movement speed boost could never guarantee him safety under his defensive tower, leaving BladeCrusher with no choice but to flash for his life.

"OK, Flash is blown, and we've chunked his HP quite a bit. The rest is up to you."

Seeing the enemy decisively burn their Flash, Shi Zhenyu turned around and walked away without the slightest hesitation.

Song Yuan gave a thumbs-up, saying confidently, "Just watch my show."

Up on the casting desk, Wa Wa and Joker were somewhat baffled by the Blind Monk's aggressive gank.

"That felt completely unnecessary. Although the Blind Monk forced Kennen's Flash, he didn't secure a kill. On the contrary, because he had to tank the minion wave, the Crocodile—who had already been poked down quite a bit earlier—is now in an even worse health state."

"Indeed, BLQG's Kennen can just rely on his Doran's Blade and ranged advantage to slowly regenerate his health..."

"That was impulsive. With the Blind Monk exposed in the upper quadrant, Caitlyn—who currently lacks both Summoner Spells—no longer needs to worry about jungle pressure and can wantonly suppress NXG's bot lane duo..."

NXG-norsha killed BLQG-BladeCrusher!

However, right as the two commentators were making their confident assessments, the system's female voice suddenly rang out with the kill announcement in-game.

The duo's subsequent commentary was abruptly choked off in their throats.

"Huh?"

"Wait, how did a solo kill just suddenly happen?!"

The eruption of a top-lane kill, paired with the commentators' stunned reactions, instantly set the live stream chat ablaze.

[Pfft, I'm dying of laughter, the slap in the face came as fast as a tornado.]

[The last second: NXG's top and jungle are impulsive, ganking top is pointless.]

[The next second: A kill erupts!]

[Renekton: Bro, what kind of elo are you, daring to question our decision-making?]

[Replay, is there a replay? I want to know how that solo kill happened, wasn't Kennen under his tower?]

[Same here, as a Renekton main, I want to know how the NXG god pulled that off.]

"Ahem, well then, let's take a look at the replay of the top lane kill together."

Wa Wa and Joker stood frozen in awkward silence for several seconds until the voice of the producer in their earpieces reminding them that the replay footage was ready finally rescued them.

On the main stage screen, the logo of the inaugural LPL league flashed past as a transition animation.

The view locked back onto the top lane.

The next second, a half-health Kennen was standing just outside the defensive tower range, attempting to abuse his attack-range advantage to farm minions and lifesteal, exactly as the audience had seen earlier.

The Blind Monk's unhesitating departure had provided Kennen with immense psychological comfort.

The enemy must have given up...

However, the NXG top laner—who had previously seemed unresponsive and somewhat clueless about playing Renekton—suddenly began aggressively auto-attacking the minions, giving off the impression that he wanted to quickly shove the wave and recall to buy items first.

Right at that moment, the time on the observer UI jumped forward—three minutes and nine seconds!

Renekton killed the last ranged minion, and a burst of leveling light suddenly bloomed on his body.

Level three!

Bang!

The familiar white light flashed once more.

The Desert Butcher, wielding two-thirds of his fury bar, suddenly materialized right beneath the defensive tower, accompanied by the Elixir of Fortitude disappearing from his item slot together with the flash.

Whoosh!

The hero's health bar surged upward by a significant chunk, and that wasn't all—the bloodthirsty beast also gained a boost in attack damage thanks to the potion's effect.

Auto-attack.

Swish!

Under the red-fury state, [Ruthless Predator] struck three times in rapid succession. Kennen's health plummeted while he was afflicted with a 1.5-second stun.

Ignite applied, followed up with an instant E-auto to squeeze out more damage. Through the seamless chaining of basic attacks and abilities, another fifty points of fury were miraculously generated.

"White meat, dark meat, it's all good meat."

The Desert Butcher swung his giant axe in a full circle to finish off the damage, ignoring the electric rat shivering at sliver health behind him as he stylishly dashed out of the tower with his second E.

Finally, the white true-damage numbers continued to tick above the hero's head, claiming Kennen's last shred of life.

[666!]

[Damn, that top laner has insane hand speed.]

[Flash, potion consumption, and red-fury W—he executed all those actions almost instantaneously.]

[Is Renekton really this busted? A half-health Kennen plus Ignite, and he just gets instantly deleted!]

[The NXG top laner has incredible attention to detail. He didn't deliberately wait to max out his fury, but initiated at just over two-thirds. After finishing his W, he relied on the fury gained from basic attacks and his E to pull off the red-fury Q damage right at the very end.]

[Looking at it that way, the jungler coming top earlier to chunk him out was definitely pre-planned. Otherwise, a full-health electric rat with superior range would have meant Renekton getting bullied would already count as individual skill.]

Indeed, Shi Zhenyu and Song Yuan's coordination had naturally been discussed and planned beforehand.

Among the gaming philosophies Jiang Ming instilled in his players was this golden rule: to help a teammate gain an advantage, a successful gank doesn't always require securing a kill.

Chunking health bars and burning Summoner Spells could achieve equally fantastic results.

Just like the Blind Monk's seemingly reckless aggressive gank from a moment earlier, it had essentially laid the absolute groundwork for Renekton's ensuing dominance.

Kennen had lost his Flash and had now been dive-killed once, falling behind in both levels and gold. Furthermore, S3 top laners practically never considered taking Teleport as a Summoner Spell, leaving his situation even more miserable than Caitlyn's in the bot lane.

Though the Renekton-Lee Sin combination wasn't quite as effortless for diving as Renekton-Elise, it was only a fraction behind.

From that point onward, to put it simply: as long as BLQG's Jarvan IV spared even one less glance toward the top lane, Kennen would die with absolute serenity, completely devoid of any pain.

Once an advantage was secured in the top lane, the Blind Monk's operating space instantly expanded exponentially. After clearing his own upper jungle quadrant and updating his items, Shi Zhenyu padded straight into Jarvan's jungle.

Gank Caitlyn?

Nah, making trouble for the opposing jungler was far simpler.