The minion waves on both sides quickly converged in the mid lane. Henry Thompson, controlling Zed, dodged Ahri’s early Q skill poke with precise movement, and in between last-hitting minions, used Zed’s Q shuriken to chip away at the opponent’s health.

League of Legends, as an esports game, offers a smart cast option in its system settings to make it easier for players to cast skills quickly. When enabled, many non-targeted skills are released directly toward your selected direction or target, skipping the original aiming trajectory. But as with everything, there are pros and cons. While smart cast can help players make up for some of the hand speed gap with top players, the accuracy of non-targeted skill shots often becomes abysmal. This is evident from the fact that Ahri’s Q, Orb of Deception, hasn’t hit Henry Thompson’s Zed even once so far, while Ahri herself has been constantly poked by Henry Thompson’s Q shuriken. In both his past and present lives, whether in matches or regular ranked games, Henry Thompson has never used smart cast.

When Henry Thompson’s Zed reached level 3, the opposing Ahri, left with only half health, had previously been forced out of the experience zone twice to heal with a potion and had just reached level 2.

At this moment, the enemy jungler Jarvan suddenly came around from the F4 camp in Henry Thompson’s jungle, carrying his battle flag. Seeing this, the half-health Ahri got excited and, despite her low HP, flashed forward, trying to land a preemptive E (Charm) on Henry Thompson’s Zed.

Henry Thompson naturally caught sight of the Jarvan flanking from the lower right with the corner of his eye, but he remained calm. He used W to send his shadow to Ahri’s side as she flashed in, then instantly activated the second part of W—Shadow Swap—just in time to dodge Ahri’s Charm.

Then came a lightning-fast burst combo: Q shuriken, E Shadow Slash, plus the skill damage from his shadow and a basic attack with Zed’s passive (dealing an extra 8% of the target’s max HP as magic damage to enemies below 50% health; this can only trigger once every 10 seconds on the same target).

The result of this combo: the level 3 Zed instantly killed the level 2, half-health Ahri.

Although Jarvan was shocked that his teammate was instantly killed, he wasn’t afraid since he had double buffs and Zed’s skills were on cooldown. He confidently went for an EQ combo to knock up Henry Thompson’s Zed.

Seeing Jarvan’s EQ, Henry Thompson’s lips curled into a subtle smile.

“If you’ve come, you’re not leaving!”

Henry Thompson’s right hand flew across the mouse, clicking rapidly. The black-clad ninja on the screen spun nimbly, dodging Jarvan’s EQ combo, and started trading blows without fear.

Although Jarvan was the same level as Zed, since he missed his skills and lacked the armor penetration from Q, even with an extra W shield, the damage each dealt to the other was about the same. After a few exchanges, both dropped below half health.

At this point, Henry Thompson’s Zed’s passive triggered. A basic attack took a chunk out of Jarvan’s health, and he applied Ignite.

Only then did Jarvan realize that Zed hadn’t even used Ignite when killing his teammate Ahri. Seeing this, he quickly flashed under his own tower to escape.

Almost simultaneously with Jarvan’s flash, Zed’s skills came off cooldown. Without hesitation, Henry Thompson sent a W shadow to where he predicted Jarvan would land after flashing, and immediately used the second part of W to swap. As a result, even though Jarvan flashed first, both of them landed almost at the same spot.

A shuriken, Shadow Slash, and a deathly basic attack under the tower finished off the ignited Jarvan.

Zhao Xin, who was fighting Krugs in the top lane, noticed his teammates were being ganked and thought he’d finish the wolves before heading over—after all, it was too late to help now. Then he was stunned to hear the system’s synthesized female voice booming with impact!

Doublekill!!!!!!

What’s going on? What just happened?

Did they get counter-killed 2v1? Or did they get counter-killed by that noob who randomly banned champions during ban & pick?

Do you guys even know how to play?

The player with the ID “Korean Master” playing Zhao Xin blurted out in all chat: “2v1 and you got counter-killed? Do you guys even know how to play?”

The enemy jungler Jarvan clearly misunderstood Zhao Xin’s meaning. In his eyes, the enemy Zed, judging by the ID and the hand speed and awareness just shown, was definitely a pro playing on a smurf. So Zhao Xin’s words in all chat sounded like smug taunting and showing off.

So Jarvan indignantly replied in all chat: “So what if you got lucky and ran into a pro on a smurf? What’s there to be proud of!”

“Him? A pro?” Zhao Xin suddenly felt a bit off.

This time Jarvan simply ignored him, revived, and went to clear wolves, planning to camp top lane.

“Zed, are you a pro?” Zhao Xin asked in team chat.

“No.” Henry Thompson recalled to base and bought a Brutalizer straight up. Seeing how naive Zhao Xin was, he couldn’t help but want to tease him.