Rise

After the results of CN•HOOK2’s 13th game came out, the players on the forums erupted into another wave of cheers. He’d managed to win five games in a row after hitting a bit of a rough patch! And he was single-digits away from becoming Rank 5 on the Korean Challenger Ladder!

The best part of the night was that CN•HOOK2 still had a little over a half hour before the server shut down and the ranked ladder was reset. That was enough time for onemore game. If CN•HOOK2 managed to play and win that game before the server slammed shut, he’d end his run firmly in the Top 5 Challengers on the Korean Server!

The millions of League of Legends fans across China sat at the very edges of the seats with trembling thighs. The finish line was right in front of their eyes! The light at the end of the very dark tunnel that this gauntlet had become. CN•HOOK2 would smash through the kimchi ceiling for all of China!

More importantly, everyone invested in CN•HOOK2’s climb felt an incredible weight lift up off their shoulders when CN•HOOK2 didn’t have to play against Moon in his last game. It was terrifying good luck. Because the Moon Emperor was a truly daunting opponent. Despite the fact that everyone in China wanted to be the wind at CN•HOOK2’s back and not the spit in his face, no one believed that he could stand a chance against the Moon Emperor. As long as CN•HOOK2 didn’t have to play Moon in his final game of the night, he’d break into the Top 5 and smash the Korean Gauntlet.

But just as the League fans across China relaxed and celebrated, the lightning of misfortune struck and travelled leagues through copper wires damn near instantaneously. Just as CN•HOOK2’s last game finished, the Moon Emperor’s game also ended.

Moon played Talon in the Mid lane. 20 minutes after the start of that game, he’d gotten 8 kills without being killed in return. Legendary. By the 28th minute, he’d carried his team to victory. And now he was back in the queue, looking for another game to play. At the same exact time that CN•HOOK2 was looking for his final game of the night.

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Moon, or the Moon Emperor, was just as well known as Rake was among the Chinese League of Legends Community. He was Korea’s second Emperor, and had demolished more than enough LPL teams on the World Stage. Even Daybreak Hermes, who’d gone up against and beaten Moon before, had lost to him more often than he’d won. Moon was the lowest ranked Emperor, but that didn’t mean much at all. He was still one of the best Midlaners in the whole world and a truly strong player whose name struck fear in the hearts of many.

Right now, CN•HOOK2 had achieved deity-status. Countless Chinese League players, streamers, and fans worshipped him and believed in the miracle that he was currently accomplishing. But despite that reverence and worship, even they didn’t believe that CN•HOOK2 could triumph against Moon. There were Gods above gods, after all. The best case scenario here, the one that they all hoped and prayed and wished would happen, was if CN•HOOK2 didn’t face the Moon Emperor at all.