Chapter 8: I Am the Incarnation of the Isekai Truck!!!

"I need a rat, I need a rat, I need a rat!"

"Can you hold on? We're on our way."

"Don't ask me; you should ask the guys on the other side if they're willing to spare me."

"Then go in peace, sayonara~"

In the V5 team voice chat.

Even though Luo Ji and the others sounded like they were ready to abandon Xiao Yan, in reality, everyone was rushing toward the mid lane with everything they had.

Following Luo Ji's immediate Teleport, Biubiu's Teleport lit up a second later.

Despite pressing the button at the fastest possible speed, distant water cannot quench a nearby fire.

Facing the perfect crowd control from the Nautilus, the WE duo carries unleashed their skills from a long distance. Before the rest of V5 could arrive to assist, Xiao Yan in the mid lane had already successfully played the role of "Chen Rui" (the great traitor), falling first under the siege of four burly men and typing "GG."

"It's over!"

Xiao Yan's face turned ashen.

Dying himself wasn't the issue—mid-game carries suddenly exploding was a tradition for many LPL teams. The point was that his death had baited out their top laner's Teleport. Looking at the Teleport location—surrounded by the WE squad and landing on a minion wave rather than a turret—he felt he had just caused a massive momentum shift.

"Another one fed."

"Are we still going in?"

"See if we can save him; if not, run."

Karsa had lost his patience.

Junglers hated these kinds of games. You spend the early game setting up perfect tempo, only for your mid-game carry to inexplicably feed twice, throwing away all the hard-earned advantages in one go.

The moment Luo Ji’s Tahm Kench landed...

In front of him were various chaotic abilities and auto-attacks raining down on his landing spot.

Especially the ADC, Jhin. When the Miss Fortune was engaged earlier, he was out of range to fire his fourth bullet. Now that a Tahm Kench had landed, and they had a four-on-one—soon to be five-on-one—advantage, why be afraid?

Just auto-attack!

However, when STAY, the ADC, watched with satisfaction as his last bullet struck the Tahm Kench, the measly hundred-plus damage number popping up over the Kench’s head left him completely stunned.

H-how much!?

What was even more absurd was that despite being mobbed by four people, when they finally chipped away nearly half of the Kench's health, the enemy simply activated his E ability.

The massive white shield, covering more than a quarter of his health bar, made even the WE squad wonder if the game was bugged.

League of Legends designers! Look at this!

Before they could even react, the ultimate abilities of Jarvan IV and Leona followed!

R [Cataclysm]
R [Solar Flare]

In truth, Karsa and Ppgod had hesitated at first about whether to go all-in to save him, as a Tahm Kench teleporting into the middle of the enemy team looked like a surefire death sentence.

But upon landing, the Tahm Kench’s tankiness completely defied their expectations.

Sunfire Cape + Thornmail + max-level E converting 65% of damage taken into a shield turned the so-called "burst focus" into a joke.

Of course, this was partly because the Jhin and Viktor had staggered damage and unfinished items, but visually, it was shocking enough.

To the rest of the V5 players, it felt like watching an expert play Plants vs. Zombies.

Dave: "I’ve run two miles away, and you’re telling me you held the line?"
Zombie King: "I’ve already popped the champagne, and you’re telling me you didn't win?"

W [Abyssal Dive]

This time, WE had no crowd control left to interrupt the Tahm Kench.

At the same time the Renekton’s Teleport landed, Viktor was successfully knocked up by the Kench's W.

Shanks froze for a second.

No matter how you looked at it, he should have knocked up the enemy ADC, right? Not only was there a support next to the ADC, but the Renekton was landing right there, too. Why choose to knock him up?

It didn't make sense...

And hadn't he seen this exact scene just a moment ago? It felt damn familiar.

Wait, just now!?

The moment he finally realized what was happening, Rookie arrived again with a Paddle Star.

This time, there was no Sleepy Trouble Bubble.

And he didn't need one.

The damage bonus from the bubble was meant for targets you couldn't one-shot with a Star, but for a squishy mage, one Star was enough—if he added the bubble, the enemy would owe him hundreds of health points.

"Bang!"

The familiar sound of skills colliding rang in his ears.

The Paddle Star hit, followed by an auto-attack with Lich Bane, and then the damage from the Rocketbelt. The landed Viktor hadn't even reacted before he surrendered his life under another lash of the Kench’s tongue, plain and simple.

V5 Mebius killed WE SHANKS.

"Nice play, Rookie!"
"Nice CC, Yimeng!"

Clearly, the two of them were no strangers to such seamless coordination.

As the saying goes, the only downside to expensive things is that they are expensive. If it weren't for a veteran like Rookie, most players wouldn't have been able to follow up on the opportunities Luo Ji created to secure the kill on the enemy mid laner.

But since they did follow up...

Then, in a 4v4 team fight, WE had to consider how to contain Rookie's Zoe.

Yes, you read that right. Contain Rookie.

With one carry missing, the output in a chaotic brawl depended mainly on the remaining carry. The difference was that for WE, it was a Jhin with no mobility; Luo Ji didn't have to do anything but stick to the enemy ADC and press whatever buttons were available.

But WE couldn't do that.

With all those spell shards on the ground for Zoe, even the prehistoric crocodile, once landed, found his scalp tingling from the displacement and CC triggered by Zoe's various summoner spells.

On that side, Biubiu’s Renekton was losing his mind watching the Zoe keep flashing, exhausting, and using Randuin's, among all sorts of other chaotic moves.

On this side, the rest of WE were completely conquered by the "King of Licks" operated by Luo Ji.

He was too tanky!

With a max-level E converting 65% of damage taken into a white shield, plus a 3-second cooldown, and the fact that the Tahm Kench was built entirely for defense—in this S12 early-season meta where damage was overflowing—he somehow managed to feel like a classic heavy tank through the shield value alone.

And yet...

While being tanky, the Kench’s auto-attacks also dealt percentage-based magic damage.

Do you need skill to play this?

Not really.

This is where the greatest advantage of a transmigrator lies: I am literally abusing the meta loopholes designed by the developers and playing a stat-monster they created. What are you going to do about it?

It was unbearable, truly unbearable!

Stay, whose scalp was tingling from being stuck, tried to output damage on the Tahm Kench for ages with his support's help, but the health bar barely budged. Just as he tried to use the support's help to kite and create distance, the next second:

Q [Tongue Lash]
R [Devour]

When an enemy hero has three stacks of passive, hitting them with Q and activating R allows you to swallow them.

That length! It was truly the "Most Shocking Tongue in Chang'an!"

Under the stunned gaze of the livestream viewers, the Jhin, who had created a full distance from the Kench, didn't even have a chance to turn around and counter-attack before he was "slurped" into the Kench's mouth and spat back out—right next to the Tahm Kench again.

Seeing this, Stay's mentality collapsed.

[What is this?]
[No way, how can he be this tanky? Isn't this meta all about overflowing damage!? I play tanks and I can't last a few seconds.]
[Is this the hidden stat-monster Tahm Kench? League of Legends, initiate!]
[Stats? There are no stats. All I saw in that play was hard work and sweat!]

They learned. Many viewers truly felt they learned something.

And...

Following the absurdity of that team fight, more and more players began to speak up for Luo Ji spontaneously:

"What stat-monster? Where are the stat-monsters in League of Legends?"
"Everyone talks about stats, but who sees the sweat and effort of us Tahm Kench players?"
"Even if we miss every ability and only land auto-attacks and passives, we Tahm Kench players can still struggle to win through persistence and effort."
"When you're sad, go play Tahm Kench; you'll be laughing within half an hour."
"Who says there's no skill? Renekton takes even less skill."
"Look how simple Renekton is—just move around and link skills to manage Fury. Compared to that, us Tahm Kench players have to consider so much more, like finding ways to weave in movement."

It was a team fight that started with their Miss Fortune being initiated upon.

Yet, in the end, V5 turned it into a 1-for-3 exchange against WE.

Xiao Yan was completely dumbfounded.

He had died instantly without using a single skill, and then his four teammates beat the five enemies?

No... you guys are making me look like a total idiot...

"Yimeng, is this hero's power level this broken?"

After the fight, even veterans like Karsa and Rookie could clearly feel that the hero's stats were not quite right. Of course, there were downsides: poor wave clear and the inability to deliver a finishing blow in team fights.

But in the current meta of overflowing damage...

If you play a tank and can actually survive, that already has immense strategic value.

"Something like that. I found it in a random ranked game where the support was insanely tanky, more than their top laner, so I practiced it to see. Turns out, it's actually pretty good~"

"You revealed it too early; this could have been a trump card."

"It wouldn't have lasted. The meta update in a few days might kill it anyway, so might as well enjoy it while I can."

One has to admit, the Mythic item meta is widely considered one of the most boring eras by many players, but it was also the Mythic item era that allowed many strange strategies to emerge.

After the team fight, WE's situation was far from optimistic.

It wasn't because of the gold deficit, but because after that fight, WE couldn't even defend the final dragon. The first Cloud Dragon Soul of the new season’s official matches was perfectly controlled by Karsa.

Biubiu was numb.

He was already struggling to withstand the damage this season, and now that the enemy had the Cloud Dragon, his health bar felt fake in every upcoming team fight.

If he wanted to make plays, he had to walk a tightrope.

However...

The moment he thought this, the V5 team, having just stepped out of their base, saw their position and launched a simple, unadorned team fight.

Yes.

So simple that they didn't need to show any openings, nor did they need to use macro to create space. Once the Tahm Kench saw the distance was right, he just used his W to engage.

Diving the turret head-on!

Don't ask—if you ask, it’s just pure aggression. Even though he didn't have enough gold for his third item yet, S12 had an item that could be called a bug—the 650-gold Stopwatch.

He had levels, health, resistances, stats, a shield, and a Stopwatch.

The point was that he had two other initiators and two core carries standing by. Why did he need to think about anything else?

I am the incarnation of a bulldozer!!!

WE squad: ???

The only thing Luo Ji had to do was activate his E and press his Stopwatch at the right time. Otherwise, he just needed to keep his eyes locked on Shanks.

It didn't matter if he couldn't get the kill.

Annoy him, harass him, make him run around until he was exhausted, make him unable to focus on his team's damage output. All he needed to do was start the fight and disrupt the battlefield.

This playstyle made Shanks' scalp crawl.

What was up with this Tahm Kench? Was he just going to chase him and only him?

In his hands, one ability after another was thrown out.

But it was useless.

The damage just wasn't significant!

Thornmail and Sunfire were from the previous fight; this time, the Tahm Kench also had a component of Spirit Visage in his inventory, and his magic resistance had finally caught up.

On the side, the support Nautilus was completely overwhelmed. WE had more than one initiator, but compared to the others, the Tahm Kench was actually the least threatening one.

After a moment of hesitation, even the support gave up trying to peel the Tahm Kench off Shanks and ran to save their ADC, who was being targeted by Karsa and Ppgod.

The simple, unadorned initiation brought about an even more unadorned team fight.

On the side?

Rookie and Xiao Yan were grinning from ear to ear watching this.

What is a top laner?

A purely offensive top laner is a top laner, but they often hold their team hostage.

But the top laner most people have in their hearts is one like this: incredibly tanky while always charging at the very front of the team, like a bulldozer, carving through the enemy formation seven times in and seven times out, charging until the enemy has no energy left to deal with the carries.

That sense of security, where you feel safe just by looking at the health bar, is something no offensive top laner can provide, whether in ranked or pro play.

This wasn't just a Tahm Kench.

This was "Father Tahm," and a mobile one at that!

"So tanky."
"Why is this Tahm Kench like a turd-stirrer? Someone come save me, I can't kite him anymore!"
"Can't save you, and if he's the turd-stirrer, then we're the ones being chased..."
"Damn it, I'm gonna die, I'm gonna die!"

The gold deficit, item deficit, and level deficit made this team fight crumble even faster.

However, only the viewers with the god's-eye view could see that WE's most fatal point was that the damage from their two carries couldn't be focused.

Tahm Kench...

This hero, who only had tankiness, fully fulfilled his role as a turd-stirrer.

Even when he was truly low on health, he would spontaneously retreat to his carries' side, using his ultimate to provide error tolerance for his teammates. It was different from the "Smite Top Janna" strategy developed earlier, but it had a similar vibe.

How can he be this tanky!
How can he be this disgusting!

Biubiu looked at his exhausted teammates with eyes full of resentment.

As a rookie, why not play the "Five Sisters" of top lane and show off your mechanics! Are stat-monsters something a young player like you can understand?

I should be the one playing!

A few minutes later...

When the Tahm Kench, now a mountain of flesh, led his teammates to charge onto the WE high ground again, both Biubiu and Shanks, after a brief struggle, tacitly took their hands off their keyboards.

2:0.

With the final explosion of the WE nexus!

V5 perfectly secured their opening victory.