Chapter One Hundred Twenty-Five: I Only Know One of Them

"Hao Ran, relying on his extreme techniques and top-tier game sense, has developed a unique style of play centered on 'taunting.' His opponents are often left gnashing their teeth in frustration, yet completely powerless to stop him."

"The editors are also very curious to see if, given his current climb rate, Hao Ran can shake the dominant position of Wei Liang before the season ends."

"Next up, we have the rising top-tier Yuan Ge player, Shark Xiao Nan..."

Lin Hao woke up just before noon and saw this news flash.

"I haven't even discussed any collaborations with them, yet they gave me so much coverage. It seems my popularity and buzz are still quite high."

Lin Hao nodded in satisfaction.

His current livestreaming focus remained primarily on the Peak Tournament. Lin Hao was confident that he could climb to the top of the Peak rankings before the season ended, or even hold the number one spot when the season locked.

Currently, the top spot was held by Wei Liang, whose Peak score had been stuck at 2615 for a long time.

It wasn’t that he didn’t want to play; in the current "jungle-carry" meta, it was genuinely difficult to find a jungler capable of matching Wei Liang’s skill. The reality was that while he sat at a 2600-point bracket, the next highest players were only at 2500. This score gap made matchmaking extremely difficult, as he was the only one at that level.

Lin Hao's phone pinged with a WeChat notification.

*Strange,* he thought. *My social circle is quite narrow; who would be contacting me on WeChat?*

Lin Hao picked up his phone and discovered a message from Wang Zhaoyi.

She was the liaison for Lin Hao’s agency. Whenever there were issues or announcements regarding agency promotions or events, she was the one who communicated with him. However, ever since the professional streamer team-up event at Shark, there had been very few activities. As for the typical "Starlight" recommendations, the Elephant Agency usually pushed them to Lin Hao directly without needing notification.

Lin Hao scanned the message.

Wang Zhaoyi’s message essentially mentioned an upcoming streamer trial event at the AC Club and asked if Lin Hao wanted to sign up.

Truth be told, given the current progress of his "Rage Value" collection, Lin Hao felt it wasn't fast enough. Even with his best efforts to queue-snipe various streamers in the Peak Tournament all day, he could only collect around 100,000 points on his luckiest days.

Ultimately, it came down to the multiplier.

The base multiplier for streamers was 2x, with additional bonuses based on popularity. Streamers with high traffic and buzz—like Bei Mu, Han Han, or Yi Fan—likely had a 3x or 4x multiplier. The absolute top-tier platform icons, such as Zhang Fenfang, Shao Bai, or Nine-Tailed Fox, were even higher.

But they definitely couldn't surpass professional players.

Professional players had a base Rage Value multiplier of 5x, and if they were FMVP-level stars like Jiu Cheng, there were certainly extra bonuses on top of that.

So... why not go?

The trial would be quite good. It would be a chance to make friends with players in the professional scene, and incidentally, harvest a wave of Rage Value from them!

Having made up his mind, Lin Hao gave Wang Zhaoyi an affirmative reply.

The processing on her end was quick. By around three in the afternoon, she had already finalized the cooperation contract and relevant paperwork for Lin Hao.

The club hosting the trial was AC Club, a highly popular organization in the KPL. They had a long-term partnership with the Shark platform, and the players' streaming contracts were also signed under Shark.

This event wasn't a closed-door affair; it leaned more towards a variety show format. The streamers' daily training and the interactions and sparring sessions with professional players would all be filmed as material, to be edited together later.

It was also worth noting that the event was quite large in scale; the slots allocated to the Shark platform were distributed among the various major agencies.

The Elephant Agency didn't get many spots, but regardless, Lin Hao was guaranteed a place.

With his current fan growth trajectory and the popularity that allowed him to rival the "Big Brother" Shao Bai during prime time, he was more than qualified. Once he agreed, the contract was sent over immediately.

Crucially, attending a professional club trial required at least "top-tier public player" (Road King) skill. This screening process naturally filtered out entertainment-focused streamers, narrowing the competition.

Before going live that evening, Lin Hao finished handling the matter, printing and signing the contract before mailing it out.

He had looked over the specific details of the collaboration that afternoon. Overall, it was indeed more variety-oriented; the training wouldn't be as monotonous as it was for professional players, focusing more on actual matches.

The event was scheduled for next Friday night, so he just needed to book a flight to Chengdu for the AC Club by next Wednesday.

That evening, he started his stream as usual, another day for the Peak Tournament grind.

After going live, Lin Hao first updated his "frequently used" heroes.

In a meta ruled by jungle kings, the one thing high-tier lobbies never lacked was junglers. Or rather, in top-tier public matches, only powerful junglers could climb effectively. Through natural selection, by the time one reached Lin Hao's rank, almost everyone was a jungle specialist.

Today, Lin Hao wanted to try playing Luna.

He updated his list to: Jing, Lan, and Luna.

Setting aside niche "one-trick" specialists, these were three T0-tier junglers. No matter how much they were nerfed, their core mechanics kept them strong.

Jing and Lan could generally be picked early with few hard counters. Luna had a higher skill ceiling but was relatively more vulnerable to specific hero counters, like "loaches" and "cockroaches."

Lin Hao set his list this way to ensure his jungle spot wouldn't be snatched by others, while also allowing him to wait until later in the draft to secure Luna.

"He actually changed his frequently used heroes today?"

"Hao-zi knows how to play jungle? How come I didn't know?"

"I remember a few days ago Hao-zi played a game of Li Bai in the jungle. Even though his game sense and positioning were top-tier, his execution was terrible."

"The one above is a true fan. Indeed, I've watched for so long, and I've never seen Hao-zi jungle. Whenever he had to fill the jungle role, he never really carried."

Lin Hao waved his hand at the chat and said mysteriously, "I am but a humble player; I secretly practiced a jungle hero last night."

"To tell you the truth, of the three jungle heroes I've listed—Jing, Lan, and Luna—I only really know how to play one of them. Care to guess which one?"

The chat started to get rowdy.

"Jing."

"Lan."

"Just spam Lan, it's brainless."

"Jing is the real brainless one. Only a fool would struggle with the 'Thunderclap' technique. Just dash in and mash the skills; the opponent dies before they know what happened."

Regardless of the comments, Lin Hao began his Peak Tournament match for the day.

Upon entering, Lin Hao saw the loading screen and his eyes lit up.

*Peak Showdown!*

These were all masters.

As soon as he entered, Lin Hao didn't even bother looking at his teammates' preferred roles. He immediately typed, "I'll play jungle."

Before sending it, he hid his rank—otherwise, if they saw his 36-proficiency-level jungle, the spot would definitely be gone.