Chapter 10: A LOL-playing Man? Or a LOL-playing Woman(2).
I haven’t turned on the stream, so I can say this: I gave up on Challenger a long time ago.
Sure, I always ranted on stream about hitting Challenger, but I knew it was impossible unless Sion got a massive buff out of nowhere.
Of course, reaching Challenger would be a huge boost for streaming.
Viewership spikes, YouTube clicks soar.
Top-tier solo queue is almost always packed with pros, trainees, or big YouTubers.
Plus, the game quality’s high, so it naturally draws attention.
The peak of my stream’s growth was during the Joseph, Demon of League, musical era.
But that rapid rise was only possible because of the clout I’d built as a Challenger years ago.
So, chasing Challenger was purely for the stream.
Honestly, Challenger’s only exciting the first couple of times.
After that, it’s just getting stomped by pros and trainees, wallowing in self-doubt.
The higher you climb, the thicker and denser the talent wall becomes.
Sion was the only champion I had the skill to even graze that wall, but now that he’s half-dead, Challenger’s out of reach.
That’s what I thought.
But around three days into grinding ranked to escape reality, I noticed three things while playing in Diamond.
The first, I became certain of after hitting a tier where one in ten opponents played like a human.
1. I’m hyper-focused.
It’s not just because I’m not streaming.
As a born League bro, I’ve done plenty of off-stream grinding, but I was never this locked in.
It’s subtle stuff.
My skill combos are crisper.
I can check the minimap every second while still pulling off precise trades.
I’m catching CS I’d normally miss.
These small things add up to something big.
I was already stomping this tier, but now I’m blazing through it several times faster.
The second realization hit after I reached Master tier.
2. I’m not getting tired as easily.
I called myself a League streamer, but I couldn’t play League with much stamina.
Not that I didn’t want to—I couldn’t.
League is a game that drains your mental energy and emotions.
If I suck, I feel like garbage. If my team sucks, I feel rage.
When a bad teammate starts typing and politicking, rage turns to disgust.
That emotional storm is hard enough, but I used to stream while playing.
Every casual comment from viewers, and my need to respond to each one, adds up.
It seems trivial, but over time, it’s a massive mental burden.
Especially when trolls show up the moment I start League, saying stuff like:
“Hmm…”
“Not gonna lie, top diff?”
“If top was different, we’d have won, right?”
“Wow, Park Minseo’s Rumble (I’m playing Renekton, KDA 0/7/1) with a 11/0/4 carry carry!”
These are the “League ghouls.”
The worst game on earth, the hellspawn League of Legends, lives up to its infamy by turning even viewers into deranged monsters.
Anyway, with no stream, there’s no chat to manage, no mental energy wasted.
Plus, this new body, though small and delicate, has surprising stamina.
It feels like I’ve physically regressed a few years.
My appearance looks like a high school freshman or sophomore, so maybe my body’s age is matching that.
With this newfound stamina, I’m playing way more games.
Back when I streamed, I’d burn out after five or six games, whining and complaining.
Now, I can play ten games in one sitting and queue up again without a hitch.
Some days, 20 games. Others, up to 30.
League, eat, League, eat, sleep, wake up, League again.
The insane cycle of League-Eat-Sleep is complete.
With improved skill and more games, my rank’s skyrocketing.
But that crazy climb stopped at lower Grandmaster.
By mid-Grandmaster, my win rate started converging to 50%.
That’s when I noticed the third change, and it’s a bit embarrassing to admit…
“Why’s this lunatic larping there?”
“Mundo? Why’s the guy who shits the bed always begging for Mundo?”
“These crazy League bros! Thinking they’re some light novel protagonist!”
3. My emotions are way more intense.
It’s not just that I don’t need to hold back without a stream or mic.
Normally, when I grind off-stream, I’m calm and silent.
The reason? Probably because my body’s younger, my dulled nerves are firing again.
It’s definitely, definitely not because I’m some hate-filled League bro.
This carried over to the stream I started for my Challenger promotion.
My ally laner ruined the early game with a pointless top gank.
I could tolerate that.
But then the jungler threw a tantrum, camped, and the enemy Nidalee joined in.
The moment Nidalee got a double kill, a scream tore out of me.
“Fuck this! Fuck this! Fuck this! Challenger, my ass! This trash game! You call yourselves Grandmaster? Fucking boosted monkeys! Is Riot so money-hungry they let these idiots slide? Ban them already!”
[Whoa, calm down, Minseo.]
Joseph’s voice rang in my head.
Maybe because I’d been sleeping less to grind League for two weeks, but Joseph’s vibe was completely different now.
[What are you doing, Minseo? Queue up again. Think while you queue!]
At first, Joseph egged me on to keep playing—
[Good. Perfect. Grandmaster in such a short time? You’re a hero, Minseo.]
Then he was satisfied—
[Minseo, these emotional outbursts aren’t good. You’re exhausted. Rest before the next queue.]
Now he’s trying to stop me from playing too much.
A so-called Demon of League giving me friendly advice? It’s absurd.
Of course, it’s all just my brain talking to itself.
Even in this Challenger promotion game, Joseph was trying to calm me down.
“Calm down, my ass! The game’s already over!”
[Four hundred viewers are watching you. You have to win and become a hero.]
Half-crazed, that kind of talk didn’t work on me.
“Screw the viewers. I turned on the stream out of loyalty, and look at this chat!”
– This is Challenger material?
– Not Challenger yet, lol. The wall’s high.
– Dived for weeks, grinded League, and still failed Chal, lmao.
– Yeah, don’t stream even near promos, just disappear.
– Don’t come back.
– Please hit Chal. And start streaming again.
– “Quitting streaming” (not quitting), “One win to Chal” (can’t win).
– This guy’s just a lunatic. Crazy LoL Demon.
– You got this, Minseo. You can do it.
– Why no mic? If you’re gonna do this, why even stream?
– No mic hard focus = win? (No idea).
– Just got here, what’s the chat vibe?
As the game went south, the chat filled with mockery.
Some familiar IDs threw in support, but I didn’t see them.
I wanted to hit Challenger to shove it in the faces of the League ghouls who trolled me, then quit streaming and the game for good…
“Fuck… fuck…”
This was my last real shot at Challenger.
Early in the season, the Challenger cutoff rises steeply every day.
My League skills were hitting their limit.
This new body restored my peak skill and stamina from years ago, but it wasn’t enough.
The average Challenger player today is leaps and bounds above where they were years ago.
In high Grandmaster, I rarely win lane anymore.
At best, I go even.
I only climb with good team luck, but this game’s top-side collapsed from the start.
I’m banking on our ADC, a pro trainee, to carry.
Please.
Please carry.
*
That hope was brutally betrayed.
Our bot lane dominated with a solo kill, but when the 2-kill Nidalee joined, it crumbled fast.
The midlaner tried to turn things around with bot roams, but our jungler dragged us down again.
Viego—either boosted or trolling—kept making incomprehensible plays, and—
[Would you like to surrender?]
[OOOOX]
[Defeat.]
Our Nexus exploded.
– Lmao.
– Chal looks like a joke now, lol.
– Would’ve won if it was Joseph. Joseph would’ve won. Joseph would’ve won. Joseph would’ve won.
– Grandmaster’s your place, Park Minseo. Don’t dream above your station.
– Pathetic, voting no on surrender, lol.
Reading the viewers’ mockery, my shoulders trembled.
“This time, I really could’ve made it…!”
I didn’t expect to feel this much frustration.
I’d given up on Challenger years ago, so this emotional surge felt alien.
But that’s beside the point—
[Stop, Minseo!]
The queue must keep going.
“Shut up, fuck!”
Ignoring Joseph’s plea, I changed the stream title and hit the Find Game button.
[Two more wins to Challenger. No mic, hard focus.]
Let’s see who wins.
Bring it on, fucking League of Legends!