Woe Strider + Kitchen Finks + Hardened Academic

Woe Strider

Kitchen Finks

Hardened Academic

How it works

1. Activate Woe Strider by sacrificing Kitchen Finks.
2. When Kitchen Finks dies, its persist ability triggers, returning it from your graveyard to the battlefield with a -1/-1 counter on it.
3. Hardened Academic and Kitchen Finks trigger.
4. Resolve the Hardened Academic trigger, putting a +1/+1 counter on Kitchen Finks.
5. Resolve the Kitchen Finks trigger, causing you to gain 2 life
6. Resolve the Woe Strider ability
7. Repeat.

This ingenious loop turns Woe Strider and Kitchen Finks into an endless engine of sacrifice and resurrection, fueled by the persistent return of the Finks with a -1/-1 counter. Hardened Academic acts as the crucial catalyst here: whenever cards leave your graveyard—such as when Woe Strider's sacrifice puts Kitchen Finks into the yard—the Academic's static-triggered ability places a +1/+1 counter on the Finks. Because +1/+1 and -1/-1 counters annihilate each other as a state-based action, the Finks is cleared of its counter, allowing its persist ability to trigger all over again while netting you infinite life and scries.