Adult muscle stem cells, also known as satellite cells (SCs) play pivotal roles in injury induced muscle regeneration and our knowledge of long non-coding RNA (lncRNA) functions in SCs remains limited. Here we identify a lncRNA, Lockd which is induced in activated SCs upon acute muscle injury. We demonstrate that Lockd promotes SC proliferation; deletion of Lockd leads to cell cycle arrest at G1/S phase. Consistently, in vivo repression of Lockd in mouse muscles hinders muscle regeneration process. Mechanistically, we uncover that Lockd lncRNA molecule directly interacts with an RNA helicase DHX36; structural probing further shows that the 5’end of the Lockd possesses the strongest binding activity with DHX36 protein. Furthermore, we demonstrate that Lockd stabilizes the interaction between DHX36 and EIF3B proteins; and synergistically this complex unwinds the RNA G-quadruplex (rG4) structure formed at the 5’UTR of Anp32e mRNA and promotes the translation of ANP32E protein which is required for myoblast cell proliferation. Altogether, our findings thus identify a regulatory circuitry consisting of Lockd/DHX36/Anp32e that functions to promote myoblast proliferation, thus enabling the acute injury induced muscle regeneration to progress.