For the Fun of It

It had been nothing more than a single win, but I'd still managed to pull a pretty spectacular scene out of it. Anticipation for the viewers' reactions welled up unbidden.

"How did I look to all of you?"

Just looking at the chat was enough to leave me oddly pleased. They were ordinary messages, nothing special — and yet they felt like recognition, and my mood lifted for no good reason.

"I'm confident in close-quarters combat. Anyone who's watched my stream before would probably know that. Looks like we've got a lot of first-timers today."

My eyes flicked to the viewer count.

...Is this even a real number?

I couldn't help but doubt my own eyes. This was only my third stream. And this many people were watching me?

A woman's voice spilled out, filtered through a mechanical TTS. I'd been streaming for a few days now, and it still didn't feel like real money. Maybe it'd sink in once it actually hit my bank account.

"Thank you for the donation. About the sword-and-shield combo — honestly, I don't think it'd be all that great."

The melee weapon I was using now was a short knife. It was excellent for ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠drawing fast and going for vital points, but it was not the right tool for the sword-and-shield play the viewers wanted. Picking up a sword in the first place meant committing to close combat, which naturally raised the odds of taking hits. With a knife, the reach was even shorter, which made it that much more dangerous.

Used properly, a shield could bleed off the impact of a sword, a blunt weapon, or an arrow far more effectively than body armor alone. Combat would be much safer. And more than that — this game had parrying.

In theory, it was a technique that could stop every attack. Time it right, and you could even stop a bullet. You had to match the beat of your own weapon to the timing of the opponent's strike, so it was undeniably difficult. Where parrying was concerned, though, I was confident enough to call it a sure thing.

Part of that was trusting Lee Harin's talent. The rest was that the sensation of landing a parry was uncannily close to a technique I'd learned as a mercenary — a skill I'd drilled into myself in order to survive. You never knew what would happen on a battlefield. Marksmanship was the baseline, and close-quarters fighting broke out constantly. If you wanted to live, you had no choice but to pick up every kind of technique the environment demanded. Watching an opponent's movement, batting their weapon aside on the beat, and carving out an opening — that, too, was something I'd learned in the field.

A motion practiced hundreds of thousands of times until it lived in my hands. The memory was still vivid, and so was the feel of a weapon glancing off, that distinctive feedback in the palm. The two techniques were far too similar. That was why, even using parrying for the first time, the thought of failing never even occurred to me. In real life there were too many variables, too many unpredictable reactions. In a game, you only had to hit the timing — if anything, it was easier.

That said, running a sword-and-shield combo with a knife still felt wrong. If I was going to do this, bashing people with the shield would give me better reach.

Wonder if the shop even has swords.

I opened the shop window thinking that, and found far more weapons than I'd expected. Even after filtering to melee only, the pages ran into double digits.

"Did they just dump every melee weapon in here?"

I'd muttered it under my breath, but the viewers apparently heard. People itching to show off their game knowledge had already taken over the chat.

I'd known before I even touched the game that it had weapons going back to World War I. Medieval arms, though? That was something else. The only way that happened was if the developers ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠were obsessively, pathologically into guns and steel.

The silver lining was that I wouldn't have to keep using a knife with no reach. I bought a one-handed sword of decent length from the shop. I'd never used this particular weapon, but I'd handled blades of similar length before, so it wouldn't be a problem. For the all-important shield, I went with a ballistic one even though it cost a bit more. There were medieval shields in the catalog too, but I had no faith those would stop a bullet.

A glance at chat showed plenty of people questioning whether I was seriously going through with this. One comment in particular caught my eye — the one asking why bother buying a shield at all.

I could see the logic. If your swordsmanship was good enough, you could stop attacks without a shield. But if you could do that with a sword, you could do it even more easily with a shield, so there was no reason to insist on the blade alone. I'd be giving up a little mobility, but picking up the shield still meant higher defense.

I've got a little money left. Might as well look around at other weapons.

The plan to buy what I'd originally wanted had gone out the window a long time ago. If things had already come this far, browsing for something that would make good stream content wasn't a bad idea. Given what I had left, a rifle was out of the question. The most I could afford would be an old matchlock, or one of those crossbows people posted as a joke. So my browsing drifted, naturally, toward pistols.

Even then, most of them were so expensive that buying one was a pipe dream. I sorted the category by price and started from the cheapest. Sitting at the very bottom, even cheaper than a Glock, was a Hi-Point. Ugly from the ground up to cut costs, weird recoil from sloppy finishing, and it broke constantly — malfunctions and jams as routine as the price tag suggested. Buying that wouldn't make good content. It would just be irritating.

I poked around the pistol category a little further, but finding one with performance I was happy with was a tall order. I simply hadn't played enough matches, so I barely had any money. And I'd already burned almost all of it on the sword and shield.

Not that it mattered. I hadn't planned on buying weapons anyway until I hit Silver. Besides, when else was I going to try a meme loadout like this sword-and-shield combo? The higher the tier, the fewer players would fall for something like it.

There didn't seem to be anything else worth buying. Staring at the shop window forever would only bore people, so it was about time to queue.

Before I matched, I stepped into the LOT Training Grounds to get a feel for the new kit. Standing there with a medieval one-handed sword in one hand and a modern ballistic shield in the other, I looked thoroughly out of place. Was this what people meant by the past and present coexisting?

I shoved the useless thought aside and swung the sword. It had been a while since I'd used a long blade, and the motion came out awkward and half-formed.

"If there's a weapon you'd like to see me use, feel free to let me know."

This was a stream, so talking to people mattered. I ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠kept swinging to get used to the longsword, opening my mouth in between cuts.

I'd said it for the sake of stream entertainment, but the chat's reaction was not normal. Had I done ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠something wrong? I'd only figured that using a variety of weapons would be interesting enough to hold their attention.

The sound of a match locking in. I'd finish the game first and think about it later.

After a brief load, I was moved to the pre-round waiting area. Allied players spawned in with a burst of bright light, every last one of them dressed like they'd walked out of a military catalog. Their loadouts ran from assault rifles to sniper rifles — different guns, same common thread. All of them were holding firearms.

The only person carrying a melee weapon was me. And I had a shield in one hand, at that.

The allies had clearly noticed. The looks they gave me were not friendly. One of them seemed to have decided I was griefing, and was staring at me like he'd bitten into something foul.

I couldn't blame them, so I let it pass in silence. At times like this, talking yourself hoarse was less convincing than simply showing them what you could do.