Choi Hana's Hidden Identity? (1)

"Ah— no!"

Choi Hana cried out in a panic. She slammed her laptop shut, hastily ducking out from under Lee Junwoo's gaze. Her face burned a furious red.

Of all places, the two of them were alone in the lounge.

"……"

An awkward silence stretched between them. After a moment, she carefully opened her mouth.

"Um… you didn't actually see my laptop screen, did you?!"

Her voice slipped out almost pleading.

That absolutely cannot happen!

Fortunately, it didn't seem like he'd been looking at the laptop for long. The real problem was that she'd been logged into Toka TV — and not on a secondary account, but on Naharing's.

It's fine. There's no way he noticed.

If he found out she was Naharing, a simple blanket-kick of mortification wouldn't cover it. Being a VTuber was something only her organization members knew about. She'd always found it embarrassing — though the truth of her feelings was a little different.

She hadn't simply thrown up the Naharing persona as a front to hide behind. When she went live as Naharing, she immersed herself in the character so completely that even she, Choi Hana, forgot who she was for a moment.

No!! Especially if he finds out about the VR War World content… I'll never be able to look Lee Junwoo in the eye again.

That was when Lee Junwoo answered.

"Nah, I didn't see anything. Just that the laptop was on for a second. I only just walked in."

"I-is that so! What a relief."

Reassured, Choi Hana clasped both hands over her chest.

VR War World. It was one of the modes in the online game Northern War World — but the current VR War World was far more than a simple game mode. A high-freedom open-world environment, packed with countless map mods, where users could even create their own content. Its uses were endless.

And the female VTubers on Toka TV primarily used VR War World to target male fans. It was a special kind of content that let them run streams with the flavor of a camgirl show — what people called simmering the broth.

That VR War World usage was the decisive difference between them and ordinary female game streamers.

I absolutely cannot let him see me simmering the broth.

It wasn't just camgirl-style talk — the content included dancing and singing, the whole package. No matter how deeply she immersed herself in the Naharing character rather than Choi Hana, an ordinary person like Lee Junwoo would never see the two as separate. He'd just think she was a very, very strange woman.

"Anyway, you look pretty wiped. Want to talk about it next time?"

"No, I'm fine! The Saintess's visit to Korea will earn us high volunteer activity points for party work too, so let's discuss it right away!"

Next Monday. An important feast day of the Goddess Church — and the day of the Saintess's planned visit to Korea. Her organization, Blood Jaguar, would also participate in the event under the pretext of security, alongside their parent organization. Of course, Choi Hana — whose identity was concealed — would only take part as a Theia cadet doing volunteer work.

"Well, as it turns out, our party might be able to get in as Student Patrol."

"Really?"

Lee Junwoo briefly recounted what had happened with Student Council President Jo Arin. Choi Hana was startled.

Even as Theia cadets, they were still just university students in the eyes of society. At event venues, that usually meant nothing more than simple guidance or cleanup duty in the outermost zones.

But Student Patrol is different.

Her organization was an unlicensed hunter guild, but thanks to lobbying by their parent group, they'd been assigned a position relatively close to the center of the event grounds.

If we join as Student Patrol, we can naturally move alongside my organization.

That day was both a feast of the Goddess Church and the day when the gate balance across Korea and the surrounding region warped most severely. Unlicensed hunter guilds were given comparatively larger roles as a result. In a guild as short on manpower as hers, every single Awakened mattered — so she wanted to take the day off streaming and help her organization.

Lee Junwoo really is something else.

Even Scarlet unnie hadn't been able to pull any strings with that stickler of a president. And yet Lee Junwoo had received a direct invitation to Student Patrol from the Student Council President herself. For some reason, that fact put Choi Hana in an even better mood.

Plenty of people in the middle class were already disappointed they couldn't party with him.

In other words, she'd successfully bought in at the bottom.

And the moment that thought crossed her mind, another one rose right behind it.

Which means I absolutely cannot let him find out about Naharing.

Socially, VTubers still hadn't shaken the weeb stigma. If he ever ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠found out about the Japanese songs she'd sung on stream, Lee Junwoo would quit the party on the spot.

"Alright, see you after the weekend."

With that, the two of them parted ways almost immediately.

The business wrapped up way too fast.

She felt oddly disappointed — but she had a stream scheduled that evening, so she couldn't make any other plans. Lee Junwoo said he had club activities too. She'd wanted to join the Crime Research Club with him, but she didn't have the bandwidth for club activities right now.

Maybe I should just take the weekend off streaming…

This weekend featured a fairly large spring festival as the eve of the Saintess's visit. Making plans to thank him for everything he'd done for her so far… wouldn't be so bad.

Scarlet unnie said the same thing, too…

But if she took the weekend off, the community boards would fill with endless suspicion posts. The kind of posts that would go up if she went dark during a festival weekend were obvious.

Naharing has a boyfriend — the suspicion threads would never stop.

Ever since a few collab streams with the Mungsukkyu Crew, Naharing's popularity had shot up. Not just her regulars — casual viewers had grown too, and her name was circulating constantly through the streaming community boards. For her own sake and for Underdolls' image, she absolutely had to stream this weekend.

And so the two of them left the lounge.

The following week arrived in no time.

Monday in March. The day of the Goddess Church's great feast — the Pure White Festival. The day of the visit by Marianne, the current Saintess, famed as the Saintess of Purity.

Before heading to Gwanghwamun Square for the event, I made my way to Theia Academy's main auditorium.

The cadets gather here first, then move out together.

Living in the dorms, I arrived earlier than expected. Not even half the cadets scheduled for volunteer work had shown up yet — and the total number participating was small to begin with.

Well, they did cut people based on Hell Week scores.

This wasn't a campus event. It was a major affair at the Seoul city and national level. Even for simple volunteer work, they thoroughly screened which cadets got to participate.

I sat down in a chair in the auditorium for a moment and checked the activated quest.

As expected, the underworld side quest had activated. In the original, it was an expansion quest — and a fairly difficult one. More than anything, it was unique content that let you experience the villain side through Choi Hana, who belonged to Theia Academy, a hunter academy.

I focused on the organization name: Blood Jaguar.

A minor syndicate, huh.

True to that modifier, Blood Jaguar was utterly obscure even within the underworld. The goal of this content was to grow that no-name organization into a major underworld power. Given their current scale, it was practically impossible content — but if you followed the quests, you could grow the organization beyond anything you'd imagine.

Choi Hana's father was a very famous boss, after all.

On top of that, present-day Seoul was in chaos. Not just the hunter world — the underworld was a mess of factional and power struggles. Which meant plenty of opportunities for me to operate as Unknown as well.

Thinking of Choi Hana like that, I found myself recalling the VTuber videos I'd been watching all weekend.

Naharing…

A few days ago, in the Free Major Department lounge — that brief glimpse of her laptop screen. If I'd been an ordinary person with no connection to internet streaming, I would have noticed nothing and moved on.

But in ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠that split-second look at the browser window, I saw Choi Hana's ID logged into Toka TV.

Naharing_♡

And though Choi Hana woke up right away and I played dumb —

Choi Hana is Naharing?

I was certain that screen had been the streamer-side interface, not a viewer's. It made no sense. Even with my Mental Strength at 90, I was rattled. I couldn't focus at the Crime Research Club's freshman welcome party either — I kept turning it over in my head.

Choi Hana was an important figure to me. But in the original, Choi Hana had never been a VTuber.

No — more than that, with her personality…

A calm cool-beauty type. A little airheaded in places, but not a personality suited for streaming. If she'd streamed as herself, she might have drawn initial viewers for her looks, but they'd have left calling it boring soon enough.

But VTuber Naharing was different. Even I, with no small amount of streaming experience, was impressed by her broadcast skills.

She was a total fox.

Naharing seemed like someone born to be a major VTuber. She had every tool a female game streamer needed: nonstop audio, decent game skill, and voice-chat ability. But more impressive than any of that was her talent for creating masses of loyal viewers — for making male viewers develop quasi-romantic feelings. She knew how to simmer the broth.

Naharing… her voice and the way she sings are exactly my type.

The short pink hair of her avatar, too. It was embarrassing to admit, but outside of training hours over the weekend, I'd spent the entire day watching nothing but Naharing clips. Then I'd logged into her live stream on a secondary account and donated part of the bounty I'd received from taking down Bonchina.

During the broth-simmering segments where she did those trending dances and sang — I'd almost gotten completely hooked without realizing it.

I still can't believe it, but no matter how I look at it, Naharing and Choi Hana are the same person.

The name Naharing was just Hana written backward and stuck together. And though she adjusted her voice to fit the VTuber roleplay, if you listened carefully, you could hear Choi Hana's speech patterns.

When ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠she's busy her words speed up, but normally she talks on the slow side.

And a few days ago, when Jeong Siu had suddenly shown me a Naharing video — that was further evidence. Someone as hypersensitive to sound as that guy might already have figured out that Naharing was Choi Hana.

Either way, that settled it for me.

I can't deny that the difficulty of this reality has gone up compared to the original.

Choi Hana doing work outside of being a cadet was clearly for her organization. The fact that she'd started VTubing was connected to that too.

She needed operating funds for the organization.

Which meant that from the very start of the underworld side quest, keeping Blood Jaguar afloat wasn't easy. Naharing — and her VTuber crew Underdolls — were currently raking in enormous donation amounts.

Well, I should play dumb for the time being.

VTubers often hide their identities even from people they know in real life. For now, to grow Blood Jaguar, it would be best ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠for me to support Underdolls' activities as much as possible.

With that, I put a Naharing clip on my phone and pulled a necklace from my pocket.

The Barrier Pendant. A polyhedron-shaped necklace glowing blue — a rare item I'd seized from Bonchina.

A useful item in its own right — quite handy for a high-difficulty quest like this one.

On top of that, I'd created an Authority from this item. I was about to check the Authority's passive skill again when —

"Lee Junwoo. Can I talk to you for a second?"

Someone spoke to me. I turned my head and saw a familiar face.

Song Sia.