Broadcast Accident

In the livestreaming business, evening is when the airwaves really come alive.

The workday ends, viewers pour in, and a swarm of streamers go live to meet that rush. Before he'd even started streaming, Yuhan had picked 6 p.m. as his start time off the back of what he liked to call industry analysis. Ari hadn't gone anywhere near that kind of grand research; she'd simply chosen the hour that looked the busiest, and so she, too, went live at six.

If the two of them shared anything, it was this: when it came to work, they were always serious.

The instant the computer clocks struck six, both streams flicked on at once.

Whether Yuhan and his chat had burned themselves out in a standoff between a streamer's pride and a suspiciously overflowing libido, today the chat and the audio were both unnaturally still. He'd even finally broken ninety viewers without a single incident to show for it, and his reaction was nothing more than boredom. Considering how lively his chat usually stayed even with a modest count, it was a genuinely unusual state of affairs — though, compared to other streamers sitting at similar numbers, it was still on the lively side.

That same out-of-character quiet wasn't confined to his channel. Something just as unusual was unfolding in Ari's room.

Her stream already sat at a respectable size, and stacked on top of an unprecedented five-day hiatus, viewers flooded in so fast the count blew past 7,000 in an instant. Given that Lethe's average hovered between four and five thousand, the extra two thousand or so could be counted as outside traffic. And that was, in fact, exactly the case.

Those two thousand trolls had spent all five days circulating Lethe's emergency hiatus as gossip — even getting told they were beating a dead horse in communities that would chew on any streamer-related bait, trivial or serious — and the moment the go-live notification went out, they stormed her channel. Their firepower was more than enough to bury a chat that had always overflowed with mutual respect.

Not that Lethe's regulars were simply buried, either. There were bound to be people angry about a sudden five-day break.

At any rate, the two streams — sitting at complete opposite extremes from their usual atmospheres — settled back toward something resembling normal after about an hour.

Getting five thousand people to chat with mutual respect is no small feat. That alone was enough to show how outstanding Ari's streaming skill really was. For someone like her, handling a mass of trolls was annoying, but not especially difficult, so she put that talent to work, calmed the room down, and once the numbers had dropped somewhat, she began an announcement.

"Yes, the five-day hiatus... I don't really have anything to say for it. I'm sorry. My head just completely fell apart this time..."

"Hm? Ah — I'd already been having a hard time, and then I had a big fight with someone I'm close to."

"Was it a fight with my boyfriend? I can't tell you who I argued with."

"...You're asking if it was because of Geum Taeyang?"

Technically, that wasn't wrong. But Ari wasn't thoughtless enough to say so outright.

The problem was... the insane stunt from Yuhan's stream yesterday flashed through her mind the instant his name came up, and she froze for a second. Her answer came a beat late — and her viewers were not the type to miss even that much.

"N-no! That's not it!!"

"Um... well, it's not completely unrelated... We met up during the hiatus, talked a lot, and we're actually pretty close now."

Ari realized it herself the moment the words left her mouth: that had been a slip.

The smartest play was to state, clearly and cleanly, that the hiatus had nothing to do with Yuhan. Instead, this was the equivalent of taking out a neighborhood ad that she'd gone dark because Geum Taeyang had wrecked her mentally.

She scrambled for a way to walk it back, but internet-stream opinion has a habit of rotting in the handful of seconds you spend thinking of a line. Lethe's channel was one of the most wholesome on TwizyTV, and even so the mood was turning ugly.

Honestly, she'd figured that if she just found the right words fast enough, she could still clean it up. It didn't take long to learn otherwise.

A streamer who kept a ruthless schedule had vanished for five days without a word of explanation. Some viewers took it in stride, but there were always going to be people left disappointed. Even those in the latter camp, though, weren't without the fierce loyalty that defined Lethe's fandom, which made it uncomfortable to simply blame her.

And then Geum Taeyang had appeared — bait more than sufficient to turn those viewers toxic.

He looked like a delinquent. Ari had, on stream, made it obvious she disliked him. And now this hiatus was supposedly connected to him besides. The satisfaction of having someone to pin it on, mixed with a strangely rising sense of justice. They had no reason not to march over to Geum Taeyang's stream and give him a piece of their minds.

Whether that was what Ari wanted or not didn't enter into it.

Just as Ari started to panic at a situation she hadn't seen coming, Geum Taeyang — Yuhan's — stream was still sitting at that same low energy.

"What am I doing today? Hell if I know... I'll just play Minecraft like always. Keep it chill. Huh? You're sick of it because I play it every day? Why should I care what you think?"

"I'm kidding. I want to try hard too, but after that whole circus with you guys yesterday I just don't have it in me... Might have to write off today's numbers."

He was still playing the bit, of course.

Then, all at once, the viewer count started to move. The number that had begun slipping into the seventies blew past a hundred before anyone could blink, and kept climbing.

"...The hell is this now."

Lethe's audience, as mentioned, skewed mild, so not that many people actually came over to terrorize Yuhan's stream. For the ones who did, though, wallpapering a chat that already had almost no viewers and even less energy was trivially easy.

Ari threw a quick explanation at her own chat about the slip and anything involving Yuhan, then hurried over to his channel — only to find the chat already packed with viewers who'd gone fully toxic.

Ending this disaster fast meant keeping a clear head, but today, of all days, Ari couldn't manage it. She hated inconveniencing people to an almost pathological degree — unless you were actually a bad person — and the thought that her own mistake was dumping this kind of mess on someone as kind as Yuhan made her wretchedly sorry. And for reasons she couldn't name, the idea that she might look pathetic in front of him was unbearable.

Her phone rang in the middle of all that. A call from Yuhan. She glanced back at the stream and saw him on screen, in the middle of placing a call to someone. The broadcast delay, apparently — reality and the feed were a little out of sync.

Ari picked up at once, as if she refused to make him wait even a second longer.

I'm a pretty sharp guy, if I do say so myself. Sehee has never once admitted it, but I at least believe it. I watched those trolls spam the chat for a few seconds and clocked that this had something to do with Ari, so that should tell you everything.

I've picked up a decent amount of industry knowledge by now, too, so I understood this wasn't happening because Ari wanted it to. It wasn't under her control, either. That's just how trolls work. They're not the kind of viewers a streamer can actually manage.

As for how I felt about the situation... I didn't feel much of anything, honestly.

The ones wallpapering my chat demanding an apology — those bastards. No, those women — weren't exactly endearing. But what mattered right now was Ari's state. The shaking voice coming through the phone said everything about how she was doing. Had she always been this skittish?

It wasn't even that big a deal.

If the viewers had the wrong idea, we could clear it up together. The trolls, I ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠could just ban.

Or was it a big deal? More than a hundred people were tearing into me, and I still felt nothing. I've always had a decently thick skin, but not this thick.

I'd been thinking ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠ever since the body changed that something in my head had shifted a little too. Maybe this was part of that. If it meant a sturdier mental game, I wasn't going to complain.

"T-Taeyang? Can you hear me?"

Ah. I'd been thinking too long.

"Yes, Lethe. Go ahead."

"I, um, I misspoke, and..."

And so Ari's explanation began. It came out in a jumble, but she was a smart one, so following the situation wasn't a problem. Everything about the present mess, the story of meeting me during the hiatus — she even spun it so that anyone listening would walk away thinking I hadn't done a single thing wrong.

So this was what a Korea University student's damage control looked like. The effect was brutally efficient. The trolls were already starting to quiet down.

"Yes. That's what happened..."

Faced with that incredible shield and Ari apologizing like she meant it, I was about to say something along the lines of I messed up plenty too, so don't worry about it — and then I stopped.

Was it really fine to just let this go?

I didn't care, personally, but all kinds of talk could start coming out of my own chat, and Ari could catch some forced criticism for being the kind of person who papered over something like this with a single apology.

Better to at least pretend I'd extracted something and then close it out.

I thought for a second, and one thing came to mind.

The Tintendo Switch I'd seen on Ari's NewTube. Not that I was going to keep it, obviously. My PC wasn't exactly high-spec, so the games I could play on stream were limited — borrowing that for a while and using it on broadcast wouldn't be a bad idea.

A warm ending. No burden on anyone. No ugly talk afterward.

Damn. A genuinely brilliant idea. If I'd studied a little in school, maybe I could've met Ari in college.

Picturing a future where everybody won, I almost smiled.

Decision made. No point dragging it out. Say it.

I put on a gentle smile to ease the mood. One corner of my mouth ticked up in a crooked, sly little grin, and I wasn't entirely sure that still counted as a smile.

Then my body moved on its own. The chair scraped back, and I crossed one leg up onto the desk.

A textbook delinquent slouch. What the hell was this.

Fuck. Not this again. I needed to finish before something even weirder happened.

Lethe.

Please.

If you really feel that bad about it, mind if I ask one small favor?

Don't do this.

Next time, just lend me a game console! Haha!

No.

"We're going to your house to talk."

I don't even ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠want to go.

"Okay..."

Her real name, which he'd never once said on stream, had been dropped in public without warning. The tone had been coercive, the whole thing delivered like an order. And yet, somehow, there seemed to be a strange thrill running through Ari's voice.