Lethe Influx (1)
Holy crap. I'd been hopping around other people's streams for a bit, and I come back to this?
Before I went live I checked my phone, and a mountain of Kkatalk messages had piled up — every last one of them from Ari.
The way she planted a period at the end of every single sentence was so perfectly, uncannily Ari it almost made me smile.
The gratitude pouring off the screen was impossible to miss… but maybe I'd made her uncomfortable?
Flip it around and it was like Ari had come over to my place, cooked a whole meal, done the dishes, and walked out.
Yeah. That would feel like a lot.
Not that I was the one feeling burdened.
People always put themselves first. As long as it isn't me, we're good. I wasn't uncomfortable, so everything was fine.
Anyway. Enough of that nonsense. It was 5:50 now, which meant those messages had been sitting there for almost three hours.
I should fire off a reply and get ready to go live.
Hmm. Was that right?
Eh, it shouldn't be a problem. After everything I'd done before I left, she wasn't going to get her feelings hurt over a short reply. She'd just take it as it was.
I sent it, switched the phone to silent, and tossed it onto the bed.
My aim was off — it thunked against the wall — but my beat-up old phone wasn't about to die from a little bump like that.
Less than ten minutes until stream.
Yesterday I'd collabed with Ari and wrapped at midnight, an hour earlier than usual. Today I planned to make that hour up, so we'd be running until around two in the morning.
Normally I'd worry whether my thin content could last that long, but today wasn't a problem.
I hadn't been streaming that long, honestly, but I'd been playing the same game every single time, so the new one I'd prepped should get a pretty decent reaction.
The Switch is god.
"Geumha, geumha. Good to see you, kids."
I'd always planned to collab with Ari someday, the way we'd talked about the first time we met at the Orphanage.
At the time I'd thrown the promise out without thinking, just to ease the guilt she felt toward me — but that wasn't the important part.
I'd figured we'd collab once my stream was a little bigger. Collabing too early with a Top-Tier Enterprise Streamer like her could wash the color right out of my own broadcast.
Looking at these chats, though, that worry had been pointless.
Already three hundred. Way more than usual, and the number was still climbing in real time.
From the way they talked, yeah — these were people pouring in from Lethe's stream.
I'd heard Lethe's viewers were the gentle type. I'd even experienced it firsthand yesterday.
So why were they like this in here?
More than three times my usual count had flooded in, so why did the chat feel basically the same as always?
Were they not even from Lethe's stream? Community lurkers, maybe?
It isn't weird for every stream to have its own vibe, or for the same viewer to type differently from room to room. But this was too far gone.
I'd noticed during yesterday's collab that Lethe's viewers were chatting a little more loosely — maybe my chat's influence, and Lethe had loosened the reins a bit too. I'd thought they were just acclimating to my viewers' freewheeling atmosphere…
At this point it wasn't acclimation. It was an infection.
Why did everyone go weird the second they stepped into my room? Was I secreting some kind of pheromone? Or was it a Geum Taeyang trait?
Yeah, no idea. Outside my jurisdiction. Best to just roll with it.
Anyway. Time to stream.
"Uh… what's that supposed to mean? You look for Lethe on Lethe's stream, kids."
No wonder the viewer count was climbing way faster than I'd expected.
There was influx, sure, but a lot of these were refugees flooding in because Lethe's stream had gone dark.
"I don't know where Lethe went either, so I can't answer that. Stop asking, kids."
Even if we were close as streamers, I should probably keep the focus on me in my own broadcast. I thought about warning them.
…But yesterday was a collab. I could allow this much.
I was grateful they'd come to my stream at all, and besides, a freewheeling vibe was the whole point of this broadcast.
Still — where had Ari gone?
One of the reasons for yesterday's collab was that if Lethe took another day off, her viewers' complaints would explode. She hadn't even messaged me about being off.
Eh. No need to worry about Ari. She was a senior streamer and ridiculously capable. Someone at her level wasn't going to fail at taking care of herself.
I just needed to focus on my own stream.
"Everyone chill out. I prepped something fun for today, so let's keep it nice."
"I'll tell you later. Right now I need to pick tonight's cooking menu."
Zero patience, these guys.
The chat was exploding with nicknames I'd never seen before. Already adapted to my room, huh. They sure picked up the bad culture fast.
I thought about how to settle them down, then just put on a dead-serious face.
Another streamer might get flamed for not taking a joke… but that wasn't our style, was it?
"That's enough."
They always acted like they had nothing to lose, but the second I looked serious they got scared.
Thinking about how these weren't even guys — they were women — made it kind of cute.
"Heh-heh. You got spooked over that? Why would I be mad."
"Alright. I don't take orders from egens who flinch at a man — wait, no, teto-girls. Quiet down and throw me some dinner recs."
Same comfortable atmosphere as always. Comfortable. Definitely.
The daily cooking stream followed a pretty similar format. Viewers recommended dishes, and if I had the ingredients, I'd look up a recipe.
I'd always had a decent sense for cooking, and after the body swap I could watch a NewTube cooking video once and recreate it perfectly.
The perfect skillset for a half-assed cooking stream. This body was born to broadcast, honestly.
Hmm. Chats like this were common enough even on a normal day.
Usually if I played along a bit, the viewers would start suggesting actually reasonable menus.
"Lobster — you buy it, I'll cook it. Eel jelly? Are you insane? Sardine pie, one-minute chat ban."
The new viewers were having the time of their lives throwing completely unhinged suggestions.
Well, at least they were having fun. Better this than some stuffy, serious mood.
"Kids, why are you all brain-rotting extra hard today? If you keep spamming bits like that you'll never get a girlfriend."
"Brainrot, you say? Is it? Is that why I never had a girlfriend either?"
Hey, now I'm the one getting sad. Why is the reaction like this.
Why do they just assume I have a girlfriend.
"What's with the reaction? I'm a guy who pursues natural encounters and pure love. Not the type who dates just anyone."
I looked at the exploding chat with a face of genuine incomprehension.
That face just made every kind of reaction pour out.
Streaming really was fun, I had to admit.
Was this what it felt like hanging out with a bunch of friends? I wouldn't know, but it was probably similar.
With so many viewers packed in today, chat was even more lively than usual — and it was usually pretty lively — and my own energy was climbing to match.
We volleyed banter for a while, and I even got a few dollar donations.
I don't know how other streamers feel about it, but those meant something to me. I'd gotten a ten-dollar one before, but talking through a dollar donation was a different kind of thing.
Anyway, the conversation that had derailed into girlfriend talk circled all the way back to the start.
"So. What am I eating today? I'm starting to get hungry."
"Oh… well, well. Walking idea banks over here."
Unlike the unhinged stuff from earlier, these were actually solid, decent ideas. I'd recently stocked the fridge with all kinds of ingredients for the cooking streams, so I could make any of those no problem.
But.
The thing was, I'd already decided today's menu.
For this exact moment.
"Hmm… pasta's winning today, huh?"
This was when I was happiest. When these adorable viewers' expectations came crashing down. Maybe becoming Geum Taeyang had warped my tastes.
It wasn't some huge crime. Just a little trolling, enough to get a rise out of them.
I wasn't even going to do it after today.
"Alright then. Today's kimchi fried rice."