Pretty Girls x100 - 3
Live: Aki-chan Special Broadcast - PC Cafe Event Special Coverage~!
-Live viewers: 3,108
Friday evening.
Aki-chan’s stream felt different today. For one thing, there was a live relay feed in the corner of the screen, and it was showing the inside of a PC cafe.
“Bigman-nim! Thank you for the donation! Are you... at a PC cafe? Then please have fun and enjoy yourselves! Bigman! Bigman—!”
“Wow...! There are so many people!”
Aki-chan stared blankly at the game screen.
It was a game she usually didn’t stream, and she let out a delighted little laugh at the sight of the tiny three-head characters packed together like clouds.
“They’re so cute!”
It was Fall Guys, the large-scale obstacle race game.
From the PC cafe relay, DoDa’s starting signal rang out.
From now on, the game begins!
When the game started, one hundred three-head characters sprinted like mad.
Pad-pad-pad.
Pad-pad-pad.
Pad-pad-pad.
Their legs were short, but they were running with ferocious determination.
Aki-chan clapped happily.
“Wow! So cute! Really cute. Are they all DoDa-ry people?”
“Hee.... Which one of those characters is an Ace?”
...
...
...
“!”
Out of nowhere came a silent uproar.
Crying emoji started appearing across the screen. Aki-chan, thinking she had accidentally discriminated against her fans, hurriedly shook her head and tried to explain.
“No! That’s not it.... I was just curious which one of them was an Ace....”
“Pfft... heh heh! Ah, thank you for the donation! Got it.”
With Bigman’s familiar line, Aki-chan finally realized this was all part of the act.
And so she smoothly resumed the relay.
“Wow.... There are so many people.”
On the screen, a brawl had broken out.
Dozens of DoDa-ry fans were rushing at a single blue player and grabbing him. It was like a swarm of doctor fish charging toward a foot to eat the dead skin.
Rumble—
In the end, DoDa’s scream echoed through the PC cafe speakers.
“Agh! You crazy bastards! Stop grabbing me and let me go—!”
But the fans’ obsession never stopped. Even if they died, they would not let DoDa go. The sight of dozens of characters piling in was horror itself.
“Agh! Aaaah! Ughhh—!”
Rumble
Rumble
Rumble
“You crazy bastards! Don’t you need a smartphone?! Just take it already...!”
Rumble
Rumble
Rumble
Aki-chan watched and burst out laughing.
“Ahahaha! What is that!”
“Thank you for the donation! Seems like they really don’t....”
That aside, there were also people who were genuinely trying hard to win.
“!”
DoDa spoke through the PC cafe speaker.
“Whoa?! Hey, look over there, guys! Stop bullying DoDa already! Look at the people up front! Those people are taking all the prizes, aren’t they?!”
The leading group ahead of them.
They leapt cleanly over the wind-aided section in one go and surged farther and farther ahead. They were already just steps away from the finish.
“Oh! Those five in front are really good.... They’re already way ahead.”
The leading group had now reached the stepping-stone bridge.
They crossed the wobbling platforms without hesitation.
“Ohhh, ohhh....”
And then, like a troupe of acrobats.
Five of them arrived in succession at once.
“Wow! Winner—!”
After the brief cheer died down, the relay screen showed the five grinning men and women getting up to receive their prizes.
Aki-chan looked at the boy with glasses among them and said, “Oh! The yellow shirt!”
DoDa’s face appeared on the PC cafe projector.
“Everyone, please give them a big round of applause! Got anything you especially want? Pick it and take it home.”
Then each person said what they wanted.
“Gaming PC!”
“Smartphone!”
“Graphics card for me....”
“I want a smartphone too.”
The boy in the yellow T-shirt smiled brightly and, without hesitation, grabbed the hotel stay voucher. It was a voucher for a five-star hotel in Seoul.
The inside of the PC cafe rippled with noise.
DoDa said in surprise, “Oh? Why’s our Ace friend taking the hotel stay voucher? Honestly, the graphics card costs more, doesn’t it? It was a brand-new high-end model, too, so it was really hard to get.”
The boy said proudly, “I want to go on a trip with my parents, who always work so hard!”
“!”
...
...
...
Aki-chan smiled brightly and clapped her hands.
“Our Ace people are all the best, really...!”
*
I watched the stream comfortably from the rooftop room above the convenience store.
“....”
Friday’s first round ended quickly. Then, during a short break, the in-house event moved forward.
So it’s three rounds a day, with prizes being handed out to fifteen people each time.
-Then I’m going to go handle a quick PC cafe interaction! Since it’ll all be broadcast on the relay channel, please keep watching!
Aki-chan said that, then briefly paused the stream. It looked like she’d finished preparing to connect straight from the studio.
Having the studio as an intermediate hub makes stream transitions really smooth. It’s nice that the mood doesn’t get interrupted because of it.
The atmosphere on the remaining broadcast channel was good too.
The Aces were joking around and praising the bespectacled boy from before. They were already settling into the fandom identity called “Ace.”
...
...
...
...
As befits Aki-chan’s lively fandom, they spent the time talking excitedly about what had just happened.
I turned to the other broadcast channels as well.
The mood differs a little on each relay channel, huh.
Clara and Berry’s channels were also buzzing about what had just happened. But each had their own emotional angle.
First, Clara and the Carrots were soaked in quiet emotion.
“Wow.... He’s really a good son. It’s not easy to do something like that these days. I’m seriously getting chills here, you know?”
Overall, you could feel the older age range there. Rather than fandom memes or trendy slang, it was a mood of sharing feelings about what was happening right in front of them.
On the other hand, the Berry channel....
Berry and the Boomerangs were mainly judging the atmosphere inside the venue.
More precisely, they were judging the parts Berry herself had put together.
“But that pink section over at the merch booth, isn’t it super cute? Everyone, what do you think? Hm? Huh? It’s cute, right?”
Even while highlighting the whole event, she still seemed determined not to lose her own stream tone. The fans were enjoying that consistency of hers too.
And the DoDa-ry were unleashing madness on the shared relay channel. They were thrilled by nothing more than bullying DoDa.
It was four different colors for four different people.
In just one month, the fandom’s atmosphere had split so sharply.
“....”
I nodded.
Maybe because they’ve been running big events back to back, each member’s vibe has started shaping the fans in a pretty extreme way.
It was a kind of brand imprinting effect.
Like some mating-game wheel spinning round and round, throwing them into a dizzying environment, they’d quickly started to explore their own tendencies.
A strong initial fandom effect.
More than just subscriber growth, it secured a much more powerful influence.
Not bad.
These fans would evolve into a solid core of loyalty.
Each broadcast would become a sturdy little world of its own.
And as long as those worlds existed, the subscriber count would naturally rise.
....
That is, unless someone got in the way.
*
On the first day, one of the event participants.
Park Hongshin, one of the DoDa-ry, drew in a shaky breath.
“Hoo...! Hoo!”
The smile on his face never left.
Cheering continued all around him.
It was only one game.
But he was playing, joking, and causing trouble with DoDa.
The prizes are going to the skilled players anyway, so I’m just here to chase fun and leave...!
Right now, for this moment alone....
The center of this place was him.
That electrifying feeling of connection shook his brain.
This is... seriously fucking fun!
At that moment.
A man next to him grinned and spoke up.
“It’s really fun, isn’t it?”
“!”
They weren’t even acquainted.
But he was also wearing a blue T-shirt.
...He’s a fellow DoDa-ry like me.
Park Hongshin, sweating, answered.
“Yes! Seriously, bullying DoDa—!”
He swallowed the rest of the sentence.
Ah, right.
This was real life.
Did I sound too perverted?
He glanced to the side.
But the man sitting beside him laughed heartily.
“We’re a fandom that exists to bully DoDa, after all.”
“!”
The two of them snickered like little rascals sharing a secret.
“By the way, it’s noisy toward the back too.”
“Ah, the interaction.”
The two men looked behind them.
There, Aki-chan appeared on the giant screen, waving her hand.
-Are you all having fun?
People looked at the screen showing her and waved back.
-Yes!
-We’re having fun!
-Waaaah—!
Grown adults greeted a beautiful girl like children.
They shouted themselves hoarse and cheered.
The scene somehow felt like a dream.
“....”
“....”
It was a ridiculous sight.
And, at the same time, an honest one.
“....”
“....”
Park Hongshin muttered blankly, “This is... seriously fucking fun.”
If only this dream would keep going....
*
The event, which continued through Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, spread across countless VTuber communities. Those who weren’t already part of the ABCD fandom were stunned all over again.
And....
Among them was also the fandom of the VTuber group with the most subscribers in South Korea.
-Even Romantic Drive can’t do something like this....
-For real, what have we been doing for four years lol
-Isn’t that side more like the actual big corporation?
“....”
There was someone else watching that movement too.
She was a predator in a suit.
---