The Forbidden Summoning
During the tutorial, the chat kept flooding with over-the-top praise. Is this game so stagnant that there's a culture where they lick every single newbie?
"Don't hype me up too much. It's not like I'm that amazing."
In truth, for a female streamer, she is good. But that's only because the average female streamer is absolutely pathetic. In Ultima Project, my main game from my previous life, I had reached Gold rank. In percentiles, that's top thirty percent. When you consider that the female average hovers around the top seventy percent, yeah, I'm definitely good for a girl. But for someone who used to be a guy, it was a pathetic stat to celebrate.
"What's so hard about landing combos? You just press the right keys at the right timing."
The moment I stated that obvious truth, the chat exploded.
Where did these people crawl in from? They were genuinely angry. All the suckers who got completely hooked by the middle-school-girl title. They probably watch female streamers all the time anyway.
Just watching the tutorial was enough to get them emotional, over-immersed, and even fighting. No wonder I Am Hero is called a disease-inducing game, a literal plague.
"Stop fighting, everyone. If you fight, I'll ban the whole lot of you."
Found him. The demon hiding among the humans, the one carrying an evil spirit in its heart. I immediately struck down the devil that had revealed its true nature. In other words, I hit it with a permanent chat ban.
Bans need to be thorough.
In my previous streams, every single viewer was so precious that I couldn't properly deal with the ones ruining the atmosphere. That had been a fatal mistake. The stream's vibe gradually worsened, new people bounced off, and the cycle continued. I wouldn't repeat that error. I am no longer Kim Hako. I have been reborn as the streaming genius Kim Haru.
There might not have been an evil demon in my heart, but I still sent the viewer with the awkward sense of humor straight to the afterlife. Since a permanent ban would be too harsh, I made it a ten-minute timeout instead. If you sharpen your gags, I'll consider letting you stay.
Right then, instead of the transparent soy sauce crab from next door, a real soy sauce crab restaurant popped up. The floaters who had swarmed in for the middle-school-girl keyword all vanished to go stare at an actual middle-school-girl cam. Viewers plummeted from twenty down to seven.
"You cuckoo bastard!"
So rude. So incredibly rude. Viewers are supposed to have manners. Don't you know it's bad etiquette to mention another stream without the streamer's permission?
I permanently banned the cuckooer, but the guy had already bounced from my stream.
The atmosphere among the viewers who remained only grew more vicious.
"Everyone stay right here. I'll show you something way better than some middle-school-girl cam."
"I said stop fighting, you idiots! Stop looking at the side chat and look at me! At me!"
"I'll turn it on once we hit five hundred viewers."
Normally, with fewer than ten viewers, only one person or nobody chats at all. But these seven seemed to have that explorer mindset, the type that visits a brand-new platform on launch day, so they were actually chatting a lot.
"Alright. I hereby name the seven heroes currently present as Kim Haru's founding contributors, the First Party!"
The moment I said that, the viewer count dropped to six.
"Just watch, you traitors who left. When I blow up, you'll be crying 'I should've followed on the first day! I should've been one of the founding contributors!' I'll make sure you regret it."
People who only watch huge corporate streams with thousands of viewers wouldn't know. In hako streams, we give thankful reactions not just for donations but even for simple follows!
Yet one viewer kept following and unfollowing while complaining there was no reaction.
"Stop following and unfollowing!"
"I said stop following and unfollowing, you son of a bitch!"
"Of course I'm a real middle school girl. What, do fake ones exist?"
"Cut the bullshit. All of you, cut it out."
Let me remind you once again: my current stream title is (I Am Hero First-Time Newbie) Real Middle School Girl Newbie / Will Turn On Cam at 500 Viewers.
"I'm telling you it's really my first time. Have you people only ever been fooled your whole lives? Am I that good?"
Is hitting the keyboard in time with the aim indicator the tutorial gives you really that difficult? There's no way.
When I played Ultima Project, even after three years all I got was criticism for being hardstuck in Gold. Maybe I was actually built for I Am Hero but wasted all that time wearing clothes that didn't fit.
"They say if you blindly baby newbies, it's a dead, stagnant game."
The viewer count climbed from six back up to eight. Hitting five hundred still seemed impossible. But how can you get full on the first bite? It was ridiculous to expect a stream to blow up on day one. In fact, gaining popularity with no cam and no face reveal might be close to impossible. Ten years ago, maybe. But in today's streaming scene, at least one of the two feels mandatory. Why don't I turn the cam on? I'm too scared to even work part-time at a convenience store. Why would I plaster my face all over the internet? Unless it guaranteed serious money, there was no chance I'd reveal my face.
"Then let's drop straight into ranked! Newbie incoming!"
After finishing the tutorial I queued for ranked.
[You must achieve 30 or more wins in Normal games.]
And immediately hit the ranked lock.
"I have to play thirty normal games?"
"I can just do a thirty-win streak. Thirty wins. It's the newbie zone anyway, right?"
I flexed as hard as I could, but it was pure stream concept. In reality I had zero confidence in pulling off a thirty-win streak. Let me repeat myself: even in Ultima Project, where I poured three whole years, I was only Gold, barely top thirty percent. Yet in a more popular game full of people who treat it like life or death, I was supposed to perform even better? It sounded impossible.
It sounded impossible, but for the sake of stream entertainment, I had no choice but to say it.
"If I fail the thirty-win streak, Kim Haru will rain down hamburgers!"
I'd use any means necessary. Streaming is all about gathering viewers first. Even if that meant going full burger maniac.
The forbidden summoning technique. Burgerji summoning!
I updated the stream title.
Stream Title: (I Am Hero First-Time Newbie) Real Middle School Girl / 500 Viewers = Cam On / 30-Win Streak Fail = Hamburger Rain
Of course, failing the thirty-win streak meant giving away one burger set. A massive seven-thousand-won bet! I wondered how many floaters this bet would pull in.
With the burger crowd flowing in, the viewer count reached eleven. A hako streamer breaking into double digits! My stream was definitely going to succeed!