Streamer Debut (6)
"Mind if I order some chicken?"
"Whoa, look at Jimin go."
Tonight they were at Yoon Sangcheol's place — his parents would be home late. Park Jimin put the offer out with real confidence: he would sponsor the food.
"You sure?"
"Yeah."
Lee Jonghyun, who'd joined them for the evening, asked just to be sure, but Jimin meant it. He still had money left from Yu Dahye, and though he hadn't filed for settlement yet, there was cash from streaming too.
Someday.
Once he was earning properly, he would pay Dahye back as soon as he could. For now, though, he was happy to treat his friends. If he was counting the people he was grateful for, they ranked right up there.
"Man, I'm nervous. What do we do?"
"They'll win today, right?"
The two of them were pure P1 fans as always. Go Yuseok fretted first; Jeon Jaeyeong tried to calm him down, though he felt the same way underneath.
"Is C-Plus still playing well?"
"Honestly, they weren't better than P1 in Summer, but their form's been climbing lately."
Sangcheol answered Jonghyun's question. He left out the other half — that P1 had been looking more and more drained.
"Enjoy your meal."
"Thank you!"
"Came faster than I thought."
They'd worried the chicken would run late with a P1 match on, but it arrived earlier than expected. A relief.
"Jimin, I'm digging in."
"Go for it."
"Thanks!"
"Next time's on me."
"It's fine."
Spending money on his friends put Jimin in a good mood. So this was the taste of money? When the people you spent it on were people like this, the joy of spending ran almost as deep as the joy of earning.
Dahye nuna…
Still, the thought of her coming over to his place nagged at him. He wanted to host her properly this time — but honestly, wasn't she the richer one by far? One look at the donations exploding on her stream told you that, and once you added every other stream of income, the gap between them was hard to even measure.
What could he even do for her that she would like? It was an old, familiar worry.
"…"
"What's wrong, Jimin?"
"Ah — nothing."
He shook his head side to side. He decided not to dwell on it. He was with his friends, and the match was about to start.
"Oh, it's starting."
"This soy-sauce chicken is really good."
"…"
Gulp.
Whoa.
The intro rolled as the match began — the arena filling the screen, cameras sweeping over packed stands — and for a moment Jimin could only stare in wonder.
"There are so many people."
"It's a P1 match. Of course there are."
SOL Park in Jongno, opened three years earlier. Complaints that the seats were too few had led to a venue several times larger, and with the heat of SOL roaring back after Maker's departure, it had no trouble filling them.
"Hello, everyone. This is caster Yoo Jongwon."
"When does it start?"
"Still a bit."
"Ah…"
Jimin could feel it clearly now — this was a big match.
"There they are."
The players were walking out. Two teams with no coins left to spend. Lose tonight and Worlds was gone, and the tension sat plain on every face.
So cool.
All Jimin could do was marvel. They weren't towering, muscle-bound athletes like baseball or soccer players — just ordinary guys in their twenties. And still, in matching uniforms, ringed by that sea of fans, they looked impossibly cool.
"Ugh, why are we starting on red?"
"Because P1's lower on points…"
"Man, that's rough."
"Is that what matters?"
"What, you don't know?"
"Isn't it just top side and bottom side?"
Jimin said it with pure innocence.
"The sides are a little different. In pro play, you feel that difference hard."
Sangcheol, the resident expert, explained patiently.
"I told you they ban five, right? Blue side picks first, so they get the best champion available. That's an advantage."
"Ah…"
"Not always, though. On red you get the last pick — you can counter-pick."
"Still, blue's way better."
"Fine, whatever."
Jonghyun surrendered the point. When Sangcheol dug in on SOL, Jonghyun usually trusted he was right.
"Ah, they took Kai'Sa."
"Kai'Sa's the best ADC right now."
"Ah…"
Jimin nodded along to Sangcheol's running commentary beside him.
It's just champion select…
His friends, the casters, the players — all of them dead serious. The weight of a broadcast match was settling on him bit by bit.
"Yasuo?"
"Oh, so it's Yasuo Diana?"
"…"
He wasn't really following, but he let the atmosphere carry him and waited for draft to end.
"How do you see both team comps?"
"Well, P1 took a Yasuo-Diana pairing, plus scaling pieces in Orianna and Xayah — but C-Plus Dia has lane priority, so the question is how long they can hold."
"We've seen Yasuo used to counter Gnar a lot in the pro scene, but the success rate isn't actually that high. If they lose top as well…"
"Hmm…"
The room had already settled into a P1-cheering mood. The casters were talking down the draft, and Jimin felt a little awkward about it. Sangcheol wasn't arguing either, which probably meant he didn't disagree.
"Everyone's just… really good."
Watching the pros farm CS alone was enough to leave Jimin impressed. Eating well while you were winning was one thing — doing it while you were getting shoved in was something else entirely.
"Ah, this makes it hard for Diana to scale comfortably."
"This is rough."
"When did Orianna even burn Flash?"
Game one. From the opening minutes, C-Plus Dia's laners were smothering P1 in lane.
"Ohhh!"
"That trade completely fell apart!"
"Ah, you can't play it like that."
A beat he could actually feel himself, so Jimin spoke up. C-Plus's top Gnar had hammered the opposing Yasuo and seized the lead. Bleed that much health into a ranged champion in top, and what followed was pure hell.
"They need to enable Oz, so why hand him a passive champ like that?"
"Is he that good?"
"Yeah. Best jungler on P1."
"Probably the only S-tier player they've got."
Talk of P1's jungler Oz lit a spark under Yuseok and Jaeyeong, who'd looked glum a second earlier. Oz — the jungler P1 had raised themselves. He'd debuted after the team's glory years were already over, but his skill had earned him deep trust from the fans.
"Xayah! Xayah— ah!"
"Ah, what?"
"C-Plus Dia takes first blood."
"The damage here is massive."
P1's bot lane had been losing trades by inches. In the end they ate a dive from the enemy bot duo with Nidalee joining in.
"It's over."
Jonghyun said it flat. No one argued — the game was tipping over in plain sight.
"Diana!"
"Oh!"
"Whoa!"
Jimin's eyes went wide. P1 had been getting crushed all game — and then Diana's super play.
"Ah — but Mega Gnar!"
Even after Diana and Yasuo opened the fight cleanly, C-Plus's answer was anything but soft.
"Ah…"
"It's fine, it's just set one."
In the end it wasn't enough. They couldn't stop the already-fed enemy Kai'Sa from carrying.
"Bathroom for a sec."
"Yeah."
Jimin stood up from his seat.
"Haa."
It had been a frustrating game for P1, but Oz's flashy entry at the end had been genuinely incredible.
"Still, once you lose mid-jungle, it gets rough."
"And top isn't exactly winning either."
C-Plus Dia's mid, Karas, and their ADC, Himmel, were both names the league respected.
"Where's P1 even spending their money?"
"Don't they make a lot?"
"They said they're paying off debt — things stay tight through this year."
"…"
Team business that had nothing to do with SOL made Jimin's head hurt.
"Then they'll be fine next year."
"They still have to make Worlds for next year's free agents to want to come. Haa…"
Sangcheol's answer left Jonghyun looking awkward.
"Holy shit— what was that?!"
A curse burst out of Yuseok, who'd been locked on the screen.
"Oz! Oz's Gragas barrel explodes!"
"He completely collapses the enemy side!"
Oz, who had been playing solid all through set two, detonated the enemy formation in the Baron fight and stole the objective for good measure.
As expected, P1 has fight in them!
GG!
"Ah, they won! They won!"
The reverse on a losing game sent Yuseok and Jaeyeong into a hug, cheering.
"Man, Oz is just cracked. Has he always been this good?"
"Straight uptrend since debut. This year he's fully awakened."
Jonghyun marveled; Sangcheol, who'd been high on Oz from the start, looked smug.
"Whoa…"
A play that seized the game in an instant. The roaring crowd. It was only the end of set two, and Jimin's head was spinning trying to fit this new world into his own.
"Ah, what is this."
"Why are they so lifeless?"
P1's bot was getting obliterated by C-Plus's Caitlyn-Lux. And P1's top, who'd already lost to C-Plus's top Sai in sets one and two, was losing again.
"This is C-Plus's winning formula right here!"
Bot smashes open the game; late-game Kassadin, fully scaled, delivers the checkmate. P1 fell apart as if the water were simply running downhill.
"…"
"Haa…"
The lifeless play left Jaeyeong and Yuseok unable even to touch the chicken.
"Whoa!"
"Waaaaaah!"
"Holy—!"
Even Sangcheol, the host, screamed at the play.
"Oz! He kicks only the enemy Ezreal!"
"How do you even see that angle?!"
Oz took Lee Sin to the absolute limit, kicking the enemy Ezreal from behind with his ultimate, and his teammates blew him up on the spot.
GG!
Put the song on!
P1! P1! P1!
The crowd chanting for P1 came through the TV crystal clear.
"Ah, please, please."
"Just win today. Go to Worlds and group-stage exit for all I care — I won't say a word."
His friends were praying out loud.
"That's insane."
"…"
Even Jonghyun, who'd been watching blank-faced, looked stunned. Jimin's face was more shocked still.
"Set four MVP is Oz."
"The pride of P1 fans… ah, if you watch today's series, you understand exactly why this player is rated so highly."
"Ah, come on, that's dirty."
C-Plus Dia five-banned the jungle. Even the casters laughed in disbelief.
"Ahh, if they do this…"
"P1 is in trouble!"
The long-awaited set five. Even Jimin, who'd only just taken his first steps into broadcast SOL, felt his expression harden.
Zero to five…
Before the ten-minute mark, all five of P1 had already died once. And C-Plus Dia was on a late-game scaling comp.
Set five over. C-Plus Dia's players celebrating. P1's players with their heads down. The cameras hunted out P1's female fans crying like wounded animals.
"So close."
"Yeah."
"Man…"
It wasn't only Yuseok and Jaeyeong, the hardcore P1 fans. Jonghyun, Sangcheol, and Jimin — who'd all watched from P1's side tonight — sat with dark faces, trading empty words.
"Ah… ah…"
Yuseok was broken.
"Hey, anyone want to lend me money?"
"What are you talking about?"
"I'm crowdfunding a truck protest."
"Stop it."
Watching them miss Worlds again, Jaeyeong seemed to feel more rage than grief.
"…"
Gulp.
His first broadcast match, and the team he'd rooted for had lost. It didn't cut as deep as it did for Yuseok and Jaeyeong, but Jimin still felt distinctly wrong.
What even is that, to make them…
Above all, he couldn't look away from the fans choking back tears. How badly must they have wanted a P1 win for tears like that to come out?
"Haa…"
He couldn't name the feeling yet, but he knew a lot had changed from yesterday.
The next day.
Jimin, live on stream, read the chat.
"Thank you for the 1,000 won — but that's against stream rules, so I'm going to ban you."
When it came to enforcing the rules, you couldn't hesitate. Dahye had told him that more than once. Like other streamers, Jimin's channel banned fishing with pro-match drama.
"…"
Despite the hangover from yesterday's series, Jimin was running a decent stream.
I want to watch more.
And strangely enough, he found himself wanting another look at the world he'd only just tasted.
Enemy slain.
Double Kill.
Jimin's Fiora turned a gank threat around and took both enemy champions instead.
"Huh?"
His first pro match. A series with Worlds on the line, no less. And even if that world didn't shine quite that bright, there were still worlds Jimin hadn't even known existed.