The Tournament Is Over, But... (3)
“Whoa.”
Not a bad way to start.
First, he actually knew the song, so a natural reaction came easy.
Second—
I have no idea who either of them is.
Anime-looking characters with completely unfamiliar names. Vtubers Jimin had never seen before in his life.
“Ah······ yes, everyone, please keep the chat mannerly.”
Somehow the rude comments were catching even more heat than before. Still, as a streamer, shutting down negative pile-ons was the right call.
“That was really nice.”
A girl idol track from five years ago. The melody was still vaguely stuck in his head, so comparisons were inevitable—but it was a pretty solid cover.
“Okay, next—oh, this is a Japanese song?”
The next Vtuber’s track was a Japanese cover.
“Ooh.”
Even without looking at the subtitles, it was a pleasant listen.
This is comfortable.
Compared to picking between pretty female streamers earlier, this felt better for broadcasting. Less careful, somehow. Kind of healing, even.
And the viewer count had climbed even higher than before.
“Alright, that was great. I’m going with······”
He picked the one on the left, covering a Korean song.
“······”
Since music was a matter of taste, there was a bit more pushback on his pick than there had been with the female streamers. And on the internet, “matter of taste” usually meant I’m right and you’re wrong.
“Huh?”
A welcome surprise—and a little flustering.
“I had a lot of fun playing with you this time.”
On the right was Yapang, his teammate from the tournament. They’d competed together, then hung out playing other games after it ended—and that had only been a few hours ago.
“No, that’s not it.”
Personally, he wanted to keep the connections with his teammates going. Of course everyone would be busy, so they wouldn’t hang out as much as during tournament prep.
“Ah! Yes, let’s play again sometime.”
Even without a cam, Jimin bowed his head in farewell. Coach was a bit······ completely ridiculous, honestly, but this wasn’t the place to say so.
“Alright, let’s listen.”
Tournament was tournament. Connections were connections. He was mid-content, so he pressed play.
Ah······
Among the teammates he’d played with, Yapang had been the quietest. So even hearing her sing in her own voice didn’t feel especially familiar.
But maybe because of that unfamiliarity—
This is really good.
A cover of a nationally famous Korean female soloist. What was the word for this? Dreamy? Whatever it was, Jimin liked it a lot.
“Okay, and—”
He listened to the other Vtuber beside her as well.
“Ah.”
Not bad, but not his taste.
“Alright, I’m going with Yapang’s track.”
He’d listened with the appropriate little exclamations, then made the call. If you weren’t running an Ideal Type World Cup alone at home, proper reactions were mandatory.
“Uh, I just liked how it sounded to me.”
This time he could say it with way more confidence than before.
“Huh?”
That name was familiar.
“Yes, Hirose Haruka.”
A Vtuber his friend Yoon Sangcheol used to watch a lot. Someone who’d even entered this tournament as a team captain.
“Oh.”
He had no idea why familiar faces kept showing up in the round of 64, but······
Left was Hirose Haruka. Right was Mitani.
Both had been in the tournament. Come to think of it, they’d all entered as Bronze supports.
“Whoa, these are both really good?”
Both were covering Japanese songs, and they were so close it was hard to call.
“What’s Estel?”
Jimin asked.
“······”
That’s why I’m asking?
Jimin hurriedly opened a Gogle search window.
“Ah.”
Some kind of agency, apparently. Dahye had an agency too, so it was probably similar.
“So Yapang and Mitani are under the same company.”
Jimin said. That explained why Yapang’s reaction had felt a little different.
“A group?”
Jimin slowly reread the BadaWiki page.
“······”
It wasn’t exactly easy to grasp from scratch.
I think I messed up.
He finally realized the painfully obvious fact that he should study ahead before running content next time.
“Hey, guys, please don’t fight.”
The chat had been, to put it crudely, an absolute bloodbath for a while now. On top of that, people were quietly lumping fans together just to bait them—it was pure chaos.
“Everyone sang so well, so I’ll go with Yapang’s Sola.”
Things moved faster than expected, and the finals were the fastest of all.
“Winning the tournament with you was truly an honor.”
And once again, he emphasized his connection with her.
“Thanks for the 1,000 won donation. Haha, this is really hard.”
He brushed it off playfully, but he was finally properly aware that he was someone who needed to be playing SOL.
“······”
Of course, the donations had been pouring in. But he knew without anyone telling him that chasing that kind of thing was a bad idea.
“Should we order five pizzas?”
“What are you talking about······”
Lee Jonghyun snorted at Jimin’s words. Even with five eighteen-year-old guys gathered, five whole pizzas was a bit much.
“I’m watching the stream.”
“When are you starting YouTube?”
“Ah, damn, I can’t watch properly because of cram school.”
A few days had passed since the tournament ended.
His ranked score kept climbing, and while it wasn’t as high as right after the tournament, his average viewership had gone up. The stream was sailing along smoothly.
But the thing that made him happiest in the short term was—
“What’s this? Your friend’s treating everyone? Aren’t you overdoing it?”
“Haha······”
The girl working part-time at the pizza place said with a smile.
He’d received his first payout. He’d already gotten money from Dahye before, but earning it himself like this hit completely differently for Jimin.
“It’s kind of amazing how fast your stream grew.”
“Yeah, and you even entered a tournament······ that’s really cool.”
Go Yuseok and Jeon Jaeyeong, the bot-lane duo of the friend group, said with shining eyes.
“Yeah······”
Jimin smiled, a little embarrassed. He considered saying something humble, but even he had to admit he’d grown pretty fast.
“I figured being good at the game would carry over, but it’s wild how comfortable you’ve already gotten with streaming.”
“Huh?”
“Honestly, talking with that many people watching isn’t easy.”
Jonghyun said. The most reliable friend of the group—the one who’d randomly asked him before if he should try streaming.
“I was worried about that too, but I’m fine with it now. People just like me because I play well.”
Every time he pulled off a good play, chat praised him to the heavens. At some point, Jimin had started enjoying the stream itself.
“So who’s winning Worlds this year?”
“······”
Sangcheol brought up Worlds. Of course, it came up around this time every year.
“Dunno. What’s the point if P1 isn’t even there.”
“You said that last year and still watched.”
“I was just bored.”
Yuseok and Jaeyeong still hadn’t gotten to see P1 at Worlds, but they kept up with it anyway. If you loved pro SOL, Worlds was always going to feel special.
“I think SPL’s winning again this year.”
“Yeah, SCK doesn’t really have a team that feels like the team right now.”
Maehwa Life Esports. Genji Esports. C-Plus Dia. ST All-Star.
Those were the SCK teams that had made it to Worlds this time.
“Ah, whatever. We’ll see when it happens. Any news on who P1’s signing?”
“They better do it right.”
“Don’t bring in weird guys again like last time.”
Worlds talk flipped back to P1 almost immediately. That was what happened when you had two hardcore P1 fans in the group.
“Hot, hot.”
“Yes.”
The part-timer set the pizzas they’d ordered down on the table.
“Our future mega-corp streamer Park Jimin is treating, so eat with gratitude.”
“Next time we’ll get it.”
“No, no.”
Jimin waved his hands. They were having a good time—money like this might as well have been free.
“Yeah, what.”
"What are you doing, hyung."
“Eating at home.”
"You cook for yourself at home?"
“Why are you picking a fight first thing in the morning.”
Jang Yaohwan (32, unemployed) answered gruffly. His cooking skills were already pathetic enough that he was making toast, and now he had to listen to this guy’s voice first thing.
"Hyung, that kid I told you about hit Grandmaster this time."
“Oh, yeah?”
Still flat.
"He completely demolished that tournament too. A Master playing like he was against Bronze and Silver."
“Yeah, impressive.”
"Why are you reacting like that?"
“Haa······”
Talking with Song Hochang—“Whata”—Jang Yaohwan suddenly sighed.
The arrival of a young player who was that good at SOL was exciting. And if this guy was talking him up that much, the talent probably wasn’t ordinary.
The problem was that Yaohwan himself was in a pretty restless stretch right now.
“Hochang, P1 contacted me.”
"Whaaaat?"
“Ah, damn, why are you yelling.”
The explosive reaction through the phone. Given where Jang Yaohwan stood in the current SOL scene, Hochang knew exactly what a call from P1 meant.
In Korea, he’d taken an unknown team all the way to Worlds. Last year, he’d led a Japanese team and knocked out SCK’s first seed in the Worlds tournament. On top of that, his blunt interviews and distinctive ban-picks had made him one of the more star-powered coaches around—though that same nature meant plenty of people couldn’t stand him either.
"So you'd be the head coach?"
“Don’t know yet. Honestly I want to see how well they recruit first. No point walking into a messy situation just to get dragged for it.”
"Isn't that a little opportunistic?"
“Can’t help it.”
P1 kept setting new lows. The prestige of a legendary org didn’t seem to move players anymore. More and more of them preferred a team with even a slightly higher chance of winning Worlds, or a team that paid more, over putting on the jersey of the greatest organization in the game.
"But you kind of want to go, don't you?"
“······”
For him, the way he was talking was restless. At some point, he’d started speaking as if going was already on the table.
“Should I try grabbing Junyeong by the pant leg?”
"He'd do it if you asked. P1 isn't a team that treats people badly."
“Right.”
Probably.
P1 contacting him seriously was almost certainly partly about raising their odds of signing mid laner Luca—Kim Junyeong—the biggest free agent of this offseason. Back when they’d been together at Sensekai in Japan, the two of them had been a package deal: coach and player.
“Hey.”
"What."
“If I say let’s do it together, you’ll do it, right?”
"Let me think about it."
“Just get lost.”
Yaohwan laughed. The greatest organization in the game. One of the most watched coaches in the world. Offering a coaching role with that combo, and that was the reaction he got.
"Ah, but······ what do I do."
“Huh?”
The guy had always had a habit of suddenly grinning to himself out of nowhere. This time Hochang was chuckling alone again.
"People are gonna get the wrong idea for no reason."
“Ah, this is not it.”
Jimin said in a slightly subdued voice—then hurriedly muted the chat. A teammate had suddenly started spewing raw English curses. Aimed at their own ADC.
The ADC—a Varus who looked like a foreign player—kept pinging for jungler ganks, and when things didn’t go his way he went off and ruined the game.
“It’s kind of weird. At this tier, everyone should be people who are actually good at the game and love it, so why do they act like that.”
Ordinarily Jimin never lingered long on negative comments about teammates or enemies. Right now, though, he wasn’t bothering to hide that he was in a bad mood.
At this tier, even a small climb raised the level of the game, and the details in opposing laners’ movement got sharper—so nerves frayed that much easier.
“Huuu.”
The tier where losses started to sting more and more. Jimin let out a long sigh.
“But the enemy Camel was really good.”
Facing Camel in lane, all he could do was admire the movement. He almost wondered if it was even the Camel he knew.
“Oh, for real?”
So he really was something else.
So if you farmed a champion that hard, you really could reach a whole other level. Another lesson learned for Jimin.
The world of SOL really was wide and deep.
“Alright, next game.”
The higher the tier, the longer the queue times. That meant more stretches of chatting with viewers in between—and Jimin was starting to enjoy those moments too.
“Huh?”
Whata had entered the room.
“Hyung, hello!”
Jimin greeted him politely.
Hm?
Instead of just typing in chat, Whata suddenly sent him a direct message over Discord.