A New Beginning and Neglect Play?
Rusty would normally have wrapped up the stream early after Crocodile Farm 2 ended and rushed off to meet Soyou. Instead, he was currently somewhere else entirely. He had come to meet someone who had contacted him a while ago.
The neatly groomed man wearing a checkered round-neck tee handed Rusty a document the moment introductions were over.
“The reason I wanted to meet you today, Rusty, is to ask if you could take a look at this.”
“Ah. Sure. Should I read it right now?”
“Yes, please.”
At the man’s request, Rusty picked up the document. As he slowly scanned through it, some rather interesting details caught his eye.
“Hmm… So it’s like this… Interesting…”
After quickly skimming to the end, Rusty handed the papers back.
“Doesn’t this already have the full roadmap laid out? It even looks like you already have developers on board.”
“Yes. We’ve actually been preparing this for a while now, and we’ve already found the partners who will be working with us.”
“Then why did you call me?”
The man had been answering smoothly until now, but he suddenly fell silent. After a moment, he spoke with difficulty.
“To be honest… I heard through a mutual acquaintance that your programming skills are quite exceptional.”
“……”
“I also heard that the A.I. you operate is something special.”
“……”
Rusty listened quietly. Sensing that he had Rusty’s full attention, the man’s words gradually sped up.
“As you can see from the document, I’m confident that what we’re aiming for will be a huge help to many streamers. We believe we’ve captured both freshness and fun in a way that’s never been seen before.”
“So what exactly do you want from me…?”
When Rusty nudged the conversation toward the main point, the man suddenly stood up and bowed deeply.
“Please help us!!”
“…..Huh?”
After finally getting the man to sit back down, Rusty heard the full story. They were currently developing a server that was already about 80% complete. They had been pushing hard on the final polish and bug fixes when Crocodile Farm 2 appeared.
At first, they had dismissed it with “It’s just Minecraft anyway…” but—
“We never dreamed that thousands of streamers would actually connect to the server.”
“And on top of that, the operation was so incredibly clean…”
In short, their own server started lagging and spitting out bugs with just fifty players, yet Crocodile Farm 2 ran smoothly with thousands of concurrent users and almost no bugs. The person responsible for that result was—
“We heard it was you, Rusty.”
“So we thought, even though the base game is different, maybe you could still be a great help to us.”
“Hmm……”
After hearing everything, Rusty fell into thought. The man’s guess was actually correct. The server described in the documents—the one they claimed embodied their ideals—was the very server Rusty had created back in the States to play with his brothers.
The man had no idea he was currently trying to recruit the original developer of the server he aspired to build. The fact that coincidences like this happened so often was exactly what made life interesting.
. . .
“I think I can help you out. But in exchange…”
“Ah. Yes. We’re prepared to accept any conditions.”
The man’s eyes sparkled. As long as the request wasn’t too unreasonable, he seemed willing to agree to almost anything.
“I can join as a player instead of being on the operations team, right?”
“Ah… Yes! We don’t have any hidden restrictions, so that’s completely fine!”
The man looked momentarily flustered at such a simple request, then answered energetically.
“And… there’s one favor I’d like to ask later.”
“A favor?”
“Yeah. For example… would it be okay if I hacked the game?”
“W… What? Hacking???”
“Yes. There’s something I’ve wanted to try for a while with a server like this.”
A mischievous smile appeared on Rusty’s lips as he spoke. The man watching him began to feel a growing sense of unease.
“Ah… Well… As long as it doesn’t negatively affect operations or cause trouble for other players…”
“Haha. I’m a streamer too. You don’t really think I’d do something like that on stream, do you? You don’t have to worry. If I do it, I’ll definitely do it on stream.”
“Ah… Haha… If that’s all, then I suppose it’s fine.”
The man’s relieved sigh drifted through the café.
After Crocodile Farm 2 ended and Rusty joined the new project—
“Boo~~~”
Soyou’s frustration was steadily growing. No matter how much she chatted with viewers during her streams or mercilessly bullied Mabel in-game—
Mabel had become noticeably more pitiful lately. Because she couldn’t meet Jiwon, Soyou’s dissatisfaction kept piling up. Jiwon had shown her the thrilling, heart-fluttering feeling of a kiss, yet they hadn’t been able to meet since. It was like an itch that wouldn’t go away, a sneeze that refused to come out. The unknown frustration was making her nerves increasingly frayed when—
The thought of finally going on a date with Jiwon put Soyou in an excellent mood.
Tang~!
“Hehe. Fun~”
“+1~”
Time passed, and it was now 1:30 a.m. Soyou finished getting ready and stepped out the door. She had originally planned to leave earlier, but—
‘Tsk. Rin keeps barging in every time I kill her a few times… How petty…’
Thanks to that, her chest still felt a bit sore from all the extra squeezing. Still, the promise of a date with Jiwon had made her increase the intensity while drastically shortening the duration, so even though she was a little late, she wouldn’t be too late. That was some consolation.
After hurrying, Soyou arrived only about ten minutes late. She spotted Jiwon sitting inside the café and was about to approach when—
“Excuse me, do you have company?”
A woman walked up to Jiwon and tried a pickup line. Jealousy flared up inside Soyou instantly.
“Ah. Yes. I’m waiting for my girlfriend.”
Soyou’s jealousy cooled slightly when she saw Jiwon reject her gently. But—
“Ah, I see… Then, maybe…”
The woman seemed reluctant to give up after seeing Jiwon’s soft smile and tried again. Soyou quickly walked over.
Jiwon noticed her and waved brightly.
“Ah, honey~. Over here.”
When Jiwon called her “honey” and waved, the woman turned to look at Soyou. After quietly scanning her from face to figure, the woman left with a heavy look of defeat.
Once the woman was gone, Soyou sat down beside Jiwon.
“This… makes me worried about leaving you alone too?”
She had seen him reject the woman, but the gentle way he smiled while doing so bothered her. She wished he had been cold and firm.
“That’s exactly why I called you ‘honey.’ I have to advertise that you’re mine.”
“Hehe. Really… How do you say things so sweetly~?”
She gently pinched his lips, shook them softly, then let go. Jiwon smiled pleasantly at her affectionate teasing.
They flirted for a while, but soon Jiwon brought up something heavier.
“Actually, there’s something I’m preparing right now…”
In other words, the project he had recently joined would go nowhere if they continued in the original direction, so they had decided to completely rebuild it. The problem was that changing the framework meant they had to overhaul everything from scratch. Instead of modifying something that was already 80% done, it was better to start over from 0%. Meeting the original schedule now seemed extremely tight.
Therefore—
“So… I might not be able to come see you for a while.”
Thud… It felt like a heavy stone had landed on Soyou’s chest. She had already struggled so much from not seeing him for just a short time. Now she might not see him at all for a while?
Soyou’s mind went blank. Then a certain word from a website she had been browsing recently for “study purposes” regarding their future flashed through her head.
. . .
‘Don’t tell me… this is what they call neglect play?’
Ehey~~ That’s not it. You’ve been looking at weird stuff again, haven’t you?