Then I'll Bang Bang on the Boss's Heart (1)
The short briefing wrapped up, and before the match began, we all took a moment in the practice range to adjust our aim. Do-hee checked the gallery reactions and smiled.
It was still a little early to mention it, but with the mix of self-restraint, burning enthusiasm, and people ready to lie down and give up, today’s broadcast goal had essentially been achieved. Biochemical terrorism warnings were popping up everywhere, but from Do-hee’s long streaming experience, this level was still on the milder side. In other words, it was time to highlight Mazia’s rarity and negotiate with the viewers.
Because even if Jia suddenly changed her mind and decided to debut one day, it was only right to protect her as an employee until then.
“Before we start the game, there’s something I need to say. Our Employee-di does a ton of work at the company. So if you guys start demanding she appear more, show her voice, or do collabs on the members’ streams, it’ll cause problems. It’ll be hard on Employee-di, and the kids will feel uncomfortable too. Still, if an opportunity like today comes up, I’ll bring her out. So can you all be satisfied with that? Deal?”
[Someone like her? This is the best job I could ask for.]
The funny part was that in the meantime, Mazia had already gotten used to the broadcast and started filling the audio with whatever she felt like. In professional terms, her mouth had loosened up. Even though she had no intention of streaming, she was perfectly following one of a streamer’s most important qualities—knowing when to jump in and when to step back.
If the original plan had been for Mazia’s spike to end the conversation, now she could toss the ball up once more and delay the spike timing.
“Really? Best job ever? Should I make you work sixteen hours a day starting tomorrow?”
[I’ll quit.]
[I’m kidding. I’m not quitting. I don’t have anywhere else to go.]
In the middle of it all, she ruthlessly swatted away the candy offered by the bad uncles. That was exactly what drove the viewers crazy. It really looked like she might start streaming if they just coaxed her a little more. But like a little kid who only listens to her mom, she kicked the candy away with a firm “No way!” leaving everyone licking their lips in frustration.
Still, the fact that Jia followed Do-hee so closely made the viewers insanely jealous. And where did all that jealousy end up going? Straight toward inflating conspiracy theories about Do-hee.
An anonymous donor has gifted 1,000 Clouds!
To be honest, with Momo’s personality she would’ve slapped her on their first meeting. How could she just let it slide after sending such an obvious distress flare lol
“Aigoo, here we go again.”
But Mazia was the biggest fan of Do-hee out of anyone. You know how it is—when someone insults your family, it pisses you off, even if you insult them yourself. You don’t want others doing it.
[To be honest, Boss, at first I was scared you might really be that kind of person when I met you in person. But you turned out to be such a good person. So I’m going to keep working with you until the company goes under.]
Even after receiving such precious and rare defense from the vicious Mazia, Do-hee could only laugh bitterly. Because this defense wasn’t helping at all—it was only inflating the misunderstandings further.
There was no way to know whether Mazia genuinely wanted to show company loyalty or just wanted to make Do-hee’s life even harder. But the double-barrel blasts echoing noisily around Do-hee’s character made it perfectly clear.
No matter how well-socialized she was, she was still a ‘distress flare.’ The vicious troll who loved messing with Momo more than anything in the world.
“You’re using dual shotguns again today?”
[Why ask something so obvious?]
Do-hee asked the next question in a half-resigned voice.
“You said your inventory’s heavy. Aren’t you going to use any other weapons?”
[Why ask something so obvious?]
“From now on, you’re going to stop bothering me and live like a good girl, right?”
A sharp question designed to induce a mistake from Mazia. The evasion was just as sharp.
[No.]
* * *
I started playing Battle Colosseum because of Momo. She was grinding away at something like her life depended on it. I wondered what the hell it was that made her scream, cry, and laugh like that. Then I discovered an FPS talent I never knew I had. Once I started taking the game a bit more seriously, I somehow ended up in Diamond tier.
And that was the turning point in my life as a Momo meat shield.
Diamond tier. It was the strongest among ordinary players, but at the same time it was pure chaos. You’d occasionally run into fallen pros who used to dwell in the heavenly realm, but most of the locals were fallen demons who wanted to climb higher but couldn’t—so they’d gone dark.
No matter what method they tried, they couldn’t break past Diamond. So they lived by the motto, “If I can’t climb, neither can you,” and trolled in every color under the sun. The sheer creativity of it was something you could never understand unless you experienced it yourself.
The guy who didn’t bring any weapons or armor and just ran around the map in his underwear using only the hero ability that increased movement speed. The guy who deliberately killed his teammates to steal their gear and then revived them. The guy who, in the middle of a fight, shot me in the back of the head to steal the kill when I was about to win.
I couldn’t just keep taking it. So the method I finally chose was two double-barrel shotguns. The moment I saw any sign that an ally was about to troll, I would charge in and blow their head off. Other guns gave allies time to run or return fire, but with the double barrel, if you landed both shots near the head, they dropped instantly. That made it possible.
Once I knocked one down, the game actually became cleaner, and I even managed to reach the edge of Master tier a few times. Of course, the victims sometimes reported me in return. But did they really think I was the type to just take it lying down?
No one could stop me—I had twenty accounts. When one got banned, I’d climb back to Diamond on another and rain down troll reports while smashing their skulls in. In other words, the dual shotguns that had become my identity started as a desperate patriotic decision to deal with trolls. And the Human Distress Flare Fireworks was the completed form of Diamond after eight previous failures—
I had stared too deeply into the abyss, and in the end I had become part of the abyss. But thanks to that, I met the boss and ended up working with her like this, so I have no regrets.
That’s why I still believe it. If you truly want victory, there’s no problem at all with preemptively excluding one—or even two—useless allies in a three-man queue. An incompetent ally is far more dangerous than a competent enemy.
But what if the baggage today consists of VTubers with massive popularity? And especially if team-killing is impossible because they’re on the same team?
Then I have to abandon the two of them without hesitation. Strategically.
[Where should we drop?]
I gave the boss a suggested point first.
“How about Factory?”
[Factory? Not bad. Not many people are dropping there these days.]
I pretended to head toward the designated point, then jumped out of the plane first. The two who followed me did the same—pretending to land at the Factory before opening their parachutes at the last second. The boss and Rain opened theirs right after, but since I had set mine to maximum deceleration, I floated much higher than them.
Once I was above their heads, I subtly tilted my parachute.
“See you in twenty minutes at the Sabondi Archipelago.”
I lightly ignored the following words from Rain and the boss.
[…? What are you suddenly talking about? Employee-di? Where are you going? Not there.]
[Employee-di? Isn’t the Factory over there? Where are you going?]
I landed in a small village a little ways away from the Factory and began looting items while listening to the bewildered voices of the two like background radio chatter.
[Why did she go over there?]
[Guess she doesn’t want to loot with us. Just leave her be.]
It didn’t take long for the two DJs running the radio to notice something was off, but I paid them no mind and diligently picked up the items on the ground.
[Hey, Boss. Parachute sounds.]
[…Yeah. Damn it. There’s more than one or two.]
What I needed were two double-barrel shotguns, along with plenty of grenades and smoke grenades. Sticky grenades were preferable to frag ones if possible. I already found one shotgun. Next, two boxes of twenty shotgun shells. That was enough to take down ten people for now. If I ran out, I could just loot the corpses.
Oh, another double barrel. A little short on smoke, but I guess I’ll have to loot corpses for that too.
…Anyway, it was about time for things to kick off for real, wasn’t it?
Sure enough, loud screams soon erupted from the radio.
[Kyaaaak, Boss, what the hell are these bastards?!]
[Rain!! Over here! Get to the roof! Ack, they’re dropping here too, these lunatics! What the hell!]
[Kyaaaak. These crazy bastards! Ah, ah! I’m hit! Boss. Punch! Ah!]
The outskirts village where I was and the Factory were roughly two to three hundred meters apart. Yet the gunfire echoing over was incredibly loud. Ratatatata, ratatatatatata.
The Factory that had looked peaceful when our squad dropped had turned into this mess because the two of them were quite popular as Battle Colosseum streamers. Rain was so bad at the game that if you spared her instead of killing her, she would grovel like she’d met her savior. The boss was so desperate for victory that her reactions when you put bullets in her were incredibly satisfying. So naturally, everyone wanted to snipe them just to see those reactions.
On top of that, there were fifteen thousand viewers today. Considering the boss usually got around eight thousand when she played Battle Colosseum, that was nearly double. In other words, the Factory had literally become an apocalypse overrun by a horde of stream-sniping zombies.
Even without me drawing aggro with my shotgun, enemies were flocking endlessly the moment they spotted a target. It was straight out of a zombie movie.
[Employee-di!! When are you coming!! Bring a car, bring a caaaar!!]
I gave the same answer as before. After all, I still wasn’t ready to push through that zombie horde. I said it firmly, meaning she should wait while swinging her long spear like usual.
“See you in fifteen minutes at the Sabondi Archipelago.”
[What the hell have you been saying since earlier?!]
If the anime otaku Rain had been calm, I would have explained it to her. But it looked like she was too busy being chased by the zombie horde(?) to think straight. There was no time to waste, so I continued looting.
All I needed was a shield extender—in other words, the armor upgrade.
“Oh.”
After checking a few houses, a purple shield extender chip appeared. It was level 3, just below the maximum. Normally even a level 2 let me fly around, so level 3 was very lucky. It felt like the gods had blessed me to win this match.
Then, with the noisy radio in the background, it was time to begin the hunt.
[Kyaaaaaaaak.]
[Rain, are you okay?]
[Boss! I’m dying! I’m dying!]
[Where are you?]
[Third floor—no, I’m stuck in the corner of the 3rd floor!]
[Just try to stay alive! I’m coming!]
I started running toward the Factory, where the roar of gunfire never stopped. Using a combination of full sprint and sliding—the so-called veteran run—I soon began to see the stream-sniping zombies clustered together outside the Factory.
Their bullets flew toward the building as if on cue. The occasional tracer rounds created the illusion of a fireworks show. Bang!
I fired once into the sky out of curiosity, but everyone was too busy watching the Factory. No one paid any attention to me.
…Perfect.
Sliding down the hill, I aimed for the head of an enemy positioned at the edge of a low cliff.
Bang!