It’s Nothing to Me This Time Either
Before I went to sleep, the emotions that had twisted my stomach into knots felt exactly like that.
Yet the moment I woke up, everything seemed to settle a little.
Whether it was because I was still groggy from incomplete sleep in the morning or because something in my brain reacted while I was asleep, I couldn't quite figure it out.
Either way, I'd lived like this for roughly twenty years, so I was used to it.
Moreover, the events weren't even happening in real life—they had occurred in a game.
And those people who were complaining about it didn't have the slightest influence over me in the first place.
I didn't particularly enjoy rubbing it in my face that I was in a higher tier.
Objectively, most of the people in the community who called me a cheater were simply players I'd never encounter in a match.
Of course, if they were the type who bothered to seek me out after leaving the game, their average rank was probably high.
Even gamers who played lightly could reach high tiers if they had talent.
But they wouldn't bother coming into the community to dig for information.
Naturally, the average tier of gamers who sought out community information would still be high.
Statistically, though, the players I was matched with were extremely rare.
And the ones insulting me as a cheater—well, they couldn't do anything about it inside the game anyway.
When we crossed paths in the ban-pick window, it was anonymous, so I wouldn't even know who they were.
They claimed it was because of anti-abuse measures, but I had no idea if those actually worked.
So when the game started, they kept muttering that their score was wasted, game after game.
In the end, all they could really do was shake with rage while reporting me.
No matter how many times they reported, I wasn't using any hacks, so nothing would happen.
It was pointless to scream at me from there.
I'd already known this, of course.
But after sitting down to sort through my thoughts, I chewed on it again.
The more I turned it over in my mind, the more I realized that even though my head knew it, my chest refused to accept it.
Still, it felt pretty miserable that the only thing I could do right now was play games.
Why not try something more productive?
...Ever since I became a woman, every single option I had been left with was shut down.
If my body had still been intact, even if graduating from a prestigious university had been a waste of time, I would've taken on all kinds of part-time jobs.
But now, was there really a place out there that would hire a limping woman with one blind eye as an employee?
I had barely managed to solve the identity issue.
Even just thinking about the simplest part-time jobs—convenience store clerk, PC bang attendant, or restaurant server—if I were the boss, I wouldn't hire someone like me.
On top of that, my face was too ugly, just like my dad had said when he beat me.
Selling my body with this uneven, half-broken face was impossible with my body.
No, before the face, with a height of only 144 cm and this hideous body, who in their right mind would want me?
I wasn't joking when I said I'd die if I ran out of money.
There was simply nothing I could do with this body anyway.
The only thing left was that the knowledge I had acquired in my head hadn't disappeared.
If I went back to university with my new identity, well, my hands worked fine, so I could probably find a desk job...
But then the money problem would trip me up.
I didn't have enough saved-up money from tutoring to cover everything.
Even just living expenses would stretch it thin, and when tuition and books were added, the gap was impossible to bridge.
So, like the people who were insulting me, I had very little I could do.
No, maybe I was even worse off than they were.
Among those who shouted insults, even the lowest rung of society could go out and find some part-time work to survive.
Whereas I was nothing more than a disabled person who was useful for absolutely nothing.
...Lying there, the miserable thoughts kept creeping in.
Self-loathing ate at me this deeply.
So I dragged myself to the edge of the bed.
The chair I'd thrown my body into yesterday was still there.
I switched to the chair, booted up the computer, and sat there blankly in front of the loading screen.
For a moment, the monitor's logo appeared, and on the black screen, a girl with pale skin and hollow red eyes stared at me.
Yeah, even I found my own face creepy. How much worse must it be for other people?
That was probably why, on top of my trophy being ruined, my dad had gotten even angrier.
Even though the women downstairs sometimes came over and treated me kindly.
It was probably because their minds were too messed up.
The people downstairs, well... they had probably kept quiet just to get me to stop.
It was a kind of deal. So from now on, I had to be careful when I went out in the house too.
At least that heavy feeling eased up a little once the computer was fully on and the bright desktop came up.
More like seeing a wide meadow and blue sky, though.
It was the default wallpaper I'd never changed. I habitually clicked the blue icon in the corner.
The lingering worries that had been bothering me started to go numb.
And as soon as I started matching for a ranked game,
the moment the clink of the queue sounded, I could finally regain my composure.
The excitement of what fun game I'd play today was gone long ago.
The worry of what kind of bastard I'd be matched