Still Not Dating?
There wasn’t anything especially noteworthy beyond her saying I should listen to my wife(?) when I was doing something. Aside from that, she said it would all go fairly smoothly.
As she said that, Chur gathered up the cards she’d laid out and began shuffling one deck after another.
“So when you say it’ll go smoothly, you mean we keep doing things the way we are now?”
“Right. You keep going exactly the way you are now.”
“Exactly?”
That was what she called smooth? The apology broadcast, the drinking, the drunken mess… could all that chaos really be described as smooth?
But even with that doubt hanging in the air, Chur kept smiling as she shuffled the cards.
“Let me say this again: I’m a WGM fan too.”
“You did that on purpose, didn’t you, Chur?”
At my words, she flashed a grin at the camera, then went right back to arranging the cards. I knew that smile had been a joke, but it was still irritating enough that all I could do was let out a sigh and swallow my annoyance.
My reaction was apparently hilarious, because the viewers were already cackling in chat and teasing me mercilessly.
When I watched this kind of thing on YouTube, I used to think it was probably all scripted. But now that I was the one going through it, I understood perfectly well.
They were all dancing in the palm of Chur’s hand.
“Now then, here’s the final common question. How should WGM come to an end?”
“This is the last one?”
“No, it’s the last of the questions you two overlap on. I’ll start with the individual questions for Hazy next.”
As she said that, Chur continued laying out the shuffled cards one by one. I held my breath and watched them go down—wait, huh? There seemed to be more cards than before.
I counted them. Twelve. Two more than earlier. But this time she’d used only one deck, and put the other one back into the card box.
“So this time it’s just for me?”
“No, this one will be for both of you together.”
“Oh.”
After saying that, she tucked the card box into her pocket and tossed it somewhere off to the side. When she finished tidying up, she studied the cards for a moment before speaking.
“Would it be all right if I ask a few questions?”
“Yes.”
“First, is there a set date you both agreed on for when WGM would end? Yes or no?”
“There is.”
“There is.”
“Oh, of course—married minds think alike. You answered at the same time too.”
“No…”
“Then next question!”
The chat was having a blast watching Chur skip straight to the next question the moment I opened my mouth to object, and they were loving the fact that she’d just handed them perfect clip material.
Ugh. Fine. Whatever. We’re doing WGM anyway, so might as well enjoy it.
“Is there any content you two are doing together as early as tomorrow?”
“Oh, can other people be included?”
“Yes. Is there or isn’t there?”
“There is.”
“What kind of content is it?”
“We’ve got a drinking stream lined up to celebrate yesterday’s tournament win.”
After hearing my answer, Chur thought for a moment, then interpreted the cards.
“First, if you look here, the left side is Luccia, and the right side is Hazy.”
At the bottom of the tree-shaped tarot layout, one card had been placed horizontally on the right and another on the left.
“What are the cards laid out horizontally for?”
“Good question! Put badly, they’re shackles; put nicely, they’re lingering feelings.”
“...Aren’t we talking about how to end things? Why are lingering feelings a good thing?”
“Oh, this card is about the viewers. It represents their reactions.”
Ah. That made sense. If you kept dragging out WGM weirdly because of the viewers and ended up stuck in a half-baked state, then yeah, it could become shackles.
So if you can’t end it, it’s shackles. If you do end it, it’s lingering feelings.
“Luckily, both of you got good reactions.”
“Really?”
“Yes. First of all, Hazy, it doesn’t seem like you’ve got much lingering attachment?”
“Huh?”
“If I put it simply, you’ve already enjoyed everything you could possibly enjoy from WGM.”
Just looking at the cards, that sounded less like WGM and more like a straight-up fake romance. Going to Namsan, filming couple vlogs—
At Chur’s words, my thoughts stalled for a second.
Wait, people really go that far for WGM? At that point, isn’t it basically a real relationship already?
And I wasn’t the only one thinking that. The chat was already full of people typing out the exact same thing.
There was something unsettling in that last one, but overall the viewers’ opinions matched mine. If anything, it was even scarier because Chur was the one saying it. It almost felt like it might actually happen.
“And Hazy’s viewers seem a little sad, but mostly like they’re taking it in stride.”
“...Huh?”
“Of course there are always the overly invested ones. But I mean there aren’t that many of them.”
Them? Right now chat was already full of people getting overly invested and typing nonstop, and she was saying there weren’t that many?
Ah. Since this was about viewer reactions rather than the romance itself, maybe the hit rate was lower?
“Anyway, the overall tone for Si-a is similar.”
“Is it the same as mine, honey?”
“The tone is the same, but with slight differences.”
Mm. Chur paused for a moment, then went on.
“No, just think of it as basically the same. The viewer reactions are similar too.”
“Okay!”
“And... have you thought about how you want the final broadcast to go?”
“Not yet, right?”
“Yeah. We haven’t decided.”
At the two of us answering, Chur suddenly broke into a sly grin. The moment she wore that expression, I started feeling uneasy.
What was she about to say now? That thought had barely crossed my mind when—
“Anyway, the choice is yours. You don’t have to listen to me if you don’t want to.”
“What are you about to say...”
“For the final broadcast, do a Namsan outdoor stream.”
“Huh?”
“Lock the padlock and leave it open-ended. Nice.”
Chur closed her eyes, nodded, and wore a faint smile that seemed perfectly satisfied. And then the chat, seeing her reaction, exploded all over again.
What was this? Was she seriously telling us to do an outdoor stream?
“Seriously?”
“I’m only interpreting the tarot for you?”
“Please give it to me straight, not some elegant paraphrase.”
“Spend some time outside, then meet your open ending.”
“...”
“That’s exactly it.”
At Si-a’s request, Chur translated the cards almost word for word. Just hearing it like that, it did sound exactly like what she’d said first—outdoor activity and an open ending. But something still felt off.
“But isn’t the padlock basically a declaration?”
“A declaration of real dating?”
“Yes!”
“No. You can just say it’s the last thing you do before breaking up.”
...Was that how that worked? The more I listened, the more oddly plausible her explanation sounded, and the more tangled my thoughts became.
“Let me sum it up. You’ve already done everything you can do in WGM, so don’t worry about that, and for your final broadcast, go to Namsan, lock a padlock, and wrap it up!”
“Something about that feels wrong, but I can’t even argue because I can’t figure out what’s wrong with it...”
“Exactly.”
“If nothing’s wrong, of course you can’t argue.”
“Is that so?”
I still felt vaguely unsettled, but it was a reasonable interpretation, so I decided to let it go. We could always think about the collab later when the time came.
Besides, Chur had already said the choice was ours.
“Now then, let’s move on to individual tarot readings. I’ll go back and forth between the two of you. Hazy first!”
*
My first question and Si-a’s first question both went through without any major issues.
“You don’t seem to have anything to worry about, Hazy.”
“Really?”
“Yes. You have good chemistry, and you understand each other well enough. If you ever get to a point where you’re worried you might cross a line while joking around, I think you’ll be fine as long as you just don’t cross that line.”
To my question about how the chemistry was with the people around me, she said it was perfect as long as I was a little careful.
“Is there anyone in your family who’s especially busy?”
“Uh... my older brother’s kind of busy, I guess?”
“There’s nothing else, but it looks like your brother will be bringing you good news soon.”
To Si-a’s question about family happiness outside the broadcast, Chur said my brother would have good news coming soon.
And then all that was left were the final two questions—Si-a’s and mine. My second question was when I’d be able to start dating.
As I was shuffling the cards, Chur hesitated for a moment, then drew them and began laying them out.
But the shape was... the same as when she’d asked how WGM should end earlier.
“Now then, what was Hazy’s last question?”
“When will I be able to date?”
“Do you want the short and punchy version, or the long and drawn-out version?”
If I wanted to squeeze content out of the broadcast, then long and drawn-out was the way to go. But the time was already late, and we’d gotten plenty of clips anyway, so it didn’t matter.
No, actually, a short and punchy answer might be better—a single perfect clip instead of a bunch of awkward half-clips.
“If you’re a man, you go short and punchy.”
“That’s weird. Short usually isn’t good.”
“...We’re still talking about tarot, right?”
At my comment, Chur quickly changed the subject and went on.
“I’ll keep this brief, then.”
“Okay.”
“From now until three to five months from now, you’ll meet someone.”
Three to five months? That was an oddly specific number, so it felt like there had to be some meaning behind it... Maybe I’d get introduced to someone later and start dating them? Or maybe there’d be a chance meeting with someone new?
While I was thinking that, Chur shuffled Si-a’s cards and laid them out on the table. The same pattern as my tarot spread.
Chur gave Si-a the same choice, too—short and punchy, or long and thin.
“What was my question again?”
“If you forget your own question, what are we supposed to do?”
Chur went back to the computer for a moment and clicked the mouse a few times before returning to the camera.
“All right, Si-a’s question was also, ‘When will I be able to date?’”
“Huh? Then the questions overlap.”
“It’s more fun if we look at them separately.”
At Chur’s words, the viewers took her side, saying she was right. Hey, someone take my side too...
“I’ll take short and punchy too.”
“Okay, then take a deep breath.”
What on earth was she about to say that required a deep breath? Over the mic, I could hear Si-a taking a deep inhale and letting it out.
The moment she exhaled, Chur said it.
“This person is the one you’ll end WGM with.”
She dropped that bomb and then, after saying she’d see us later, left the voice chat.
Hey. Since when is it okay to set off a nuclear bomb and just walk out like that?
Huh?