In the Darkness
The conversation with Rena-ttang had gone smoothly overall.
If there was one thing I'd confirmed all over again, it was that her hunger for power hadn't changed one bit.
She constantly craved the spotlight and always wanted a seat inside the inner circle. Looking back, her plan to open Rena World as a viewer server when her self-esteem was at rock bottom had probably been an expression of that same tendency. She'd been terrified that a streamer server would leave her overlooked — terrified that her string of failures had already eroded her authority among streamers. With a viewer server, she wouldn't have needed to worry about any of that.
Rena-ttang wanted to be the protagonist no matter what. Sure, she had her sucker side, but the moment something touched a value she considered important, she flipped a full hundred and eighty degrees into someone cold and ruthless.
Which was exactly why I'd had no choice but to drop the Blueby matter cleanly. I couldn't risk overplaying my hand and earning Rena-ttang's resentment. Instead, from the start of the conversation to the very end, I'd worked hard at grooming her ego. And thanks to that, I'd managed to walk away with a firm commitment.
"Alright. I'll put up a new notice that Rena World is a streamer server… Then you leave an application comment right away. Got it?"
"Yes. Of course!"
She made a point of demanding I leave a comment immediately — just in case I was all talk and planned to back out. She looked sloppy on the surface, but when it came to things like this, she was rock solid. After all, if a streamer with real weight joined up, the buzz would grow and even the small-time creators would take interest. From Rena-ttang's perspective, the V-Live crew was far too attractive a catch to let slip. Outside of Freeca, we were one of the hottest crews around, right up there with Decrescendo and Pocotin.
"Haa… I'm wiped."
Back when I'd worked sales before the regression, hospitality talk like this had been practically daily routine. Two and a half months of streaming, and somehow it already felt hard. I'd changed this fast?
I posted a short summary of the key points in the crew group chat. Once Rena-ttang's notice went up, I'd let them know — and they needed to leave application comments for Rena World. We had to do it anyway, so moving sharp and fast would leave a better impression on her.
I should casually mention it to Oh-ha and Oh Yeong-jun when the timing's right. Let them know I did them this favor.
Hoping someone notices your goodwill without any self-promotion doesn't work in this day and age. There's a reason they call it the era of personal PR. If I put two people who were about to skyrocket through Rena World in my debt, we'd be able to trade favors for a long time to come.
Even if our own weight class is a little light, solid connections with the mid-tier players mean we'll be able to hold our own when the real monsters start flooding in later.
There's a reason the word "cartel" exists in the streaming world. The Dullahan cartel on Rabbit TV was especially infamous — openly rumored to protect their slice of the broadcast pie by pulling each other up, shutting people out, and coordinating attacks on whoever they'd marked for exclusion. Between the incidents preserved on namu.wiki and the whispers that circulated under the surface, it was a cartel that put the animal kingdom to shame.
Pangea TV had a few powerful cartels of its own, even if the flavor was a little different. The PUBG cartel was the most famous. A rigid hierarchy with PUBG Dictator Wang-ko at the apex, Vice President Lee Horun under him, and Prime Minister Blackfoot among the other power brokers. People said that if Wang-ko marked you, you were done on the PUBG scene — that alone told you everything about their clout.
Not that I want a cartel quite like that. Something more like a loose mutual-support network.
When it came to preparing for the future, the more friendly forces you had, the better.
And so I kept my eyes fixed on Rena World — and on what lay ahead.
A dark room.
The only light came from the soft glow reflecting off the monitor. Leaving the lights off was her habit — a way to sharpen her focus when her head was crowded and there was too much to think through.
Blueby slowly shifted her gaze, scanning every line from top to bottom.
"Tsk."
She didn't like it.
— Rena World.
Blueby already knew quite a bit about Rena-ttang. At her level, information had a way of filtering through. And that was exactly why suspicion took root.
A Minecraft server on Pangea TV?
Honestly, her first instinct was negative rather than optimistic. The age group that mainly played and consumed Minecraft was mostly students… and Pangea TV had the highest average viewer age of any platform. Minecraft, on a platform where StarCraft — a game released in 1998 — was still one of the load-bearing pillars?
Blueby clicked her tongue again out of habit.
"But… she applied, huh."
A cold gaze locked onto one spot. Right at the very top of the Rena World resident application notice sat someone's comment.
I've always been really into Minecraft, so the fact that you're personally opening a server means the world to me.
I'm going to enjoy the hell out of this, Rena-Rena-ttang-ttang~♪ [up 1845]
The application had been fast, and the upvotes had claimed an overwhelming first place. Which meant she'd rallied her fans to hit the up button. The intensity of her interest in Rena World was unmistakable.
You don't pull something like this without real conviction and confidence. Was everything she's pulled off so far just luck?
Blueby's eyes flashed cold.
Other people might not know, but Blueby had been observing the streamer "Seo-a" for a considerable amount of time. That observation had started from Seo-a's debut broadcast. Hang around the communities long enough and you pick up decent intel in near real time. For someone like Blueby, who had been considering a move to Pangea TV, that kind of information gathering was essential.
I was genuinely shocked. I never imagined a single individual could put together a debut stream of that caliber…
Seo-a's debut broadcast had hit Blueby with enormous shock — and an equally enormous realization. This was supposed to be a complete rookie who'd just started streaming? It was absurd. Blueby had tried putting herself in those shoes. Could she have pulled off a performance like buying fifteen million won worth of Pangea TV stock on her debut stream?
I could never do that. That kind of insanity.
But Seo-a had actually done it — and astonishingly, that moment had been the launchpad for a nonstop climb. A new wind blowing through Pangea TV. Watching Seo-a's remarkable run, Blueby had grown more and more certain.
This person had a natural-born gift for broadcasting. And if that wasn't it, then the "god of streaming" was spoiling her rotten.
Best case, get her into the same crew. If that's not possible, at least stay on good terms.
That had been Blueby's approach to networking for a long time. Then an opportunity she never saw coming dropped into her lap. Shockingly, Seo-a turned out to know "Lucy" — one of the people in Blueby's own network. They hadn't known each other long, but the other side had been so aggressively friendly that a tight bond was already forming.
That was clearly something worth using.
So she'd quietly kept Lucy close, made sure every important decision went through a "consultation" with her — and that effort had borne fruit, leading all the way to a phone call with Seo-a.
But I had no idea. For reasons I still don't understand, she was already hostile toward me…
A completely unexpected development. But Blueby hadn't panicked. She'd responded calmly. After all the experience she'd racked up grinding through the streaming scene, it was far too early to start flailing over something like this. She'd prodded and poked, needling the other side until they exposed their own intentions.
She wants Lucy that badly? Interesting. But not a bad thing.
Blueby had worked through it coolly. And before long, she'd arrived at the optimal approach. Seo-a was without question a streamer with exceptional utility. Soften that inexplicable hostility as much as possible and build a long-term relationship. And the key to that was none other than Lucy.
"Lucy, I've been thinking about this seriously. Transferring to Pangea TV might not be such a bad idea. I've been thinking about making my own virtual debut on Pangea TV once I've prepped a little more, too. Yeah! Exactly. If anything's hard, I'll help you out, so don't worry too much."
She'd helped persuade Lucy on the platform transfer and, in return, been introduced to a writer far more capable than expected. After that, Blueby had kept watching for openings — maintaining a close relationship with Lucy and periodically dragging Seo-a back to the negotiating table. That arrangement had continued right up to the present.
Can Minecraft really succeed?
For the first time, she found herself genuinely uncertain. No matter how gifted Seo-a was, she couldn't see the future — which meant she couldn't always make the right call.
But looking at everything she's shown so far… tsk.
The longer the deliberation dragged on, the more it irritated her, and she clicked her tongue out of habit. In the end, she shelved the decision. Blueby lifted her head and leaned back into her chair.
A moment later, in the darkness, her fingers moved with decisive purpose.
