Decrescendo's Choice
In truth, the outcome of this Diamond CK hadn't been all that important.
It wasn't a 10-to-0 split to begin with. Rather than chasing profit, we'd laid the board with the crew's mental management and a handful of symbolic meanings in mind.
Yeah. That had been the original plan, at least.
"Hey, you two can't even mine better than me and you're still running around outside? From now on I'll carry the endgame pickaxe myself. How about you two just stay home and do the housework?"
"……."
"I'm sorry, okay? I was wrong, okay?"
"Okay?"
"Ah! I caught the speech pattern without even realizing it."
The final score of the Diamond CK came out 75 to 84—our bitter defeat.
Miho had gone nuclear, mining thirty-two diamonds on her own, but the rest of the team simply hadn't had the luck.
"Tch! I didn't even want to mine in the first place. I just want to go on a bunch of adventures."
"Hey, Intern. Read the room."
When a quiet person finally snaps, it's always scarier.
See that?
Even Lucy, who normally just quietly said whatever she wanted in her own little world, was reading the atmosphere and keeping her mouth shut.
"Lucy is a beginner so whatever, but you two need to reflect! I want to run around everywhere too instead of just sitting at home!"
Miho grumbled, shooting us a sharp look.
Aha. So it wasn't just the CK loss—she was jealous of the two of us who got to do outside activities so often.
"Oh? So outside activities are better, is that it?"
"Well, yeah? Staying inside is boring. I've been practicing building on a private server, but here I still don't have the materials to do anything serious."
In that moment I made a firm decision to guide Miho exactly where she wanted to go.
If she liked outside activities so much, then I'd make sure she chose Little Forest.
Spending the entire day outdoors under healthy sunlight, growing and harvesting onions, carrots, beets, and tomatoes.
Yes—and then diligently turning them into ratatouille.
Oh right, you can't make ratatouille without bowls, so she'd have to grow trees too.
She would need a reeeeeally wide field and an absurd amount of labor.
Then she'd be so busy she wouldn't even think about stepping inside a building all day.
"Ahem! Hands are starting to droop. Hold them higher and more properly! I'm watching the stream right now, so no slacking."
"……."
I had not made this decision out of spite just because I was currently standing with both hands raised high in punishment.
Really.
Sunday, December 11th.
I was currently watching Park Na-na's stream while logged out, secretly soothing my racing heart.
For once, all five members of Decrescendo were logged into Rena World at the same time.
Even Apple-mong, who normally dominated the main story, had no choice but to yield the spotlight to Decrescendo on this particular day.
Muyo presented the plans she had been diligently working on for Decrescendo Island, and Seol Pyo-woo bragged about their Diamond CK victory.
Baiyo, true to her reputation as the legendary LoL girl with 1,300 games of Lulu, had been buried in ranked matches and hadn't done much in Rena World, but she blended in just fine.
Their leader Park Na-na was wandering around causing minor chaos here and there.
The real problem was Elsa.
She had genuinely believed the Poko Server would succeed and had dragged Baiyo into it.
The moment she logged into Rena World she started whining and went looking for Park Na-na.
"Na-na, Na-na."
"Hm? Elsa, what's up?"
Park Na-na tilted her head at Elsa's thoroughly pitiful expression and greeted her.
I watched the scene with eyes full of anticipation.
"I'm so sad. You know the Poko Server? We need to form a team but I think it's too late. There's nowhere decent left. So Baiyo and I are just loners."
"Oh? W-well. That must be really hard. Fighting!"
The second the Poko Server came up, Park Na-na tried to gently dodge, but Elsa refused to back down.
She kept clinging to Park Na-na, emphasizing how difficult things were.
"B-but the Poko Server recruitment period already closed, right? And even if you tell me, there's not really anything I can do."
"Don't worry! I already asked Ori-koong and she said she'll accept anyone I recommend."
"Really? W-well that's great then. I'm busy so I'll just—"
"So I want to do it with our crew members. Let's all do the Poko Server together!"
"……."
Was it just my imagination that the atmosphere suddenly turned ice-cold?
I had heard the nickname "Elsa the Rhinoceros" because she was so oblivious and stubborn that she just charged straight ahead no matter what, but I never expected it to be this bad.
If I had been Park Na-na I would already have pulled her aside for a private scolding.
But you can't react coldly when every fan is watching the stream.
I could see Park Na-na forcing herself to exercise patience.
"If you really feel that way, we should hear the other members' opinions too. Muyo, what about you? Interested in the Poko Server?"
"Huh? I'm not really good at that kind of thing… I'll just follow whatever the unnies decide."
As the youngest of Decrescendo, still a streaming newbie, young, and lower-tier, Muyo had no choice but to read the room.
So the ball came right back to Park Na-na.
A short sigh slipped out.
After organizing her thoughts for a moment, Park Na-na spoke to Elsa.
"That server doesn't require all-day play or anything like that, right?"
"Huh? Not at all. It's a server where you play as much as you want. Don't worry too much."
Would she show the image of a leader embracing a stubborn member, or the cold decisiveness of cutting things off cleanly?
I felt like I could see that exact dilemma in her eyes.
After a brief moment of consideration, Park Na-na chose the former.
"Alright, I got it. You said you don't even have people to team with, so what's the point of a crew otherwise. Everyone, let's help out."
"Kyaaaaah! Na-na, thank you so much! I'll contact Ori-koong right away and get our server entry confirmed!"
"No, you can take that slowly… Ah, whatever."
Elsa, completely over the moon, bounced up and down a few times and then logged straight out of Rena World.
A short while later Seol Pyo-woo arrived, smiling brightly and greeting the members before noticing the strange atmosphere. She tilted her head and asked a question.
"Why's everyone like this? Did something happen?"
"Ah. Well, you see. Um… we decided to join the Poko Server. Sorry, Seol-pyo. I didn't get to ask your opinion."
"Huh? Suddenly? Why?"
Park Na-na calmly explained everything that had just happened.
Seol Pyo-woo's expression gradually hardened, and she finally spat out in a cold voice:
"No, seriously, why though."
"Seol-pyo, you don't have to force yourself, but let's just do it together for now."
"…… Fine."
At Park Na-na's gentle coaxing she nodded as if she had no other choice.
Having watched the entire scene from beginning to end, I could only twist my lips into a bitter smile.
So this was the legendary story those old-timers on Pan-beo-gal always bragged about?
The one they called "Ori-koong poisoning the Decrescendo crew"…
There were even theories that Ori-koong was controlling Elsa, but that was probably just delusion.
I always say this, but you have to remember that about fifty percent of the posts that go up on the gallery have some fabrication mixed in.
Unless the person involved personally tells the story, no one can know the truth.
Anyway, what mattered right now was that the entire Decrescendo crew had decided to play on the Poko Server.
That meant from the Poko Server open day of December 12th, for roughly a week, Decrescendo would be considered gone from Rena World.
Of course they'll log in now and then. They still have to watch Rena-ttang's mood. But they won't be able to do much. A healing server and a war server are completely different things. Logging into a healing server to mess around while a war is raging? That's an automatic scope-and-snipe situation.
Among the Decrescendo members, the one who took the biggest hit from this decision was Muyo.
She had been playing hard in Rena World and had started getting attention from the floating viewers after getting tangled up with Apple-mong in various storylines.
Looking back at how Muyo later became the only virtual streamer to hit 10,000 concurrent viewers in Rena World through pure self-power rather than big-corp streamer trickle-down, if the flow hadn't been cut off like this she might have gotten even better results.
Of course, nothing is more meaningless than hypothesizing about the future.
Anyway, for us this is the best possible outcome. While Decrescendo is gone we can solidify our position in Rena World a little more firmly.
Later, when Decrescendo came back after suffering through the Poko Server and tried to reinsert themselves into the main story, it wouldn't be as easy as it was now.
Because by then we would already have claimed a considerable share of the pie.
Yeah. Without overreaching, just that level of positioning is enough. Big-corp streamers haven't even joined yet, so there's no need to open up too much.
The moment we revealed our true power had to happen in front of as many spectators as possible.
That timing would come only after at least two big-corp streamers had settled into Rena World.
Only then could we maximize the effect of breaking the seal.
I was already looking forward to that day.