Han A-yeon
Rena-ttang's announcement recruiting new members kicked up quite a storm.
It snagged the attention of game streamers who'd grown sick of the endless StarCraft and League of Legends grind over the years. Rena World had already been running smoothly for nearly two weeks, so there was no real reason to hesitate.
Named streamers far beyond anything the first recruitment wave—restricted to female virtual streamers only—could have dreamed of flooded the application comments, and that interest spilled straight over into Rena World itself.
Poko Server? Sure, it was famous among the virtual streamer crowd, but to the fans of the human streamers who made up Pangea TV's main audience, it was a complete non-issue. If anything, they found it annoying—a server that couldn't even break into their scene constantly blanketing the popular posts.
The human streamer fandoms flexed their muscle, and in no time Poko Server's buzz was shoved aside and Rena World claimed the spot.
In the middle of all that chaos and complexity, V-topia was starting to stretch its legs as well. The first audition round had wrapped without incident, and the schedule for the second round—featuring Park Bong-sik—had been locked in. A few of the first-round passers had even applied to Rena World, muddying the waters inside the virtual streamers' own heads.
But virtual streamers put this whole thing together themselves, right? Shouldn't we be rooting for Poko Server? If that server does well, more virtual streamers will step up to host projects of their own down the line.
Those fretting virtual streamers found their dilemma resolved more blandly than expected. Ori-koong, the admin, managed to shoot herself in the foot all on her own.
Day two of the server. A veteran Minecraft player exploited a systemic loophole that had never been announced, and the entire server reeled. Through what was known as villager trading, they raked in a massive amount of in-game currency—and from the very start, the server's balance collapsed.
Honestly, this was the admins' fault for failing to ban the exploit in advance. A straightforward apology and cleanup would have fixed it. But Ori-koong instead claimed she never imagined anyone would maliciously abuse a system gap, and turned the whole thing into a political mess. The result: a total loss of public trust.
Only then did Ori-koong scramble to apologize, reclaim the currency, and offer some token compensation—but a button fastened wrong from the start does not come undone easily. The server owner's authority had been gutted in the opening days. At a time when they should have been riding a wave of momentum, a significant number of virtual streamers abandoned Poko Server right out of the gate.
A streaming scene so turbulent you could barely predict the next day. How many people could keep their footing and push forward with real grit through something like this?
If it were me.
Not the song title—though that is a pretty good song. No, that was exactly how I felt right now. If only I could be that kind of unshakable great tree of a person.
I finished checking the absolute dumpster fire that was the community and went live.
"Hello, everyone. Ah—sorry, but please keep the off-topic chatter about other servers to a minimum. Rena World spam alone is enough of a headache."
I snuffed out the spark tossed into chat with practiced ease. Leave something like that alone and the viewers decide it's fair game and pile on in a stampede. I'd been at this for three months now. A skill like this was nothing.
The topic shifted, and now the Rena World spam came flying in—especially about the additional resident recruitment notice Rena-ttang had posted that morning.
He was definitely the kind of figure who would make waves. Once he entered Rena World, he'd be one of the biggest names on the server alongside Haisu-ya. On top of that, his fame as a League of Legends pro was considerable—skilled enough to land a major offer and jump to an overseas league.
But I couldn't care less.
I enjoyed League well enough, but outside of Worlds I barely even watched the domestic leagues. A player who'd made his name overseas? Complete non-issue. What I actually knew a lot about was the scandal that blew up later.
It ended with no charges, sure—but the fact that his private life was a mess was real.
Whether it was just a streaming persona or not, the arrogant way he talked and the way he treated virtual streamers like servants never sat right with me. Even if he was trying to manufacture some storyline with a virtual streamer he'd just met, the way he launched straight into cursing them out was something else.
Which makes him the perfect first sacrifice.
Mist, along with founding the first company, put on an incredible showing at Purge Day until the big corporate streamers arrived. He was rated a top contender for Rena World's number-one combatant, right alongside Endu the Ender Dragon Slayer. But he also had a habit of airing grievances about Purge Day and calling the server management incompetent. That got him on Rena-ttang's bad side, and eventually the whole Bad Potato Company roster paid the price.
That whole chain of events is what opens a window for me to slip in. And honestly—number one in combat power? Who wouldn't want that?
If I missed this timing, the chance would never come again. Once the corporate streamers moved in, the infamous Battle Royale monsters would flood the place in droves. I wasn't a former pro gamer—there was no way I was outplaying those freaks on pure mechanical skill. So the plan was simple: snatch the glory title and retire immediately, dignity intact. And shed that weird "Outlaw" nickname while I was at it.
No—did a nickname like that even make sense for a law-abiding, decent person like me? Clearly there was some shadowy force out there trying to smear my name.
"Ahem!"
Today, before heading out to mine, I needed to do a quick inspection. Over the past two days, four people had signed building contracts. Paying customers required continuous, warm attention.
I walked along the canal with my hands clasped behind my back, clearing my throat for no particular reason.
Apple-mong really did put in the work.
Roads wrapping left and right around the canal as a central axis. Railway construction starting from the Pokémon Center. Ah—the Pokémon Center was that warehouse building with the NPC that teleported you to Taecho Village. Apple-mong and the people under her influence had decided it was an eyesore and knocked together a brand-new one. It was a YouTube edition build, and because it looked just like a Pokémon Center, the name stuck.
If they'd spent all that public-works time mining diamonds instead…
Just thinking about it made me dizzy. They would have earned more money than our entire crew. These were the real deal—people who played Minecraft for fifteen-plus hours a day. But they sacrificed that golden time for the public good, and I pocketed the sweet fruit of their labor.
Huh. Looking at it that way, I really do sound like the villain.
"This the place?"
It was the house of the first streamer I'd signed a building contract with. A temporary residence, apparently—walls of brown dirt, ceiling covered in pink wool. Ahaha. Did this even count as a building? Well… at least it wouldn't leak when it rained.
"Ah! Hello, Seo-a!"
She must have seen my nickname moving on the map, because she came out first to greet me. The glorious nickname of my first paying customer: Han A-yeon.
We actually had a bit of history. She'd made it all the way to the final stage of the Wooga-dol audition. As a real college student, she'd picked up the nickname "Engineering Goddess" during the audition period.
Was she from Bad Potato Company later on? Her presence is pretty faint right now, but she's a hidden workhorse.
Her timid nature kept her from standing out much in Rena World. But consistent effort never goes to waste—later on, in Rena World 2 and various other Minecraft servers, her diligence and ability earned proper recognition.
In other words, this is her absolute lowest point as talent. Plus her personality is great. Across countless Minecraft servers, she never once stirred up drama.
That was why I'd had my eye on her from the moment I drafted the first building contract. Once the companies started popping up, the V-Live crew alone would inevitably get pushed around. I needed to expand my influence.
With that in mind, I carefully approached Han A-yeon.
"Aigoo, my dear customer. Hard work paying off those building costs lately, huh? I know exactly how you feel. My palms are nothing but calluses from all the mining. Don't even get blisters anymore, you know?"
I ignored the fussing viewers and focused on the conversation with Han A-yeon. She looked back at me with trusting eyes as I empathized with the hardship of labor. Only twenty-one this year, right? Definitely still young enough to have some innocence left. In that case, it was only right for a senior like me to give her a little advance warning about the darker corners of society.
"So here's the thing. I've got a great business opportunity. I've got one spare endgame pickaxe sitting around."
"An endgame pickaxe? No way! I heard mining diamonds with one of those earns three or four times more a day than a regular pick."
"Exactly. So how about I rent it to you? There's a fee, but it's cheap. Just one-fourth of the diamonds you mine that day. What do you think? Even after the cut, you'll still make more than double your usual."
"Whoa! That actually sounds really good?"
"Right? There are a few conditions, though. An endgame pickaxe is valuable. So we've got a compensation fee set in case it falls into lava, plus a daily minimum payment. After all, if someone borrows a precious pickaxe and just wastes the day without working, we're the ones taking the loss."
"Yeah. Endgame pickaxes really are super rare."
I deliberately ignored the accusations flickering through chat—"Is this a pyramid scheme?" and "She's fleecing an innocent kid." Getting tangled up with me would be far better for Han A-yeon than joining Bad Potato Company, which would flash bright for a moment and then completely collapse.
Hmm? This doesn't sound like persuasion so much as chaining her up with debt?
…Must be my imagination.