111. The Yeti Zone
111. The Yeti Zone
***
Kang Hyeok put on his headset and cranked the volume to max.
And then, the voice that followed.
—Kang Hyeok, thank you for the 1,000,000 won donation... Oh, if you mean cheering me on, then a few days ago during the Gauntlet Match... I really enjoyed the match. Honestly, I was a little surprised when you pulled off the All-Kill. You were really good, you know?
Rin's soft voice filled his ears, amplified by the cranked-up volume.
He grinned.
Unable to control the corners of his lips curling upward, Kang Hyeok wore a pleased expression as he focused on Rin's voice, when suddenly he felt a persistent gaze.
"...?"
He turned his head to find Minseong, who had stopped running an Another World simulation right beside him, staring at Kang Hyeok in disbelief.
Feeling awkward, Kang Hyeok lowered the volume, took off his headset, and asked.
"Why are you staring at me like that? You're embarrassing me."
"No, seriously... I was just thinking you're really something. Do you like her that much?"
Minseong looked at Kang Hyeok, smirked knowingly, and spoke in a suggestive tone. Kang Hyeok quickly turned his head to check the screen Minseong was looking at.
And sure enough, it was Rin's stream that Kang Hyeok had been watching.
Minseong also had Rin's stream open on one side of his monitor.
"...Ah, fuck."
Kang Hyeok let out a small curse and crumpled his expression. Minseong looked at him, grinned, and slouched back lazily.
"Come on, Hyeok. A pro player shouldn't be showing off for attention by donating to a streamer like that. You're the team captain. If you act that frivolously, I'm genuinely worried you'll drag down the team's reputation~"
Donating to a streamer while making it obvious that he was a pro player. That was something Minseong had done a lot back when he first joined G1.
Back then, Kang Hyeok had looked at Minseong and said things implying that if you're a pro, you should act like one and maintain some dignity.
Even though more than a year had passed since Minseong heard those words, he had never forgotten them.
"Shut up, you little shit. Rin... cheered for me, okay? I mean... what's wrong with showing this much appreciation?"
"Yeah~ yeah~ sure you can."
Minseong laughed and waved his hand dismissively. Kang Hyeok scowled, but because of what he'd said to Minseong before, he couldn't snap back.
"...Ah. Seriously, the more I think about it, I should've gone out during the gauntlet match too. The more I think about it, the more unfair it feels, you know?"
Then Minseong grumbled, venting his regret about the last match.
"Hey. If you'd gone out that day, we would've lost."
"No, I mean... not the anchor spot, I'm talking about the opener spot! The opener! If I'd gone out as the opener, I could've beaten that Baekya and shown Rin something cool, couldn't I?"
"You're saying things that would make a passing dog laugh. What? You beat Baekya?"
"Come on, don't you remember game 2? Who was it that finished off both Jeongmak and Baekya?"
"That was all setup. If Baekya had only been focused on you, do you think Baekya would've died like that? Once the match looked hopeless, Baekya used White Night at the end to try to take me—the ace—down too, and died."
They bickered back and forth over pointless things, but in the end Minseong was clearly losing the argument.
His blunder in game 1 was one thing, and Kang Hyeok's reverse All-Kill in the game 3 Gauntlet Match had overwhelming impact all on its own. Realizing he had no comeback, Minseong shook his head and spoke.
"Ha. Seriously... anyway, if we ever go to a gauntlet match again, I'm definitely going out."
"Gauntlet match, my ass. You should be thinking about winning 2:0. You're saying ridiculous things."
"Ah, I don't know. I want Rin to cheer for me too!!"
Even when Minseong finally shouted as if he was genuinely annoyed, Kang Hyeok just smirked.
The fact that Rin had watched the match a few days ago. And Rin's voice, cheering for him at the end and mentioning the reverse all-kill, kept coming back to him whenever he was about to forget it.
It felt a little different from when he had faced Rin under his other Another World ID, "Gosu."
The person he had thought of as a monster. The feeling of being acknowledged by such a skilled player—the more he thought about it, the better he felt.
Then, suddenly, the image of Rin from that time came to mind.
The silver-haired woman who had driven a greatsword into his chest and said "That was fun" with a dazzling smile.
'Well... it's probably just a character.'
Still, he knew the voice belonged to Rin herself, so he sometimes found himself imagining what she might look like.
With a voice like that, he couldn't imagine her being ugly. Maybe a woman with a refined impression. Unlike her in-game appearance, she might have a gentle impression, or be very shy—
"Ugh."
Minseong had been watching Kang Hyeok because he'd suddenly stopped responding. As Kang Hyeok's expression gradually turned creepier, as if he were imagining something, Minseong couldn't stand it anymore and got up to leave.
"You little shit... you really know how to make things awkward."
Kang Hyeok, feeling awkward at that reaction, also got up and headed to his capsule to practice.
***
—Diamond Tier.
In almost every game, it was a tier that signified the very top or upper ranks.
The concept of "diamond" itself was never used anywhere as a cheap or derogatory term, so famous games generally assigned a tier worthy of the name diamond.
And in Another World, Diamond Tier was a high tier corresponding to the top 1% of all users according to match-history sites.
It meant that among Another World users, those at Diamond Tier or above made up a proportionally small percentage.
"...I'm a little excited."
Before her streaming hiatus, Serin had finished her Diamond Tier promotion and ended the stream, so she knew that from this Arena matchmaking onward, all her opponents would be Diamond Tier users.
And that lasted through part one of the stream, through Just Chatting, until she logged into Another World.
It really lasted exactly until then.
......
Swish!
With a strange sound, a dark teal dagger surged toward her, and she twisted at the waist to evade it by a hair's breadth.
Clang!
She grabbed the weight part of her Crescent-Moon Weight and deflected the daggers at angles too hard to dodge, then leaped, and before she knew it, she had closed the distance to effective range.
Slip.
She released the hand holding the blade part of the Crescent-Moon Weight, naturally grabbed the black cord that followed, and deployed a skill.
—Dark Moon Weight.
The Crescent-Moon Weight shot out fast, moving as if crawling along the Colosseum floor while tracing an unpredictable trajectory. The tip of the Crescent-Moon Weight, sharp as an awl, was aimed at the opponent's heart.
Even as they watched the Crescent-Moon Weight that had been crawling along the floor suddenly surge upward, the opponent was somehow utterly composed.
They showed no tension and made no movement.
'No way...'
I really thought, no way.
Whoosh!
The Crescent-Moon Weight shot forward as if to pierce straight through the opponent.
Just as it seemed the Crescent-Moon Weight had reached them, the opponent suddenly turned into a shimmer of light and vanished.
'The Crescent-Moon Weight definitely hadn't even reached them yet.'
The Crescent-Moon Weight, arriving belatedly at where the opponent had been, passed through the faintly scattering light, and only then did the hologram appear.
—Victory!
"...No!!!"
At that sight, a whining voice escaped me before I knew it.
"Is this right?! Seriously!?"
Could there be a victory this hollow?
*
————
[Diamond Tier 5]
—42 LP → 53 LP
—Additional bonus LP has been awarded for the ongoing win streak.
————
*
[Whoa! That surrender timing was insane!]
[It's hilarious how Diamond 5 players surprise me with their manners every time, seriously lololol]
[The dignity of Diamond 5s who surrender faster than anyone else, damn]
[lololol their surrender timing is genuinely legendary]
[Ah, don't you know about the Yeti zone lololololol]
[This zone is full of people who surrender faster than anyone when they think there's no hope lololol]
[When it comes to giving up, these guys are seriously the fastest]
[Once you hit Diamond, you barely get demoted, so it's full of people like that lolol]
[Why is Rin's angry voice so cute lolololol]
Even while reading the chat, sighs just kept leaking out of me.
I definitely didn't expect this from Diamond Tier.
Expectations aside, no, still, wasn't this too much?
I had conceded the first move to most of my matched opponents. And every single result was a spectacle.
The first opponent I matched with openly prepared a charging skill, and when I parried it right in front of them, they immediately surrendered and left.
The next opponent I met surrendered right away after I parried a few of their attacks.
And the next opponent, just like a moment ago, poked around half-heartedly and then gave up the moment they thought they might get hit.
"No, the level of the top 1% users... no, more than their level, is this really how Diamond Tier players behave?"
No, even if you take some hits(?), once you've been matched against each other, shouldn't you at least trade blows?
If this were a real fight with your life on the line like in the world of Black Ark, I wouldn't blame them for running away like that.
But this is a game, so why did everyone get scared before even getting hit and give up like that? I couldn't understand it at all.
Even if they felt the skill gap or recognized me, I was willing to match their pace a little.
[This is all because of stats, what else lololol]
[It's because they're people who care about their rank stats, for real]
[From Diamond Tier up, attack success rate, defense evasion, all of it gets recorded one by one]
[lololol if you play against someone you can't beat, your own stats just get worse]
[To Diamond 5s, Rin is basically a natural disaster lololololol]
[They just poke around a bit and leave so their stats don't get messed up]
[I'm a Diamond 5 too, but if I meet Rin, I'm confident I can hit surrender fast lol]
[Yeah right, next you'll say you're Bronze-Silver-Gold trash]
I had already gone through five matchmaking rounds, and every single result was unsatisfying, so irritation was bubbling up for no reason.
The clear sound of weapons clashing against each other.
Or the solid heft of the weapons as they tested them against each other.
That's what I wanted to feel.
But the users I got matched with after reaching Diamond Tier were hard to even describe.
They were all just weird.
—Ding-ding-ding-ding!!!!
『Yoo Eunha donated 1,000,000 won!!』
《You were so cool at the end, Rin!! Good luck reaching Challenger!!!!!》
"Yoo Eunha, thank you so much again for the... 1,000,000 won donation. But... you really don't have to donate more. Even just what you've donated so far is already so much..."
At the massive donation alert sound and the now-familiar name of the donor, those words reflexively came out.
'How many times has it been today already?'
That was probably the fourth donation just now.
And each time it was 1,000,000 won, so I had no idea what her intention was.
Within just one hour of starting the stream, the donations from Eunha alone had exceeded several million won, so I couldn't help but be concerned. Why was she donating so much today of all days? I wondered if there was some hidden meaning.
After the pro player Kang Hyeok had made a huge donation at the start of the stream and left, Eunha had also, unlike usual, written donation comments so passionately that I momentarily doubted whether this was really the Eunha I knew.
—Ding!
While I was thinking that, a match was found right away.