130. Want to Come to My Place?
130. Want to Come to My Place?
***
Trudge. Trudge.
Serin pulled herself up from the capsule and shuffled along like a zombie before flopping onto the bed.
Unlike Rin in Another World, Serin's comparatively slender body made only a small shadow on the bed. Serin gently closed her eyes, surrendered herself to the mattress, and rubbed her cheek against it.
"...Hoo."
I was tired. Really... so tired.
As I squirmed against the softness of the bed wrapping around me, my disheveled white hair scattered across my body like it was leaving traces, but my mind was too hazy to bother fixing it.
Slide.
Through the daze, I flailed an arm and nuzzled into the soft bed.
Letting myself sink into that soft coziness without a single thought was so comfortable.
How long had it been since I'd spent such a long stretch fully focused?
The scrim had lasted about three hours, longer than I'd expected.
The scrim that started at 1 p.m. didn't end until well past four.
In some ways, three hours could feel short for a scrim, but to me it didn't feel short at all.
By feel alone, it was like I'd spent at least a full day.
Every single match, I'd thought through the opponent's movements and skills down to the second. And against five players, each with a different style.
I'd focused so hard it reminded me of the old days wandering battlefields, when I couldn't even feel how a day passed.
Since falling into this world, I'd never concentrated like that, so I wasn't used to it.
"It was fun, but... I really am exhausted."
I muttered blankly and rubbed my cheek against the bed again. Feeling the pleasant softness, I thought.
There was no physical fatigue in my Another World character, obviously.
But the more I focused mentally, the more I'd get hit with sudden dizziness or a muffled, cut-off feeling in my thoughts near the end.
There had been moments to catch my breath here and there as breaks, but that didn't make the mental fatigue completely disappear.
At the end of it, I'd burned through all my energy and was now discharged, just blankly squirming against the soft bed.
My body could move without any problem if I wanted it to... but I had absolutely no will to do so.
My head felt like it was floating, and I simply didn't want to do anything.
"...They were all monsters."
As I blankly recalled the scrim, the words slipped out.
I'd never thought of myself as lacking talent, but today I couldn't help but realize what "real talent" was.
Going by the scrim results alone, it was 10 wins out of 10. By all appearances, a total victory for me.
Recording a perfect win streak in scrims against pro players was certainly surprising and amazing, but... I didn't want to show off that record or act like it meant anything to the players.
Because in the matches that followed, the players all showed changes that made it hard to believe they'd only faced me once each before meeting me again.
Improving bit by bit in such a short time could only be described as dazzling talent. There was no other word for it.
Just as I could outwardly sense that the G1 players had felt some emotional shift from seeing me, I couldn't help but feel something when facing them again.
Even without me teaching them anything or saying anything directly, every one of them grasped things at a different speed.
I'd mixed in the weaknesses and shortcomings I'd noticed while researching the players, but they changed their behavior little by little as if they'd realized it instinctively.
Minha was a prime example.
She was already famous for not giving melee classes any distance, but against players like Baekya, who was skilled at range and also had depth in close quarters, or against a melee class like Jeanne d'Arc who had reached truly overwhelming skill, she often lost anticlimactically the moment she gave up distance.
But.
In the rematch against Minha, her split-second improvisation and the pacing of her sniping had changed so dramatically it was impressive.
I had deliberately parried and deflected while closing in on her with that in mind, but Minha had caught on fast. Once her sniping pace became more precise, the openings were much harder to spot.
And the same went for the other players. When they played again, every one of them had made small adjustments.
It wasn't that their skill had skyrocketed in a short time. It was just fascinating that they'd realized those things from a single match.
And... at the end of it, the players' words of praise and admiration were all genuinely embarrassing for me to hear.
From the weird abbreviation "yeokcheon-goe," short for "greatest genius monster of all time," to "fighting princess," to "goddess."
I knew they were joking when they described me with those words, but it still made me laugh.
"And me losing would be... the weird thing, I guess."
Even while laughing, the words slipped out without thinking.
The more I adapted to Another World, the more I was coming to understand my objective position.
Compared to when I first logged into Another World, I could move far more naturally now, and even moving my body came without any hesitation.
Compared to that first fight with Sua about two weeks ago, my skill had clearly risen—no, it was more accurate to say I was returning to my original level.
So now I could clearly see the "difference" between myself and them, and I wasn't thinking that my talent was superior to theirs.
If I'd encountered Another World as a game rather than a world like the real Black Ark, no matter how well I did, I would've been worse than the current players.
Even at my absolute best... I'd probably have stayed just below them.
That was how different the real combat of Black Ark was from fighting in Another World.
There were many system similarities and a few other differences, but you couldn't put me—someone who'd wandered battlefields for years, crossing the line of death—on the same level as players who'd worked hard as pros.
"Did I agree to scrims for nothing...?"
I muttered blankly to myself, sorting through thoughts that wouldn't quite connect.
Going undefeated against pros was, from my personal perspective, fun in itself, and facing players with their own distinct styles was all enjoyable.
But... even if I felt that way, had the pro players on the other side really felt okay about it?
To players who didn't know my past, I was just an ordinary person.
Or at most a streamer or NewTuber. I couldn't help worrying that losing to someone like me might chip away at their pride as players.
'They all seemed fine on the outside, but...'
You never really know what's going on inside someone's head.
Maybe because I'd spent time with them and chatted here and there, even if only briefly, I'd grown a little fond of the G1 players.
Or maybe it was because they'd all been warm to me from the start.
Even Minha, who'd treated me coldly at first, had started talking to me in a friendly way by the middle.
When the scrims ended, the players all said their goodbyes with bright expressions, bringing things to a clean close.
Saying they were looking forward to tomorrow's scrims.
Maybe because of that, I'd unconsciously relaxed a little around them by the end.
Smiling more than usual and carrying on conversation like it was nothing.
"This is definitely better than it was in Black Ark."
The more I replayed the recent past through my daze, the more an unprovoked smile crept out.
Facing skilled players and showing nearly my full strength.
And at the end of it, being able to close things out cleanly with smiles and no conflict between us was amazing in itself.
A duel was originally something with only two possible endings: I died, or the opponent died.
But at the end, being able to face each other and smile like this...
It struck me as strangely, oddly wondrous.
'...'
No, maybe I was just getting sentimental because I'd focused every moment for the first time in so long and played for hours. Or maybe I was just hyper-aware of every little thing.
"Han Serin..."
I murmured my own name blankly, aware of how I was changing little by little.
Lately, as the time I spent meeting and talking with people increased, I'd found more things to think about.
For someone like me who'd lived wandering the world alone, suddenly spending time with so many people was still unfamiliar, and a little confusing.
As I lay there blankly surrendering to the soft bed, I suddenly picked up my phone to check the time.
Tap.
—August 16.
4:51 p.m.
I'd gotten lost in thought replaying the scrim, and another thirty minutes had passed.
"Normally I'd be streaming right now."
Today and tomorrow were streaming hiatus days because of the G1 scrims.
In her last stream on Friday, she'd said she'd do a short stream if the G1 scrims ended early. But the fatigue she felt now was nowhere near a level where she could stream.
Streaming with low energy would just disappoint the viewers, so resting felt like the right call.
'Is that okay, though...?'
But if she did, it would overlap with the weekend hiatus and she'd end up resting four days in a row.
Just as she was wondering whether it was okay to take that much time off as a streamer—
—BaTalk!
Right on cue, BaTalk rang.
Yoon Sua.
[Serin! Did you finish the G1 scrims? If you’re still going, check this and reply when you can!]
She sent a quick reply to Sua's energetic message.
Me.
[Yeah. Just finished.]
Yoon Sua.
[You’re not streaming today, right!?]
Me.
[Probably? I'm kind of tired right now so I don't think I can.]
She might stream later if she rested and felt better, but that was unlikely.
Yoon Sua.
[I'm off today too... then let's have dinner together! I'm also dying to hear how the G1 scrims went, so I want to hear it in person.]
"I don't wanna go out."
Her true feelings slipped out before she even sent a reply.
I didn't feel like moving my body or leaving the house. I just wanted to keep rolling around on this cozy, soft bed.
Then Sua's bed suddenly came to mind, but she shook her head.
Me.
[I really don't wanna leave the house. Sua, do you want to come over?]
After being around people, being alone felt comfortable again, but at the same time she kind of wanted someone to talk to.
Seeing Sua curious about the scrims made me want to chat about our shared interest.
She had no intention of doing that with the players, but strangely, with Sua, she wanted to brag in a childish, not-quite-bragging way.
Yoon Sua.
[Then I'll bring alcohol!]
"...Weren't we supposed to have dinner together?"