140. NewTuber Big Cat
140. NewTuber Big Cat
***
While the fourth and final scrim was underway, retired players began appearing in the stands one by one.
Jinhyeok, who had turned to light and vanished at the very start of the match under a surprise coordinated attack, was watching the Colosseum with an awkward expression. Minha, who appeared a little later, was also looking at the Colosseum with a face full of regret.
"Jinhyeok, seriously, why did you go down so pointlessly?"
Minha scolded him, but Jinhyeok made an awkward excuse.
"Hey, I've never been ambushed like that before. I didn't think they'd gamble like that."
The other side's tactic of rushing in almost all-in at the start was so unconventional that it was hard to imagine.
Minha figured Jinhyeok had a point, so she didn't press further and let out a small sigh.
"Ah... it's just. I feel bad for Rin. And I couldn't finish off Kang Hyeok either."
Minha muttered at the end, as if regretful that she hadn't been able to finish off Kang Hyeok.
From the moment Jinhyeok went down at the start and it became 2:3, the losing position had essentially deepened. Even so, the one who had to handle the 2:1 wasn't Minha—it was entirely Serin.
If the scrim hadn't used official match rules, then through Awakening Skills and Emergency Evasion, even with the numerical disadvantage, the shape of the match might have been a little different. But Minha shook her head slightly. It was all pointless thinking anyway.
Awakening Skills and Emergency Evasion were genuinely crucial in Solo Queue and team ranked, but in actual pro matches, their use was banned.
Back when the ACK League first launched, there had been several rounds of adjustment over whether to allow Awakening Skills and Emergency Evasion, because simply having them available sped matches up far too much.
Awakening Skills, which could decide a match in an instant, and Emergency Evasion, which could always slip through an opponent's attack, had both generated endless debate on their own.
After matches began, they tried adding a delay of several minutes before skills could be used, but ultimately, due to game-speed issues, from the first Spring Season onward, Awakening Skills and Emergency Evasion were banned in tournaments.
"The last scrim ending this pointlessly is just too disappointing."
When Minha said that, Jinhyeok nodded without a word.
Up through the third match, the two sides had clearly fought fiercely back and forth.
Whether it was the team with Rin or the team made up only of G1 players, the balance had strangely held.
But the final match, the fourth, ended up 3:1.
With only Rin left, the rest of the players had been eliminated, and the result felt hollow.
No matter how outstanding Rin's skill was, a 3:1 situation left no room for anything.
"Huh...?"
Jinhyeok and Minha, who had been watching the Colosseum thinking Rin would be finished soon too, suddenly widened their eyes.
Rin abruptly began launching a fierce assault against the two players with bizarre movements.
"She's actually insane... Rin."
In a 2:1 numerical disadvantage, she was instead pressing the attack and driving them back.
And at the end of it, when Rin finished off Hajun.
"No way, she actually took one of them down?"
"Rin seems even better than yesterday."
Minha's voice was incredulous, while Jinhyeok expressed admiration at Rin's performance.
Right after, when Minseong reached Rin's immediate vicinity and tried to finish her, they watched the Colosseum with regretful eyes.
But when Rin succeeded in a parry that was close to miraculous and even landed a hit on Minseong in the same motion.
Everyone, without exception, wore expressions full of disbelief and couldn't manage a single word.
Even though she clearly was not using a skill, Rin attacked with movements that looked exactly like skill activations. She had demonstrated something considered impossible even in theory—a miracle in itself.
Why were skills classified as "skills"?
Because no matter how much a person tried to reproduce them through basic gestures and actions, there were limits. Since the game itself transcended reality, "adjustments" inevitably existed.
Even an expert who had handled swords in reality and learned kendo or martial arts wasn't much different in Another World.
The body in virtual reality was overwhelmingly superior to a real one, and everything from instantaneous reactions to skills existed on a different dimension.
So no matter how exceptional someone was in reality, in Another World they were effectively starting the game from the same starting line as an ordinary person.
...And yet Serin was demonstrating it directly.
Without any blood-red aura or any other energy, movements identical to skills themselves.
Her display of the very ideal every player aspired to went beyond unreal and brought the players to something close to disbelief.
BOOOOM!!!!
And immediately after, the sight of it ending with a greatsword shooting forward wrapped in black light.
Minha and Jinhyeok couldn't speak until the other players and Rin appeared in the stands.
It felt as if the values, ideals, and common sense they had always held were suddenly collapsing.
Someone demonstrating something considered "impossible" to near perfection was, in itself, another shock to the players.
***
"..."
The black-wreathed greatsword she'd seen at the end of the fourth scrim, after fighting on instinct without conscious thought.
'Could I have blocked it if I'd tried?'
The thought suddenly occurred to Serin.
Now that the scrim with G1 was over and she had logged out of Another World, the final scrim match kept flickering in Serin's vision.
It hadn't been a conscious block or response to the attack. The sensation of moving unconsciously, as if momentarily swept into the situation, still lingered strangely and held Serin captive.
Because it was a feeling she had rarely experienced even in Black Ark.
When she wondered whether she could have blocked the greatsword fired at the end, Serin found herself thinking that she could.
She couldn't deny reaching that conclusion.
A slightly recovered Stamina Gauge. One usable skill: Single Kick. Just one.
She thought that if she had gambled on using Single Kick with the right timing to parry, it probably would have been possible.
'...But.'
Even if she had, she felt it would have been meaningless.
More than the greatsword wrapped in black light for an instant.
Beyond the greatsword, Kang Hyeok's eyes filled with shock.
At the end of that unconscious movement, the first thing Serin recognized with focused eyes wasn't the greatsword wrapped in black light.
It was the gaze of a player looking at her with eyes close to disbelief.
And that look... didn't sit well with Serin.
The look of someone seeing her as something other than human.
The moment she faced again in this world the gaze she had experienced countless times in Black Ark, Serin's will crumbled without her realizing it.
So maybe that was why she had simply met her end at the last moment.
Even if she had successfully parried the incoming greatsword and continued the scrim with the players, it would have meant nothing to her.
......
- Ah, I'm asking because it's really such a shame. Do you seriously have no intention of going pro?
Minha asked repeatedly, practically pleading.
- You weren't going easy on us yesterday or anything, were you, Rin...?
Jinhyeok spoke as if puzzled.
- Seriously, I couldn't stop being impressed the whole time!
Minseong smiled brightly, as if amazed by my play.
- I'll watch your streams often as a fan from now on. The scrim was fun.
Hajun said it was fun and that he'd watch the streams often.
- It's not that being a streamer is bad or anything... I just think that if you went pro, Rin, you'd be far better off. I mean this sincerely.
Even Kang Hyeok, with a subdued expression, recommended going pro.
After the two days of scrims ended, I exchanged a few words with the G1 players.
The second day's scrim result was 2 wins, 2 losses.
Considering I'd been scrimming alongside players I'd never coordinated with before, it wasn't a bad result.
Coordinating my attacks and defense with someone else felt far harder than countering a combined assault.
Because it was practically impossible to use skills with the Crescent-Moon Weight—which could even hurt me—without putting my allies in danger.
And even with other weapons, while the aftereffects of skills wouldn't damage allies, the weapons' actual trajectories could still get in the way. It seemed much the same.
"Ah. It's already over. What's the point of thinking about it more?"
Serin suddenly shook her head and shook off the thoughts that threatened to continue endlessly.
The scrim had ended earlier than yesterday, and she had been sitting in the Another World capsule lost in thought for quite a while, but it was now 4 p.m.
—BaTalk!
Park Soyul.
[Rin! Can I really pull clips from the video you sent and upload them to the channel? I don't know much about Another World, but even a quick look shows every single part is amazing. No matter what part I edit, the only thing I can say is that this is seriously insane!]
Serin checked the message at the notification sound and smiled.
She had recorded all of yesterday's and today's scrims and sent the footage to the editors less than an hour ago. The fact that Soyul was already sending a message like this showed how hard she worked.
"Just how much of a bonus does she want?"
She said it offhandedly, but Soyul's passionate attitude didn't look bad.
And for the RinTube channel, it seemed right to pull only the parts where she won in the 1:1s, but since she had to send the footage to G1 before uploading it to the channel.
She thought it might be better to mix in the team match she won and the one she lost.
Me.
[For the team matches, I think it'd be good to mix in both the match I won and the one I lost when editing.]
Park Soyul.
[Ah, right, since we have to send the footage to G1 too, we should protect the players' dignity a bit, right? Wow, but seriously, did you win all of the individual matches, Rin? Does that even make sense? Really?? No, G1. They're currently first in the ACK League. I've already rewatched it several times and I just can't believe it. Rin, have you always been this amazing?]
Soyul's excitement was so obvious just from the messages that Serin laughed while reading them.
"Come to think of it, the second RinTube video got really good views too."
She'd heard the two editors had a small celebration yesterday, and she was a little disappointed she couldn't join them.
Just as she was about to write a reply, she saw a new message notification.
Kim Hayoon.
[This is just my personal opinion, but how about splitting the footage into two videos? It feels like such a waste to end it with just one video.]
Park Soyul.
[Right! It's G1, after all, so shouldn't we milk the footage a bit more? If we also hype up the players a little, splitting it into multiple videos seems fine.]
Me.
[Just keep in mind that we have to send the footage to G1 as well when editing. I'll give you the contact for the G1 staff, so the two of you can talk it over with them.]
Park Soyul.
[Just leave it to us! It'd be weirder if this doesn't blow up, seriously, no, the footage itself came out so well.]
Kim Hayoon.
[I've watched a lot of Another World videos, and this is honestly good enough to upload as is... if we had to upload only one, that would be such a shame.]
Park Soyul.
[(An emote of a baby seal clapping in agreement)]
"Seriously, these people like it more than I do, don't they?"
With the editors reacting so positively, she suddenly felt a sense of pride, even though it didn't seem like that big a deal.
Serin rose from the capsule and stretched lightly, loosening up.
She knew the cleaning service was coming at 5, so she figured she should tidy up at least a little.
***
—3.42 million.
—2.7 million.
The view counts of just two videos uploaded to a NewTube channel.
"Ha."
A voice so deflated it was close to resignation.
NewTuber Big Cat.
Real name Cha Dohyeon, a 27-year-old man.
A NewTuber with 1.15 million subscribers—by anyone's standards a "successful" NewTuber, and also a NewTuber currently in decline and stuck in a slump.
The latest video on BigCatTube was barely reaching 50,000 views after 24 hours.
To anyone else, those view counts might be enough to say he was still doing well.
But people always remember their peak and compare themselves to it.
Just as someone who had held a fairly high position would struggle if they suddenly dropped to the bottom rung or lower.
Only a few months ago, his videos averaged 300,000 views, and the real hits approached one million. So he couldn't possibly be satisfied with the current numbers.
Cha Dohyeon. His known public image was that of a good-natured person, and his actual personality wasn't really much different.
He genuinely took good care of the people around him. He had a wide network, and even among fellow NewTubers, his image was decent.
Until early this year, when he secretly invested most of the money he'd made in crypto... Cha Dohyeon had actually been a good person.
*
————
My assets.
Total assets: 122,231,503 won
Return rate: -75.24%
————
*
And on one side of the monitor Cha Dohyeon was staring at, the crypto investment program was still open.