61. A 165:1 Competition
61. A 165:1 Competition
***
Like that, I started checking the emails one by one and going through the portfolios.
The funny thing was, even among those emails, a few malicious troll messages were mixed in like traps. There were only a handful, but they were there.
"Childish..."
Even as I blocked them, all I could do now was let out a hollow laugh.
And after that, what I was doing was less reviewing portfolios and more practically just checking the attached videos.
......
How many videos had I watched by now? I was checking emails on autopilot.
And the video I was looking at now was the one where I'd met the 'Outlaw Archer'—the video that had been the starting point of my identity becoming known.
—Clang! Clang! Clang! Clang!
At the end, the video showed me chaining four parries in a row in midair.
Watching it, it felt less like there was any real editing and more like they'd just taken the footage and dropped it in as-is.
"The editing feels way too sloppy."
I didn't even watch the rest and moved straight to the next email.
—So what I'm saying is, let's do this with no handicaps on either side.
A scene of me talking before my duel with Sua. Partway through, there was a close-up highlighting me, and subtitles appeared along with it.
"...No."
Even to me, someone who doesn't know much about editing, the subtitles felt tacky, and I couldn't help cringing.
And so, on to the next email.
—Whoa, ah? S-stop. Rin, Rin!!?
A video from when I'd fought a streamer named Hana. The streamer named Hana was shown being toyed with like a puppet by my Ghost Dance, and it was portrayed in a comical way. Watching it, I felt a strange sense of discomfort? Something like that. The streamer named Hana genuinely looked terrified. The editing and various effects definitely felt professional in their own way.
But still.
"...Isn't this a video that makes me look bad?"
The more I watched, the more I wondered if they really had to edit this particular footage, so I moved on to the next email.
......
Before I knew it, I'd checked nearly 150 emails, and now only a few remained.
"Ugh... I'm all stiff."
After sitting in one spot watching videos for about two hours, my body felt like it was locking up.
I simply raised both arms above my head and stretched.
Crack.
Along with the sound of my bones popping, I felt a deep fatigue.
"I'm tired... seriously."
It seemed like every person who had applied for the editor position had their own style. At a glance, some looked similar, but when I checked closely, the differences were obvious.
On top of that, quite a few of them had experience working as editors for other famous NewTubers. I saw several videos that seemed decent.
And more than anything, as I watched the videos, I naturally came to understand the key point Sua had emphasized.
—Honestly, the editing itself doesn't need to be all that flashy. If there are too many flashy, glittering effects, a lot of people actually find it annoying to watch. So what matters more is whether there's anything awkward or off-putting to the eye. That's basically the foundation.
—If that basic condition I mentioned is met, the next thing to look at is whether the video presents Rin in a 'good' light. This might sound a little strange, but NewTube isn't about showing your 'real self' as-is. The channel owner on NewTube—so in this case, that would be Rin, right?—how well you package Rin's image to make her look pretty and cool to other people. That's also really important.
—Because Rin's channel isn't aimed at comedy, right? Looking at Rin's strengths broadly, I'd say there are a few. The pretty character identity of Rin in Another World, combined with high skill, and on top of that, Rin's distinctive pleasant voice—I think those are probably what leave the biggest first impression.
—So while it's good to capture Rin as she is in the video as much as possible, what matters is how much prettier and more beautiful you can make that image, and how quickly you can make viewers fall for her.
—Because if you look at NewTube over the long term, it's a 'process of building intimacy' with subscribers, but in the short term, the 'impact' that makes someone subscribe to a channel within just a few videos is what matters.
Only now did all of Sua's words make a bit more sense.
Some videos clearly had a lot of effort put into effects and subtitles, yet somehow had no charm to keep you watching. Others had hardly any effects and plain subtitles, yet kept you watching.
And though rare, there were also a few videos that properly had both qualities—videos that felt quite well made.
Those videos that genuinely seemed good, I'd noted separately in a memo pad and gathered into a folder so I could go through them with viewers during tomorrow's stream and make the final editor selection.
"I'm actually looking forward to tomorrow."
As I kept stretching, a strangely excited voice slipped out without me realizing.
It was sinking in that so many people had applied to work on my NewTube channel, and the more videos I watched, the more I could feel just how desperate the applicants were.
"And I don't know if I should call it uncanny..."
Most of the people who'd sent the videos I'd sorted out separately were people with previous experience working as editors for other NewTubers.
'Seriously. I'm starting to see why companies prefer experienced hires.'
Now that I was in the position of choosing someone, I could really feel it. No, honestly, just watching a little bit of video made it impossible not to notice.
People who hadn't been editing for long, or who had no experience, showed it immediately in their videos.
From small things like subtitle timing, to videos that felt really crude, there were a lot that were outright bad.
Or there were also a lot of people who, even while making the video, didn't seem to notice which parts were lacking.
And that said, did every experienced person make good videos? No, not that either.
Among the videos I'd sorted separately, there were definitely people with no experience who made really good videos, and people with experience who I felt were mediocre.
I finished stretching and clicked on another of the few remaining emails.
"Let's finish this quickly."
After that, I checked the rest of the remaining videos.
Then, from the remaining emails, I picked one more.
I was able to narrow it down to 10 videos that met my standards.
So out of a total of 165 editor application emails, only 10.
And thinking that even among those videos, only one person at most would be chosen as the editor.
—165:1 competition.
'Isn't this competition rate worse than getting into most major companies...?'
Being an editor really is a tough job, huh. I found myself thinking even that.
"Should I just pick two...?"
So for a moment, that thought crossed my mind, but I decided to think about it again during tomorrow's stream.
It struck me anew how strange it felt to watch myself.
After continuously watching videos of myself—about 160 of them—I could see, even if only a little, the flaws and subtle gaps I hadn't noticed at the time.
It felt like it had unintentionally become a time to look back on myself.
"...I need to check this too."
And then I turned my attention to one email I'd sorted separately.
An email that wasn't an editor application, but had a completely different purpose.
*
————
[This is Han Siwoo, coach for the ACK Pro League team G1.]
(6 images including an ID card proving personal identity and photos of the G1 pro team dormitory)
— Hello. This is Han Siwoo, coach for the G1 pro team.
First, I imagine Rin was surprised to receive such sudden contact.
However, I'm reaching out because there's something I urgently need to discuss with Rin.
Admiring the performances captured in the recently trending videos of Rin......
To urgently discuss matters related to Another World......
Since its founding, the G1 pro team has consistently......
1. Requesting scrim support for approximately two days, August 16 and 17.
2. Regarding compensation and benefits for scrim support...
3. ACK attendance and preferential treatment guaranteed at the G1 organizational level.
————
*
It was an email from the coach of a pro team called G1.
At a glance, it looked like formal boilerplate, but the content was still novel enough that I found myself reading it carefully.
I'd been thinking I'd refuse no matter what it said. But since they'd put so much care into sending the email, it felt a bit harsh to reply too coldly.
So I opened another tab and searched for the pro team called G1. They were definitely a well-known pro team. Several search results appeared.
Though the notable thing was.
No championships, but a lot of runner-up finishes. Still, they looked like a prestigious team that consistently placed in the upper ranks every season.
"...But this is unexpected."
I'd been sure they'd make some kind of pro offer.
It was a sudden scrim support request.
Apparently, they wanted me to play practice matches against the pros on the G1 pro team.
"Is there any point to that?"
And it was only a two-day scrim request.
The funny thing was, for what it was, they'd listed quite a lot of compensation, and at a glance, the rewards were anything but ordinary.
Things like money or ACK Pro League preferential treatment didn't really catch my eye.
—Provision of a Legendary-grade Crescent-Moon Weight item with no current listings.
I couldn't help but focus on that item.
When I went into the Another World exchange that could be searched from my PC and looked it up, there were no listings even on the Auction House right now.
But it wasn't particularly because the performance was good—it was just a Legendary-grade item, and one known for having an especially beautiful appearance.
The armory inside a House. One of the items wealthy users collected for display to decorate it.
One of those was this Legendary-grade Crescent-Moon Weight. And it stirred my collector's instinct for no good reason.
A beautiful Crescent-Moon Weight with no listings at all.
Wasn't that too tempting?
"...Should I do it?"
So those words slipped out without me realizing.
Considering today was August 2, the scrim was about two weeks away, so there was plenty of room to fit it into my schedule.
And the scrim wasn't even offline, so I didn't have to worry about revealing my real-life appearance to anyone.
Then it struck me that a prestigious pro team was willing to offer terms this generous just to arrange a scrim.
Even if I'd become famous, I'd only made a name for myself in a short period, so I wondered if a pro team would really take this much interest.
Honestly, I'd mostly been inclined to refuse no matter what it said, but with terms this unconventional and rewards I actually liked, I found myself hesitating.
"It is tempting..."
Moreover, even if it was a scrim, they weren't going to hold me all day. The email said 3 hours per day, for a total of about 6 hours over two days.
But that deliberation was brief. Serin soon made up her mind.
She clicked reply at the bottom of the email and started typing on the keyboard.
Tap tap tap.
*
—
I've confirmed everything written in the email you sent.
I was able to view the scrim support request positively.
......
However, since I'm currently a streamer and also looking to run a NewTube channel, I'm wondering if I could upload one short video to my NewTube during the two days of scrims.
If that's possible, I think I'd be able to do it.
Of course, any video uploaded to NewTube would be posted only after prior review under mutual agreement with the G1 pro team, so there wouldn't be any harm done.
————
*
Like that, I spent a few minutes writing the reply.
Click.
Sent.
What Serin, who'd been agonizing over whether to accept the scrim, chose was a slightly different approach.
"...Will they accept it?"
I'd added one more demand, and I wondered if they'd take it.
If they accepted, I'd do the scrim. If not, I wouldn't.
'I'm the one with the leverage here.'
I wasn't the one who'd offered to scrim—they'd made the request, so I figured adding one more demand wouldn't hurt.