Enry Hits Gold
Enry gritted her teeth as she spotted the opponent lying in ambush beyond the obstacle. She had been chasing him with desperate intensity. In the current situation, it was the single most irritating strategy he could have chosen. Like most tactics that made people mutter about opponents playing like shit, this one was brutally efficient.
Right now Enry was being hunted by the walking disaster called Ara. No matter how fiercely she fought, if she couldn’t finish the match before Ara arrived, none of it would matter. Ara was an unstoppable calamity, an absolute force that would decide Enry’s fate the moment she appeared. Everything would be determined by which of them her arrow chose, and neither Enry nor her opponent would be able to resist that judgment.
Which meant Enry had been handed the duty of ending the fight before Ara showed up. Her opponent surely understood this too. In fact, that was precisely why he was camping back there. After eating the first strike and losing health, he stood at a clear disadvantage. If he could reset the scales from unfavorable back to even, it was a trade worth making.
If he tried to force a breakthrough instead? That would be welcome too. Putting a bullet through the face of an impatient fool who slipped and fell would be almost too easy.
She’s smart. Enry had no choice but to acknowledge her opponent as the remaining time continued to shrink. She needed to decide. Keep camping and leave the verdict to the judge named Ara, or carve out her own fate.
The choice was obvious. She had already resolved never to hand her destiny over to Ara again.
Of course, that didn’t mean she should charge in blindly. Enry had died countless times doing exactly that—trusting her advantage and rushing forward. She might learn slowly, but she did learn. She refused to repeat the same mistake.
So how could she drag a camper out of hiding?
Think in reverse. What had annoyed her most when she was the one camping in Apis? What kind of opponents had been the most irritating?
The answer came instantly. The ones who checked from beyond camping range, forcing her to wonder why she should be the one to push. The ones who made her impatient and clouded her judgment.
All she had to do was return that same discomfort to her opponent.
In this situation, the way to make him feel rushed was simple.
Fire and Justice!
Enry pulled the pin on a grenade and hurled it over the obstacle, then immediately raised her gun.
What will you do? Die to the explosion while hiding back there, or come out and die to my bullets? Simple binary choice. If you want to leave that corner, you’ll have to pay with your life!
The opponent, who had been charging his shield, clearly decided he couldn’t afford to die stupidly to a bomb. He burst out from behind the obstacle in a panic.
That’s right. You have to move.
Enry, who had been waiting for exactly that, pulled the trigger without a shred of hesitation. The opponent tried his hardest to dodge, but he wasn’t Ara. There was no point in twisting around when you couldn’t even see the bullets coming.
Already carrying a physical disadvantage, he couldn’t withstand Enry’s barrage for long.
After confirming the opponent’s body had collapsed to the ground, Enry checked the survivor count with trembling eyes. The number that had read three only moments ago had now become two.
There was only one thing that could mean.
“Gooooooold!”
She had achieved Gold with her own hands.
The cheer burst out of her before she could stop it. Her legs promptly gave out and she dropped to the floor, only to stagger back up again, laughing and crying at the same time.
Gold. It was Gold!
Who was she? Enry, the skilled FPS gamer who had finally earned her Epic Legend Gold emblem!
She was so overcome with emotion that she sat there sobbing on the ground even though the game hadn’t ended yet. I could think of quite a few things to say while watching her.
I understood that reaching a goal she had suffered for over several weeks would bring a rush of feeling. Still, completely forgetting about her own existence was a bit much. It was a good thing I had been spectating from the beginning. Otherwise she might have experienced the black screen of death right in the middle of her touching moment.
Imagining her bursting into tears, only to take an arrow to the throat and collapse in confusion, was honestly pretty funny.
The moment I drew my bowstring, thinking it might be fun to mess with her, a donation flew in. It really felt like someone was reading my mind.
“But she’s way too defenseless.”
Experiencing a sudden shock like this would make her more careful next time. Everything I do is purely out of concern for Enry.
“They caught me.”
Since they had watched my streams for a long time, they seemed to understand my psychology perfectly. I would praise them for that.
With this many opposing opinions, I supposed I should put the bow away for now. Still, the zone would start shrinking soon. That emotional moment of hers wouldn’t last much longer anyway. If it was going to end, wasn’t it better that I be the one to end it?
I deliberately let my footsteps be heard, but Enry didn’t even lift her head. Was she so lost in the praise from the chat and the pride swelling inside her that she couldn’t come back to reality? Even though I had walked right up behind her, she still hadn’t sensed the danger. I became certain that climbing any higher would be difficult for her.
When I gently tapped her shoulder, Enry turned with the innocent eyes of a child.
“H-hyaaak?!”
She let out a startled shriek and fell backwards. Her ragged breathing didn’t look like acting. It seemed she really hadn’t noticed me at all.
“H-Hwaryeong?”
“Yes. I heard you’ve secured promotion. Congratulations.”
I offered my hand to help her up, but Enry examined my palm with suspicious eyes. To think she would distort my pure goodwill like this. It left me with rather complicated feelings. Did I really look like such a bad person to her?
“Enry.”
“Y-yes?!”
“Think about it. If I had wanted to kill you, wouldn’t I have done it long ago?”
Even now you’re full of openings. If I wished, I could slit your throat at any time. There would be no reason for me to play petty tricks.
“...That’s surprisingly convincing.”
Enry let out a sigh that turned into a small laugh, then took my hand and stood up.
“Then I won the bet this time, right?”
“What bet are you talking about?”
“The one about who would reach Gold first!”
“That was a bet?”
It had simply been a casual goal I set as a joke. How could something started without mutual agreement even be called a bet? When I shamelessly pointed this out, Enry puffed out her cheeks.
You fool. Did you think a grown adult woman puffing her cheeks would look cute? That sort of thing is only cute when a girl like Baru does it. On someone like you it simply looks childish.
As I stared at her with a pitying gaze, even Enry seemed to feel embarrassed. She quickly deflated her cheeks.
“You were the one who one-sidedly declared it, and I suffered so much because of it! So just call it a bet already!”
She had stopped pretending to be cute, but she clearly hadn’t stopped grumbling. At this rate she looked ready to roll around on the floor without any shame. I found myself unconsciously rubbing my temples.
“Sigh. Fine. I’ll say you won.”
“Whoa! Did everyone hear that? I won! From now on, no matter who beats Hwaryeong, I’ll still be the first one to ever defeat her!”
She was so happy she started jumping up and down. Watching her, I felt a sudden urge to drag her mood back down a little. So this was what the viewers meant by malicious behavior. If that was the case, then I suppose I really was malicious.
“By the way, Enry. I heard you badmouthed me on your stream.”
The moment I casually brought it up, Enry’s jumping came to an abrupt stop. Like a puppy that knew it was about to be scolded, she deliberately looked away. I continued speaking.
“That I wandered around in front of a kiosk like some grandmother, that I didn’t have the intelligence to handle complicated programs—quite a few of your quotes came flying in through donations. What do you have to say for yourself?”
“T-that’s all slander! I would never say things like that!”
“Really?”
“...”
“Would it be all right if I watched your VOD?”
Don’t assume I will remain ignorant of Turret’s system forever. I had recently hired several video editors and was learning all sorts of things. Naturally, I now had ways to check the broadcasts she had done.
“My VODs are subscriber-only…”
“Didn’t you gift me a subscription last time?”
“Ah!”
Apparently she had no more excuses left. Enry’s lips began to tremble.
Now then, what punishment should I give this loose-mouthed fellow?
As I smiled while considering it, Enry suddenly shouted.
“Yes! I said it! So what are you going to do about it?!”
“Pardon?”
“I’m already Gold no matter what you do! I won against you! What more can you even do?! Other than getting mad at me, what else can you do?!”
I hadn’t expected her to come out so boldly. For a moment my mind went blank.
Oh? Enry. You have more backbone than I thought.
Yes, there are times when you want to rebel even though you know what the future holds. I understand. I was like that once in the past. However, from my experience, the results of such rebellion are rarely good.
Perhaps my slowly rising smile made her uneasy. Enry closed her eyes and shouted, then carefully opened them again. Her face drained of color.
“Joke! It was a joke! Hwaryeong! This is a trending thing these days—”
“Enry. Let me tell you one thing. I know where you live.”
“Hic.”
“Aren’t you curious how your karma will come back to you?”
I was confident in both friendly and humorous expressions, but I was even more confident in scary and imposing ones. The moment I decided to threaten her, Enry’s face crumpled and she began to hiccup.
This kid. She’s even good at acting scared. Anyone watching would think she was actually about to burst into tears.
“Hup! Hic.”
...Was she really crying?