Butterview (2)
◎ The 124th Butterview (With. Heavenly Demon) ◎
“The ‘Defeat Mootdayang!’ corner is where the guest—in this case, me, Mootdayang—competes against the invited guest in all sorts of events! You earn prizes for every win, so the more victories, the better, right?”
“I see. What events have you prepared?”
“We have a total of three events ready! The first one is a general knowledge quiz! All right, stage—standby!”
As Mootdayang shouted and thrust both arms into the air, the space where the two sat began to transform.
The background shifted from a classical Chinese style into the bright, retro set of an old-school quiz show. A table equipped with large buttons rose from the floor in front of them.
“Stage ready! There will be five questions in total, randomly selected by our staff! Of course, even I have no idea what will appear, so please don’t worry!”
“Hehe, I’m pretty confident when it comes to quizzes! The questions range from simple math to current events and history, so everyone stay focused! Viewers at home, feel free to play along!”
With Mootdayang’s cheerful declaration, a massive electronic scoreboard rose behind Myeong-yun and Mootdayang—the board that would display the questions. Another screen floated in front of the two contestants so both participants and the audience could see every problem clearly.
“Then let’s begin! Defeat Mootdayang!!”
A sharp buzzer sounded and the first question appeared on the board.
—What is the capital of China?
The moment the question appeared, both Mootdayang and Myeong-yun reached for their buzzers at nearly the same instant—but Myeong-yun was faster.
The chance to answer went to him.
“Qishan.”
A harsh error tone blared.
Myeong-yun wore an expression that seemed to ask what was wrong with his answer. Mootdayang quickly slammed her own button and shouted.
“Beijing! It’s Beijing!”
A cheerful correct-answer jingle played.
Myeong-yun looked genuinely puzzled. “When exactly did the Zhu clan move their capital to Beijing?”
“Uwahaha! Heavenly Demon, sir! Not the capital of the ancient Zhou kingdom—the capital of modern China! I’ll be taking the first point, thank you very much!”
Myeong-yun still looked unconvinced, but the quiz continued.
The next question was a mental arithmetic problem.
—2455 + 125222 + 9787 − 23488 = ?
The instant the question appeared, Myeong-yun slammed his buzzer.
Mootdayang immediately tried to check him. “Y-you don’t even know the answer and you’re just pressing the button?!”
“Why would This Seat press it if he did not know the answer? The correct figure is 113,976.”
The cheerful jingle rang out once more. Mootdayang’s eyes widened like saucers at the sheer speed of his mental calculation.
Hardly a tenth of a second had passed since the question appeared.
The viewers were just as stunned.
Myeong-yun gave a small shrug as if he couldn’t understand what all the fuss was about.
“Is this not something anyone can do?”
“…Th-that’s way too much humblebragging! Even I need at least ten seconds to solve something like that!”
“What does ‘humblebragging’ mean?”
“…Wow, you really are from the old Central Plains!”
“This Seat is from the Central Plains.”
The perfectly timed comedy routine flooded the chat with laughter.
Yet who could have known that Myeong-yun had been completely serious?
The quiz continued, but victory ultimately went to Mootdayang.
Myeong-yun had taken two points on pure brainpower questions, but when it came to current events or VTuber trivia there was simply no way for him to know the answers.
The final score was 3 to 2 in Mootdayang’s favor.
“Yahoo!”
She jumped for joy. Myeong-yun merely shook his head beside her with a look of mild regret.
How could he possibly know the name of the very first VTuber, or the Four Heavenly Kings of the first generation?
In every possible way, the quiz had been unfairly stacked against him.
Having secured her first win, Mootdayang proudly explained the next event with a triumphant grin.
“For the next event, even the greatest leaders need a bit of luck on their side, don’t they? The game we’ll be playing is Yacht Dice!”
“Yacht Dice?”
“Yes! It’s a game played with five dice that tests both luck and, perhaps, skill! You roll the dice to fill out a scorecard, and the person with the higher total at the end wins!”
Mootdayang took a moment to explain the rules in detail for Myeong-yun, who had never heard of the game.
After listening to the rules, Myeong-yun nodded slowly and spoke.
“You said one can reroll the dice up to two more times after the first throw, correct?”
“That’s right!”
“Hmm. Would it not be more interesting to allow only a single roll? Every face becomes a decisive blow.”
“Oho, are you challenging me—the undisputed Queen of Yacht? This should be fun!”
“This Seat shall now demonstrate what the Heavenly Demon of Yacht truly looks like.”
And so the dice game began.
What the viewers witnessed in the live broadcast was a merciless bloodbath of soaring hope and crushing despair.
“Huh?”
“Wait…?”
“What… what is this?”
“No way… this can’t be happening…!”
“I… I lost… This doesn’t make any sense at all……”
“How amusing. Shall we play another round?”
“…I must decline.”
Myeong-yun was the one smiling. Mootdayang was the one on the verge of tears.
The final score was 297 to 125.
A gap of over 150 points—an utterly devastating defeat.
Myeong-yun had perfectly matched every single die face to the scorecard, achieving the maximum possible score in a single game.
Mootdayang had first assumed it was mere luck, hoping the same fortune would smile on her. But as the game progressed she realized it was not luck at all.
Myeong-yun was controlling the dice with pure skill, making them land exactly as he wished.
“…My heart actually hurts. I’ve never lost this badly before… Wait, how did you even do that? You throw the dice inside a cup—how do you control them to come out exactly the way you want?!”
“It is not difficult. The secret lies in precise force modulation and minute adjustments of the wrist.”
“That’s impossible…! Th-this is cheating! It’s cheating!”
Mootdayang screamed that such a thing could never be possible, but the results left her no choice but to accept defeat.
After all, she had been the one who chose the game.
“S-so that makes it one win each. We’ll decide the winner with the final event! The last event is ‘Mootdayang Learns Martial Arts!’”
“This is a brand-new segment we just added! The Heavenly Demon is a master of martial arts, correct? We’ll have him teach Mootdayang a technique and then see how well she can apply it in practice. If Mootdayang wins the spar, the Heavenly Demon wins the event! If Mootdayang loses, then Mootdayang wins the event!”
“There will be no throwing the match! I, Mootdayang, always give everything I have! This time too, I’ll pour my heart and soul into it! Standby!”
Once again, as Mootdayang shouted and threw her hands into the air, the space transformed.
From the reception room to the quiz show stage, from the dice arena to a neatly paved training ground.
Wooden training dummies stood at various points across the martial arts field. Mootdayang’s outfit had also changed from her flowing traditional dress to a sturdy training uniform tied with numerous straps. Her signature dumpling buns remained the same.
“All right! For the next thirty minutes or so, I’ll learn a martial art with explanation and then test it against a beginner-level training dummy! Viewers, feel free to learn along with me!”
“A beginner-level dummy will suffice?”
“I may not look it, but I’m actually really bad at physical stuff!”
It didn’t seem like something to declare so proudly, yet Myeong-yun smiled faintly, clearly amused.
“Very well. Let us begin. From what This Seat observes, the technique that would suit you best is the Flying Heavenly Squirrel Art. However, time is short, so I shall teach you only the fundamentals.”
“Flying Heavenly Squirrel Art?”
“It means flying squirrel.”
“A flying squirrel…! Do I really look like that?”
“You bear a certain resemblance. In any case, I will not be teaching you that. Instead, I shall teach you the Three Talents Fist.”
“Understood! Please take care of me, Heavenly Demon Master!”
“Master, is it? That is a title This Seat has not heard before. Very well. Let us begin, my disciple.”
And so began the first martial arts lecture in service of Myeong-yun’s long-cherished wish.