Trident Villain

"Yes. The match has just started!"

The caster's call brought the broadcast feed up with it. On the left sat the nickname of whoever currently held the screen; on the right, the basics—player count, match time, and the rest—were laid out clean and easy on the eyes.

"It's an amateur bracket, so as I understand it there are hardly any players with a real name."

"But doesn't that let us focus on the actual in-game play, with no favorites? And who knows—we might even dig up a rising star at today's tournament!"

"Exactly! With a total prize pool of three million won on the line, I can't wait to see what kind of highlight reel we're about to get!"

The pros really were different. The moment the game began, they yanked the energy all the way up, stoking the tension and the sense that something was about to happen. There was always a little dead time between stepping into the waiting room and the match itself, and casters usually packed that stretch with talk that had nothing to do with the game, just to keep the audio from going empty.

"All right! ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Gaojing, what do you think?"

Gaojing, an Eternal Battle streamer. Decent skill, a mouth that wasn't half bad, and a loyal fanbase he'd built on both—a solid mid-tier name. For this tournament he'd been brought on as commentary, essentially the face they stuck on the desk. He'd never match a professional analyst for detail, of course. Even so, he'd clenched his jaw and prepared like a man possessed, determined to use this chance to nail down his image as someone who actually knew the game.

"Right. First off, the map came up Red Wilderness, so I'm expecting a lot of hot, straight-up fights."

"Oh, straight-up fights! I like it! Anything else we should watch for?"

"Hmm... People get cautious in a tournament. That's just psychology. And since most of today's field is ordinary players, I think we'll see more fighting late than early."

Good. The words were coming out far more smoothly than he'd expected. Maybe the nerve-calming pill he'd swallowed before the start was actually doing its job. The caster seemed to like it too; a smile broke open across his face.

"Ah, that really might be it! Wow, Gaojing. You're a lot sharper than I expected!"

"Haha. Thank you."

"Uh—uh oh! A fight's breaking out right now!"

Gaojing flinched at the analyst's urgent voice and jerked his eyes to the screen. A fight already? How long had the match even been going? Not two minutes had passed since they'd left the waiting room for the combat zone. Count the time spent moving, and they'd started swinging about a minute after opening their eyes.

When that happened, one side was usually a fight-crazed lunatic—the kind who latched on like a mad dog and would not let go, so a battle broke out whether anyone wanted one or not. From the feed, at least, they weren't going at it with bare fists.

"Ah, a fight really is happening already! This is wild!"

Professional to the bone, the caster not only recovered his calm in a heartbeat but leaned into the hype as he called it. For the people watching, it was welcome anyway. Better a fight than a dull early loot phase.

"Both of them already have a main weapon. Hosik2 is holding a riot shield, and the one facing him, Jjamppong Aficionado, is..."

The words died in his throat. He could see the weapon in the woman's hand perfectly clearly, and still he spent a long moment doubting it was the thing he thought it was, looking again to be sure.

"...A trident?"

He wasn't the only one stunned. The caster and the analyst beside him couldn't hide their shock either. A trident was scorned in casual queues and tournaments alike. In a normal match it might at least come out for the meme; in anything that called itself serious play, it was shunned with something close to cruelty.

The fluster passed quickly. Gaojing forced his voice back to something natural and offered an excuse on the player's behalf.

"Uh, looks like that was the only weapon she found at the start. She ran straight into an enemy, so she's grabbing the trident in a hurry for now."

"You think so? Eternal Battle players will know what I mean—that weapon doesn't exactly have a great reputation, right? So how does it look this early in a match?"

That wasn't even a question. The trident wasn't a weapon that got better as the clock ran. It was maggot-tier from the first second to the last, the kind of thing people would rather replace with a dinner fork. He couldn't say that on an official broadcast, so he softened it as far as it would go.

"The trident's upside is that, for a melee weapon, the reach is long."

"Right. And?"

"Uh, that's all of it. Other than that, it doesn't really have any advantage worth naming. Which is why nobody uses one."

While that heated breakdown of the trident rolled on, the fight itself boiled over, the result a breath away from being decided. This was the moment to watch the fight.

"Ah—right as we're saying it! She jumps and clears the shield. Lands right behind him!"

"He's got to counter immediately! But she stays calm, ducks, and tackles!"

"And down he goes. Clean stab!"

Weapon aside, the player's skill was no small thing. Before he knew it, Gaojing was watching with a quiet admiration he hadn't meant to feel.

"Whoa! First blood! Just like that, we have our first death!"

"Wait, what is that? Water's pouring out of the corpse's chest? And the trident's absorbing it?"

The caster wasn't asking because he truly didn't know. A commentator who worked pro events already had the basics down. He was only keeping the talk moving, laying the table so Gaojing could explain.

"That's unique to the trident. It can absorb water from a corpse."

"Whoa! So what changes? Does the weapon grow on the spot? Like a level-up?"

"No. It just looks cooler. That's the whole thing."

"...Ah. That's the whole thing. Looking cool matters too, of course. Ahem."

Faced with the trident's staggering lack of upside, even the unflappable caster lost his footing for a second and covered it with a dry cough.

"Still, she won the fight, so she'll swap weapons now."

"Right. And it's that riot shield everybody says is so good, isn't it? Dependable as a hot bowl of soup!"

"Exactly! Jjamppong Aficionado! Just from the movement, she's no ordinary player. Worth keeping your eyes on!"

They'd been a little thrown, but it looked as if they'd spun the moment smoothly enough and the segment was about to settle. Then the booth panicked all over again.

"...She's just leaving?"

"Uh, yeah. She didn't swap. She's moving out still holding the trident."

"She isn't planning to keep using that, is she?"

No way. Surely not.

And yet that was exactly the feeling he got. He'd watched only a short fight, and still she seemed to carry the kind of star power that could send shockwaves rolling out from here.

Meanwhile, on the biggest Eternal Battle community in the country.

And somewhere in the middle of it, talk of her began to creep onto the boards. The way a drizzle soaks your clothes before you notice, people started paying attention to the tournament still in progress. What that attention would come back to her as, though, was anybody's guess.

"Good."

Before I knew it, the match had entered its late phase. The sandstorm had died down, which meant it was time to move again. I switched on my Watch and checked how many were left.

More of them had survived than I'd expected. Then again, tournaments pared away a lot of the survival elements, so of course more people stayed alive. Out here, you pretty much only died if somebody killed you.

Still, not bad. If anything, looking back over how the match had gone, I was plenty satisfied. I'd knocked out a double-digit number of players all by myself.

I couldn't hear the booth, but I could roughly guess how the commentators were taking it. I was definitely drawing real attention. This was the situation I'd wanted, which meant the ending had to land even harder. I meant to put on the most striking performance I could when it closed.

All right. Time to go kill somebody else.