The AI's Whisper
Arine’s laughter only subsided after a long while. Was my dorky reaction really that funny? Well, it’s not like I’m exactly the life of the party anyway—I’m more of an outsider than an insider. [Hehe… ugh… haha… I’m dying… I’m actually dying… guys… my stomach hurts so bad… hehe]
When she laughed like she was about to collapse, the awkwardness and embarrassment faded away. Instead, the feeling looped around and climbed all the way up to Mount Pure Delight. The sense that I’d managed to entertain her so thoroughly left me oddly proud. Just as that feeling settled in, she finally pulled herself together.
[Ah… sorry. Really, pfft—ah, I’m gonna laugh again. It was so funny I couldn’t even keep the stream going.]
“You calmed down now?”
[Yeah. Wait, no—hold on. We’re not supposed to use formal speech, remember?]
She caught herself slipping back into polite speech—the way we used to talk—and quickly corrected it.
“Right, Arin. We decided on casual, didn’t we?”
[Oh. Now you’re getting it.]
“I just don’t want to get mocked that hard again, so I’m trying to be shameless about it.”
[What are you talking about~ I wasn’t mocking you. The situation was just too funny, that’s all.]
“Ah~ sure~ whatever you say~.”
[Then should we try calling each other’s names again?]
“I already did. Why do I have to do it again? You’re the only one left.”
[Ah~ just once more, please. We have to get used to it. We need to match our rhythm, don’t we? We still have to go defuse that bomb.]
I wasn’t sure what she meant by “defusing the bomb,” but from the stubborn look on her face, it was clear she wouldn’t move on unless I gave in. I let out a sigh.
“Fine. Arin.”
[Yeah, Doyun~ pfft. Wow, this is so awkward… I just got chills from how cringey that sounded.]
Arin giggled at her own words. Watching her, a thought crossed my mind.
…Being called by my name so casually by someone younger might not be so bad after all?
Just like that, a month slipped by.
Our routine hadn’t changed much. I kept doing regular collabs with Arin, about once every two weeks. Most of them were just light games, but our chemistry was so good that they were genuinely fun. I’d only visited her stream a couple of times, yet it felt like almost none of her viewers didn’t know who I was anymore.
[These days, you’re the main topic on my stream. Some people are even saying once every two weeks isn’t enough and asking me to invite you more often.]
Ever since that day, Arin had switched to full casual speech with me even off-stream, and she kept me updated on how her viewers were reacting to me. I was blending into her broadcasts pretty well. But if someone asked whether we were riding the natural flow of a virtual marriage concept… the answer would be no. We were just a guy and girl who got along great and had fun together—more like close opposite-gender friends than anything romantic. At least for a WGM vibe to really take off, there needed to be some kind of melancholic, flirty tension between us. For some reason, that atmosphere never formed during our collabs. It was hard to create that kind of mood in a game stream anyway. Maybe I needed to bring in some concept RP content and force the atmosphere if I wanted progress.
I’d been mulling over the stalled build-up when an unexpected event finally broke the deadlock.
“No, I’m telling you! Guys, you seriously don’t know this? You never tried eating ants when you were a kid?”
Even with the harsh comments, I couldn’t help but smile as I watched my average viewer count climb close to 200 during the collab with Arin. I launched into an impassioned defense of my childhood memory for the viewers who didn’t get it.
“What do ants taste like, you ask? Sour. Kind of like vinegar?”
Maybe the viewers were tired of my ant story, because a donation suddenly popped up.
It was a short video donation. The clip showed Arin doing a low-chat stream, tapping her desk with her left-hand fingernails while reading something from the fan café.
“What’s this? So?”
I glanced at the chat while waiting for her next move. She was looking at a site a viewer had linked—one that told your fortune for the year using AI. Even while grumbling that it was probably nonsense, she clicked the link anyway.
[So it really matches that well? It’s just AI anyway. Wouldn’t a human be better for this kind of superstitious stuff? Like tarot or something.]
Ah, I’d seen that before. With AI doing everything from writing songs to making videos these days, it wasn’t surprising that fortune-telling had joined the trend. Still muttering skeptically, she started entering her birthdate and some basic info. A few questions popped up—typical ones for love fortune. She clicked the top option: “What kind of person will I end up dating?”
The AI began spitting out text in a steady stream.
Overall
This year’s love fortune is strongly influenced by peach blossom and red flame energies. The key point is a connection with someone you’ve recently grown very close to. Especially, this person is a perfect match type whose speech, lifestyle rhythm, and values naturally align with yours in a mutually beneficial flow.
One-line summary
The person who recently entered your life and quickly grew close—the one whose compatibility with you is excellent—will be the main flow of your love life this year. Don’t miss the timing.
Arin tilted her head as she read the result.
[Oh, it came out. It says the person I’ve recently grown very close to and who matches well with me…]
[Guys, was there someone like that? Me?]
The chat in the small clip exploded.
Then came the thousand-won punch that summed it all up.
The video ended. It was strange. The way the AI described it really did sound like me. I didn’t watch every one of Arin’s streams, but I knew enough. Top-tier streamers like her didn’t suddenly expand their social circle unless they were doing guest appearances or something. She already had plenty of connections, so there was no need to get close to many new people. The only person who had recently grown dramatically close to her—and matched well with her—was me.
“When was that stream?”
Since Arin and I usually streamed around the same time, it was the perfect clip for viewers who watched both of us. Just as the donor intended, the rest of the chat started reacting.
……Did this even make sense? Arin and I hadn’t done anything, yet it felt like the heavens themselves were helping us. A perfectly natural WGM build-up was unfolding on its own. Watching the chat go wild with excitement, I tried to calm them down.
“Hey, you’re really gonna push WGM over something like this? It’s just a fortune. An AI fortune at that. Don’t overreact, seriously.”
Even as I said it, I felt secretly thrilled. Things were going way too smoothly.
……But wait, it couldn’t be, right? Did Arin plan this too? Even though I told myself there was no way she could pull off something like this, a strange chill ran down my spine.