Fame
Presenting the greatest city in the history of the planet…
(After winning the full five-set match)
Back when I was still studying under Han Su-yeong.
One day she suddenly grabbed me and said something out of nowhere.
"Ahyun. Attention is a measure of expectation."
"Pardon?"
"So stay obscure and make a lot of money."
"Isn't being expected of a good thing?"
"You little brat. You think expectations come free?"
It was such a random thing to say that I answered without thinking much of it. But Han Su-yeong's face went serious on the spot, sat me down right there, and launched into a full lecture.
People's expectations, she said, worked like a prepaid deposit. Fail to meet them and you became a scam artist who ran off with the money, and so on and so forth….
It was a little out of left field, honestly, but I could relate.
I'd been a child super-rookie model myself, hadn't I? Loaded with expectations. The moment I fell even a little short of them, it started with I knew it and spiraled into every other kind of commentary imaginable.
And looking back on it now—parents who'd poured everything into getting their own kids into children's magazines had resented me for a long, long time.
Well. It was an understandable kind of resentment. As an adult, hadn't I stolen the seats of kids who still had milk on their breath?
…Thinking about it now, I really was pretty awful, wasn't I? Anyway.
Through that whole stretch of experience and Han Su-yeong's sermon, I'd installed a mindset of stay just famous enough that people don't recognize me and make a lot of money. And this time, there were a few things I had clearly overlooked.
"Sorry? Did I watch the Rel match? Ah, yes, I watched it in the living room."
"Excuse me?"
First of all, I had severely underestimated the popularity of Legend of Legends.
I'd known the Rel tournaments were doing well. But there were way more people watching Rel matches than I'd ever imagined.
"Aren't you a regular person? From what I saw on stream you seemed a little…."
And of all things, last week's international Rel tournament happened to be the biggest competition of them all—big enough that even I knew about it. On top of that, it was the tournament where China had taken the trophy two years running after Seoul's win three years ago.
Which was why the final set between Seoul and Beijing had set a record for the highest viewership of any Rel tournament in history. And once that set ended, while everyone was still soaking in the afterglow of the players' celebrations—my face got broadcast.
Doing a spectacular little celebration of my own, no less.
So of course my popularity exploded. The viewers right now were making a whole production of it, and more importantly, messages were pouring in from every direction. Absolute chaos.
Our model alumni group chat in particular looked ready to explode. I'd recommended the game to them a few times on that side, but from the looks of it, none of them had expected me to go as far as the actual tournament.
Well. I probably wouldn't have gone either if this opportunity hadn't fallen into my lap.
"Seoul Noona this, Seoul Noona that. Let's just play Rel."
More than that, these people kept telling me to go look. Just look in a mirror—there she is.
"Wouldn't everyone rather look at Wayo's avatar than a 3D woman? She's unrealistically pretty."
"What do you mean…."
Still. It was just one good shot on the broadcast. It'd probably blow up on the communities for a bit and die out.
Practically speaking, the only thing I'd shown at that tournament was a single celebration, wasn't it? So as long as I didn't throw any more fuel on the fire, it was inevitably going to be a flash in the pan.
Give it a week and everyone would forget. Memes got consumed so fast these days. For about a week it'd float around the internet as one of the memes riding the tournament high, and then it would vanish. That was the plan, at least.
"Everyone, I'm a girl streamer too, you know. If you keep talking about other women in my room, the rivalry consciousness…."
Well, whatever. Seoul Noona was a Seoul girl, and these bastards…. How much of Seoul Noona had they even seen to be acting like this?
I was Seoul Noona herself and even I was at a loss for words. Had that scene really been that popular?
Well. Standing in front of cameras was my job, so I'd roughly predicted how I'd come out. I just hadn't expected it to blow up this much.
They'd even contacted Team Seoul the same day. Asked if I could guest on a commemorative content piece for the international finals. I'd refused, of course, but it was still bewildering.
"Everyone shut up and let's play Rel."
"I watched the finals too. Kind of got the blood going, you know?"
"We'll do Laboratory later."
The Last Exit Laboratory was a place I'd been looking forward to, sure. But I'd just come off watching the Rel finals—what Last Exit? Obviously we were playing Rel.
I clearly wasn't the only one thinking that. The second I queued up, a match locked in almost instantly.
"Hell yeah. I believed in you guys."
Honestly, Rel tournaments and solo queue were different enough to almost count as separate games. But one thing still carried over.
The meta.
Picks that got popular in tournament play showed up in solo queue too—and sure enough, our team and the enemy team were a carbon copy of yesterday's fifth-set finale.
"We're in a match. Focus."
Anyway.
Honestly, if it was just this much, it was still barely within my expected range. Or… maybe a little outside it…?
…Either way, it was a reaction I could understand.
But if there was one more fact I'd overlooked—it was that I was a seventeen-year model, and that the cyber archives available for bored archaeologists to dig through were truly, deeply extensive.
After the stream that day ended, the Rel tournament communities kept burning hotter and hotter, until—
A famous talk show reached out. And—
—messages came in from variety PDs I'd worked with a few times back in my school lunchbox days. The shoutouts started pouring in so hard it felt like I was the one who'd won the tournament.
"Ahyun, this is…."
"There's nothing we can do about this one."
Honestly. I'd just been trying to go about my life like nothing had happened. But the world wouldn't leave me alone, so what choice did I have?
Okay. I lose.
Thank you for the prepaid fame.
They say popularity is momentum, don't they? One photo and it flares up like this—I never even imagined it. Well, the photo was the fuse, and the real reason it took off was probably the flashy career… but anyway.
People were searching for me and wanting me this much. How could I not answer?
"I've decided to compete in a tournament this time. Shiver shiver."
Knock out the remaining shoots as fast as possible, then go into seclusion in the cyber world for a while.