Momoru, Die…! Harumong… Die…! Heukrangi, Die Die Dieeee…!
1.
The viewers begged me—please, for the love of god, do something else—but I kept grinding aim practice right up until scrim time.
"Ahh, h-hello…."
Ten minutes before the scrim started, I joined the voice chat where the rest of the team had already gathered. Having seen them once yesterday made it a little easier this time.
"Welcome!"
"Hiii hiii!"
The duo of Momoru and Harumong greeted me with bright, cheerful energy. Even after all the abuse I'd thrown at them, they were still pure sunshine.
They could still be trash-talking me behind my back, though….
Remembering the conversations I'd seen in that anonymous chat room, I couldn't let my guard down completely. The kind of people who smile like angels while hiding a knife behind their backs.
"Welcome, Bullet."
Next to greet me was Aura.
"Ahh, my love, my light, my darkness, my life, my joy, my sorrow, my rest, my soul…!"
That voice of hers was as elegant as ever today. Somewhere behind that voice, I was certain, sat a woman just as beautiful as it sounded.
"Would you cut the bullshit already."
"Yes, ma'am."
"Hey. You seriously practiced aim for like seven hours straight? Without talking to your viewers at all? Are you actually insane?"
While I was quietly worshipping Aura, an unbearably childish voice cut in. Heukrangi.
"…What about it."
"I heard you slaughtered over a thousand viewers. You murdering bitch…! You massacre bitch…! You alligator-snapping-turtle bitch…!"
"Heukrangi, you've burned through over a thousand viewers yourself with your trash-talk controversies."
"Fuck you."
She really was an immature little brat. Somewhere behind that voice, I was certain, sat a short girl who looked like a kid. No doubt about it.
802 watching……
Checking my viewer count confirmed it—quite a few people had bailed. Honestly, though, I was kind of relieved.
"Th-this is plenty. Eight hundred two puts me at, w-well, second place on the team… heheh… Momoru, die…! Harumong… die…! Heukrangi, die die dieeee…! Get wrecked—!"
"Why am I the only one who gets the long version."
"I think you already know the answer to that…."
"Heh."
"Huh?"
By now I should have gotten a "fuck you" back. I should have smiled with smug satisfaction. So what the hell was that little snort of laughter?
No way…
A chill ran up my spine. I scrambled over to Heukrangi's stream.
1,462 watching……
"W-what!?"
I nearly fell out of my chair. Her viewer count was almost fifteen hundred!
"H-how did you grow this much already…?"
"While you were busy farming ants under the excuse of aim practice, I just opened my mouth wiiiiide—and scooped them all up. Uwahaha!"
"G-give me my viewers back…!"
"Who said they were yours."
"Y-you fucking bitch…!"
"Uwahahaha! So this is what it feels like. Getting cursed out and still feeling amazing~?"
"I gained viewers too."
"Me too!"
Checking further, Momoru and Harumong had each picked up around two to three hundred more viewers as well. And if you thought about it, wasn't that a little bit my influence too?
"Hmm. Well… good for them."
"Huh? Why aren't you cussing them out, you bitch."
"W-well… I did cuss them out, but I didn't really mean anything by it… I-I'm the one who was trying to thin out my viewers in the first place."
I shrugged.
"I-I'm happy with this number right now."
Later, maybe. But right now, this was all I could handle. Eight hundred viewers on day two of streaming? That was already an absurd result.
"Th-the viewers who should have scattered and disappeared went to my teammates instead… so you could say this is actually a good situation."
"Bullet…!"
"Ahh, my light, my love, my darkness…! Just light light! I believe in you…! Bullet…!"
The duo gushed over me in voices thick with emotion.
"If you put it like that, what does that make me for mocking you."
Heukrangi, on the other hand, sounded a little awkward. A faint hint of guilt mixed in too.
"Y-you become trash…."
"You bitch. You planned this too, didn't you?"
"Y-you're the one who happily gobbled them up, Heukrangi… D-don't you know eating random stuff gives you a stomachache…?"
"Now that they're not 'your' viewers anymore, you show no mercy… you bitch…."
"Death to traitors…!"
I muttered it with grim resolve.
"A-Aura, did your viewers go up too…?"
"Me? Yes. Compared to yesterday, I went up by over a thousand as well."
"Then… I guess the others gaining viewers wasn't because of me after all…."
I'd gotten a little cocky there. Adding up everyone's gains, the total far exceeded the people who'd even been in my stream to begin with.
"No, that's not right. Our team's viewers went up overall because of Bullet's… well, the hack aggro, and because our scrim win rate shot up. Those two things worked together."
"So if you really break it down, it is thanks to Bullet. She pulled people's attention and interest over to our team."
"I-is that so?"
"Yes. So feel free to get cocky."
"Then let's all say thank you to Bullet!"
"Thanks, Bullet!"
"Thanks for the meal, Bullet~"
"Uh, uh, yeah…."
I felt… something. A little cringe, maybe.
Apparently the chat felt the same way I did.
"I-if you're grateful… m-maybe gift some subs…."
Might as well cash in while I was at it.
I received a total of a hundred gifted subs from my teammates. Thanks to that, a full eighth of my viewers now sported a sub badge.
"I-I'll get the sub badge ready as soon as I can… emotes too…."
They'd gifted me subs, after all. It'd feel pretty hollow without either of those.
"Wait, you don't even have a sub badge or emotes?"
Heukrangi pointed it out in shock.
"W-well, no?"
"You really don't have the basics down at all, do you?"
"I-I don't have money, what do you want me to do… I blew my entire savings on stream setup and the virtual avatar…!"
"Virtual avatar? What are you talking about, Bullet-Bullet. This is the real me?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"That reaction is so fucking dry, I swear…."
Heukrangi grumbled.
"Alright, enough small talk."
Once again, Aura clapped her hands and pulled our attention back.
"We've got a scrim lined up again today. The team is Chamchican. Does anyone know them?"
Silence settled over us.
"…I-is Chamchican a big name?"
"As a streamer? Not really. But their team has a sixty-four percent scrim win rate."
"Th-they're not S-Jji, right?"
"What's S-Jji?"
"S-Stat Trash… they might've padded their scrim win rate by only beating weak teams."
Aura chose her words carefully for a moment, then spoke.
"Hmm. The phrasing is a little harsh, but you're right."
"I-I am?"
"Yes. They're famous for mostly scrimming weak teams. Their nickname is the Weak Team Detector."
"The Weak Team Detector… so the fact that they asked us for a scrim means…!"
"It means they see us as a weak team."
"W-well, at least they see us as a team. That's something…."
I let out a sigh of relief.
"Bullet."
"Yes…."
"Unlike the teams we've faced so far, Chamchican won't be easy. They're good at looking down on weaker opponents, and they're known for being excellent at wall fights."
"Wall fights…."
Wall fights.
A composition where the tank hero planted an energy barrier at the front, while the dive heroes and supports pressed right up behind it, pushing and pulling the frontline.
A fight where you either forced a gap with damage dealers or just chewed through each other's walls until ultimates came online.
Frustrating and slow—but it also demanded intense focus. Whoever made the first mistake lost. That was what made it so suffocating.
Low-tier players like us struggle with this the most.
Because low-tier games never really demand this kind of structure or patience.
That was probably how Chamchican earned the nickname Weak Team Detector. They forced the exact textbook composition that low-tier players found most alien—and most difficult.
Of course, you didn't have to answer a textbook composition with a textbook composition. But at our level, cracking that kind of solidity was no easy task.
"Hmm…."
My teammates all looked uneasy after hearing me out. Fair enough—I'd done nothing but deliver bad news.
"So we're probably going to lose…?"
"No."
I shook my head firmly at Heukrangi's question.
"Why? From what you just said, we don't sound like we'd be good at that textbook style."
"Is there a way we can win!?"
"Really!?"
The duo got worked up immediately.
"There is."
"How?"
"Aura's team has me on it…! That's how we can win…!"
"Ah… right…."
"Hmm… well, we have been winning thanks to Bullet, that's true. But this one might be different, don't you think?"
"We'll find out when we face them. Who's actually better…!"
Chamchican Team clearly saw us as free food—but there were two things they hadn't accounted for.
First: ever since I'd taken over as main shotcaller, the entire character of this team had changed.
And second….
Aim Assist — Lv.2
My aim had leveled up once more.
You're all dead…!
I quietly curled the corner of my mouth.
2.
"Eheheh, you're all dead… ihihi…."
Hearing Bullet's creepy little laugh in her ear, Heukrangi wrinkled her nose.
"What's her deal?"
"Just let her enjoy it. Sounds like something good happened."