This Bitch Is Like a Snapping Turtle...

Gulp—

It's fine. It'll work out.

I already had the whole board mapped out in my head—every play, every flow. If things went according to plan, I could smooth this over with a smile.

"It'll be fine…."

I clenched and unclenched my hand around the mouse, over and over.

I had to move. I had to hit the start button. That was the only way forward. I knew that—and still, my fingers refused to obey.

Maybe the original owner of this body had frozen up for the same reason. Maybe the pressure had gotten to her too.

I grabbed the pack of cigarettes I'd tossed beside the desk, fished one out, and stuck it between my lips. A familiar smell brushed the tip of my nose.

"Huuu…."

Only then did my heart, which had been hammering like mad, start to find its rhythm again.

"Let's go."

I put force into the finger resting on the mouse.

Click—

"I—I hit it…!"

I shot up out of the chair like a cat that had just spotted a cucumber. Sitting still was impossible, so I paced a useless circle around the room.

I flicked the cigarette from my mouth into the trash and opened the fridge.

"Ugh…."

Shriveled takeout pickled radish, a half-drunk bottle of water, assorted disposable sauce packets. One expired carton of milk and a bottle of soju.

There wasn't a single proper scrap of food in sight.

I pulled out just the water and sat back down. On the vertical monitor standing to my right, chat was scrolling by at a vicious speed.

I carefully kept my eyes off that side and twisted open the plastic bottle. I was about to put my mouth to it when a weird thought struck me out of nowhere.

Does this count as an indirect kiss?

It was the same body, sure. But the original owner of this body and the person moving it right now were two completely different people.

"I am genuinely unwell…."

Even I had to admit that was a deeply creepy line of thinking. All that stress must have finally cracked something in my head.

Feeling stupidly embarrassed, I drank carefully so my lips wouldn't touch the bottle mouth. After a few swallows, I set the water down on the floor.

"Huuu. Alright. Let's do this."

I dragged the chair flush against the desk and sat. Then I put up the image I'd prepared ahead of time—back when I'd talked it over with Heukrangi—onto the stream overlay.

The chat window, which until a second ago had been stuffed with curses and chaos, flipped in an instant—flooded with laughter and pure shock.

"Ahem."

I flipped on the mic along with the virtual character.

"H-hello… I-I'm Bullet… T-today's clarification stream will be… w-with my teammate Heukrangi…."

My voice was shaking hard, but I got the whole sentence out.

Ding—

I connected to the That's Code voice channel first. Heukrangi followed right after.

"H-Heukrangi, c-could you introduce yourself…."

"Uh… hello. I'm Heukrangi—currently playing defense on the same team as Bullet. Nice to meet you all!"

A husky, energetic voice. The tension of a pro streamer, no question.

"………."

"………."

"………."

"Um, Bullet?"

While I was still quietly impressed, Heukrangi broke the silence first.

"Yes?"

"Could you say something? It's getting a little awkward with nobody talking…."

"Ah."

Right. I was on stream too. The nerves must have been frying my brain—I kept blanking on the basics.

"Ah—waaaa…."

I gave a tiny clap to welcome her.

"Thank you. Not that I felt a single ounce of soul in that."

"…Sorry."

"It's fine. So—why did you specifically want to do this clarification stream with me?"

"W-well… when the hack scandal blew up, Heukrangi was the one who cursed me out the hardest… and also the one who leaked it on stream…?"

I said it and glanced at chat. I'd thought that was a pretty well-reasoned line.

Judging by the viewers' reactions, a lot of them were reading it as a dominance play. That really hadn't been the intent.

"…I'm sorry."

"Ah, no. I was the one in the wrong… so the cursing wasn't unreasonable."

"Still. I shouldn't have said things so carelessly. I'm truly sorry…."

"I-if you really feel that bad… could you maybe host a little…? I, uh… I did write up a script to some extent…."

"M-me? Host?"

"Yes…."

"This is… your stream, though…?"

"Yes…."

"Alrigh…t. I've never done this before, but I'll give it a shot. Can you send me the script?"

I passed her the script I'd prepared in advance. She seemed to read it for a moment, then let out a dry laugh.

"You're seriously fine running it like this?"

"Yes… it's pretty clean, isn't it…?"

"Yeah, well…."

Her voice carried zero agreement.

"Uh… so, shall I start?"

"Yes…!"

"First, let's cover what viewers are probably most curious about. Did you get banned from NOVA Syndicate?"

Heukrangi asked in a low voice. Her enunciation was so crisp she might as well have been a news anchor.

"N-no, I didn't…!"

Meanwhile my voice was still shaking, and I kept tripping over my words. Getting compared to her in real time was doing catastrophic things to my self-esteem.

"I-I'll show you right now…!"

I dragged NOVA Syndicate—which I'd shoved down out of the way—onto the main screen. Then I opened the inbox and put the email from the operations team up on stream.

"A-as you can see… t-the ops team investigated it themselves…! I didn't get banned…! I'm a completely clean person…!"

"Then why, in the middle of a scrim, did you leave a message saying you were going out on a tofu errand and disappear? Did you actually go on a tofu errand? At two in the morning?"

"I-I did not go on a tofu errand. I don't even have parents to send me on tofu errands… I'm an orphan…."

"…What? Hold on, that wasn't in the script!"

"S-sorry… I must have forgotten…."

I wasn't actually sure whether this body was really an orphan. But looking at the empty contacts list, it was probably true.

And the original me had been an orphan, so… yeah. At the very least, it wasn't a lie.

"O-okay, then why that excuse? And why leave a chat that just said 'I'm sorry' and vanish?"

This was the important part. If I could get the words right here, I'd make it through clean.

"Because I was sorry, so I typed that I was sorry?"

"……What?"

"Uh, the reason I said I was going on a tofu errand and disappeared was because I wasn't feeling well…."

I swallowed dryly.

"But if I just said I felt bad and left, I figured I'd get flamed, so I tried to play it off light and funny, and, uh… yeah… that's how it went…."

"So it was an excuse to keep things light."

"Correct…."

"And then when chat went nuclear, you apologized after the fact?"

"Yes… I didn't have any friends all through school, so I think I was a little… socially stunted… I'm sorry…."

I bowed my head. On screen, the character mirrored the motion exactly.

"Then since you didn't get banned, are you still participating in Fall of the Great?"

"Yes… i-it may be shameless of me… but I plan to keep going… Aura and the rest of the team all said it was fine…."

At the sudden donation, my eyes went round.

"Th-thank you so much for the ten-thousand-won donation…!"

I shot up from the chair and bowed at the waist over and over.

"Uh, so… the reason Heukrangi didn't know is probably because she didn't check the group chat… or maybe she has a grudge against me and ignored it on purpose…?"

"No—!!!"

"Hic…!"

The volume was so loud it hurt my ears. I flinched hard.

"Why would I have a grudge against you!?"

"Well… earlier on stream you said things like, 'Some psycho bitch used hacks mid-scrim.' 'What a complete disaster because of one absolute airhead.' 'Hope that fucking bitch never shows her face again.' 'That motherless bitch….' You said all that…."

I delivered the lines in an imitation of Heukrangi's voice.

"I did NOT ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠say 'motherless bitch'—!!!"

Heukrangi practically had a seizure over the mic.

"So you're admitting you said all the rest…?"

"I—I did say those, but… ah, this is…."

"And you wrote this, too…."

I put the post Heukrangi had written on ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the community board up on ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠screen.

"S-so… how do you explain this…."

"………."

Silence hung for a long moment.

"……I'm sorry."

"It's fine! You did it on purpose, but…! These things happen!"

It wasn't like I'd done any of it myself anyway. I could forgive this much with a smile!