The Twenty-Four-Year-Old Streamer, Kim Geonmo
Streamer GOandMO. Real name, Kim Geonmo.
He had been there since Project A's earliest days, a former pro, and right now he was one of the hottest streamers the scene had.
Call him a former pro and plenty of people would scoff—the career hadn't even lasted half a year—but almost no one doubted the skill. He had been a mid-to-high Chaser on the Asia server.
Skill, a mouth that never quit, and a network on top of both: he had climbed into the big leagues without a real scandal to his name. Of everything he ran, nothing pulled like Talent Scouting.
The name made it sound as if he were out discovering prospects. What he actually did was closer to digging up small-time streamers who still showed signs they could grow. Cash, the woman who was the single hottest topic on the Project A scene, was one of his finds, and that famous network of his had been built much the same way. Take a nobody no spotlight had found, raise them up, and get close. Later, when he needed content, the streamers who owed him a favor would pitch in or collab.
Someone might have called it calculating. It was how GOandMO kept his people.
And lately, another streamer had caught his eye.
Eunha.
A new star who had grown through one controversy after another, and a high-school girl—rare on the Project A scene. Women who mained Project A were common. High-schoolers who mained it were common too. A high-school girl whose main broadcast was Project A? That was not. And if she was actually good on top of it?
Other people said it was too early to judge from what she'd shown in Diamond, and they pegged her around Master. GOandMO, who had sat in the upper ranks of Asia Chaser himself, did not agree. Eunha was Immortal at the minimum. No—she would make Chaser. Set raw aim aside. The detail in how she read a game, the judgment in her calls: that was not a Master's. Not even close.
A streamer like Eunha would have grown on time alone, Yangjeon and Cries or no Yangjeon and Cries. No harm in getting close to someone who could become a solid mid-tier someday—no, one of the giants. That was his conclusion. So he had done something he rarely did. He hosted her, and he sent a collab request.
"Why isn't she writing back?"
To a small streamer only just starting to grow, a collab offer from the top of the industry was a lifeline dropped out of the sky. But Tuesday evening was nearly here, and still nothing from Eunha. Even he thought the offer had been sudden, so he had given her a generous window to answer. It still hadn't come.
If he was honest about the present, a collab with Eunha had no upside for him at all. And if she never grew enough, there was no long-term upside either. He was seriously wondering whether to drop the whole thing when a notification chimed on Dico, the chat app every streamer lived on.
"Finally!"
He scrambled into his DMs and confirmed the ping was a reply from Eunha.
An OK, thank God. GOandMO eased a little, privately.
A Dico channel for the Kwitch streamers whose broadcasts revolved around Project A. For a girl stuck on her own little island, it was the perfect chance to start a network with other broadcasters, and GOandMO had just handed her that chance. Go first to the person you want close, and do them a favor. That was the secret of how he managed people. Of course, he had also been stabbed in the back a few times doing exactly that.
Someone who at least knew they had been done a favor was comparatively less likely to turn around and stick the knife in. He was glad to see a reaction like that from Eunha.
"Okay~ so then..."
GOandMO went into his stream community and wrote a notice.
"It's not Cash this time, you bastards."
He had been collabing with Cash so often lately that viewers kept pairing them off—a dating show, a romance, whatever they felt like shipping. In reality they were just an ordinary older sister and younger brother.
GOandMO found himself really looking forward to Friday. Half thrill, half dread.
"Please. Just don't let anything go wrong."
"Wow. It's already today..."
I had turned it over for hours and hours, and a collab with Geonmo-hyung was too good to pass up. I had only just scraped past a thousand average viewers. A collab with a giant who held ten thousand was a golden chance, plain and simple. Streaming in secret from home was getting hard, too. I wanted Father to acknowledge it properly, and soon, and for that I needed to make some real money first. That was exactly why I had accepted Geonmo-hyung's offer.
Honestly, back in my pro days, a few of the hyungs I knew had called me in, and I had collabed with them more than once. The Geonmo-hyung who had just offered me this one had been among them.
Geonmo-hyung was one of the best-connected people on the Project A scene. Every starter on my team, KZ, was on familiar, brotherly terms with him. He was a decent person with a good personality, so almost no one disliked him. I had liked that hyung quite a bit myself.
"Oh, who do we have here! Korea's greatest— ah, no. The world's greatest entry, Choi Eunha? Sign this for me~"
"Hey, Eunha, what are you crying like that for. Cut it out. Cut it out."
"Hey, you idiot, that was more than good enough! Screw it! I'm taking a shot too!"
"Sue every last one of those troll bastards! Stop reading that crap, you'll make yourself sick. Hyung's really worried about you."
Anyway, Geonmo-hyung would meet me partway. As long as I didn't let the wrong thing slip out, the collab would turn out fine enough.
4:46.
"...Why am I this nervous over nothing..."
Back when I was the pro Galaxy, thousands in the arena and hundreds of thousands online could watch, and it never touched me. Now the thought of standing in front of fewer than twenty thousand viewers had my hands and feet shaking.
"Hoo. Calm down. Calm..."
I took a sip of the honey water warming in my tumbler and let the breath out slow.
"Hooo..."
Do not call him hyung, Choi Eunha. I'm a girl... I'm a girl... It's GOandMO, or Geonmo-oppa. I absolutely cannot say hyung. Choi Eunha...
"Haa..."
I'm meeting GOandMO for the first time... The Geonmo-hyung in my memory is a delusion... a delusion... I am meeting GOandMO for the first time...
"All right. Let's go."
Turning over the facts I had to keep straight, I hit the button to go live.
I warmed up for about three minutes the way I always did, then offered the chat a hello.
"Ah— ah, hello, everyone~"
I was nervous?
"Does my voice really sound that shaky?"
It felt the same as usual. People say the voice you hear and the voice everyone else hears aren't the same, so maybe that was it. If I was honest, I was nervous. Not from the weight of collabing with someone at the top. From the fear that an old memory would make the wrong word come out.
The time was 4:55. I ought to get on Dico.
Ding.
"Ah, ah, can you hear me?"
A man's voice I hadn't heard in quite a while. Light, if you only caught it in passing. Not anymore, but once he had been a close hyung of mine: Kim Geonmo. Streamer GOandMO.
"Yes, I can hear you."
"Okay. Everyone, today I've brought someone who was genuinely hard to land. Go on, introduce yourself!"
"Hello. I'm Eunha, and I stream Project A on Kwitch!"
Eunha's own broadcast had heard that voice plenty of times already, so it barely stirred. GOandMO's broadcast was different.
"Hey! Woman-chaser or not, I know where the line is, people. I don't want to go to jail!"
The woman-chaser act was a broadcast persona. He did not have even one percent of a thought of creeping on Eunha, who was still a minor.
The viewers, of course, did not believe him.
"Ugh, let's not even talk about it. All right, guest, just a few simple questions."
"Okay."
"First question. How old are you?"
"Born in 2007. I'm seventeen."
"Seventeen! At that age I think I just lived in the PC café. Then again, if you're seventeen, isn't it about time you start school?"
"Yes. My entrance ceremony is in two weeks, actually."
"Got it. Next question—when did you start Project A?"
"Mm... probably since the very beginning?"
"Ooh, a launch player?! Folks, this is actually really rare."
"All right, that's enough grilling from me. Time for some duo ranked with Eunha, a skilled high-school girl who's been playing Project A since she was suspiciously young. Eunha, are you ready?"
"Ah, yes. I'm ready."
"Then let's queue right— huh?"
A big mission, right from the opening of the collab.