A Reliable Ally
I had been skeptical of the Platform Exhibition from the start.
Set my real skill aside, and on Kwitch I was nothing more and nothing less than a female streamer who had only just reached Immortal. People would think, First among the women, sure, but not good enough to show up at the Platform Exhibition. I could understand that. I had only started making a real name for myself as the streamer Eunha two months ago—no. More precisely, a month ago, once the controversies landed: Yangjeon, and the blowup over the insults thrown at a KZ trainee.
Someone like me, leaping past the big-name streamers into a tournament meant to crown the strongest Project A platform? Of course it would cause a stir. If I had been going as a starter, I could have shut that noise down by showing what I could do. Unfortunately, the chance that came to me was a substitute's seat, and the odds were better that I would never play at all. Most of the skilled players who streamed on Kwitch had declined to attend. Even if a chance did fall to me, I didn't think we could win.
Project A is a team game. Flipping a match on individual ability alone is something you can do in solo queue. In a real team setting, it is too much to ask. You need teammates you can trust at your back. Better to stay out cleanly, I had thought, than show up, never get on the server, and eat Why did they pick some Immortal nobody? I was ready to do exactly that.
If it hadn't been for that one piece of news.
People didn't seem to expect much from Nebula. I was different. I had met him as a teammate and as an enemy, and he still had plenty of rough edges—but if he ground those edges down, he had the tools to hold his own even among pros. That was what I thought, at least. There were rumors that several pro organizations had already made offers. They were written off as empty talk almost at once, of course. Even so, if Nebula was entering the exhibition on the Kwitch team, this tournament was worth a try.
Bang!
"Haa... winning even one game is brutal."
Climbing into Immortal, the games felt sharply harder. The opponents were better, yes, but the more fundamental reason was this.
It was as if the teammates I kept matching sat a cut below the enemies. I wasn't the sort to blame my team, but today it had gone too far.
"Why is every single teammate like this, all day long..."
ACS—average combat score. Damage, multikills, assists, ability use, averaged into one of Project A's signature numbers. Clear 200 and you have done your share. Clear 300 and you have carried. On my team, besides me, only Raze had broken 200. The stat dumps too many points onto the first kill and the second kill of a round, so it isn't something you should worship. Still. This was not it.
Ugh. At this rate, when was I ever going to reach Chaser?
Six games today. I had posted over 300 ACS in every single one, and the record was still three wins and three losses. ACS weighs heavily on rating, so the wins paid out a lot and the losses barely shaved anything off, and my rank was climbing—slowly. I wanted Chaser as soon as I could get it, before the Platform Exhibition began. This pace was not going to satisfy me. What was I supposed to do? Team luck doesn't improve just because you decide it should.
"Ugh, I'm wiped. One more game, and I'm ending the stream."
In the end, all I could do was pray the luck turned, and play my best.
The moment the match popped, I insta-locked Jett. On an ordinary day I would have looked at the team comp and taken whatever role was left. Today was different.
"I'll win this clean and go to sleep."
Ask ten people which role in Project A carries the hardest, and nine of them will say entry. Ask who the highest-carry players in the game are, and most of them will name entries like Apas or Duke. There are strange cases—YAYE among them—but the entry role's ability to take over a game is as close to proven as it gets. And Jett was the strongest agent among those entries, and the one I trusted most. I worried someone might riot over the insta-lock. Fortunately, it didn't happen.
I was uneasy because, just a game ago, I had run into some unhinged asshole threatening to throw over a teammate insta-locking Reyna. Normally I wouldn't have spared a worry like that. Today's team luck had been grotesque enough that even a scene that abnormal felt plausible.
"Huh?"
Fourth pick, volunteering to fill. Something about him felt off. That voice... I was sure I had heard it somewhere.
I wasn't the only one who felt it. Chat had gone noisy.
"For real?"
I had thought the voice sounded familiar. It really was him. As if heaven had finally heard the prayer, it had dropped an absurdly reliable teammate into my lobby.
Strange, though.
"But Nebula, aren't you on the first page of the rankings? Why did we match?"
As far as I knew, Nebula sat on page one of the Asia server—the top nine, that high. Even on the Korea server he ought to be at an Asia rank or above it, not below. Not a tier that should queue into someone who had only just hit Immortal.
School let out and I went straight to the academy. It was nearly ten by the time I got home and finally threw off the uniform I had been wearing for fourteen hours. Any other student would have been dead on the floor by then. I wasn't. I had already slept plenty at school. Whatever they taught there, the academy covered all of it, and if I wanted these hours before dawn, sleeping through class was mandatory.
The internet broadcast had started on an older friend's recommendation. Not many people watched, and I had no intention of streaming for a living. It was better than playing alone, so I kept turning it on.
"Hey."
A handful of regulars watched every time, and talking with them while I queued wasn't bad. I would probably keep going live.
I hit the queue button. A short hello, a little small talk, and a game was found.
An insta-lock Jett the second the lobby loaded. Nine games out of ten went like that. Nothing strange.
"I'll fill."
I said it so the players still picking could take what they wanted without a fuss.
Eunha?
My desk partner, who put up with the nuisance of me sprawled asleep through class—Choi Eunha. The same name threw me for a second.
"Eunha... you mean her?"
Couldn't be. Eunha was a common enough name.
"Is she good?"
Rabbit-hyung and Geonmo-hyung rated her that highly... Those two had streamer images thick enough that they farmed attention, but they weren't careless mouths. They wouldn't hand out respect that openly unless they meant it. So she was good enough to catch the eye of former pros.
"Hmm."
"If she's in the exhibition, we'll end up on the same team."
"...A sub? Why?"
"I'm only Immortal 2. Why couldn't she go?"
"Still, we're both going out representing Kwitch. I should at least try to get along with her."
However hard the viewers talked her down, I decided to watch this game first. You don't know until you've seen it for yourself.
Eunha and Nebula didn't know it, but the two of them were drawing a great deal of attention. They were the only streamers who had declared for the exhibition. On an ordinary day they would never have recognized each other, even in the same lobby. Eunha didn't use her mic in game, Nebula's audience was small, and Project A hid names on its own. With so many eyes on the exhibition, though, drifting viewers were hopping back and forth between the two who had declared—and because of them, Eunha and Nebula realized they had queued into each other.