Match Two Feedback, and...
"Looks like we get the walkover. They're saying AFS is a player short right now."
"...What?"
A Platform Exhibition roster is seven people: five starters, one substitute, and one coach.
The sub is there for when a starter can't play — some special circumstance — and somebody has to stand in. So how was this even a sentence?
"A team short a player. That doesn't make any sense."
A starter having something come up and being unable to play — that, I could understand. That was the whole reason a substitute existed. But the sub who was supposed to stand in was missing too? How was that supposed to be real?
"Right? Haah... I genuinely can't believe this."
Spax said it like he couldn't decide whether to laugh. Or maybe he was a little angry. Knowing him, of course he was.
He was the one who'd worked the hardest getting ready for AFS. And on top of that, he was the textbook stubborn senior — nobody hated a broken rule, or a broken promise, more than he did. A situation like this was guaranteed to set him off.
It wasn't only Spax, either. The viewers who'd been waiting on our match against AFS, our own teammates who'd prepared all day, and the rest of AFS besides the two who were gone — every one of them was a victim.
Anyway.
"So what happens to our third match?"
Day two's third match was Kwitch versus AFS. If AFS was a player short, they couldn't play at all...
"It's a walkover. So we go straight to the finals."
Thankfully, the staff seemed to have handled that part cleanly enough.
AFS and Kwitch were both 2–0. We were still first on round differential, but today's third match had been the one that would decide who stayed there. You can't play four against five, so the walkover sent us to the finals at 3–0. AFS, now 2–1, went to the playoffs alongside KKT, who were 1–2.
"Am I even supposed to be happy about this..."
From our side, we'd reached the finals without playing a game. There wasn't much reason to hate it.
"It just feels empty."
Not one of us was celebrating in any real way.
AFS viewers and Kwitch viewers are rivals, and this exhibition is what the audience treats as the thing that picks a winner between them. The first time it failed to produce a clear winner, neither side could hide the disappointment.
"Huu... well, nothing we can do. Can't exactly play four against five. Anyway — what should we do about feedback?"
With matches stacked back to back, the plan had been to review today's games on Monday. We hadn't even booked a scrim for then. And now the day had far too much time left in it.
"Want to just do it today and rest properly tomorrow? Or wrap early today and stick to the schedule tomorrow?"
"I think today's better."
It wasn't worth pushing to tomorrow. I was for doing it now.
"Um... me too."
"Today for me, too."
"I don't care when."
It wasn't just me. Most of the team wanted the review today.
"All right, then we do it today. Sorry, Pola — the early clock-out is canceled."
So the feedback would happen today after all.
"...Yeah. Understood."
There was something faintly wilted in Pola's voice. Still, this kind of review only works if you do it right away, doesn't it?
"Let's start from the first half. You know, right? From the middle on, there were quite a few mistakes."
Spax, who was still a pro, and I, who used to be one, both knew exactly how much feedback mattered.
"Here. Right here. Pola, you knew they were all on short guns, and you knew your team was coming to cover you. So why did you peek? You've been making this mistake since last time. You know that, right?"
Schori. That was the nickname chat had hung on Spax, the man coaching us through the exhibition.
"I'm sorry."
"And when the IGL isn't saying anything, you play way too passive. Even with Nebula calling, an IGL sets the overall flow. The small stuff is yours to read and decide."
Not that Spax only tore into people. If a play deserved praise, he gave it — carrot and stick.
"Game sense isn't something you grow overnight, so let's build it slowly. Your fights have been consistently good, though. Get your understanding of Project A up, and you'll grow a lot past where you are now."
"...Yes."
The truth was, of everyone on the Kwitch rep team, Pola was the one I'd expected the least from. I barely knew who he was, and from what viewers said, he hadn't even been playing Project A for long.
Turn it around, though, and he'd climbed high enough in that short time to earn a spot in the exhibition. On raw FPS hardware alone. In a Project A overflowing with abilities, that should have been close to impossible.
"Huu. We'll stop here for today. Good work, everyone."
And with that, the review of our second match was over.
It had run close to an hour. Unlike the last game, which we'd won in a rout, this one had stretched to 13–7, so there was plenty to pick apart — and most of that hour had gone into grilling the three teammates who weren't me or Nebula.
"Haaah..."
"Good work..."
An hour under Schori, and they were wrecked. For them it probably felt like dozens of hours had passed.
"Good work."
"Good work."
Nebula and I were fine. Spax simply hadn't had much to say to either of us.
Not because there was nothing to say. More like he treated the two of us as his equals. With the others, it felt as if he imposed his way. With us, it felt like a suggestion. A recommendation.
The third match was canceled, the review was done, and that was everything left for today. I was pretty tired. Time to head to bed...
"...Huh?"
A donation, out of nowhere, asking if I was taking the day off stream.
"No. I'll probably still go live, whether it's Just Chatting or Project A..."
A day off didn't mean I was planning to end the broadcast. There wasn't anything else to do on a rest day anyway, and streaming wasn't just work to me anymore. Being a streamer had become fun enough to feel like a hobby.
"Ah."
Cancel. Cancel.
I want tomorrow off...
The practice room of KZ, a Project A pro team, was mostly empty — nearly everyone had taken the break. Only the captain, Spax, was still at his seat.
"Huuuu..."
He finished the review for Youngest and Oldest, pulled off his headset, and was midway through a stretch when a voice found him.
"Seungtaek. It's your vacation. Aren't you pushing a little hard?"
Yoo Seonho, KZ's head coach, had come over.
"Ah. Coach."
"I was the one who suggested it — even a simple streamer event, taking the coach's seat ought to help you as an IGL. But you do know our season isn't far off, right?"
"Don't worry. My form's fine."
"All right. Still, pace yourself. So, how are the players?"
"Mm... they listen well. I like them. They're not loud, either."
At the word loud, someone on the roster surfaced in Yoo Seonho's mind. A trick of the mood, probably. He made a point of ignoring the thought.
"A few of them, especially... I honestly don't know why they're even streamers."
"I know enough to guess. You mean those two seventeen-year-old streamers?"
Yoo Seonho was old enough to be dull to whatever happened to be trending, but he was still a team's head coach, and that made him sensitive to anything moving through Project A. The story of two seventeen-year-old supernovas was the hottest topic in the scene, so he knew it, at least in outline.
"Yes. That's right. Um... Coach."
"Hm?"
"This might be... a little out of line."
Spax pointed at the names sitting offline in the rep team's Discord channel.
His finger rested on the monitor, and on the two names inside it.
Nebula. And Eunha.