Fateful Reunion

My brain short-circuited at Nangin Geomgaek's sudden host raid.

Dumping roughly sixty-four hundred refugees onto someone who'd just hit Go Live? What kind of grudge did that man hold against me to pull a stunt like this?

...Okay, fine, I had been a little mean!

I'd given him a hard time three months ago — but it wasn't on purpose. We just kept running into each other, and the bullying kind of... happened.

Watching the chat rocket upward made my head spin a little. I forced myself to stay calm and tried to remember how other streamers handled situations like this.

Right. If it were Curry, he'd definitely type this command.

My fingers flew across the keyboard. The moment I entered the command to enable followers-only mode, the runaway chat froze cold. That bought me a little time — but I couldn't keep it like this forever. You couldn't really call it a "stream" under these conditions.

I held followers-only for exactly one minute. Hoping the chat's temperature had cooled in that window, I typed the command to lift it.

The chat was somehow even hotter than before. Watching messages fly past made my head swim all over again, and I flipped followers-only back on.

Being a streamer was harder than I'd thought. My chest already felt tight just thinking about how I was supposed to survive this trial.

"Haa... hup!"

I sighed without thinking, then clapped both hands over my mouth. Too late. The mic was already live.

You idiot. You absolute idiot. Why did you leave the mic on?!

The second my voice leaked, it was over. That thought settled over me — and strangely, the crushing weight on my shoulders lightened just a little.

Fine. Whatever. A woman streaming Leori wasn't weird, was it?

I forced myself to calm down and typed with trembling fingers. Followers-only mode lifted.

Strangely enough, the viewers stopped spamming. They even started policing the chat themselves, roasting anyone who kept flooding it. An eerie silence settled between streamer and audience.

"Haa... yeah."

I was the one who surrendered first.

The moment I spoke, chat split into two camps — one side fascinated that the mysterious Yone god was a woman, the other refusing to believe it. Believers and deniers started fighting almost immediately, and the chat went to absolute shreds.

So that's why streamers hire dedicated chat mods.

I sat there watching them brawl for a while, and irritation started crawling up my spine. I'd already been in a bad mood from being forced to stream — and from the stream ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠not going the way I wanted. Now the viewers were losing their minds at each other, and my mood sank even further below the waterline.

"Hey."

I grabbed the mic with one hand.

"Anyone fighting from this point on. I'm banning all of you."

"Got it?"

I warned the chat in a voice thick with irritation. The people who'd been arguing vanished almost instantly. What filled the empty space were... strange, incomprehensible messages.

The vibe after the warning was bizarre. Hearing an irritated voice should make people feel bad — that was normal. I'd freely said unpleasant things, and yet the viewers' reactions were completely off.

...The reactions were weird. But the atmosphere had settled somewhat, so maybe that was a win?

"Whew... if you trash the vibe from now on, you're getting banned, so behave yourselves."

One of those weird messages caught my eye. I moved the mouse and banned the viewer who'd typed it on the spot. Then I let the corner of my mouth curl up and spoke in a low, teasing voice.

"Reward delivered. If you like it, type 'woof woof' in chat. I'll unban you."

"Ah, I was going to queue the second I went live, but... something just came up."

I scanned the list of users currently in chat. Midway down, hiding among them, was NanginGeomgaek00 — and I slapped him with a one-hour blind.

Mindlessly hosting into a zero-viewer room. Toxic behavior, cut.

Having dealt with the root cause and prime culprit — Nangin Geomgaek — I queued up. High-elo matches at this hour usually took a while, so I had to wait. That didn't mean I sat still, though.

Oddly enough, the viewer count kept climbing. I cleaned up a few trolls who hadn't caught my earlier warning. I was only streaming for one day, so half-assing it wouldn't have mattered — but I'd turned this on because I lost a bet, and that meant I couldn't phone it in.

Eventually even the trolls dried up. I'd heard somewhere that dead air on a stream was basically a sin. Why that particular memory was surfacing now, I had no idea.

"Haa..."

You'd think dead air would make people leave. Instead, the viewer count kept rising. The whole situation just made me want to sigh.

"...I'll answer, so if you're curious about something, ask."

"You're banned. Cross-the-line questions get banned."

I banned the over-the-line question on the spot. I was only streaming for a day and never again, so I could ban whoever I wanted.

More questions rolled into chat, and I picked a few to answer.

"I've been playing Leori since Season 3."

"I think Guinsoo's Yone is broken right now. Oh, but tankers building Sunfire Aegis are even better."

"How many times have I dated? No comment on that one."

"First kiss? It's always the lifelong virgins who ask that."

"Please keep the overly personal questions to a minimum."

"Yesterday was the first time I ever talked to Nangin Geomgaek."

"How many hamburgers can I eat? Hmm. Based on Big Macs, I could probably manage two..."

"Am I pretty? Also no comment."

Answering questions as I cherry-picked them, a match finally popped.

"Question time's over."

Both teams started banning, and as first pick I locked Yone without hesitation. Picking Yone second ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠was a non-starter — too many hard counters — and the fact that Guinsoo's Yone was broken had already spread far and wide.

No sniper ban, at least.

I'd expected to get sniper-banned the second I went live. Apparently nobody on the enemy team was watching my stream. Or maybe they wanted Yone themselves and left it open.

The pick order moved on, and the enemy locked Ornn and Amumu. The moment I saw pure tanks like Ornn and Amumu, my head went blank. If I was being honest, losing the bet had been partly because of Sunfire Aegis in the first place.

Word that Sunfire Aegis was broken was slowly getting around. A quick look through the community boards confirmed it — and the most eye-catching posts were all guides advertising how broken Guinsoo's Yone was.

It's getting nerfed for sure.

With this many people finding out this fast, Guinsoo's was going to eat a nerf — whether it was a hotfix or the next full patch. I wouldn't be too upset if Guinsoo's got hit... but if they left Sunfire Aegis alone, I might actually get mad.

While I was thinking all that, both teams finished locking in. I shifted my gaze and checked — enemy mid was Akali. Like Azir, she was a classic mechanical champion who swung between tier one and tier five depending entirely on the player's skill.

Our top is Malphite with Zac jungle... solid.

Enemy top and jungle were tanks, and so were ours. High elo for you — preseason was only a day old and everyone already knew which items were broken.

The game began.

I switched the stream capture from the Leori client to the game window.

I checked the enemy Akali's username late and swallowed a hollow laugh. What kind of cosmic joke was this — the day I start streaming, first game, and I get matched against Showdown?

I'd never faced Showdown in a direct mid lane matchup before, so the nerves hit hard. Then I glanced at the chat rolling in beside me, and the effort of holding back laughter melted the tension on its own.

I answered by flipping off the camera with my middle finger.

"I wouldn't take yours even if you offered."