Entry Qualifications

"Hnnngh..."

I woke up and reached for my water bottle. After a night of restless sleep, the thirst was unbearable.

Gulp. Gulp.

Once I'd quenched it, yesterday's final moments before I went offline came flooding back — the stretch that had tilted the camera upward and put my face on stream.

Well. Whether my face had been fully exposed still wasn't certain. I hadn't enabled VODs, so no recording remained, and it had been end-of-stream timing, when most of the audience was already peeling off. What still made me uneasy was that the camera angle had been pointed straight at my face.

"Haa..."

My head ached just thinking about it. Had a screenshot of my face already been pinned as a featured post on the streamer community boards? A face-only shot would be the lucky outcome. If someone had uploaded a full-body photo, the fallout would get a lot messier. Even looking at myself as someone who used to be a man, the body I'd woken up with was close to perfect — and yesterday I'd been wearing nothing but a sleeveless top with a thin cardigan thrown over it. If I'd known this was coming, I would have just worn a hoodie. I resented yesterday's me for choosing the sleeveless option just because it was comfortable.

I went to the bathroom, splashed some water on my face, and came back to my room. The phone that usually felt light in my hand now weighed more than a brick left on the sidewalk. Did I really have to check the communities? I could just look the other way and never stream again.

Even as I argued with myself, I was already logging into the Leori community boards. I didn't have to look — but the curiosity was too strong to ignore. Had my face actually been leaked? And if it had, what were people saying?

In the end, curiosity won. I opened the community, ignored every ordinary post, and filtered down to the featured threads that had racked up recommendations. A flood of them appeared — and my eyes locked onto the title of the newest one sitting at the very top.

"..."

Gulp.

So it really had been pinned. Confirming it outright, though, wiped out the anxiety that had been spinning circles in my head. Spilled water couldn't be put back in the cup — I decided to just accept it, and clicked the post.

A single photo was attached. Long, straight hair mixed black and red, the red deepening ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠toward the tips and standing out sharply against the dark background. Looking at myself with my hair still sticking out every which way because I hadn't properly fixed it after washing — I felt weirdly embarrassed. Beyond that, the ruby-red irises and the brown-tinged pupils gave off an almost mystical quality. In contrast to those otherworldly eyes, the dark circles stretching beneath them were painfully real. I still wasn't used to seeing myself radiate that kind of decadent atmosphere from the dark circles alone.

Fortunately(?), it was only a face shot. No other photos. I left the post and checked the rest of the featured threads, but nothing with a full-body picture of me had been uploaded. I went back to the original post and scrolled down to the comments.

...

...

...

There were far too many comments to read them all, but the overall reaction didn't seem bad. Honestly, given how I'd acted during the collab stream, I'd expected a pile of hate — yet almost none of the comments were about the collab. Nearly everything was about my looks.

Before checking, I'd been anxious. Now that I actually had, I felt almost nothing. I barely streamed anyway, so there was no real reason to care. And even with my face out there, it wasn't like anything serious would come of it. Unless Night Move suddenly lost their minds and violated the nondisclosure terms, Choi Nayeon's personal information was never getting doxxed. I didn't do social media. I didn't post on communities. That was that.

I sat down at my desk and powered on the computer.

I had a problem. A big one.

Curry usually went live in the evening. Until then I killed time with various games — but lately none of them held my interest. Leori was in preseason, so climbing ranks had lost its fun, and the RPG I mainly played had announced a major update and then gone quiet for ages. From the perspective of someone who'd already drained both games dry, they weren't entertainment anymore. They were homework.

Sick of just playing games, I switched accounts and went looking for a streamer to snipe. There were people streaming Leori in the morning, sure, but their ranks were far too low — outside sniping range. Even the Diamond-tier streamers had audiences so small it barely mattered. Honestly, what kind of reaction was I going to get sniping some nobody with a double-digit viewer count?

No streamer worth sniping. No BJ either. And when I tried to just play a game, my hand wouldn't even reach for the mouse.

Ugh. So boring. Isn't there a streamer out there who's perfect for sniping?

The thought had barely formed when a notification arrived.

I checked the alert, smiled, and hopped into Nangin Geomgaek's stream.

Nangin Geomgaek had been streaming steadily ever since our bet. Thanks to that, barely two minutes after going live he already had over thirteen hundred people watching.

"...I cannot get used to this chat."

Every single message felt off — like watching a room full of young fogeys, old souls trapped in young bodies. The vibe was perfect for same-age roasting, but it wasn't a chat I wanted to hang around in for long.

I waited for Nangin Geomgaek to show up, and before long his voice came through.

"Ah — can you hear me?"

As more people filtered in, the senior-center atmosphere of the chat finally started to liven up a little. If the menthol vibe had gotten any stronger, I would have bailed ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠without a second thought.

"Today I'll be attempting the Challenger one-thousand-point climb I couldn't finish yesterday."

After taking nine straight losses to me during the bet stream, Nangin Geomgaek's LP had somehow climbed back near nine hundred. One more loss — a tenth — and he would have dropped straight into Grandmaster. How many games a day was this guy grinding? More than anything, the fact that he was ranking this hard during preseason was just impressive.

I logged onto my main Barcode account and queued up at roughly the same time he did.

"Nangin Geomgaek, why grind ranked so hard during ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠preseason? Hmm — I just want to raise my score. No particular reason."

"How high are you planning to climb? Personally, I'd like to reach fifteen hundred. It'll be difficult, no doubt, but I don't want to give up."

On his very first stream, Nangin Geomgaek had sat in complete silence while queuing. Now he fielded viewer questions like it was second nature, carrying the broadcast without missing a beat.

Before I knew it, his viewer count had broken three thousand two hundred. While I was checking the numbers, my match popped — and right after that, so did his. At this hour, sniping in the Challenger bracket had better odds of landing than missing. I sniped him with almost no effort and watched his stream through the ban phase.

"Ah — come to think of it, I heard the Platform War is being held in early December."

What on earth were they talking about?

I pulled up the Teu-ichi announcements. Sure enough, a Platform War between the two major streaming platforms — Teu-ichi and Paprika — was scheduled for early December. Unlike last time, when the event had been split into Earth Realm and Heaven Realm brackets, this one was Heaven Realm only. And because it was being held with support from Goliath Games Korea, the prize pool was enormous. Not that it was particularly big money by my standards.

"I did receive an offer from Curry, actually. He asked me to take the mid lane spot on the team he's putting together."

"What?"

The words slipped out before I could stop them. He'd offered the spot to Nangin Geomgaek instead of Barcode — who was, for all practical purposes, a perfect upgrade?

I'd tormented Curry plenty over the months, sure. But I'd also felt sorry for him at times and thrown him donations often enough. From Curry's perspective, of course, he had no way of knowing Barcode and NayeonQueen were the same person. The only reason he would have picked Nangin Geomgaek over Barcode was yesterday's collab stream. I'd roasted him hard during that collab, yes — but in the end Curry had blown up all over again because of me.

And this was how he repaid it?

After everything I'd done for him. He should have come to me first, and instead he went to Nangin Geomgaek. Granted, even if Curry had asked me, I would have smiled and turned him down — but not even getting the offer, watching only Nangin Geomgaek get it, still made me petty.

That old, rotten impulse stirred in its deep sleep and started thrashing to wake up.

I locked in Yone in champ select and checked the Entry Qualifications listed in the announcement. The minimum requirement to apply for the Platform War was fifty hours of stream time. One month until the Platform War. Fifty-plus hours of streaming inside a single month? For a rich shut-in like me, that was easy.

I fired up the stream in a hurry — to snipe that ungrateful Curry who'd chosen Nangin Geomgaek over me.