A Tiring Day

"H-how... how did something like this happen..."

"Hm? Isn't this great? You hit it big on day one. Take a look at the subscribers and the views."

Yoon-jae's voice refused to land. Damn it. How in the world had this happened? The ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠one thing I had been absolutely certain could never happen — that thing — had gone and happened anyway.

"......"

"Hani? Hani? Can you hear me?"

"Ah, sorry. I spilled some water on the desk."

"Oh, did you. Anyway, this is a better start than I'd imagined. Now that it's come to this, I'll be pulling all-nighters from today to get the videos ready. When the tide comes in, you've got to row."

"D-don't push yourself too hard. Look after the videos before your health."

"Huh?"

"Kidding."

"Ahaha! Spoken like someone who shot to fame doing impressions. You said it so seriously I thought you meant it."

I did mean it. For a second my composure had blown out completely, and the honest thought slipped free before I could catch it. Damn it. Shit. How had that condition even been met? I was glad, of course, that the YouTube channel had exploded on the first day. But if it stayed like this, next time I would have to go through with the Penalty Broadcast, exactly as promised. My head was spinning. It would never happen, but I wished the whole thing were a dream. In truth, today's subscriber count was 999! Yeah, right. No chance of that.

"Anyway, I should get going. Good luck with today's stream, too."

"Yeah, yeah. Get home safe."

A deep sigh slipped out of me. Even so, clearing several YouTube missions and pulling in a heap of points was something to be happy about. The only thing that could soothe the ache of a Penalty Broadcast now set in stone was points — and more points.

1,630 points... More. I need more.

My first goal had been somewhere around three thousand. Pour every one of those points into my looks, and I could walk into any room and still come away with an above-average verdict. The feeling of I used to be a perfectly ordinary guy, and the moment I turned into a woman I became the prettiest face on the block — something like that.

Honestly, it stung a little. With about four thousand points, I could have made a proper debut on near-celebrity looks. A gap of a thousand points was enormous. If I could only clear the special mission for the YouTube Silver Play Button, even reaching four thousand by Mia's birthday wouldn't have been unreasonable. I would only have needed about twenty-five hundred more on top of what I already had.

But the mission itself is the problem. Ha... A hundred thousand subscribers.

Two days had passed since I received that special mission, and all ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠that remained to me now was a little over a month.

"Unni!"

"Unni!"

"Oh— oh, right. Did you two have a good lunch?"

I had been staring into space all morning. When I came back to myself, it was already lunchtime. Everything we do is just so we can eat and live, so I set the worries aside for a bit and ordered delivery. I was just about finished with the meal when — what was this? Mia and Yerin had both reached out to me on Discord at almost the exact same moment. Without thinking much of it, I threw together a group call and invited the two of them.

"Huh?"

"Hm?"

The moment they joined, both of them greeted me brightly. Then they realized someone else was there besides me, and froze.

"Ah, say hi to each other. Mia's a BJ I get along with, like a little sister, and Yerin's the one I just hired to handle thumbnails and art for my YouTube channel."

"......"

"......"

"Hm? What's with you two?"

The mood was off. Both of them had suddenly grown sparing with their words. Then Yerin seemed to realize something, and her voice dropped low.

"Unni... I'm not a close little sister? I'm just someone you hired? A contract?"

"Huh? N-no, that's not— Right. Yerin's a close little sister too. Ahaha!"

She had said she'd been watching my streams for a while, but it really hadn't been that long since I'd properly learned Yerin even existed. Close little sister, my ass! If I actually said that, though, I had a feeling something terrifying would happen, so I scrambled to cover it and mumbled my way through.

"Huuuh? Is that so. Hello. I'm Mia. I stream as a BJ, and Hani unni and I are very close."

"...... Yes. I know. You collab when Hani unni streams, and last time you duoed Legend of League with her. I do illustration. My name is Yerin."

"......"

Wh-what kind of atmosphere was this? I had invited the two of them into a call without a second thought, and now some inexplicable chill was crawling over my whole body.

"You must like unni's streams an awful lot. You've watched plenty, and on top of that you've even joined the YouTube channel as staff."

"Yes. I already liked them, but after I met unni in person, I liked them even more!"

"......!"

This time it was Mia who went quiet. The kind of silence where it was hard to get a word out. Then she asked me.

"Unni, in person? You met her? What about me? I begged and begged just to eat together once. Huh? So that's how it is? I was a joke to ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠you?"

"Wh-wha—? No, that's not it. I met Yerin because we had to draw up a contract. It's a misunderstanding. We already promised we'd meet on our birthdays anyway."

"...... Right? I just misunderstood, didn't I?"

Mia's voice, which had been coming through in oddly chopped little pieces, returned to normal. I was about to breathe a sigh of relief when the other side became the problem.

"So I only got to meet you because of a contract? If it isn't about work, there's no reason for us to meet?"

"......"

I kind of wanted to cry.

I tried to mediate between them. In the end, I failed. Whatever it was they found so intolerable about each other, Mia kept pressing how much longer she and I had been close, while Yerin kept pressing the fact that she had actually met me, and both of them had their claws out. As if being close to me were some grand thing worth boasting about. Absurd as it was, today's victory went to Yerin. What decided the match was a single short line.

"Miss Mia, do you know what unni's chest feels like?"

"......!"

"Hey, hey! What are you saying right now!"

"I fit right into her arms and nuzzled all over her, though."

After that, Mia seemed to want to mount some kind of appeal of her own, but anyone could tell the strength had drained out of her voice from that remark on. And so the gathering petered out in a muddle. It felt as if a typhoon had torn through and passed on. The worries about points that had been aching through my head all morning felt swept clean away. Whether I ought to call that a blessing or not, I could at least think about today's broadcast in a lighter state.

I've been doing cam rooms way too often lately. Let's rest those for a few days. Another ideal-type World Cup would get booed before it even started... and a twist on the hidden-camera bit means I'd have to find a proper target first, so that's out for now too.

I thought it every time, but finding content that actually felt new was genuinely difficult. I did have a few ideas saved up, but to use them I would have to finish my appearance first. Which brought me right back to the same old refrain. Content I could plausibly pull off today... what was there?

"Huh?"

While I fretted and rummaged around the internet, a notification came in that a letter had arrived in the inbox of my Shindaeryuk TV account. I opened the new letter without much thought, and waiting there was something I hadn't expected in the slightest.

"This couldn't be..."

It was an advertising offer for a new mobile game that had launched two weeks ago. A game that several already-famous BJs had streamed while running the ad — and now it had made its way all the way to me.

A shame. But not bad. Once I took out this month's rent and living expenses, my balance was going to thin down to a little under a thousand dollars. I'd been too attached to the stocks I held to sell them, so if a single day of ad streaming could put about four hundred dollars in my pocket, it was a genuinely good opening.

I wrote back at once to say I'd accept. They must have been waiting, because a contact number came right back. I called, went over the finer terms of the ad, and we wrapped the conversation on a good note.

Were ads usually this easy? Wondering, I asked Mia and Lac as well. One-off ad contracts, they told me, really did tend to come together that simply. The tradeoff was that the pay ran on the cheap side.

Huh? Isn't four hundred dollars kind of steep?

I asked, and they said that next to my average viewer count, I'd actually gotten a pretty decent rate. Anyway, I couldn't see a problem, so I let it go. The money was money, but I was happier to have found something to stream today. And if I delivered a solid ad broadcast this time, I had a feeling more work like this would come in later.

But what genre was this game again?

I'd only heard that it had launched. I had no idea what kind of game it actually was. So I went to the official site to find out.

"Uh... huh?"

"H-huhhh?"

This broadcast wasn't going to be entirely easy, either.