Too Much Money to Refuse
The Legend of League Ladies Cup, hosted by Shindaeryuk TV.
A tournament only women could enter.
It couldn't begin to compare with the pro league, of course, but there was prize money, and there were viewers—a real event, run by the platform itself.
What 19Sonyeo was getting at was simple. She wanted to enter this tournament and play for the win, and from a top laner's point of view, she wanted a jungler with actual skill on the roster.
It felt good to be acknowledged by 19Sonyeo, but it wasn't a decision I could make lightly. I decided to hold off, think it over, and send her a firm answer once I'd made up my mind.
A more urgent problem had just landed right in front of me.
"No, honestly, isn't this a bit much? Hmm? You're a student—think about it. I've already put up with this for two whole months."
"I'm sorry."
"And last time it was a complete circus. Reporters showed up, YouTubers or whatever they were, gawkers—the worst, the absolute worst!"
"Yes. You're right. I'm sorry. I'll sort it out as fast as I can."
If you're a BJ, there is one fate no one escapes.
Noise between floors.
At last, an ordeal I couldn't dodge had come for me too.
Strictly speaking, it was my fault. I'd started streaming without any proper soundproofing and hadn't spared the matter a second thought.
If I'd been broadcasting until dawn and keeping the neighbors from sleeping, the complaints would have arrived ages ago and the whole thing would have blown up. They'd only endured it this long because I started around five in the afternoon and signed off near eleven.
Even that had reached its limit. I was going to have to move, and soon. There was no way to install real soundproofing in the studio apartment I was living in now.
Moving is one thing, but I don't know the first thing about soundproofing...
Whenever a streaming problem had me stuck, I had an all-purpose cheat code.
Help me, Miaemon!
On the off chance it might help, I invited Yoonjae and Yerin into the Discord chat as well so we could talk it through.
"……."
"……."
Oh, crap.
I only remembered after I'd already done it—what kind of ordeal I'd suffered the last time I dropped both Mia and Yerin into the same chat at once.
Sure enough, once the bone-dry greetings were out of the way, the two beasts showed their claws.
"Mia, I really enjoyed your collab. Lac put that necklace on you himself. You two looked just like an actual couple."
"Oh! That reminds me—you entered that game as a team, right? And you didn't get a single question right, did you? If it had been me, one look at Hani unnie's face and I'd have known exactly what was going on."
"Anyone can say that. But would it actually work once you tried?"
"If it's about Hani unnie, I can do it anytime. Sounds like you're not so confident?"
"Uh... girls?"
"Yes, unnie!"
"Did you call?"
"……."
Every now and then, the two of them genuinely scare me.
Anyway, that wasn't the point today, so I told them what I actually needed help with.
"Lac oppa, Clemoomoo oppa, and I all hired the same company for the work. The price is fair, and they're really thorough. You should just go with them too, unnie!"
"Mm, I've heard of them as well. I remember people in the industry saying a few times that they do decent work."
The company for the soundproofing was settled more easily than I'd expected. It wasn't a huge industry to begin with, so there weren't many firms, and since nearly everyone I knew had used this one, I trusted it.
"Then the important part is the place. Have you thought about an area?"
"Well, obviously I'll stay inside Seoul, and if I can help it, I'd rather stick with the east side. It's familiar."
I'd lived around here for more than twenty years. Leaving didn't come naturally.
At that, Mia looked thoroughly disappointed and burst out.
"Ah, unnie! Just come over here. Huh? If you lived near me we could collab all the time and eat together—how great would that be?"
Mia, who lived in Eunpyeong-gu, launched into a hard sell about how housing over there was cheap, too.
"I think looking around here would be better as well. You're moving because of the stream. If your whole daily life changes on top of that, it might be hard to adjust."
Yerin, over in Gangnam-gu, was trying to persuade me that familiar ground was best.
Well... personally, I agreed with her. I'd spent my whole life around Seongdong-gu and Gwangjin-gu. Move to Eunpyeong, and all I'd get out of it was awkwardness.
"Location aside, we should check the budget first. In the end, money is what matters most."
Yoonjae brought up the practical point.
Right. Location could wait. Before I could move at all, I needed money.
So, for the first time in a while, I checked the balance.
This month's rent was already paid. After utilities, the building fees, phone and internet, and the taxes that came with being registered as a sole proprietor, the final balance was—
"Huh?"
"What is it, unnie? Is there so much you're thinking of buying a place outright instead of a lease or monthly rent?"
"If buying is the goal, I don't think Gangnam would be a bad idea. Sell it later and the profit's pretty sweet."
They tossed jokes at me because I'd gone to check the account and come back stunned. It was a fair assumption. Ever since my debut I'd held a steady spot in the Water Balloon rankings' top 100, and once I fully revealed my face I'd been pulling in balloons hard enough to threaten the reigning 3 Great Female Cams. YouTube was blowing up, too. Of course they'd pictured my account stuffed full.
Reality, though, is cruel.
"It was there... and then it wasn't."
"What?"
"???"
The account lit up red.
Money.
People like to say it isn't everything when it comes to happiness. But there's always a follow-up. It may not be everything, yet most happiness is possible with money. Put a number on it, and about ninety-nine percent would probably do.
That's how important money is, just for staying alive.
And that very money had hit the bottom.
It was a shock. I'd sensed since last month that things were getting dangerous, but I never thought it would fall this far. Forget moving—I had to start worrying about living expenses first.
Money. I have to make money.
Choking back tears, I gave up on farming points through Water Balloon missions for the time being. At the rate balloons had been pouring in lately, a month of that ought to bring in somewhere around fifteen to twenty million won.
Even that wouldn't come close.
The deposit on the studio was twenty million won, but a place that could actually take broadcast soundproofing would have to be bigger than what I had now, and I'd need construction costs on top of it.
"Agh, what do I do?"
Stay calm. Think it through, and there will be a way.
"There'll be a way, sure. But I'm in a hurry. I don't know when they'll come back to chew me out."
Keep streaming from here for a whole month? The neighbor who'd come to complain in person might not show up again, but the one downstairs—the one quietly stacking up grievances—wasn't going to sit still.
Then what about being honest, and accepting some help?
"I don't want that! I've got my pride. How am I supposed to hold my hand out to the younger ones?"
The moment I saw the balance, I'd bolted from the chat, claiming something urgent had come up and we'd talk later.
Money problems really do make your head hurt.
Just in case, I checked my stock account, but all I had was a little profit. Even if I liquidated everything right now, would I even clear seven million?
"Ha... money, money, money. Isn't there some way to make it fast?"
No matter how I turned it over, short of hitting something like the lottery, the only way to make money in a hurry was something illegal. I planted my head on the desk and let myself sink into a light despair.
Maybe I really did need to look into a loan?
Ding!
I was deep in serious thought when a chime suddenly went off in the Legend of League client.
"Hm?"
I opened it without much thought. It was 19Sonyeo.
"Ah!?"
An article about the Ladies Cup flashed through my head.
1st place: 30 million won + @
MVP bonus: up to 3 million won
The @ was an incentive based on viewer numbers and the ads attached to the broadcast. Hadn't the winning team last time walked away with about eight million won each, incentives included?
On top of that, the Ladies Cup was a round of sixteen, and the whole schedule wrapped in two weeks. Even the timing was plenty attractive.
"This is my chance."
At first I'd meant to turn it down, thinking of viewer fatigue. I'd already spent a full week streaming nothing but Legend of League to climb into Master, and entering a tournament would only stretch that stretch longer. Plenty of people liked the game, but not everyone played it, so some viewers were bound to feel left out. With that in mind, I'd been inclined to decline and run some other content instead. But if things had come to this...
It was too much money to refuse.