Suspiciously Rich Yerin
The Ladies Cup draft ceremony turned into an enormous sensation.
For a start, the live broadcast averaged a hundred and seventy thousand viewers. Short highlight reels had been cut for each streamer and posted on the official site, and those pulled staggering numbers of their own. The board-breaking clip of me, in particular, was only two days old and had already cleared seven hundred and eighty thousand views.
All those eyes on me. Satisfying. Bits and pieces like this were exactly what stacked into the little extra on top of the prize money.
"By the way, no special mission for this tournament?"
The difficulty of this tournament is assessed to fall well below the administrator's level. Regrettably, there is no special mission.
"......Can't be helped."
I already knew it. Compared with the Blame Tournament, this one was far larger and run directly by Shindaeryuk TV, yet the level of play was actually lower. Averaged out, it was about what you'd get from throwing five Platinum players into a room. Our team, at least, sat a cut above that.
Even so, the reason the tournament was a hit was the sheer pull of the participating streamers' fandoms. And there were surely a few suckers tuning in for no better reason than that women were playing. In any case, I wasn't taking the championship all that seriously. I figured our odds of winning were seventy percent at the least. What mattered was taking MVP in a fierce fight with 19Sonyeo, and finding a decent place to move into.
If you lower your guard in that manner, you may be met with an unfavorable result.
"Yeah, no. Unranked—gl."
Shutting the System Helper's mouth never stopped being a thrill.
"Mid! Mid, right now—go!"
"Ah! I got caught."
"What are you even doing!"
"......"
I was wrong. Maybe I'd let my guard down too far. We won the game, of course. The problem was that, contrary to my confidence it would be a walkover, the thing dragged past forty minutes into a bloody grind.
A light interview followed the match. The hosts smiled the whole way through, trying to keep the mood bright, but there wasn't a trace of a smile on my face or on any of my teammates'.
One fact this game had made unmistakable: Legend of League is a team game. Why can't the Challenger monsters who soar through solo queue ever debut as pros—or if they do, why do they flash once and vanish? The answer was written all over the sloppy performance we'd just put on display.
Individually, we had clearly crushed them. Solo kills in top and jungle, again and again, the victory bell rung. But that was as far as one person could carry it. Rotations that arrived a beat late every single time. Calls that missed each other. Communication that just kept stalling. A mess from top to bottom.
We'd taken the last teamfight on the back of 19Sonyeo's absurd individual skill, but nobody was happy. The way we were playing, getting eliminated next game looked like a foregone conclusion.
"This isn't it. We can't win a championship like this."
Saturday's schedule finished, we gathered at 19Sonyeo's place, the nearest one. Opinions went back and forth. One conclusion came out of it: for whatever time we had left, we needed ruthless practice syncing as a team.
"Think about it. We formed this team two days before registration closed. Prep was short, so we barely got to practice as a team."
"Right. Some teams have been syncing up for a month—no, even longer than that—and a roster like WeAlreadyWon is fixed to begin with. Those were the same members in last year's Ladies League Winter and Summer."
"......"
She wasn't saying it, but I could practically hear the System Helper sneering. The read on the situation was done. Reflecting on yesterday's arrogance was its own matter; the goal still demanded a win. I wanted a conclusion that actually produced something.
"Practice......"
"Yeah. Nothing for it but practice."
The orthodox answer. The one everybody already knew. But there wasn't time to build it up piece by piece. Tomorrow was the quarterfinal, next Saturday the round of four, and Sunday the semifinals and the final.
"......Well, if we win tomorrow, there is one method that might actually work."
"Huh? What is it? Whatever it is, say it."
Yerin, who had done little but listen until now, stepped forward for once.
"In the end, what we're short on is time, isn't it?"
"Right. Even if we start the second tomorrow's match ends, we've only got until next Friday."
Honestly, against weak teams that much practice would have been plenty. The problem was the Saturday opponent waiting if we kept winning—UpperBodyCarry—and WeAlreadyWon, the team we expected to meet in the final.
"If we're short on time, we buy it with money."
"Buy time with money?"
19Sonyeo's brow creased at words that made no sense. Sensing she needed to explain, Yerin spoke again.
"More precisely, we're buying efficiency. I have a plan, so would you all hear me out?"
Yerin's confident smile. None of us had any choice but to nod.
Today's match hadn't been easy either. Maybe they'd read my love of early counter-jungling: the enemy jungler not only pathed the exact opposite of me, they even gave up Scuttle to avoid fights on purpose. Their top laner locked a tank and then lay down completely. A tailored plan built to shut down the team's aces—me and 19Sonyeo—and their coordination was tight on top of it. Clean rotate timings, clean tempo, clean teamfights. As a team, they were far better. We could lose like this.
That flare of crisis finally pushed me to dodge the fight and gamble on a backdoor. It luckily worked, and we won...... but it was a game that taught me, down to the bone, how much you suffer when you truly aren't ready.
Keep showing games this messy and I won't even get MVP.
The way our team was playing, it was obvious we'd take a hit in the viewer vote that decided MVP.
So do I end up doing it Yerin's way after all?
19Sonyeo had accepted on the spot yesterday. The three of us, me included, were still holding off. Following the proposal straight through was a burden, after all. But once today's match was over, my heart tipped. The fear that we really couldn't win another one like this had swollen to fill me.
"What are you gonna do? If it's really too much, at least chip in living expenses for the five days. I don't think now's the time to be picky if we want the win."
"Me too. I did hesitate a little, but if it's for the trip with you, unnie......"
I hadn't known she'd take the promise of a trip together if we won quite that much to heart. Anyway, after 19Sonyeo, even Mia had swung to yes on Yerin's proposal. All that remained were my say and Dogu-neun-sirheoyo's.
"I-I'll go with everyone else."
Her dodge. Now every eye turned to me. A deep sigh. In the end I had no choice but to throw up both hands.
"This really won't cause any problems with school attendance, right?"
"I told you I can put you on the phone with them myself. Stop worrying and let's go!"
The moment I agreed, Yerin broke into a bright smile and took the lead, guiding the group from the front. She wasn't about to drag us somewhere strange, was she?
Somewhere strange? Maybe it was......
No—looking again, it really was strange!
"Huh? Wha—?"
"Is this for real?"
"I registered all of you ahead of time, so you can just come in."
A building I'd only ever seen on TV. Right—I remembered. Tower Palace? The very thing they called a mixed-use high-rise!
Unlike Yerin, who strode in like she owned the place, we were thoroughly cowed and froze before we could pass the entrance.
"What are you all doing? I said follow me."
"C-can we foll— I mean, may we?"
"Unnie! What's with the sudden polite speech!"
I hadn't done it on purpose. It just slipped out. Terrifying. Was this a commoner's instinct? I buried the panic as best I could and walked after Yerin.
"Damn, this place is insane. Live long enough and you see everything. Even somewhere like this."
"Hey, hey, you're way too loud. Keep it down."
The others craned around at everything, and Dogu-neun-sirheoyo tried to rein in 19Sonyeo's complete lack of restraint. From the entrance alone, it was a different dimension from an ordinary apartment. Security guards to start, then an ironclad system that ran you through check after check, and facilities all around that made your eyes go wide. There was nothing missing. Worthy, indeed, of a mixed-use complex where homes and shops lived side by side.
We took the residents-only elevator. Once Yerin selected the floor, the car fell silent. Everyone just reading the room. So, just as I steeled myself to open my mouth, the elevator reached the destination floor. For something that expensive, it was tactlessly fast. It couldn't have waited a second?
"Uh...... should I put on some newlywed-house music for you?"
"......"
I'd tossed out a joke, and when nobody bit, Yerin looked a little sheepish herself. She started with the fingerprint reader, cleared several layers of security, and opened the door.
At last, the five-day bootcamp house revealed itself before the team. I truly could not have imagined a place like this.
Yerin...... what in the world are you?
Ms. Yerin, who had a suspicious amount of money.