Season 5: Chapter 129. A Benefactor (2)

"Sweet Potato... calm down."

"Hic... sob... wh-what use am I anymore...?"

"You were never useful to begin with."

Having been overtaken by Almond in the brain department, Sweet Potato was now last in every category. Sweet Radish was comforting him.

— lmaooooooooooo

— lmaooooo

— Fair though

— lmaooo he's for morale

— One-trick morale captain

Black Tea also offered comfort that wasn't quite comfort. "Oppa, this is actually a good thing. If you're going to do something, you might as well do it properly. If you're going to be useless, you should be fully useless. Before, you were also useless at being useless~. That's what I'm saying."

It sounded like an insult, but it was too true when thinking about the streaming industry. Viewers didn’t see it that way, and laughter filled the chat.

— lmaooooooo useless at being useless

— Useless at useless

— Black Tea getting revenge for the Knight Order gaslighting lmaooo

— It is true though LOL

"Hey! You can't carry as a carry any better than Almond either!"

"What? You're just straight up bad!"

They went back and forth with comfort that wasn't comfort. The others discussed the coach and scrimmage schedule.

"Oh. This is how it was arranged?"

"Oh..."

The chat didn't say anything noteworthy either. Occasionally, certain comments appeared.

— Staged vibes very strong!

— Need to improve the acting lmaooo

— Take flight~

Almond, seeing those comments, didn't understand what they meant.

'Hm?'

He had zero mental circuitry related to anything staged, so it just read as nonsense. As viewership grew, the volume and frequency of nonsense in the chat usually increased until meaningful and meaningless became impossible to distinguish.

— Does a doctor deliver or a mid-tier streamer?

— Who wins between Mihawk and Shanks?

— Are perfect shots actually a real thing?

These attention-seeking and meaningless comments appeared by the dozens and hundreds every day. He needed to focus on something far more important than the chat right now.

"Let's try running a split this game, casually."

After Coach Sa-Rang finished explaining the split and shared the scrimmage schedule, she suggested resuming practice.

'We're actually doing a split.'

Almond swallowed dryly. It essentially felt as if his own opinion had been accepted.

Sweet Radish asked, "But how should we split up, coach?"

The coach thought for a moment and just shook her head. "Figure it out yourselves."

Sweet Radish sensed the air of someone testing them while knowing the answer. When faced with this, his personality compelled him to find the right answer.

A seat had been arranged for Coach Sa-Rang in one corner of his head, and he found himself reading her.

'Hmmmm.'

Without even realizing it himself, he tried to form the teams while reading the coach in his head.

Then, Almond suggested, "Let's go in and decide based on what weapons come out."

He suggested deferring the decision. This was actually reasonable. The weapon box produced random weapons anyway.

Split positions couldn't be distributed in advance. They were different from role positions. Nobody knew yet who would be good at which position.

"Let's start quickly. We're short on time today."

"Okay~!"

***

Sweet Radish had naturally expected there'd be some trial and error when first starting a split strategy. If a knight who'd trained only with a sword was suddenly told to fight with a spear, they couldn't just be good at it immediately. On top of that, the quality of opponents showing up in team ranked was climbing considerably.

A few teams of streamers preparing for the tournament were always mixed in. Their effort was pushing even regular casual players to play with more intensity. With sniper groups forming specifically to take down streamers, the difficulty shot up sharply. It was total chaos.

Pop!

[5th place]

They ended up in 5th place. This ambiguous rank was neither here nor there, but it gave them enough data.

"Oh. That was good. A split... looks like it genuinely has potential?"

"Wow. Something about this just feels right. The strategy itself is somewhat cool."

Sweet Radish and Black Tea, the higher-tier members, laughed and chatted casually.

"Bro...?"

A dazed Almond stared into space.

"Hm, what?"

"Are you alright?"

"Oh... no."

"Pardon?"

"Oh... I don't think I am." Almond was struggling because it hadn't gone the way he had imagined.

— lmaooooooooooo something went wrong?

— His ace strategy didn't land and he's sulky lmaooo

— 5th place is actually good~

— His soul left

— He was trying hard lmaooo

— The opponents were just too good

— With Paprika teams mixed in, it gets really rough

Ba-bam!

[CucumberStirFry has donated 10,000 won.]

["It's a split." <<< that was the achievement of your life and it failed. Of course, you're not okay]

— lmaooooo fr

— First brain praise of his life

— Probably the first brain praise since elementary school dictation tests lmaooo

— Oh lmaooo right lmaooo

Shockingly, the donation pointed out exactly what it was.

'It's the first time...'

For the first time, someone with a considerable reputation had recognized his brains. It even happened in front of all those who had denied the Smart Young Man.

'JeonJaPa recognized me for the first time.'

He had been recognized by the best in this domain! Privately, he had expected too much from that fact. High expectations reliably delivered disappointment.

His brain rival, Sweet Radish, even comforted him. "Bro, this was pretty good for a first try. A bit more and it'll come together."

Almond still muttered blankly, "Do you think the coach thinks so too?"

Mountain after mountain, the collapsed expectation was hard enough. The fact that he'd have to receive feedback on the last game felt equally devastating.

"Hm? Well, obviously, she didn't say anything when she left either."

Sweet Radish recalled Sa-Rang smiling pleasantly and being kind throughout. Would someone like that get angry over 5th place? She probably wouldn't say anything unpleasant either.

"Let's go."

"Sweet Radish... you don't know anything."

— Sudden brutal assessment LOL

— lmaooooo??

— He doesn't know... he really doesn't know...

— ?

— Treating Sweet Radish as a brain rival is so funny LOL

— He probably knows more than you lmaooo

Almond got up either way because the coach was gesturing them over.

"Coach is calling~."

"Yes~ coach~. Woohoo~!"

The Knight Order went to her in cheerful high spirits.

The moment they arrived, a frostbitten voice pierced through. "Calling it a split and going around in groups of two and three the whole time, what's the idea behind that?"

Sa-Rang didn’t even look at the Knight Order. She rewound the footage and was speaking almost to herself.

Everyone went rigid for some reason.

Sweet Radish had it the worst. "Uh..."

The shock was obvious.

"You merge when you need to merge. That's what makes it a split. Haven't you played 1-3-1 in Siege? If you're going to do this, just run two separate queues."

Everyone froze. The atmosphere literally froze too.

Sweet Radish was caught in it and couldn't move.

'Completely different.'

The others felt the same. Sweet Radish’s mind flashed back to just moments ago. Sa-Rang had smiled pleasantly and presented a magical-girl PowerPoint. Could someone be this different like a completely different person had appeared?

— ?

— Wow

— I see

— What

— What what what what

Almond knew another reason existed.

'She already explained it to us, and it still went wrong.'

Most competitive sports went like this. Things weren’t easily explained because it had to be realized by the body doing the work. If they were told something and still couldn't do it? They would receive the most cold-blooded disposition.

"Haah. I explained everything earlier."

Of course, quitting wasn't an option. What did most coaches do?

"Let's go again."

On this road called competition, this rough path almost seemed predestined. All the participants could do was thrash and practice while holding onto the belief that maybe fate could change.

— No feedback...

— What

— Who is this woman?

— Too scary...

— Wait, is someone else in the capsule?? lmaooo

— Wow... I want to receive feedback too...

— Intense;

— This is a bit...

***

"That was the root of the trouble."

Tap, tap.

Ju-Hyeok touched his monitor. Things were pointlessly burning up in the community, but there was no smoke without fire. A reason always existed.

"Because Sa-Rang's actual specialty is LIL... she's even sharper than in Civil Empire."

"LIL is her specialty?" BornToB was surprised.

From the door, he pointed a camera into the room. He had pretended to leave, but hadn't.

"Wait, you're still here? I thought you left?"

"No. I wanted to capture something authentic."

"..."

"What do you mean she's better at LIL?"

"Don't worry about that part."

"?"

"Don't do this here. Since things have come to this, find something that might turn public opinion around."

Public opinion was growing increasingly extreme.

[So Almond's understanding of a split proved it after all lmaooo. It's staged]

[What does that woman even do? Two Challengers in a group and?? lmaooo]

[The two of them are staging this and doing roleplays together, it's ridiculous]

[What Sa-Rang teaches is just plausible-sounding theory...]

[The people criticizing Sa-Rang, are you even human? Anyone who watched the world championship wouldn't be criticizing]

[5th lmaooo, there's no way Almond understands survival split so it's definitely staged right?]

Almond didn't understand the split, and Sa-Rang had no real expertise. That narrative was catching fire.

"Hm? How?"

How were they supposed to put that out?

"I don't know! Figure it out!"

Knock knock.

Someone knocked on the door.

"It's Team Leader Seo Ji-Ah."

"Oh, yes. Come in."

Ji-Ah came in without a thought. She nearly fainted at BornToB standing prominently beside the door.

"Oh!? Wh-what are you doing here!?"

"Oh, if you'd fainted, that would have been legendary." BornToB expressed disappointment

Ji-Ah looked back and forth between them in disbelief.

Ju-Hyeok changed the topic as if to tell her to move on. "What brings you?"

"Oh. Um... I was trying to insert behind-the-scenes content into the full video edit and found something. We had that internal studio recording file, right?"

Ju-Hyeok didn't know what she meant yet.

"The conversation with Orange King after the stream was turned off."

"Oh, yeah. What about it?"

***

At the same time, Orange King expressed disbelief. "What? A staged content verifier? Someone like that got attached? What is this, a killer exam question? Even if it were staged, it's just a stream. So what?"

Viewers seemed to agree with this to a fair extent.

— So what do you think, real or not?

Ultimately, they circled back to whether Almond had genuinely figured out the split himself. That was the real question. When this kind of controversy broke out, it made even ordinary people uncertain.

"Alright, I'll give you my opinion. This is..." Orange King confidently declared, "Not staged."

— Oh

— ~

— But how would he know?

— lmaooooo saying it's not obviously

— Does he have some grudge with Almond?

Either way, those demanding judgment would be unhappy with the answer. There was actually a fair point to be had. Orange King knew a lot about LIL, but knowing whether this was staged or not was a separate question.

"I can say this with certainty. This isn't staged."

As it happened, Orange King had exactly the right evidence to present.

— ?

— What

— You have evidence?

— Wow...

— Oh

— But how can there be evidence for something like this???

— At least thank you for saying it