Chapter 123: Tutorial (3)
The meteor shower created by the blue arrows reflected off of Ju-Hyeok's frameless glasses. Around fifteen arrows suddenly rained from the sky, all hitting their targets.
Even Ju-Hyeok, who always watched Almond's stream, couldn't keep his mouth closed. It was a jaw-dropping performance.
"... Wow."
The chat went wild.
[Alright... I'll tell you how to use the ultimate.]
Raina, who seemed reluctant at first, started explaining quickly to Almond.
'I think I built some rapport with her.'
LIL wasn't like any other MOBA game. There were different genres mixed with it. One of the game's features was the ability to build rapport and friendships with the champions. Even if summoners fought with the same skill, the level of rapport they built affected the fight.
Building rapport was similar to how well a summoner worked with the champion. In that case, it was a good sign that Raina was starting to act more friendly with Almond.
— Wow, she already looks close to Almond.
— I've never come this far with Raina... but he does it in the tutorial?!
— Hmph! I'm not jealous because she's low tier!
— If it's like this in the tutorial, what will happen later?!
The viewers were thinking the same thing as Ju-Hyeok. Everyone was witnessing Almond's incredible skills firsthand just from the tutorial.
"He's showing them from just the tutorial. Good."
Almond's first LIL stream was going to leave an impactful impression.
[Current Viewers: 7.5k]
The number of viewers had already increased by a thousand people.
Clap! Clap!
Ju-Hyeok clapped and cheered.
"Alright. Let's hit 10,000 again."
They could do it. No, they had to do it.
After transitioning games, they had to recover the number of viewers within the week. Otherwise, it'd be a failure.
'What can I do...'
Ju-Hyeok glanced at the statistics program on his right screen. He grabbed his pen and started jotting down the important data. He needed to form a strategy based on what kind of viewers were watching and what other streams they watched.
That was Ju-Hyeok's job.
***
[Not just the ultimate, but every other active skill has a Link Movement...]
While Raina was explaining, Sang-Hyeon also took notice of the viewer count.
'7500... It's recovering. Or are they new viewers?'
He went from 6000 to 7000. Considering it was just the tutorial, the rise wasn’t bad. However, he couldn't tell if they were his previous?Battle Large viewers or new viewers watching him play LIL. He left those questions for Ju-Hyeok to figure out with the data.
[Summoner, are you listening?]
Almond was startled.
"Ah, yes. Of course, the linked movement..."
[Sigh. I'm not going to explain this twice, okay!?]
"Yes!"
This wasn't good.
Almond was both disappointed and surprised with himself. The viewer count was affecting him. It was unexpected.
'Why am I like this?'
Before he knew it, he was already acting like a streamer. For him, the viewers were an important existence to him. As a result, he became swayed by the numbers. He couldn't shake it off easily despite knowing the number of viewers would inevitably decrease.
Almond started shaking his head to gain focus again.
'Let's pay attention. How will I win the match if I keep my eyes on the scoreboard instead of the ball?'
He recalled what his senior, who played basketball, once said.
Almond's top priority right now was to give his viewers the best video game performance through his stream. That was the only thing he could do right now. If he focused on doing that, his viewers would return just like how the score would change if he had his eyes on the ball.
[... Alright? Okay, try it out.]
"...?"
Damn, he let it slip by again.
[... Hey!]
***
Ever since childhood, Almond had no talent for listening to other people. In his defense, he had a knack for listening and letting it out the other ear.
This talent was helpful for archery. During the act, nothing got to his head except the shooting itself.
Unfortunately, this talent was holding him back with Raina.
[... Hey!]?
Raina couldn't help but shout.
— LOL
— Hahahaha
— Raina's shouting!
— The special package
— I like it!
Raina's voice was always calm to fit the image of a champion. However, she just sounded like an angry woman now.
[Are you ignoring me? Or are you deaf?!]
"I-It's not that..."
— LOL
— Almond's in trouble!
— Almond... you're the same as me. Can't pay attention in class.
— I can tell what you were like in school, boss.
— Geniuses can't pay attention once they're in their own world.
The viewers laughed at the sight of Almond getting scolded. Almond looked like a human for once. These little hiccups made watching streams worth it, so it wasn't a bad outcome.
[Sigh... I can't do this.]
"T-Then should we stop here? We can do it next time."
Almond sounded genuine. He thought turning the game off and on would reset her mood since Raina was a video game character.
— Is this guy really trying to end the stream here?!
— Hey!! At least beat the tutorial!!
— What the! Are you insane?
— Raina's going to be so pissed!
— Boss! This is all autosaved!
The viewers panicked because Almond was notorious for ending streams out of nowhere. They were also worried Raina would go on a rampage because she hated giving up. However, everyone was surprised by what happened next.
[W-What!?]
Raina asked in surprise.
[W-What are you talking about? Why are you stopping?]
"Because I can't do it..."
[T-That's... alright. This is the last time, okay? Listen carefully.]
Raina continued teaching Almond. She unintentionally filled the chat with question marks.
— ?????
— ???
— Raina...?
— Breaking News: Raina can now see faces...
— B-But to me...
— What's going on?
It seemed like Raina didn't want to lose Almond as a summoner.
***
Raina finished her ultimate's explanation once more.
[I'm only specially explaining again because it's hard to come by a summoner like you, okay? Now, try it again.]
The explanation wasn't anything special, but Almond's ability to focus was incredible.
'So if I do a certain action, it activates.'
Link Movement. Activating skills in full-dive gaming was inefficient because the system lacked a keyboard. Setting up a virtual keyboard to activate skills took too long.
There was also another method, which was to think about the skill to activate it. This was the most commonly used feature in games such as Kingdom Age. However, for LIL, the skills activated from the mind were unreliable because the player's thoughts were unpredictable in the chaos of battle.
It worked in Kingdom Age because that was a singleplayer game, but it was difficult to pull off for LIL, a multiplayer fighting game. The solution?LIL found was Link Movement, which was when a certain action was initiated to activate the skill.
Link Movement was a class of precise movements that couldn't be done accidentally, but were efficient. It mainly used finger movements.
'So the edge of my hand, with my middle finger and thumb...'
For Raina, the ultimate activated if the player made an X with their right thumb and left middle finger.
'Like this?'
As soon as Almond made the action…
SLAM!
A loud noise echoed.
[Ultimate - Evil Archer]
A bloody text appeared before him. The letters looked sticky and creepy.
[I am going to activate the contract we made with blood.]
Unlike Raina's friendly voice from earlier, an eerie voice came out.
Crackle!
Red and sticky blood flashed all over the area. It looked like lava made out of blood. From the lava emerged a figure. The white skin, blue cape, and blonde hair contrasted greatly with the dark lava around the figure.
"You have finally summoned me, Summoner."
Looking over his shoulder, Almond saw his face reflected in the wall while looking up. After meeting eyes with him, Raina's crimson lips formed a smile.
— Rainaaaaa!
— Kya, Raina's ultimate is always something else.
— This is the best game!
— Shiet!
— Skill: kill everyone with your beauty, activate!
After Raina turned around, she pulled on her bowstring.
Creak…
She made a perfect draw pose as her delicate blue cloth and blonde hair waved. Her pose looked like a carefully chiseled statue shining beautifully. On top, a blue mana aura enveloped her.
Woong…!
The air around her started trembling as the bow gathered mana. The blue light started gathering, creating sparks.
Bzzzt...!
It was pure energy being condensed. The power was now in the hands of Raina. Her delicate, white hands finally released it.
Tang!
The collected energy was released like a horse back into the wild.
Kwaaaaaa!!!
It enveloped everything in its path with a white light. Almond, the summoner, shut his eyes from the energy’s bright light.
"..."
Rumble...
The land still shook, unable to fully absorb the impact.
'... Wow.'
As the smoke cleared, the enemy turret's HP was nearly depleted. There were no signs of enemy archers or soldiers near the area. They were all burnt away by the beaming light of energy.
"This is my ultimate. As soon as I'm summoned, it activates."
Gulp.
Almond felt it as soon as he saw Raina's ultimate ability.
'This is it.'
He even thought Raina was more befitting of the bow than him. After checking Almond's expression, Raina formed a smile. It was a genuine smile.
"I'm not done teaching yet, but I think you can go into a real battle now, Summoner."
"Did I learn all the skills?"
"No, not yet. But it's too much to explain everything one by one. You learn as you get beat, right?"
She smirked with a smile as if to comfort him. After that, Raina disappeared and the tutorial was finished.
— Noona, don't gooo!
— Noona, you're killing me!
— Noona, kill us all!
— She's so pretty...
— For real. This is why you play Raina!
[The tutorial is over!]
[Try playing a real match!]
***
Almond was summoned into the lobby where he could start queueing up. A text appeared before him.
[Choose your summoner name.]
A nickname. Almond was going to choose Almond, but it was already taken.
[This nickname is already in use.]
— LOL! Identity theft.
— Almond is a rare nickname.
— How's Nuts?
He tried Nuts, but it was taken as well.
'Wow, this is hard.'
He could tell right away how many more people played this game than Battle Large.
"Hmm... Guess I have no choice. I'll go with something a lot of people don't know about."
[Lazy Soldier]
Almond decided to name himself the mobile video game he would be a model for.
[Summoner name has been set to Lazy Soldier.]
"Oh, it worked."
Thankfully, the name was available. It was like a sign for him to advertise the game.
— This guy's crazy...
— You tricked me! This is an ad!
— Thinking about an ad now...
— Were you in marketing?
— What is this?
— This guy LOL
— AD King
Almond started queuing up right away.
[Summoner level is too low for ranked gameplay.]
He couldn't play ranked yet.
— Bye, newbie!
— Where are you trying to go!
— LOL
— Almond can't even play ranked…
"Ah... right. My level's too low."
Almond scratched his head.
'I guess I'd just hold them back.'
It was unfair to play ranked since he only knew how to use one champion. If Raina was banned in the champion selection, he wouldn’t be able to do anything. His teammates would only be frustrated by him.
"Hmm. Then let's play a simple game with normals."
He found a normal game in five seconds.
Shiiiik!
As the scenery around him changed, he found himself in a magical environment. There were four other summoners with him. As soon as Almond entered, he could tell what kind of game it was.
"Ah, fuck. He’s Level 1?"