Season 2: Chapter 126: The Named (3)
"Jancos is a named player? Wow, this is getting interesting!"
When Jancos first appeared, only AK47 was as excited as OrangeKing. This was almost the first time a player with the skills to rival Almond had emerged.
"The veteran knights requested can only be S rank or above! And we're lucky an S+ rank, the world's 18th ranked knight, has appeared!"
— Wow
— What is this?
— It's a lottery game, lol
"A lottery game?"
OrangeKing leaned into the camera, furrowing his brows and shouted, "Yes!!! It's a lottery game! Didn't you know that?"
— Lol
— Crazy
— It's madness
"Even BornToB didn’t do the lottery draw. He already has a 100% chance that Almond will appear! AK47 can draw someone on that level too, right?"
— Agree
— That's true
— BornToB was at fault
— He’s acting possessed again, lol
The propeller on OrangeKing’s head spun as he switched the topic.
"While I was speaking! The two of them have confronted each other! Wow! My heart is..."
The fight between Almond and Jancos happened so fast that it was hard to follow with the naked eye. Blocking arrows, dodging, and swinging...
Clang!
"He blocked it!"
Whoosh!
"Almond shoots again!"
Clang!
"Jancos blocked again! And he swings!"
Whoosh!
Despite having almost no speed correction compared to games like LIL, Jancos moved incredibly fast.
"That's amazing! Almond's attacks are not working at all! Jancos even blocked the curve shot!"
The longer the one-on-one fight went on, the redder OrangeKing's face became. His words also started to become hard to keep up with.
Then, Almond and Jancos finally exchanged damage for the first and last time.
"Wow! Finally, they exchanged damage! It's the first damage exchange we’ve seen! It's an unfair exchange though!"
— That's legendary
— Wow, this 1-on-1 is crazy
— They did it like that?
At the peak of the viewers' joy…
Ping.
[The opponent's connection has been lost.]
— ??
— What's this?
— ???
— ?
— Excuse me?
The connection suddenly dropped. OrangeKing and Kimchi Warrior both stared blankly at the screen for a while. The propeller on OrangeKing's head also stopped.
Then, OrangeKing quickly regained his composure like a professional commentator.
"Oh, it seems like the connection was momentarily lost..."
[Attempting to restore the connection with the opponent...]
[00:29]
The game paused and around thirty seconds passed.
"It seems like AK47 has disconnected?"
OrangeKing tilted his head in confusion and Kimchi Warrior replied, "Rather than a disconnection, it's more like unplugging the LAN cable."
"…!?"
Such an incident hardly ever happened in LIL games, so OrangeKing was taken aback.
"Unplugging the LAN cable? You mean intentionally disconnecting the internet cable?"
Unplugging the LAN cable referred to intentionally disconnecting the internet connection to exit a game. If a player quit this way in some games, it didn’t count as a loss or a win and invalidated the game instead.
Although there were hardly any games like that nowadays, Civil Empire had one slightly annoying feature.
"Yes. If they quit this way, the person who's left behind ends up wasting about five to ten minutes."
"Ah… So time is wasted trying to re-establish the connection?"
"Yes. Since it's a global game, it's quite generous about disconnections. In the past, they even gave players up to thirty minutes to reconnect."
"But the opponent is also Korean, right?"
"Yes."
"Wow…"
— Really?
— Wow, such bad manners.
— Is this for real?
The news that they would have to wait around ten minutes frustrated the viewers and OrangeKing. He started spinning the propeller on his head wildly.
"Wow, this is really infuriating, isn't it!?"
— Lol
— This is crazy.
— The windmill spins (physically)
— Haha
— Seriously, lol
"No..."
OrangeKing's face turned red. He would have held back if it had been an official broadcast, but this was his personal content. He decided not to restrain himself.
"This crazy stream sniper jerk!"
He vented all his pent-up frustration.
"Honestly, isn't it obvious? It's stream sniping, right? If you're not sure, go ahead and install Civil Empire. See how likely it is to meet a Korean commander."
— He's coming.
— OrangeKing's tongue from his Gyul era returns!
— The seal on OrangeKing has been broken.
— It was a stream snipe, lol.
"I just let it pass. Both I and Kimchi Warrior overlooked it! For the sake of fun! But to pull the plug on the LAN cable!?"
"Uh…"
Kimchi Warrior tried to intervene, but OrangeKing was already too heated up.
"Stream sniping and then tower rushing in the first era! And running away when it looks like you're going to lose!?"
OrangeKing had already instinctively known everything. AK47 was a stream sniper and planned to use a first era tower rush.
OrangeKing overlooked it and continued commentating for the sake of the stream. Mentioning it would only cause a ruckus. Now, he wished to cause a ruckus.
"The game is already ruined anyway."
"AK47! I don't know where you live, but don't go around calling yourself a Korean! Say you're North Korean! Your ID is even named after a North Korean gun! What? You @*($*@($!*…….)"
He continued to spew insults for a while.
"#&#*(*!)!&$*@..."
Thanks to him, the viewers weren't bored during the ten minute wait.
— A 10 minute improvised diss track, wow.
— I'm getting dizzy.
— Lol
— Hilarious.
— He finally erupted, lol.
Afterward, the scene of OrangeKing ranting was uploaded on YouTube and spread on Embul.
***
The fact that AK47 was a stream sniper was already known On the community platform Embul. They had debated about it, but no one seriously criticized it since it was just one game.
However, that changed when people other than Embul users became aware of the stream sniping. After the video of OrangeKing's furious rant was posted on Embul, public opinion shifted.
[LIL Champs Official Commentator OrangeKing Furious]
— I'm so embarrassed watching this, lol.
— Is he an Embul user???
— What will people think of us now…
— One year later... "Hey, that guy is from Embul!"
└ Lol
└ It's really going to be like that…
└ I thought this was a safe place 😭
Embul users, known for their rigorous and insular nature, took pride in their community being relatively safer than other online communities. Many of them cherished the pure joy of gaming. Embul users, especially the old-timers, were proud of this.
[This is really a spectacle... Stream sniping to counter strategies and then unplugging the LAN when losing…]
[I've been here since Embul started and it's really becoming something else now.]
[No one here has the right to criticize the national team.]
OrangeKing's outburst initiated a powerful self-regulatory movement. AK47's stream sniping had crossed a line, especially with the final act of unplugging the LAN cable. This was an atrocity far worse than the notorious nail builds.
[Using such cheap tactics and then unplugging the LAN, lol. Just execute him.]
If Embul were a real country and its rules were laws, AK47 would have been sentenced to death. That was how bad the public opinion became, but what about Almond?
When one side of the scale went down, the other tipped up.
[Almond and BornToB must have known it was stream sniping. I respect their choice to stay silent and play.]
[If I were Almond, I would've quit.]
[If Almond didn't care about the national team title, he would have just milked the mission money and moved to another game.]
Posts like these began to appear frequently. The half-and-half divided opinions about Almond’s recruitment into the national team started to crack and the scale tipped. Did it increase to 60-40? No, it felt more like 70-30 in his favor now.
[They should just put Almond on the national team right now. If you agree, upvote this like crazy.]
This post quickly garnered a lot of likes. Clicking on it revealed a compilation of Almond's super plays.
— National team of Civil Empire and it's full of Raina?"
└ Lol
└ True, lol
└ Now that you mention it, lol
└ Impressive, huh?
— You’ve gotta admit, it’s impressive though.
— Isn’t this just the Damien Association?
— It’s so funny to see something so meaningless blown out of proportion.
Although the content was slightly irrelevant, the likes kept coming.
1. They should just put Almond on the national team right now. If you agree, upvote this like crazy.
It became the top post on Embul. It wasn't a big deal to be the top on Embul, but…
'Finally.'
Chi-Seung smiled brightly. All he wanted was recognition from Embul and the support of public opinion. Just that would be enough.
'I can comfortably continue the national team practice now.'
Almond had achieved his goal even before officially reaching S+ rank. More than half of the people recognized him as worthy of the national team.
"Kimchi Warrior, why are you smiling?"
"Oh... I just saw something funny. Haha."
"What do you think about the matchup we just got?"
"Ah. Well, the opponent might have a slight advantage in this position with their wood resources..."
***
Meanwhile, at Treevy’s branch office in Korea…
"Director, this is the last task for today."
"Ah, is it?" the middle-aged man with a pleasant demeanor answered his secretary with a smile.
He had just returned to the office after an external meeting.
"Ah, this. Yeah, the award ceremony is important."
It wasn't anything significant as it was the last task before leaving work. He just had to check an email that seemed like a simple survey.
"Alright then..."
The secretary took his coat, hung it on the hanger, and returned to her place.
"Hmm."
Alone in the office, the middle-aged man stroked his chin.
"Nowadays, I hardly recognize any of these names."
There was a time when he knew the faces and names of active streamers on the platform, but that wasn't the case anymore. He only recognized a few nominees who had been active for a long time.
"Ah, the Rookie of the Year award..."
The list of nominees for Rookie of the Year felt suffocating.
1. ForeverAlone
2. Pepperoni
3. SweetPotato
4. Lemon
5. Almond
Preferring to tackle the unknown first, the executive started looking at the Rookie of the Year nominees. He clicked on the attached video for each nominee.
[Video - ForeverAlone]
The videos summarized who the streamers were, what characters they played, and how they grew. In short, it was a neatly edited chronicle of their journey as a rookie.
Regrettably, most executives tended to vote according to the given order, but his subordinates still prepared these materials diligently. Occasionally, executives like him earnestly watched the videos.
After the video ended…
[… This concludes the introduction.]
The executive moved on to the next video without any change in expression.
[Video - Pepperoni]
[Video - SweetPotato]
They all felt quite similar. Individuals nominated for the Rookie of the Year streamer award had somewhat similar life stories as well as growth graphs.
[Video - Almond]
As he played the last video, the executive thought he would probably just choose the first option. However…
'This person…'
He was the only one on the Rookie of the Year list whose face looked familiar.
'Wasn't he in the news?'
The executive couldn't recall Almond’s real name, but he remembered his face.
[... Forced to retire due to an injury, he garnered a lot of empathy and attention by pursuing his dream as a streamer...]
Watching the video confirmed it was indeed him.
'The young man who was an archer.'
He remembered this young man was an archer who used to work at Ah-Sung and started gaining popularity as a streamer around the end of this year.
'He got nominated for this year's Rookie of the Year. I thought it would be next year.'
After a moment of contemplation, the executive checked the last box on the list.