Genius Archer’s Streaming - Chapter 182

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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The Genius Archer’s Streaming Season 1 Episode 182
63. Continental Shift (1)
“A Knight?”
“Yeah. You know, like gaming-related press outlets. Nothing major, but.”
“Ah… like GameMeca?”
“Yeah. This’ll definitely get the Ollytube commenters swarming, that’s for sure…”
Normally, I’d be strategizing damage control or formulating a response to news coverage like this.
But right now, we’re at a company dinner. And once even a sip of alcohol enters Juhyeok’s system, he doesn’t entertain such bothersome thoughts.
“You’ve drawn plenty of attention! Shouldn’t a streamer celebrate that even more?! Huh?! A toast!!”
“That’s right?! Cheers!”
Sanghyeon readily accepts.
Even Jia’s glass—three beer glasses clink together refreshingly.
Clink!

* * *
The first company dinner was absolutely delightful.
Perhaps too delightful, if anything.
All three of us were thoroughly drunk, practically crawling into the taxi.
“Phew.”
“Hey, get in. Come on.”
The fortunate part was that all three of us were heading in the same direction, so we could share a taxi.
“To Huchae, please.”
Car headlights swept past my eyes several times, and as I half-listened to the crude jokes from the taxi’s radio, we suddenly arrived at those towering stairs.
Sanghyeon, being the most sober of us, paid the fare.
“Ugh. When are we ever going to climb these again?”
Phew. Juhyeok had recovered almost completely during the taxi ride and stretched his arms.
He began doing some warm-up exercises as if it were already routine.
“I’ll carry you.”
“Can you manage?”
“Yeah. I’ll think of it as a deadlift.”
“Isn’t it more like a squat?”
“It’s all the same thing anyway.”
They seemed completely different to me. Sanghyeon didn’t bother correcting him.
Juhyeok was already hoisting Jia onto his back and climbing the stairs.
‘That bastard…’
Sanghyeon watched them intently for a moment, then suddenly noticed something.
‘She’s not drunk.’
Jia’s eyes were barely open—deliberately so.
Sanghyeon’s vision was more than two to three times that of an average adult, and his night vision was exceptionally sharp.
He was seeing something he shouldn’t have been able to see.
Jia seemed unaware that Sanghyeon could see her from his vantage point. A faint smile played across her lips.
“Mmm….”
“What, what’s wrong?”
Jia’s arms tightened around Juhyeok.
“Are you afraid of falling? Then please, don’t get drunk!”
Juhyeok tensed his legs and kept nagging, yet he continued climbing earnestly. Or rather, wasn’t he actually enjoying this?
I wasn’t being honest with myself.
‘Damn it.’
Sanghyeon let out a quiet chuckle.

* * *
After carrying Jia all the way into her room, Juhyeok carefully laid her down on the bed.
“Phew. I’m exhausted.”
Juhyeok sat on the bed for a moment, rubbing his lower back.
He checked on Jia’s condition once, then rose to leave.
“Mmm….”
A hand tugged at Juhyeok’s sleeve.
“…!”
Juhyeok’s footsteps stopped abruptly.
He waited a moment.
Jia’s hand still gripped his sleeve.
He slowly turned his head.
The blue moonlight streaming through the window made it impossible to see the light in his eyes behind his glasses.
For Jia, it was unknowable.
She couldn’t read where his hesitation lay, couldn’t decipher his thoughts.
A moment later, Juhyeok shook his head and fled from the house as if escaping.
Thud.
The sound of the front door closing.
“What.”
Whoosh.
Rising from the bed, Jia exhaled a shallow sigh.
Through the window, she could see Sanghyeon and Juhyeok walking up steadily.
A massive blue full moon hung large above Sanghyeon’s home’s rooftop. They looked as though they were climbing the stairs toward that very moon.
As if they might one day reach it. They climbed eagerly, stumbling slightly.
Chuckle.
A smile tinged with blue light bloomed on Jia’s lips.
Zing. Zing.
But a single phone vibration was enough. Enough to steal away her smile.
[Bastard]
The phone rang.
I ignored it without responding.
Then a message came through.
[Bastard: Were you at Panda today?]
Jia’s lips pressed into a thin line again.
So our eyes had met after all.
I’d glanced over while pretending to go to the restroom. I should have just ignored them completely.
“I shouldn’t have gone.”
I muttered a pointless regret to myself.
My gaze turned back to the window where blue light seeped through.
My eyes took in the enormous moon.
Sometimes I wanted to escape this planet.
What if I ran away there?
Had they reached the moon?
I couldn’t see them.

* * *
The next day.
Sanghyeon woke with a hangover-dulled head, and the first sensation that assailed him was the savory aroma of dried pollack soup.
Tack, tack, tack, tack.
The familiar sound of a knife striking the cutting board.
When I went to the living room, Juhyeok was busy cooking.
I knew he was diligent, but hadn’t he drunk quite a lot yesterday? I was a bit surprised.
‘Maybe he’s trying to call Jia.’
Sanghyeon sat quietly at the table so as not to disturb Juhyeok. He habitually checked his SNS account, reviewing comments and monitoring community reactions.
Then he spotted Almond and Jeon-ja-pa in the portal site’s search rankings.
4th) Jeon-ja-pa
.
.
.
8th) Almond
When I clicked on one of them, an article appeared at the very top.
It was a popular article with over ten thousand comments.
「Jeon-ja-pa with 6 million followers follows only 10 people. One of them is rookie streamer Almond?」
The news outlet was Game Mecha.
It was a major outlet in the gaming industry, so it made sense that it would get main exposure on portals like Jaebu.
and lol
-Almond’s getting articles from Game Mecha too
-Why does this guy get more famous when he’s on hiatus?
└Because he’s an insider
lol
└Being an extrovert means performing better when you’re out in public.
-What’s Jeon-ja-pa’s relationship with him anyway? He even left comments before.
└What relationship? He just follows because Jeon-ja-pa is really good at what he does.
└But you didn’t follow that player who won the Monthly Championship twice?
└Almond must be better.
└This guy’s deliberately trashing Almond lol
People start bickering again.
To be honest, I understand where they’re coming from.
Even by my own assessment, I’m not yet accomplished enough to deserve being followed by Jeon-ja-pa (though I’d have nothing to say if someone dismissed it as trivial).
‘I never thought his following list would only have nine accounts.’
If Jeon-ja-pa’s following list were in the hundreds or thousands like other people’s, I wouldn’t have felt this way. It wouldn’t have become such an issue.
“What? When did you wake up and sit there?”
Juhyeok, who had been simmering the dried pollack soup, finally noticed me.
He closed the pot lid and approached me.
“Why are you staring like that?”
“Oh. The fact that Jeon-ja-pa followed me. It became a news article.”
“So it turned out that way after all.”
It was exactly as Juhyeok had predicted.
Since one out of ten was Almond, there’s no way he’d miss such a story.
‘That’s strange.’
I felt something was odd even when he first said he followed me.
Now it felt even stranger.
Nine accounts are colleagues who shared past glory together. And the remaining one is Almond?
Doesn’t the balance seem off?
‘It’s completely special treatment.’
Juhyeok tends to be wary of good news without reason. What you gain by luck, you’re destined to lose through greater misfortune.
That’s how humans are designed, and society, created by humans, works the same way.
“Hey. Do you know Jeon-ja-pa by any chance?”
“…No. I’m telling you, no.”
I avert my gaze again.
“Hey. I’m worried because something feels off, you know?”
“….”
I said nothing.
‘So it’s something he can’t talk about.’
This guy is terrible at lying.
“You can’t talk about it, right?”
I nod quietly.
“…Okay. I got it.”
Juhyeok had a vague idea of what it might be, but since I said I couldn’t talk about it, he decided to let it go. If he pressed further, it would cause me pain.
“It’s not something bad, right?”
“I didn’t follow you with any ill intent.”
“Fine. That works then.”
Rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle.
The pot lid clattered and trembled. The water was on the verge of boiling over.
“Oh!”
Juhyeok rushed over and turned off the heat.
“When is Jia arriving?”
“Ah… she should be here soon… huh?”
Juhyeok’s hand froze as he reached for the ladle.
“How did you know?”
“It’s obvious.”
“…Why?”
“What?”
“Why did you think it was obvious?”
“…”
Instead of explaining, Sanghyeon sent him a meaningful look that said: just look at what you’re doing right now.
“Ahem, ahem.”
Juhyeok turned his head away on his own.
“It’s nice when we all eat together, isn’t it?”
“Nice. Sure. Absolutely wonderful.”
Sanghyeon snickered and mocked him, but Juhyeok, unusually, couldn’t manage a proper retort.
He simply decided to focus on cooking instead.
After a moment, the doorbell rang.
“It’s me!”

* * *
The dish Juhyeok had prepared was dried pollack soup and pork belly glazed sweetly in gochujang.
“Wow. A feast fit for royalty!”
Jia clapped her hands together and bounced excitedly. She clearly hadn’t expected such an elaborate spread.
Sanghyeon chuckled softly and picked up his chopsticks.
Perhaps due to the sheer care poured into it, the pork belly melted like braised pork, which was exceptionally delicious.
The sweet and spicy sauce had seeped deep into the fat, making rice an irresistible craving.
The dried pollack soup had a light seasoning with a refreshing taste, and the harmony between the two dishes was perfect.
“You could totally become a cooking content creator. Seriously.”
“You’d do mukbang videos?”
“Oh. Yeah. Should we really do it?”
As we exchanged such idle banter and nearly finished our meal.
Ding.
[Takoyaki: We’re doing the Power Ranking broadcast again today. You don’t all need to watch it together. Feel free to catch it whenever you have time. Practice starts at 6.]
A message arrived from Takoyaki.
‘Ah. We’re doing the Power Ranking broadcast again today.’
Since the practice matches were also the main content of this ‘Nan Tournament’, they broadcast periodically.
They would briefly review the two days of practice matches and adjust the Power Ranking incrementally.
Of course, with only two days having passed, there was hardly anything that would change.
It would probably just be everyone gathering to chat about how this player performed and how that player performed.
‘During lunch time?’
So today, instead of the peak hours of 6-7 PM, it would be conducted briefly during lunch.
It seemed I could just watch it after coming back from training.

* * *
“Huff. Huff.”
My first jog in about three days.
My breath comes in ragged gasps.
On top of that, my body creaked slightly from yesterday’s drinking.
“I’m almost thirty, so my body’s starting to….”
Whoosh.
Sanghyeon exhaled deeply and collapsed onto a bench, grumbling as he gulped down water.
My throat, roughened by the cold air, becomes moist again.
White vapor rises into the air.
Not just from my mouth, but white steam also rose from my heated body.
My body is hot, but the weather is equally cold.
Perhaps that’s why my sides ache from the chill.
Sitting on the bench and gazing at the river, I spot quite a few couples walking arm in arm.
Actually, nearly all of them were couples.
“Whoosh.”
I toss the empty water bottle into the trash and stand up again.
As I resume running, my lengthened bangs flutter across my vision.
Her long, dark hair shimmers in my mind.
Sanghyeon closed his eyes briefly to wipe away the sweat trickling down.

* * *
By the time I arrived home and finished showering, it was nearly 1 PM.
‘Did I really run for that long all of a sudden?’
I thought my condition was poor because of the hangover, but I ran better than expected and ended up going much longer. I completely lost track of time.
I quickly sat down at my computer and opened Tribee.
[‘King’ Gul’s Power Ran’king’]
The title reminded me of the Kingdom villain I’d met on the subway. But I deliberately erased that terrible memory and entered the broadcast.
The broadcast was already winding down.
[So would it settle like this?]
King Gul was trying to summarize something.
[Well… yes. Actually, with only two days passing, there haven’t been any major changes.]
The Analyst responded and pointed to the power ranking chart.
‘That’s how it is?’
Just as the Analyst said, there were no major changes in the power rankings.
In fact, nothing had changed at all.
Not until you looked further down.
[Only one team is showing significant movement right now?]
[It’s not that big. They’ve risen three ranks.]
[But considering it’s still early, isn’t that quite substantial?]
[If you don’t like it, you can just drop out next time. Whatever.]
There was one team that had climbed three ranks.
12th Place) Balloon Stars
Balloon Stars, the team Almond belonged to.
12th place.
Yesterday it was 15th.
[Oh…!]
And in the remarks column next to it, there were comments from three commentators.
It went like this.
[Comment 1: Almond. Might be quite strong?]
[Comment 2: Almond. Just as I said.]
[Comment 3: Certainly flashy gameplay. However, still requires verification.]
It was clear who was responsible for the three-rank climb.
Those with sharp instincts were already sensing it.
[I believe this about Almond. He’s an entity that will cause a seismic shift in this industry.]
The change Almond was bringing about.
[Ah. So Almond is an earthquake?]
[No. How did you get that?]
[Where’s the tsunami in that?]

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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