Genius Archer’s Streaming - Chapter 435

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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 2 Episode 155
54. The Banquet Hall (3)
After Partishe’s complete return.
The Streamer Garden, which had been flooded with rumors and slander about Cutie Pie for quite some time, had no choice but to shift its tactics.
When Pie Muffin Cross showed up, everyone hid, right?ㅋㅋㅋ
[They got exposed! Let’s go! To hell we go~~!]
“A love triangle or whatever lol Do you even trust that Recca??”
Because they had proven far too perfectly that there was no discord or disbandment.
Since they could no longer feast on Cutie Pie, they inevitably had to find new prey.
That’s right.
They always find new prey. Only the target changes.
[Heard rumors about Almond winning Rookie of the Year. For real?]
[Almond’s growth momentum is scary…]
It always starts like this, testing the waters.
If you reveal outright hatred from the beginning, no one will sympathize.
So you subtly provoke their inferiority complex.
[Wow, an award for a rookie just three months after debut?ㅋㅋ]
Even though Rookie of the Year hasn’t been confirmed yet, they act surprised as if he’s already won it.
Then, right on cue, comments like this appear.
-Will Almond get Rookie of the Year? Mosol will get it. He’s consistent and has solid fundamentals.
-Rookie of the Year usually goes to people who debuted last year… How would someone who debuted this year get it?
It’s always the same.
When someone gets pushed up, critics emerge.
They could be fans of other streamers, or they could be related to them.
They argue that Almond hasn’t shown enough yet to deserve Rookie of the Year.
Cutie Pie won an award that year too lol
└It’s not about seniority or anything, and Almond’s viewer growth trajectory is overwhelming? Even if sponsorships lag behind female streamers, the buzz factor is strong
However, such arguments are quickly refuted.
After all, Rookie of the Year is meant to go to unclear rookies in the first place.
“I’m a newcomer, but what’s this about not being able to receive it because I’m too much of a newcomer? lol”
Haha, that’s right.
That’s right, haha
I wanted to say that too ㅠㅠ
Absurd statements that a rookie can’t win Rookie of the Year because they’re too new.
The reason they say such things was simple.
They were jealous of him.
And unfortunately, they didn’t exist only on the internet.
“…Who’s that?”
“Yeah. He even brought his manager. Quite the world star?”
“That kind of thing never lasts long.”
At one of the tables, a group of Streamers quietly discussed Almond, careful to keep their voices low in case any microphones were picking up their words.
“I made a grand entrance like a comet. That’s what I wrote on my face.”
“Puhaha. Exactly.”
Most of them were newcomers who had debuted not long ago.
And by anyone’s standards, they had achieved considerable success for newcomers.
Which made Almond all the more hateful in their eyes.
He had started streaming much later than they had, yet he had achieved far greater success.
The spotlight that should have come to them had been stolen away. None of them had even made it onto the Rookie Award nominees list.
“I could understand the other nominees. They’ve been streaming consistently for one or two years. But nominated after just two or three months of broadcasting?”
“That’s exactly what I’m saying, hyung. Those kids are out there doing ‘blah blah blah blah blah’ but they can’t even understand what people are saying to them?”
The reason they were particularly bitter toward Almond was that the other Rookie Award nominees had considerably longer broadcasting careers.
In other words, longer careers than their own.
“What’s the point of talking to them? They don’t know anything until they’ve actually done it.”
“Right. Those bastards don’t know anything.”
Sigh.
People sighing and nodding along with each other.
“That guy doesn’t even interact with other Streamers. He acts like he’s on another level entirely.”
“Yeah, I heard he left Asung because it was dirty. But he sure loves using the fact that he’s from Asung.”
Moreover, since Sanghyeon made no deliberate effort to interact with other Streamers, he was inevitably at a disadvantage in this kind of behind-the-scenes gossip.
Because people naturally harbor less overt hostility if they have at least some acquaintance with someone.
“If he keeps acting like he’s so great and walking around alone like that, he’s going to fall flat on his face.”
“Right. In the end, they just play among themselves. When you come to the big leagues like this, shouldn’t you be talking to the big names and all that?”
They indulged in hollow psychological victories while sipping their drinks.
Then they scattered to make other connections among themselves.
Searching for the kind of networking that could pull them up.

* * *
“That’s right. It’s always been like this.”
At the bar table in the banquet hall, Juhyeok turns off his phone screen as he speaks.
“It’s human nature to pull down those who are rising.”
Juhyeok mutters with a slightly flushed face.
“But you know what? It’s also human nature to help those trying to climb up!?”
Sanghyeon stares at him intently, then tries to gauge how many glasses of wine he’s been holding beside him.
“Sadly! Meeting someone who’s doing better than you turns out to be the best kind of human relationship…!”
This guy really does get drunk easily on wine.
‘There goes his drinking habit again.’
One of Juhyeok’s drinking habits.
Suddenly going to the company to work overtime.
Repeating something that sounds like a passage from a self-help book.
“For that to happen, you need to be free of inferiority. You have to be liberated from it. That’s the hard part! That’s why success is difficult!?”
If you go to a wine bar with Juhyeok, you can get a free summary of Dale Carnegie’s human relations book without having to buy it.
“You’re… drunk.”
Sanghyeon taps his shoulder, signaling him to stop.
Juhyeok falls silent with a slightly flushed face.
It seems his senses are returning now.
“Ahem. What, what do you mean I’m drunk?”
Sanghyeon simply looks at him without saying anything.
Juhyeok soon confesses.
“…Department Manager Jang really does drink fast.”
Sanghyeon asks, partly to change the subject.
“What do you think about Department Manager Jang’s proposal?”
Juhyeok thinks for a moment.
“Department Manager Jang is a major network PD first of all. And he’s had quite a few hit programs. However….”
“He’s not on good terms with the higher-ups.”
“Exactly.”
Juhyeok is weighing things out.
Beyond personal connections with Department Manager Jang, whether he truly has the power to pull us up.
“That person has a rebellious streak. To put it worse, it’s artist’s syndrome. It’s a rare disease among variety show PDs.”
Pfft.
Jia, listening from beside them, laughs.
Juhyeok’s words were quite piercing to the core.
“Why is Department Manager Jang here? Just an invitation?”
Sanghyeon asks what he’d been curious about.
“No. He’s the overall director of this event.”
“…This event?”
“Yeah. Somehow it ended up that way. He actively volunteered for it, apparently.”
Department Manager Jang certainly seemed to have developed an interest in the streamer market.
“That’s how it always works. If you want to climb up from the bottom, knocking on doors in new markets is the best approach. He’s probably planning something with streaming and virtual reality.”
Juhyeok’s speculation aligned with Department Manager Jang’s actual thoughts by over 90 percent—enough to startle him if he’d overheard it.
If he’d been less drunk, it might have been a perfect 100 percent match.
“But would what that guy plans actually have much merit? That’s the real problem. There aren’t many people who’ve made it after crossing over from the entertainment industry to here. Even someone like him….”
Juhyeok’s gaze naturally drifted toward Cutie Pie, seated across the way.
“!?”
But then Juhyeok suddenly froze.
Cutie Pie was walking straight toward them, her eyes fixed directly on him.
Juhyeok’s drunkenness evaporated instantly, and he quietly asked Sanghyeon.
“Hey. Was my voice really that loud?”
“No.”
Yet Cutie Pie was unmistakably heading their way.
Click-clack.
She was right in front of them now.
“Hello. Nice to meet you. I’m Cutie Pie. It’s embarrassing to say this nickname myself, you know.”
‘A nickname? That’s an idol name….’
Kyahahaha.
Her distinctive laugh accompanied a face that gleamed brilliantly.
This was no illusion.
She’d genuinely overdone the pearl in her makeup….
Ahem.
Sanghyeon cleared his throat briefly before greeting her.
“Ah. Hello. I’m Almond.”
This was a gathering where streamers naturally greeted each other anyway, so there was nothing strange about suddenly approaching to say hello.
‘But she walked all this distance in a straight line just to greet us.’
Sanghyeon observed Cutie Pie, thinking it seemed like she’d come with the intention to greet them from the start.
He naturally expected her to bring up her business first.
“….”
“….”
A brief silence fell.
Juhyeok interjected.
“Hello. It’s an honor to see last year’s Grand Prize winner like this. I’m the Manager, and this person here is the Head Editor.”
Jia also offered a somewhat awkward greeting. She seemed intimidated by Cutie Pie’s glamorous, idol-like appearance.
“Ah.”
But her eyes brightened as they turned toward Jia instead.
“So… you’re the editor!”
“?”
Her enthusiasm triggered a reflexive defense mechanism in Sanghyeon—was she here to recruit them again?
But that didn’t seem to be the case at all.
She suddenly says this.
“I owe you a debt of gratitude from before.”
Jia was bewildered.
“What… a debt….”
Kyahahaha.
Cutie Pie grabbed Jia’s hand with her characteristic laugh.
“My controversy and all sorts of rumors got tangled together, and that… well, that wrecker… no, that issue YouTuber uploaded a video.”
“?”
What was she suddenly talking about?
The three of them looked at each other, but none could guess. It simply wasn’t important enough for them to remember.
“I almost hit number one in the social-political category! Almond’s video just went boom!”
Cutie Pie was truly someone with big, expressive movements.
She thrust her fist forward as if striking the air itself.
“And then you came and knocked that guy down! I didn’t get first place! If I’d just missed first place, it would’ve gotten coverage in newspapers or something, but the impact just… whoosh… disappears, you know?”
Kyahahaha!
She laughed with such delight it was hard to believe she was talking about a controversy video.
“I mean… it became such a hot topic that it climbed to second place in the social-political category… something felt off, right? Because it wasn’t first! The editor said it was ambiguous to cover! So no article came out!”
The point was that Almond’s video had been registered under the social-political category due to such an enormous concept that it blocked that video from hitting first place, preventing the situation from escalating further.
‘The fact that no article came out seems more like coincidence.’
While Sanghyeon was thinking this, Juhyeok raised a question.
“Wait. But we dropped from the chart before that video… and Double Trouble’s video came up later. Didn’t it hit first place after that?”
The real-time chart is calculated on a 24-hour basis.
The peak is when 24 hours have passed, and after that, it’s out of the chart.
With this system, since Almond’s video came up first, it couldn’t have continuously blocked Double Trouble’s video.
“Oh! That’s the thing! Right then, boom~! Some corruption scandal broke out! A huge one too! Literally a real political-social incident! So it got buried again, that’s all!”
Kyahahaha!
Cutie Pie laughed, saying she was really lucky.
‘What. So it was because of that?’
Juhyeok and Sanghyeon exchanged glances, shared the same thought, and chuckled.
“That’s why I really wanted to thank you. For coming all the way to the social-political category and taking that spot.”
Cutie Pie grabbed her hand once more as she spoke.
Jia’s face flushed red as she answered.
“…I didn’t do it on purpose. Really.”
“Still! Thank you! And you too, Almond! Well, have a great time! And please give me a shout-out during my performance later!”
Kyahahaha.
She laughed cheerfully once more.
Then, spotting someone she knew, she whooshed off in that direction.
“Ooh! Kiwi~~~”
“Wow! Unnie! Amazing! It’s been like a million years, right?!”
“Did you see my performance earlier?”
Kya-ha-ha!
The two disappeared with laughter.
Only after Cutie Pie left did I notice it.
‘Hm?’
Countless gazes were fixed upon me.
Those who pretended not to look while sneaking glances from the corners of their eyes.
Or those who stared openly. Some even looked at me with hostile intent.
The intensity was so blatant that even from where I stood, I could discern the meaning behind those stares.
‘Why were they talking to Cutie Pie for so long?’
‘Do all three of them know Cutie Pie?’
‘Didn’t Cutie Pie leave first just now?’
I could have felt intimidated by so many eyes, or perhaps angered.
But it seemed I felt something different.
Gulp.
I took another sip of wine and murmured to myself.
As if wanting to be heard.
“This awards ceremony is fun.”

* * *
A moment later.
Probably after three or four streamers had spoken with Almond.
An announcement echoed from the speakers.
“Now, shortly after a performance by our invited singer, the awards ceremony will begin. All invited guests are requested to take your assigned seats and remain in place.”
The words “Trivia Awards” appeared on the stage screen.
A grandiose, if somewhat clichéd, melody flowed through the venue.
The streamers slowly made their way to their seats and sat down.
At last, the awards ceremony was beginning.

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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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