Chapter 101

CHAPTER 101

[ ???? ]

[Did the Demonic Cult really win?]

[Is this a bug?]

[This is so random, but Demonic Cult victory lmaoooo]

Almost nobody had been watching the battlefield interface.

Maybe that was why.

When the message announcing the Demonic Cult’s victory suddenly appeared during Seo Jun’s broadcast, it wasn’t easy for people to immediately understand what had happened.

So even as posts like these started popping up, countless people had no idea what they were even talking about.

Even though twenty thousand viewers had been in Seo Jun’s stream, most of them were still watching the broadcast, so there were plenty of people on the community boards who didn’t understand those posts.

[What happened?]

[Why are you guys already back from the future?]

[Looks like those Demonic Cult freaks finally lost it and started hallucinating.]

— I’ll let this cute Unorthodox Faction brat off just once.  

— What? Why is everyone laughing? Have you all gone crazy? (Post author)

— Excuse me? Did you just call us freaks?

Then one user uploaded a screenshot of the battlefield interface, and only then did people finally grasp the situation.

[=]

[What about it?]

[The map’s still the same.]

[Well, the victory message is appearing in the same place where it normally appears when the battlefield ends.]

But if it was going to appear, it should’ve shown up tomorrow at 7 when the final tally was calculated. Why is it showing up now?

[My guess]

===

This is the first time every faction has been completely driven out, right?

The trigger for that victory-faction message was probably coded wrong from the start, and this is the first time anyone has touched that condition, so it accidentally spoiled the result.

The developer bros will probably explain the details later!

===

Right.

The Heavenly Demon’s game was probably the last one.

And since the final match had ended, the points must have already been calculated.

Anyway, something had gone wrong, and only the victory message appeared early.

That explanation seemed the most believable.

And if that was true, it meant the Demonic Cult had genuinely won.

After seeing the Orthodox Faction eliminated and the Unorthodox Faction immediately pushed back, everyone had already predicted there was a decent chance the Demonic Cult would come out on top.

Even so—

The emotions the Demonic Cult players felt after actually achieving victory were something else entirely.

[At last... we, the oppressed ones... have won...]

[Since when were you ever oppressed?   Anyway, congrats.]

And then there was one player who was truly obsessed with the Demonic Cult.

The Third Elder.

Ever since he had fallen in love with the Heavenly Demon’s battles as an elementary school student and joined For the Sake of Chivalry, he had been beaten down again and again.

Now he sat alone in a pavilion on his personal channel, pretending to drink alcohol.

[We really won, right? It’s not a bug, right?]

Of course, since it was virtual reality, he couldn’t actually drink.

And he was a minor who had never tasted alcohol in his life.

Still, his emotions were so strange and overwhelming that he was trying to set the mood.

He had entered the game because of the First Heavenly Demon.

But the First Heavenly Demon had disappeared almost immediately.

Even so, he loved the Demonic Cult so much that he kept playing.

Yet a battlefield victory had always seemed impossible no matter how hard he struggled.

And then came this battlefield.

The Fake Heavenly Demon appeared.

Apparently, he had earned the title of Grandmaster.

Then he started setting Death Match records, built up an absurd winning streak, accumulated insane fame points, and somehow brought them right to the brink of battlefield victory.

The feeling was strange.

They had won because of a single person.

Without the Fake Heavenly Demon, the Demonic Cult winning would have been unthinkable.

And yet he was happy.

Because—

Every one of them had truly done their best just to win one more match.

To avoid being discovered for one more day.

To hold the enemy back for one more day.

Because they couldn’t afford to fail, even for a single day.

“Really...”

They had done everything they could.

Maybe they’d win tomorrow.

Just like they had kept telling themselves these past few days.

Even after pushing the enemy back so successfully, anxiety still lingered.

Human psychology was unavoidable.

So he emptied his mind and gazed at the distant scenery.

“To think that all of this is a futile battle that will end tomorrow...”

He struck a dramatic pose and started spouting nonsense.

The Third Elder.

He too was, ultimately, just another For the Sake of Chivalry player.

“Fate itself is no different... huh?”

Message notifications suddenly began piling up at an incredible speed.

What?

Why are there so many?

Could it be that the Fake Heavenly Demon—no, the True Heavenly Demon—had lost?

Alone in his personal channel, the Third Elder screamed and started running around wildly, flailing his arms.

Had some massive disaster occurred?

Startled, he checked the messages.

His eyes widened.

“Huh? What? Really?”

Because everyone was cheering.

They won?

The Demonic Cult really won?

“We won! WAAAAAAAH!”

— We wonnnnn!!!

— We actually won this thing?!?!

— I came to see the hero of victory!

— Kyaaaa!!!

— Let’s have a gathering!

— Streamer, thank you...

Seo Jun stared in bewilderment at the viewer count, which continued climbing higher and higher.

How far is this thing going to rise?

When the game ended and the message announcing the Demonic Cult’s victory first appeared, everyone had been doubtful.

But after thinking about it carefully, it was easy to conclude that if the Demonic Cult hadn’t actually been the winning faction, then even a bug wouldn’t have produced a message like that.

As a result?

The viewer count was rising in real time.

Well.

The same was true for Ark’s stream.

And for the other streamers as well.

Everyone wanted to see the reactions.

— He actually made the Demonic Cult win  

I acknowledge him as the GOAT among all Heavenly Demons in history.

— I have no regrets now.

— Legendary. Just plain legendary.

— Heavenly Demon, thank you for your hard work.

Maybe it wasn’t really over yet, but who cared?

“But honestly, I think the Orthodox Faction players are the happiest right now?”

More than the Demonic Cult players celebrating, the Orthodox Faction players were busy mocking the Unorthodox Faction.

Originally, Seo Jun had planned to end the stream immediately after the game.

But now he felt like he should stay a little longer.

“Thank me? Heh. You guys worked even harder.”

So he sat back down.

It felt like the ending.

Everyone kept saying it was over, but in reality, it wasn’t quite over yet.

— They couldn’t even stop us for a single day  

— They should’ve at least tried isolating us like we did.

— Would that have worked?

— We won, and now all the losers are fighting among themselves 

What would it have changed if the Unorthodox Faction had tried isolation tactics like the Orthodox Faction?

The Demonic Cult had basically attacked as a unified force, so there were no reinforcement lines to cut off.

From the Unorthodox Faction’s perspective, wasting even a single day on a risky isolation strategy was impossible.

Did the Orthodox Faction players not know that?

Of course they did.

They were just talking trash to the losers.

Even though they themselves had lost first.

Of course, that wasn’t Seo Jun’s problem.

“That’s right. I think the Unorthodox Faction did everything they possibly could. Don’t you?”

Seo Jun had just said essentially the same thing as the Orthodox Faction.

— Kyaa. The composure of a winner.

— Tea-bagging mode ON.

— He’s about to start talking trash! Run!

— Streamer’s inner thoughts: “The losers should start taking their beating now, right?”

— Orthodox Faction, watch out too.

The moment Seo Jun opened his mouth, people were already preparing to flee.

Damn it.

“I think everyone fought really well.”

So he threw them a curveball.

“But honestly, the Demonic Cult fought the best.”

“And this is the result.”

Seo Jun brought the window back up.

“Am I wrong? You agree, right?”

Winning Faction: Demonic Cult

— Oh.

— Wholesome mode.

— True. Everyone fought well. Haha.

— Yep.

— If you lose, you keep quiet. 

— We’re going to hear Demonic Cult players saying this for the next six months. Please don’t start already!

Battlefield victories came with an unwritten rule:

Until the next battlefield opened, the winning faction gained temporary immunity from criticism.

The simple fact that he had done something good for the Demonic Cult left him feeling strangely conflicted.

In his previous life, they hadn’t fought all-out wars, but there had certainly been plenty of clashes.

Well, one victory for the Demonic Cult should be fine.

Mm.

Seo Jun smiled faintly.

They’ll never win again anyway.

Even if Seo Jun somehow split himself into five copies and entered the next battlefield, their odds of winning still wouldn’t exceed five percent.

Unless a ton of people switch over to the Demonic Cult because of this.

— See you next time, Demonic Cult!

— The streamer himself is leaving first  

— People will switch to the Demonic Cult, realize the Heavenly Demon Divine Art is garbage, and come right back  

— We just won today and you’re already talking about the next battlefield? You Orthodox Fraud and Unorthodox Shameless bastards!

— What are you talking about, Demonic Cult freak?  

Right.

Orthodox Fraud?

Unorthodox Shameless?

The nicknames fit surprisingly well.

What about the Demonic Cult?

Even after winning today, they were still “Demonic Cult Freaks.”

Anyway.

Watching everyone trade blows in chat, Seo Jun laughed along with his viewers.

Still, because the Demonic Cult had won, both the Orthodox and Unorthodox Factions were on the back foot.

“Oh. Hold on a second, everyone.”

Blue text appeared in his vision.

It was his first time seeing it.

But he knew exactly what it was.

A real-time message sent by the administrators to every player.

[First, many users seem curious about the message that appeared on the interface, so we would like to address that first.]

[The results were calculated correctly.]

— Oh!

[Hello. This is the administrator.]

— I knew it!

— We won!

The announcement appeared one line at a time, each new sentence pushing the previous ones upward.

[However, due to an error, only the winning faction message appeared ahead of schedule.]

[We sincerely apologize for unintentionally spoiling the result.]

[To all Demonic Cult users.]

[Congratulations on your victory in this battlefield.]

— We really won!

At last, it had been officially confirmed.

And right on cue, Seo Jun reopened the donation notifications he had left paused.

“Thank you for the donations, everyone. Wow, there are a lot piled up.”

— Kyaaa!!!

— Isn’t this the first time the administrator has personally congratulated a faction? I’m jealous!!

— Administrator fact: He’s a Demonic Cult player. He’s been waiting for this day ㅋㅋㅋㅋ

He had disabled donations during the final match so he could concentrate.

Then he forgot to turn them back on.

['Victory!' donated 150,000 won!]

[I believed in you.]

['Is It Real?' donated 30,000 won!]

[What kind of stunt did you pull this time?]

['Please' donated 50,000 won!]

[Be the Heavenly Demon forever!]

“Whoa there. Thank you for the donation, ‘I Believed in You.’”

That was only the beginning.

Just playing through the backlog of donations took over thirty minutes.

How much money had he earned today?

Judging by the timing of the earliest donations—right after people discovered the Demonic Cult had won—it seemed everyone had simply sent the donations they’d originally planned to send tomorrow.

“Looks like it’s over seven million won total? Thank you.”

— I want to be a streamer too!

— Me too!

['Streamer Is a Hard Job' donated 50,000 won!]

[If someone offered you seven million won to make the Demonic Cult win, would you do it?  ]

— You were actually keeping track? 

— Seven million won for one day’s work is insane.

When you put it that way, it really does sound like a brutal profession.

— Not “wouldn’t do it,” but “couldn’t do it.” ㅋ 

— This is how hard it is to make a living as a streamer.  

— Peak inefficiency. 

Anyway.

That was how it all ended.

“Alright everyone, thanks for the donations. Bye.”

Today’s stream.

And the twenty-day battlefield.

Had finally come to an end.