Chapter 102
CHAPTER 102
After getting out of the capsule, Seo Jun opened the My VR app.
This was where he could check messages from all of his game accounts.
And his For the Sake of Chivalry inbox was overflowing with notifications.
People he had met as allies and enemies alike.
Regardless of the results, they had all sent him friend requests.
And Seo Jun had accepted every single one.
As expected.
A game for veterans.
If he played through one more battlefield, it felt like they’d end up knowing his entire family history.
And eventually, they might even realize his greatest secret—that he remembered his previous life!
Seo Jun deliberately avoided reminding himself that nobody believed him even when he practically begged them to notice, and checked his messages instead.
[Cheonsalseong: Next time, I’ll definitely win!]
[Cheonsalseong: So make sure you participate in the next battlefield too! Who knows? Maybe I’ll give you another twelve-game winning streak.]
[HeavenlyDemon14: Sure.]
Seo Jun sent the reply and moved on.
It was Cheonsalseong, who had kept challenging him despite losing over and over.
The former Number One Under Heaven and the God of Sniping.
Even while Seo Jun had been attacking the Orthodox Faction, they had somehow crossed paths twice thanks to Cheonsalseong’s timing.
Each time, Seo Jun had been amazed.
So he can do things like that too.
[OnePenny: Please don’t come.]
People in the same faction really ought to coordinate their opinions.
[OnePenny: Just kidding.]
[OnePenny: If you do come, please join the Orthodox Faction.]
[OnePenny: Or don’t come at all.]
Seo Jun chuckled.
The moment he sent a reply, the unread mark disappeared.
Apparently OnePenny had read it immediately.
The “typing...” indicator appeared.
And stayed there.
But no reply came.
He must have had a lot on his mind.
Though it wasn’t exactly a difficult message to respond to.
Seo Jun moved on.
[HeavenlyDemon14: I’m thinking about joining the Unorthodox Faction next time. It’ll be hard for the Demonic Cult to win from now on.]
[Third Elder: If there are seven billion fans of HeavenlyDemon14 in this world, I will be one of them.]
[If there are one hundred million fans of HeavenlyDemon14 in this world, I will also be one of them.]
[If there are ten million fans of HeavenlyDemon14 in this world, I will still be one of them.]
[If there are one hundred fans of HeavenlyDemon14 in this world, I will still be one of them.]
[If there is only one fan of HeavenlyDemon14 in this world, that person is probably me.]
[If there are no fans of HeavenlyDemon14 left in this world, only then will I no longer exist.]
[HeavenlyDemon14, my love.]
[HeavenlyDemon14, my light.]
[HeavenlyDemon14, my darkness.]
[HeavenlyDemon14, my life.]
[HeavenlyDemon14, my joy.]
[HeavenlyDemon14, my sorrow.]
[HeavenlyDemon14, my pain.]
After reading it with a complicated expression, Seo Jun replied without the slightest hesitation.
[HeavenlyDemon14: If this ever shows up on a stream, you’re getting blocked.]
[Dang So: You can’t deny that about 10% of the Demonic Cult’s victory belongs to you!]
[Dang So: Well done!]
[Dang So: In the next battlefield, I...]
There were countless other messages as well.
People who had fought him and lost.
Demonic Cult players celebrating their victory.
And—
Seo Jun stopped reading.
Dang So was currently writing a lengthy self-promotion piece about how he would nobly lead the Demonic Cult to victory in the next battlefield.
Which clearly meant:
He wants to play together again.
That was all Seo Jun needed to know.
The rest was nonsense.
[Ark: Great work, Seo Jun! Would it be possible to get a few comments about your thoughts?]
[HeavenlyDemon14: I’ll think about it.]
[Dang So: Think about what?]
[Dang So: Don’t leave!]
[Dang So: Reply already! Aren’t you reading this right now?!]
Looks like Ark was trying to farm content for a video.
After thinking for a moment, Seo Jun replied.
[HeavenlyDemon14: I had fun. I’m satisfied with the victory.]
Then he moved on.
[HeavenlyDemon14: If I receive an invitation from Movie Soft, I’ll return as the Heavenly Demon then.]
[Ark: Thank you.]
This guy reads messages instantly too.
“Movie Soft will probably invite me.”
Apparently, players who finished within the Top 16 of the battlefield rankings were invited to special events or tournaments.
He had no idea what form they would take.
But just like the battlefield, they sounded fun.
So if he got invited, he would go.
“Though the Orthodox Faction got eliminated first, so there probably aren’t many Top 16 players from them.”
Previous battlefields existed, so there wouldn’t be none.
But the number would probably be low.
Of course, that wasn’t Seo Jun’s concern.
After sending his final reply, he turned off his phone.
“It’s really over.”
For the Sake of Chivalry.
A game with a very distinct identity.
And a rather unusual one at that.
The combat itself wasn’t particularly revolutionary, but the way martial arts had been adapted into game mechanics was fascinating.
And the faction rivalry had been genuinely fun.
If there was one regret—
It was that he never got a chance to face professional players.
No matter how skilled For the Sake of Chivalry veterans were with swords, and no matter how thoroughly they mastered the martial arts system, professionals existed on a completely different level.
Skill.
Instinct.
Intelligence.
In professional gaming, lacking even one of those could mean elimination.
“Well, it’d be difficult for pros to get into this game anyway.”
The battlefield itself required communication and connections just to participate in meaningful competition.
“The techniques are the real problem.”
Every game inevitably had a barrier to entry.
Character skills.
Skill properties.
Game systems.
Countless small details.
To newcomers, it all seemed overwhelming.
But surprisingly, those things usually took care of themselves.
As long as the game was fun.
Many gamers eventually found themselves knowing the abilities of over a hundred characters without even realizing it, simply because they kept playing and watching related content.
That wasn’t the real issue.
The real issue was the techniques.
The martial arts techniques.
“The techniques are the problem.”
Every game inevitably has a barrier to entry.
Each character’s skills and the traits of those skills.
The game’s systems and countless little details.
To a newcomer, all of it can seem overwhelming.
But surprisingly, most people naturally absorb those things just by playing.
As long as they enjoy the game.
There are plenty of gamers who suddenly realize one day that they somehow know the skills of over a hundred characters simply because they kept playing and watching related videos.
For the Sake of Chivalry was no different.
That is, if the top-ranked players had only researched techniques to a reasonable degree.
Just a reasonable degree.
“There has to be a limit.”
They had been consumed by the concept.
These people dug deeper and deeper into techniques as if they were actual martial artists, and anyone trying to catch up would need to invest an absurd amount of time.
They had created a gap so deep that it could never be bridged by simply enjoying the game casually.
There was a reason Lee Dongsu had chosen the Green Forest Sect when playing casually.
Of course, none of that applied to him.
“Ah, that was fun.”
Seo Jun smiled.
“And I achieved my goal too.”
He had finally hit thirty thousand viewers during the broadcast.
Unlike EyeTube, there wasn’t some special button awarded for reaching a certain number of viewers, but this was enough to say he had built the level of recognition needed to be almost guaranteed a spot in Rios.
“Even if it’s a bubble.”
Now that he was done with For the Sake of Chivalry, nobody knew how many viewers would remain.
Still, the general consensus was that he would maintain at least a respectable mid-tier streamer status for a while.
The impact of what he had accomplished wasn’t going anywhere.
And with the battlefield now over, people probably wouldn’t quit For the Sake of Chivalry in huge numbers either.
“Tomorrow’s a day off. The day after too.”
It wasn’t because he wanted to rest.
Not entirely.
Having too many viewers could be a problem as well.
If he planned to continue For the Sake of Chivalry, that would be one thing.
But he didn’t.
He needed a period where only the viewers who genuinely wanted to stay would remain.
If he only cared about short-term numbers, streaming every day would be best.
But in the long run, this approach would be healthier.
Besides, he really did need a break.
Anyone who’s going to leave will leave anyway.
And he had things to do tomorrow.
The next morning.
After finishing his workout, Seo Jun checked the announcement he had posted on EyeTube.
I’ll be taking a two-day break.
I believe I’ve earned the right to be lazy.
— Hyung, do you actually want to die?
— This reminds me of when you ended the stream right before finishing the hidden quest during Dawn of the Assassins and then took a break.
— I’m getting PTSD
— You should probably start apologizing right now.
— Streamer... I’m already cold... just open the stream now...
— This guy led the Demonic Cult to victory???
— You all donated so much yesterday that he became lazy. Reflect on your actions.
— I donated 100,000 won yesterday. If I request a refund, will he give it back?
— What streamer takes a break at a time like this?!
Two whole days?!
— Thanks for winning the battlefield, but this isn’t acceptable, hyung.
Mind sharing your address? ^^
After quickly scrolling through the thousand-plus comments, Seo Jun thought:
The reaction is pretty average.
It wasn’t much different from the chat messages he normally saw during streams.
Looks like he had written the announcement well.
Posting it at exactly 6 a.m.—the time viewers usually went to sleep—had apparently paid off.
Satisfied, Seo Jun nodded and closed the announcement before opening his email.
His inbox was full of sponsorship offers for upcoming game releases.
All of them were scheduled to launch within the week.
Doing one sponsored stream before moving on to the next game would be perfect timing.
The offers were tempting.
But he could only choose one.
Naturally.
They were competing titles.
And the game Seo Jun had tentatively chosen was a two-player co-op title developed by Monster.
The conditions were the best.
Twenty million won.
Movie Soft paid ten million, but that was an exceptional case.
Normally, that kind of offer went to established mid-sized streamers with four to five hundred thousand subscribers and a stable audience of ten to twenty thousand viewers.
Even if all eyes were currently on Seo Jun, EyeTube wasn’t exactly the strongest platform.
However, the payment wasn’t the reason he chose it.
The game looked fun.
He hadn’t become obsessed with horror just because a game company had asked about it in an email before.
The theme was horror.
But the actual genre was a two-player cooperative action-adventure game.
That’s right.
Games where two or more players cooperate against a common enemy were generally called co-op games.
And Seo Jun had always wanted to try one.
Even though the sponsorship date was only three days away, he still hadn’t made his final decision.
[Han Jimin: Boss! Tell me who you're doing the sponsorship with! I'm curious!]
[Jin Seo Jun: No.]
Since it was a co-op game, the streaming partner mattered a lot.
But Monster had contacted him saying that keeping the partner secret would be more fun.
They had offered to tell him beforehand if he was curious.
Still.
Seo Jun had already made it clear that if he didn’t like the choice, he would reject the deal even if only three days remained.
The company had accepted that condition.
So he let it go.
He assumed they had a good reason for wanting to keep it a secret.
“I should get going.”
It was currently 8 a.m.
The meeting was at 4 p.m., leaving eight hours until then.
But he was still a university student.
He had classes to attend.
So he stood up.
“Huh? What are you doing?”
As soon as he stepped out of his room, he spotted Taewoo lying on the couch in outdoor clothes, staring at his phone.
Normally, after being dragged to the gym by Seo Jun, Taewoo would have been asleep again by now.
Seeing him awake surprised Seo Jun.
“Oh. I need to head out soon. Just getting ready.”
“Really?”
Seo Jun didn’t think much of it.
No matter how much Taewoo loved games, he wasn’t the type to spend his entire life under a blanket.
Click.
After opening the front door and stepping outside, Seo Jun headed toward the bus stop.
Then a troubling thought crossed his mind.
There’s no way my co-op partner is going to be him... right?
The possibility left him with an uneasy feeling.
Still, considering Taewoo was already dressed and preparing to leave somewhere himself, it didn’t seem very likely.