Chapter 19
Lee Dongsoo finished his 30-minute run and went over to the gym master.
“Dongsoo.”
“Yes.”
“I’ll tell you the points you need to be careful about during sparring. Sparring is meant to test your skills and improve your abilities, not to knock out your opponent.”
Dongsoo looked up at the gym master and thought.
If he were born in the old days, he’d definitely be a bandit leader.
“…So, make sure to be polite, don’t get excited, don’t go all out, and… are you listening?”
“Huh? Yes, of course.”
In reality, he hadn’t heard a thing.
‘Well, I’ll just think of it as a practice match.’
Though Dongsoo was still young, he had the sportsmanship of a professional athlete.
Sometimes he had childish thoughts, though.
“Okay then, we’ll start once they finish. In the meantime, think about the techniques you want to practice in the sparring. You haven’t learned much yet.”
“Yes, got it!”
“Good, that’s the spirit!”
The gym master ruffled Dongsoo’s hair as he spoke.
“But have you decided who you’ll spar with?”
The fighters who came here also liked games.
When virtual reality games first came out, many predicted that combat sports would be the first to become obsolete. However, as virtual reality games became more popular, combat sports saw a rise in popularity as well.
The flashy skills in the game and the primal, bloody fights in reality turned out to be complementary rather than substitutive.
And above all, virtual reality games were simply fun for the fighters.
So, Dongsoo was bound to be popular in the gym.
Among men, being good at games makes you a god.
And being an 18-year-old professional gamer, ranked 2nd in the world in the most popular game, with a good personality?
It’s harder not to become friends with him.
So, the gym master wasn’t particularly worried.
“Choose whoever you want without pressure. They’ll all go easy on you.”
In sparring, the opponent is crucial.
If the opponent doesn’t match your level, you might gain nothing from the sparring, and the risk of injury increases.
And if the opponent is much more skilled and has a nasty personality?
Bang! Bang!
In the area they were looking at, sparring was in full swing.
The gym master watched contentedly, with a resigned smile.
Jin Seojun.
That crazy guy is back, trampling the rookies.
‘He’s here to blow off some steam again. Just avoid him.’
The gym master recalled the past, watching a confident rookie about to debut being toyed with by Seojun.
When a handsome high school student, looking just like his father, approached him saying, “Teach me some modern martial arts,” he should have realized.
That he was a crazy guy.
If Dongsoo was the cute younger brother that everyone wanted to play with, that guy was like…
A stinging nettle.
The master nodded to himself, thinking he’d found the perfect metaphor.
“Touch him, and he’ll sting you. His natural talent, whose origin is unknown, is undeniable.”
“No, even if he stays still, he’ll come at you and sting you. Even today, after a long absence, he didn’t do the exercises he was supposed to but instead hovered around the players, giving unsolicited advice until he ended up fighting with a newbie who didn’t know anything.”
“Someone who knows better should have stopped him. Seo-jun doesn’t know how to moderate.”
The gym master glared at the other players who hadn’t intervened to stop Seo-jun. They were watching the ring with keen interest, as if watching a distant fire.
“I’ll have to give some comfort today.”
The gym master sighed and turned to the side. He noticed Lee Dong-soo looking at Seo-jun and started feeling anxious.
‘That’s not right. You won’t gain anything by facing him.’
The reason Seo-jun wasn’t kicked out of the gym despite his unsolicited advice and his tendency to toy with others using his exceptional skills was simple: strangely, the performance of the players who took his advice improved.
‘It’s not because Seo-jun’s dad enrolled the entire family in the gym, nor because I’m waiting to recruit him into this field someday.’
Indeed.
Think about it: even though nettles have toxic thorns on their stems and leaves, if you remove those thorns, they become a nutritious and versatile plant.
Seo-jun was a useful presence to the players. But to Lee Dong-soo, Seo-jun was just a nettle in its raw state, with all its thorns intact.
Seo-jun had never initiated a fight with non-athletes, knowing his limits. However, that was only when others didn’t provoke him first.
“Isn’t that guy unavailable?”
Lee Dong-soo finally said something he absolutely shouldn’t have.
The gym master turned his eyes away and pointed to someone else.
“Oh, that guy?”
The gym master responded in a barely audible voice, like an ant crawling.
“No. Where are you pointing? That’s too different.”
Lee Dong-soo scratched his head awkwardly.
“How about that guy sparring over there? I haven’t seen him before. Would it be rude to ask him?”
“Oh! Yeah, that’s really rude and inconsiderate. Let’s ask someone you know. Or I can do it for you.”
It had been a long time since the gym master had held the mitts, and now he was about to spar.
Despite feeling relieved internally, the gym master let out a sigh of relief.
Meanwhile, Lee Dong-soo felt a deep sense of regret.
The reason was that even Shin Ha-yeon was impressed after watching a video of the streamer Jin Seo-jun.
‘Does Min-hyeon get that excited and Ha-yeon noona get impressed to that extent?’
Lee Dong-soo couldn’t accept it.
He had planned to replicate Seo-jun’s play in “Dawn of the Assassins” this afternoon.
Park Min-hyeon was a teammate he respected, and Shin Ha-yeon was an object of admiration for him.
The fact that they recognized someone else was unacceptable.
And now, he had the chance to directly face and defeat his rival in reality without playing a game. Missing this opportunity was frustrating.
“Well, I guess there’s no other choice.”
Since it wasn’t polite.
“Then, gym master, please spar with me.”
Lee Dong-soo quickly got over his disappointment and prepared for sparring, stretching the moves he had learned over the past two weeks.
The gym master, smiling warmly, fetched protective gear and corrected Dong-soo’s stance.
A harmonious atmosphere prevailed.
Until he came.
Someone approached them.
The gym master saw who it was and sighed, looking at the ring.
The newbie had a dazed look of shock, staring blankly into space.
And there he was, the scary guy, calmly and indifferently removing his headgear, as if nothing had happened.
“Hey. I heard you earlier. Want to spar with me?”
The gym master’s plan to secure a pro-gamer customer base through Lee Dong-soo seemed to collapse.
“Oh? Sure, I’d love to. You’re Seo-jun, right?”
“How did you know my name?”
“I watched your stream. Is it okay if I call you hyung?”
Seo-jun didn’t expect to be recognized so quickly, showing the influence of his streaming.
“Yeah, do as you like.”
“Let’s do this right now.”
They both got into the ring.
“Hyung, you’re pretty good at games, but not as good as me.”
“Okay, but who are you?”
Lee Dong-soo tried to provoke Seo-jun.
However, it had no effect on Seo-jun since he didn’t even know who Lee Dong-soo was.
Even if he did know, it probably wouldn’t have mattered.
Lee Dong-soo was momentarily shocked and wondered if Seo-jun was provoking him back, but then he remembered that Seo-jun had only started playing games three days ago and regained his fighting spirit.
“I’ll tell you after I win. It’ll be an honor to know later.”
“Alright. Here I come.”
As soon as Seo-jun finished speaking, he threw a jab, and as his fist connected with Lee Dong-soo’s face, Lee Dong-soo thought,
‘Sparring is supposed to be courteous, right…?’
Thwack!
That day, Lee Dong-soo added “Dawn of the Assassins” to his game library, realizing that he was out of his league in real life.
Seo-jun and his father, Jin Ha-jun, were on their way home from the gym.
Actually, they lived next door to each other, or more accurately, they both lived in a building owned by Ha-jun.
This was because Ha-jun’s wife wanted to keep their son, who was eager to move out as soon as he became an adult, close by.
They found a compromise, and it was decided that Ha-jun would offer the adjacent apartment at half the rent.
Of course, Ha-jun’s opinion as the landlord wasn’t really considered.
“Seo-jun, you should’ve gone easy on him. He seemed like a regular guy.”
Seo-jun had already made several players quit the gym.
He was ruthless.
“It’s fine. From the way he moved, he seems to have talent comparable to a decent fighter. He’s probably just building up his body.”
In the end, Lee Dong-soo couldn’t tell Seo-jun that he was a pro-gamer.
“Is that so? How’s your streaming going?”
“Well, unlike Mom, you don’t oppose it as strongly now that you know it’s safe. But streaming is tough, right?”
Ha-jun had heard from Tae-woo that it’s hard for new streamers to get even a single viewer.
“If I can give you a tip, try playing ‘Spacecraft’. PC games are becoming popular again, and you could seize that blue ocean. What do you think?”
Ha-jun was a hardcore PC gamer.
He wasn’t recommending it because he thought capsule gaming was dangerous for his son.
And the notion that PC gaming was trending wasn’t true either.
“Is that really popular?”
“Never mind that, how many viewers do you get?”
“Last time, I had 440 viewers, but if I start the stream today…”
Ha-jun was shocked to hear that he had 440 viewers.
“With 3,000 followers, I expect at least 1,500 viewers.”
“Cough.”
Ha-jun spat out his coffee, surprised by the unexpectedly high numbers.
“Why is it so high?”
“I guess I was lucky.”
Seo-jun’s follower count had jumped to 1,000 right after his collaboration stream.
Considering he originally had around 400 followers, this was a big increase.
Then, Lee Soo-han had edited the key moments into YouTube Shorts.
Those Shorts climbed to 15th place in the trending game videos, and Seo-jun’s followers increased by another 2,000.
This showed the influence of YouTube Shorts.
“You must have been really lucky… You didn’t do anything weird to get attention, did you? If you did, your mom would take away your capsule immediately.”
Ha-jun shivered at the thought.
“Do you think I’d do that?”
“Not really… but getting 3,000 followers so quickly is a lot.”
Actually, Seo-jun and Tae-woo had considered 1,000 followers as their minimum goal.
Before starting his stream, Seo-jun briefly checked the community.
The community was filled with posts about him and the collaboration stream with Alpaca from the previous day.
Seo-jun set the stream to start at the same time as the previous day and started reviewing the posts.
[About Seo-jun currently on the stream]
[Regarding what’s happening on Alpaca’s stream right now]
[Betting 250,000 points on 1% real-time: the biggest sucker in history]
– [A few years’ worth of memories just gone like that, idiot lol]
– [Seriously, a beast’s heart]
– [That’s Jo Am lolololol]
– (best) [If this hits, I’ll grill meat in the middle of Myeongdong on Christmas Eve]
ㄴ [Isn’t this an old best comment pledge? The person who said they’d sing and the person who said they’d play the tambourine should come out quickly.]
– [I’ll sing]
ㄴ [I’ll take care of the tambourine]
Seo-jun scrolled down to check the replies posted later.
[??????????????? Why did it actually hit? Why???]
ㄴ [Don’t delete the comment]
ㄴ [Guys, we’re screwed.]
[Some earned 25 million points, while others are going to face public humiliation in Myeongdong lol]
[Richard Neville Unmatched Strategy]
– (best) [Oh? Lol, if you analyze the video and try a few times, you’ll soon destroy his armor and beat Richard, right?]
ㄴ [Just tried it, and I barely destroyed the gauntlet on the 10th attempt, then got my head split by Richard right after. Give up on it.]
[So Seo-jun challenged it in one go and destroyed everything?]
[That doesn’t make sense. Really, wait, but why am I the best comment?]
ㄴ [You’ve been immortalized.]
[What’s Gyeol, and why does it have its own skill?]
[Someone check on the overlord instead?]
[How did Seo-jun find Gyeol? It doesn’t make sense.]
[Beware of haters: I’m the owner of 25 million points real-time lol]
[Predicting weak spot detection conditions]
[Aww damn, Seo-jun is ridiculously handsome. Unfollowed immediately.]
Each of these posts had more than 30 upvotes.
No more posts discrediting Seo-jun’s popularity appeared.
At least within this community, most people knew who Seo-jun was.
But then.
[Seo-jun, check this out lololololol]
Following the link Taewoo sent, Seo-jun found a post that had been downvoted and hidden.
When Seo-jun clicked to view the content:
[Reasons why streamer Seo-jun is a hacker]
Although written earnestly and at length, the summary claimed that since Seo-jun could see Gyeol in the stream, and no one else could, he must be either a game developer or a hacker.
Naturally, the post received a flood of downvotes and was hidden, but checking the link Taewoo sent revealed a few more posts with similar claims.
Seo-jun burst out laughing.
He recalled Taewoo’s words, “Once you become famous, you’ll get criticized for other things.”
Upon reflection, the idea of being a game developer seemed somewhat credible.
With a smile, Seo-jun reported the posts on the Dawn of the Assassins website and entered his gaming capsule.
After writing the stream title, he started streaming.
[Okay. I confessed.]
‘Does this mean I’ll have to do an explanation stream on the third day?’
It was a silly thought.
It wasn’t really an explanation stream.
‘How many will join?’
Seo-jun’s lips curled up in anticipation.
[Viewers: 400]
Just seconds after starting, 400 viewers joined.
[Viewers: 700]
[Viewers: 1,300]
[Viewers: 1,500]
After about a minute.
Seeing the numbers far exceeding the minimum Taewoo and he had anticipated, and the rapidly filling chat, Seo-jun greeted them.
“Hello, everyone.”
