Episode 19

After laughing out loud like that, it suddenly occurred to me that bursting into laughter alone in my room was kind of embarrassing. There wasn’t anyone else here, but still—it felt a little ridiculous.

As I cleared my throat and caught my breath, trying to calm down, Retake, who had been kneeling, suddenly made his character spring to his feet. Someone must have passed along my request to tell Retake to stop crying, because he stopped that whole crying-and-apologizing act. Though maybe as a replacement, he now set himself to walking mode and started circling around me.

I straightened my disheveled posture and looked at the secondary monitor, where Retake’s stream was showing. The chat was in chaos, so I turned on the sound and heard him arguing back against criticism like, “How could you just curse at the other person out of nowhere?” with, “You guys didn’t know it would turn out like this either!” With reactions that funny, of course people couldn’t help teasing him.

Anyway, it didn’t seem like he had flipped me off by accident… I tried calling the guild members through guild chat. Since there were people who watched Retake’s stream religiously, I wondered if any of them had seen what Adam said.

[Guild] Honeybun : anyone watching Retake’s stream?

I waited a moment, but somehow there was no response at all. When I opened the guild window and checked the locations of the only two guild members currently online, they were inside a dungeon. Ceylon Tea and Nickjung seemed to have found a tank and gone farming in the meantime.

Those two were farming, so there was no way they were watching the stream. Romantic was at work, Solo was at performance practice, and Summoner-hyung had afternoon class. Who should I ask?

I held my phone and thought about it for a while, then put it back down and tapped on the keyboard.

[General] Honeybun : anyone been watching Retake’s stream this whole time??

[General] Socks Are Socks : Me

[General] Calm : Mee

When I asked in general chat, two Bia who had been watching us hurriedly typed replies. Then both characters scurried over and sat down beside mine.

[General] Honeybun : what did Adam say

[General] Honeybun : that made Retake flip me off

[General] Honeybun : did you see?

[General] Socks Are Socks : Ah.... lolololololol

Socks suddenly burst out laughing. Why were they laughing?

While I was waiting for Socks’s next words, Retake, who had left his character standing still for a moment while he talked to his viewers, moved. He stuck close to me, looked back and forth between Socks and Calm, then looked up at me again.

I clicked on Retake’s character too. Honeybun’s head turned that way, and when Retake saw that, he inched one more step closer and stuck to me. He seemed curious about what we were talking about.

[General] Socks Are Socks : So

[General] Socks Are Socks : I don’t remember exactly but

[General] Socks Are Socks : Adam basically went, Commander-in-Chief, who was peeping at the Bia while waiting~ If you have anything you’d like to say about the current situation?

[General] Socks Are Socks : and Retake got pissed at the “peeping at” part and gave him the finger

[General] Calm : yeah lol to add some details

[General] Calm : while the Bia were talking to each other, Retake got some kind of exploration mission

An exploration mission? Since he couldn’t participate in the conversation and would have had nothing to do while I progressed the story, did they put that in for him?

[General] Socks Are Socks : lololol ah that;

[General] Calm : as soon as he clicked your wings the NPCs suddenly went quiet and the mood got icy

[General] Calm : so Retake was like, did I maybe... click somewhere... weird??

[General] Calm : he was totally freaked out lololol

[General] Calm : he thought the mood got like that because he clicked something like the character’s butt

[General] Calm : but right after he realized it wasn’t because of him and that the conversation just had that kind of mood

[General] Calm : Adam suddenly laughed and said something about peeping

[General] Calm : so Retake got pointlessly worked up... lololol

[General] Calm : in the heat of the moment lololol

[General] Calm : he didn’t curse on purpose lol

So Retake got an exploration mission and was examining my character’s wings, but the atmosphere on our side turned cold, so he thought he had touched somewhere inappropriate and got scared for a moment. Then after he realized that wasn’t the case, he flipped off Adam for teasing him. Was that it?

……He flipped off an NPC over something like that? When Dusk only has a handful of free-response input prompts? Anyway, if you only heard his voice, you’d think he was mild-mannered, but he’s got a temper in him.

I was just admiring that anew when it happened. Since I’d been distracted listening to the situation through general chat, my ears perked up when Retake suddenly mentioned my nickname.

— “Should I try inviting Honeybun-nim to the stream?”

The stream? Me?

Invite? Me?

Shocked by the completely unexpected remark, I looked at the sub-monitor. Retake rambled on, adding things about the hidden story and whatnot, and the chat window’s reaction was unexpectedly very positive. Before long, Calm spoke to me in general chat too.

[General] Calm : Looks like Retake wants to invite Honeybun-nim onto the stream?

I know. I’m listening too. But I didn’t want to let on that I was watching the stream, so I gave a simple reply.

[General] Honeybun : Huh

After hitting enter, I thought it over. Getting to talk with Retake was a fairly welcome prospect, but separately from that, going on a stream made me uncomfortable. I thought the most suitable relationship between Retake and me was about the level of killing and being killed in-game.

In fact, even back when fighting with me became the main content of his stream, I’d worried that it might actually have a negative effect on Retake. Only after combing through every community and checking the stream reactions did I feel relieved, because fortunately, most viewers accepted fighting with me as main content.

But if that was the line viewers were willing to tolerate, crossing any further past it might cause Retake a big loss.

Even if the chat window was welcoming me, those weren’t the only viewers. Viewers who quietly watched the stream or only picked out edited videos might be displeased with me. Even if I couldn’t be of help to Retake, at the very least, I didn’t want to be a nuisance.

Resting my chin on my hand and listening to the stream, I heard his voice sounding as if he was deep in thought. It seemed he intended to invite me over for story analysis and talk about this and that.

— “Until now, there hasn’t been a single person among the Divine Knights who said they saw a hidden story, but Honeybun-nim got paired with me, so Honeybun-nim should be the only person who has seen the Divine Knight hidden story… I’m curious about a lot of things too, like what kind of story happened before meeting me, and whether the story as a whole changes like it does for Assassins. And for me, getting to have a proper conversation with Honeybun-nim is something I’m pretty excited about. ……Ah, is the Bia next to Honeybun-nim right now one of the viewers?”

Whether Socks or Calm had posted something in chat, Retake continued in a pleased tone.

— “Then could you please ask Honeybun-nim if they’d be willing to come onto the stream and at least have a quick conversation with me? Voice chat would be best, but please tell them chat is fine too.”

I could sense the anticipation mixed into Retake’s voice. Maybe because I intended to refuse, my chest pricked for no reason.

[General] Socks Are Socks : Honeybun-nim Retake-nim says come to the stream and at least have a quick talk

[General] Socks Are Socks : he says voice chat would be best but chat is fine too

I paused for a bit, then slowly pressed the keyboard. How should I put it so Retake would think, That’s too bad, but it can’t be helped, and move on?

[General] Honeybun : Um... sry

[General] Honeybun : I’m kinda really shy about going on streams

[General] Don’tSmokeOnTheStreet : ?? You?

What do you mean, “you?” A person can be shy on stream.

[Whisper] Honeybun >> Don’tSmokeOnTheStreet : shut it

[General] Don’tSmokeOnTheStreet : I’m pretty sure when you first traded with me

[General] Don’tSmokeOnTheStreet : even though we’d never met you KakaoTalked me and voice-called me like I was your friend

[General] Don’tSmokeOnTheStreet : asked me what snacks I wanted

[General] Don’tSmokeOnTheStreet : and seeing you casually drop formalities, I thought your sociability was something else;

[Whisper] Honeybun >> Don’tSmokeOnTheStreet : ㅡㅡ

[General] Don’tSmokeOnTheStreet : You definitely gave off the vibe that if you took an MBTI test you’d be an E, hmm;;

How did he know?