Chapter 120

Oh Ji-hye, the head of the Surface Research and Development Center, was watching intently beyond the screen.

On the monitor directly in front of her, she could see the gameplay of Seo-jun, who had entered the highest-grade capsule located a few meters away.

And on the monitor attached next to it, Seo-jun’s physical responses were being collected in real time.

These data were also saved and sent to her when Seo-jun played the game with the capsule at home.

“That is only natural.”

Originally, if a user showed abnormal physical responses, Surface could know it immediately.

In addition, in order to make safer capsules, they also collected data only from those who consented.

However, for just one person, they simply asked for the data without giving any choice, and that was Seo-jun.

Of course, there was no need for Oh Ji-hye to check Seo-jun’s data herself.

“After all, if even a slight problem occurs, they will let me know on their own.”

Even so, she looked over Seo-jun’s data every day.

Safety was just a side benefit; the biggest reason was pure curiosity.

“It is truly fascinating.”

The test that Seo-jun was currently undergoing was a program called the combat simulator.

The creator was her.

Seo-jun was currently dealing with virtual enemies that surrounded him.

The purpose of the program was to observe the physical reactions that appeared in the numerous situations that could occur in battle.

Since many virtual reality games contained combat where one directly moved their body,

she had created the program thinking that instead of having to perform other exercises, it would be better to just implement a combat situation and see how they reacted immediately.

And she was currently in admiration.

“The highest rank came out again.”

Other responses were not bad.

Dozens of values related to the body were at appropriate levels, and several reactions related to brain waves were also at a good level considering the assimilation rate.

However, the in-game reaction speed it took from seeing an attack to parrying it was different.

[Reaction Speed: Highest]

A value that could only appear when someone whose reflexes in the real world were in the top 0.01% had a high assimilation rate to transmit them without loss was appearing now.

Even though it should not appear for Seo-jun, who had a low assimilation rate.

Since she had set the standard itself to display ‘Highest’ when one moved the moment they saw an attack and parried it even faster than the fastest possible speed, it was physically impossible.

Yet, ‘Highest’ appeared.

“Let’s just check if it works well one last time.”

Oh Ji-hye typed on the keyboard and turned off the combat pattern of the program.

This simulator moved according to a specific pattern.

The purpose of the pattern was one.

To generate a combat experience that was appropriate for the playing user to react to, while creating complex and numerous situations.

Oh Ji-hye turned off that pattern, and immediately after it was changed to random, the combat situation began to become messy.

Naturally. All attacks that could possibly come out just popped out randomly without any context.

Disorder, neither difficult nor easy.

Although it would become difficult to see a proper reaction, against Seo-jun, she had to do this to see it properly.

Oh Ji-hye turned off the program and checked the final values while waiting for Seo-jun to come out.

[Reaction Speed: High]

This was Seo-jun’s real reaction speed.

Since even this value was close to impossible to appear considering Seo-jun’s assimilation rate, it could serve as proof that Seo-jun utilized his body to the absolute limit.

It also meant that his physical specifications in reality were incredibly outstanding.

Then, what was the ‘Highest’ from earlier?

Seo-jun came out of the capsule, and Oh Ji-hye spoke.

“Good work today. There are no abnormalities in your body, and I lost again. You know it too, right? That you won.”

“I have no choice but to know.”

It was because he had read the patterns.

In short, instead of seeing and reacting, Seo-jun had moved in advance, which allowed the ‘Highest’ to appear.

‘Although there must be an intention since the pattern has a purpose.’

How many possibilities were there, yet he read the next attack!

Even Oh Ji-hye only set up the formula and could never predict the result, leaving the calculations to the machine, yet he predicted that?

It could not help but evoke admiration.

“At this rate, I have to update the patterns again! I will have to add more, much more variables.”

This was a small battle between Seo-jun and Oh Ji-hye.

Since there had been absolutely no one who predicted the next attack besides Seo-jun until now, the update was actually not necessary.

Even so, Oh Ji-hye, who kept updating it every time, was a person with quite a competitive spirit.

And Seo-jun was also someone who would not back down.

“Director, there are no other problems, right?”

“Yes.”

Oh Ji-hye, who checked Seo-jun’s data every day, replied.

As mentioned earlier, it was not because of safety.

It was just because she could see when the brain waves appeared during the gameplay through the data to check whether he predicted it or saw and reacted, and she was curious about this.

A prediction close to foresight that only Seo-jun could show!

In the past, Oh Ji-hye, who knew of this talent, had wished for Seo-jun to return to this world.

However, the problem was the price.

‘Although he has the reward money from before and his family seems to be well-off.’

Being able to buy it and actually buying it were strictly different.

Therefore, she threw the bait.

And Oh Ji-hye was confident.

She was confident that once he entered again, he would not want to leave.

That expectation hit the mark, and Oh Ji-hye showed a satisfied expression, thinking that it was a good thing she had pushed him in the end.

“Ah, Seo-jun. The announcement for the LiOS registration will be posted today.”

The reason why she had asked if he could come today.

“It is today, then.”

“Yes, and with your current number of viewers, you will definitely be able to participate. Congratulations.”

Oh Ji-hye was acquainted with the people related to LiOS, and if Seo-jun did not cause any trouble during his streaming, she had planned to recommend him directly later.

If she told them about Seo-jun’s past, they would surely show interest.

However, since he succeeded as a streamer like this, there was no need to move separately.

“Thank you.”

“Still, you know it’s hard to win, right? Since it is a team game.”

“Well, I know that well. I have done it before.”

“Right. So if I were to give you a tip, hide your strength even a little bit until the team is formed.”

“Pardon? Why?”

Seo-jun wore a curious expression.

“LiOS forms teams by having the team leaders auction for team members. However, the probability of you becoming a team leader is low.”

“Yes.”

For team leaders, they mainly chose long-time streamers who had long careers, were highly recognized among streamers, and had built various chemistry.

Seo-jun was a newcomer, so to speak.

There wouldn’t be any major problems, but from the organizer’s perspective, hosting the tournament with Seo-jun as a team leader was definitely a choice they would avoid unless there was no other alternative.

“Then you will become an auction item, but in the past, these items appealed to others immensely to be sold at a high price.”

“It is good to be recognized, after all.”

“Yes, but everyone realized by the end of the first tournament that being auctioned off at a high price comes with a serious problem.”

That was because the higher the price they were auctioned off for, the fewer points the team leader had left to bid on other team members.

“Meaning the more expensive I am, the lower the probability that other expensive items will join the team, right?”

“Yes, that’s right. So they try to downplay themselves as much as possible. If you hide your strength just a little bit, you will probably benefit greatly too.”

Even if she said that, she thought he wouldn’t care anyway.

Oh Ji-hye let out a dumbfounded laugh at Seo-jun’s following reply.

“I see. Since I am already in the habit of only showing thirty percent of my power, it should be fine.”

“I don’t think that’s the case at all. Ah, and when are you going to reveal that you played the game in the past? I’m curious.”

“Well, how famous could I have been? Even if we look at it, it was in the early days back then.”

“Still, wouldn’t a lot of people know? Far more than you think?”

“No way.”

***

Having finished preparing to start streaming, Seo-jun pressed the back button briefly just before hitting the start broadcast button.

The place he entered after that was Travel.

Among them, it was the category for The League.

– 1.185 million watching

More than one million people; this number amounted to 4% in terms of viewership rating.

It meant that a single category on a streaming platform was on par with the viewership rating of the most popular variety show.

It was a simple example showing how great the influence was.

As such, naturally, countless streamers flocked to this category.

‘Did they say the number of streamers alone easily exceeds ten thousand?’

That was not all.

Here, several major corporate-level streamers who were the majors among majors would turn on their streams at the same time.

Additionally, it was basic for mid-sized streamers to always be packed tightly.

Such was the ecosystem.

A fierce ecosystem where the more viewers there were, the more streamers there were.

And now, finally, Seo-jun was setting foot in that place.

Seo-jun set the broadcast category and then pressed the start button.

[Starting the stream]

-Seo-hi

-Seo-hi

-Has the stream host arrived?

-Seo-hi

The viewers who possessed excellent reflexes and clicked as soon as they received the notification typed in the chat one after another to greet him.

“Hello. Nice to meet you. Yes, today is The League.”

-New game, whoa

-I’m curious what kind of trolling he’ll show us today, lololol

-Noob guy, go cause trouble again

-If he gets support, he’ll probably eat all the minions himself, lololololol

-No, no, he definitely won’t know where to go, abandon his lane, and go somewhere else

Chats containing spoilers could be seen.

However, this time, he was not a real noob.

So, Seo-jun spoke like this.

“Everyone, I have studied. I even decided on my nickname already, you know?”

Seo-jun launched The League.

-This isn’t it!

-Why do you keep deciding on such important things on your own?

-For real, lol. If you’re a streamer, you should spin a roulette.

-It’s Heavenly Demon, right? Heavenly Demon, right? Heavenly Demon, right?

-I’m so damn curious what he chose, lol

He too had intended to decide on the nickname after discussing it with the viewers this time.

Because deciding on a nickname was originally the hardest task!

If not at times like this, when would he borrow the power of collective intelligence?

However, he had received a message from Han Ji-min yesterday when she was checking the emails.

Namely, that someone had bought a nickname in The League to give to Seo-jun.

‘Did she say they bought it for one million won?’

Even if only out of gratitude, he checked it once, and since he liked the nickname, Seo-jun immediately contacted them and logged into the game.

The method of buying and bringing over a nickname was simple.

One just had to create an account with that nickname at the exact moment the owner changed it to another nickname.

The ID obtained that way was…

[Sword God]

-A rare nickname… right?

-Whoa! Sword God!

-Did you buy it?

-How much does something like that cost? Lol

-In the end, did you betray us for the Orthodox Faction! You bastard!

Seo-jun immediately corrected them. It was not that he corrected the fact that he betrayed the Demonic Sect.

“I didn’t buy it, but fortunately, one of the viewers gifted it to me, so I decided to go with this. Thank you once again to the person who gifted it.”

-Ah…

-Hey, you Demonic Sect bastards, we even won the championship, shouldn’t you present him with the Heavenly Demon nickname?

-We should reflect a bit

-Anyway, does this mean he will only carry swords in this game too? Lol

-Since you named it like that, you must not play a mage. You know that, right?

-Are we going with a foot-slogger?

He did not necessarily intend to play only characters carrying swords.

Still, since it had been a while, he had made up his mind to choose a character he used to play today.

“Then I’ll start the game right away. I’ve studied the tutorial, so it’s not necessary. Really.”

The character was ready.

-Of course, of course. Naturally.

-Skip without hesitation, lol

-Because of people like this, tutorials must be made mandatory, lol

-Hey, he probably completed the tutorial while making the nickname yesterday!

-Do you believe the stream host? Lol

-Ah, lol, if he looked at manuals, would he have been bad with technology? Lol

-Troll on

He complained that it was really not necessary this time, seriously.

***

Meanwhile,

in the community for The League, the largest among the game communities on Adventure, a post was uploaded.

[Who the hell is this guy that twenty thousand people are watching? It’s my first time seeing him]