Chapter 4

Suit Apology

At a glance, the chat seemed to be divided into two groups.

The first were people who played Neo Chronicle.

@reoco: You fucking idiot, trashing a game you haven’t even played

@yjy887: If you don’t know shit, keep your fucking mouth shut

@gogme: Normal people are allowed to judge games without knowing anything about them!!

The second were people trashing Neo Chronicle players.

@rariii Neo old-farts, someone’s going to die T_T

@richboy4 Upvote if they’re Neo-hikikomori freaking out even harder because he’s a popular guy

@piara Cash-farmers, doing this here isn’t going to make gold prices go back up

It looked like those were the only two groups.

It definitely looked that way.

Then, at some point, I realized something.

The moment I noticed that I could hardly see the Neo Chronicle players insulting me anymore.

@richboy4 Sorry I’m an old-fart beggar who plays Neo Chronicle T_T

One chat message caught my eye.

More precisely, the username of the person who posted it.

‘Rich Boy? Huh?’

Something felt strange.

I didn’t even know what was strange about it, but it felt strange anyway.

I immediately searched the username in the chat window.

I wanted to check what that bastard had been saying.

11 seconds ago.

@richboy4 Sorry I’m an old-fart beggar who plays Neo Chronicle T_T

49 seconds ago.

@richboy4 This bastard hasn’t even played Neo Chronicle and he’s fucking hahahaha

1 minute ago.

@richboy4 Insulting a game? Almighty Normie

@richboy4 So you’re the reason gold prices dropped!!

Even in the messages from two minutes ago, Rich Boy had been insulting Neo Chronicle players.

But his messages from three minutes ago were different.

@richboy4 Harassing a normal person? Neo Chronicle

@richboy4 If the price of gold drops, go outside and get a job!!

The moment I saw the chat, my stomach churned.

‘What am I looking at right now?’

I kept going through the chat.

This was someone who had kept insulting me.

And now he suddenly switched to the other side?

My confusion rapidly cooled.

The messages insulting me that had seemed to be swept away by the violent current became visible again.

[Viewers: 4,724]

Out of all those people, how many genuinely wanted an apology from me?

The chats from Neo Chronicle players that had been completely buried for a minute or two started appearing again.

Did the people who had been too lazy to insult me start chatting?

No.

Probably not.

It had been two hours since I started watching the barrage of chat messages.

At first, it had started because people were angry.

And now.

‘Maybe there aren’t actually that many angry people.’

I narrowed my eyes and looked at the chat window.

I felt like I could see playfulness mixed into people’s messages.

Was I imagining it?

Had I gone crazy after getting cursed at so much?

I didn’t think so.

Out of five thousand people, at least a thousand.

Maybe even half of them had simply come to watch.

I didn’t know why they were watching a stream that had turned into this much of a mess.

I didn’t know why they kept switching back and forth between the two sides.

‘They want to see my reaction, don’t they?’

I had kept trying to talk to them, and kept trying to calm them down.

Was that entertaining to the people who had just come to watch?

Watching me flounder?

I opened the lid of my tumbler and gulped down water.

I slammed the empty tumbler down and dragged the webcam over, roughly fixing it on top of the monitor.

It seemed a little tilted, but who cared.

“Everyone.”

I spoke and waited.

Until the chat reacted.

After counting about ten seconds in my head, different messages started mixing in.

- Those old cash-farming fossils are getting too full of themselves lol Those old cash-farming fossils are getting too full of themselves lol Those old cash-farming fossils are getting too full of themselves lol Those old cash-farming fossils are getting too full of themselves lol

- If you fucking called us, then talk

- You’re saying gold prices dropped because of a normal person? You’re saying gold prices dropped because of a normal person? You’re saying gold prices dropped because of a normal person?

-??

- Neo Chronicle players, please stop T_T Neo Chronicle players, please stop T_T Neo Chronicle players, please stop T_T

- If you don’t know shit, you shouldn’t talk

Messages reacting directly to what I had said.

Only about ten percent of the whole chat.

It didn’t matter whether they were angry, had come for fun, or had come to insult someone else.

Reacting meant they were willing to talk to me.

Even if all they were thinking was, Let’s see what this guy has to say, it was the same.

At the very least, it seemed to mean they were willing to listen to me.

“I think I’ve been cursed at more than enough. Anyway, I’m sorry once again to everyone who likes Neo Chronicle.”

Messages like ‘running away,’ ‘are you fleeing,’ and ‘you’re ending the stream?’ poured in.

Of course, I had no intention of doing that.

“End the stream? No. I’m absolutely not running away.”

I firmly nailed that down and continued.

“Whether you did something wrong or whatever, if there’s friction, shouldn’t you at least patch things up on the spot?”

The response was to ask what I planned to do.

Naturally, there was far more spam like before.

What I was looking at were the few people visible among the endless flood of spam.

Because I was speaking to the people reacting to what I said.

I wondered if I should persuade the others too.

But people don’t even listen to their own mothers.

They don’t even keep the resolutions they make for themselves.

Humans simply aren’t made to hear someone else’s words and change their behavior because of them.

I’m like that myself.

So I was going to try talking to the people who were actually listening to me.

“Kneel down and apologize? We’re just going to skip that one. Don’t make ridiculous demands. It’s true that I ran my mouth without knowing anything, but it wasn’t that serious.”

Then I remembered one particular message that had kept catching my eye and continued.

“The thing I saw Neo Chronicle players saying the most was, ‘Have you even played it?’ Right?”

I minimized the streaming program and opened the internet.

Then I searched for ‘Neo Chronicle.’

“I’ll play it myself. I’ll try it, then evaluate it again.”

When I entered the homepage, the first thing I saw was an advertisement for a package.

[Summer Festival! Lovers on the Beach Package]

A scantily clad female character with outdated graphics waved her hand.

“She’s pretty. Where do I download this?”

I looked back at the chat window.

The spam had lost some momentum, and the regular messages were a little easier to see than before, making me nod inwardly.

“You’re saying press the Start Game button. I have to sign up first... right. I’ll sign up first.”

I checked the streaming program while entering the registration page.

[Viewers: 4,117]

Six hundred people had left in the meantime.

Come to think of it, at some point the viewer count had suddenly jumped from the one-thousands to the four-thousands in an instant.

That was also around when the chat split into two factions.

‘How many of these people am I supposed to assume are actual Neo Chronicle players?’

I couldn’t tell.

Even if there were markers in front of their usernames, it would probably still be hard to figure out.

Then some strange messages appeared among the spam.

-??

- What are you doing

- Are you crazy?

- What is this

I was in the middle of entering the information required for registration.

First, I verified my phone, and next was my address...

“Ah.”

I had almost broadcast my address exactly as it was.

Good thing I checked the chat window before entering the final information.

- Crazy bastard hahaha

- Fuck, you scared me lol

- Are you an idiot?

- Getting cursed at a little made him lose his mind

I answered the messages I could see among the slightly reduced spam.

“I’ve only ever turned the stream on. I’ve never actually done anything like this, so I didn’t know. How do I hide this? Ah.”

I enlarged the webcam feed until it filled the entire broadcast screen.

Now they shouldn’t be able to see it.

I finished registering and started the download.

“The download... says about thirty minutes. What the hell, why is this game so huge?”

It had been about five minutes since I said I’d try Neo Chronicle.

[Viewers: 3,791]

A thousand people had left in barely five minutes.

It seemed like they were the kind of people who would leave the moment things showed any sign of calming down.

“Okay, let’s talk now. How do you want me to try Neo Chronicle? Tell me what you guys find fun about this game. I’ll give it a shot.”

- Story from level 1

- The raids are amazing

- War is the heart of this game

Amid all the different messages flying around, I confirmed those three.

“Got it. If possible, I’ll try all three of those starting now.”

You were upset because I ran my mouth without playing it, right?

I’ll try every single thing you told me to.

Before that, there’s something I need to do.

In the military, which I was discharged from two months ago, we spoke in formal military speech.

From the outside, you might think, What kind of ridiculous way of talking is that? But there, it was completely natural.

Every school, every classroom, or even every tiny group can have its own culture.

Naturally, internet streaming must have its own culture too.

Even if it’s the kind of culture that outsiders would find strange or wonder why anyone bothers.

To people who stream on the internet, those things are perfectly natural.

“While it downloads, I’ll go look for the suit you’ve all been talking about since earlier, and the cro... what was it again? Anyway, I don’t have the equipment, so I’ll just find a suit and come back. You said that’s the standard way to apologize on internet streams.”

Do what needs to be done.

Then I can start the game.

______________

“...”

I stood in front of the camera.

Wearing a suit and standing in front of a white wall.

‘...Do I really have to do this?’

I’d heard that internet streaming was free.

People even used profanity and insults too harsh to say between friends, all for entertainment.

So why am I doing this again?

It wasn’t like last time, when I’d used some kind of derogatory expression.

I had consciously softened my words considerably.

I hadn’t even used insults ending in things like “-freak” that friends casually threw around with each other.

My head felt blank.

Because I couldn’t understand the situation?

That was part of it.

Because it felt like I couldn’t keep up with what was happening and was simply being swept along.

I just couldn’t understand it.

Why am I, again.

Again!

Standing here in a suit.

I apologized barely one day ago, and now I’m doing it again?