Honey Stewed Squid

Chapter 39 - Bonjwa?

His tone sounded extremely displeased.

97’s voice began to stammer. “Sister-In-Law… said she was going to introduce me a girlfriend. That’s why we turned on the mics, so we could chat first—”

Before he had finished, the channel went completely silent.

Tong Nian was a little dazed. I said I was going to introduce a girlfriend to him?

Of course, her mind that had drifted away was quickly yanked back. The system was already beginning to assign the players on the opposing team. In the little chat room, the people who had been assigned by the system into the room were all in the same state as Yaya…

ImAGodYouKnow: Oh my mommy…

BrainDeadNumero7: Oh my dearest mommy…

KillLalala: … K&K?? All the gods have descended down to the mortal world?????

DieLalala: Gun???????

TheLittleMatchstickThatSellsGirls[1]: God Gun, please accept all the MMR I have accumulated for you over this last decade as well as my groveling bow on bended knees!!!!

……

While the feelings of the crowd were pumping excitedly, the two were actually busily having a private chat.

Lolicat: What type of gun should I select 0.0?

Gun: Whatever.

Lolicat: What will match and work well with you?

Gun: ……

Lolicat: 0.0?

Gun: Dagger.

Lolicat: Oh, oh! OK!

……

Yay, so awesome! Turned out the weapon most suitable for her was a dagger. Elatedly, she bought a dagger. Over in the all-chat, their opponents were still spamming the screen. Sitting beside her, Yaya finally recovered a tiny portion of her senses and tugged on her arm. “Gun really is your boyfriend?”

Tong Nian nodded and beamed at her. “I didn’t lie to you. He’s great at playing video games.”

……

Could “great” even be used to describe Gun?

That word, when used on him, was ridiculously pathetic, you know?!

Yaya’s tears were threatening to stream down her face. Back in the days of Team Solo, the captain, Solo, and the top sniper, appledog, had been together. In game, they had stood shoulder to shoulder, a match made by Heaven itself. Everyone had contrived that the ultimate reason for the dissolution of the team was because no woman could meet Gun’s standards, and he had eyes only for the gaming goddess, appledog… Now, however, from the looks of it, that was all a load of crap. God Gun did not care at all whether his girlfriend was a gaming master or not…

Let’s not even mention being a master…

She knew very well from experience what Tong Nian’s gaming skill level was—

Yaya pulled herself back together and focused. Her hands trembling slightly, she slid her eyes over the weapons that everyone had chosen. Though she could not see their other secondary items, she still had a general idea what role and strategy each was taking—besides Tong Nian. Yaya was baffled. “All you bought is a dagger?”

Tong Nian nodded in dead earnest. “Mm-hmm. I asked specifically. He said just buy this one.”

What… way of playing was this?

There was no time to dwell on this though. The system had begun the countdown to game-start and had automatically loaded the London city map.

The image on the screen switched.

Very soon, a picture appeared before Tong Nian’s eyes of post-war London, utterly destroyed, with ruins of buildings everywhere. As she gazed upon the several people inside the scene, she suddenly felt as if her blood was roiling. It’s time to game! Clench fists! Must focus and play well!

97: Sister-In-Law’s classmate, come. I’ll take you along.

grunt: 97, you take southeast, I’ll take northwest. Sweep it clean. Don’t make trouble for me.

97: Screw you, punk. It’s YOU who shouldn’t make trouble for ME. You’ve never been higher than me on the leaderboard, yet still so cocky.

grunt: Whooooa. With a girl around, you’re acting tough now, you, the forever little bachelor.

……

Yaya had a feeling like she was utterly going to faint.

This sort of situation, where she was on the same team as professional gamers and watching them as they took jabs at one another, was like… she had abruptly joined a professional gaming team and a professional eSports organization, that she was suddenly one step closer to that world. As a longtime gaming fan, she soon slipped into form, forcing herself to remove herself from those feelings of exhilaration and try her best to keep up with 97.

They had all left already?

Tong Nian tilted her head to the side to glance at the scene in Yaya’s screen. She had already run to the roof of a building?

Lolicat: Where are we going?

Gun: Open a separate voice chat.

Lolicat: Oh, oh, ok.

She accepted Gun’s invitation for a private voice chat.

In her headset, she heard the sound of typing, or that was what it seemed? He was using more than one computer? Working?

Lightly, Tong Nian asked, “Can you hear me?”

He gave a faint answer, then told her, “Follow my instructions. Move and control your character.”

Tong Nian immediately straightened her sitting position. “Mm.”

“See those ruins of that church on your left?”

“Yup, see it.”

“Walk over. Let me know when you get there.”

“Mm.”

She was still not very proficient with using the keyboard to control her character to walk, so she used her mouse instead. Hop after hop, she moved the character over and soon arrived at that place. “Alright.”

From within the headset, he seemed to hear that she was using her mouse. “Still don’t know how to use the keyboard?”

“… I’m still not very good at it… Seems the mouse is easier, right?” Why did she have to use the keyboard?

In the headset, after a long moment of silence, he realized that his task was actually onerous and extremely challenging. Of course, what was being challenged was his patience… “In front of you, there’s a flight of twenty-nine stairs. W is to move forward, space bar is to jump. Pressing both will let you jump forward. One step at a time, jump up the stairs.”

0.0? This was different from what she had played last time, ah…

So…

Even when the game had come to an end…

Those opponents did not even get to see what corner the true God Gun was in and what he was doing.

On the southeast side, 97, with Yaya in tow, had encountered three enemies and a fight to the death had broken out. On the northwest side, grunt had easily finished off two opposing players, like he was cutting two blades of grass. Gun’s character, having nothing to do, sat on the steps with sniper rifle in hand, constantly adjusting his visual field and angle to see if there were unnecessary persons nearby while, at the same time, directing the kid beside him in learning…

… how to hop up a set of stairs…