Chapter 35 : Hidden Piece (3)

“Hmm.”

Kim Hayun, who had been in a deep sleep, slowly opened her eyes.

‘It was just a dream.’

Still in a daze, she clicked her tongue as if disappointed.

She had dreamed of touching Yoo Seoyeno’s chewy, rice cake-like cheeks.

Thinking it was a good dream, Kim Hayun stretched.

All the fatigue disappeared.

It felt as if she had slept for 10 hours, so refreshing.

“…Wait a minute.”

She turned her head.

Outside the window, it was dark.

It looked like night.

“Ugh.”

In a hurry, she checked the time, and it was 8 PM.

She had only planned to rest her eyes for a bit, but it felt as though she had slept soundly, as if in cryogenic sleep.

‘I set the alarm, though?’

Kim Hayun picked up her smartphone with a foggy mind.

Upon checking, it was clear that the alarm had gone off several times.

But it was all turned off.

No matter how she looked at it, it seemed like she had turned it off herself.

“…Did I really turn all this off and fall asleep?”

It seemed that she had unconsciously reached out to turn off the alarm and fallen back asleep.

She must have been really tired due to accumulated fatigue.

“Well, there are days like this.”

Since she had shown an incredible amount of streaming content until now, the viewers probably wouldn’t mind if she woke up a little late.

She hadn’t promised to stream at any specific time anyway.

A few extra hours of sleep wouldn’t change the world.

Kim Hayun tidied up the blanket and got out of bed.

She let the night breeze from outside the window hit her for a moment.

Then, as a habit, she began stretching.

She stretched both arms above her head and repeated movements that stretched her back and waist, waking her body up.

With the sound of her joints loosening, the fatigue slowly faded away.

After finishing her stretch, she headed to the kitchen and prepared a simple but healthy meal.

Avocado, chicken breast, and some vegetables.

Maintaining her figure was closely related to her job as a streamer, and it had been a steady habit she had kept up until now.

She might appear easygoing, but surprisingly, she had been working hard on her diet behind the scenes.

Contrary to the viewers’ imagination that she would only eat chicken and beer once the stream was over.

‘Should I stop Hidden Run?’

While wrapping the chicken breast in lettuce, Kim Hayun thought to herself.

Hidden Run.

Digging through the map to find the Hidden Piece and dying.

‘A week should be enough, right?’

A week.

It was the time she had put everything into finding the Hidden Piece.

[Somewhere in the beginner village, a Hidden Piece exists.]

Thanks to that one sentence from the admins, everyone started focusing more on the Hidden Piece than leveling up.

They searched through the grass, wells, rooftops, behind trees, and even pressed every single brick they could find.

Of course, it all started as a fun event at first.

But the viewers’ reactions were beyond expectations.

‘Let’s find the Hidden Piece!’

‘We have to find the Hidden Piece!’

‘We need to find it faster than other streamers!’

‘Are we showing our class today?’

Such chats flooded in, and naturally, Kim Hayun got swept up in the momentum.

For the fans, it was only natural.

They wanted their favorite streamer to get more attention and rise higher.

And if they found the Hidden Piece.

They would certainly get the spotlight and be at the top of the server.

So, she ran tirelessly.

She scoured every corner of the map, gave meaning to every NPC dialogue, and whenever she saw strange positions or artificial objects, she broke them with a pickaxe.

The result was all for nothing.

Even so, the viewers’ reactions were okay.

The catchphrase “It’s artificial!” flooded the chat, and scenes where she got stuck in weird poses due to bugs circulated as clips.

Thanks to the funny moments, the atmosphere wasn’t too bad.

As a result, other streamers gained some motivation, and one by one, everyone jumped into Hidden Run.

But.

Now, the limits were starting to show.

It had been a week.

There was nothing to show for it.

Both the streamers and viewers were getting tired.

More and more comments like these appeared in the chat:

‘Isn’t it better to just level up?’

‘I think there’s no Hidden Piece…’

‘Isn’t this wasting too much time?’

Kim Hayun, too, was starting to feel those thoughts inside.

Wasn’t she missing something?

It seemed like there was definitely something in the plan, but no matter how much she searched, there was no clue.

The admins had said there was a Hidden Piece in the beginner village, but—‘Isn’t this a bait?’

‘Did they mix it up with the admin test server?’

‘It’s not there. Let’s just level up.’

People’s reactions were gradually becoming more realistic.

Just level up and farm some gear.

The term “Hidden Piece” was slowly losing its weight.

Rydel sighed, pressing her forehead.

It felt like she had searched for treasure in the desert only to come up empty-handed.

Even when she secretly spied on other streamers’ broadcasts, the atmosphere was similar.

‘Why can’t anyone find it?’

Was it possible that the hint had been given incorrectly?

Or maybe there was never a Hidden Piece to begin with?

No one could be sure, and that made things even more confusing.

In fact, some people started to suspect that Zeronix, the “overall manager” and lead planner of the server, might have missed something or made a mistake.

“The Hidden Piece definitely exists in the ‘beginner village.’ I believe we’ve given enough hints.”

In the end, Zeronix himself came on air with the admin Frost to clarify the situation.

With that short but firm statement, the controversy was settled.

“There’s no reason to lie.”

Zeronix and Frost.

Would those two, in front of countless popular streamers, lie?

It was absurd.

There was nothing to gain from lying, and even if it was a bait, the atmosphere wasn’t one where people would laugh it off.

Among the streamers invited to this server were several top-tier broadcasters.

If they wasted a week of their time, and it turned out to be some elaborate prank, they would only be met with endless criticism.

No, it might not just be criticism—they might even have to seriously retire from streaming.

That’s why it was even more confusing.

They were saying it definitely existed, but no one had found it.

Some said the approach was wrong from the start, while others speculated that someone had already found it but wasn’t revealing it.

And slowly, the atmosphere began to change.

The initial excitement started to cool down, and some streamers gave up on the Hidden Run, instead focusing on farming and leveling up.

There was no time to waste chasing the Hidden Piece.

Soon, streamers invited via the invitation tickets were going to join the server.

“If I fall behind now, I could really be left behind.”

The Hidden Run ends here.

Kim Hayun also came to the same conclusion.

Of course, there would be viewers who would be disappointed about giving up on the Hidden Piece, but there would probably be even more viewers who were waiting for her to give up.

“Sigh. Let’s do our best today.”

Muttering to herself like a self-affirmation, Kim Hayun got up from her seat.

She tidied up her makeup in front of the mirror, adjusted the lighting, and set the camera angle.

Broadcast start.

Since she had already given up on the Hidden Run, there was no need to run around like crazy anymore.

She planned to have some light banter with the viewers, spend about an hour doing a cafe tour,and then join the Pixel Wars streamer server.

It was a perfect plan.

Kim Hayun closed the broadcast preparation screen and turned on the camera.

“Delha delha. I wanted to come a little earlier, but I ended up sleeping too deeply.”

She expected messages like,“Why are you so late?” or “You worked hard, you should have rested more.”

But instead, a flood of completely unexpected messages came in.

“Did you see the announcement, Rydel???”

“Silverhair found the Hidden Piece.”

“The first Hidden Piece on the server just appeared 😑😑😑😑😑 ”

“Admin put the name and announcement 🙂🙂🙂🙂🙂”

“Delbung missed it because of a deep sleep 😴😴😴😴😴”

Rydel opened her mouth in surprise.

“Wowwwww! Really? That’s amazing.”

She let out a small, incredulous laugh.

“…Really? If you’re going to prank, at least make it believable. What nonsense is this?”

Suddenly, the image of Yoo Seoyeon, who had made a raft and was stumbling towards the sea, came to mind.

Her confident demeanor reminded her of Ace, the son of the Pirate King.

It felt like she was going to some strange place and would end up dying in vain.

‘But at least they’re united.’

Whether it was intentional or not, the viewers were all working together to deceive Rydel.

Some of them even reacted like, “Is that really true?” as if hearing it for the first time, adding a sense of realism.

It almost felt like Yoo Seoyeon really had found the first Hidden Piece.

“Yes. You all did a great job. If the content was believable, I might have fallen for it.”

In the first place, Yoo Seoyeon had never even played Pixel Wars.

Even the top streamers couldn’t find it after a week of struggling.

There was no way Yoo Seoyeon would find something like that out of nowhere.

‘Chunma is a woman’s rule’ donated 3,000 KRW!

Delbung, this is no joke.

Go check the announcement right now, or at least check another room.

“Really?”

“Hurry and check it!”

“Have you been living in the dark, Delbung!”

“Go check the announcement!”

“Okay. Okay, I will check it.”

Rydel spoke in a slightly disheartened tone.

After all, when you stretch something out to the point of the first, second, and then brainless jokes, it loses its fun.

However, by now, there should have been viewers telling her to stop.

But instead, it seemed like these viewers were all suddenly in sync, urging her to check the announcement.

“Zeronix…”

Pixel Wars streamer server operation site.

They didn’t actually create a separate homepage,but the broadcast station of the streamer, Zeronix, served as the homepage.

Zeronix’s announcements were practically the server announcements.

Rydel entered Zeronix’s broadcast station and checked the announcement.

And.

[First Hidden Piece discovered in the streamer server! Congratulations to ‘Silverhair Silverhair’!]

The announcement at the very top immediately caught her eye.

“Uh?”