Arena Finals (8)

Cerberus’s character loses strength and collapses.

A moment of silence. The message visible before my eyes somehow lacked a sense of reality.

The bamboo forest stirred briefly in the wind that blew.

I won.

So I became the champion.

Really?

It didn’t feel real at all, so I tried to close the system message.

A gesture made unconsciously. The notification window naturally disappeared from view, but once it was gone, I felt a sudden fear.

Should I not have closed it? What if something went wrong?

Perhaps due to anxiety, the strength left my hands.

The sword I was holding falls to the ground. I didn’t pick it up since there was no one left to fight anyway.

I couldn’t have done so anyway. While the ringing of metal spread noisily, my body was frozen in an awkward posture.

Fortunate, or should I say expected.

My stupid worries never came true in reality.

When my view returned after being briefly turned off, the stage’s appearance was reflected again.

The first place my gaze landed was the large central monitor.

My nickname was proudly written on the largest screen.

[1st Infinity Arena]

[Winner: Gawol]

Only then did the delusions covering my chest dissipate.

Thump. Thump. It felt like the sound of my heartbeat was echoing up to my head.

As I stared at the screen as if entranced, bright lights came down on the dark stage.

Streams of light mixing red with a white base.

It seemed like colors conscious of my hair and eyes. They chose colors symbolizing me.

The projected light stretched like pillars, and flower petals showered down with fireworks, falling gently.

There seems to have been a small mistake with the sound.

Belatedly, a faint noise mixed in, and music I’d never heard before started playing.

It might have already been playing, because when it reached my ears, it seemed to have passed the middle part already.

The fast and cheerful sound suited my taste quite well, and then the excited voices of the commentators began to be heard.

《 …Nevertheless, we can now proudly proclaim. 》

《 If someone asks, ‘Who is the strongest assassin in this game? And who is the most powerful swordsman?’, today’s match will be the evidence. 》

《 It was by no means an easy journey. Those who have seen the path she broke through to victory will know. In the preliminaries… 》

It’s always pleasant to receive praise.

The chat window of the official broadcast was scrolling up too fast to even read properly.

Even if I had looked, I wouldn’t have been able to understand anything but Korean anyway.

It was a bit noisy with all sorts of sounds and information overlapping.

Boisterous. Clamorous. Chaotic.

But it’s not bad.

I don’t think it was this much even when I won the national championship.

Staff members approaching from behind draped a wide cloth over my shoulders.

It was a large cape-like item commonly called a victory gown.

The person walking over from the side of the stage was Ho-eun, the caster I saw during the group draw ceremony.

And the female announcer who conducted the winner’s interview.

Was her name Lee Yeon-bit?

I acted like a broken robot to the greetings the two offered.

“Congratulations on your victory.”

“Congratulations on winning!”

“Ah, that’s… yes, thak. No, thank, you. Ow, it hurts.”

Huh?

Why do I seem to be stuttering more severely?

Somehow my mouth doesn’t move well.

Although what I should say is already organized in my head, the language that came out of my throat was very different from what I thought.

The pronunciation wasn’t right either, and my voice trembled.

I even bit my tongue while speaking.

I bit it hard, so it hurt…

The announcer smiles at me with her eyes.

Is this funny? That’s too much.

“Now, Player Gawol. You’ve become the winner of the Infinity Arena, beating countless adventurers. We can’t help but hear your thoughts, can we?”

“Um… well, first I’m happy. And… uh, I’m just very happy. It doesn’t feel real yet.”

“Yes, you seem very happy. You’re showing such cute reactions.”

“Cu-cute? No, that’s not it. I’m not cute…”

“Pfft. I see.”

Come to think of it, this person said I was cute and whatnot last time too.

I know she doesn’t mean any harm.

Because not even a tiny bit of malice was visible in those eyes.

But isn’t it a bit much? Such words usually suit young girls.

I’m a proper adult. I’m old enough to legally buy alcohol and cigarettes.

In the first place, I wasn’t originally a woman either.

But I’ve always been timid in front of women.

Should I say I’m not used to it?

I wasn’t very sociable to begin with, but my school days were all-boys middle school to all-boys high school. University was a 100% male-dominated build following the sports scholarship track.

Throughout my entire life, I’ve hardly had the opportunity to properly talk with women.

So I didn’t dare to protest.

I just had to answer the questions well.

“Looking back, Player Gawol, you showed very confident appearances from the beginning of the tournament. Did you perhaps expect to win?”

“A little. It wasn’t like ‘I’ll definitely win no matter what’… but I did think that if I gave my all, I could go far.”

“It sounds like you were confident you’d achieve good results.”

My words were disorganized.

But when announcer Lee Yeon-bit added to them, they became quite plausible answers.

Thanks to this, even if I stumbled over my words a bit, there wasn’t much problem with the interview.

That was until I made a slip of the tongue.

“Then conversely, in today’s 3rd set. You were pushed back, giving two sets in a row to Player Cerberus. How did you feel at that time?”

“Ah, this is fu… Ahem. I thought, ‘I’m screwed. What should I do?’ I definitely felt like I was pushed to the edge of a cliff.”

The profanity I almost inadvertently let out. And the cover-up.

The caster who had been listening quietly jumped in.

“Wow, that’s skill befitting the best assassin. The broadcast was almost pushed to the edge of a cliff too, but Player Gawol’s quick wit shone through. It’s very impressive!”

“Pff, cough cough! Hack. Ack!”

Ah, I couldn’t hold back my laughter.

No matter how I think about it, it seems like it’s not me but them who have good quick wit.

Their instantaneous wit covered up my mistake well.

Is this what you call the experience of professional broadcasters?

After that, I received various questions.

Trivially, about the details of engagements, or what I thought was the point that decided victory or defeat.

When questions about the swordsman came, I felt like the inevitable had arrived.

“The reason I didn’t use the swordsman… it wasn’t because I looked down on my opponents or anything like that. Just bad memories with swords? Hmm, I shouldn’t say that much. I’d like to just say there were… personal reasons.”

I’ve even achieved the championship I wanted so much.

It seems it was purely my misunderstanding that I thought I’d get better.

My stomach churned even though I only said a few words.

Fortunately, perhaps noticing my condition, there were no more questions about the swordsman.

How should I put it, it felt like they were asking in a roundabout way. I received consideration in various ways.

Nevertheless, it seems they couldn’t have anticipated this.

Neither the ones asking questions, nor me.

It was at the timing when we were moving on to trivial talk as almost all questions had ended.

“There’s a light one among viewer questions. What kind of meal did you have before the match?”

“Salmon… I ate. Grilled. I seem to always eat it on important days.”

“Salmon! It’s a fish I really like too, do you enjoy it often usually?”

“That’s, not really. I didn’t eat it because I particularly liked it. Just, in the past… Hiccup!”

I was holding it in well, but why.

Why am I crying over something like this?

A sob slightly mixed into my voice.

Human emotions have an aspect like a dam holding back a river, so once it breaks, it doesn’t easily calm down until everything is spit out.

My crying voice, hiccup, sniff – was all heard on the live broadcast.

It was a disaster.

The first winner of the Infinity Arena… became a girl crying while talking about salmon.

* * *

[This is streamer ‘Elderin’s lounge.]

[Author: Elderin]

[Title: Notice of no stream on Friday~]

Hello, this is Elderin

As the title says, there’s no stream on Sunday (~♡’ㅅ’)~♡

The reason for no stream is, wow!

I’m meeting Gawol this time and we’re going to have a meal together!

You all know, right? It’s to celebrate her winning this time.

It’s not just the two of us meeting.

We’re gathering casually with a few party members who used to hunt with Sulbbang.

If I get the chance, I’ll introduce these people to you too.

I’ll upload lots of photos too!

I wanted to avoid streaming days if possible but…

The schedules didn’t match so it couldn’t be helped.

Please understand!

[Comments]

– Then will Gawol appear as a guest later?

└ Nothing’s confirmed yet but I’m planning to talk about it!

– Your first meeting was getting PKed in the field, how did you get so close?

└ I know right… how did it happen?

– (Hidden comment: Going to eat salmon?)

[Author: Elderin]

[Title: I met Gawol]

Crazy

Wow

Woah

Whoa

Wooow

Woah

[Comments]

– Speak human words, human words

– Why are you suddenly like this?

– Why do only you get to see

– If you’re going to be like this, at least show us