Chapter 9: God of Skills (4)

「NPC brain lol」

「Wait, he did all that without knowing? LMAOOO」

「This chat is killing me 💀」

「No way that actually worked LOL」

As Silverhair’s human-sounding messages scrolled by,

Stage 2’s arrows and anti-gravity field started to look smaller and smaller.

Tilting the character slightly caused the scenery around them to spin rapidly.

Like they’d activated some cheat, the three bald characters spun and soared upward through the sky.

“Waaah! Nice!!”

Raidel clapped excitedly. She was still too overwhelmed to fully register what had happened—

But at the very least, she knew they’d just successfully skipped an entire stage.

“…But where exactly are we going…?”

After taking dozens of arrows, the characters had been launched with absurd momentum.

They showed no signs of stopping, continuing their upward flight.

“We passed Stage 5… 6, no—Stage 7 just now….”

Their upward speed finally began to slow near what seemed like Stage 9. And then—

Wham!

All three characters slammed into something.

Not the ground—but the entrance of Stage 10.

It looked awkward, sure.

But they had landed directly in Stage 10.

Raidel blinked in disbelief.

As if it had all been planned from the beginning—

Using the recoil from the arrows and the anti-gravity fields, they had traveled straight from Stage 2 to Stage 10.

「Stage 10 entry complete LOL」

「They just skipped the entire game, wtf」

「That guy’s not normal…」

「HOW is that even possible?」

「This is actual legend-level content LOL」

The chat exploded.

In any other context, people would’ve brushed it off as pure luck or a fluke—

But Silverhair had already called it:

“Some of the stages might be skippable.”

And now, he’d actually gone and done it.

It was hard to write it off as coincidence.

‘Wait—no way…’

Cold sweat dripped down Raidel’s back.

‘No way… even when we got hit by those arrows the first time…’

Back when they first entered the anti-gravity zone, they’d been shot down and slammed into the wall in one second flat.

She’d just assumed Silverhair had made a mistake.

I mean, who would think it was intentional when all three characters got shot and knocked into a wall?

‘But now that I think about it… all of us landed in safe spots.’

When hit by the arrows, you either slammed into a wall—or fell off the map.

And obviously, the wall was much better.

‘Because this is a pot game.’

In a normal game with saves and reloads, success is all that matters—not how you fail.

If you mess up, you just reload.

But in games like this, how you fail matters more than whether you succeed.

Where you fall determines how far you’re set back.

‘We failed, but we landed in safe spots.’

And somehow, in that hellstorm of arrows, all three characters ended up safely plastered into the wall.

“I didn’t know what would happen when you got hit by arrows, so I tried it once.”

“Turns out, if they graze you even a little, you get launched.”

If he wasn’t lying, Silverhair had said this was his first time seeing the stage.

So naturally, he wouldn’t have known how far you’d be launched when hit.

Which is why… he deliberately let himself get hit.

To measure the launch force.

And if one or two arrows could launch you, then dozens—no, over a hundred arrows, divided among three characters—

That kind of impact could absolutely blast them all the way to the moon.

[Raidel: Hey, by the way—]

[Raidel: Why did we get hit by arrows again in the second run?]

In the second try, both Raidel and Delbung #3 had gotten hit once.

They didn’t fall out of bounds—but their speed took a big hit.

Was that part of the plan too? Or had Silverhair made a rare mistake?

「LMAO why’d you get hit if you cleared it anyway」

「Saved you from drowning and you asked where your package was」

「Don’t lose your pride, Delbung 💀」

“No, seriously! I’m just genuinely curious!”

Raidel shouted with a frustrated look.

She wasn’t trying to pick a fight at all.

It was just… if the whole thing had been planned, was there really a need for them to get hit?

[Raidel: You did awesome, I’m really just asking out of curiosity;]

Still, just in case her message was misunderstood, Raidel added another polite line.

「You’re such a simp, Delbung LOL」

「He’s kinda cute tho」

「LMAOOOO」

“Oh come on! You’re the ones who told me to ask!!”

Red-faced and annoyed, Raidel stared at the new messages on screen:

[Silverhair: There was only one possible clear timing that let us avoid the arrows.]

[Silverhair: But if we avoided all the arrows, we couldn’t trigger the reverse gravity in the final zone.]

[Silverhair: And if we waited for reverse gravity to trigger, we’d get hit by all the arrows.]

[Silverhair: But if one or two people got hit mid-run and slowed down, we could enter right as reverse gravity turned on.]

[Silverhair: So yeah, I had you take a hit on purpose.]

“So… that means he calculated everything, down to that?”

Raidel murmured in a daze.

To enter at the right timing when reverse gravity activated,

they had to take hits mid-run and slow down.

It was impossible to match the timing otherwise—so he manipulated the timing.

「???」

「What am I even hearing right now」

「That’s actually a thing you can plan??」

「It had to be a fluke… no way」

「Is this guy a supercomputer or what?」

From the very start, there had been no mistakes.

Even the part where they got blasted into the wall in one second—

Was just Silverhair testing launch angles.

‘Has there ever been someone this good at games?’

Silverhair’s performance didn’t just scream “experienced.” It felt like something else entirely.

The way he’d carried from Stage 1 was already ridiculous.

At first, she thought he was just some longtime player, but—

Longevity didn’t explain this.

Some players grind games for years and never get out of low ranks.

Others just have that overwhelming talent from the start, rising straight to the top.

Talent.

If she had to sum it up in one word, that was it: talent.

「Delbung looks so defeated LMAO」

「Press 👍 if you think Raidel just hit the talent wall」

「Hang in there, Delbung…」

「Delbung used to have some gamer pride too lol」

Was her face showing how stunned she felt?

She was a game-focused streamer.

Sure, her viewers teased her all the time—but she’d always been somewhat confident in her own skills.

But seeing this level of raw talent firsthand… it left her feeling hollow.

“No. No way. This game’s not over yet. I’m warmed up now—watch, I’ll show you what I’ve got!”

「Warmed up (after 4 hours)」

「Even if she’s bad, at least she’s got spirit lol」

「I support her, but let’s be real—she’s gonna get carried again」

“No, no, you don’t get it! Expensive supercars need more time to warm up!”

Regardless of how she felt, it wouldn’t help to let those negative emotions show.

Besides, Silverhair hadn’t done anything wrong.

‘Why did I even feel like that?’

Raidel was a little startled by her own reaction.

Sure, she was known as a skilled streamer—

But it wasn’t like there weren’t better players out there.

There were active pro gamers, retired pros, and tons of anonymous monsters out there.

She’d admired many of their plays before—but never felt actual inferiority or jealousy.

Sure, she’d raged plenty when losing in 1v1s—

But she’d never hated anyone.

And yet, now she found herself feeling this weird hostility toward some random player she’d just met.

‘This is how I used to feel about cheaters.’

Nowadays, in the VR gaming world, cheaters were all but extinct.

The anti-cheat systems were nearly perfect.

Still, some popped up from time to time, especially in smaller games with weaker protections.

They were universally hated—for ruining games made for people to enjoy.

Which was why she’d instinctively tagged Silverhair as a hacker.

That discomfort and hollowness—that was where it came from.

‘But he’s not a hacker… probably.’

She couldn’t say for sure, but Silverhair didn’t seem like one.

The game hadn’t even been out that long—no one had time to make cheats for it.

Even an indie game like this would have some kind of protection.

And even if someone did bother, what kind of idiot would pour that much effort into a game this niche?

‘No, that level of precise cheating might not even be possible.’

She’d seen a lot of hackers over the years.

And even the best of them had their tells.

But Silverhair? Nothing felt off.

No inhuman movements. Nothing unnatural.

‘I know he’s not a hacker… but…’

Even if her brain knew that, everything about Silverhair’s gameplay felt beyond human.

That little sense of dissonance was where her emotions were coming from.

‘Actually… not even a hacker could play like that.’

No matter how good you are, you can’t beat cheats with pure reflexes.

There are hard hardware limits—reaction time, input speed, etc.

But watching Silverhair’s plays—

It almost made her believe someone could beat cheats with skill alone.

‘Okay. Chill. It’s just one indie game. You’re spiraling.’

Raidel took a breath and grounded herself.

Losing focus during a stream? That’s amateur hour.

Focus on the broadcast. Nothing else.

That was the rule she’d set for herself, from the day she clawed her way up from bottom-tier to mid-tier streamer.

“Okay! Time to go all out. You know what they say—final round wins make you the real MVP!”

《‘RaidelLuvsYou’ has donated ₩10,000!》

• “Raidel, this is a co-op game by the way… ;;”

《‘DarkDelbungi’ has donated ₩10,000!》

• “If I met that guy in a versus game, I’d just uninstall.”

「You’d quit streaming too lol」

「Don’t go full Delbung mode~」

As Raidel burned with hopeless determination, her donations started trickling in.

“I’m not quitting! I’M NOT QUITTING STREAMING!!”

The power of money restored her spirit.

Turning her gaze toward the final stage, she muttered—

“…Okay, but what is that?”