Genius Archer's Streaming

Even though it had only been two games so far, Orange King noticed something while playing Survival mode at low rank.

'Maybe Almond was right. Maybe it really had become a planning game.'

When a game was around long enough, players developed a certain set of agreed-upon plays. What were agreed-upon plays? When one thought about it, that phrase was actually kind of funny. Was anything agreed upon in a game about deceiving, tricking, and killing opponents? It would be better to call it something else.

'Plays that became predictable.'

Data accumulated over a long period until people exchanged these plays on autopilot without thinking. Somehow, it still didn't matter.

For instance, the early-tank-contract meta centered around leveling growth in Survival mode. Contracting a tank first significantly improved stability during monster hunts. Higher-level and more difficult monsters could be taken down faster and more reliably. That was how the meta had developed.

'There definitely was an early-assassin meta before that.'

In the early days of Survival mode, there had also been a style of contracting the assassin first and preying on enemies for growth. Teams that contracted tanks first encountered these teams and either struggled badly or got wiped. Why did the tank meta ultimately win out?

'The leveling speed difference.'

The approach to hunting players was unstable, leading to many early exits. The early-tank meta of focusing on monsters placed first far more often. What if they made it past the very early game? They'd actually turn around and eat the assassin teams whole because LIL was a game where level was everything.

It wasn’t easy for an assassin to take down even a higher-level uncontracted member of a tank team. Naturally, the assassin-hunting meta died out, and with it, the Vault meta ended too.

The idea that monster-based leveling was the optimal path took root instead. After that, everyone just picked tanks and hunted. Early-game fights simply stopped happening. As a result, the stability advantage of early tanks had only grown further.

'But here?'

None of that existed. Players suddenly picked assassins and charged in. They even sacrificed their own leveling to do it. This kind of fight didn’t happen at higher ranks, but it happened here. Getting caught by it meant 9th or 10th place. It was basically a natural disaster.

'But now I know!'

Orange King knew now that anything could happen here.

"DID YOU REALLY THINK THAT WOULD WOOOOORK!? Ptew!"

He practically spat in the enemy's face. His confidence was through the roof, and his spear found the enemy assassin just as precisely.

[Team 4 Out!]

The enemy team was fully wiped out while their team remained all alive. Almost no time had been lost.

"NICEEEEEEE!!" Orange King roared.

All the teammates high-fived and embraced.

"YEAAAAH!"

"W-we won!"

"Bubblegum champions!"

— What lmaooo

— LOL

— Winners again?!

They'd only eliminated one team so far, but anyone watching would think they'd won the whole tournament.

"YEAHHH! NUT VILLAGE NEIGHBORHOOD WATCH!"

They raised their spears, roaring again.

— lmaooooooo

— Insane energy

— Not a commentator for nothing

— LOL

Even for someone with notoriously high energy as a commentator, Orange King seemed unusually good-spirited, and with good reason.

[Defense Rune - Common]

[Vitality Rune - Common]

Killing the enemy champion had yielded bonus runes. With this, they now had a level 3 team with two champions.

"Let's go, Bubblegum."

"... Huh!? Me!?"

"Yes."

The bonus runes were garbage anyway. They needed Bubblegum to quickly contract and couldn't afford to have Iron Ball taken away.

[Iron Ball - Dino]

Boom!

White light descended on Bubblegum.

"Wahahaha! Second lesson right here~. Contract in order of skills~."

— lmaooooooo

— Where's his conscience??

— Isn't this obviously a dump pick??

— lmaooooo

— Oh lmaooo cute

Orange King didn't laugh at all and immediately issued combat orders. "Anyway, Bubblegum moves to the front and fights. I'll take over protecting Almond."

"... Huh? Really?"

"Yes, because it's Iron Ball."

"Ah...!"

Iron Ball specialized in initiating fights. Of course, protecting the carry was also possible. Bubblegum was reasonably good at Iron Ball.

"Fundamentally, LIL is a game of exchanging low-value units for high-value units."

"...?"

Bubblegum didn't follow the explanation. Effectively, Orange King meant that since Bubblegum had low value, he was good material to exchange for higher-value players.

— Sacrificing the low-value LOL

— Bubblegum sacrifice technique

— Though it does suit him

— lmaooooo

— fr it's fine since his runes are trash too so there's nothing to regret

— He doesn't even understand it either...

"Now, we have no time. Move out! Oh, and..." Orange King looked at Almond. "Dumb Young Man?"

"Yes?"

"Walk and talk. How do you think we won that fight?"

Having succeeded with the early Vault strategy, Orange King was feeling quite buoyant. He was trying to be a teacher again.

— Is this finally the third lesson??

— lmaooooo

— Why is he suddenly so high on himself??

— I'm the teacher! You're the student!

— But we won Almond's way!

"Hmm..." Almond thought about it and replied, "Because I successfully hit multiple enemies in succession?"

— Correct!

— lmaooooo

— That's literally the right answer;

"Ahem... that's also correct, but isn't there something else?"

Orange King seemed to be expecting a different answer.

"Because of that, the tanks didn't die."

"That's the same thing!?"

"Because of that, I got to attack freely."

"You're just saying the same thing in different ways!?"

From Almond's perspective, that was genuinely all there was. Every time he fired Ran's Pure Concentration, he'd hit two or more enemies. That had turned the tide.

— Bulldozer Q&A

— Almond is just saying whatever he wants to say??

— lmaooooo

— But that's not wrong

— Just saying whatever lmao

"Okay, look. Almond." Orange King gave a hint. "We robbed the Vault. What were our levels like when the fight happened?"

Almond briefly tried to recall.

"Oh...?" His eyes flickered. "I have no idea."

— Ugh

— lmaooooooooo

— LOL

— Why did his face look like he was about to have a realization then

— Honestly not even surprised anymore

He hadn't been thinking about it at all during the fight.

This kind of student was infuriating. Surprisingly, Orange King accepted it easily.

"Makes sense you wouldn't remember."

"?"

"Because we were the same level."

"Ah...!"

"That's just how it goes in a fight. You don't remember. If you're at a level disadvantage and the fight is going badly, that's when you remember. You can blame the level difference."

— Lmaooooo

— Wow

— That hits close to home

Right, it wasn't often that people remembered same-level fights.

"But do you know why I remember?"

"Because you're smart?"

"No. Because I was only planning to fight if they were the same level as us. I checked in advance. That's why I remember. Going forward, Almond, you need to always keep these things in mind before a fight."

It seemed Orange King's full-scale field lesson had begun.

"There should be one more thing you're curious about."

"...?"

"We robbed the Vault. Why were we the same level?"

When they robbed the Vault, their levels were supposed to fall behind.

"This is because I robbed the Vault on an off-beat."

Orange King's early Vault route hadn't simply been copying Almond's strategy. There had been some variation.

"This might look like a simple Vault route, but it's actually a combination of three conditions stacked together."

"What are..."

Almond raised his fingers, trying to count them out. No matter how he looked at it, three seemed like a stretch. It felt like Orange King just wanted to say three things.

"Three conditions..." Orange King started and then shook his head. "Look back at the replay later. See how it played out."

The danger zone was coming up.

"Sir!" Almond gave a quick nod.

'Good thing he didn't explain right now.'

Honestly, his ears were about to bleed.

Bubblegum, moving ahead, called out, "Someone's here!"

He'd been pushing through the bushes toward the Red Turtle.

Whoosh!

They quickly crouched and hid in the vegetation. Then, they crawled forward.

"... There. They're there."

"For real."

A few enemies were already preparing to hunt the Red Turtle as they checked the surrounding area thoroughly.

"Shh." Orange King raised one finger and slowly peeked his head out. "One team. We're level three right now. Some of them are level four, but I can't see how many champions..."

Orange King tried to analyze the enemies. From here, not everything was visible.

At that moment, Bubblegum tugged at Orange King's sleeve. "But... I, I think I just saw something..."

"Hm? What?"

"That face over there looks really familiar..."

"?"

Among the group preparing to hunt the Turtle, Bubblegum found one face all too familiar.

[BubbleSniper]

"BubbleSniper?"

This notorious dedicated sniper was known for targeting Bubblegum to interfere with his gameplay. The problem was that this person was quite skilled.

***

Meanwhile, BubbleSniper's team circled near the Red Turtle. They placed wards and made small talk.

"Hey, what's Bubblegum's team looking like?"

"Oh, just nobodies like Zelo, ForeverAlone, Acorn Jelly, Choco Shroom."

"Pfft, BWAHAHAHA! Except ForeverAlone, they're all idiots, right? Oh, this will be so fun."

They were mistaken.

"But we did successfully snipe him, right?"

"Yeah. You know the app?"

Click.

He pointed at an addon. Stream-sitting was hardware-blocked within the capsule itself. That meant sniping wasn't easy to begin with. Going from watching a stream to starting a game took a bit of a process.

Professional snipers, therefore, didn't watch streams at all. Watching a stream and then getting in was too slow. Once they confirmed a stream had started, they opened this addon in the next game lobby and waited.

"We got in soon as the GoodSniper addon notification fired."

"Man, you're something else."

"Gotta do what you gotta do."

“Teeheeheehee!”

They laughed, imagining the hell that would soon unfold before Bubblegum.

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