Ranker’s Return - Chapter 237

[He apologized and made a donation of one billion won for his work as a proxy knight. Can we let him go now? There are still many other people to scold.]

-Milk Drinking Yuljae: Yes. We can let him go. Let go of the reformed Heder and put on fur starting from today.

-Unexpected Death when Touched: He came out because he knew he would be labeled. I can just ignore it until something happens.

-Power Muscle King: You are right. Now it doesn’t matter if Heder makes his pro-scene debut or does streaming.

-Pro Dog Dreamer: Is Power Muscle King a fool? He is already streaming. Where did you come from? 10 years ago?

-Power Muscle King: Ah, really? Sorry, sorry. Then I’ll go to see it.

‘Heder was eventually forgiven.’ Hyeonu smiled when he remembered Lee Hoon’s apology during his streaming. Then a thought flashed through Hyeonu’s mind, ‘By the way, what is Heder’s class?’ He knew that Lee Hoon was a player with excellent skills and a proxy knight, but he didn’t know the exact class.

Hyeonu immediately switched to A-World. Then he searched for ‘Heder.’ He thought that Lee Hoon would’ve changed his streamer name after revealing that he was a streamer. Hyeonu’s thoughts were exactly right. Not long ago, there was definitely no streamer called ‘Heder.’ Now, search results for ‘Heder’ existed.

Hyeonu entered the channel of the streamer and played a video. The video Hyeonu chose was called ‘Heder’s Educational Stream’. He couldn’t figure out what it was from the title alone. Nevertheless, Hyeonu’s reason for watching this video was simple. It had the highest number of views.

-Today is my first stream after revealing my identity, so I prepared this to help viewers. I will teach you how to play my class, a ‘Liru Paladin’.

Hyeonu stopped watching the video after the first minute. That was enough. It would be a waste of time to watch any further.

‘Heder will be the sixth one.’

Hyeonu modified the file that was attached to the email he sent to Nike. This was Crescent Moon’s complete lineup.

***

Inside the CEO’s office on the highest floor of the Nike Building in the United States, two men were chatting with a serious expression.

“Boss, is this a lineup that makes sense? It is a team with Alley Leader, but there are only six people. How can it be like this?!” Kale said with a raised voice.

In Kale’s opinion, the file that Hyeonu sent was too outrageous. Hyeonu was being overconfident. No, he was being really arrogant. Otherwise, there was no way to explain the reason for Hyeonu to build a team of this level.

“There is a reason for it. It isn’t far-fetched. There is a very reasonable explanation. In addition, we might be acting as experts, but it is nothing compared to him, the new blood. Kale, you should calm down,” Jamie replied.

Unlike Kale, Jamie liked the lineup that Hyeonu sent. To be precise, there were no problems. Jamie asked, “Then are there any players that can be recruited right now? Even if there is Alley Leader in the team, countless people will refuse when they hear it is only a team of six people.”

The great Nike might’ve started recruiting, but the existing pro gamers and aspiring ones shook their heads when they heard Crescent Moon would only consist of six people. They knew because they had seen the heights of professional gaming. The low number of six meant there would be a great difference in strength.

This was until yesterday.

“However, it was only like this until yesterday. Yesterday, Alley Leader proved it in his stream. Numbers? Why do they matter?” Jamie said and clicked his mouse a few more times.

Then a video was played on the screen on the other side of the room. It was the video that Hyeonu sent to Ellis.

“Red Bull America, the winner of the last Arena Week raid, took more than 15 minutes to kill a single purple ogre. Then what about Alley Leader? Just four times. He killed a purple ogre with just four cuts. He surpasses all the people Nike contracted previously. We will reject all the offers that come in now,” Jamie declared.

“Boss…”

“We have to be bold. We made a bold move by signing a contract with Alley Leader, but that was how we gained tremendous success. Remember this, Kale.”

Jamie played another video. This video was to be released after Alley Leader debuted as a professional gamer. It was kept a secret, and only Ellis and himself knew about it. The video begins with an intense rock song as the background music. Then a phrase soon appeared: ‘MELEEGOD IS BACK.’

“Alley Leader is already the god of Arena.”

***

Hyeonu received a positive response from Nike. To be precise, it meant that Hyeonu should do whatever he wanted. Hyeonu didn’t care too much. It was going to be like this anyway.

‘I have no intention of recruiting other people.’

Hyeonu immediately sent an email to several people—Heder, Sunny, and Dwayne. Yuri was excluded from the recipient list as it was thousands of times faster and easier to contact her by phone.

‘I’m sending it at the same time, so I have to be vague.’

Hyeonu never brought up being a pro gamer in the email. He just said he wanted to meet and talk about something. The reason why he wrote only this much was that there was no way to persuade them on the spot if they felt burdened and refused to join his team.

‘It is best to meet before speaking.’

He was confident that he would unconditionally be able to sign them on after meeting with them. Hyeonu wrote the email neatly and carefully. Just then, Yeongchan banged on Hyeonu’s door. “Hey, come and eat.”

“Okay,” Hyeonu said and sent an email to the three of them before heading to the living room.

Food was already prepared on the table in the living room. There were a few sets of food—jajangmyeon, jjampong, and sweet and sour pork. They were the staples of the delivery food scene.

“Ah, I’ll eat well.” Hyeonu held his wooden chopsticks and sat in front of the place where jajangmyeon was placed.

The gloss coming from the jajangmyeon made him drool. On the TV, a program related to Arena was playing. It was a program that organized the topics of Arena. The host was excellent, so Yeongchan and Hyeonu watched it often.

-The video that recorded the highest number of views this month is ‘Alley Leader Academy - Priest’ by the streamer Alley Leader.

“Hey, Yuri is number one,” Hyeonu commented.

“How is she number one? You are number one,” Yeongchan responded briefly before inhaling the jjampong again.

Hyeonu trembled in an uncomfortable manner when he saw this and picked up a piece of sweet and sour pork. He dipped the meat in the sauce and took it out. While waiting for the excess sauce to drip down, Hyeonu once again spoke to Yeongchan, “Oh, right. Yuri said she took a leave of absence for the second semester?”

“Yes, she took care of it herself. Is she a kid? Why are you asking?” Yeongchan looked like he was on the verge of becoming annoyed.

Hyeonu couldn’t talk to this person while he was eating jjampong. Yeongchan grabbed some noodles.

“So can I borrow her for a few months?”

At Hyeonu’s words, the noodles fell from Yeongchan’s chopsticks, and the table was covered with the red soup of jjampong.

“Can’t you use your chopsticks well? Aren’t you going to clean up?” Hyeonu quickly picked up a tissue and started to clean the table and floor. It would be a pain if there was a stain.

As he watched Hyeonu, Yeongchan muttered to himself, “Please... Please...”

Hyeonu heard Yeongchan muttering and looked up. In Hyeonu’s eyes, Yeongchan looked a bit crazy as he held his smartphone with trembling hands.

“What is it?” The surprised Hyeonu threw the tissues he used to clean the floor and ran toward Yeongchan.

***

“So you thought I was going to confess to Yuri? You thought I was going to ask for money to live together? Aish, this distorted image. Wake up. Please think clearly!”

Yeongchan heard Hyeonu’s words and finally replied in a small voice, “No, it is natural to think so. Your words were easy to misunderstand.”

“Bullshit!”

“Then what were you going to say?”

“I want to borrow her for a few months as a pro gamer, a pro gamer.”

Pfft. This time it was water, instead of jjampong soup, that Yeongchan spilled on the floor. “Her? Don’t you want revenge? Don’t you want to win? So why pick her?”

Hyeonu stared at the water-covered floor while replying, “I have to make a team of six. A normal priest can’t handle it. It might only be possible if they’ve learned unique-rated skills.”

Yeongchan saw Hyeonu’s look and quickly grabbed a mop to clean the floor. Meanwhile, Hyeonu sat on the couch and watched him.

“Six people? Don’t other teams have 12 people? Won’t a team of six be ruined?” Yeongchan asked.

“Which one do you think is impossible for me? PvP, raid, siege.”

Yeongchan shook his head. He thought Hyeonu was a monster. So, of course, there were no problems. It was just the fixed idea. He was trapped by the preconceived notion that an Arena professional team should consist of 12 members.

‘This man is good enough to eat up everyone alone...’

In the Arena Pro League PvP event, everyone used characters with the same stat points. The only difference was the stat distribution ratio. The method of round progression was successive battles for the winner. It was also called a gauntlet match. The winner would continue fighting. It was a way for one super ace to carry the team. Thus, Quency picked it. They didn’t want a bunch of players with the right skills but a superstar who would draw the attention of the world.

‘Perhaps if it is Hyeonu, he will be able to win all matches.’

For Hyeonu, a raid was even easier. Just recently, he had proved it in his stream. Hyeonu had hunted faster than the entire Red Bull team.

‘The siege war is the biggest problem.’

Hyeonu alone was likely to be overthrown depending on how the other party prepared their strategy.

‘It depends on how he fills out the other five people.’

Thinking until here, Yeongchan could understand why Yuri was needed. If there were only six players on the team, a priest couldn’t just play the role of a priest. They had to be able to respond or dodge the opponent’s attacks until the other players saved them.

“Well, it is useless to tell me. You need to talk to Yuri. She will probably agree to whatever you say.”

The result wasn’t far off from Yeongchan’s expectations.

***

Yuri readily accepted Hyeonu’s suggestion, “Really? I’m naturally happy. I can be on the same team as Oppa... However, will I cause you any inconvenience? Will you regret it?”

She agreed so quickly that Hyeonu was worried.

“What inconvenience? You are the best. I don’t know about the world, but you are the best in the Korean League.” Hyeonu gave Yuri a thumbs up.