CH 131

Fighting Cock felt like he was going to go insane from anger.

The fact that he lost one-sidedly against someone he thought was a hacker was extremely infuriating, but the hacking bastard even called him an Abuser, which increased his blood pressure.

However, Siegfried wasn’t really trying to taunt or provoke Fighting Cock in any way.

He was serious when he asked if Fighting Cock were an Abuser.

“You must be an Abuser, right? I mean… there’s no way that someone with your match history and rank is this weak…”

“…!”

“Sigh… Why did I have to meet an Abuser of all people…” Siegfried muttered and sighed.

However, every single word he spat stabbed Fighting Cock’s pride like a dagger.

“Hey!” Fighting Cock screamed. He pointed his finger at Siegfried and raged, “You bastard! What did you say just now?! What? Abuser? Me?!”

“Hey, I mean… does it make sense that a Total Expert with over 1,400 matches and a 60% win rate would get one-sidedly beaten up by a newbie like me? Hey, don’t do this kind of shit. Why are you wasting your time boosting your rank when you’ll eventually get discovered the moment you fought the big boys?”

“T-This crazy bastard actually dares to…!”

“You were accusing me of being an Abuser when you were the Abuser. Are you a pot calling the kettle black or something?”

“Y-You...!”

“You should be ashamed of yourself.”

‘I want to kill him! I seriously want to kill him! I want to kill him in real life!’ Fighting Cock was ready to offer up, even his soul, as long as he could kill Siegfried, who was trampling on his pride right now.

Of course, he had the freedom to think of whatever scenario in his head.

“Alright, GG~” Siegfried said before heading straight for the Door of Infinity.

It was the final blow that shot Fighting Cock’s blood pressure through the roof.

“Hey! Where are you going?! Wait! Hey!” Fighting Cock screamed at the top of his lungs, but Siegfried had already disappeared into the Door of Infinity.

***

Siegfried entered the Door of Infinity in hopes of meeting a true expert after beating the living daylights out of the Arena veteran, Fighting Cock. However, the automatic matching system matched him with users that were no different from Fighting Cock.

In fact, they reacted the same as Fighting Cock upon seeing Siegfried’s match history and win rate.

“Aigoo~ You went a bit too far with abusing~”

“A perfect win rate? Eighty-six out of eighty-six? Are you a hacker by any chance…?”

“You seem to have pulled some shady stunts. You could lose your account doing that, you know?”

Abuser and Hacker…

Every Adventurer he matched up with seemed to have agreed beforehand that they would call Siegfried either an Abuser or a Hacker.

“Did you play another game before playing BNW? Wait, are you a pro gamer?”

Of course, there were a handful of people who reacted positively, but a handful was a handful.

Fortunately, Siegfried could no longer be bothered by other people’s thoughts.

‘I can’t even believe my own win rate, so it’s only natural that they would think the same. I completely understand their misunderstanding.’

Siegfried knew that the ruckus was all because of his win rate. Therefore, he decided not to stress about what others thought of him anymore.

Why?

What Siegfried needed right now wasn’t the praise of others but a high enough Arena rank to act as his entry ticket into the high-ranking dungeons.

However, he had to admit that he was incredibly dissatisfied with his matches.

When he finally obtained his 87th consecutive victory…

‘Why are they so weak…? Where are the strong ones? I know that Abusers cannot be avoided in the Arena, but everyone shouldn’t be this weak…’ he thought.

The fact that he had become exponentially stronger than before he met Deus never crossed his mind. Rather, he started suspecting that the Arena had been compromised and was now completely filled with Abusers.

The Adventurers in the Arena weren’t weak at all. Siegfried just couldn’t see that he had become extremely strong.

However, it was understandable that Siegfried still couldn’t see his true strength. After all, the difference between Tae-Sung and Siegfried was simply too massive for him to begin wrapping his head around it.

In fact…

“There’s nobody again…?” Siegfried grimaced after opening the Door of Infinity.

This was now his fiftieth time opening the door, but the door couldn’t give him an opponent.

“Ah… What the hell… Why isn’t it matching me with anyone? Is today a bust? Ah, forget it. I’ll just go for a drive with that bastard Cheon Woo-Jin,” Siegfried grumbled and left the Hall of Balance.

One couldn’t log out from the Arena, so he had to leave the hall and return to the Martial God Temple in Proatine.

‘Should I try going to the higher fields? Hmm… no… the skill difference is not going to jump just because I went to the higher fields,’ thought Siegfried.

He was in a dilemma because he would definitely find more experts if he went to the ‘Battlefield of Balance,’ which was the next field.

The Battlefield of Balance also had the ‘Aura of Balance,’ and it was frequented by martial artists who wanted to fight with their abilities rather than relying on their stats and skills.

“Over there!”

All of a sudden, someone shouted.

“That’s him! Over there! The bastard I told you about!”

“Who?”

“Ah! You know, that guy! The one I told you about a while ago!”

Siegfried turned toward the commotion and found Fighting Cock pointing at him.

Thanks to him, all eyes in the lounge immediately darted toward him, and a few people whom he fought recognized him.

“Huh? Oh, it’s that guy from a while ago. He was really good!”

“Hyung, how many matches did you win in a row? I think you were at thirty consecutive victories when we fought?”

“I think that guy is hacking… He was at seventy-nine consecutive victories when I fought him…”

Many people started murmuring while looking at him.

‘Ah… are things going to become troublesome once again?’ Siegfried grimaced.

“Excuse me.”

All of a sudden, the Adventurer standing next to Fighting Cock walked up to Siegfried and asked, “Have you ever been in a match with my friend?”

“No,” Siegfried lied through his teeth.

“What do you mean, no?! You even accused me of being an Abuser!” Fighting Cock screamed.

“I think you’re the one who fought him…” Siegfried pointed at someone else.

“No, I’m not. You got the wrong guy,” said the stranger.

“Come on, don’t be like that now,” said Siegfried.

Fighting Cock’s friend revealed a strange smile at the sight and said, “Are you free, by any chance?”

Siegfried took a closer look at Fighting Cock’s friend, and he tilted his head in confusion as he slowly recognized Fighting Cock’s friend. ‘Huh? Have I seen this guy before?’ 

“By any chance… Do you stream on G-Tube by any chance? Meowbro?” Siegfried asked carefully.

ID Meowbro.

He was in his mid-thirties and was a BNW Arena streamer on G-Tube. He was a pretty famous streamer as well.

***

“It’s you, right? Meowbro?” Siegfried asked.

“Haha… Yes, well, I am Meowbro,” Meowbro awkwardly laughed and scratched the back of his head in response.

“Wow! I watched a lot of your streams before!” Siegfried exclaimed.

“Really?”

“Yes! I used to support your streams with whatever money I had left! My nickname at that time was…” Siegfried looked around before whispering into Meowbro’s ear at a volume that only Meowbro could possibly hear. “…ig.”

“Huh? What did you say?”

“…pig.”

“Sorry, I cannot hear you…”

“Male Pig. My ID was Male Pig.”

“Ah! So you’re Male Pig-nim—Eup!”

Siegfried hurriedly covered Meowbro’s mouth with his hand.

“It’s a secret. A secret!”

“Eup! Eup!”

“Top secret!”

“A-Alright.”

Meowbro was dumbfounded by Siegfried’s sudden actions.

“Anyway, M—”

“Shh!”

“So you are that person. I do remember you. You used to donate one thousand or two thousand won on my stream.”

“Really?”

“I remember you asking this and that question whenever you donated, and you used to comment quite a lot in all of my videos.”

“Wow! You remember all of that?!”

“Haha! Yes.”

“It is an honor to be remembered by you!”

Siegfried was so starstruck that he extended his hand and asked to shake hands with Meowbro. Meowbro was the one who made Siegfried start playing BNW.

Three years ago and about a year since BNW launched and took the world by storm, Siegfried stumbled upon Meowbro’s stream and instantly got hooked to BNW.

‘Hmm? This game looks pretty fun…’

Meowbro’s stream was unique because his content was more on the educational side, and he also gave a lot of tips and information related to the game.

Siegfried absorbed all of the information from watching Meowbro’s streams and used them to become even stronger in BNW.

Naturally, watching Meowbro’s streams became his daily habit.

In short, Meowbro was the one who turned viewer Han Tae-Sung into the gamer Han Tae-Sung of today.

“But why did you stop streaming? I think it has been nearly two years since your last stream,” Siegfried asked.

“Ah, that’s…” Meowbro’s expression darkened as he replied, “I was always cooped up in my room, and I kept on eating takeaway that it started affecting my health. I started exercising, but it was already too late. I suffered a stroke while exercising, and I had to retire.”

“Aigoo…”

“Still, the rehabilitation therapy was successful, so I am much better now, but my compatibility with the game isn’t as good as it used to be. Well, it is still better than the average gamer, so I have no qualms with it.”

“That is indeed a relief,” Siegfried replied with full sincerity.

“Thank you very much. I will soon start streaming again.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yes. To be honest, I find streaming to be much more fun compared to playing the game.”

“I will be rooting for you, and I cannot wait to watch your streams again, hyung.”

“Thank you.”

Fighting Cock’s face turned red from anger at the sight of Siegfried and Meowbro leisurely chatting.

“Ah! Hyung! That bastard is a hacker!”

“There’s no way that one of my viewers is a hacker…”

“Argh! Hyung! Do you actually believe this guy’s bullshit? Look at this guy’s win rate! He was at seventy-seven consecutive wins when I fought him! I couldn’t even touch him, you know?! He’s a hacker! A hacker!” Fighting Cock screamed and started rallying the other Adventurers against Siegfried by saying that Siegfried was a hacker.

“Jun-Hyeok, you shouldn’t easily accuse someone of being a hacker… It is a serious allegation, you know?”

“I know! But does his win rate make sense to you, hyung? And his movements are unbelievably good! It was too good to be true!”

“What if he’s just… good?”

“Are you saying that he could be some sort of a genius?!”

“Not necessarily, but anyway, you shouldn’t accuse someone so easily like that. And he is eventually going to get discovered if he is indeed a hacker, so you don’t have to get so worked up over it.”

“Ah! Again! You are doing it again! That Mr. Good Guy thing of yours!”

Finally, Siegfried carefully butted in and asked Meowbro, “Uhmm… if it’s alright with you… do you want to spar?”

“A spar?”

“I cannot trust other people, but I feel that I can trust you.”

“What do you mean?” Meowbro asked, tilting his head in confusion.

Siegfried decided to share his concern. “The players here are too weak, and I suspect that all of them are Abusers. I can’t find even find anyone to fight anymore because the automatic matching system has stopped working.”

“Huh? You think these people are Abusers because they are too weak, and you cannot find a match with the automatic matching system?”

“Yes…”

“Haha… hahahaha…!” Meowbro laughed in disbelief at Siegfried’s words before asking, “So, is that why you want to spar against me? You want to test your skills?”

“Yes…”

Meowbro wasn’t a Ranker, but he was a proven expert. As such, there was no one better than him to spar against if Siegfried wanted to test the limits of his abilities.

Search tinyurl.com/2p9emv8w for the original.

“Alright, then let’s have a round. I have to grant your request since you are one of my loyal viewers.”

“Thank you!” Siegfried bowed in gratitude.

“Then, I will go set up the room. Please come in once it’s ready.”

“Okay.”

Siegfried and Meowbro walked toward the Door of Infinity.

“Hyung! Put me in as a spectator!” Fighting Cock shouted as he chased after them.

***

Badump! Badump! 

Siegfried’s heart started beating wildly as he stood in front of his idol, Meowbro.

‘Who could have known that I would get to fight Meowbro-nim one day?’ he thought.

He was getting excited at the thought of sparring with his idol, whom he could only watch through a screen back then.

[Meowbro]

[Level: 221]

[Rank: Ultra Total Expert I (Veteran)]

[Match History: 3891W 21D 1911L (67%)]

Meowbro lived up to his reputation as a BNW Arena content streamer. His rank and match history were leagues better than Fighting Cock’s.

Among the opponents Siegfried fought since he started fighting in the Arena, Meowbro was undoubtedly the one with the highest rank among Siegfried’s opponents.

Participants of the Arena were divided into the following ranks…

— Total Newbie/Newbie

— Low/Intermediate/Expert

— Total Expert/Super Total Expert

— Ultra Total Expert III, II, I

— Hero III, II, I

— Overlord III, II, I

— War God III, II, I

— Martial God

Meowbro was still Ultra Total Expert I despite his long absence. There was a saying about how an old eagle was better than a young crow, and the saying definitely suited him.

Without a doubt, Meowbro was strong.

“Let’s have a good match, hyung.”

“I’ll be in your care.”

Siegfried and Meowbro greeted each other with a bow.

[Ready!]

[3… 2… 1…]

[Fight!]

‘You’re fucked now,’ thought Fighting Cock with a smirk.

He was happy because the hacker who dared to call him an Abuser was about to be humbled by Meowbro. He believed that Meowbro would be able to beat the shit out of Siegfried.