[Woniwoni>.< ▄︻┻┳━一 BangbaedongBbatta]
[Woniwoni>.< ▄︻┻┳━一 IllIIlIllI]
[DOUBLE KILL-!]
"It's the same game, so why does it look so smooth? Is it always like this when you spectate?"
-no way
-one thing's for sure, they're better than the room host
-the game looks super easy
-probably a smurf, no ranked history on this account
Dead Zone streamer Angler watched Woniwoni's gameplay with one exclamation after another.
A spectating-a-toxic-guild stream, born entirely from the flow of the moment.
He'd dropped in to watch because four people were in the same room together.
And as it turned out, those four were in the middle of bullying one person!
He'd been pumped at the thought of uploading something to NuTube with a title like "Toxic Guild Goes TOO FAR! Innocent Players Pay the Price!"
Instead, he'd captured footage of the supposed victim not getting bullied at all—but outmaneuvering them with insane map knowledge and mechanics, snatching victory right out from under them.
That alone would've been satisfying enough.
But then.
The same four players who got matched against Woniwoni again in the next round were—
[BangbaedongBbatta — 2 kills 7 deaths]
[IllIIlIllI — 2 kills 6 deaths]
[YourBFSucks — 3 kills 6 deaths]
[MomAmIHacking — 5 kills 8 deaths]
—getting demolished on the enemy team, every single one of them in overdeath territory.
And Woniwoni, the one pummeling them without mercy, was sitting at 15 kills and 2 deaths.
*A smurf account?*
How else could an account with zero ranked history be toying with four Masters players?
-lmaooo they're so bad
-must've boosted to master
-toxic guild getting schooled lol
-tsk tsk, obviously boosted
The chat was drowning in mockery as the four got stomped without a shred of resistance.
But from Angler's perspective—a fellow Master-tier player—they didn't actually look that bad.
Games were relative like that. You could look terrible compared to the right opponent.
But judging by their reaction times and quick adjustments, these weren't scrubs by any means.
"No, like, Master tier is genuinely good… 'mediocre tier'? Come on. That's not fair. And no, I'm not defending the toxic players."
He'd come here to roast some griefers, but now they'd been getting beaten up all day, and being the same tier, he almost felt sorry for them.
"Wow, who even is this person? Has to be a Challenger smurf. There's literally no ranked history."
-yeah, definitely
-really wanna see their POV;;
-hmm… their reaction time doesn't even seem human
-is it really that impressive? maybe those guys are just terrible
While the debate raged between "Woniwoni is just that good" and "those guys are just that bad"—
"Oh, all four are moving at once. The position Woniwoni's in right now is completely exposed on all sides—if they rush in together, there's no way to hold it."
In a casual Quick Match, that kind of positioning happened all the time.
But against opponents who were actively coordinating? Worst possible spot to be.
Woniwoni was cutting across a hallway lined with windows, open on all four sides.
*They got overconfident from dominating the gunfights!*
Angler was certain this was Woniwoni's mistake.
He figured they'd die, sit through the respawn timer, and regroup—
"Huh?!"
Bang—!
[Woniwoni>.< ▄︻┻┳━一 IllIIlIllI]
Sniper in hand, Woniwoni pushed aggressively straight forward and cleaned up the rifle in front of them first.
Then spun around instantly.
Rapidly swapping between pistol and sniper, canceling the reload animation.
And immediately—bang—!
[Woniwoni>.< ▄︻┻┳━一 YourBFSucks]
Two down. Almost simultaneously, the remaining two climbed through windows on either side.
(AWR)
[1/20]
Only one bullet left in Woniwoni's sniper magazine.
Bang—!!
[Woniwoni>.< ▄︻┻┳━一 BangbaedongBbatta]
With that uncanny aim, they drilled the shot into one of the two window climbers—
But surviving still seemed impossible.
Honestly, getting flanked from the side and still taking out three of four was already a massive humiliation for the enemy.
The moment everyone accepted that Woniwoni was about to die—
"Okay, this is it— wait, what—?!"
-????
-what the
-what did I just watch
-this person is insane
-is the enemy bugged or something
-holy sh*t
Instead of the sniper, Woniwoni instantly drew the pistol, threw in a jump with a bizarre, unpredictable step pattern to dodge the last player's first shot—
Bang bang—!
[Woniwoni>.< /̵͇̿̿/̿ ̿ ̿ ̿ ̿ (HEAD) MomAmIHacking]
—and put a pistol bullet clean through their head, escaping the crisis without a scratch.
"What the— are you serious? Holy sh*t."
Instant, unfiltered praise.
The kind of play people would call a legendary highlight reel moment.
"What even was that movement? They just, like, jumped?"
-probably panicked and spammed
-classic horror game energy from the room host
-lucky shot?
-seems too clean for luck tho
The game was already a complete blowout, so more than continuing to spectate, Angler desperately wanted to rewind and watch that clip again.
It was the kind of high you got as a gamer when you witnessed something you couldn't quite explain.
"I, I really want to see this person's POV… ugh, spectating has its limits. I want to see both sides—the one getting hit and the one doing the hitting."
Woniwoni was now sitting at 22 kills and 3 deaths.
At this point, it was just a front-row seat to a massacre.
"Their reaction time is practically feral? Whether they're holding an angle or pushing through, they always shoot first. Who the hell is this? Has to be one of the Challengers, no question."
The praise for this mystery player continued until the very end of the match.
What had started as forced hype for a NuTube upload had turned into genuine, heartfelt admiration.
Time passed, and the team deathmatch hit 100 kills.
Woniwoni alone had racked up 35 of them.
-who is this? insanely good
-the movement alone is on another level
-lmaooo they can't do anything
-honestly embarrassing, I got griefed by those guys once too
"Wait, is this actually someone famous?"
Just like Angler said, everyone was convinced it was a smurf account.
The main content in Dead Zone was ranked matches and guild battles.
Technically there were both guild rankings and individual rankings—
And top guilds regularly recruited players with high individual rankings.
Most of those top guilds also streamed regularly.
So if you were Challenger tier, there was a solid chance you'd heard the name at least once.
"Hmm…."
Angler knew that well enough.
"Ugh, who is it? Can't tell just from watching the gameplay. I'll ask a Challenger friend."
And just like that, he smoothly pivoted the stream's content to "Finding the Identity of Woniwoni!" and kept going.
***
"Mmm, that was fun."
Haven't focused that hard on a game in a while.
[Woniwoni>.<: Thanks to you, I got to fix the K/D ratio that dropped while grinding for the title! Appreciate it!]
I got the last word in and made my exit.
Their chat activity had already dropped off sharply mid-game, so I had no idea if they'd even see it—but the one who lands the finishing blow wins. That's just how it works.
I'd won completely, both in-game and in the chat, and was sitting back feeling thoroughly satisfied when—
[Friend Request +42]
Out of nowhere, friend requests started pouring in.
"What the…."
Their friends, maybe?
They couldn't beat me on skill, so maybe they called in reinforcements.
*They have a lot of friends….*
Four of them rolling together made sense now—total social butterflies.
Probably each one called their own crew.
I went into settings and immediately blocked all friend requests.
That should've been the end of it.
[Gift Box +55]
"Eek."
Most of them were cheap, useless gifts—but the intent behind them was unsettling.
*How angry do you have to be to send someone gifts?*
It was a method I couldn't even imagine using myself.
Sending gifts to an enemy?
I'd begrudge every single won of it.
Unless I had hundreds of millions sitting in my bank account….
*Wait! Could it be—!*
So they're rich… and popular… actual social elites?
*Wh-what is this, I clearly won, so why do I feel like I lost.*
I pouted a little and opened the gift box, then hit claim all.
They sent it, so there's no reason not to take it.
Consider it war spoils.
Just to be safe, I scrolled through the sender IDs—
*Huh, none of their names are in here?*
AnglerTubeSubAndLike, WhoAreYouNotYou, AcceptMyFriendRequest, and so on and so forth.
Not a single normal username in the bunch.
The level of dedication it takes to change your name just to harass someone.
"Yikes."
Did I poke the wrong bear…?
What's AnglerTube. Is that the toxic guild leader's NuTube channel?
I searched NuTube just in case, but all that came up was a channel about keeping pet parrots.
Blocked gift receiving too.
*So that's why that feature exists. Anti-harassment protection.*
My heart was pounding a little, so I jumped into a casual knife-only room to calm my nerves.
"Alright, let's go grind some titles."
I'm almost done with the grenade kills anyway.
Thanks to that unexpected interruption, the title grind took one more day than planned.
And for a while after that, I basically lived in the melee weapon rooms, chasing the Sword Master title—the last piece I needed for the Weapon Master title.
A week passed like that.
I was nodding off after lunch, barely keeping my eyes open, when—
"Hey hey, you know Woniwoni?"
"Who's that. Are they Challenger?"
"Nah, just a Quick Match stomper, but the style is insane."
"Ehh… I can stomp Quick Match too."
"No seriously, trust me and watch the highlights. This is stomping on a whole different level."
"Ugh fine, Woniwoni? Is this the one?"
My ears perked up.
"…?"
Did I mishear that?
I could've sworn I just heard a familiar name….
I swallowed the drool that had almost escaped while I was dozing and zeroed in on where the voices were coming from.
"Oh, damn, what is this."
"Insane right? Don't know about the skill level, but the dopamine hit is unreal."
"Couldn't any decent Challenger do this in Quick Match though?"
"But apparently people are saying Woniwoni is probably a Challenger smurf too."
"Is there a POV? It's all spectator footage."
Wait.
Sleep evaporated instantly. I shifted and pressed my face flat against my desk.
*Gulp.*
*No way… that's not about me, right…?*
A very familiar username was being passed around between guys I barely knew.
If I were the social type, I'd have run over and gone "That's me! Wanna be gaming friends!"
But these were guys who avoided eye contact and got awkward whenever we crossed paths.
Hopeless for someone with my deeply antisocial DNA.
*O-okay. I need to check this for myself.*
Not possible at school.
My phone isn't a smartphone, so I can't watch NuTube on it.
*But borrowing Si-yeon's phone means leaving a search history, and I'd rather not.*
I spent the rest of class just bouncing my leg under the desk.
"Goodbye, everyone!!"
Then bolted home at the speed of light and searched my Dead Zone username on NuTube.
[Woniwoni Downtown Highlights]
[Woniwoni Sniper Compilation]
[Weapon Master Woniwoni 40-Kill Carry]
"Wha—?"
It actually came up.
The moment I searched, I was staring at thumbnails with my username and character plastered right on them.
Looked like someone had spectated my gameplay and uploaded it….
*Why me though?*
I'm not even that good.
I've always been a casual player at heart—even in my past life, I mostly messed around in Quick Match, and the one time I hit Master rank was just to see if I could. I never pushed further than that.
Sure, I climbed with a solid win rate, but there was definitely a ceiling, and it was never a game I took that seriously.
*My reaction time has gotten a bit better, but… enough to get spectated and broadcast like a pro gamer…?*
There were about seven highlight videos in total—not exactly viral, but—
"Wait, what."
[Hidden Master Schools Toxic Guild]
(Views: 189,400) (6 days ago)
A video closing in on 200,000 views, and the star of it was, by all appearances, me.