After that, I let Shin Heejae’s bullshit go in one ear and out the other while I thought about how to make him quit the game. And if I really could pull off this netkama act and get close to him, what exactly could I do to get my revenge?

　　“Should I clean out his account?”

　　Once players got close, they sometimes shared login details and asked each other to pilot their accounts for events or daily check-ins. If I got close enough for Shin Heejae to let me log into his account, couldn’t I just destroy every item he owned?

　　Considering that bastard was the master of the number one clan, he had to be decked out in high-grade gear. If he lost all of it, even Shin Heejae would have no choice but to quit. And even if he didn’t, there was no way he’d hold up in three siege wars a month without his gear.

　　Since the thought had occurred to me, I clicked on Heejae as he walked ahead of me and hit [View Info]. I wanted to see what gear he had equipped.

　　[You cannot view this player’s info.]

　　His info was set to private.

　　Was the bastard trying to act all mysterious? Still, I had nothing to lose, so I messaged him.

　　[Sesam]: Hey

　　[Heejae]: ??

　　[Sesam]: What gear are u running

　　[Heejae]: what do u mean?

　　[Sesam]: What are u wearing

　　[Heejae]: ur gonna be surprised when u see o.o

　　That dorky way he had of dodging a straight answer pissed me off, but I stopped myself from typing curses. I needed the info, so I’d just have to sit through his bragging.

　　A moment later, Shin Heejae messaged me again.

　　[Heejae]: infos open o_o

　　I immediately hit [View Info] and started going through his equipment one piece at a time.

　　[Silver Rain Wolf’s Lance +5]

　　“What the… It’s only +5? Not +9?”

　　Something was off. I’d expected everything he owned to be max-enhanced with enchants pushed to the limit, but honestly, Shin Heejae’s weapon wasn’t even on par with what other Arcadia streamers used.

　　Did this bastard already get cleaned out once? Confused, I checked his accessories and equipped title too, but the best thing he had was a pair of boots. Only his boots were max-enhanced. Everything else was +5… and his ring was only +3.

　　[Speedy Icarus Boots +9]

　　“Other than movement speed, all his stats are mediocre.”

　　Even those max-enhanced boots weren’t particularly rare. The Auction House was full of them. In other words, no matter how I ran the numbers, even if I stripped off every item Shin Heejae had equipped and sold the whole lot instead of destroying it, I’d only get around $350 in real money. As someone who’d once dumped a thousand bucks a month into high-end gear, his setup baffled me.

　　“Was he… just some hardcore PvP player…?”

　　I was muttering blankly to myself when Shin Heejae typed, almost like he’d read my mind.

　　[Heejae]: i just outplay ppl so this much gear is plenty lol

　　[Heejae]: its usually ppl with no skill who swipe that hard hehe o_ov

　　“Fuck, I seriously want to murder him…”

　　The bastard knew exactly how to hit a nerve, like he’d personally witnessed my past. My face heated up as I remembered my old main, decked out in expensive gear and higher level than him, getting absolutely wrecked by Shin Heejae.

　　This asshole was evil just by existing. I mean, what was even the point of pay-to-win capitalism if this asshole could destroy whales with cheap gear? I closed Heejae’s info window, already feeling thoroughly defeated before I’d even gotten started.

　　“Even if I cleaned out his gear… he wouldn’t even bat an eye.”

　　Worse, my easiest revenge plan was already off the table.

　　“Is e-dating seriously my only option?”

　　Meaning I’d have to go full Sweatdrop and start draining his wallet for real. Except…

　　The more time I spent with him, the less he seemed interested in me that way. And even if he was interested, he didn’t exactly seem like the type who’d let himself get played.

　　Sure, he still called me Noona every chance he got, but he wasn’t remotely clingy the way Yatta had been.

　　“No. Let’s not jump to conclusions.”

　　I narrowed my eyes at Heejae, then slowly headed toward the dungeon entrance where he was waiting. For now, I’d keep watching him and wait for an opening.

* * *

　　A week passed.

　　“Shin Heejae… God, this son of a bitch.”

　　Aside from the hours I was at work, from ten in the morning to five-thirty in the afternoon, I spent almost all my time playing Arcadia.

　　And the more time I spent in the game, the more ways Heejae and I had to contact each other. He started calling me on Discord, and we even exchanged numbers.

　　Of course, since he thought I was a woman, I never turned on my mic. But despite having more ways to talk, Shin Heejae and I hadn’t actually gotten any closer.

　　All I knew about him was that he was twenty-one, ran his YouTube channel himself without an editor, and currently lived in Seoul. None of that had come from getting close to him, either. You could figure it all out just by watching a few of Shin Heejae’s livestreams.

　　Since I was determined to find some weakness I could use to make him quit, I’d started watching his streams seriously too. But even when fans dropped good money just to ask him a question, he’d always give them some half-assed answer.

　　For example, someone would ask, “Heejae, do you have a day job?”

　　And he’d answer, “Yeah, I’m a Night Walker.”

　　Maybe that was just one of his dumb jokes. Still, the more I looked into him, the more weirdly careful he seemed about what he revealed.

　　Shin Heejae had also been streaming for over a year without putting his face on camera even once. I hadn’t followed him consistently, so I couldn’t say for sure, but there wasn’t even anything in his uploads with some clickbait title like [Heejae Finally Reveals His Face!]

　　Every now and then, he’d turn on a hand cam while he played. Gaming streamers who never showed their hands were quick to get accused of using hacks, and even then, Heejae acted annoyed, like proving himself was a huge pain in the ass. That unapologetic attitude only pissed me off more.

　　“Though I bet he’s ugly as fuck.”

　　If he was that stubborn about keeping his face off-camera, he probably had something to hide. These days, even guys who looked ugly as hell showed their faces on stream. If Heejae insisted on showing nothing but his hands, maybe he had a serious inferiority complex about his looks.

　　But even when I occasionally baited him by calling him ugly, Shin Heejae never got mad.

　　[Heejae]: is that a pet name o_o?

　　Instead, he’d just say shit like that, then rename his pet [Ugly♥] to piss me off.

　　By that point, I was getting confused too. Did this bastard even see me as a woman? Even accounting for the fact that I talked to him like an asshole because I hated him, Shin Heejae was way too casual with me.

　　“He doesn’t even talk to me unless it’s about the game… If you’re interested in someone, don’t you usually keep trying to talk to them?”

　　If I exchanged numbers with a girl I liked, I’d say all kinds of stupid, unfunny shit just to keep the conversation going. Whether it worked or not wasn’t the point. You just threw something out there…

　　But Shin Heejae never contacted me unless it was about when I was logging in or some item in the game. Even his messenger profile picture was still the default silhouette.

　　“Or maybe he’s the type who thinks game friends should stay in the game…”

　　For some reason, that was the impression I got from him.

　　Anyway, my takeaway from the past week was this: Shin Heejae was ridiculously careful about hiding his identity, and I still couldn’t tell whether he was actually interested in me.

　　I was even starting to wonder if Hyejin had exaggerated when she said he’d lost his shit because I hadn’t logged in for a few days. At this rate, instead of getting my revenge, I was going to end up as that bastard’s healbot! I mean, I’d quit the game again before I let it get that far, but I didn’t want this whole scheme to fizzle out before it even got off the ground.

　　Which left me with one option.

　　“Fuck… Do I seriously have to make the first move?”

　　I clutched my head and groaned. But no matter how I looked at it, there was no way Heejae and I could suddenly start acting all lovey-dovey. Because this was pretty much what it was like whenever we played together.

　　[Heejae]: Noona u kinda scare me o.o…

　　[Sesam]: What??

　　[Heejae]: watching u play makes me realize ur field of vision gets super narrow when u get old o_o…

　　[Heejae]: man… getting old sure is scary o_o

　　[Sesam]: F**king asshole whats ur problem???

　　[Heejae]: watching u still squirm around in the middle while im pulling mobs from behind…

　　[Heejae]: its obvious u missed them cuz ur vision is so narrow o.o

　　[Sesam]: Thats not

　　[Heejae]: im not blaming u Noona o_o lol cant help it when u get old T_T

　　[Sesam]: F**k u I was casting buffs okay?? Dont bulls**t me

　　[Sesam]: U f**king piece of s**t u better die when u reach my age or I’ll kill u myself

　　How the hell was I supposed to sweet-talk him when this was what our conversations usually looked like? This was about as good as it got talking to an insufferable bastard like Shin Heejae. Even when I held myself back as hard as I could, I still ended up swearing at him.

　　Romance was definitely out of the picture.

　　Besides, we didn’t even spend that much time screwing around in chat like this. Because Shin Heejae… was the kind of bastard who never wasted a single minute in-game.