Chapter 1: It’s been a month since the broadcast-2

I stared at the slowly booting monitor.

The room was dark, but the monitor was bright—so bright it was almost blinding.

I rubbed my eyes, which stung slightly.

Did that help a little?

As I sipped some water to soothe my throat, the computer finally finished booting up.

Grasping the worn mouse, I clicked twice with a distinct sound.

My homepage was set to my own channel, and I frowned.

“Why…?”

A question whispered to myself.

I stared at the number next to my channel name.

Just a moment ago, my subscriber count was at 28, but now it had dropped to 27.

Where did that one person go?

I had been consistently uploading videos and thought I was making progress—was it just wishful thinking?

Out of curiosity, I replaced the pinned 10-subscriber milestone video with my latest upload.

The stats read: 14 views, 1 like, and 1 dislike.

The one dislike, which hadn’t been there before, caught my attention more than anything else.

The comments section was still empty.

What could have gone wrong?

If someone had at least left a comment, I might have been able to fix it.

With a sigh, I brushed my lips lightly in frustration and started up the stream again.

Viewers: 0.

Feeling a sudden wave of gloom, I forced myself to brighten up and smiled.

“Ah! S-sorry! The stream cut off unexpectedly…!”

Who was I even apologizing to?

That little question was quickly drowned out by a sense of duty to appear cheerful.

“Alright, so! We’ll set Skull Soul aside for now and try Isaac! Hehe…”

This game shouldn’t crash, right?

Laughing awkwardly, I kicked aside the pile of trash cluttering the space under my chair.

Something wet spilled out and soaked my foot.

I bent down to look—it was leftover pickled radish from some chicken.

Disgusting.

I hastily wrapped some tissues around my foot to wipe it off and grimaced as I glanced around the room.

Cleaning. I had been putting it off, telling myself “I’ll do it tomorrow” over and over.

And now, the result was chaos.

Food scraps, garbage—it might’ve been my imagination, but even the air seemed murky.

I vowed to myself, Tomorrow, I’ll definitely clean this room.

Quickly, I refunded Skull Soul and purchased Isaac.

If there was one stroke of luck, it was this: the game was 50% off.

Though I had spent a hefty 60,000 won on Skull Soul, Isaac was only 6,000 won.

“So… I came out ahead, right?”

I tried to sound upbeat.

The money I had originally spent came back, and I bought something cheaper with it.

It felt like I had scored a bargain, though recalling the process left me feeling conflicted.

“Haa…”

With a restless mind, I clicked on the download button.

The file size was small, so it seemed the download would finish quickly.

About six minutes, give or take.

What should I do for six minutes?

I couldn’t just sit there staring blankly.

Even if there were no viewers, a true streamer should never let their mouth rest.

That’s what I had learned.

And where did I learn that? From watching YouTube.

I repeated the lessons I’d learned and slowly opened my mouth.

“Now that I think about it, it was quite warm yesterday, but today it’s suddenly gotten so cold.”

Hmm…

Even though I said it, it didn’t feel interesting, stimulating, or funny.

It was too mundane, and without anyone to respond, it was even duller.

Even if viewers joined, I doubted I could keep them engaged with this kind of talk.

If I were to grade myself, I’d give it 2 points out of 10.

“Uh…”

A moment of silence.

Wouldn’t something more provocative be better?

“Did anyone see that incident yesterday?”

No, that sounded too much like clickbait.

Besides, I didn’t even know of any incidents.

That’s a zero.

“Uh, um, ah, hmm…”

Trying to force out a conversation, I couldn’t think of anything.

While I struggled, the download finished, and I sighed deeply as the game launched.

Watching and doing it yourself were really two different things.

When I watched popular streamers, they were always chatting away, making it fun—how did they do that?

It was almost admirable.

Were they even human like me?

Maybe they were AI programmed to entertain.

Yeah, maybe all streamers are AI except for me.

Maybe we’re all just watching streams run by AI.

“Uh…”

As my thoughts grew more bizarre, I shook my head vigorously.

Enough with the stupid daydreams.

These were thoughts too embarrassing to share with anyone.

I let out a deep sigh.

The simplest way to tell interesting stories was to mix exaggeration into personal experiences.

But since I never left the house, there was nothing to talk about.

“Should I make something up?”

Even if I did, I wasn’t great at storytelling.

I felt a bit down, but now was the time to start recording again.

Let’s put on a brave face.

No one likes a gloomy, sulking streamer!

“Today’s game is Isaac!”

Though I personally disliked the slightly gory elements, it was undoubtedly a well-made game and loved by many.

Why else would it have a fifth series installment?

I was slightly worried, but unlike Skull Soul, there was no lag.

The computer wasn’t screaming, either!

At least this game worked.

I felt a bit proud.

My computer wasn’t obsolete just yet.

And neither was I.

“Hehe, let’s start without further delay!”

Enter.

As the monitor, the room’s only source of light, momentarily went dark, the room became pitch-black.

“Ah…”

The sound escaped reflexively as I was startled for a brief moment.

The screen lit up again, showing the protagonist’s illustrated diary, giving hints about the story.

To summarize, the stepmother was strange, and shortly after, the father died.

A typical game plot—nothing special, but it left a slightly sour taste in my mouth.

I swallowed it back and focused on the screen.

The illustrations were simple, as if drawn by a child, but that simplicity made them more unsettling.

Black, red, orange—just three colors formed these eerie drawings that suddenly zoomed in, causing me to let out a short scream.

“Eek! It’s a bit scary, isn’t it?”

I wanted to seem brave, so I said “a bit,” but it was actually very scary.

I knew the game had some gore, but I hadn’t expected this.

The zoomed-in image disappeared, replaced by a familiar, cute yet dark game screen.

“What the…”

It was my first time playing the game, but not my first time seeing it.

Hadn’t I watched plenty of other streamers play this?

But they never showed anything like that—why me?

With a mix of confusion and an odd sense of unease, I pressed ESC and slowly checked the options.

There, I found an unchecked box labeled Story Skip.

“So, that’s why…”

I paused just before checking the skip feature.

Everyone seemed to play with this option enabled, but wouldn’t it be more unique to leave it off?

Most people used this game for challenges or simply to clear it…

But I could approach it differently, by genuinely diving into the story.

The vague thought that popped into my head seemed like a pretty good idea.

“Wait, just a moment!”

I asked for patience from my zero viewers and searched online to see if anyone had delved into the game’s story.

Nothing came up.

For the first time in a while, I felt excited.

A vague sense of hope, as though I could actually accomplish something.

“There might be someone overseas, but at least in Korea, no one seems to have analyzed Isaac’s story in detail…”

Or perhaps someone had done it but just hadn’t uploaded a video.

“Still, this feels worth doing, doesn’t it?”

Sure, it was a bit—no, very—scary, but it wasn’t unbearable.

With that, the answer was as good as decided.

I changed the stream title to “[Riera] Exploring Isaac’s Story!” and restarted the game to rewatch the unsettling illustrated diary.

If something could be done, it should be done immediately.

Regrets later wouldn’t leave anything behind.

I took a sip of water and cleared my throat.

“Let’s get started! Today’s game is Isaac!”

My heart raced again for the first time in a while.

It felt like my very first stream.

I rubbed my flushed cheeks with both hands, and just as I started the game, a viewer joined.

Wow!

What should I say?

“Hello” seemed like a safe opener, right?

Or maybe “Welcome”?

As I debated how to greet them, the viewer posted a message in chat.

• “This has already been done by Dreja. Isn’t it embarrassing to steal someone else’s content without originality? ᄍᄍ”

Without giving me a chance to reply, they immediately left.

Back to zero viewers.

“Hmm…”

That stung a little.

I rubbed my aching chest and took a deep breath.

Ignore it. Think positively.

Three people had already seen the stream.

Wasn’t that amazing compared to yesterday?

Why should I feel hurt?

I should be happy instead.

I forced a smile.

After about ten minutes of collecting myself and putting on a fake cheerful expression, new viewers joined.

One, then two, then three.

“Huh…?”

Suddenly?

• “I’m sorry!”

Having viewers pour in was surprising enough, but now I was getting apologies I didn’t understand.

Had they entered the wrong stream?

But that didn’t make sense—there were too many of them.

And it didn’t stop at three viewers.

Seven, then eight.

And still, the mysterious apologies.

• “I’m so sorry!!!!”
• “Please forgive me!”

I could only gape at the chat, making a dumbfounded sound.

“Uh…?”

What on earth is going on…?