Season 5: Chapter 147. Preemptive Annihilation (3)

According to the rules revealed so far, the Platform War consisted of qualifiers, main rounds, and playoffs. The qualifiers were split into Group A and Group B. Since Survival mode had a total of ten teams of fifty people per game, each group consisted of five Cheese teams and five Paprika teams. This was Group A.

Groups A and B were each formed with ten Paprika teams and ten Cheese teams mixed half and half, playing a total of ten games. Through those ten games, only the top five would advance to the main round. The rest would be eliminated.

In the main round, games would be played as a single group. The four surviving teams would advance to the playoffs. The playoffs ran in a best-of-three Siege format with only the finals being best-of-five.

"Now, does anyone feel something from this? Ber~?"

Camebert had said he'd explain why they tracked first-place rankings in scrimmages. He ran through the Survival mode rules once more and asked them another question.

'What?'

'I don't know?'

'Feels like I'm supposed to raise my hand and say something. What is it?'

Everyone looked puzzled, glancing at each other. Suddenly, someone raised their hand.

Click!

[DumbYoungMan]

It was Almond.

— Student, lower your hand

— Hermione Almond

— lmaooooo

— What is he planning;

— His name alone inspires no confidence...

His viewers had zero faith in him.

"Hmm."

Camebert, having asked the question himself, nodded and recognized him.

"Yes, Dumb Young Man. Go ahead."

“Pfft...!”

Countless streamers barely held back laughter at hearing Almond’s username called. Among many, Zelo was working the hardest to suppress an exaggerated laugh.

"Mmmnghh... nnghh... NGH!?"

It seemed intentional. Apparently, they still harbored a grudge against the Lord.

— Zelo lmaooo

— What lol

— Laughing like that won't bring Raina back to you...

— He really likes him fr

Whether anyone laughed or not, the Dumb Young Man answered with bright eyes because it was completely obvious to him. "Ranking people so the bad ones can just be tanks."

From his perspective, it was the most natural thing.

— ?

— Truly fertile mind...

— ??

— How do you tank an entire team lol

— lmaooooo

— LOL

— What the

— How many tanks insurance lol

— Tanks are people too...

Almond proposed the supremely corporate idea of ranking people and making the bottom performers do chores while the rest carried. Of course, everyone took it as a joke.

"Oh?" The person who had actually asked the question, Camebert, reacted with genuine interest. "That's roughly close."

Da-da-DUN!

Naturally, the streamers couldn't help but murmur after the Cheese moderator himself proclaimed so.

'What? Is that actually real?'

'Are they telling me to be fertilizer again!?'

'Damn.'

'Then our team has no hope from the start!'

Wanting to perform and receive attention was human instinct. For streamers, it was practically an obligation. If they ranked low in scrimmage, even that opportunity wouldn’t come. Confusion naturally arose.

"Oh, don't be too frightened. I said the nuance is similar. The Dumb Young Man's words aren't exact~~ly correct. We've learned through Cheese Village's history, right? That hell cannot repeat itself. Ber-ber-ber~~!"

— lmaooooooooo fr

— What happens when you do it Almond's way: Cheese Village Ah-Sung

— Learned from history lmaooo

— Good thing they tried it then

— The process by which one person's madness devours a village

— Hear hear!

"Now, let's take a look at this screen."

Ding!

He pulled up a reference chart. It was a bracket. The qualifiers were divided into Group A and Group B. Cheese and Paprika were distributed exactly half and half.

"It starts beautifully split half and half, but let's consider the worst case?"

Ding!

The screen changed. In Qualifier A, Paprika's five teams took ranks 1 through 5. In Qualifier B, Paprika also took 1 through 5.

"This can absolutely happen. Paprika takes all the spots in the qualifiers. If the main round begins that way...?"

Ding!

[Main Round]

The screen changed, and another bracket was revealed entirely in one color.

— Wow

— What the

— This could actually happen?

— Impossible

— Interesting

Every team was Paprika.

"The tournament organizers have no countermeasures against this scenario. It was simply made with the mindset of surely at least one Cheese team per group will keep advancing~.' That's the tournament."

The streamers' expressions became slightly serious.

"No wait, if that happens, it's not a Platform War anymore."

"It’ll just be a Paprika festival running with half of Cheese's money..."

"Insane. That would be hell."

"Impossible. Is that what those guys are aiming for with all that obsessive practice!?"

Paprika hadn't said anything yet. Seeing the worst possible future, these Cheese streamers' hatred for Paprika was growing. Like Almond, they'd all heard certain rumors.

"They're supposedly doing 25-person practices! If we stay like this, won't we all get eliminated!?"

Someone finally said it. It was Zelo.

"We can’t let this slide! Everyone! Paprika's 25-person joint practice is like North Korea's nuclear test provocations! This is a damn warrrr!!!"

— lmaooooo

— LOL

— North Korea nuclear test lmfao

— fr lol

— Wow lmaooo

— Though this side is more like North Korea?

The commotion grew.

"A 25-person practice?"

"What... is this genuinely war prep?"

"Insane. Are you saying we should do the same?"

The 25-person joint training hadn't actually been confirmed, but just hearing it was frightening. The Cheese platform had barely launched. If they were all completely eliminated in the Platform War, the main round would become a Paprika-only festival.

"Wait, wait, wait!?" Miho suddenly stood up.

She'd realized something and was startled.

"This... it's not just a problem of Cheese getting eliminated. Think of there being even one more Paprika team than us in the main round!"

— What the

— Interesting...

— Wow

— True??

— Group ganging would be unwinnable?

Survival mode practically considered another team intervening a special emergency call. It was treated as an extremely dangerous situation. Going into a 2 vs. 1 Survival scenario was truly the worst possible situation. Adding even one more team meant five more people, making it 10 vs 5. The outcome would be completely different.

Camebert clapped.

"Correct! Miho, sharp observation. It's not just about avoiding the shame of not getting a single team through. We need to advance a minimum of five teams to the main round!"

Ding!

The screen changed.

[Cooperation]

Nothing else was written. Just the word cooperation and a picture that would suit a title that said, “Friends of the Global Village.”

"We must trust each other. We are competing and fighting now! But we must not forget that we are of one Cheese!"

— Teaming lmaooo

— Just telling them to gang up in a weirdly elegant packaging

— In the end...

It seemed to be heading toward a beautiful conclusion.

"Which is why! We track rankings!"

The story had returned to its original starting point. Why track rankings?

— ?

— ?

— ??

— ?

The cooperation poster evoked “Friends of the Global Village,” and tracking rankings didn't quite align because this cooperation had a strict hierarchy.

"We need to clearly understand who to rally around!"

They wanted to pick out who was the best in Cheese for everyone else to support that person.

"That's all. We're not the self-righteous and coercive Paprika. Just be aware of it... and make a decision when the critical moment comes."

He was essentially telling the weaker teams to go ahead and die in the actual event.

"Please make that decision without fail! We worry that you might receive the public's barrage of criticism... That is to say, not Cheese's coercive and self-righteous barrage, but the barrage of democratic citizens! Ber-ber-ber~!"

— lmaooooooooo

— Isn't this too much?

— This is what it takes to win...

— If you don't do this, you end up in the same hell anyway

— If you're bad, just die by yourself lmaooo

— Wow

— Will this even work...

— Bubblegum is already out?

"Explanation done! Everyone worked hard today!"

***

The first joint scrimmage concluded, but not for the fans. The heat still remained for them.

— Zelo plays well, streams well, provides everything, what's the problem?

— Whatever anyone says Bubblegum is a tournament winner. Treating him as a sandbag is too blatant

— UnderZeloUnderZelo UnderZeloUnderZelo

— Bubblegum's fans are also super old lmaooo

— Zelo’s viewers are also 30-40 looking at data LOL

Practice eventually led to clashing not with the enemy, but with allies. It was the same for the fans. Fights broke out as people tried to determine who did well and who didn't. In Can't Can't Can't, Zelo and Bubblegum's fans were already grabbing each other by the hair.

— Remember when Zelo got Ice Aged by Bubblegum?? LOL

— Bubblegum is genuinely indistinguishable from a troll and that's the issue. Mess up and the team atmosphere goes sour instantly

— Zelo fans pretending to be in their 20s is gross. These guys are all 30 now, only their bank accounts are still in their 20s

ForeverAlone's fans actually had a loud voice, but they were just too few and couldn't say anything.

— Bubblegum-Zelo showdown

— Let's just quietly stay still...

— Intervene wrong and you'll get a hole poked through you like an ace

— ForeverAlone fighting~

This wasn't only Can't Can't Can't's problem. Many other teams also had heated conversations after yesterday's scrimmage. In the extreme case, things like this happened.

[#3. Kick Miho kick Miho kick Miho]

Whether they hacked Streamer Garden or someone coordinated it, Miho's haters had pushed a post to the top of the trending list.

— You guys are crossing the line...

— What is this?

— Are they genuinely unwell?

— Miho has always had a lot of haters lmaooo

Amid all this, missiles flew from every direction in this warzone. Some fandoms remained strangely quiet.

[Knight Order is just trusting the coach and going]

[Just upvote if you're a solid Knight Order fan]

[Somehow I just feel like our team will get first anyway just saying]

Only very positive posts appeared. Why?

[#7. The reason why the Knight Order side is currently quiet]

This one trending post perfectly explained the current situation.

==== ====

The coach drew aggro yesterday and summoned all the cockroaches then stomped them all lmaooooooo

==== ====

— fr

— Agreed

— fr fr

— lmaooooo fr

— I want to get stomped too...

└ ?

└ You should have come out yesterday. Now it’s too late. I rushed out yesterday and got stomped

└└ Early bird gets the stomp

— Changing the strategy and hitting first place immediately, genuinely legendary

— lmaooooo she summoned all the cockroaches yesterday and killed them all and now it's quiet lmaooooo

— The ones who would've caused trouble already spent all their energy yesterday lmaooo

— Admiral Yi's preemptive annihilation form is insane

...

This was the result of preemptive pest control. A woman scrolling down put a hand to her chest in relief.

"Phew... thankfully nothing went wrong."

She was grateful nothing had passed without incident.

"Just a bit more... Let's hang on."

On the corner of her desk, her calendar had a few yellow circles drawn on it.

"Once the actual tournament starts, it'll be fine."

The tournament would be all over in two days. The hard part of streamer tournaments was always the practice process.

Gyuri resolved to just get through those days.