"Ju-Hyeok was a highly respected employee at Ah-Sung, unlike me. Everyone was probably upset when he said he was resigning."

“Oooooh~~!”

The streamers cheered and clapped.

— ??

— The manager was from Ah-Sung too?

— Wow

— So they were an Ah-Sung duo

— That’s insane

For most streamers and viewers watching the broadcast, this was their first time hearing this story. After all, it was Almond's personal life that perhaps only his fans knew. It was natural for others to be unaware.

"Yet, for his dream and for me, he left and achieved incredible results as a manager. I wanted to take this opportunity to express my sincere thanks. Ju-Hyeok will definitely be a person needed in this industry in the future. Keep an eye on him."

— Almond can speak this long?

— Wow, is this really Yu Sang-Hyeon? Is this really Yu Sang-Hyeon?

— Is this an advertisement?? lol

— Backdoor advertising for walnuts here

— LOL, the walnut is speaking for him

As the viewers commented, Sang-Hyeon was never the type to smoothly continue speaking for so long. Indeed, it was out of character for him to suddenly speak so extensively. He talked about his own life experiences in the simplest fashion possible.

‘That guy…’

Ju-Hyeok momentarily took off his glasses.

‘He prepared that.’

Ji-Ah patted his shoulder.

"Ah, no. It’s just something on my glasses."

Ju-Hyeok made an excuse.

However, Sang-Hyeon's acceptance speech wasn't over yet. Now, Ji-Ah's face turned red.

"I remember it clearly when my editor Ji-Ah made videos out of nothing special about me. Ji-Ah's videos were more famous than mine."

“Ahahaha.”

Light laughter came from the streamers.

"Then, by chance, we met in the park and found out we were neighbors. I remember holding onto her because Ju-Hyeok told me to stick with her no matter what as he prepared the documents."

The camera focused on Ji-Ah. Her face appeared huge on the screen and she lowered her head in embarrassment.

"After the contract, Ji-Ah would stay up all night to make videos if none were coming out. If the response was poor, she made another video. If there was no content, she studied other streamers' videos. She had a sense for film that we didn't have. Without Ji-Ah, our YouTube subscribers wouldn't have grown so much. I wanted to take this moment to say thank you."

Sang-Hyeon briefly moved away from the microphone. It seemed like he was wrapping up.

"Thank you to everyone at Treevy as well. I'll work hard. I'll also give my all in the ongoing international competition to beat Japan and China. Oh, and the Newcomer Award..."

Sang-Hyeon shouted, making a gun shape with his hand.

"Chikicha!"

— lololololol

— WHAT? lol

— Ahh! lol

— My hands and feet lol!

— Crazy lol Who requested this? lol

— ForeverAlone has died how many times? lol

This long Newcomer Award acceptance speech eternally roamed YouTube as a short.

***

In Streamer Garden, another round of posts started pouring in for a different reason this time.

[It's so funny how everyone who doubted got completely owned lol]

[They said he wouldn't win the Newcomer Award~ He wouldn't win it~~]

[The Newcomer Award was overwhelmingly his lol What do you mean he wouldn't win?]

Almond's fans grew emboldened and launched a counterattack. Since he won the Newcomer Award so overwhelmingly, they had every reason to strike back.

[Whenever someone tries to succeed, they get knocked down lol]

[Welcome to the domestic inferiority complex garden]

[What can we do…? These people were born as squids…]

[Yeah~~ just get smacked again~~ just do a Chikicha and it's over~~]

It was the same in any field. Even in the music market, there were one hit wonders. People whose first song exploded, but they effectively retired after that song. Fast rising stars had many fans who supported them. However…

[No way it's this overwhelming lol what lol]

[The gap is crazy]

[It should have been next year at least]

[Feels like being a newcomer was undervalued]

𝓯𝓻𝓮𝙚𝙬𝓮𝙗𝒏𝙤𝒗𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝒐𝓶

No matter what, there were always those with negativity. This resistance happened all the time. Maybe this wasn’t a social matter, but physics.

[One newcomer award has turned into a colonial era]

[Tsk tsk, such a fuss]

[Looks like the newcomer award will be his last lol]

[What’s with the atmosphere, did he win the grand prize? lol]

[You would think he swept all the awards?]

It was like air resistance. For those who were stationary, it was a source of life. For objects trying to move faster than the standards set, it was hellfire.

Even comets, far bigger than humans, could not withstand air resistance and burned up white. Most comets disappeared before reaching the earth's soil simply because they tried to go too fast against the air.

However, maybe that was only because the comet wasn't big enough. If a sufficiently large enough comet fell, the living creatures on Earth would burn up instead.

***

After they presented the newcomer award, they also gave out various other awards.

Miho took the stage first among the other Balloon Stars members. She received the excellence award in the female gaming streamer category.

Although the newcomer award was for a single person regardless of age or gender, the excellence and top excellence awards were divided into categories. That was why the newcomer award held greater value.

"Wow. I'm not sure if I deserve this!" Miho exclaimed with a thrilled face after thanking many people before leaving the stage.

Next was the top excellence award for men, which was somewhat predictable.

— Wow, the gap is insane

— Bubblegum's class hasn't gone anywhere

— Honestly, just for rolling around in Zombie School alone he deserves the grand prize lol

Bubblegum won the top excellence award by a significant margin. It had been expected when the candidates were announced.

As Almond grew, so did Bubblegum. This potentially also made Bubblegum a contender for next year's grand prize.

"

Wahaha!

Ah... First of all, I'm incredibly grateful to my wife. My YouTube channel wasn't doing well, but..."

He delivered a touching acceptance speech to his wife.

— Awww

— So sweet

— Bubblegum is lucky with people

— Sweet, so sweet!

Bubblegum also thanked his son and daughter for their support.

"Kids! Daddy won an award! You can succeed even if you're bad at studies or short!"

Laughter erupted, but Bubblegum's eyes were teary.

It was the end of the year. With alcohol involved, thinking about their achievements throughout the year could make anyone emotional. Sang-Hyeon felt the same.

‘I’m jealous.’

Applause.

Sang-Hyeon clapped harder than anyone else as he thought that.

Bubblegum’s wife ran up to give him flowers and hugged him.

‘That looks nice.’

Bubblegum and his family looked happy.

Sang-Hyeon lost his parents at a very young age. His grandmother took their place. Apart from that, he always harbored a fantasy of having a harmonious family with parents, sons, and daughters. He never consciously realized it, but he increasingly wanted a family as he grew older.

When Ju-Hyeok said he left home after a fight with his father, Sang-Hyeon sometimes felt like that was a spoiled complaint. Of course, it was a serious matter for Ju-Hyeok so he didn't show such a sentiment.

"The Female Streamer! Top Excellence Award! Goes to BlackTea!"

The Top Excellence Award for female streamers went to BlackTea.

She gathered many viewers by playing games with her straightforward personality and reportedly saw significant growth during the recent

LIL

tournament.

Surprisingly, she thanked GreenTea for always supporting her and teared up.

"

Ha

, thank you always!"

“Oooooh...!”

The streamers cheered and applauded. The ceremony continued to proceed.

"Now, only the grand prize remains in the regular awards," the host declared.

At this point, it seemed the atmosphere was shifting.

"Let's watch the performance of our second invited guests before starting the special awards! Most of the special awards... weren't pre-decided! So everyone, feel free to look forward!"

The special awards presentation, Sang-Hyeon was also waiting for this.

'It looks like the Best Couple Award is coming up.'

It seemed the Best Couple Award was included there.

***

Around an hour later, the performance by the invited guests ended. It took quite a while with stages prepared by streamers in between.

"Now, let's present the first special award."

The host looked around the audience as he spoke.

"This one had nominees, right?"

Swoosh!

The curtain was drawn back and the screen displayed some text.

[Best Team]

The award for the Best Team began.

"This award goes to the team that showed the most perfect harmony!"

Candidates were mainly composed of teams that participated in the

LIL

tournament.

"The special awards also reflect a fair amount of votes from the company's staff, so don't take it too seriously!"

“Ahahaha.”

The streamers laughed lightly.

"For the special awards, there won't be a presenter other than me. I, the host. will directly hand it over! Now, the special award! For Best Team!"

Dudududu...

The names of the teams scrolled up and down as drums filled the air. It didn't drag on for too long perhaps because many awards would be given out afterward.

"Balloon Stars!"

“Wooooah!”

Cheers erupted from Balloon Stars' table.

"In this year's Treevy hosted

LIL

tournament! They showed a delightful rebellion as the underdogs and even won! Unanimous votes from the employees! It was an overwhelming vote difference! Balloon Stars!"

Sang-Hyeon stood up and reunited with his former team members: StrawberryShooter, Miho, Bubblegum, and Takoyaki. They all held hands and went together.

“Wooooah!”

The other streamers cheered them on.

— Congrats

— This was so obvious lol

— Wow, seeing them together now feels so epic...

— The beginning of a legend

— The clip of Almond picking Flashy Blade and slashing Pickles is still going around lol wow lol

Videos of their performance in the tournament began playing on the screen. A scene showed Almond picking Flashy Blade. At the time, nobody expected him to use Flashy Blade.

Even more, nobody knew he would manage to score a level one solo kill against SweetRadish, the most skilled competitor in the tournament, with that very first pick.

Following that were scenes of Bubblegum's four person ultimate, Takoyaki taking a crucial CC for Almond, and Miho's charm hitting ForeverAlone.

All sorts of iconic moments were shown.

— Almond! Almond! Almond!

— Is this an Almond highlight reel? lol

— Is this really for the team award?

Among them, Almond's super plays made up a significant part of the footage. It was an unavoidable tragedy that not all the plays were shown.

The scenes where he played Raina were missing perhaps because they didn’t look as flashy as Flashy Blade.

— Where's Raina?

— Raina's gonna be sulking again lol

— This is a conspiracy by the alliance, damn where's Raina

— Raina not showing up when it's their award to win?

— Where did the world’s first kiss scene go?

Although the chat was filled with viewers looking for Raina, the ceremony continued.

"Okay, since there are so many of you, how about one representative come up to speak?"

The teammates all deferred to Almond for the microphone.

"The microphone goes to the one who worked the hardest!"

— That’s natural lol

— Bubblegum lol firmly refusing

— "Carry"

Almond ended up with the microphone. He had anticipated winning the Best Team award and prepared some remarks.

"Ah... First, I'm truly grateful for this award. I've hardly ever participated in team sports, but teaming up with the Balloon Stars members was a meaningful time."

— Oooo...

— Did he prepare this too???

— What advertisement is it this time?

Viewers, seeing Almond speak so fluently, anticipated an advertisement.

"Because of this experience, I was able to participate in the

Civil Empire

national competition without any hesitation. Thank you."

— Always leads to the national competition lol

— No way lol

— Nutty guy really ground his teeth for this lol

— Parrot damn lol

— Another hidden advertisement!?

"Wow, that national competition… At this point, don’t you want to see it already?" the host chuckled and sent the team members down.

The next award started, but then—

"Now, for the Best Performance award! Almond! He’s coming up again!?"

Almond won the next award too.

Sang-Hyeon seemed slightly embarrassed whether it was because he had to go up again or because he ran out of things to say.

"Come on! Come back up quickly!"

This was just the beginning.