Ascension Online: I Grow Stronger By Streaming-Chapter 29: A Night Walk

Kai logged off the game the moment he got into his room. He initiated his class awakening and then left. His eyes opened inside the pod, he reached up and pulled the helmet off his head.

The light of the room flooded into his eyes, bright due to the bulb, but his eyes slowly adjusted to it. He sat inside the pod for a few seconds, not moving at all.

Today had been something else for him, progress beyond what he imagined, his views, the resources that he gained, everything had taken a different step, he was now considerably a big streamer, in only two days at that. It was a near impossible speed, and Kai could barely believe that.

He had spent a total of six hours inside the game, it was still night out though, which meant his sister was still asleep. Kai propped himself from the pod, standing on the worn out floor of his room, and somehow, he didn’t feel like his body was even his own, it felt free, empty.

He lifted his hands, looking at his palms, he clenched his fist, feeling the power in his body rise. A smile formed on his face, one he could not tame or control.

"My strength in real life is rapidly increasing, I feel like I could punch through a wall,.... Well, I’m sure I can’t, but I feel like I can." Kai said to himself.

He turned around and looked at the pod, old and at the end of its life, but yet the very pod that changed everything for him. He smiled, knowing that going forward, for the best gaming experience, he would have to get a new one some day.

The issue was Kai had no idea if the streamer system would work the same way if he wasn’t in this specific pod, but he’d have to find that out soon.

He picked up his phone, clicked a button, seeing a string of several notifications lined up, most from the streaming platform that he used. He had done a lot of things today and he surely got noticed.

He clicked on the first one, a congratulatory message.

[Congratulations Shadow_Wolf on reaching 1000 views]

[Congratulations Shadow_Wolf on reaching 2000 views]

[Congratulations Shadow_Wolf on reaching 3000 views]

.....

The messages continued until five thousand viewers. His status had shifted from a level one streamer, all the way to level five.

The system of the platform gave streamers levels, based on the accomplishments that the streamer amassed. These levels didn’t mean nothing, but had a ton of benefits. 𝒇𝒓𝒆𝒆𝙬𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝒎

It gave higher visibility, higher opportunities, and a lot more.

Kai read through them fast, there was nothing really that interested him, because all of it was simply the standard machine set congratulations and rewards, but nothing that would actually help him make real life money.

But then Kai noticed something, one single message there.

[Shadow_Wolf collaboration]

He clicked on the message very quickly, eager to see what that was about.

[Shadow_Wolf has been selected for the platform’s new streamer collaboration setup.

The details of this collaboration;

Player receives multiple in game rewards for completing specific quests of the platform.

Player’s stream will get platform wide advertisement for twenty seconds every stream start for the duration of the program.

Player gains a sixty percent gift reward cut, rather than the standard forty percent.

Duration of Collaboration: 2 months.

Do you want to take this collaboration?

Kai read through all of it, eyes blazing across the screen.

’A collaboration with the platform directly? Was this something that existed before?’ He wondered to himself.

"What should I do?" He muttered, he wasn’t sure if he should accept this, it could probably be a trap, something that would stunt his growth for a long time. But then again, everything that had been offered was completely good, there was no real issue with what he saw there.

Still, Kai knew better than to trust platforms, he swiped off the platform and clicked the button on his phone, he turned it off.

"I’ll worry about it later." He said, putting the phone inside his pocket and then turning to the door, he walked out of the room, shutting the door behind him, he looked at his sister’s room, walking to it and then he opened the door, he looked in, she was sleeping soundly, he smiled seeing that, and then slowly closed the door.

After that, he headed out of the house, closing the door behind him and locking it. The night was still high, and the skies were dark outside their apartment building. He stuck his hands into his pockets and then walked down the street, his eyes on the ground.

Clack Clack Clack

His footsteps echoed on the sidewalk, he had no idea where he was heading to, but he walked.

’It’s been two days since I started the game, and a lot has changed in that two days. I need to handle all the streaming, the game stuff and also understand what really was happening inside the game.’

Kai kept thinking for a while, not knowing how far he had walked.

Clang

Suddenly, the sound of metal hitting the ground echoed, it caught Kai’s attention immediately. He looked over to the side, it was an alleyway, dark, the kind of place even an adult would be scared to walk into at night, the kind of place where the scary stories originated from.

Kai looked closer, and for some reason, the darkness faded a bit, until he was able to make out what was happening there.

Kai was stunned by this, how could he see, but then he recalled that the game had been changing him quite a bit. In the darkness, he noticed that someone was getting beat up there. Three men were beating on a young man that was curled up on the ground.

Kai watched this, the sounds of thuds soon reached his ears as well.

Kai looked at what was happening, it was normal, wasn’t it? Someone getting beat up. He had absolutely no reason to be here or care, so he made to turn away, but in that moment, he noticed something on the arm of the man that was getting beat up, a weird happening, because he could barely see what was happening, yet he saw that clearly.