Chapter 416: Forum Gossip (part 1)
In the middle of the night, the air in the room in the South Villa was heavy with heat, the kind that clung damp and sticky to your skin like wet plastic while every breath suffocated your lungs.
Micah jolted awake from yet another nightmare. His heart pounded wildly, each thump rattling against his ribs, his hands trembling as they clutched the sheets.
He blinked into the darkness, but nothing came to his mind. It was like this every time he woke up. He couldn’t remember anything, except a raw, intense grief.
"Dammit..." he whispered hoarsely, dragging the back of his hand across his damp lashes. His throat was dry, the taste of salt clinging to the back of his tongue.
He turned his face toward the balcony. "Oh..."
The wind had rattled the latches loose, slamming the door shut.
The air in the room had become hot and humid because of that. The fan above his head spun sluggishly and had no power to cool him down.
He sighed and rose to his feet. He walked toward the balcony door and pushed it open. The cool sea breeze brushed his face, calming him down. Most of his injuries had healed, his complexion had returned to its usual pallor, and his ribs just ached now and then.
His eyes drifted to the dim glow of his computer monitor, still on standby. The gaming logo was dancing around the screen. Last week, he had killed time by playing a few matches with Russell, pretending to be his own cousin, a girl. It had been amusing at first, feigning innocence and shyness, teasing Russell, until he was invited to their club team.
Micah knew most of the players. At first, he was waiting eagerly for Archie, jumping up and down, playing his best, but the man didn’t appear at all. Well, he had too high expectations; this team was like a reserve squad, even below the second team of SilverBlade Legion.
The novelty of gaming quickly wore off when Russell tried to make him talk about his absence. "SugerPlum, where is your cousin, Micah? Why didn’t he come back to the university? Where was he? Why was his phone off?"
Blah, blah, blah. The questions had gotten under his skin, making him annoyed.
Micah had wanted to snap back, to tell him to shut the hell up, let him forget about his problems. But instead, he had swallowed his irritation and thought of not playing at all. His fingers hovered over logging off, ready to shut everything and disappear, when he coincidentally teamed up with Archie’s alt account, ShadowSlayer.
So Micah lingered and played. He tried sweet-talking him, teasing him, and adding him as a friend. But Archie had ignored him. Flat-out ignored him. He had even muted the team voice chat entirely.
Micah had no way to get close to him. He gritted his teeth and played to his maximum capacity, wanting to finish the match quickly and leave the game. He thought about how Archie lingered around him and Darcy, always acting easy-going, as if closeness came naturally. He had been fooled.
What was with this cold, indifferent response? Tsk.
When the match ended, Micah had been ready to fire up some curses at him, but then, surprise, surprise, Archie had added him!
What the fuck! Micah had exploded. His finger itched to block him. But he held himself back. With this boring way he was living in this villa, having some entertainment was not bad.
So he swallowed all his curses. And just logged off.
Now, he desperately needed something to take off his mind. He stepped toward the computer and tapped the mouse, the standby screen blooming into life.
He sat down behind the monitor. The clock on the screen glared back at him: 2:04 AM.
He logged in his alt account. SugerPlumFairy.
He looked at his friends’ list.
"Hmm... no one is online... just my luck," he mumbled dejectedly.
Micah sighed and still queued up for a match, thinking it was better than going back to sleep anyway.
He played two rounds. The first game was sluggish. He wasn’t in the mood to put on the fake girlish persona, so he typed the bare minimum in chat instead. But he kept the voice channel open, listening to the chatter of strangers. Their laughter and banter filled the silence in his room, distracting him.
By the second game, he was only half paying attention, mind wandering, when a familiar name reached his ears.
"Hey, did you guys see that screenshot that went viral?"
"What screenshot?" another voice asked.
"About DarkVyne. People are trying to figure out who he really is."
Micah froze, ears perked up.
"Hah? How?" someone else chimed in.
"I heard someone snitched, said he’s from their university."
"Seriously? His fans are gonna lose it."
Micah’s heart jumped. He fumbled for his mic and flicked it on.
"Big brothers, are you talking about that legendary, mysterious player? The DarkVyne?" Micah said, stretching his girly voice to sound coy. Inside, he felt he would throw up.
"Hey, little sis finally speaks!" one of them laughed.
Micah replied. "I am a bit shy... being the only girl here..."
"Don’t worry! This big brother won’t let anyone bully you. How about it? Do you want to be my girlfriend?" one of them said with a smug laugh.
Micah’s face twisted like he had just bitten into rotten fruit. He nearly yanked off his headset. What a Playboy! Two sentences in, and this clown was already hitting on him! If he knew he was actually a guy, he would faint for sure.
"Ah...n-no, thanks," he cooed weakly, almost gagging.
Micah pinched the bridge of his nose, deciding to completely ignore him.
"Don’t tease her," another voice cut in, sounding more mature. "Yeah. That’s him. You a fan too?"
"I have never seen him play. But my cousin is obsessed," Micah said. "Is he really that good?"
"Oh. He is insane. Should’ve gone pro ages ago. But he’s flaky. Always disappearing, offline for weeks."
Micah bit down on the inside of his cheek, enjoying hearing the praise about Darcy.
He talked more about how amazing DarkVyne was with the polite guy until Micah asked the question he wanted to know from the start.
"Oh... " He pitched his voice higher. "Where can I read about this? I wanna show my cousin."
"Try the forums on the alpha server. Last I checked, the whole thread was blowing up there."
"Thank you, big brother," Micah said sweetly and continued to play with them.
When the match ended, he went straight to the forum. He wanted to know who had snitched about them.