Chapter 18
Well, that hurts.
I think I’m somewhat sane now, at least I hope I am…
Really, I still have no idea what idiotic thoughts I had when I inflicted this cut on my neck, but the pain is really starting to show itself now.
Fortunately, I was able to find the bandage and disinfect the wound, the process stung a lot of course, but what could I do about it?
After that, I took a shower and purposefully wore clothing that covered up to my neck to hide this annoying wound. You’re so stupid, Jia Lin… Why cut the one place that’s really easy to spot? If you’re going to self-harm, at least do it at the hard to spot areas like the abdomen.
Ah, not that I’ll do that or anything, it was just a one time impulse…
…Nevermind.
I can’t even trust myself these days… How pathetic of me…
Forget it, that’s not the important thing. What’s important is that the wound is slightly deeper than I thought, which meant that it would take more than a day to heal, how annoying.
Knowing that much, I'd inevitably only wear turtleneck clothes until it heals… I doubt I’d be able to come up with a great excuse as to why my neck of all places got hurt, so hiding it would be best…
Well, well, well… if it isn’t the consequences of my own actions, how depressing.
Oh well, what can I do about it? Let’s just live with it like always.
Now then, the real dilemma begins.
Waking up? Checked
Brushing teeth? Checked
Violated by a friend? Checked
Random self-harm out of nowhere? Checked, wait why is this even documented?
Ah, nevermind, even my thoughts are all jumbled too, pretend I’m fine!
The real problem is what to do now…
I said it before but I’m alone right now, there’s no one in the house except me! Of course, Xia would likely be back within a few hours, but that’s still a few hours I’d have to spend being alone, with nothing to do at that!
While I can pride myself in being a professional time-waster, I still feel self-conscious about it, you know?
The sentences contradict each other? Well, that’s true, but pretend you understood what I mean! What I was saying is that I don’t just want to sit all day and do nothing!
So what the hell should I even do? Watching videos is definitely out of the window, that would be the opposite of doing something…
Going outside again… Honestly, I don’t feel like it.
Hah… What a dilemma after dilemma, I’m so hopeless.
“What to do… What to do…”
Stuck to the couch, I could only be silly and stupid…
“Ah…!”
Come to think of it, I used to play games, don’t I? Although it’s been years…
As for what I played…
I forgot.
But I’m sure any game would curb all boredom, right? That’s what games are for after all, to get rid of boredom…
I think.
If I don’t know what to play, I should search up online on what is the most popular, the most popular games are usually the most fun as well, probably.
Quickly running upwards to my room and opening my laptop that has seen better days, I quickly searched up games to play.
“Hmm… CSGO, Minecraft, Roblox, Fortnite, Call of Duty… There’s a lot of options, wow…”
I tried searching for popular games but it seems there's too many to choose from, that’s a bit troublesome…
Hmm, maybe I should pick after doing some information digging, surely that would make it easier for me to pick a suitable game to enjoy?
Let’s see…
CSGO… an old first person shooter game? Oh, apparently famous for its not very nice playerbase too… probably not.
Minecraft… Well, it looks fun but it costs money and I really rather not waste money on games… I guess it’s also a no.
Roblox… There’s a lot of games on this wow, a good variety to pick from but it’s a bit too childish for my taste, so it’s unfortunately a no.
Fortnite… Hmm, it’s a battle royale…? What’s that? Oh, a third person shooter with a survival game aspect… Looks interesting but let’s look at the last option.
And finally, Call of Duty… Same reasons as CSGO… it’s a no.
Out of all, Fortnite looks the most interesting, but what to do… The game mechanics look a bit too complicated for me… Can I really play it?
“Ah? What’s that?”
While I was pondering and searching, another game caught my eye.
Valorant.
While it’s not on the popular list, it still has a sizable playerbase and it looks quite interesting. One of those first person shooters but with a twist of character ability and skills, it doesn’t look too complicated and looks fun enough.
“The art style looks good enough~ Let’s do it!”
Well, I should install the game now and play—
“2-25 gigabytes…? That’s a bit excessive don’t you think…?”
—Or not…
“Estimated download time… 3 hours and 49 minutes…? What the…”
I guess I should do something in the meantime…
◈
“Is it finally done? Ah! It is!! Yatta!!”
The cursed game took so long to download I wasted the entire morning watching videos on my phone while waiting, even Xia already came back home before it finished downloading…
“Haah… So much for not wasting time…”
There goes my alone time…
Well, it doesn’t matter too much, as long as the game is downloaded, it’s all good in the end right?
Still, 25 gigabytes is a bit too much… Actually, maybe it’s not? Games these days are all super heavy, I think? So maybe 25 is actually a relatively decent number…
Forget about it! The game is installed now, so I should play it, yes?
With that said, I booted up the game!
…
Well, after a bit of loading and file installments, I wasn’t immediately dropped into the game but a tutorial, which is to be expected.
As for the tutorial, it’s as basic as it can get I suppose. You play as this guy who is talking with his comrades or something? I can’t really follow the story of this but pretend you understand, okay? Anyways, it’s just a simple tutorial showing you how to play the game.
Oh and it teaches you about the special abilities too.
For example, my current character, Phoenix or whatever his name is, has the ability to create fireballs and fire walls! It’s so cool that different characters have different abilities that makes the game more unique than just a typical shooter.
Either way, after finishing the tutorial it seems like I have an option between 4 characters.
I’ve decided to stick with Phoenix since I’ve somewhat familiarized myself with him.
“Oh that was fast?”
After pressing the queue button on an unrated game (it was recommended), I was quickly put into a match. I guess these games are that advanced…
Oh well, let’s play the game and have some fun!!
It’s a standard game where two teams of 5 players are split into the attackers and the defenders, both having different objectives to win the game.
The attackers must plant this bomb or spike thing to win, and the defenders must prevent them from planting it or if it’s planted, defuse it before it detonates.
Oh, there is another win condition that benefits both sides, which is to kill every player on the opposing team.
Sounds simple enough, yes? That’s because it is!
Oh and at the start of the game, there’s a shop phase where you can buy things I suppose? Anyways, enough rubbish and let’s go kill some enem—
“Ah?”
Before I even knew it, I died as soon as I left the starting area…
“That can’t be right…? How did I die?”
Ah, was it because I was moving in an open area so I easily got killed? That’s probably it.
It’s no biggie, I’ll retry next match and at least try to get a kill.
…
…
…
“That’s not right at all…”
I’ve played quite a few matches, and all of them ended in me dying, without a single win or kill…
There were a few matches where I actually came face to face with my enemies, but I couldn’t kill them due to sloppy control and got gunned down instead…
That can’t be right…
One more match… One more… Surely, I’ll win this time, right…?
DEFEAT
Ugh… another loss…
While I was in pain, something in chat suddenly caught my attention.
(Team) Bilepunker : Hey Phoenix you b**** enable vc rn
VC…? What’s that?
(Team) Placeholderings: vc? What’s that?
(Team) Bilepunker : Voice chat you bastard! Stop pretending to not know!
Ah, voice chat? The game does have that function if I remember, though I disabled it because some mean person kept yelling slurs and insulting everyone after losing…
Well, if they want to talk using their voice, it’s fine I guess? Though judging by their tone, it’s definitely not going to be nice things… Maybe I should clarify first.
(Team) Placeholderings: Okay… I’ll enable it but please don’t curse, okay?
(Team) Bilepunker : oh i wont curse alright… i wont.
Since I got confirmation, I should hear out what he wants to talk about, yeah. The person seems nice enough.
(Team) Placeholderings: I enabled it
After a quick tinkering with the settings, I enabled voice chat again and—
“You can hear me now, huh?! Phoenix you dumb piece of…!”
—was immediately bombarded with an angry surprise.
That’s too loud, how do I lower the volume…
“My god, you’re so garbage at this game!”
“...”
“We have been playing 7 games and you somehow died in EVERY single one! How the hell are you this bad at this game???”
“...”
“First of all, why the hell did you jump head first as soon as the game started? Did you think you’re a Japanese soldier on a Kamikaze mission??? Just because you have self-sustaining skills doesn’t mean that you won’t die, you idiot!”
“...”
“Second of all, where the hell were you aiming??? With an aim like that I’m surprised you even got past the tutorial. What the hell was in your head when you aimed the gun at the enemy?? Are you trying to hit your father? Or is your brain so damaged that you’re lagging in real life??!”
…
“Just because this game is free doesn’t mean that someone like YOU can play it! Einstein didn’t die just so some rat like you can discombobulate his theories! If your parents had an aim like yours, you wouldn’t even be born!! Why the hell did I have to get queued up with someone like you?! I know this is casual but god, you’re so awful I hope you never touch ranked.”
…
…
I…
I want to refute everything he said, but it’s all true… Worst of all, he kept his word too… he didn’t curse at all… He just expressed his anger…
Honestly, he has a right to be angry, yeah… Even I can understand how horrible I played. For someone like him who has a much higher playtime than me, it must’ve been frustrating to play with a total loser like me.
Yeah, I understand him, so I should apologize too.
I turned on push to talk to answer him and…
“I-I’m… Hick s-sorry…”
“Huh…?”
“Eh?”
“I… didn’t mean to cause you Hick so much trouble, I played r-really horribly and I’m… Hick sorry… I won’t do anything like that anymore, sorry for the inconvenience… Hick”
“Omen, you just went full ham on a girl lol, I feel bad for her now.”
“Wait you’re a girl? Ah no! I’m sorry, maybe that was a bit too much—”
I disconnected from the game before he could continue what he was going to say. Honestly, the direction of the talk was going somewhere not very ideal and I didn’t want to garner any pity, especially with my new gender…
Oh well, even if he was a bit mean, everything he said was true… I played really badly and made my team frustrated…
But even worse…
“Hick… why am I crying…?
I wasn’t the type of person to easily get stimulated like this, yet I’m crying easily now…
This is troublesome…
I should uninstall the game. Clearly it’s not something meant for me. Damn it…
I wasted so much time only to waste even more time, I’m such a dumb idiot…
Hah…
“Sis?! Why are you crying like that?”
“Ah, Xia? Sorry, nothing really happened…”
While I was quietly sobbing on the chair, it seemed that Xia came in without me noticing.
“What happened?! Did some bastard hurt you?? Tell me and I’ll—”
“It’s okay, it’s okay! Nothing really happened, Xia. Your big sister just heard some really harsh truth in an online game, that’s all..”
“If it hurts so much that you’re crying, it’s not really nothing, sister…”
“No… It’s just that I’m strangely more sensitive than before, that’s all. I wouldn’t have cried over something like this if it were before…”
“Hah… Fine, fine. But still take a break, okay? It must’ve been mentally draining for you.”
“...Yeah, thank you… Xia…”
“Don’t mention it, I was going to ask if you want anything, but since you’re like this, that’s not appropriate now.”
“Sorry…”
“It’s okay. I’ll get you some takeout, okay?”
“Yeah, thank you… for so much…”
“Like I said, it’s okay… Don’t fret too much and just go to sleep already.”
“Yeah…”
Really, I had to be pampered by my little sister just like that, but there isn’t much I can do I guess.
For the first time in a while, I came to somewhat resent my changed body, but quickly resumed and cried myself until I lost consciousness on the bed.
All because of a game…
Really, I am so annoying and worthless…
