Chapter 62

Well, Lily also raided the stream...

'bzoomster has raided your stream with 71,007 viewers!'

Dude…

'Rykun has raided your stream with 47,231 viewers!'

Okay, man…

"Welco—"

'Poodlefluff has raided your stream with 69,886 viewers!'

Yeah, at this point I'm just going to assume every single one of our streamer friends will be raiding me.

'Yvettel has raided your stream with 57,112 viewers!'

I stayed silent.

'LoafofBread has raided your stream with 81,490 viewers!'

"Welcome viewers o—"

'Juliamn has raided your stream with 46,289 viewers!'

I waited silently for ten seconds before continuing again.

"Welcome viewers of bzoom, Rykun, Poodle, Yvette, Bread, Ju—"

'wipL has raided your stream with 56,892 viewers!'

"Of Julian, and wip. Thank you guys so much for the raids."

Immediately, in the discord blacklily began calling all of us except for Reed in a private Discord Face call.

I immediately accepted and everyone else started joining in with their cameras.

I took my camera away from the stream and put our face call with a confused smile.

"Ah, hello everyone."

[blacklily: "Hullo hello, I heard Redde was finally doing a face reveal?"]

I glanced at the accumulated more than 850,000 viewer count dryly.

"I… am not sure."

Why is everyone gathering their viewers at my stream, though? Wouldn't it have been better for Reed to show his face in his own stream and we raid him instead for his more than 1 million viewers? Why is it me that is getting the 1 million viewers?

[bzoomster: "Well, Redde is the same as Charlie's age so we can assume Redde will look very young as well."]

[Juliamn: "Yeah, the problem is that Charlie's face looks from anywhere from twenty-five to fifteen years old."]

I coughed and tried protesting indignantly.

[Yvettel: "Yea… Well Redde did say his hair was auburn brown."]

I nodded.

It'll be any time he arrives now, it has been more than 10 minutes and the metro inside the city is pretty quick.

He's been to my house before with Natsumi for a math project. It was also one of the first times we saw Natsumi acting like a dramatic drunkard suffering from a sugar rush.

I picked up my phone and from my apartment's own app I accepted the notification from the lobby receptionist to let him in.

"Redde might be coming in any time soon."

Instantly, both the people in the call and the chat burst in excitement.

[blacklily: "Oh my god, it's been more than a year ago since we've known how everyone else looks."]

[Rykun: "Yeah, we never knew how Redde looked like, and Charlie because we've just known each other for a while now."]

[wipL: "He said he would reveal his face years later, Charlie probably took some part in him revealing it early."]

I smiled brilliantly. When we started playing Among Us, I remember he admitted he was ashamed of being a streamer and videogamer. That was also the first and only time I've ever seen him that emotional. I do believe I cracked his shell a little.

[Modeling has gained 110 points.]

Gaining points is just so easy now.

[Chat:

thewatchrx: YOOOOOOOOOOOO ARE WE FINALLY GOING TO SEE HIS FACE IVE BEEN HIS FAN SINCE 10K

Itsjustin2: NO FN WAY ive been waiting my whole life for this]

As Reed took every step closer, the viewer count became higher and higher.

The community of streamers and videogamers united to finally see the long-awaited face of one of the most popular streamers on the platform.

His earlier peak viewers of 280,000 will allow him to finally get listed as a top streamer.

Finally, my phone began ringing and Reed's contact appeared on my phone.

I turned off my camera, muted myself, and walked to the living room in my slippers.

"Reed?"

["Charlie…"] his breathing was rough and desperate.

"Did you run all the way here?"

["No bro, I'm just nervous out of my ass and I'm sweating and I don't fuken know how I'm handling this."]

"Dude, it's okay. Take deep breaths man are you at the elevator? I'm here dude."

["Bro, remember when I almost vomited because your elevator was so damn fast? Right now I'm wishing it was even fucken faster oh my god."]

His nervousness was perceivable from within the phone.

My stomach became a void and filled with nerves in empathy at his situation. He'll be showing his face for the first time since he's started streaming and began his legendary career.

He's risking having his personal life, real face, and real self intruded by his internet personality.

He won't be known as Redde anymore but as Reed.

"It's alright dude. Take deep breaths man, it's fine. It's fine."

My 12 points of charm and voice amplified by the Singing skill had a straightforward effect as his breathing stabilized.

["Fucking hell man, did anyone ever tell you your voice is fucking sexy?"]

We laughed.

I now realize his way of coping with nerves is cursing like a sailor and cracking homiesexual jokes.

I opened our door and waited outside with my comfortable pants and baggy shirt.

The elevator indicator finally showed the elevator had arrived at our floor not so far away from the ground-level.

Not even had the doors fully opened, red hair belonging to Reed's sweaty and pale white complexion came at full speed to my door.

"Charlie, bro. Fuck fuck fuck."

"Alright, alright. Let's stop cursing for now."

"I can't, I can't. Bro, I didn't even tell you what I'm doing, I just went straight to your house."

"It's alright man, you can come here whenever you want to."

My relaxed deep magnetic voice once again took effect.

He took deep breaths and became steady-going.

"Thank you, man. Is it fine if I show up at your stream to do the face reveal?"

I laughed, "Dude if I denied your request some viewer would place a bounty on my head."

He chuckled and I signaled him to enter.

I let him come in while he cursed into his breath as he got ever closer to the face reveal.

It's even more nerve-wracking than recording a face reveal since you'll be getting instant and live reactions from your fans.

Apart from the fact my life online wouldn't be private and unknown, that was one of my first fears when I first showed my face but I've come a long way now.

I put my hand on his shoulder, and Reed spoke before I was able to say anything.

"Bro, how am I supposed to appear on the camera?"

"Alright, alright. Where'd your confidence from being a sexy beast and the city's number one playboy go?"

He likes to joke around by calling himself a sexy beast and scandalous playboy even though he's literally never been in a relationship before. We can now see he's all just talk.

He got embarrassed quickly and prepared to tackle me.

"Well, it's just like talking with anyone else. Talk to them as you would in a stream."

[Teaching has gained 2.2 points.]

The effects of my teaching skill came in effect and his previously nervous face descended into a calm one. Reed nodded.

I pat his shoulder, we've got this.

We walked to my room and I walked in. He, however, hid outside.

I laughed.

"The camera's turned off, you can come in."

He walked in tentatively and with small steps.

I unmuted,

"Hello, hello. Is everyone else ready to see Redde?"

Obviously, without my earphones, I did not hear a single thing from the face call, but I just knew everyone was yelling.

I clicked the mouse pretending to mute myself again but I completely missed the button.

"How do we do this? Should like, you appear first and then I just come in?"

I absolutely know more than 800,000 just got thrilled hearing Reed's voice

"Ew, it's not a game show no. How about putting on three masks. You take down the first mask and they'll be surprised to see a second mask instead of your face, and then you'll pull down the mask again and it'll just be another mask. They'll think it was just a prank and you pull it down again and boom it's your glorious face."

Yes, I know I'm unmuted.

He sweatdropped at my suggestion.

"...That's if not more, just as dramatic as a game show…"

"Shh. Go on with my idea, it's the best idea."

He sighed and prepared his heart to do something he used to consider taboo.

I began patting his shoulder,

"Go get 'em, Redde."

His eyes opened in an instant and he smiled in surprise at me.

"I got this dude."

"Yes, you do."

"Okay, so where are the masks?"

I scratched my head with my index finger audibly.

"Uh…"

We heard a knock on the door and we both turned immediately to see Charlotte sneaking up with a gummy smile.

"You need masks?" She took out masquerade masks.

I walked over to her and hugged her.

I gave her a thumbs-up, "Our savior."

She threw me a v-sign.

"Where'd you get these masks?" I whispered at her, loud enough for Reed to hear but chat only heard mumbles.

Reed sweat-dropped at the corner.

She whispered back at the same volume.

"Ah, you don't remember? Remember that one school play that was about… uhhh… well the one I participated in that was about a masquerade party murder mystery or something."

It seems she got my message.

Both our mischievous sides came out. I gave her a knowing smile and she reciprocated. Let's annoy Reed a little.

Still whispering,

"Ohh… I honestly don't remember, when was it? Masquerade murder mystery? Do you have pictures in one of those costumes? I wanna see."

She took out her phone,

"Yah yah."

She went to her pictures and purposefully scrolled slowly while I watched as if we had both completely forgotten Reed's important event.

As if poking fun at Reed, Charlotte started fiddling with the masks and even dropped one of them.

Both of us not even bothering to pick it up, I started lightly kicking it around.

"How many masks did you get, by the way?"

"Oh well, I was supposed to be switching masks every scene I appeared so the school gifted me like five."

It sounded like we were doing something illegal by our whispering.

"Oh, that's totally enough for Redde."

I finally spoke loudly enough for the chat to hear.

Oh I know they're definitely so salty right now.

He finally smiled thinking we would be reminded of his face reveal but we both went back on her phone to look for her pictures.

Rubbing salt over the wound, Charlotte almost threw the masks into the trash can.

"Whoops, I'm sorry!"

She yelled.

Her sincerity sounded so fake even I wanted to cry with Reed.

However, it seems she started feeling bad and yelled as if she had gotten a shocking revelation.

"Oh my god! Redde! I'm so sorry! We forgot that people were waiting!"

Chat is probably also crying in frustration and wanting to pull our hairs out one by one.

I gave Charlotte a thumbs up, she gave me a cute smile and left.

"Okay, Redde. Put on the masks."

I handed him four and I put on one.

Chat thinks Reed is only wearing three masks right now, but he'll be wearing four. He will have the apparent last 3d mask for a long while until we finally take it off and the face chat will be expecting, will be another mask.

I smiled innocently at the thought of the stupid childish prank.

Unfortunately, the masquerade masks only covered some portion of the face so the mysteriousness and anxiousness at wanting to see Reed's face won't be as much.

I gave Reed a signal and he signalled back to me with a thumbs up.

Having pulled a plastic stool from the kitchen, I sat on it and allowed Reed to sit left of me on my chair.

I handed him the earphone for the right ear and put on the left earphone.

I turned the camera on.

"Hello, hello. Please welcome Redde to the stream!"

[Author Note: Please go on YouTube and go to 'To Animenz - 11th year Animenz anniversary celebration' at minute 13:27. It is 38 pianists all playing 'My Dearest' from Guilty crown at the same time.

Animenz is a pianist that does covers of anime songs and he's known as the father of 'Anime Piano.' A few months ago he revealed his Steinway grand piano, work, Intellectual Property, and the culmination of more than 11 years had been stolen and he was accumulating mountains of doubt while being unable to do what he loved most— play the piano. It was tragic for all fans as it was the end of 11 years of a united community. It was the end of Animenz.

More than 40 pianists in the community of anime piano collaborated to create this tribute; working on it for 3 months to wish all the best for Animenz.

Fortunately, he has been able to negotiate his Intellectual Property back and we'll see more of him.

The piece played at 13:27 in which 38 pianists play at the same time, 'My Dearest', is one of Animenz most difficult, beautiful, and popular covers—though his more than 70 million views Unravel is still insane.

Thank you for allowing me to let out my emotional rant in this very useless author note. Thank you for reading once again.]