Level 3-2

„Hi y’all, it’s Gaia, and this time ... with a special guest!“

„Hi, it’s ValsStreams!“

[Yooo!]

[My faves together!]

[Yeah, I don’t think they’ll be playing together exactly ...]

„You are guessing right,“ I said, „because Val requested a rematch from me, after her embarrassing defeat at my hands!“

„Bwuh?! Hey, quit lying around like that! Anyone that was here last time, knows, that you sucked so hard, I finished the game at a 100% in the same time it took you to beat it normally! Idiot!“

[Omfg, they’re gonna kill each other]

[Ingame! Just ingame ... I hope ...]

„Whatever Val, we’re here because we decided to play it fair and square this time. So we picked something that would not allow us to play at any advantage at all!“

„Stop beating around the bush now, we are going to play an Oelda Zcarina tf Oime Randomizer!“

„Huh! Why do you spoil it like that, I had such a cool transition to the game ...“

„Oh, sorry, it’s been on my screen the entire time.“

„Bruhh.“

„Anyway, the fun thing is: None of us is going to know, what’s going to happen! There are of course certain strategies what to do, but mostly it just amounts to grabbing the four chests in one of the houses at the beginning and to hope for the best.“

„And to keep an eye on your opponent’s screen, so you know, where the item you might be looking for is hiding.“

„Excuse me, an Oelda, what now?“ a donation asked me.

„Oh yeah, maybe we should clear this up.“

„Basically, we are playing a modded version of the game, where the items you get from chests are randomly swapped with each other, so you have to play this game, completely differently. It’s chaos.“

„And full of blue rupees.“

„And full of blue rupees ...“

„Anyway, wanna get started?“

„Sure!“

„Kay, just let me put in my name.“

„Your name? Funny, I usually just press the A-Button and start. Speedrunning habit I guess.“

„I know what you mean. I’ve started talking to myself when playing games off-stream.“

„We are broken people ...“

„And go!“

„Wai- whu!“

And just like that I got myself a little head start. Didn’t want to lose against her this time!

As soon, as we skipped through all the opening dialogue, we gained control of the titular hero Oelda and left his house through the door. While I decided to take the classic route of climbing down the ladder, Val decided to do a backflip down the balcony.

„Oh Vaaaal, your speedrunner is showing!“

„Shut uuuup~“

„Your attempts at gaining an advantage are futile! For you will soon be faced with the frustrations that come with playing a randomizer!“

I entered the chest house a few seconds behind her and we got to opening the four chests. Whatever items were in there could make or break a run, and it was always fun to see what came out of them.

A heart container. Not bad, not good.

A blue rupee, of course.

„THE FRICKING SLINGSHOT!“ I exclaimed. „Sorry.“

„Are you trying to startle me, so I mess up?“

„No. Do you really think I planned out an elaborate strategy to thwart your efforts?“

[Lol, what’s with Gaia-sama]

[She went all evil wizard]

[„Thwart your efforts“ lololololol]

Getting the slingshot was so good though, as it unlocked many areas in the game. Sadly, it didn’t work as a weapon, as it only stuns enemies, without dealing any damage. And it was useless as long as you were still playing as young Oelda.

The final chest just had a bunch of Seku Dticks. Those were good as well. They break after use, but can be used as a weapon early on, and they actually deal more damage than a sword for some reason.

„Nice, some Seku Dticks,“ Val muttered.

„Heheh, you said dick,“ I blurted out. I could feel my avatar growing an anime flesh fang.

„I- what?!“ She shouted, evidently flustered. „It’s not my fault, that they named these things that way!“

„Sorry, I just had to. I am a chronic pun maker, you know. Oh, my chat is filling with eggplant emojis, help!“

„That you’ve brought upon yourself, idiot! From now on I’ll just remain silent, how you like that for a stream?“

„N- no! You can’t do that! I can already see our viewer count decreasing! My poor ad revenue!“

„You don’t even have ad revenue!“

„No, you just use an adblock, so of course you wouldn’t know.“

[Love that banter]

[If you care about your favorite streamer, don’t block <3]

[You could almost assume, they’ve known each other for a while]

[Old married couple]

[What’s their shipname?]

[Vaia]

[Valia]

[GalVal]

And like that our chat filled with tons of messages, supporting this newfound relationship. A rivalry is a relationship too.

„Aww, Val, the people like us. They want us to get married! And ... evidently do other stuff as well ...“

„Yikes, your following is gross! Full of perverts!“

„Nooo, that’s exactly what I’ve been trying to avoid!“

„THEN WHY DO YOU KEEP ENABLING THIS BEHAVIOUR!?“

„SORRY! Now we really are a married couple. But not in a good way ...“

„This is really your first collab together?“ A donation came in, asking this question.

„Thanks. Yeah, for me it actually is the first collab ever. What about you Val?“, I asked her.

„Well, it’s embarrassing to admit it like that, but my long-time viewers probably know ... I don’t have many V-Tubing friends to do collabs with. V-Tubing is cool and all, but it really restricts you in terms of how you interact with other streamers. I mean, I know tons of regular streamers, that just invite their irl friends to play some games with them on stream. That just doesn’t work when you are V-Tubing. You kind of have to build a network of your own, and I am not the most socially capable person.“

„Really? Kind of funny considering the type of entertainment you do ...“

„Yeah, I know, there is a contradiction there. But I guess ... hiding behind an avatar lets you forget, who you really are. That being said, I am kind of glad, you approached me with this idea. On top of the problems, I mentioned earlier, speedrunning doesn’t really lend itself for collaborative streams. This is fun though.“

I ... did not expect our conversation during the stream to get his way. I thought we’d just play the game, interspersed with talk about the game and maybe some banter along the way.

Thinking about it, obviously Gaia is different from Guy as well. And Val seems to be perfectly okay, with being someone else, when the camera’s off.

An irl meeting between V-Tubers. Wouldn’t that be something.

„It’s so crazy, when you think about what we’re doing,“ I just started babbling. „When this came out ... almost 25 years ago now! Obviously, the internet wasn’t big before then, so no-one could have predicted that people would just show themselves playing games like that. Speedrunning, but also playing the way we do, racing each other to finish the game first ... that wasn’t intended by the developers at all!“

„Speedrunning has been around since the eighties actually! Back then one of those video game companies had a magazine, where people would send in pictures of their TV screens with their high score in game like Kario Mart and Bxciteeike.“

„Wow, I never bothered to look up the history behind speedrunning. That’s so cool!“

„A-anyway, I know what you mean. Us playing a modded version of this game – that surely wasn’t intended by Tinnendo at all. But I don’t mean to bore our viewers to death with worthless video game trivia L-O-L.“

„Why did you pronounce every letter separately like that. What are you, in your mid-30s?“

„Uh?! Excuse me? I am the epitome of youth! You on the other hand are nothing but a pile of muscles.“

„Ouch.“

If only she knew, that in real life that couldn’t be any farther from the truth.