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the-booty-crusader · 6 months ago

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BinggeYuan streamer x video game fic

There’s a rumor going around the gaming community. It sounds a bit like one of those old creepypastas, although without a punchline.

You see, in the hyper popular cultivation-based MMORPG called “Proud Immortal Demon Way”, there’s an encounter that can happen at any time, that is different from any other encounter in the game.

It can only happen once to a player in a lifetime; strangely enough it does not even repeat when a player switches accounts and locations.

The encounter is generally only a few seconds long, and with how rarely it’s encountered, there’s only a scant few pieces of proof that it’s even real.

To most players in the game, this encounter is a fun easter egg to be seen once, ask about online, get validation that many others have experienced the same and then wonder about it from time to time.

For one streamer, the encounter would change his life as he knew it.

—

A few months before the first encounter…

“Thanks for the gifted subs, BouncingPlum! Always appreciated.” said Peerless Cucumber, an up-and-coming gaming streamer who’d garnered a fairly large following of Chinese, American and most importantly, Chinese-American viewers. Shen Yuan, being a second generation Chinese in an immigrant family was a slight young man due to complications with his health, but his personality was feisty, temperamental and passionate, if his viewers were to be believed.

Specifically about his favorite game, Proud Immortal Demon Way.

He streamed a few times a week, with his over 4500 followers usually being fairly consistent viewers.

In these streams, Peerless Cucumber would show off crazy character builds, new monsters and herbs that were added or discovered and locations that opened up.

“Oh, this is the cave of the Roaring Eye Toad! I’ve mentioned it before. When you first encounter it,” Shen Yuan starts, walking up to the gigantic toad in the back of the half-flooded cave, “It looks like a regular toad. But when it attacks…”

The toad played an attack animation, revealing that the creature’s gigantic mouth was, in fact, a gigantic eyeball that immediately locked onto Shen Yuan. Where a regular toad’s eyes should be, two smaller mouths opened up with long tongues whipping around it.

It looked a bit odd, but really, that’s why Shen Yuan liked the creatures in this game. They were so cool, and a bit weird and sometimes silly.

Oh, Shen Yuan spent as much time complaining about the game as he did praising it. The mechanics were more often than not contrived or weird and most of the time ended up being weirdly lewd! Why did each piece of clothing come with three submodels that could be triggered when coming in contact with slicing weapons or acid?! Was it necessary to destroy players’ clothes when attacked?!

That was the reason why almost every other player in PIDW was walking around in a female avatar. They just wanted to see the clothes get ripped off of their characters. Bah!

Not to mention the erotic animations and voice lines! The female player characters were absolutely horrendous in that regard, always moaning and panting and every voice line seems to be a sexual innuendo.

Truly a hateable game.

It had a saving grace, however. The worldbuilding was absolutely phenomenal. The animals had logical reasons for existing and the biomes were interesting and believable, in a fantastical way. Their designs were like nothing Shen Yuan had seen before in other games. Not to mention there were potions and items with effects that other games usually didn’t bother with, usually in interesting ways. Although he could certainly do without the papapa-mechanics.

Anyways, lore! There were so many sects and villages and countries with their own history, and there were two distinct realms that you could visit with their own ecosystems and history that were at war! It made for great PVP fodder, of course, but the real treat was the events that furthered the plotline.

Shen Yuan’s eyes fell on a message in the Twitch chat, asking about the new lore added in a recent update. He immediately pushed up his glasses and started to explain, ignoring the few comments calling him out for looking like some geek from an anime.

“Well, the newest dungeon is an ancient palace that seems to have been owned by an Emperor many centuries ago. Apparently he was a half-demon who worked to unify the worlds, causing immense destruction and deaths in the process.” Shen Yuan rattled off, skipping over the part where the man apparently had over three thousand wives. “He was like a protagonist all on his own! I haven’t been able to get all the lore from the palace yet, but we can try tackling it today to find more lore. We’d be some of the first.” he said smugly, and the rest of that stream was dedicated to exploring the huge new palace and finding loot, scrolls and books that described the history of the place and its inhabitants. The palace was way too big to explore in a single stream, of course, what with the literal thousands of harem members’ rooms.

The place looked abandoned and oddly realistic compared to the other locations revealed in-game so far.

After six hours of endless explorations, Peerless Cucumber ended his stream.

He immediately went onto the forums to discuss his findings, only to see a few new threads speaking of a new random encounter. Excited, Shen Yuan clicked the threads, only to be met by what seemed like vague, creepypasta-esque descriptions of an encounter. Apparently, multiple people had experienced it, but no footage had been caught yet. Finding new, fresh-off the press content like this was Shen Yuan’s absolute favorite; he thrived off of the feeling of discovery. He immediately opened the threads in multiple tabs over his two screens to cross-reference, opening his notebooks to get every piece of information he could out of this encounter.

The encounter was described pretty consistently as follows.

While doing regular activities within the game, the player would suddenly hear a deep, ominous voice echoing over their sound system, sounding almost like someone was whispering in their ear. English-speaking players claimed it might be saying something like “Sister” or “sizzling” or “system”, although none sounded quite right from the mixed responses in the comments.

The atmosphere in the game would turn dark and ominous, and the players even felt something eerie, themselves.

This is where accounts of the occurrence started to vary the most. Some people claimed to see a glitchy, red thundering rend in space appear like a knife ripped a hole into spacetime. The cut would then open up into a ragged hole, from which a blurry dark figure crackling with red energy would rush at their character. Other people claimed a red lightning bolt zapped towards their characters from off-screen, and one person even claimed they were struck by the red lightning from above.

In every case, however, their characters ended up somehow incapacitated; either held against the ground or held up by the neck in a chokehold by a mysterious man.

The man was taller than any playable character in the game so far, with a muscular yet lithe build. His hair was dark and curly and he had a glowing red huadian on his forehead to match his glowing eyes.

The man would seem to inspect their characters, in a way that almost seemed too real, having detailed expressions and micromovements that would usually be skipped for such encounters.

Then the character would be killed in a single move, sometimes with a loud crack of a snapped neck, sometimes with a single slash of the ominous red-and-black blade the mysterious man would sometimes pull out. Shen Yuan noted the sword was usually only mentioned by people who had seen the man step out of a portal.

Apparently the strange new character had multiple voice lines as lots of people claimed to have heard something different when the man killed their character. Lots of players complained about the fact all the voice lines were in Chinese, but the Chinese community rejoiced in having their culture represented more in game.

Shen Yuan snorted a little at that. It’s a fucking cultivation game, it’s ALL Chinese representation, ah!

“Tch, another empty husk.” reported one player translated from Chinese, while another claimed they heard, “These things are everywhere.”. Another claimed the man didn’t speak at all.

The next moment is where the whole thing got a little bit scary, and perhaps a bit meta.

The man would then turn to face the player. Not the dead player character, but the actual player’s screen, staring right at them. Some people even claimed the man’s eyes followed their movements, but that would be insane; Proud Immortal Demon Way had no access to webcams.

Strangely enough, in this next part everyone who spoke Chinese seemed to agree on the exact wording used.

“No, you’re not him.” the man would say, before disappearing as suddenly as he had appeared, the atmosphere returning to normal.

People were a little mad about this unskippable encounter that would and could instantly kill their character, but luckily this game was very forgiving when it came to death, allowing a player to return to their body with minimal effort and only a small fee of gold.

While Shen Yuan was about to type a response asking for screenshots, another reply was posted where someone had shaky phone footage of their screen where their character was actively getting murdered by this NPC. The player babbled in Spanish as their character got killed and discarded and the strange new character turned to the camera, too blurry to be seen properly.

Shen Yuan felt a chill up his spine when the eyes turned towards the camera, and he felt like they stared right through his screen at him.

But that was silly.

However, something that wasn’t in any of the text descriptions of the encounter happened in the video.

“I’ll find you, Shizun.” said the mysterious man in fluent and noble-sounding Mandarin, and Shen Yuan felt goosebumps rising on his arms. That felt strangely personal.

The strangest thing about the whole encounter, however, was that the character did not match the artstyle of the rest of the game. PIDW was a very painterly-looking game with slightly exaggerated features and organic shapes, while this man looked�� Real. Strangely so. It added a whole new layer of mystery into the whole situation.

The discussion continued fervently in the thread, and Shen Yuan participated merrily.

He was a known figure within the gaming community, so his input was both valued and sometimes ridiculed. After all, his theories on these threads came with as much criticisms and harsh words as they did praise and adulation.

PeerlessCucumber (posted at 01:21 AM):

This encounter certainly is interesting, if a bit cliche. Very “Ben Drowned”-inspired, I would say. The only way this could be more overdone is if there was blood raining from the skies when the guy appears and he jumpscares the player after killing their characters!

Maybe it’s retribution for all your characters looking like they came from an XXX-rated donghua, ha!

Have we figured out what triggered it yet? Some people were farming, a few were in the middle of a dungeon and there was even one person that was just logging out. There seems to be no rhyme or reason to it! And what’s with the artstyle, huh? Can’t the devs be arsed to keep to their own game design?!”

Shen Yuan typed out a few more paragraphs of theories before posting it. Then he yawned, looking at the clock and seeing it was past 2 am. He could look into it more during his next stream.

–

He didn’t end up encountering the strange man in that stream, or the next, or the next. He didn’t end up getting the encounter for weeks. He was a little miffed at first, going through the motions and exploring the new lore and palace. He found overgrown gardens, a throne room and even a dungeon with a lake that held a pickling pot on a platform in the center, with only a partial skeleton remaining inside to hint at its intended purpose. He found that last one unsettling and gruesome yet morbidly fascinating.

He heard about people encountering the strange NPC from time to time, but eventually he mostly forgot about it as no new information came out.

That is until one night he saw a new thread on the forums about the NPC, claiming the mysterious man seemed to be getting more aggressive. The character, now nicknamed “The Rogue Emperor” due to his first appearance coinciding with the new palace dungeon and his royal-looking robes, used to talk to his victims sometimes, referring to someone called “Shizun”. People were starting to consider whether the mysterious man could be a bug or a rogue AI, though nobody put much stock into these theories. It was true that the NPC’s behavior changed over time, however.

Nowadays there was nearly no dialogue, just an annoyed growl here and there. The man would look at the player’s screen for a distance and leave, angrily. Attempts to follow the character were unsuccessful as, inevitably, another red crackling portal would be opened with the man’s sword and he would vanish through it.

People online were, of course, theorizing about an upcoming event that this whole encounter thing was a build-up for. Perhaps the man was a new raid boss and he would be found inside a hidden room in that recently-released palace, some suggested. Others thought it might be a rogue artificial intelligence, although they were laughed out of any forums they posted in.

Regardless of the reason behind it, Shen Yuan was a bit disappointed that, to this day, he had still not encountered the elusive Rogue Emperor for himself. He made sure he was always recording when he played PIDW, in case he did encounter the character. He did not want to miss it, although he would prefer to have the event happen while he was streaming.

Lo and behold, whatever gods might exist hear Shen Yuan’s silly little request as he was an hour into his usual Saturday stream— one of his busiest in a while as a new questline was revealed that would give more information about the palace— when suddenly, his screen took on a darker, more reddish hue.

It took him a moment to recognize the oddity, wondering at first if he’d had a curse placed on him like his viewers sometimes did as a prank, if only to get PeerlessCucumber started on one of his famous rants.

It was when he saw the slight visual glitching in the game that he realized exactly what was going on and he immediately got excited.

“Oh my— guys, guys, it’s happening, it’s happening!” he said excitedly, pointing at his screen with a big smile. His chat always lagged a few seconds behind like every other streamer’s, so it took a few moments for them to catch up.

By then, the red sparking lightning had started and by the time chat caught up, Shen Yuan’s character was being choked out.

Shen Yuan knew his facecam was shaking from his excited movements but he didn’t care, it was finally his turn!

He started describing how the encounter would go as he watched the tall, muscular character snap his own character’s neck (eh, it would take like two hours to regain his previous prestige, it’s fine) and drop the lifeless body to the ground.

Immediately, the man’s red glowing eyes locked onto Shen Yuan’s.

Shen Yuan happily described how, next up, the tall man would sigh or grunt about how the player was not who he was looking for and— and….

The character was approaching?

He looked… honestly, the character looked out of place. Shen Yuan had a good computer, sure, but PIDW had a more fantastical and slightly anime-like art style than could be fully realistic.

This man, this character looked photo-realistic. Shen Yuan wasn’t sure if anyone had ever gotten such a clear close-up of the man who had, apparently, broken his usual script and continued to approach, eyes intent and locked onto Shen Yuan’s.

“This is… wait, guys, this is different.” he finally said. Maybe he somehow broke its programming?

His screen flashed a black frame and when it came back on, the man was in front of the user interface.

Shen Yuan was vaguely aware of his chat going insane for a few moments as the character continued to approach before it, and most everything else on Shen Yuan’s screen completely froze save for the Rogue Emperor who was now practically right up against the screen.

And Shen Yuan wasn’t gay (or at least, he didn’t think he was), but this man, photorealistic as he was, was the most gorgeous man Shen Yuan had ever laid eyes on. Long, curved lashes framed luminescent red eyes. A sharp jawline that would make Henry Cavill jealous and long, curly dark brown hair framing a face that looked like it was carved by angels, with perfect, soft-looking, kissable lips— but like, platonically.

Shen Yuan also didn’t recall the Rogue Emperor having his cleavage on display like that but that was neither here nor there. Shen Yuan just thought the piece of jade jangling around between those pillows was interesting, okay?!

His face wasn’t red, it wasn’t.

The man leaned forward, to the point where if the screen were a window, his breath would be fogging it up.

Shen Yuan watched in a daze as the man then put his hand on the edge of the screen like it was the most natural thing and the man’s previously intense glare slowly twisted into a satisfied, smug and downright unsettling grin, exposing sharp cannes that Shen Yuan did not find sexy at all, no siree. He was so straight.

A voice that sounded way too close to be coming from his speakers startled Shen Yuan as the man suddenly spoke.

“Found you, Shizun.”

The stream ended with a single freeze frame of what looked like a robes arm with black claws reaching from off-screen towards PeerlessCucumber, the man looking absolutely horrified.

That was the last time anyone heard from PeerlessCucumber in a little over a year.

—

A year later, on a random Saturday in early March, PeerlessCucumber posted on his social media that he would do an impromptu stream in a few hours to hopefully lay to rest some of the more insane theories that had cropped up about his disappearance in the past year.

This caused a much bigger stir than any other of Shen Yuan’s previous streaming notifications as the name PeerlessCucumber had grown to be an internet phenomenon. A cute streamer with a fiery personality that was absolutely obsessed with the game and passionate about streaming, suddenly disappeared after encountering a niche event in his favorite game, after which some straight-up creepypasta crap took place.

Most people thought the whole thing was a publicity stunt.

Those people were often refuted by the fact that PeerlessCucumber had, in fact, disappeared after the whole debacle, so doing a publicity stunt only to not take advantage of it sounded stupid in that regard. Those people were often, in return, reminded of the spike in active players in PIDW after PeerlessCucumber’s thought-to-be-final stream, and thought the whole thing was set up by the game’s creators to get more interest in their game.

There were even some fringe opinions that the guy in the game had somehow abducted Shen Yuan which were usually considered crack ideas.

That is, until the young, sickly third son of the extremely wealthy Shen family was reported missing, who bore an uncanny resemblance to PeerlessCucumber. No, they actually looked exactly the same.

The plot thickens, because why would someone that rich take a sponsorship from PIDW to participate in this event and then stop streaming?

Nothing was adding up.

Especially when, a few weeks or so later, the Shens retracted their missing person’s report, claiming Shen Yuan was located. He never came into the public eye again though.

Multiple people made hours-long video essays on the subject positing their own theories and ideas on the matter, boosting the general populace’s awareness of the situations to untold levels.

The theories went from a murder plot to Shen Yuan deciding streaming wasn’t for him and trying to go out with a bang, to alien abduction.

So when PeerlessCucumber turned on his stream, he was surprised that, rather than his usual 800 or so viewers, he had closer to 150k viewers.

Needless to say, he seemed a bit nervous.

He adjusted his camera slightly, first and foremost, once the “Stream will start soon!” splash-screen was replaced with full-screen camera footage of Shen Yuan himself.

His hair was longer, now, worn in a loose ponytail. He wore a loose robe with what looked like a shirt underneath and it was the first time he’d been on camera without dark bags under his eyes.

He cleared his throat.

“Uh, hi! Long time no see.” he started, sounding as cheerful as he always had during his streams.

“So, apparently, there’s been some… ah… confusion about my last stream. Which is understandable given how it went and. Uh. Yeah! I’m here to let you all know that I’m fine! Some personal things came up and I’ve just been really occupied with those. I also went abroad for a while which is why I’ve been out of the public eye and— oh, dear. You don’t need to donate, guys, I don’t know if I’ll be able to start streaming regularly again after this but—” Shen Yuan babbled, realizing he should probably have typed up a rough draft of what he wanted to say beforehand.

It didn’t help that he still got flustered at a flirty Superchat splayed across his screen, telling him how pretty he was with his longer hair.

Shen Yuan’s face reddened, spluttering as he tried to regain his train of thought when the sound of a door being opened slightly more forcefully than was natural interrupted him and a large, red and black shape came into the edge of the camera’s view.

Some people felt a sense of dread, thinking this could totally be Shen Yuan’s kidnapper… only to see how Shen Yuan’s face softened at the new person’s entrance.

“Binghe, I told you I can do it myself.” he said softly, more gentle than anything his usual viewers had ever heard him sound before.

A deep voice came from off-screen, just barely on the edge of inaudible because of the microphone’s settings.

“You— oh. Thanks.” Said the slight young man as he was handed a plate of, honestly, professionally made gourmet sandwiches. “I’ll eat these afterwards, it’s rude to eat while streaming.”

The voice mumbled something off-screen again and PeerlessCucumber rolled his eyes. “Yes, yes, I’ll introduce you in a bit, I still have to get to— oh!”

Before he could protest, Shen Yuan was being picked up off his chair by the barely visible man who immediately plopped down on the chair, finally revealing himself.

The chat freaked out when they saw the man properly.

Shen Yuan cheerfully introduced his new husband, Luo Binghe, whom he met through the game Proud Immortal Demon Way and who he’d gotten married to in late January. Luo Binghe remained quiet until a Superchat popped up, lamenting the loss of one of the most eligible bachelors ever to this random guy.

A dangerous smirk made his way onto the large man’s face as he nuzzled into Shen Yuan’s hair. “Shizun, Shizun, this one needs your help with the remote again. Will you please come help this Binghe?” he whined, and Shen Yuan looked fond but exasperated.

“Again? I’ve explained to you how to use it so many times… all right.” he said, leaning into the nuzzling. “As you all can see,” he said, turning back to the camera, “I am happy, healthy and safe. I don’t think I’ll be going back to streaming after this but thanks for sticking around! Uh. Yeah. See ya!” he said, and as he leaned forward to shut off the camera, Luo Binghe leaned forward with him, burying his face in Shen Yuan’s neck to leave a stream of sensual kisses.

Shen Yuan protested audibly, although more in a “Not in front of the camera!” sort of way rather than anything that implied he was unhappy with the affection itself.

The last frame was of Shen Yuan with an embarrassed but happy face and Luo Binghe, his head half buried in Shen Yuan’s neck, one glowing red eye glaring at the camera smugly.

Needless to say, this did not at all stop the flow of theories that would’ve been considered crazy in any other situation.

Not that Shen Yuan or Binghe cared. They were happy together.