Work Text:
WISP POV
Kit bit his lip hard, teeth pressing into the skin as he stared at the footage playing on his monitor. His latest UHC recording was right there in front of him, every block placed, every arrow fired, every clutch that had earned him his reputation as the undisputed champion. He had been so confident, so sure he would walk away with another flawless victory.
Then, his had phone buzzed. Another message from his manager. Kit frowned, not expecting anything urgent mid-recording. He clicked it, and his stomach sank.
“Just a heads up… Solace is joining this UHC.”
He froze. Solace. That name had been floating around the community for months -no face reveal, unmatched clutches, and somehow always one step ahead of everyone else. Every rumor, every highlight clip he’d seen made his chest tighten. Kit had never met this Solace person, yet somehow, the thought of facing them made his usually unshakable confidence falter.
He tried to shake it off, focusing on the game. But as the match progressed, things went sideways faster than he could react. A perfectly timed ambush, a trap he didn’t even see coming… and just like that, he was out. Eliminated. The screen flashed the words “Respawn”, mocking him in bright red.
Hours later, still seething, Kit’s anger hit a new peak. A notification popped up - Solace had uploaded a new video. He clicked it, heart pounding, and froze as the title stared back at him:
“I Trolled Wisp’s UHC Event.”
Kit slammed his desk, the chair rattling behind him. His flawless run, ruined. His pride, shattered. And somehow, beneath all the fury, there was a spark of something else - curiosity. Who was this Solace? How could someone who didn’t even show their face play with such confidence and skill? And most importantly… how had they managed to make him feel this unsettled?
He leaned back in his chair, dragging a hand through his hair, muttering under his breath. “This isn’t over.”
He tried to fight the urge to log onto Youtube. But his hands moved before his mind could resist, and he was suddenly typing "Solace" into the search bar. He clicked on the profile and scrolled through her videos. She had created her channel three years ago, but she had somehow managed to gain three million subscribers in that short span of time, and her views were rapidly increasing.
Like every minecraft youtuber, each player had their own domain. Dream was the king of speedrunning, Marloww was the ruler of pvp combat and Wisp was supposed to be the best UHC player. He held that title for six years. He had earned almost six million subs from his UHC content and adding random mods to minecraft. He had even been trying horror games to broaden his minecraft skills.
Solace was coming dangerously close to his territory. To make things worse, she was evidently a fan favourite. Her most recent video had gained 800k views, which was almost double the average amount of views Wisp got from his channel. Comments were flooding with funny timestamps from the video, and Solace's video had become a trending topic on Tiktok.
Wisp grunted. Solace was simply stealing fame from others, that was all.
He scrolled down to see her other videos.
"I Beat Dream's Boat Clutch Record", "I Became Tier 1 in Crystal PVP (Sorry, DrDonut)", "I Added 100 Horror Mods to Minecraft". Each view had over 750k views, and thousands of comments and support online.
Some of those achievements were...impressive. But Solace lacked originality. She was a newbie to Youtube, and her content could never beat the originals.
Wisp sighed and looked back at his monitor. The raw footage was paused, almost ready to upload. If Solace could use other people's names to make bank, perhaps the flood of comments on the video about how Solace joined his UHC would get him largely monetised. At the end of the day, Youtube was not only about spreading entertaining content, but creating a living for oneself.
Wisp sent the footage to his editor Seth to make some more complicated cuts. However, he couldn't ignore the small ache in his chest, at the fact that he now had a rival, someone who was evidently doing better than him in a short amount of time.
Afterall, how could a faceless creator make it so far, with barely any of her information and history online? All her viewers knew was that she was a random 21 year old college student. How could someone like her make it big in the minecraft community?
Kit rose from his gaming chair, stretching lazily after hours of gaming. He slowly paced toward the kitchen. His heavily illuminated gaming room had made him forget how dark the rest of the house was. His gaming room was timeless, oblivious to the setting and rising of the sun, instead luminous with artifical lights.
Shit. What time even was it? Kit pat down his nike shorts for his phone. He quickly pulled it out and the bright screen blinded his eyes for a second. His pet lizard Loki appeared on his lockscreen, alongside the bold outline "1:06am." The UHC event and editing had taken longer than expected. He became aware of his parched throat, after screaming at his mic for hours. For content reasons, of course.
He walked towards the cabinet, his socks barely protecting his feet from the cold floor. Kit grabbed a glass and turned on the tap, the harsh flowing sound of water grounding him.
He sat down, letting his thoughts about the past few hours consume him. He had been so close to victory, so close to winning. However Solace had outsmarted the doer. She had become stupidly overpowered with special modded items, bow spamming until Wisp was down to half a heart. Before he could consume a golden apple, she had struck the final blow with a fire axe, ending the game. Wisp took a sip of water. Solace definitely had skill, she was talented at minecraft. For some reason, her content even attracted many viewers, both of a young and older audience. What was so special about her skills? Was it really about theatrics, or were they just attracted to her personality? Afterall, half the game was being as theatrical as possible to sell the story to the viewers.
Kit, deep in thought, didn't realise as the glass slipped from his grip, falling to the floor. The sound of broken glass echoed across the room. Before he could even process what happened, he heard footsteps coming from the other room. His roomate Jonny, wearing a ridiculous pokemon sleeping mask, walked into the kitchen,
“Seriously Kit? I thought we made an agreement that you wouldn’t make any noise when you have late night streams…” Jonny murmured sleepily.
(im going to complete this trust, i have to upload it now because ao3 would delete my draft)