“Ah.”
But before that hand could reach, Shin-jae stepped aside and bowed his head slightly.
“I, uh… I’m tired, so I’ll head in first.”
“Oh? Oh, yeah, sure.”
Was he still feeling the aftereffects of the acting earlier?
Watching Shin-jae’s retreating back, Sa-yoon tilted his head in curiosity. He had been completely immersed in the performance, after all. He’d heard before that sometimes it takes a while to shake off a role.
He should make sure Shin-jae eats well later. Sa-yoon ran a hand over the nape of his neck a few times before turning back toward the set.
By the time he handed taxi fare to the younger members and wrapped everything up, it was already past midnight. Stepping into the clubroom, Sa-yoon threw himself onto the collapsible cot. He planned to stay here until the first train started running.
“What a long day…”
Still, it was a relief that the shoot wrapped up well. Contrary to his initial worries, everything had flowed smoothly at some point, like water carrying them along.
Even though they’d shot the same scene for over an hour, the atmosphere on set hadn’t turned sour. And that was largely thanks to Shin-jae, the sole actor present.
Given his naturally sharp and prickly temperament, Sa-yoon had thought there might be some friction. But instead of snapping, Shin-jae had been the one to get more frustrated and downcast over his own performance. He was so serious about acting—it’d be great if he actually pursued it as a career.
As Shin-jae briefly crossed his mind, Sa-yoon pulled out his phone.
[Shin-jae, great work today.]
[You’re seriously the best.]
After hesitating for a moment, he added a heart-eyed cat emoji. Then, skimming through the endless flood of messages, he opened voice chat.
Killer: Noize = NodeMaster, maybe?
It all started with Killer’s casual suspicion.
“…Wait, why is Noize suddenly coming up here?”
The guild members’ reactions were the same.
Freedeal: Huh? Out of nowhere?
Furple: You got proof?
Killer: I’m calling it.
GegulGegulFrog: LMAO, Viper senses tingling.
Furple: Noize either bailed or changed their nickname. Can’t find them when I search now.
Jeon-gi: Ah, if it’s them, they got caught and ran.
Jeon-gi: No persistence, tsk.
Freedeal: Didn’t Node transfer servers, though? I checked back then, and their achievement score was exactly 400,000.
Oath’s Vow: So, to summarize, Noize left for another server to wipe their identity and then came back?
Killer: Yep.
Oath’s Vow: And ditched all their achievement points?
Killer: Yep.
Oath’s Vow: Hmm…
Jeon-gi: If it’s true, isn’t this some Min So-hee level shit? LMAO, changing their name and appearance before sneaking back.
Freedeal: But where did this suspicion even come from?
Killer: Check this out.
GegulGegulFrog: Guys, there’s a post on the other server’s forum questioning the #1 ranked score.
GegulGegulFrog: (Link)
Killer: (Link)
GegulGegulFrog: Oh, damn.
Sa-yoon clicked the link, but a message popped up saying the post had been taken down due to multiple reports. Tilting his head in confusion, he switched back to the chat.
Jeon-gi: This is kinda sketchy.
Furple: Yeah, this is looking real suspicious.
Freedeal: But this alone isn’t enough proof that Noize = NodeMaster.
Killer: Frog, are you online? Whisper me.
GegulGegulFrog: Okay, okay, on it.
Oath’s Vow: Ah.
Oath’s Vow: I figured it out.
Furple: What is it?
Oath’s Vow: If you look at the screenshots, the first 17 show the top 20 rankings.
Oath’s Vow: Up to screenshot 17, there are 7 teams where a Noize guild member is part of the pair, and NodeMaster’s score hasn’t changed.
Oath’s Vow: But after that, when NodeMaster’s score starts rising, Noize members begin dropping off the rankings one by one.
Oath’s Vow: Everyone’s been focused on the #1 score changes and missed this pattern.
Oath’s Vow: NodeMaster is definitely linked to the Noize guild.
Jeon-gi: Whoa, you’re like a detective.
Furple: So you’re saying they boosted NodeMaster’s score?
GegulGegulFrog: But is that even possible? Matches shouldn’t be limited to just Noize members, right?
Freedeal: Maybe it is… At high ranks, you mostly run into the same few players anyway.
Jeon-gi: True. I climbed to 17th once and got matched with the same pair three times in a row.
Oath’s Vow: The system is designed so that matches happen within a certain point range above and below your own, so it’s possible.
Freedeal: Yeah, since you keep getting matched within the same 10-20 teams, they could’ve just queued at the same time.
Oath’s Vow: If you look closely, whenever the second-place pair’s score moves, NodeMaster’s score stays mostly the same.
Oath’s Vow: They probably tracked Chasa’s playtime and deliberately avoided him while getting boosted.
Jeon-gi: Damn…
Furple: But who the hell was taking all these screenshots in real time?
Freedeal: Oh, that? LOL.
Freedeal: The Warlock forum kept doing live updates on the Cygnus rankings and scores, calling it “the best output” or whatever.
Freedeal: Towards the end, they started consolidating everything in a single post with updates in the comments. Probably got it from there.
Oath’s Vow: But this isn’t solid proof yet.
Oath’s Vow: There’s still no direct evidence that Noize and NodeMaster are the same person.
GegulGegulFrog: Holy shit, holy shit.
GegulGegulFrog: Guys, I just pulled a big one.
GegulGegulFrog: BOW BEFORE ME, THE GREAT FROG.
Furple: ? What now?
GegulGegulFrog: (Screenshot)
GegulGegulFrog: (Screenshot)
GegulGegulFrog: (Screenshot)
Furple: ????
GegulGegulFrog: So Killer told me to message only the people who recently transferred to Noize.
GegulGegulFrog: And LOL, they all got super cagey and started dodging questions.
GegulGegulFrog: No idea if Noize = NodeMaster, but…
GegulGegulFrog: It definitely looks like they were recruiting mercenaries.
Oath’s Vow: Yeah, when did all these guys transfer to Noize?
The names in the screenshots Frog had posted were familiar to Sa-yoon. It made sense—most of them were top 30 rankers.
The common factor? After transferring to Noize, their rankings this season had dropped way below their usual spots.
GegulGegulFrog: WhiteNoise was apparently going around before the battlefield opened, offering high-level support to rankers if they joined the guild.
GegulGegulFrog: (Screenshot)
GegulGegulFrog: This guy’s been a Cygnus veteran forever.
GegulGegulFrog: Even he got a recruitment offer!
GegulGegulFrog: And when he refused, one of his friends got a weird proposal instead.
GegulGegulFrog: I asked if he was planning to go public with it, and he said yes, so he shared the info!
Killer: What do you mean by “weird proposal”?
GegulGegulFrog: They said they’ll ask their friend for permission to share once it’s confirmed this is going public.
GegulGegulFrog: …Wait, why is Potato in here?
Sa-yoon’s eyes wavered.
PurpleSteamedPotato had held second place for most of the season in the pair battlefield rankings—until Sa-yoon overtook him, dropping him to seventh by the end of the season.
It was surprising enough that he was connected to Frog, but as Sa-yoon scrolled down, even more shocking information popped up.
The chatroom was getting livelier as more evidence piled up. So that’s why there had been so much chatter. At the same time, Sa-yoon’s mind was racing.
So basically… they recruited top rankers to manipulate the rankings, intentionally losing to certain players in exchange for rewards…?
And from the looks of the conversation, Noize hadn’t just targeted their own guild members—they had reached out to rankers outside the guild as well.
If this theory was true, it was outright match-fixing. And match-fixing was a serious case of abuse.
If all of this turned out to be real, this would be the largest match-fixing scandal in the game’s history.
And Wartum was stricter than any other game company when it came to abuse.
NodeMaster’s abnormal score progression was already documented, which meant their account was as good as permanently banned.
If this was real… could he actually claim the first-place reward? The custom-designed outfit?
The faint spark of hope that had been extinguished suddenly flickered back to life.
Freedeal: If this is legit, over 30 people are getting banned.
Furple: But we don’t have a smoking gun.
GegulGegulFrog: I’m trying to make contact with suspicious pairs right now.
Killer: I’ve already got NodeMaster’s unique ID.
Killer: Now we just need Noize’s.
Jeon-gi: Damn, man of action.
In Divine, every character was assigned a unique ID upon creation. Even if they changed their nickname or transferred servers, the ID remained the same. It was sometimes used for real-money trades to verify identities.
But since unique IDs were only visible to the account owner after logging in… how did he even get it?
Swakkoong: Wtf, why is the chat on fire all of a sudden?
Furple: Kkoong, check the link above.
Swakkoong: Ah, fuck.
Swakkoong: NodeMaster is Noize???
Swakkoong: Where’s the guild leader?
Swakkoong: Leader, leader, get your ass over here.
Swakkoong: Someone check their DMs~~!!!
Swakkoong: LOL, I actually have Noize’s unique ID.
GegulGegulFrog: ???
Jeon-gi: …Why do you have it?
And then, the person who could turn suspicion into certainty appeared.
It was an entrance so dramatic, it couldn’t have been scripted better even in a novel.
Killer: LOL, evidence collection is done.
Killer: Post is up.
Killer: (Link)
That was the final message in the endless layers of chat.
Sa-yoon, still in a daze, clicked the link. A new window immediately popped up, revealing a familiar homepage—the Divine server forum.
***
[Cygnus] How to Manipulate Pair Battlefield Rankings
Author: Killer
Sharing the method to reach Rank 1 through score manipulation.
- Noize = NodeMaster
***
From the title alone, it was a clickbait masterpiece.
