Chapter 4

Bloodborne: Ever wondered what it's like to live in a nightmare? In this action game, you create your own hunter and explore the horrifying world of Yharnam, fighting merciless creatures and slaying nightmarish enemies along the way. Known for its difficulty, this game has a tendency to unleash anger and frustration in players.

It's been four days since Marinette tried to stream with Chat Noir, only to be let down when he apparently went back to his old ways before she had a chance to teach him. Since then, Chat Noir has been trying to get into contact with her but to no avail. She kept ignoring all of his messages, still feeling insulted from what happened. She was tempted to block him, so that he wouldn't be able to send her anymore messages, but she felt that doing so would be a little too harsh. She hoped that he would get the message eventually.

Today was the day though where she would let go of the rest of her frustrations. She was going to play a game that would help her release all of her pent up rage: Bloodborne. It wasn't a game that she normally plays, she only saves it for occasions such as these. The game was actually gifted to her by one of her fellow classmate, Nathaniel Bronn, as a Valentine's Day gift. He heard that Marinette was into video games so he gifted a copy to her since he appreciated the art style and thought Marinette would also. She tried it out the day she received it, and found to be rather difficult and horrifying too with its graphics but she could see why Nathaniel said about the art style. It was quite vivid and realistic for a video game.

She fired up her Playstation 4 and prepared herself for the stream. She checked her chat and saw that people were already present and ready for the stream. She smiled, feeling happy that she has such an enthusiastic and loyal fanbase. She turned on her stream, not wanting to have them wait any longer and began playing.

"Come on, come on, NOOOOOOO!" she screeched, as a large claw made contact with her character, causing her to drop down to her knees, and finally, flat on her face. Marinette nearly tossed her controller down to the ground, having been so close to defeating the fourth boss of the game, Vicar Amelia. However, she took a deep breath and began laughing to get her frustration out. This was exactly what she needed to vent everything.

She turned to her chat, to see if anyone was offering any tips as to how to defeat the bandage wrapped wolf monster. She scrolled through, seeing a lot of encouraging messages or basic tips that she already knew, and stopped at one. She grimaced seeing who it was coming from, Chat Noir. She wanted to scroll past it but her curious eyes had already started skimming it. It said, "Ladybug, I truly am sorry for the other day. I don't expect you to forgive me but please know my apology is genuine. I'll be watching your stream. I'm really enjoying it!"

She sighed once again. She didn't have time to mull over his words, she had six hundred and eighty three other people waiting on her. She said into her microphone, "Chat Noir, if you're still watching, go on Skype. We'll talk when the stream's finished."

Two hours later, with the boss that gave Marinette difficulty now finally defeated and a good portion of the next area already explored, Marinette decided to call it quits for the night. She signed off from her viewers and loaded up Skype. She was reluctant to sign in, still not wanting to chat with him, but she made him a promise that they'd talk once the stream was done and she was one to actually keep their promises.

As she had anticipated, Chat Noir was online and waiting for her. Before she could click on his name to chat with him, a window popped up saying that he was calling her. She sighed and accepted the call. Like the first time they met, he had his video on while she just had her audio.

He waved at the screen and smiled. "Ladybug!"

"Hey Chat." she answered, slumping back into her seat. "So about that apology of yours-"

"Before you say anything, I want you to know something." A small beep suddenly sounded from Marinette's computer, coming from the conversation between her and chat. When she checked to see what it was, she saw a link that directed her to Chat Noir's channel. "That's the VoD from my stream when you were on. Please, have a look at it."

She was rather confused as to why he wanted her to do it, but she complied to his request. He told her to skip ahead until they were playing, which she did. She didn't see anything out of the ordinary when the two of them were bouncing up and down together, and she saw his expression when she was explaining her plan but didn't think anything of it. She noticed soon after that point how his smile quickly turned to a frown, how his eyes darted back and forth frantically for some reason.

She turned to the chat replay from the stream, to see if that was the cause of his distress. Much to her surprise, it was. She watched as others in the chat appeared to be yelling at Chat Noir, using all caps and a lot of explanation marks. They were saying things like "I didn't come here for this!" "Come on Adrien, woo us like you always do!"

Mixed in with some of the messages too were people criticizing Marinette, asking who she was and why she got to be so lucky to play with them. There were even a couple of death threats from what she could pick out from the flood of messages.

"Chat…"

"That's why I did what I did." he said, capturing Marinette's attention. She saw that he was looking down at the ground, appearing to be ashamed. "I was losing viewers rather quickly too. I got scared and gave the audience what they wanted. I was genuine when I said I want to better my content and was willing to give you a shot. But, I guess you see now that's proving to be more of a difficult task."

"Chat, listen to me. You can't let your viewers keep pressuring you into doing this. You have to be strong enough to say 'Okay, I don't care if I lose viewers, I want to do things MY way because it's MY channel!' Do you understand?"

Chat Noir nodded at the screen. "I do."

"Trust me Chat, it will pay off better in the long run." She placed her hand on the screen, thinking back to a time in her past that she had hoped she wouldn't have to recall. "Believe me when I say it, I've been there, I've done that. You have to ask yourself, do you want to be a puppet for your viewers or do you want to be yourself?"

"I…" Chat paused and thought about her question. He bit his lower lip, feeling stress from the question. The answer was obvious to him, but at the same time, he had his doubts. "I want to be myself Ladybug."

Marinette smiled, feeling relieved that he did choose that option. She was a little bit afraid that he would've gone with the puppet route, but she didn't need to worry about that now. "I'm glad Chat."

"But!" he said, holding up a finger. "You said that I have to be strong enough to accept losing viewers and disappointing the audience. Well, the fact is Ladybug, I'm not. At least, alone. Would it… would it be alright if you could be there with me and help me?"

She looked at his video and saw the adorable expression he had, it was almost like a kitten begging for its food. She giggled. "Well, I kind of have to be after all. I did promise to be your teacher and just because you agreed to do things on your own doesn't mean your content has magically improved. We have a lot of work to do Chat Noir."

"Oh," Chat began chuckling along with Marinette's giggled. He wasn't sure if she was serious or not, but he didn't care. He was just glad that she agreed to be with him. "Thanks Ladybug."