Classmancers - A MOBA Esport Story

Vol.7 Ch.14: No Female Candidates

"So, we really gonna play a video game for club activity?"

"That sounds fun as heck! The best club!"

That was the mentality of most candidates who came to apply for the Classmancers club.

"......." Kai was dead silent. She handed out the registration forms like a robot and didn't utter a single word the whole time.

"Something wrong?" Yuel asked.

"........" She glanced at him, then returned to the registration forms. "No, nothing." She sighed.

Yeah, sure. "Nothing". Yuel rolled his eyes. "You're disappointed that this is all we got? I admit it's pretty weak. Back in StormBlitz, we held a big entrance exam and lots of people attended."

"That's not the issue," Kai said. "Did you notice how many girls applied so far?"

"I believe there weren't any."

"Exactly. Not a single one. Nada. We got like ten applications but not a single one of them was a female."

"I see," Yuel didn't know what to say. Kai's prophecy seemed to be on point: very few girls at this age had any interest in Classmancers.

However, it was too early to draw any statistics from just one sample. Even if boys were more interested in the club on average, surely some girl will eventually show up as long as they continue drawing people's attention. But...

Do I really want to find such a girl? Yuel wondered. As far as he was concerned, picking the most capable candidates was the entire purpose of going through such a selection process. So, prioritizing a player's gender over their skill went against that belief.

But, at the same time, he wanted some girls to apply to dismiss Kai's statement. He wanted to prove that enough girls had an interest in the game. But, why? It had nothing to do with him. He shouldn't have cared in the slightest. And yet...

Why do I keep thinking about Julia? Yuel knotted his brows. Somehow, every time this topic came up, his mind couldn't help but wander back to Julia.

According to Lars, some of his classmates in grade school didn't like playing Classmancers with Julia because she was a girl. That undoubtedly stifled her ability to improve at the game. After all, without a supporting group to play with, it was difficult to improve or even get motivated enough to play. Even Yuel started off by playing with some of his classmates, though that story didn't go so well...

Anyway, having other people to play with was incredibly important when starting out, especially in a team-based game like a MOBA. It was a thousand times harder to be invested in the game when you didn't have any teammates to share your good and bad times with.

And, Julia didn't have that privilege at first. She only had Lars, who agreed to play with her unlike the rest of the boys. But, Lars wasn't exactly the sharpest tool in the shed so he couldn't give Julia much advice on how to improve.

So, it came as no surprise that Julia's skill was so unpolished when Yuel met her. Back then, Yuel thought she was a terrible player who had no idea what she was doing. But, given the kind of stifling environment she played in, it only made sense she struggled to develop as a player.

If Kai's theory was correct, there were many girls like Julia who couldn't get into Classmancers due to the similar gatekeeping. And, most of them weren't lucky enough to meet a nice goof like Lars or a knowledgeable coach like Yuel. So, these girls never got, and might never get, into Classmancers even though they could've really enjoyed the game and even reached a high level at it. That was unfortunate.