Gamer mum goes viral for winning at Mortal Kombat while holding baby

Fighting game fans are celebrating a mother’s accomplishment in taking care of her ‘mega chill’ baby during a local tournament.

Video games may have once been perceived as being just for kids, but nowadays you can find parents who are even bigger gamers than their own children.

If that describes you, you probably aren’t quite as hardcore as one mum from Florida, who joined a Mortal Kombat tournament on a whim over the weekend and won… while cradling her newborn baby who was barely five days old.

Only known by her online handle of Legi0n, she was also still recovering from a caesarean section, and her story has quickly gone viral among the fighting game community, mostly for how adorable it is.

‘I only won because she coached me mid set. Sending our daughter to DreamHack,’ reads an X post by Legi0n, who works as a 3D artist and is an ‘occasional’ fighting game fan according to her profile.

She also shared a post victory photo of her sleeping baby, who she and her husband have named Cereza in a cute reference to the Bayonetta games.

Despite the C-section being described as ‘brutal’ and ‘almost [resulting] in a rupture,’ Legi0n and her husband – known as Argenrost on X – opted to attend a local fighting game tournament, Juicy Game Night, at the last minute and brought baby Cereza with them.

Apparently, she was ‘mega chill,’ even with ‘Tekken players screaming no more than 10 feet away from her,’ which Argenrost believes is a sign she was ‘born for the sticks.’

Even while taking care of her newborn, Legi0n ultimately won the Mortal Kombat tournament (which interestingly was for 2015’s Mortal Kombat X, not the more recent Mortal Kombat 1), with Argenrost taking third place.

Her story is currently the top post on both the Mortal Kombat and Fighters subreddits, where fellow fighting game fans have expressed awe or made light-hearted jokes about it, such as referring to the baby as her kameo fighter or how the baby should be named after whoever she mains in Mortal Kombat.

Speaking with Dexerto, Legi0n is using the attention to raise awareness for non-profit organization NORD (the National Organisation for Rare Diseases), which helps those ‘who battle and care for rare disease feel seen, heard, supported, and connected.’

Legi0n says she had previously donated to NORD after her first daughter Alcina sadly died last year, at only 11 days old, due to a tumour caused by a rare disease called Kasabach Merritt Syndrome.

As for what comes next, Legi0n has expressed interest in taking part in more tournaments ‘once I find something I love enough to care about again and have a bit more time.’

In a separate post, she added, ‘Hormones and trauma related to our older daughter’s death/the surgery was hitting me pretty hard but I’m so grateful to make it out. Never want to stop doing things that I love, just need to adjust my life accordingly for our younger daughter.

‘I just want people to feel like no matter what they can do things that they still love even if it’s in small chunks. Never feel like it isn’t worth it.’

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