Over the past few days, Anna had grown.
-"Meet various people along with Inagika."
Laura had given her that advice.
So, until today, Anna had been meeting senior VTubers from EYEAI, people she wasn’t very close to. And she had been doing it with Inagika.
Starting a conversation with someone wasn’t easy, but once she tried, it wasn’t as hard as she thought.
Besides, Inagika was probably the most junior-like among the 6th generation.
Laura was the most charismatic person in EYEAI, Sora had recently become her rival, and Chel was someone whose thoughts were impossible to read.
So, at least in front of Inagika, she wanted to show a side of her that was befitting a senior.
‘Today’s broadcast... Inagika will probably be watching too.’
She wanted to look good in front of Inagika.
More than that, she didn’t want to show a disappointing side of herself to her favorite, Rui.
Still, after meeting people these past few days, Anna had gained some confidence.
Hanabane Rui?
Starting today, Hanabane Rui wouldn’t just be her favorite.
She’d be “my woman.”
《Laura: Go straight for it.》
“Huh? What is this?”
A sudden message appeared, and Anna was startled.
At the moment, Anna was in the middle of the street.
This was her VR My Room.
However, its quality was oddly high. It was as if an entire city had been transplanted here.
It didn’t seem like a free preset, and it looked like something someone might have commissioned, given its grand scale.
‘Come to think of it, among Rui’s acquaintances, there were quite a few people good at this kind of thing… Did Hikari make it for her?’
Asahina Hikari. A 1st-tier member of Behemoth.
And once, the VTuber closest to Hanabane Rui.
She was very famous for ASMR, but at the same time, she was also known as one of the VTubers most skilled in building things.
Her main content included Minecraft, and she was particularly skilled with Bluestone Circuits. She had even won VTuber building competitions, if Anna’s memory was correct.
Not only Minecraft, but she was also famous for creating VR My Rooms, so Anna thought Rui might have sought help from Hikari.
‘Even though it’s been quite a while since Hikari left Ink Palette.’
It was surprising that Rui had asked an “old colleague” for help and just as surprising that Hikari had agreed to help.
Well.
When a VTuber left a company, it was usually because they disliked the company, not because they hated the individual VTubers.
Even after leaving, they might remain on friendly terms.
Thinking along those lines, Anna moved her feet forward.
Then, she spotted Rui in the distance.
《Sora: Greet her with a cool tumbling! Go go go!》
“...What the heck.”
Anna was dumbfounded.
She knew Laura was watching the broadcast simultaneously. After all, the punishment idea had been Laura’s in the first place.
And it seemed like Sora was also watching the broadcast with Laura.
It was obvious they had come to mock her, a self-proclaimed loner. Ayano Koji Sora, that arrogant woman, was the epitome of a social butterfly...!
Still, the messages that had been popping up earlier—were they some feature Rui had added?
‘Tumbling? This is ridiculous.’
Even though Inagika was her fellow 6th-generation junior.
Seriously, there was no cute charm to her.
Fine, just wait and see.
After these past few days of training, she had completely transformed.
Mock her if they dared!
With that, Anna shrugged her shoulders and confidently approached Rui.
“Hello, Rui-chan! Let’s work well together today!”
Anna bowed her head in greeting.
When she looked up again… Rui was nowhere to be seen.
“...Huh?”
Blinking, Anna looked around.
In the distance, Rui reappeared.
《Sora: Greet her with a cool tumbling! Go go go!》
The same message from earlier popped up again in front of Anna.
It was as if time had rewound.
***
“You want to do a dating sim concept? It sounds fun, but is it realistically feasible?”
That was yesterday.
Sora had asked Rui that question.
“It’s just a My Room, after all. You probably don’t have the authority to control other people’s avatars.”
In VR, the My Room system was like Notepad or Excel on a PC.
If you bought a VR device, it was a basic program that came pre-installed (or could be installed).
This kind of program was easy to use, but as such, there were also many functions it couldn’t do.
“You’re right, controlling other people’s avatars isn’t possible. But instead, you can use the feature to reset things to their original positions.”
Rui had explained.
My Room was a system where users could freely customize their VR space.
Because of this, there were occasional issues where avatars got stuck between objects.
The feature to rewind a few seconds was designed for such situations, akin to the ctrl+Z function on a PC.
“And sending messages isn’t difficult either. You can use this.”
The plan was as follows:
Laura and Sora would watch Anna as audience members.
If they wanted to give a command, they’d type a message and send it to Anna.
Anna would most likely ignore the commands, but that didn’t matter.
They could just use the rewind function.
“Keep rewinding until Anna listens.”
“It sounds fun. But giving commands doesn’t seem easy….”
Unlike live interactions, sending commands to Anna required typing them out and sending them. It wasn’t instantaneous, and creating fun scenarios seemed harder than expected.
But Rui, of course, was sharp enough to address that concern.
“Oh, I see. You’re planning to use the Time Acceleration system?”
She also figured it out.
Time Acceleration.
A system that sped up time in VR up to five times faster than real time.
“You caught on. That’s right.”
Laura nodded and pressed a button.
“Pressing this button changes the flow of time in this area to 5x.”
The area where Anna and Rui’s date was happening would remain at a 1x flow.
In other words, by pressing the button, Anna and Rui’s date would appear five times slower from their perspective.
If they used the relative speed advantage to draft commands, the messages would feel almost instantaneous to Anna.
If Anna followed the commands, great.
If she didn’t, they could use the administrator privileges Rui had granted them to rewind time for a few seconds.
It was essentially like gaining the power of a god.
[Hey! Ayanokouji Sora! Are you seriously doing this!?]
On the monitor screen, Anna was fuming.
[What’s this tumbling nonsense! How am I supposed to do that!]
《Sora: If it were me, I’d fall for someone the moment I saw them tumble. Go go go go go!》
[Don’t lie! Anyway, I’m not doing it! No way!!]
With that, Anna shouted and walked toward Rui again.
Of course, Sora kept rewinding time whenever she did, so—
Anna never reached Rui.
[…Um, excuse me, Sora. I mean, Miss Sora… Do I really have to tumble…?]
The time it took for Anna, who had been yelling moments ago, to lower her tone—
About three minutes.
Anna had never done a tumbling before.
And in the first place, greeting someone with a tumbling was just weird…
《Sora: Tumbling ㄱ》
[Couldn’t you at least change it to something else…?]
《Sora: Tumbling ㄱ》
[We haven’t even properly started the stream yet… Let’s not do this from the very beginning.]
《Sora: Tumbling》
[…]
《Sora: Tumbling》
- “So stubborn lolololol.”
- “At this point, just do the tumbling already lolol.”
- “Why is she so obsessed with tumbling lol.”
Sora’s attitude was as unyielding as a rock.
In the end, Anna had no choice but to give in.
After all, Sora and Laura had seized divine powers.
There was no way Anna, who was just a dating sim protagonist, could take the initiative.
[Ugh, seriously…!]
Anna ran toward Rui, stretched out her arms, and as she bent her body, her palms touched the ground.
And then—Anna completely lost her balance.
Thud.
Anna fell flat on her face.
Anna stayed down, burying her face in the ground.
She didn’t want to see anything.
Not the chat that was undoubtedly mocking her,
Not the messages from Sora, who was clearly teasing her,
Not the gaze of Rui, who might be thinking she was a weirdo.
‘I want to disappear…’
That was what she was thinking.
Falling while attempting a tumbling wasn’t a big deal. It wasn’t like this was the first time she had made a fool of herself. She had been the butt of jokes plenty of times before.
But still…
Becoming a joke in front of her favorite person was emotionally devastating.
Even if the punishment had been a horror game, it would’ve been better than this.
With those thoughts, Anna couldn’t bring herself to lift her head.
“Are you okay?”
Suddenly, a voice broke the silence.
When she cautiously lifted her head, Rui—contrary to her expectations—was extending a hand toward her, with a soft smile on her face.
“Can you get up?”
That’s what Rui said.
Ah, an angel.
The moment Anna saw Rui’s face, that word came to her mind.
“Ah… Aah…”
No words came out.
All she could do was make sounds. The words didn’t come to mind, so her voice couldn’t form sentences.
It wasn’t a beautiful sight.
VTubers, naturally, put effort into making their appearances as appealing as possible. Being “pretty” was an advantage, after all.
In that sense, the standard of beauty for VTuber avatars was relatively high. But Hanabane Rui’s avatar leaned more toward plainness.
Overly elaborate appearances often led to higher production difficulties for Live 2D or complications when transitioning to 3D models.
In the end, the design of an avatar often matched the personality of the VTuber. If the appearance was too far removed from their actual personality, it could create a sense of dissonance.
So calling Hanabane Rui “beautiful” wasn’t accurate.
That word would be better suited for someone like Aurora.
While it was hard to describe her as beautiful…
The faint fluttering in Anna’s chest, which she had almost forgotten, resurfaced.
Feelings often faded with time, their intensity diluted. But they never disappeared entirely.
Like an old man reminiscing about his youth when looking at old photos, or a struggling artist rediscovering their initial spark through a piece of their earlier work.
The first emotions are etched into one’s soul; they just need a trigger.
“I respect you.”
Anna spoke.
Why had she started watching Hanabane Rui’s streams?
Why had she decided to keep watching them?
Why had she chosen Hanabane Rui as her favorite?
The passion she hadn’t felt in a long time was reignited by a chance encounter.
“I know.”
Rui gave a small smile.
Just that alone made Anna inexplicably happy, instantly dispelling the shame she had felt moments ago.
That’s what it meant to have a favorite.
Ding!
《Laura: Take this chance to confess honestly that you’ve switched your favorite from Rui to Aurora.》
“...Excuse me?”
It was like cold water had been poured over her.
Come to think of it, this was a punishment game.