Family Time (1)

I had expected myself to be getting flamed, yet somehow my subscriber count was increasing instead.

As I tilted my head and investigated the reason, I managed to identify several causes.

One was that my provocative remarks had been clipped by a famous channel specializing in Vtuber clips, and the video had received an oddly high number of views.

Another was that after the stream, I had posted on Monology under the hashtag “Show Us Your Radiance,” asking people to upload the things they had left smoldering inside themselves—the remains of things they had once poured their passion into, the wreckage of abandoned dreams, so to speak—and declared that I would feature some of them on future streams, which apparently motivated a great many people to start posting all sorts of things.

Naturally, there also seemed to be plenty of people criticizing me, but… well.

Some complained that I sounded arrogant or asked who the hell I thought I was, but from the perspective of someone who had regained her memories of a previous life, my response was basically, “Of course We are important. We are the Demon Lord, are We not?” so it didn’t bother me in the slightest.

Besides, I had no intention of concerning myself with the barking of defeated dogs. Hahaha.

“…Still, I didn’t expect this.”

The following afternoon after school, what I was currently looking at after returning home was the Monology account of Ephir Lunette, a Vtuber affiliated with Gem Pro, the agency where Yuzu-neesan worked—the same person who had apparently discovered my debut stream.

“Personally, I support what Demon Lord Ver-chan said too. Struggling against things is way cooler than letting yourself get swept along into some suffocating way of living! I’m gonna draw something too! #ShowUsYourRadiance #VercheraMerisis”

Apparently, she had clearly declared her support for me.

Normally, the bigger the agency someone belonged to, the more likely they were to stay silent so as not to get dragged into someone else’s controversy.

Especially when the general consensus seemed to be that my remarks this time had been fairly extreme, yet for some reason she had openly announced that she supported me.

For a moment, I suspected Yuzu-neesan might have done something behind the scenes, but probably not.

For better or worse, Yuzu-neesan was a consummate professional. She wouldn’t interfere in my controversy out of personal feelings, and she certainly wouldn’t ask one of the talents she’d worked so hard to support to take such a reckless risk for me.

Still… looking at the replies, there were a lot of bewildered comments like, “The legendary terrible artist is going to… draw?”

I, too, knew that the pictures she drew were horrib—avant-garde and progressive, yes, the sort of artwork no one else could possibly imitate, so my face involuntarily twitched.

I hadn’t told people to conquer things they were bad at. I had meant for them to awaken things they’d once poured passion into and then tried to forget.

Still, it would probably be a bad idea for me to say that on Monology, so I kept quiet.

“Rinne-chan, are you sure you’re okay…?”

“There’s nothing to worry about. If anything, you could say getting flamed would actually work in my favor.”

Mom, who diligently checked my streams and was apparently worried that I’d stirred up a situation bordering on a controversy, asked me that, and I answered without the slightest concern.

“It’s probably about right if it gets controversial. Of course, I don’t want to become a controversy-bait Vtuber, and I don’t think it’s something I should deliberately aim for all the time. But if people are going to learn what kind of person I am, then this particular situation is better off getting enough attention to become controversial.”

“…I see. All right. If you’re okay with it, then your mother is too.”

“Yeah. Thanks.”

It was true that my subscriber count had somehow risen to four thousand, which was an astonishing pace for a brand-new independent Vtuber, and I had enough recognition that I could no longer call myself completely unknown, but ultimately that was all it amounted to.

From the perspective of someone who had regained memories of a previous life, this world seemed rather distorted.

It had constructed systems that mechanically drew people into society in a vague, aimless fashion, wearing down individual dreams and hopes and then treating that as the correct way to live.

That was precisely why, if my provocative words could become the spark that stirred someone’s heart into motion, there was nothing better.

And if, as a result, they decided that my way of thinking didn’t suit them, they were free to leave.

But if even one living person could use my words as an opportunity to shine, wouldn’t that be wonderfully satisfying?

Although I had assumed my influence would remain fairly limited, discovering that my subscribers had exploded past ten thousand by that morning had certainly been beyond anything I’d expected.

At any rate, Vtuber activities gave me a place where I could enjoy being the We I once was, and watching that take shape was fun.

I wanted to put a little more effort into it and try various things if possible, but this body was still that of a blossoming high-school girl.

I had to properly balance school life and streaming life, or I’d feel guilty toward Mom and Yuzu-neesan, so I would have to do my best somehow.

That said, I had also been openly firing back at people who had continued complaining about me on Monology since yesterday.

“Ten thousand subscribers… you say…? We did not foresee this… You have Our gratitude, subjects. Still, these clips and such are quite something.”

I posted that in the morning, maintaining exactly the same tone as the previous day.

Then I shook my shoulders with quiet laughter at the insults that came flooding back.

And on top of that, I had posted this one just a little while ago.

“If you dislike Us, then simply avert your eyes in silence. You have entirely too much free time. You may continue clinging to Us if you wish, but understand that it causes Us not the slightest discomfort. No matter how much rebuttal you spew, it means nothing to Us. We shall not change. As We said yesterday, simply show Us your radiance.”

Partly because I had posted something like that, the replies under both posts were extremely lively.

When I suddenly felt someone’s gaze and looked over, Mom was watching me with a delighted smile.

“Hehe, things have gotten pretty incredible, but I’m glad Yuzu and I suggested that you become a Vtuber. I think it’s because of that that you’ve finally been able to stop pretending to be someone you’re not.”

“Yeah. I’m glad I did it too. Thank you, Mom.”

Surely it was thanks to Mom and Yuzu-neesan that my previous-life memories had returned at this particular moment.

Even before those memories came back, I had clearly used my former self as the basis for the character setting and even drawn her appearance, so perhaps there had already been signs that the memories were resurfacing… and since I had finally remembered everything amid the tension right before my stream, maybe some unconscious part of me had known that streaming would be the trigger.

I was just about to get up from the living room and start preparing a video for my next upload when Mom’s phone suddenly rang.

“Oh, it’s Yuzu. Hello, Yuzu? What’s up? …Huh? Yes, she’s right in front of me. Oh, really? Then I’ll make enough dinner for you too. Mm-hmm… Okay, we’ll be waiting~”

“What did Yuzu-neesan say?”

“She has something she wants to talk to you about and asked if she could come over. Sounds like she’ll be here around seven.”

“Huh, something for me? Wonder what it is. Okay.”

It wasn’t quite five yet, so that would put her arrival right around dinnertime.

After answering Mom, I headed back toward my room.

Our home was a detached house.

Apparently, my grandparents had originally lived there, but Grandma had died before I was born, and Grandpa passed away soon after, so now Mom and I lived there together.

It had originally been an old house, but we’d undergone major renovations while I was in middle school, so the building itself now looked practically new.

Mom had even bought me a piano and built me something like an atelier for practicing music and drawing, so my room was essentially a detached annex that had been built where part of the garden used to be.

It seemed like an incredible amount of money to spend as a single parent, but apparently that wasn’t much of a problem where Mom was concerned.

The reason was that Mom worked as an actress.

She had debuted as a genius child actress and remained in show business ever since, eventually becoming known as a highly respected actress once she grew older.

Incidentally, she was such a powerhouse that she had taken a temporary break from acting only long enough to give birth to me and care for me until I was no longer an infant, then completely restored her figure and returned to work.

My father? No idea.

From the little I’d heard, Mom was apparently an unmarried mother.

Apparently, she did know who my father was, but since I had never expressed any desire to know and Mom didn’t seem inclined to talk about him either, the subject never came up.

I might have been grateful to him for the fact that I existed, but any father who had left Mom alone deserved ten thousand deaths.

Since magic existed even in this world, I sometimes thought about placing a curse on him that made him stub his little toe roughly once every two days.

Or perhaps one that made him cut his nails too short every single time he trimmed them.

Since I could actually do it if I wanted, I was starting to feel rather serious about developing those sorts of petty prank curses.

Magic power dwelled not in the flesh, but in the soul.

I had understood that much, but I had never imagined that the same principle would remain valid even in an entirely different world where magic itself was considered fictional.

I had no idea whether I would ever need to use magic going forward, but having it certainly wouldn’t hurt, so I intended to make proper use of it.

Especially teleportation magic.

It would make getting around much easier, so I definitely wanted to use that.

I needed to check whether I could still use things like that too.