Chapter 10: If you have to sprinkle burgers, you can get a dog

“Shall we quickly fill out the consent forms before thinking about your activity names?“

Ms. Ari, who had changed her clothes, handed out some papers to us as we started settling down on the terrace.

“This is…”

Reading it slowly, it felt like some kind of menacing pledge.

If caught leaking information about the dormitory or headquarters externally, there’s a penalty fine for damages…

Oof, I wouldn’t be able to pay this off even if I worked on commissions for my entire life.

Unless I become one of the top illustrators in the country, I’d probably have to live a life rolling around on the streets to pay this penalty…

Anyway, I agreed to the other minor clauses and finished signing the confidentiality agreement, finally allowing us to officially begin our lodging together.

“Once you debut, your activity name will likely not change, so let’s decide on that carefully first.”

“Ah, please try to make the activity names Japanese-style!”

“You know the vibe, right?”

Honestly, it might be a bit hard to understand why a Korean VTuber would have a Japanese-style activity name.

But if you think about it, the reason isn’t particularly complex.

The homeland of VTubers is Japan, and the primary consumer base is also the otaku demographic.

Of course, since they are Korean VTubers, a Korean-style naming wouldn’t be bad either,
but Japanese names are just more familiar and easier for VTuber fans to immerse themselves in, making them more appealing.

Anyway, a name…

The only things popping into my head are names like Asuna, Yue, Ai, things like that.

What should I do?

“Have you decided on a name?”

“No…”

The gyaru asked, but I didn’t really have an answer.

Since I’m Korean, my knowledge of Japanese names mostly comes from anime.

Should I just use a random name generator?

“May I choose a name for you?”

“…I don’t really mind.”

“Then Kotori!“

“Kotori suits you!”

“Isn’t that too common?”

It’s a pretty name, but quite familiar.

It feels like a name I’ve seen often for heroines in anime.

“Hiyoko is also good!”

“Hiyoko?”

It sounded like a pretty name, so I searched it up and found out it means ‘chick’ or ‘baby bird.‘

What.

Are you teasing me for being small right now?

Even for someone like me, who used to be a basement-dwelling loser, this hurts my pride.

Believe it or not, my previous body was a healthy, military-discharged man over 180cm tall.

…Although my weight and eyesight had some issues.

“……”

When I glared at her, she flinched and avoided my gaze.

It seems she really did recommend it with that meaning.

At this point, I’m curious about Kotori, the name she suggested before.

“Kotori… Hmm.”

“Is this for real?”

“Y-Yes!”

So I searched it up, and it means ‘small bird.’

Wicked girl…

This is teasing too.

Sure, I might be the smallest and have the slightest figure here, but…

Hold on, apparently in Japan these days, Kotori is also being used as a name for small, cute boys?

“…Not bad.”

Thinking about it, it’s a bit of a stretch, but my current body is small and cute, and my mind is male.

Plus, Haruka’s fandom name is Canary, derived from a small, cute bird, so it does have some meaning for me…

“Kotori… It might be okay…“

“…!”

“It suits you perfectly!”

“Let’s go with Kotori!”

“!”

As I muttered to myself, the gyaru girl, who had been watching my expression, brightened up and clung tightly to me.

Startled, I scooted my butt backward.

Having something soft press against various parts of my body was really dangerous for me, someone who had been a single, virgin loser for over 20 years.

I shut my eyes tightly, trying not to look at her cleavage which filled my vision, and slapped at her weakly with my dainty hands, but she didn’t budge.

How can a girl be this strong?

“G-get off…!“

“Are you going with it?”

“I’ll do ittt…”

As I dodged her face that kept nudging towards me like a Golden Retriever, I gave a small nod.

Satisfied, she smiled and moved away.

I tried hard to ignore the pounding sound of my heart in my ears and cooled my flushed face.

Sometimes, fragments of Wooseo Woo pop out unexpectedly, but never at times like this.

Or maybe Wooseo Woo also had no tolerance for skinship, just like me?

“Phew…”

“Kotori feels like a small animal.“

“You smell nice too.”

“…I don’t wear any perfume.”

Wooseo Woo, being broke, didn’t even own perfume, something common for women, so I couldn’t spray anything.

Of course, even if she had, I wouldn’t have worn something with such a feminine scent anyway.

But do I really smell nice?

As I briefly buried my nose in my clothes and sniffed,
I saw the girl with the idol trainee-like appearance, whom I had exchanged a few words with earlier, approaching out of the corner of my eye.

‘What is it?’

‘She didn’t seem interested in me before.’

“Um, I was listening, could you possibly pick a name for me too?”

“…Yes!”

‘Truly beautiful people have an aura just by being expressionless.’

Her face seemed a bit blunt, but her tone itself was polite.

Perhaps because of that, the gyaru also brightened up, nodded enthusiastically, and rested her chin on her hand.

“…Hmm.”

The gyaru stared intently at the idol trainee’s face.

If it were me, I would have been so uncomfortable I’d want to dig a hole in the ground, but the girl calmly crossed her legs and sat on my bed as if she were used to it.

I couldn’t tell if she was confident in her looks or just accustomed to being looked at.

Anyway, sitting butt-to-butt with another girl on the same bed made me unnecessarily nervous.

Feeling the weight pressing down on the mattress right next to me, my body stiffened involuntarily.

As I unconsciously clenched my buttocks and sat bolt upright, the gyaru finally spoke.

“Miyu (most beautiful, excellent)…?“

“Or Hoshino is nice too!”

“I took it from the name of the character I like the most and think is the prettiest in an anime!”

Hearing her words, I tilted my head.

“Isn’t Hoshino a surname?”

If it’s from an anime, it must be that character from Oshi no Ko.

I watched it for a while too because it was fun, so I looked into it a bit; Hoshino was a Japanese surname.

And the pronunciation is the same as  (Hoshi no – of the stars), which actually seems to suit that perfectly idol-like girl quite well.

“It doesn’t really matter.”

“We won’t be using surnames and will go with single names.“

Ms. Ari, having overheard our conversation, nodded in approval and handed out the schedule we needed to follow.

I took the paper from her and nodded slightly.

Right, it’s not like we’re getting adopted into Japan; we don’t need to worry about surnames.

Anyway, what is this schedule?

Ugh.

With Ms. Ari’s permission granted, the gyaru’s and my gazes turned towards the idol trainee.

She must have some knowledge of subculture, having applied to be a VTuber, as she seemed to roughly know which character the gyaru was referring to.

“Hoshino… star, you say…“

She let out a dry smirk.

“Might be okay…”

The gyaru girl and I made eye contact.

‘Does this person have chuunibyou (eighth-grader syndrome)?’

[So when is the 2nd generation debuting?]

Is there any official news?

• It’s been over two months since Kanghyun-bro tweeted about it, so maybe in 3-4 months?

└ Hmm

└ He said it could be sooner, but who knows

└ Probably within this year

• Heard the interviews are done

└ Are you a HQ employee? How do you know?

└ Saw a post on a female-dominated community from someone rejected, cursing them out

└ ?ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ

└ It’s a popular post now

(Popular)[FeministSlayer-bro struck again ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ.jpg]

(A post on some female-dominated community cursing Kim Kanghyun)

Apparently, the last interview question was about what she, as a woman, thinks about the current internet broadcasting culture ㅋㅋㅋㅋ

Her answer is ridiculous lol

Recommended: 157 Disliked: 13

• Sh*t ㅋㅋㅋㅋ This is why Korean VTubers get flak

└ Bro.. this is a Korean VTuber fan gallery

• What kind of answer is that ㅋㅋㅋㅋ Saying viewers are disgusting but she’ll take their money? What kind of business are you running?

└ She’ll sell other things too if things go south lol

└ The sexual harassment is disgusting;

└ She’s here

└ The ahjumma got summoned instantly ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ

└ ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ Trigger button ON

└ Shouldn’t auntie start working hard now if she wants to be a Pongpongnam’s wife?

└ Got all your IPs. Suing you.

└ Wow ㅋㅋㅋ Preparing a PPT ㄷㄷㄷㄷㄷㄷㄷ

(Popular)[Told you the 2nd gen debut only hurts the 1st gen?]

They’ll just comfortably freeload off the path the 1st gen paved, what’s good about supporting the 2nd gen?

Honestly, they should be abandoned and forced to crawl up from the bottom, agree?

Recommended: 17 Disliked: 59

• Upvote manipulation smh

• Who the hell are the regulars upvoting this BS post?

• This is f*cking ridiculous fr

• The state of the gallery these days is serious

• Mods, please do your job;

  ---

The hottest topic in the Belus Gallery these days was, perhaps unsurprisingly, the upcoming debut of the 2nd generation.

Perhaps humans are creatures that perpetually seek dopamine.

As soon as something becomes familiar, they discover or invent something new.

In other words, now that it’s been almost a year since the 1st generation’s debut, the creatures known as VTuber fans were seeking new stimulation.

Of course, this didn’t mean their affection for the 1st generation had waned.

They still loved their gallery queens and continued to support them.

But how could people not desire a new picture?

They were just VTuber fans, like baby birds waiting for food, anticipating the new generation members writing their own stories and creating new dynamics with the existing members.

[Still, once the 2nd gen debuts, we’ll have plenty to consume for a while, so happy days]

Lately, Haruka hasn’t released any songs, and the others haven’t had much content either, so it’s been boring.

It’ll be a bustling feast for a while.

• Rewatch all the VODs, you’ll be full

└ Jobless bro..

• Come to think of it, there hasn’t been anything dopamine-inducing lately

└ The members are taking short breaks, aren’t they?

So, it wasn’t unreasonable for posts filled with such anticipation to appear in the fan gallery.

And the fact that they were naturally feeling the absence of the 1st generation was, in truth, an inevitable situation bound to happen eventually.

The 1st generation, beloved by Belus fans, had been running relentlessly without rest for so long that they were starting to overload one by one.

Moreover, most streamers hold the peculiar belief that hospitals are places you only go to respawn after dying.

In essence, the 1st generation, Crystal, had been charging forward like runaway locomotives with their brakes removed, oblivious to their bodies breaking down.

The new manager, who took over from Ari,
looked at their schedules and felt ashamed for even considering quitting over mere manager duties
when the members themselves were handling such murderous schedules.

She resolved to work hard.

But thinking again, there was something she couldn’t understand from her perspective.

‘Is this a human schedule…?’

‘Why aren’t they dead yet?’

She urgently checked the members’ conditions through home visits and was utterly shocked.

Every single one of them had physical ailments and was on the verge of collapse.

This was partly Ari’s fault for not paying enough attention as the 1st generation’s former manager.

However, it couldn’t solely be blamed on her, as Ari herself had been in a similar physical state due to overwork before her short vacation.

Anyway, the new manager’s first task was sending the members to the hospital and persuading them, over several hours, to take a break.

Still, from the viewers’ perspective, there was no way to know these circumstances.

From their standpoint, the VTubers, who had been streaming so intensely and producing results simultaneously that fans couldn’t look away—truly the perfect VTubers they had only imagined—had suddenly entered a collective ice age.

(Popular)[Told you these b*tches all got boyfriends?]

VTubers who were basically corpses without their diligence suddenly go to the hospital en masse and take vacations, abandoning streams.

What else could it be if not boyfriends? ㅋㅋㅋㅋ Isn’t it obvious?

Once Haruka the wh*re got a boyfriend, everyone else started getting them too and going out to play ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ

Even at the very moment they’re showering you with ‘I love you~ Let’s get married~’ and brewing gachi koi, they’re at motels having orgies with alpha males ㅋㅋㅋLOLㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ

You Pongpongnams jerking off at home while your oshi gets f*cked, just die lol

Recommended: 598 Disliked: 109

• Ahh sh*t, this is relentless

• 598 upvotes ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ Did the manipulation bot go crazy?

• Feel like I saw something similar last month or the month before, what’s this?

└ Correct, it’s back again

└ Not gallery banned?

└ Dunno

• Mod f*ggots, stop messing around with each other and please do your job

• Mods not working?

└ Deleted it

└ ? It’s not deleted

└ If you deleted it, how could comments be posted here?

└ Is the sub-moderator seriously an idiot?

└ Ahh you motherfcker, why did you delete the fanart below it, sht

Thus, trolls seized the opportunity, flooding the gallery, and even some less discerning users got swept up, making the gallery even more chaotic.

With the gallery literally turning into a sh*tshow, the users of this Belus gallery began to miss the super sub-moderator (‘Shu-peo Patak’) from not long ago.

He used to laugh off ten thousand mentally unstable posters,
fight single-handedly against a hundred thousand trolls,
stand firm against a million reactionaries,
was a psychic who brought member news faster than official notifications,
yet would break into a cold sweat and distribute burgers at the slightest complaint.

(Popular)[Upvote if the mods should distribute burgers ㅋㅋ]

No, actually, maybe they just missed the burgers.