Just How Curious Can You Be
...Do I really want to see them that badly?
“...Why didn't you tell me?”
-What? Ahaha... when I thought about houses that met your conditions, nothing came close to mine. So I figured I'd recommend it...
I'd already suspected the house and Yena had some kind of connection.
She knew the place far too well, and to begin with, the house had come to me through Yena's "introduction."
So I assumed it was a relative's or an acquaintance's place, or at worst somewhere she used to live herself...
Introducing the house she was currently living in? That hadn't even crossed my mind.
From someone I've known for barely a month.
Yena had done cam streams in the past, so her face was publicly known, but I was someone hidden behind customization.
So what had possessed her to hand out her own address to someone she knew nothing about—someone whose very identity and intentions were a mystery?
“You really just toss out your personal information to anyone, don't you, Yena.”
-You're Lily, so it's fine, Lily.
“No. It is not.”
-Anyway! How do you like the house?
I looked around.
Seeing it again, it really was a home I'd never regret choosing.
My signature was already on the contract, but even if I were given the chance to renege... I honestly wasn't sure I'd take it.
“...I mean, it is nice.”
-What a relief. The landlord here is a good person, and honestly, even though I could afford somewhere pricier now, I keep staying here.
Yena continued to sing the apartment's praises, one selling point after another.
Even though the contract was already signed, she kept going on and on, and for a reason.
-So, about that... do you by any chance need movers to─
“All I have to move is my capsule. There's really nothing else, so I don't think I'll need the help.”
I knew exactly what she was playing at.
But I had no intention of meeting her.
If she saw me, she'd definitely sense something was off.
Frankly, this face was far beyond something you could casually write off as "foreign."
At first glance it looked like the best of East and West blended into one, but then again, my appearance in DeoEn and my appearance in real life were one and the same.
I had no plans to do cam streams or anything of the sort, and I had no desire to stir up trouble for no reason.
Technically, I'm running a cam stream every single day as it is.
-Ah...
“Thank you for the introduction, though. Let's push the Newdlebak stream to next week.”
-Awww... Lily, you're abandoning me...
“Did you finish your homework?”
Click.
Homework.
Twist the mana circuit of a condensed mana stone until it transforms into ordinary rock.
It was the main subject of the second lecture, and only those who completed the assignment would be allowed into the classroom.
Four days had passed, and only three people had cleared it so far—Yena, unsurprisingly, was not among them.
-Ah.
“You do realize that if you can't do it, you can't come to class this week, right?”
-I... I'll definitely try my hardest, but... if I fail, maybe you could at least let me watch─
“Yena.”
I smiled sweetly.
“There are no exceptions.”
-......
Who was the hottest person in DeoEn right now?
Plenty of names could come up, but the vast majority of people would think of only one.
Lily.
Bursting onto the scene like a shooting star, Lily had amassed an enormous fanbase with a striking, one-of-a-kind appearance and skill to match.
Among the dozens upon dozens of Lily-related communities, the largest by far was the Lily Fan Cafe, which had already surpassed seven hundred thousand members—and a single announcement had just gone up.
Saturday afternoon.
Going outside required a great deal of preparation.
Not for makeup, or picking out an outfit—nothing like that.
My face looked fine without any makeup, and anything I wore sat well on me.
“Maybe I should dye my hair.”
In the past, a single hat had been enough to deflect most stares, but I was simply too famous now.
Even setting aside people with no interest in DeoEn whatsoever, nearly everyone below retirement age was deeply invested in it.
DeoEn-related broadcasts were already airing on terrestrial television, and Lily's face kept showing up on screen.
Which meant if I went out looking like this, eight times out of ten someone would squint and think, Wait—isn't that Lily?
I stuffed my blue hair under a hat, pulled on a black mask, and added a pair of dark sunglasses—until I looked exactly like a celebrity dodging recognition.
A celebrity sneaking through the city incognito.
Well, that description isn't exactly wrong.
Back in the day, I'd simply twisted perception with magic whenever I needed to move unseen, but that wasn't an option now, so clothes would have to do the job instead.
Rattle. Rattle.
“Everything loaded, right?”
“Yes.”
“Then we're off.”
Vroooom~
The modest belongings I'd gathered in my tiny one-room apartment were loaded onto the truck and gone.
Aside from the capsule, there was nothing worth bringing, so I hadn't really needed a truck at all—but somehow it had ended up this way.
The new apartment already came furnished to a degree, and the shabby furniture from the one-room was in no state to fill in the gaps anyway.
If I'm starting fresh, I might as well start with new things.
When all was said and done, what remained was the capsule.
The DeoEn 3rd Generation Linker—the very purchase I'd sworn I would never, ever make, only to buy it in the end.
Come to think of it, this whole move might have been for that reason alone.
From the back of a taxi, trailing the moving truck, I glanced back over my shoulder.
Now that I looked at it, the old one-room villa really was run-down.
Something about the scenery, so similar to the past, stirred a strange feeling in me.
The 'me' of that time, now faded to a blur—so distant I could barely recall it.
Was I Lily... or wasn't I?
It didn't even feel like the distinction carried any meaning anymore.
“Ah, thank you.”
The truck had arrived before I knew it.
Already towering over the shabby villa, the tall building came into view.
The truck passed through security, and I stepped out of the taxi and entered the apartment complex alongside it.
In the landscaped grounds I'd seen before, plenty of people were out and about.
And there...
Far off in the distance, a woman in comfortable clothes, sneaking glances in my direction again and again.
Her appearance differed a little from her DeoEn avatar, but the overall vibe gave her away at a glance. I knew exactly who that was.
The face I'd seen on the internet.
“...Do I really want to see them that badly?”
It was Yena.
What kind of person was Lily, really?
The question had gnawed at Yena ever since their very first meeting.
What did she do for a living?
How old was she?
Her face? Her height? Her build? Was her real personality just like the one on stream?
She'd always been curious—but she'd never once tried to dig up her personal details.
Doing that kind of thing in DeoEn went beyond bad manners into outright taboo, and as a streamer herself, Yena understood better than anyone how sensitive the matter of one's private life was.
But now things were different.
Thanks to Yena's own introduction, they were living in the same apartment building.
She'd been upgraded, in one leap, from mere streamer colleague to neighbor (and soon, very likely, a guildmate).
So even if they weren't close friends in real life, surely it was fine to at least catch a glimpse of her face?
Yena stood in the complex in her hoodie, waiting only for the moving truck, replaying a conversation from two days ago in her head.
“Ahh, Lily? Total knockout, I'm telling you~ Weren't you two close? Don't tell me you set this up without ever seeing her face?”
“Virtual reality? Oh, so you met in-game~ Yeah yeah, right, that's Lily for you.”
A stunning beauty.
And apparently even part foreign-blooded, at that.
So her real name actually is Lily.
She never would have guessed. Never in a million years.
She'd been curious even before hearing the name, but now that she had it, the curiosity only burned hotter.
Just who was this person?
PLEASE come out and show yourself!
Vmmm~
“She's here!”
The moving truck rolled through the security gate and into the complex.
And behind the truck...
“Huh? Nobody's there?”
Then was she inside the truck?
Yena circled around, eyes darting this way and that, scanning the area.
But no one who remotely resembled Lily was anywhere to be seen.
...Don't tell me she's coming separately.
That was possible too.
Why needlessly draw attention—she might have come in early, or she might arrive much later...
Yena let out a sigh of defeat and tilted her head back to gaze up at the towering building.
“...Figuring out her unit number would be straight-up stalking, right?”
She could always ask the landlord, but even that felt like one bridge too far; Yena's conscience was already prodding at her.
This much was as far as she could go.
“Ugh, I blew it. Blew it completely.”
Yena had no choice but to turn on her heel and leave.
She'd just have to be satisfied with the good intel she'd already gathered.
Nothing to be done about it...
“...Huh?”
Someone was slipping quietly into the apartment.
Only from behind, but even so—taller than most women, with a figure that had real curves.
Black hat, black mask, dark sunglasses—a person bundled up head to toe as if wrapped in chains.
She had never once seen anyone like that in this complex.
In that instant, only one answer surfaced in Yena's mind.
“...Lily?”