Ruru Teaching Her Junior
Some time had passed since that mortifying little scene with Lua.
In the meantime finals had wrapped up, and Ruru’s streams had started picking up steam again.
During exams Lua… Ruru… ugh, screw it. Just Lua.
Lua had been taking her streams nice and easy. No new games, no big flashy collabs or major content. She stuck to the usual game streams and radio shows, keeping things as relaxed as possible.
But as of yesterday those finals were officially over, and Ruru was free.
So what brand-new content had she cooked up to celebrate that freedom?
Right—
“Hello! I’m Elia Sironi of Happy Heaven~!”
A collab with Elia Sironi, leader of Fantasy Live’s second-generation unit, Happy Heaven.
As the prize from the last special stream, Elia had been promised a collab with Ruru—and only now, roughly two months later, was it finally happening.
“Elia~ Long time no see~!”
“Yes, Senior! It’s been a while!”
“What’ve you been up to lately?”
“Mmm~ Working super hard so we can debut!”
For the record, only the leader, Elia Sironi, had been revealed from Happy Heaven so far. The rest of the members were still under wraps—how many there were, what they looked like, all of it unknown.
The one safe guess was that, unlike the demon-flavored Sweet Mare, Happy Heaven would almost certainly lean hard into angelic, holy-side vibes. You didn’t even have to look past the leader herself: Elia Sironi was a saint character through and through.
Which made for a truly bizarre situation—an older-sister-type saint calling a mesugaki succubus “Senior.”
“Isn’t it crazy hard?”
“What is?”
“All the training.”
“Ah… that… Honestly, yeah, it’s tough. The first-gen seniors were just so good that we end up pushing ourselves even harder by comparison.”
“Us? No way. The teachers nagged us constantly…”
“They keep grinding us to at least reach half of what you seniors pulled off…?”
The conversation flowed naturally into debut behind-the-scenes talk.
Sweet Mare… every single first-gen member really was absurdly talented.
Well, Lua’s voice alone was already broken. And she used that same voice in a completely different style. That was pure talent territory—nothing else.
“You’re still doing amazing, though! You’re debuting soon, right?”
“Yes, that’s right! We’re debuting really soon!”
Ah. Now the whole collab made sense.
That special stream had been the snowball from the start. It had naturally set up a collab with Elia, and the moment they collabed, the debut schedule would get announced.
“Whoa, when’s the debut?”
“Christmas Eve!”
A Christmas Eve debut. Pretty provocative move.
Normally agencies avoided big commemorative days for debuts. Consumers were limited, and holidays already had every brand fighting for their attention.
“Christmas Eve debut… isn’t that gonna be rough?”
“We’re super confident, you know!”
“Insane confidence…! You’re not gonna outdo us, are you?”
“Maybe~?”
“Ooooh~ Look at that confidence~!”
Ruru didn’t sound the least bit offended. If anything she was hyping Elia up nonstop.
“Still, if you wanna beat us you’d better work ridiculously hard, got it?”
“We already worked ridiculously hard! We can do this!”
That rival-flavored banter felt good somehow. At the same time it was building a brand-new dynamic.
Most VTuber agencies kept things friendly across generations. I’d assumed Fantasy Live would be the same at first.
But it wasn’t just friendship—they seemed to feel like genuine competitors too. Almost like real idols.
If that choice paid off, it could become a huge plus. If it backfired, it could just as easily become a huge minus. Managing that balance would be Fantasy Live’s homework going forward.
“Anyway, enough of that! So what game are we playing today?!”
“Today’s game is my absolute favorite—Endless Return!”
The second Endless Return came up, Ruru made a face that wasn’t quite disgust but was definitely something close.
“…If we’re playing that, wouldn’t it be better with Aris? I heard she already hit ranker.”
No matter how you sliced it, Sweet Mare’s undisputed weakest Endless Return player was Ruru. Her control was just that hopelessly, painfully bad.
Maybe Elia knew that too—she giggled as she answered.
“Jinjo-chan was doing great last time, right? Play Jinjo-chan! I’ll get you the win right away!”
“For real…? You’ll really get me the win?”
“Of course~ Don’t you trust your junior?”
“Junior… I trust you…!”
Ruru switched expressions on a dime, putting on the cutest face she could manage as she nodded.
Apparently that was adorable enough that Elia muttered almost to herself,
“So cute…”
“Hm? What’d you say?”
“I said Senior is cute~”
Ruru answered that with the most shamelessly proud look imaginable.
“That’s right! Ruru’s always been cute!”
Thinking about the actual Lua saying those words made “cute” feel like a stretch. The girl had zero shame.
Honestly, Lua gave off more of an elegant vibe than a cute one. Not that she wasn’t cute—her height was on the short side, so every time she looked up at me I did think she was ridiculously cute. But that was mostly because of her small frame. Overall, Lua was elegant.
And that elegant Lua was straight-up declaring “I’m cute!” on stream. The acting range was terrifying.
Meanwhile the chat started beating the living hell out of her.
As always, Ruru tried to fight back against the chat’s assault.
“I am cute, okay?! I’m cute!”
“That’s right! Our Senior is cute! Stop bullying our Senior!”
Elia jumped in to defend her. The pure headpats-and-cuddles energy was a total 180 from the rival spark they’d been lighting earlier.
Anyway, they left the flirting behind and hopped into Endless Return together.
Ruru locked in the vampire-girl character she was most comfortable with. Elia pulled out something completely unexpected.
“Whoa, Blade. Isn’t that character crazy hard?”
“I can handle it. This is my main, you know.”
She’d picked Blade—the long white-haired dual-blade girl. It was a notoriously high-skill character, so Ruru looked worried… but honestly I wasn’t worried at all.
I’d quietly looked up Elia’s match history earlier…
…Yeah. She was an Endless Return ranker too.
Seriously, if she teamed with Aris and just found one solid third, they could aim for pro.
Ruru, blissfully unaware, kept fretting while Elia announced with total confidence,
“I’ll carry you.”
“I believe in you…!”
Right after those words, Elia literally started farming the enemy team by herself.
—Slash! Slash! Slash-slash-slash! Slash! Slash! Shiiing!!
She dove into the enemy alone and carved them all up, leaving Ruru with absolutely nothing to do.
“…Wow, Elia. You’re insane.”
“Right? Hehe~”
She was playing ridiculously well. But there was a problem.
The biggest difference from Aris was this: Aris was a streamer. Elia was a gamer.
What did that mean?
Aris deliberately created situations where Ruru could actually play. If Ruru messed up she bantered around the mess-up; if Ruru did well she bantered around the success. Constant back-and-forth.
And Elia? She just butchered everyone solo, so there was zero banter room. Best you got was “Wow our junior is so good.”
Even Ruru looked genuinely flustered for once—like she had no idea how to steer the stream.
I was willing to bet that once this stream ended, Elia was going to get an earful from the Representative.
…Or so I thought for all of a few minutes.
Then Ruru made a nation-saving decision.
“I’m going in…!”
“Senior, wait—!”
Ruru just yeeted herself into an angle that made zero sense.
Normally she would have dithered and thrown in some weird way. This time she was way too bold. Completely different from regular Ruru.
Result? Of course she hadn’t actually calculated the angle, so she got deleted instantly.
“Elia, sorry…!”
“It’s fine, Senior. I’ll fix everything…!”
—Slash-slash-slash-slash-SLASH!!
With flashy control Elia cleaned up Ruru’s troll play and immediately started comforting her.
“Senior, it’s okay. I’ll revive you right away.”
“Yeah, please.”
“Senior.”
“Y-yeah…?”
That was real fluster—acting from not knowing what Elia was about to say.
Thankfully, Elia dropped a pretty solid line.
“Just do whatever you want, Senior. I’ll handle everything.”
“…Whoa, I almost fell for you just now.”
“You’re allowed to fall for me~”
Yeah. That was proper banter.
Or so I thought—until Elia went even further.
“Senior, present!”
“Elia, this is…”
“Jinjo has to use Blood Crystals!”
She dumped every single coin she’d earned into Ruru, and by the end Ruru was geared exclusively in the absolute best items.
“E… Elia… I’m scaaared…!”
“You can do it, Senior! Fighting!”
I’m rescinding my earlier evaluation.
You’re an excellent Ruru fan too. You just invented a brand-new way to bully her.
Still, I should probably throw some shade. This was a collab that somehow… wasn’t a collab.