Persuasion
Rena Universe.
Honestly, it was a group I barely knew anything about.
By the time Lucy transferred over, it had already faded into a half-dead corporate shell. I'd heard there had been all sorts of incidents, scandals, and controversies. Dig around the galleries long enough and you'd always find people dredging up the past, swinging for the fences. Common enough. It wasn't just a streaming-industry thing, either.
Take this kind of thinking, for example. What if Goguryeo had unified the Three Kingdoms instead of Silla — how big would our country be now? What if we'd led the reunification during the Korean War — how developed would Korea be today? People spinning the historical what-ifs, cranking the hopium machine for all it was worth. In the end, it was pure escapism. Fantasizing about things that could never, ever happen again.
When I followed Lucy over to Pangea TV, Rena Universe had that same flavor. The gallery veterans they called the permanent fixtures of Pan-beo-gal would drop into full "back in my day" mode and dust off a handful of favorite topics — and Rena Universe was one of them. So even as a newbie, I'd picked up a few legendary anecdotes here and there. Whether any of them were true, I had no idea. I'd never bothered looking into it, since none of it seemed connected to Lucy.
And that was Rena Universe.
"Ugh… I won't forgive this. I'm going to tear it all down!"
October 2nd.
I'd gotten up early, freshened up, and headed over to stamp my presence on the FM Community — only to walk straight into a shocking reality. After yesterday's performance, I'd expected to flood at least a full page of popular posts. The results were only half of that. Filling the rest of the space were posts about Rena Universe.
Everything from Rena Universe's history to who its members were. First-generation members, second-generation, third-generation, on and on — they'd plastered the board completely. From the perspective of someone who once couldn't live without communities, this was not normal. Someone had clearly intervened in an organized way.
Nearly two full pages of popular posts about Rena Universe.
I heard Rena-ttang streamed yesterday, but she didn't even make a clean transfer announcement. This shouldn't be possible.
The Rena Universe fandom had almost certainly moved as a bloc. Layer on a few other factors and you got this kind of ripple effect. Rena-ttang's name value, for one. Plenty of streamers on Pangea TV hung out their shingles as former comedians or former girl-group idols, but none of them were still actively appearing on TV. Of course a currently working celebrity like Rena-ttang commanded serious status. Just look at yesterday's stream data. Peak concurrent viewers: 14,784. That dwarfed even Ssa-yo's broadcast, where I'd put in all that work.
"Damn it. Of all the days to overlap…"
Opportunities to raise your profile didn't come around easily. The thought that my results had been cut in half left a bitter taste. Still, nothing to be done about it. I mind-controlled myself into forgetting what was already past. October was packed with events — another chance would come around.
And right now, there's something more important.
The top-priority project I'd been working on since day one of the regression. At last, the first real response had come in. It was time to talk with Lucy about transferring.
V-mellodi.
The virtual crew Lucy had belonged to before the regression. The members were five in total, led by Blueby, with Mayo, Miho, Lucy, and Iruri rounding out the roster.
Huh? Why am I suddenly talking about a pre-regression crew?
If you're curious, listen for yourself.
"…is what she said. That transferring right now seems risky. She wants me to wait a little longer."
"That Blueby person said that? That now isn't the time to transfer?"
Talking with Lucy over Discord, I was seething with rage. Honestly, even before the regression, just hearing Blueby's name had automatically made me scowl. She was a member of the same crew as my favorite streamer, so it felt a little harsh — but I couldn't help it. Working sales had meant dealing with a lot of people, and I'd developed an eye for them. In my judgment, Blueby was a classic case of someone whose outside and inside didn't match.
She played the responsible crew leader, but in reality she only ever grabbed the benefits and shoved the annoying work onto someone else. Lucy, with her weak assertiveness, was Blueby's favorite target. As Lucy's biggest fan, watching that had made my blood boil every single time. Still, she never quite crossed "the line," so I'd gritted my teeth, ignored it as best I could, and moved on.
I went through a whole regression just to hear this crap? Ha… should I just flip the whole table?
Irritation surged, but I held it in for now. I still didn't know what Lucy and Blueby's relationship was like at this point in time. I'd thought my connection to Blueby only started after coming to Pangea TV — turns out they'd known each other since back then. And from the way Lucy talked, she leaned on her a lot.
"And it's not like anything's ready anyway. No avatar, no RP concept thought out — if I start preparing from scratch, it'd take a few months at least…"
"No problem."
"Huh?"
"You don't need to worry about the avatar or the RP. I've got ways around all of that."
I casually sent Lucy the illustration file for an avatar I'd prepared alongside my own, with a firm warning that it must never be leaked.
"I've got a Mama and Papa I'm really close with, you see."
"Mama and Papa?"
"Ah — it's virtual-streamer slang. The person who draws the illustration is the Mama, and the person who takes that art and does the rigging — you know, the work that lets it detect motion and actually move — is the Papa."
The excuse I spun went like this. Some artist friends of mine had taken a commission and made an avatar, but something went wrong and the deal fell through. They never got paid, the avatar was left hanging, and the quality was so good I'd just gone ahead and bought it myself.
"But I already have an avatar, right? Our images are totally different, so I can't really use both side by side. I've just been sitting on it — and looking at it now, it matches your vibe so perfectly. What do you think? Now that you've seen it yourself."
"…"
Lucy's answer didn't come right away, but I already knew. She liked it. A lot.
Brown braided hair, huge eyes like they'd bottled a lake. The hanbok outfit, with its refined, understated beauty, held your gaze from start to finish. A distinctly unique avatar. Why had I made it this way? Simple answer. It was modeled on the avatar Lucy had used before the regression. Compared to 2025, the technical limitations meant it was a downgrade — but the core of it, that it was steeped in Lucy's own tastes, hadn't changed at all.
"…It's nice. Really nice."
She really couldn't lie to save her life. Even so, she couldn't answer easily. She wasn't the type who was comfortable receiving things. That was why, before the regression, she'd been terrible at taking Candy donations. Fans needed a little prompting to feel justified in throwing money — and she never gave them that. Knowing her personality that well, I drove the nail in first.
"I'm not just giving it to you, so don't feel burdened. Think of it as me lending it to you. You can pay me back slowly."
"But that still feels like I'm taking too much advantage…"
"If something this small counts as taking advantage, then I'm the one who should feel hurt!"
"…"
"I told you I'm a huge fan. And that I want to get closer. That's why I've been showing up to every stream and messaging you on Discord every day — and Unnie still keeps her walls up and barely even talks to me. You're so mean!"
I'd been reading the room carefully, then started whining. Lucy didn't have many close friends, so she had zero resistance to someone latching on this hard. Sure enough, the plan worked perfectly. Lucy fretted and fussed trying to soothe my full sulking act, and in the end she agreed to take the avatar.
"So that settles it, right? We transfer as soon as possible…"
"But I think we still need to talk more about the transfer itself."
Not easy. Just what kind of relationship did she have with Blueby that she was leaning on her this hard? I casually pried into it, and surprisingly, she explained without resistance.
"I've known her for about a year and a half. There's a Naver café for internet broadcasters — that's where we met."
What followed wasn't particularly complicated. Lucy had been full of worries, and Blueby had given her counseling and advice, helping her get started with streaming in a lot of ways. And she was Lucy's only friend in the broadcasting world.
"…"
I was at a loss for words. When she trusted someone this much, what more was there to say? But when I dug into the finer details, the suspicious corners piled up. Lucy treated Blueby like a benefactor who'd basically made her streaming career possible — yet when I asked what concrete help she'd actually received, the answers came back vague and fuzzy. Financial support? Equipment? None of that. Just counseling, advice, and introductions to a few industry contacts Blueby knew. Had she been gaslit? Given Blueby's underhanded nature, it was more than possible.
I've been saying it in the galleries for years. Blueby's character is shady as hell.
I'd never had solid proof, so I'd gotten thoroughly dunked on for it — but ah, that wasn't the important thing right now.
"Could you introduce me to this Blueby person? I'll try persuading her myself."
It felt like force-feeding myself sweet potatoes, but there was no choice. To convince Lucy, I clearly had to go through Blueby first.
I'll let it slide this time — but the second you transfer, you're cut. Immediately.
Old grudges rose to the surface.