A Day in the Life of a Certain Blue-Haired Streamer
Olive — the real-time streaming platform that had been officially live for a little over ten years now.
Serving as the premier personal live-broadcast platform while simultaneously offering video sharing and hosting, Olive boasted the single highest market share of any site on the entire internet. And it wasn't merely a private enterprise chasing profit; as part of the cultural revival industry, it received massive government subsidies as well. Trying your hand at personal streaming here was something anyone with talent and passion could attempt at least once — a place that could, without exaggeration, be called a continent of dreams.
But… not everyone makes it. Of all the stars hanging in the night sky, only the brightest one percent ever get to show their faces.
Succeed, and it was the ultimate career — one where you could rake in money hand over fist. Reality, however, was far crueler than that fantasy. Compared to the number of personal streamers multiplying in real time at this very moment, the people who had even crossed a hundred thousand subscribers were vanishingly few.
One hundred thousand subscribers — the so-called Plus Streamers — numbered roughly four thousand.
One million subscribers — the so-called Complete Streamers — numbered about three hundred fifty.
And the long-awaited ten million subscribers — those enshrined in the so-called Hall of Fame — numbered a mere eleven.
Considering that the total number of personal streamers on the platform ran into the tens of thousands, and that Olive's concurrent live viewership hovered around a million… even the relatively "simple" milestone of a hundred thousand subscribers accounted for only five percent of the whole, while those who reached the Hall of Fame made up a scant 0.01 percent. A tower of despair so steep it defied climbing. Becoming a shining star on Olive was no easy feat.
The reason growing a channel on Olive was this difficult, though, was almost painfully simple.
"Tsk…. Think I'm done with this guy's videos."
Tap. Tap.
A blue-haired woman with a languid expression lightly tapped the screen of the device in her hands twice. Instantly, just as she intended, the subscription was cleanly canceled, and every video with a similar thumbnail vanished from her subscribed-channel feed in a flash.
The woman who had just performed what might well be the cruelest act imaginable to a personal streamer — Menchi — had unsubscribed for the following reason:
"Just because one catchphrase got a good reaction once doesn't mean you get to keep using the same one over and over…."
That was it. The reason she had so casually cut the subscription was simply that the catchphrase the streamer kept pushing had grown stale and boring. And that, more than anything, was the fundamental reason so many personal streamers on Olive never truly grew — stuck in place, or slowly sliding backward.
Humanity in the twenty-second century was bored. Even the people living it couldn't deny that plain truth. With the link between past and present severed, and a generation that had never properly experienced cultural exchange in childhood now forming the young adult backbone of society, genuine humor was never going to spread easily through this world. And if those same twenty-second-century humans tried running personal streams themselves, there was no way they could satisfy an audience already quietly steeped in Ooparts.
In the end, unless you were a pioneer of the age, someone lucky enough to catch a trend early, or a person with some special connection or talent, succeeding as a personal streamer was impossible.
"…Not that I have any right to talk."
And Menchi fell squarely into the second and fourth categories — someone lucky enough to ride a trend early, with a modest bit of talent on top. Of course, that talent wasn't the kind that created anything entertaining. Just a face that was a little better sculpted than most people's, maybe.
But that gift of appearance must have carried a certain power of its own. The moment she seized a single opportunity, she blasted through countless competitors and rocketed to a staggering eight hundred thousand subscribers at record speed. An overwhelming, meteoric rise that could carve a line through history itself.
Most of the people who had started streaming alongside Menchi envied and resented her, going so far as to dismiss every bit of her success as pure luck.
"They're not wrong. A streamer who got famous by accident on luck and a pretty face."
Menchi didn't particularly deny what they said. Looking back on her own streams from time to time, she often found herself wondering whether any of it was actually fun. Still, she wished they wouldn't trash the people who came to watch her. Even if being boring was her fault, what was there to criticize about the people who simply showed up?
"Haa…. Compared to someone like me, this person is really…."
Spinning lazily on the expensive bed she'd bought with her recent earnings, Menchi picked up the PDA she'd set aside and hit play on a video she'd liked. On the screen, a silver-haired girl of absolute, transcendent beauty appeared in light clothing, standing atop a wide stage.
"Heeheehee… Nia's too cute…. How does an angel like this even exist…."
"I can do this much, at leas— ngh-ngh-ngh…! Ow! W-wait! Cramp, cramp…!"
In the video she'd rewatched countless times, Nia was demonstrating a full-body calisthenics routine designed for people who didn't move much. Menchi had skipped Poses One through Six — the ones that required standing — and gone straight for Pose Seven, which could be done lying down… only to seize up with a cramp on the spot. She'd cherry-picked only the convenient parts, and the whole framework had come crashing down.
After writhing in sudden agony for a long while, she finally managed a sigh once the pain subsided, staring up at the ceiling.
"…Why am I such a mess."
The halfhearted attempt at calisthenics had only left Menchi more exhausted than before. Watching Nia still smiling brightly and stretching with effortless flexibility, she was suddenly hit by a hollow feeling.
…Right now I still have more subscribers, but in a few months I'll probably be trailing far behind. Nia's gaining almost ten thousand a day, and I'm stuck at eight hundred thousand.
Perhaps it was the moment an ordinary person who had coasted through life finally stood face-to-face with a true genius and felt, for real, the gulf between them. Menchi had been born with a face pretty enough to pass for a celebrity, had lucked into a single viral catchphrase, and ridden that awareness all the way to eight hundred thousand subscribers. But whether she could push on to a million was doubtful — and she had no idea when all these people might simply leave.
Floating high atop an unstable foothold, she found her own situation almost unbearably awkward.
In that restless, unsettled mood, Menchi stared blankly at the ceiling until her thoughts drifted to the email she'd impulsively sent not long ago. A message that had started as a simple apology for dropping viewers without any connection between them, and somehow ended up sounding like a collab proposal. A flicker of anxiety rose in her chest — had she gotten ahead of herself?
"…Should I have just said sorry in the email? Did I mess up by suggesting a collab? Still, with eight hundred thousand subscribers I could at least be a decent draw, and it'd help Nia too…. Wait — hang on. What if she thinks I'm some weirdo approaching her with shady intentions? Ugh… that wasn't it at all…!"
Unable to bear the anxiety any longer, Menchi bolted upright on the bed. She decided the collab proposal had been way out of line, and resolved to send a second apology to set the record straight. As a devoted fan of Nia's streams, she felt that even with her eight hundred thousand subscribers, burying herself in the groundbreaking icon of a twenty-first-century virtual idol — something that had never existed before — wouldn't be a good look. And because she so deeply admired Nia's talent, Menchi wanted all the more to avoid doing anything that might hurt her.
"I-I'll edit it… I'll just say my cat wrote and sent it…."
Staggering off the bed and practically crawling on all fours to reach it, Menchi frantically opened Olive's mail inbox to revise the message… and then stared blankly at the unfamiliar email sitting at the very top. The moment she read its contents, she could no longer hold back the emotion surging up inside her and let out a scream.
"HIKKYAAAAAAH!"
The email said she was positively considering a collab with Menchi. What kind of luck was this on a day that wasn't even her birthday? She felt ready to leap for joy.
"…Huh? Have I ever connected to the virtual world before?"
With just a single spoonful of curiosity mixed in.