I May Be a Virtual Youtuber, but I Still Go to Work-Chapter 143

Kuroboshi Taro.

Anyone with basic knowledge of Japanese or kanji would recognize the connection—

Her name was derived from the CEO's, Shirahoshi Momo.

White Star vs. Black Star, opposing yet complementary.

Put their names together, and you got "Momotaro," a play on the classic folktale.

A fitting name for someone who constantly clashed with Momo in real life.

Taro was, in many ways, Momo's first "daughter"—long before Parallel and its first generation existed.

The very first VTuber Momo debuted.

The proof of her abilities as a producer and CEO.

At least, that was how the story went—until about two years ago.

Now, things were completely different.

The CEO had stalled just shy of 2 million subscribers, while Taro had skyrocketed past 3.5 million.

Technically, they were ranked #3 and #1 in VTuber subscriber counts,

but the gap between them was huge.

That was why Momo barely mentioned her on stream anymore.

She had even warned her fans to avoid discussing their friendship beyond "real-life friends."

At this point, if Momo suddenly started talking about Taro like her "eldest daughter,"

it would just look like she was trying to leech off BachuuBachuu’s success.

And Magia agreed with her completely.

That was why she had always avoided interacting with Taro.

At the year-end party, despite knowing her personally, she hadn’t even bothered to say hi.

During the Combative Tournament, she had given Taro a shout-out, but she had made sure not to act too familiar.

So when Movgun proposed the pre-tournament talk show, Magia hesitated.

She didn’t like the idea of dealing with Taro.

But avoiding it would be worse.

She had already committed to putting herself out there.

And this was a strategic opportunity.

Better to accept and plan her approach in advance than to run away from it.

The Next Morning

As soon as she arrived at work, she went straight to the CEO.

Movgun had apparently been too busy recruiting participants to inform her yet,

so this was the first time Momo heard about the pre-tournament Battle Colosseum talk show.

"...So my opponent is Taro. What’s the plan?"

"...The way you’re saying that makes it sound like you’re about to destroy her."

"Should I? It’s Battle Colosseum, not Combative. Nothing’s stopping me."

"Okay, no. Not literally what I meant."

Momo let out a helpless chuckle.

"When you’re playing in the same squad, just do whatever you want.

You used to run into our games all the time back in the day, remember?"

"That was then. Now, I doubt BachuuBachuu’s fans will take it lightly."

"I trust you won’t cross any lines."

Magia pouted, prompting Momo to lay out a clear guideline.

"Just don’t loot-steal like you did when you anonymously sniped Movgun before."

"Got it."

"You can stir things up a little, but try not to go overboard."

"That’s gonna be hard. My main weapon is a shotgun.

Even if I want to play quietly, I can’t."

Unlike most players who used suppressors to stay undetected,

Magia ran around firing loudly and attracting attention.

That was just how she played.

Momo laughed.

"Okay, fair. I thought you meant you were gonna lure a whole squad to her like you used to do to me."

"Come on, I’m not that much of a rookie anymore."

"Glad to hear it, Manager Magia?"

Magia snorted.

"Fine, that’s the game part. What about the talk part?

Businesslike approach?"

Momo frowned slightly, thinking.

If anything, the conversation part was trickier than the game itself.

They had known each other for a long time,

but lately, things had been... tense.

"Yeah. Keep it strictly business.

No ‘over-the-top buddy-buddy’ act."

"You mean avoid exaggerated flattery?"

"Exactly. You know that fake hype you sometimes see in collabs?

Where people praise each other so much it obviously sounds like an act?"

"Oh."

Anyone who watched a lot of VTuber streams could tell.

When two people were genuinely close, you could feel it.

And when it was just a forced business relationship, you could tell.

Magia had gone out of her way to bicker and joke around with the first-gen members

just to shut down rumors of a rift between them.

Anything to avoid that fake vibe.

"It’s not really my specialty, but I can manage."

"I’m just throwing it out there. You sure you can pull it off?

You’re always extra nice to VTubers, no matter how much you prioritize work.

That includes Taro."

"Was I?"

"Think about when you talked to Bazubi.

People were shocked by how sweet you were.

I was too, honestly. The same girl who plays pranks on me all day

suddenly turns into a perfect little angel in front of Bazubi?"

"That’s because you always bring out my inner wolf, boss—"

Momo’s hand shot out and clamped over Magia’s mouth.

Struggling was pointless.

"Anyway," Momo continued, ignoring Magia’s muffled protests,

"just try to keep it neutral.

I never want people thinking we’re just leeching off BachuuBachuu’s success."

Magia pried her hand away and nodded.

Of course.

That was exactly why she had treated Taro like a pretty but irrelevant statue all this time.

"...Are we sure Taro is even participating?"

"Not yet. But Movgun sounded pretty confident."

"...Shouldn’t I be the one to sit this out, then?

If Taro’s in, shouldn’t you be the one playing instead?"

Momo scoffed.

This translation is the intellectual property of Novelight.

"What, so Movgun can pretend to be polite by inviting me while knowing I’ll refuse?

If anything, he should’ve asked me first, then invited you."

"True."

"And at the very least, the matchups should be fair.

This is Taro we’re talking about. She has 3.5 million subs.

Compared to you, that’s ten times the gap."

Magia tilted her head.

"Isn’t that the whole point?

I have zero subscribers.

There’s literally nothing to compare me to. Zero is just... zero."

"Zero, my ass."

"It is zero."

"Our official channel just hit 350K subscribers."

"...Why are you counting that as mine?"

"You basically live there."

"It’s for official broadcasts only."

But now that she thought about it...

Did her channel really belong under the official umbrella?

The Live Watchroom streams.

Technically meant to highlight all the members' broadcasts,

but also just a way for her to keep watching VTuber content while working.

If she broke it down logically,

it wasn’t all that different from a °• N 𝑜 v 𝑒 l i g h t •° fan-run clipping channel.

"...Actually, should we just separate the Watchroom into its own channel?"

"Huh? Out of nowhere?

You also have to run the Fan_C channel. You sure you have time for two?"

"CAT is handling most of that.

I only need to record when needed, and they’ll reach out for anything urgent."

"Okay, fine. But why split off the Watchroom?"

"It just feels... too casual for the official channel.

If we’re serious about surpassing BachuuBachuu one day,

shouldn’t we start considering things like brand image?"

Momo squinted at her.

"Are you saying your streams lack class?"

"Let’s be real. They’re just chaos.

And if people start seeing it as my personal playground,

they might not take important announcements from the official channel seriously."

Momo paused.

"...Can’t argue with that. Damn, now I have to think about it."

"Exactly. Official channels should be quiet most of the time.

That way, when there’s a big announcement,

it actually feels like a big deal."

"...This is actually annoying me.

Why are you making so much sense today?"

“Normally, things should stay quiet until we suddenly yell, ‘Big event!’ to make official announcements more impactful. Lately, since I’ve been busy preparing for the second-generation debut, that effect has naturally taken care of itself. But in a few weeks, when I start the stream room broadcasts again... honestly, won’t it feel a bit off?”

“Is that so?”

“We only have big announcements left from now on. Did you see the new song’s performance? The future looks bright.”

The president took a long time to think.

It seemed like she was worried that giving me a separate channel might cause unnecessary misunderstandings.

“Well, we’ve already firmly established on the official website that I’m staff. Having a separate channel for broadcasts shouldn’t be weird, right? If we explain it as a division of content, the audience will understand. And if there’s an important announcement coming up, I can just mention it during my broadcasts.”

“That’s not what I’m worried about. If a channel with your name exists, you’d just be a VTuber who hasn’t debuted yet.”

“Then I just won’t put my name on it?”

The source of this c𝓸ntent is freewebnøvel.coɱ.

“Still official but with a label like ‘Parallel Behind’?”

I was considering names like ‘Long Parallel’ or ‘Endless Parallel,’ but as expected, when it comes to naming, the president is way better at this than I am.

“Yes. Just like how most streamers separate their official and archive channels, we can separate major announcements from minor content. Monthly content like Fantasia and important announcements stay on the official channel, while irregular Stream Room sessions or my involvement in content go to the ‘Behind’ channel.”

The president nodded for a long time, seemingly convinced, so I continued.

“Anyway, this way, we can clearly see that the subscriber count on the official channel has nothing to do with my actual subscriber count. At best, I’d have, what, maybe a thousand subs?”

“.......”

Seeing that the president still looked unconvinced, I shrugged and made a bet.

“Wanna bet on it? If I lose, I’ll give you a one-hour massage. If I win, you have to go to a PC café with me for an hour. Deal?”

Honestly, I expected her to back out since she’s been so busy lately.

But instead—

“That bet’s too small. Let’s raise the stakes.”

“Raise it? How much?”

“Ten thousand.”

For a moment, I thought she had misspoken.

“My subs. I bet you’ll have over 10,000 by the tournament. If I win, instead of a massage, you buy a massage chair for the break room. With your own money.”

“... If I win, you buy it with company funds?”

“No, with my personal money. What do you say? Deal? Or are you scared?”

I couldn’t understand why the president was making a bet she had no chance of winning.

As Team Leader Ra Seunghyun admitted, I do create good synergy when I stream with the members.

But my role has always been support, the background.

There’s no way 10,000 people would subscribe just for me.

It seemed like she was expecting my subscriber count to surge after the talk show with Movgun and Taro.

But I was just going to follow her orders and keep it strictly business. Would that really attract subscribers? No way.

In other words, I couldn’t possibly lose this bet.

And even if I did, it wouldn’t matter—I had too much bonus money piling up anyway.

I had already been caught using alt accounts multiple times to secretly donate to our members and got banned from donating.

Every time I created a new alt, I had to split the donations under 50,000 won to avoid detection—it was getting annoying.

So if I could dump my money in one go like this, that was a win for me.

“Alright. Let’s do it. But if I win, forget the massage chair. You have to go to a PC café with me for 12 hours.”

Not knowing my thoughts, the president smirked.

“Deal!”

***

... ─ — Parallel (VTuber) Gallery ─ — ...

[Magia got her own channel?]

—————————————————

Parallel Behind

@parallel_official_behind · 425 subscribers · 39 videos

A full archive channel for non-official announcements from Parallel.

—————————————————

[Comments]

— Parallel851: Goddamn, these sludge fans are nasty.

ㄴ Parallel851: Why the hell are they calling this Magia’s channel? LOL

ㄴ Parallel851: It’s the official channel...

— Parallel069: Also, what’s ‘sludge’?

ㄴ Parallel202: Are you a pink fish? Read the trending posts first.

ㄴ Parallel572: Originally, Magia was associated with shotgun slugs > slug gang, but someone messed up and said "sludge," so now on this board, fans are called "sludge" LOL.

ㄴ Parallel214: Thanks for the explanation, nerd.

ㄴ Parallel115: Sludge, like sewer waste? Actually, kinda fitting LOL.

... ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ...

... ─ — Parallel (VTuber) Gallery ─ — ...

[To the guy I trashed earlier, I take it back]

[Posted by: Parallel851]

—————————————————

Parallel Behind

@parallel_official_behind · 2,689 subscribers · 43 videos

A full archive channel for non-official announcements from Parallel.

—————————————————

Holy shit, looking at the videos moved from the official channel, this really is Magia’s personal channel, huh?

Everything here is just her streams.

[Comments]

— Parallel589: You still don’t get it?

ㄴ Parallel589: Magia is "official."

— Parallel221: Accept it.

ㄴ Parallel221: Magia is the one and only officially recognized entity in Parallel!

— Parallel094: But should Magia’s solo streams count if she was with the first-gen members?

ㄴ Parallel094: That part feels a little unclear.

ㄴ Parallel851 (OP): It does seem like a corporate promo activity, but also kinda feels like a personal stream, no?

ㄴ Parallel851 (OP): Honestly, I don’t even know anymore...

... ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ...

... ─ — Parallel (VTuber) Gallery ─ — ...

[So does this mean the Magia second-gen theory is dead?]

Doesn’t seem like there’s any more room for speculation.

Looks like she’s sticking with being a Parallel staff + Fan_C performer.

[Comments]

— Parallel108: How long are you guys gonna drag out this damn Fan_C thing LOL?

ㄴ 🟦 Parallel02: Hey hey, calm down, Parallel Peeps. No need to get mad, just call a mod—this is a block-worthy offense.

ㄴ Parallel108: Thanks, mod Chad!

... ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ...