The Princess Saving the Hero?!

KAGAYAKI

Current viewers: 502,343

Current viewers: 589,102

Current viewers: 612,000

The stream viewer graph must have been a straight line going at a 45-degree incline.

“Omg TeamRiku stays fed!! We can’t stop winning!!”

“WAIT WAS SHE HOLDING HIM??”

“REVERSE KABEDON?!”

“Is Miss Kagayaki BLUSHING??”

“GET THE BRUTE AWAY FROM HER!!”

“Our mistake, chat!” Yumi cried, rushing forward to cover the lens with her hand. “Technical difficulties!”

“No, Yumi! It’s OK.” Naomi shouted.

Yumi froze. “...Ma’am?”

Naomi’s mind was racing at a million miles an hour. You stop the stream, your Mother will rain hell on you. 

Akari was watching. She had to be. If the screen went black now, right after that outburst, it would look like a scandal. To survive, Naomi had to spin it. She had to turn the "accident" into "content."

Kagayaki smoothed her hair. “Even goddesses make mistakes now and again…” she purred, stepping into the frame, blocking Riku from view.

The chat exploded again.

"Yumi panic cute lol” “KAGAYAKI SAMA!!” “STEP ON ME YUMI-SAN!!” 

“Don’t think just ‘cause I am Japanese I don’t understand English, chat…” Kagayaki said in English irritatedly. Then, immediately, she code-switched. “Ugh, I forgot about you freaks who slobber over the thought of Yumi taking charge of their lives. I cannot believe I’ve allowed such insolence to fester. Give us a moment of privacy, will you?”

With a smooth motion, Kagayaki shut the lens with its built-in lens cap.

Riku could only watch in stunned silence.

Did Kagayaki know how Chat was going to react? This was… deliberate.

“What have we done?” Yumi cried.

“Don’t worry, the cap also mutes the mic, remember? And now is not the time to panic,” Kagayaki said with conviction.

“So what can we do? We can’t stop the stream now,” Yumi hissed. “Very soon, it’s going to become your top two stream. Your mom will kill us if we stop it now. These are some of the most unprecedented metrics in a while!”

Kagayaki felt the cold sweat return.

She looked at Riku.

The easiest solution was right there. Throw him under the bus.

She could play the victim, sigh about how "hard it is to work with amateurs," and the fans would do the rest of the work for her.

And he would never want anything to do with her again.

Why can’t I do it? Kagayaki thought. It would be easier for me.

Wait. No. If I do that, he will throw the competition. He'll quit. And if he leaves so brazenly after I went to his house? It would reflect badly on me. It would look like I bullied him out of the industry. Yes. Yes, that’s a good reason. It’s for the brand.

It definitely wasn’t because the thought of Riku looking at her with total, cold hatred was unacceptable.

She took a deep breath. The Ice Princess descended.

“Open the cap.”

“You sure?”

Kagayaki breathed out, and soon made a neutral face.

“Of course.”

The stream started again.

“Hello my minions,” Kagayaki said, leaning into the camera lens. “Sorry for bothering you with the... passionate creative process. But we have to pause the stream for a little while to set up the microphones.”

Riku couldn't believe what he was seeing. 

She merely winked, carrying on. “Hope that is OK! Sorry for not meeting your high standards. But we have a surprise coming up. You won’t regret it! And in fact, I might package in a little extra surprise… Since you have been such good minions for me.”

She signaled Yumi. “Cut it.”

Yumi hit a button. The red light finally, mercifully, went dark. Naomi slumped against the desk, letting out a breath she felt like she’d been holding for seven years.

Oh my god. Her hands were shaking. She hid them behind her back, clutching the edge of the desk until her knuckles turned white.

What did I just do with Riku?!

She had physically grabbed a man and screamed at him to take responsibility. Seven years. Seven years of media training, and Riku had shattered it all in five seconds.

“You are such a bad liar.” That stupid, simple sentence. 

Was she really that weak? Was she so starved for someone to actually see her that a single moment of honesty from a loser could make her lose her mind?

She bit the inside of her cheek until the sharp pain grounded her. 

But the silence in the room was worse than the noise. Because now, she had to turn around and face Riku.

Riku took a step forward. The image of her grabbing his lapels was still burned into his retinas. “Kagayaki… I know you said you have a plan. But—about what you said—”

“Riku.” She cut him off, spinning around. “You had a song to record, yes?”

“Of course, but—”

“Then let’s head to the studio. We are wasting time.”

She brushed past him without making eye contact, signaling for Yumi to follow. She walked fast, terrified that if she slowed down, even for a second, the gravity of him would pull her back in.

I wonder what Yuuji was cooking up? Probably waited all year to capitalize on this songwriting moment.

But something happened that she didn't see coming. She was suddenly pulled back.  

"H-Huh...?" Kagayaki gasped, spinning around.

Riku was looking straight at her, his dark eyes burning with a fire she hadn't seen since they were twelve years old.

"My emotions... you think you can just toggle them on and off like a light switch? You ever consider the fact I like you, as well? Like, really really like you? Do you understand, then, what happens when you you push me to my brink? I make rash, impulsive choices. When you treat our relationship so flippantly... do you realize how close to danger you really are?"

Kagayaki ignored her traitorous heart in that instant practically screaming out its ribcage. "But I—I saved the stream!" 

"Stop it with these lame excuses! There's something going on between you and your agency that I'm not aware of. I get it. I'm not entitled to them. But you ever consider what happens when I can't play along anymore, when you make me feel like this?"

Riku stepped closer, forcing her to look up at him. 

"I care about the fact that five minutes ago, you grabbed me like I was the only person in the world. And the second the red light turned off, you treated me like a prop you were done using for a skit."

"Riku, you don't understand—"

"I understand perfectly," Riku cut her off. "This places sees everything as content. Even us. Even this."

He gestured between them. 

"I need you to understand something, Kagayaki," Riku said, his grip on her wrist relaxing slightly, but his gaze intensifying. "I am an active participant here. I am a human being. And what you are doing really hurts. You have some ulterior motivation I can't ever know, I understand that. But please... at least leave on the light for me?"

Kagayaki stared at him. 

She was in so much trouble. She could never admit to the fact she liked being scolded at...

He didn't let go of her wrist. Instead, he slid his hand down, lacing his fingers through hers. 

"I'm sorry." She said it with a full chest. "I'll try not to pull that stuff again."

Riku smiled. "Apology semi-accepted. Now, to our original plan. We have a song to record."

Kagayaki looked at their joined hands.

"Okay," she whispered. "Okay."

\\

YUUJI

“Yuuji.”

Somebody called out to him, but he was doing far more important things than to listen.

He was staring at his smartphone, adorning some Cheshire cat grin.

“Look at her, my Ice Princess,” Yuuji whispered. “Look at that maneuvering over a botched scene that she clearly wasn’t ready for. The subtle manipulation of the narrative...”

On his screen, Kagayaki winked at the camera. Yuuji clutched his chest dramatically. “Oh, good grief! The scandalous nature of it! She made a disastrous scene into a teaser trailer!”

“Yuuji.” The producer’s voice was getting tighter.

“Oh my god,” Yuuji continued, zooming in on Riku’s shell-shocked face in the background of the paused video. “She even had a fall girl ready. She made the assistant look like the aggressor while allowing the assistant to save face at the same time. How does she do it? I am envy personi—”

“Can you please stop procrastinating and get on the mic, man?” the producer snapped. “Akari-san wants the demo by midnight.”

Yuuji, with a sigh, finally turned off his phone with a click.

“Of course.”

He adjusted the pop filter on the mic. He wasn't worried. He’d seen Riku; the panic on his face.

As much as Yuuji’s own parents mocked him for having the “easiest job in the world,” it took real skill to act cool under the camera.

It was a skill that could only be trained.

This line of thinking should also extend to Riku’s songwriting capability.

It will be unconfident. That’s just the nature of all rookies in the K-Pop space.

Meanwhile, Yuuji was saving his best work for this one single. He co-wrote it with a Berliner hitmaker, for goodness sake.

Riku, realistically, wouldn't stand a chance against this. And that... was almost a shame.