Empire of Fantasy 10
The following day, in SHINSEKAI’s town square
Tsumugi: “Gwahahahahaha ☆”
Shu: ......
Tsumugi: “You’re kidding, right? Did you actually think everything would be okay?”
“Indomitable artists? Really? Ahahaha, that didn’t work out for you too well, did it?!”
“Your entire track record on SHINSEKAI is just one long series of losses—you know that, right? Did you think small fry like you could pull that off?!”
Shu: ......
Tsumugi: “It does look like you’re achieving some success in events and missions, but your battles against the other players are total failures!”
“Of course, you’ve been running away from those encounters and avoiding conflict a lot too—”
“Are you guys okay? Are you even trying?”
“At the rate you’re going, the other idols are going to pick at you like vultures after a fresh carcass until you’ve got nothing left.”
“Ohhh, but maybe that’s your plan? Make yourselves look like sitting ducks, and then when they let their guards down, you’ll strike back—something like that?”
“But obviously that’s not it, right? Since you’re always serious about every little thing, right Shu-kun~?”
“So you went at it with all you’ve got, and in the end it didn’t work out? You poor thing! Ahahahaha ☆”
Shu: Aoba.
Tsumugi: “Yes?”
Shu: The laws of the real world don’t apply here in this... the SHINSEKAI, correct? So if I were to kill you here and now—
Mika: Ngaaah, calm down, Oshi-sa—Onii-chan?!
Tsumugi: “Yes, calm down. I’m not actually Aoba Tsumugi, remember?”
“You shouldn’t take out your frustrations on me. Or more accurately, you can’t actually challenge us support characters.”
Shu: How am I to trust anything you say? You’re just trying to hurt me again while pretending to be a harmless bystander, aren’t you? This is exactly how you’ve always been!
Tsumugi: “Ahaha, you really don’t like him, huh? Aoba Tsumugi-kun, that is ♪”
“I did get a little carried away with all the fun I was having and riled you up. But please try not to curse out or kill anyone, or really anything else unbecoming of an idol.”
“It’ll make you lose points. Or what I mean to say is, you’ll have your SSG confiscated as a fine.”
“If you’re feeling a little cranky, there are plenty of monsters wandering around out there. Try using one of those characters as a punching bag instead of the ones with personalities.”
“If you do that, then no living person will have their feelings or their bodies hurt.”
Shu: Hmph. Where’s the fun in playing around with some inanimate object without a soul?
Mika: But Onii-chan, wouldn’t that spell the end for us if you’re sayin’ that? Or no, maybe it’d mean a doll gets a soul if it’s been well-loved?
Tsumugi: “Fufu. In any case, everything that happens on SHINSEKAI will be shown on our program—so please keep that in mind.”
“Well, in practice the footage is hand-picked. But you two are quite the hot topics right now, so any situation you find yourselves in could end up being broadcast nationwide.”
“Just keep that in the back of your mind and please remember to always behave like an idol should.”
Shu: Like an idol, hm...? I don’t particularly like pandering to the public with flattery or the like.
Tsumugi: “Yes, but. If you behave yourself, you’ll start seeing some success and appreciation here on SHINSEKAI, don’t you think?”
“During missions, you’ll often be presented with choices, right? Most often, the one that’s more idol-like is going to be the right answer.”
Shu: Hmph. What’s your point? We have our own way of doing things; we won’t give in to peer pressure.
Tsumugi: “Hmm, I wish you’d stop being so stubborn and play nice.”
Tsumugi: “If you keep going down this path, you’re going to lose all of your money, and then what? You’re going to lose your ticket to the SS Finals right after you got it.”
“Since all of your SSL$ was forcibly converted into SSG, victory at the winner-takes-all match is nearly meaningless.”
“It just meant you had a bit more money to start.”
“And as you lose more and more of that initial payout, Valkyrie is going to find it pretty difficult to win the Qualifying Rounds.”
Shu: How many times must I repeat myself? Just what is your point? We are at no disadvantage if we don’t advance to the Finals.
We already won the live—that winner-takes-all match. Our value was displayed in full there.
We don’t have to play along with this ridiculous fantasy world.
Tsumugi: “Ahaha, you may think that’s good enough, but ES and the public at large have all passed judgment over you as idols who can only perform in lives.”
“But nowadays at ES, there’s been a huge increase of work that doesn’t even involve lives. Sure, that’s what being an idol used to be all about.”
“But in this day and age, just how much demand is there for some idols who only know how to sing on a stage?”
“You two will gradually fall out of the mainstream, and then you’ll lose your place within ES. And ES is the utopia made of idols, by idols, and for idols.”
“Right now, you’re just artists who can’t keep up with the ability and talent that ES demands of its idols—”
“As it stands, it’ll be impossible for you to do better than, or even just as well as, you’ve done up to now.”
“First, they’ll cut your funding; then, you’ll lose opportunities—you’ll slowly start to dry up. This is just what happens to people in the adult world when they defy their superiors and are difficult to manage.”
“In the past, we called them window watchers.”[1]
Shu: Hmph. So what are you saying? That if you’re not an idol, you’re not even human? You ought to take another look at the Tale of the Heike.[2]
Tsumugi: “I should say the same to you. I’m sure you know exactly what happens to a sovereign who becomes too proud to take notice of his surroundings—right, Valkyrie?”[3]
Shu: ......
- Translated many different ways, window watchers are employees who are considered “useless” by their employers and are therefore given no work whatsoever, in hopes that the employee will get sick of being hopelessly bored and leave the company. Kinda soul-crushing, if you ask me.
- The Tale of the Heike is a classic in Japanese literature. Shu’s line アイドルに非ずんば人に非ず (aidoru ni arazunba hito ni arazu) is a reference to a line spoken by Taira no Tokitada, a military commander in the Genpei War (depicted within this epic). The Taira clan was extremely prosperous during this time, and in a show of his disregard for those below him and his clan, Tokitada states that if someone is not of the Taira clan, they must be inhuman. It’s a scornful and dehumanizing line, one that implies that only the Tairas are worthy of humanity, and anyone else is like, bugs on the ground or something. So here, Shu is criticizing Tsumugi, saying that Tsumugi believes idols are the only people worthy of success and wealth and whatnot, which is why ES only favors idols and would leave Valkyrie to rot if they don’t conform to the standards demanded of them. Basically, he’s pissed!
- Still on our little Tale of the Heike kick, the major theme of the epic is that of impermanence. The story tells the tale of the Taira clan’s fall throughout the Genpei War—that which prospers must eventually fall. So Tsumugi flips the script back onto Shu here: where Shu had accused Tsumugi of being in Tokitada’s shoes, Tsumugi is now saying that Shu is the true Taira clan proxy, and that Valkyrie is currently boasting the same decadence which caused the Tairas’ downfall. This is also most likely a callback to Marionette, since this exact scenario has already played out in Shu’s life, and he met with the same fate that the Taira clan did in the Tale of Heike.