Oshi no Shugosha 3 (Patreon)

Oshi no Shugosha 3 - or ‘I refuse to kill this poor Idol, you heartless scum!’ (Oshi No Ko, Ryosuke!SI)

I dreamed… an angel. No, it wasn’t an angel. The wings were crow-like and of black plumage. It was… a sign of doom.

This is not how I imagined being ‘approached’ by the ‘God’ that was currently overseeing this situation. And it was not a good development. I knew I was treading on some bad footing already as I had detoured the story a fair bit, but if this divine bitch was planning to push me aside, it meant she found a solution to the clever retaliation I delivered to the one that was plotting to indirectly kill Ai.

Still, it really makes me wonder if this was indeed Yatagarasu. Sure, the awareness of the reincarnation both in my case and the twins back in canon should be telling, but the fact that everything was moving within a logical route suggested she was restrained. The fact she also mentioned God/Kami as the one doing this was, perhaps, a telling point too.

Nonetheless, I didn’t plan to let go if there was even a slight chance for Ai and the kids to be hurt. And I planned to keep playing the indirect game myself when- I got a notification on Twitter roughly two days after meeting Ai.

It was a DM. From… an anonymous account. I was instantly guarded on the matter, thinking it was the killer or someone close to that. Maybe he had tracked me down, maybe he was trying to ‘hire me again’ or some shit like that. The situation was indeed tense when-

TwinStarsGirl: Hello! I am Ai from the Supermarket and I wanted to thank you for helping me with the baby-feeding issue!

I blinked, frowning at this equally terrifying situation. I had expected something to happen in that front- just not this soon after first contact. I sat down to contemplate how to reply to this and…

BerserkerGuts49: You’re welcome.

She replied fast.

TwinStarsGirl: So, can I ask you a thing? Can you babysit my kids?

BerserkerGuts49: No.

TwinStarsGirl: Whaaa? Why not?

BerserkerGuts49: I have a job, and I study.

TwinStarsGirl: You should have some free time.

BerserkerGuts49: Which I need to sleep, eat, and unstress.

I thought that was it. I had laid out my reasoning and that should have stopped any push in that direction. I expected some ‘whining’ but-

Ding Dong~!

That’s my doorbell.

TwinStarsGirl: Well, this is silly but… I mayhavetoldthemanagerthatyouaccepted.

I blinked, frowned at the message, then looked down at my PJ and…

“Fuck.”

I was a world record holder when it came to switching out from an outfit to another, but I have to say that I did panic a bit and tripped a few times while putting on my outside clothes and rushed at the door.

Cue the manager of B-Komachi, Saitou Ichigo, his wife and Ai with the twins in arms waiting there.

“It’s quite rude to make people attends after planning an important situation like this,” The manager was reasonably pissed and-

“If the event had been given proper notice to be planned, then sure,” I replied flatly, glancing at Ai as she ‘focused a lot’ on the kids. “But I believe we can continue this conversation indoors.”

Perplexity appeared first, then realization as I explained the situation and Ai got a few more eyes on her.

“I-I didn’t think this through.”

“Like many other things,” The manager’s wife, Miyako, remarked and then gave me a perplexed look. “We are sorry for disturbing you.”

“It’s alright. I get how this is awkward but… may I understand from Ai-san why she thought this was a ‘good idea’?”

“You helped me.”

“Once. And for good reasons.”

She bowed her head in embarrassment.

“Still, you helped us and we are thankful,” The manager commented, switching his tune a bit. “We can’t offer you much since our finances are-”

“Far from ideal,” Miyako added dryly, causing her husband to flinch at her tone.

“You’re welcome. However I am… confused? I thought that an Idol production group would be able to harness quite a lot of money. Especially one as popular as B-Komachi.”

“That’s… I failed to realize until it was too late that we needed to invest more on merchandise. And right now, we can’t fix this issue.”

I slowly nodded at this explanation as it was actually a good enough reason on why their bank account was so empty. Still, this wasn’t an outright decline into defeat as they did have options. Some of which I feel like they didn’t even consider.

“What about streaming? Or making Vlogs?”

Ichigo opened his mouth and… frowned.

“Surely such an option is not that cheap,” Miyako remarked but… then she noticed how distracted her husband was. “Right?”

Ai perked up at this curious shift of behaviors and she looked at me quizzically, to which I sighed.

“Considering that your Youtube Channel has music videos of the various songs B-Komachi recorded, it would be fair to say that this very equipment can be used to create videos that are not music-related ones. Heck, you could also open up a monthly or even weekly Q&A for fans and even entertain game shows with the rest of the group.”

“It could be done-”

“Which would also mean Ai wouldn’t have to stress herself as she should be not working so much after going through the delivery of two kids just short of four months ago. Or was it less?”

Ai blinked, a bit surprised by this brief derailment. “Three months.”

“Can it be done?” Miyako inquired and her husband nodded. I could tell from her morphing glance she was not exactly happy to learn this was a good option and they had ignored it. “Then I suppose it can be entertained.”

Ichigo nodded and then gave me an odd look. “You said no to a full-time job, but what about Part-time.”

“I work at McDonald’s,” I replied, ready to rebuke it but-

“Yet you need to have a way to secure a good place at one of the universities. If this was inserted in your curriculum, it would open up some paths.”

“...What is ‘it’?”

“Assistant Manager.”

…

“It would be an odd thing to explain at a job interview.”

“And yet you are a young man with the right mindset, so you are telling me you can’t overcome it?”

…

“I don’t like the idol business.”

“Then we are on the same boat!” Ichigo slammed, surprising the rest of the group with that statement. “I-I thought it could have worked, but now I learned that someone had tried to hire fans to kill Ai. For what? For having a family! I can’t just- this is not something acceptable and, at the very least, I want to give my daughter a chance at having a peaceful life.”

That statement stunned me. I knew that Ichigo had been on the edge in the canon timeline until he ‘snapped’ when Ai was killed, but maybe he realized how deep of a mess was behind his back. How much Ai’s connection with the twins’ father was only going to create more misery. How much security did he even hire? I could tell he had to have hired some investigators to further understand what was going on and, if I was correct, he had to have learnt of the affairs of the Discord Servers.

There was so much to take under consideration but… maybe, I could take this ‘close approach’. I was still a nobody that had no picture online. It was clear my current opponent was relatively average when it comes to the internet and can’t track people down with it.

So, appearing as a nobody that just got hired for something silly and had no connection with Ai before that event may be a good way to worm my way in a more ‘protective’ frame of the situation.

It was a risk, but I could tell I had to push back on the threat I faced in those last few odd dreams.

“I am listening.”

While Miyako and Ichigo looked relieved, I couldn’t exactly decipher the odd but intense look Ai gave me…

—------d-d-d-d—---------

AN

If Crow God wants to rumble, she is going to get rumbled hardcore through some ultimate canon-fuckery.