Esmie the Calamity Chapter 24 (Patreon)

** May the binky be with you. **

I was sweating like crazy. Our introduction reel had run and we now had almost two hundred thousand viewers. Ruth had even used some of the footage from yesterday’s market chaos, artfully edited to keep the nudity off screen. I’d sent it to her sometime last night in my drunken craziness.

We were debuting as a group first, and then over the next three days we’d cycle through individual streams so our audience could get to know us. It was so fucking scary, I was about to melt into a crying puddle.

I had my tail firmly hugged to my chest as I watched the camera bob gently up and down in front of us. We were sitting on the sofa together, Lynna in the middle, Iria and me on either side of her.

Ruth’s people had bustled into the house and spruced it up a whole bunch. Gone was our old ratty couch and all the other furniture, replaced with a nice but understated medieval style set. It included two new, soft beige couches with armrests that curled outwards, along with polished wooden cabinets and drawers. There were even some flowers in a vase on top of one set, and a simple tapestry hanging from a wall.

It was all in an effort to spruce the place up a bit, since we hadn’t made a fortune in the time since we’d logged in. The reason that the original plan had gone out the window? Hype. Our debut had been announced two weeks ago, and the FTLN had caught fire from the news. A vtuber group set in CORA? It had been a powder keg with a magnitude that even Ruth had been surprised by, and she was the one who’d discovered it.

Lynna must have noticed my nervousness, because she leaned over and kissed the top of my head. “Just be your normal, cute, chaotic self, Esmie. It will be fine.”

“I’m not so sure,” I mumbled, shy beyond measure. Wasn’t I just a creature of contradictions now?

“Almost time,” Iria said, leaning forward to give me a smile around Lynlyn. “If you get too anxious, just come sit in my lap. The fans will love it and I’ll protect you.”

Relief settled into my body like she’d rubbed a cooling ointment into every inch of my skin. That, of course, led my imagination to run away with that whole idea, and causing a blush and a grin to vie for dominance on my face. Another feeling had coiled itself in my chest, suffusing the air that I exhaled, but I couldn’t place what it was.

“Thanks, Iria. I think I’m ready,” I said, clubbing my confidence over the head so I could drag it back and strap it into its rightful place. Little bastard kept escaping.

We could see chat on a screen to the right of the camera, which was currently whizzing by too fast for us to really catch anything. It was mostly just a mass of hype emojis anyway, but it made me wonder why on earth so many people were interested in seeing me act like a dofus on camera.

Ruth’s voice drifted into our comms channel, pulling my eyes back to the camera. “Switching to ingame camera in three, two, one…”

"Heyo, folks!" Lynna smiled, waving to the camera. She’d chosen to use the shortened version of her actual name, rather than a new one. She figured it would be easier on everyone, including her. "I'm Lyn, and I'm a dark elf rogue who… well, you saw the highlight reel. We'll just call me in training, yeah?" She said the last with a grin and a wink, before turning to Iria.

"I'm Iria, a raptor duelist," she said, with a smile that was teetering off the edge towards a smirk. "I do all the actual fighting."

"Hey, I killed some of the stuff yesterday," Lynlyn huffed theatrically, crossing her arms.

Iria laughed and met my friend's grumpy gaze. "I guess."

Then she turned to me, and raised an eyebrow. Oh crud, now it was my turn.

"U-uhm… hi!" I squeaked, blushing as I turned back to the camera. "I am Esmie. I'm a disaster when you put me in a combat situation so… I like to craft and, you know, make a fool of myself."

"You're very good at both of those things," Iria nodded with mock solemnity.

"Hey!" I pouted. "You're not supposed to… to say that."

"I'm sure you'll live, little cutie," she shot back with dark, lidded eyes.

I gaped at her, then at the camera, then went bright red. Oh fudgehole, she was flirting with me on camera! Live! I could see people posting blush emojis by the hundreds in the chat!

“Only if you keep looking at me like that,” I mumbled, staring at the wooden floor.

Iria chuckled like it had all been a joke, then shifted to watch the camera again. “Well, I guess I’ll go first with further introductions.”

“Sure,” Lyn laughed, giving me a sidelong look.

“So,” the tall raptor woman smiled, her feathers rippling in tandem with her expression. “I have a bit of a background in combat, out of the game, that is. I’ve chosen to use a build that is tanky, but allows me to do reasonable damage by reflecting enemy attacks. As for my interests… uh… well, I enjoy skiing, basketball, and thriller shows. Oh, and mystery shows and horror movies!”

As Iria continued to speak about her interests and the like, I found myself listening intently. She sounded like a really active person, but she also had a thing for movies in general. The cutest part was when her eyes lit up as she explained her interest in retro games and game consoles. It was nice to see her nerding out over something.

We went on like that for about an hour, talking about ourselves and our interests while the other two would cut in and ask questions. It was pretty fun, actually, and by the time it was my turn, my nerves had faded.

I blabbered on about my non-VR games and the shows I watched, then about my ingame stuff that I was doing, like alchemy and the thieves guild. Iria and Lyn gently teased me about the last one, calling me a brat-savant. I kind of liked the name, honestly, so I did everything I could to have them keep using it.

After that, we let them know our respective streaming schedules for the next week and closed the stream. We’d done it! We’d done our first stream!

A giggle burst out of me and I threw myself at Lynlyn, snuggling close and laying a big kiss on her cheek. She laughed in turn and wrapped me up in a big hug. I was let go pretty quickly, though, and the reason became clear in a moment.

Ruth popped up in a video call window, answered by Lynlyn. “Hey girls, that went well!”

“Yeah!” my long time childhood friend smiled, glancing at me. “Esmie was so nervous, but she was fine in the end.”

“You should each take a look at your subscriber counts,” Ruth laughed, showing her huge canines in the process. “Oh, and I have some very good news. I was able to secure celebrity protection for all three of you, along with any further girls who join the CORA branch.”

“What’s that?” I asked, getting up so I could find some water.

“It’s a complex functionality that allows the game to keep stream snipers off you,” the dragon woman explained. “It’s essentially a restraining order that is enforced by reality itself. Virtual reality, sorry. It has a great many aspects to it, like causing you to be invisible and invulnerable to anyone who has your stream open, or who is in contact with someone who has your stream open. Honestly, it’s far too technical for me to do it justice, but suffice to say that you will be able to stream and not worry about some stalker fan hunting you down.”

“Wait, what am I here for then?” Iria asked, her words muffled by a grunt as I plopped down in her lap with my glass of water.

“It’s not perfect by any stretch of the imagination,” Ruth said wearily. “We had an… incident, in another game branch. Since then, we have always ensured that each generation of girls we take on will have one protector.”

“Good to know,” Iria murmured, resting her chin on the top of my head. “I think I’ll make some friends around here, just in case. Ask them to be first responders if anything goes wrong and I need backup.”

“That is an excellent idea,” our manager said, her smile looking happy and relieved. I guess Ruth was a bit softer than she looked, if she’d been worried about our safety.

“Are we allowed to exempt people from it?” I asked tentatively, because I knew that my new friends might have watched my stream. I didn’t want to be suddenly invisible to them.

“I believe if they are on your ingame friends list then they will be ignored by the algorithm,” she replied, smiling indulgently. “Remember that you’ll need to clear people with me before you can play with them on stream, though.”

“Uh… okay,” I said, trying not to blush as I remembered just what had happened with the friends I was thinking of. I could only imagine the trouble I’d get in if I streamed that kind of thing. Goodness.

I really wanted to go and see them again, they were fun people. Maybe I’d do that after we were done here. Ah, except I needed to go and buy some better alchemy equipment with the money that Sandy and I had made while playing cards. I wonder if they would keep me company while I did it? Just to like, hang out, or whatever.

“Ah, now…” Ruth said, breaking through my internal dialogue. “There are some other things we needed to discuss, let me find my list…”

Dang it. Freakin’ meetings. Blech.