Idol Gunner [Yuri Villainess LitRPG]

“Minami-san, Minami-san!”

Kana began the day by forcing her head out of the blanket, and being assaulted by the sharp sun rays hitting her eyes. Through the corridor, on the room door, was the very grating voice of Chitose Yono. Banging on the door loud enough to cause the vibrations to spread across the entire room, her infectious joy made Kana scowl.

Calm, she reminded herself. Clearing her throat before slipping out of bed and putting a robe on, she took deep breaths as she made her way across the warm wooden flooring of the Hiroyama Resort room. Every step, she made a mental note not to get angry at this trainee. Last night’s promise hadn’t been for nothing. Even if Emi had just gotten up and left for her own room immediately after, Kana was not going to go back to her old ways.

She was a reformed human being now, and she would be kind to everyone she encountered. The years she had spent playing old RPGs and getting the good endings for completion were to prepare her for this very moment of picking the correct dialogue option.

Opening the door, she smiled wide. Crystal clear teeth shining at the trainee, she leaned against the doorframe and yawned, “Good morning, Yono-chan! How can I help you?”

“Ugh, creepy…” Chitose hastily stepped back, raising her eyebrows with caution, “Are you alright, Minami-san?”

“Huh? Yes, I am. What happened? Did I do something wrong?”

“Uh…uh…” The girl wildly shook her head, letting her hair fly wild until one of the strands hit her in an open eye and made her yelp. Crouching down in pain, she let the letter she was carrying fly down on the floor and land with a soft thump at Kana’s feet. While her mentor picked it up, Chitose rubbed her eye, “Aw…shit…”

“Now, now, Yono-chan. That is not very nice language, so watch your mouth. You don’t want your fans to be hearing those words come out of your mouth, do you?”

Kana tore open the letter and pulled it out. The first thing she noted was the premium feel of the texture; rough and hard, yet settling perfectly on the ridges of her fingers. Printed on something like this, this early in the morning, could be only one thing. She pushed herself off the frame to stand straight and open the folded letter.

“Where did you get this?”

Yono stood up with her red left eye glaring, and drool dripping down her mouth, “Uh…it was pushed under my door. In your case, it was just kind of kept on your door handle, so I picked it up. That’s your letter. Mine is back in my room.”

“Ahh…don’t go around stealing people’s letters, Yono-chan. That is not good. What if your fans saw you stealing like that, huh?”

“Y-yeah.”

It was the Coalition, as expected. Kana looked at the contents of the letter and sighed. Being here had not been good enough for them. Now they wanted a stupid detour to satisfy the press members who had been attracted to the resort. What made her curse them the most, however, was neither of those things. It was the fact that they had negotiated with the agencies to cancel the weekend practices for all the girls.

No lyric writing, no dance practice, no Round 3 today either. All of it had been pushed to tomorrow, Sunday. And since they would be spending most of today outside the resort, it meant something that was worse than all of them combined – no Emi.

“Exciting, right?” Chitose jumped up and down, grinning like the idiot that Kana knew her to be, “I’ve never been to a World War 2 bunker before. Have you, Minami-san?”

What kind of dumbass stupid question is that? she thought, but then calmed herself down. No anger. She was a calm, collected, peaceful, kind person. She didn’t care about people being idiots because they did not hold power over her good heart. Kana Minami could not be swayed so easily by outside influence.

“Minami-san, Minami-san! It’s gonna be so fun, right!?”

But no practice. She had been waiting so long to get the new steps in, and now it was going to have to wait until tomorrow. She would also lose the flow she had going every day to pen the final touches on the lyrics. It wasn’t like she was some writing genius, either.

“What dress are you going to wear? I’ve never actually been on television before, you know!”

And no Emi. After so much pining all night, she wouldn’t even get to spend any time with her. There was nothing to be done, either. She couldn’t just not attend this. The fact that it was the Coalition’s plan meant she had to be there, no matter what. Every second spent closer to them was another chance at collecting intel. But in this particular case, she would be void of Emi Kitamura…

“Minami-san…? Uh…Minami-s-”

“Oh, son of a bitch.” Kana angrily stepped back and put her hand on the door before looking at Chitose with a scowl, “Fuck you, Yono-chan.”

“…eh. Why me?”

She slammed the door shut in her face.

_____________

“Wow, would you look at that? The Kana Minami is sitting in a measly, cheap, civilian bus…” Nobuko sighed as she walked past her and got to her seat in the back.

Kana was not even sure how she was supposed to respond to something like that. It didn’t anger her, or annoy her, or elicit any real reaction out of her – other than confusion. By the time she could decide if Nobuko Kimura was trying to be witty and funny, or actually thought that was an insult, the Ruby Passion Jr. leader was already gone, followed by her members and their trainees.

So, with Chitose by her side, and Jina and Kelsey in the back and front, Kana decided to close her eyes and go to sleep instead.

The Coalition and the media had come together to decide that they would take the girls to an old WWII bunker for a little test of courage. It was a dumb segment for a variety show whose producers were far too excited to put idols in haunted locations and get reactions out of them. Fortunately for those producers, and unfortunately for the talent, the prime location had been found only an hour’s ride away.

That was why Kana had decided to go forward with her decision. She could not do anything about the whole situation, so she wasn’t going to try. But she could take her time and cover up the sleep she hadn’t gotten because Chitose woke her up. It was a no-brainer what she was going to do throughout the trip, then.

Kana took a deep breath, leaned back into the comfortable seat, and let it unfold to a diagonal position. She felt her chest relax, and a sense of comfort creep into her tired limbs. She could melt into the seat right then, she thought, and she wouldn’t mind. She could fall asleep and never wake up with the air conditioning turned on right now. It was perfect.

“Let’s play Two Truths, One Lie!” Jina leaned in from the back seat, smiling, “What do you think, Kana-chan, Kelsey-chan?”

Ignore her, Kana thought.

“Very hard no.” Kelsey declared with a middle finger directed at the girl.

The three trainees, however, immediately looked at each other and started jumping up and down in their seats. A persistent chorus of them singing the word ‘Yes’ in different ways started to make its presence known throughout the bus. And before Kana could act like she had drifted off into a deep sleep, the other idols had already started looking in their direction with disgust.

“Shut up, Minami!” Nobuko was the one to shout first, groaning.

“Yeah, yeah. Minami, shut it!” One of the Fluorescent Angels followed it up.

What a pathetic group of losers.

“Calm down, everyone. They’re just a bit excited. Right, girls?” Akiko was the one to maturely handle the situation before anyone else.

And that broke the straw. She could accept anything, but not that. Sitting up, Kana shot Jina a dirty look, only to be met with another knowing smile. Then, taking a look at Chitose, who had quickly gone quiet, she snapped.

“No, it’s not fine. They’re gonna shut up, and they’re gonna shut up right now. Got it, Yono-chan?”

“Y-yeah…”

Once the trainees stopped talking, the other girls started. Whispering and complaining about how Kana Minami was the enemy of fun, they began to insult her just like Akiko Hara had probably envisioned. Kana closed her eyes and muttered a curse before opening them back with a smile.

She was supposed to be calm, and quiet, and composed. And she was a nice, kind-hearted person who gave people what they wanted. Kana reminded herself of her promise for the fiftieth time today and looked at Chitose.

“I meant, Yono-chan. You all are gonna keep quiet because we’ll play the game, and you should not scream while we’re doing so, alright?”

Chitose’s eyes lit up, but with a mixture of happiness and dread. She nodded, looked at the other trainees, and they nodded, too. The three of them looked at Kana and promised with hands joined that they would not raise their voice at all. Once Jina joined them in the same promise, it sadly became reality that they would now play Two Truths, One Lie. But if Kana was going to drown, she wasn’t going to go alone.

“And of course…Kelsey will play with us, too!”

“What? No, I wo-”

She looked back at Kana, but immediately understood the assignment when her attention was redirected to Akiko Hara. They could not, at any cost, afford to make enemies on the bus. If they were going to try to make them look like the villains, they would have to push back and become the good guys. Even if it meant playing a sad game with the kids.

“F…fine. I’ll play.” Kelsey rolled her eyes and put on a smile.

“Yay! Let’s begin, then!”

With Jina’s enthusiastic declaration, Kana decided to mentally check out of the game. It would be easy to act like she was participating by throwing in a random guess once in a while, and that would be more than enough. She didn’t actually need to put all of her attention into the game.

Or that was, at least, how she thought it would go.

Chitose Yono went first, “I…have had six boyfriends. And I actually slapped my mother once! Also…I am not religious at all, even though my mom and dad are very, very into it all!”

And silence followed. Jina and the two girls started to consider what the answer might be, while Kelsey tried to play the same game as Kana. Who, in return, was not feeling the comfort of the seat anymore.

Every moment that the thinking continued, she felt like she was going to spontaneously combust. The blur of the shrubs outside and the rush of the air conditioning started to blend into one. The rhythmic swaying of the excited Chitose Yono started to sync with Kana’s internal clock of calculating how long it would take them to get the answer. And yet, the answer did not arrive.

Her heart rate increased, and she crushed the air within her palm in anger. Jina had to be doing this on purpose. She wasn’t actually that dumb. Was she? It could not be, after all. They had spent more time with her, and yet did not seem to know what the lie here was. It was so obvious, and they couldn’t see it.

“Yono-chan!” Kelsey’s trainee looked back, “You haven’t had six boyfriends, have you?”

“Of course she has!” Kana lost it, almost shaking in anger, “What a pathetic lot! How could you possibly arrive at that answer!? Isn’t it kind of obvious that she’s lying about the slap? She’s totally religious and has definitely had six boyfriends. Hell, I’d wager she’s had double digits and is just lowballing you. You’ve got to be doing this on purpose.”

“Uh…is that…so?” The trainee looked down in shame, and Kelsey gave her a pat on the back.

“Don’t bully my girl, Minami.”

“You don’t start now, alright? I know you were keeping quiet, too. You knew the answer, didn’t you? And you too, Jina!? When’d you get so dumb?”

“Eh, but Yono-chan hasn’t confirmed that you were right…”

“She’s gonna do it right now. Aren’t you, Yono?”

To her right, Chitose had her hand on her mouth. Leaning towards the window to get away from Kana, she shuddered and rattled along with the bus as they covered some rocky ground. Moving up and down from the rocking bus, she slowly started nodding at the same time, and whimpered an approval back.

Kana sighed and lay back down in peace, putting a hand over her eyes, “The girl’s far too cheery to not have had multiple partners. She probably switches them like toothpaste. She’s also far too cheery to have been shouted at by her mother, which would have happened if she had dared to slap her. And no, Jina, she is not a spoiled brat. Her mother would not raise her to be one if she were religious. That being, of course, the only confirmed fact in her sentences.”

“You’re…” Chitose took her position in shock, eyes wide open, “awesome. Very awesome, Minami-san!”

“Ah…yeah.” Jina nodded, “Kana is the best!”

“Let that one get to your head, too, Minami. I’m sure it will go well for the rest of the day.”

Kana ignored the last sentence and yawned. There. She had participated once, and now nobody could say that she hadn’t had fun with her trainees. No longer would she be the enemy of fun. She was fun, and cool, and kind. And now the nice older sister was going to take a nap and drift off into dreamland.

“So, it’s Minami-san’s turn next!” Chitose clapped, “You guessed, so you’re the one who needs to give us the new set of sentences.”

I’m gonna kill her. I’m gonna murder her. I’m gonna make sure she never goes back to that fifteenth boyfriend of hers. What the fuck kind of rule is that? Why can’t she just be normal for once? Can we stop already!?

Kana pressed her eyes with her fingers and let out some steam. Shaking her head, she chased the thoughts away and smiled. Good person. Kind person. She didn’t like having violent thoughts about good girls like Chitose Yono. The kid was just trying to have some fun and had gotten starstruck.

She just needed a set of sentences. Two truths, and one lie. It was easy enough. Kana nodded and spoke up.

“Uh…I killed the Emperor. I killed the Lieutenant General of the Military. And I killed some random guy on the street.”

_____________

“Do all of you have your cameras?”

The white-haired Coalition representative held up the small, analog cameras that all of the girls had been handed and taught how to use. Kana looked at hers and then at the one Chitose had. They were identical and apparently had a few hours of footage worth of storage. Once the Coalition rep stopped staring at her, he went back to looking at the others.

Their goal was simple. The idol and her trainee would step into one of the entrances of this complex maze of a bunker and try to exit from another entrance. They would not be alone, however, since other pairs would also enter from the other entrances. As spice on top, of course, they were only allowed one flashlight in total, which would force them to cooperate well.

It was the exact kind of pointless entertainment Kana hated. The one which had no purpose or meaning other than to go viral online and generate buzz about the cute scared faces these idols were making. And as much as she didn’t want to do it, Kana didn’t take long to slip right back into the persona that had gotten her here. She’d be as scared as they needed. She’d be the scarediest cat in the world if they so demanded.

“Alright, that’s great, then. Please move to your entrance, and we’ll get the first round started.”