Chapter 12
Pyrrha Nikos exited her limo with a confident smirk, taking in the sight of the towering hotel before her. Standing tall at fifty stories, it was an impressive structure, to most people at least "So, this is the 'Vale hotel' huh? Eh, i've seen better" she shrugged nonchalantly, striding towards the entrance with so much confidence it was basically a swagger. Behind her, she could hear the rustling of her assistants carrying her bags, but she didn't bother to glance back at them. As she walked, she noticed a small group of people snapping photos of her, ‘Damn, how did the paparazzi already find out I'm here? It's barely been an hour!’ She huffed internally.
Her manager trailed behind her, listing off the various amenities of the hotel, but Pyrrha was lost in her own thoughts. She had arrived in Vale a week before Beacon started, hoping to find something interesting to do before the academy began. After all, that was the reason she had chosen Beacon over Haven - she had heard that only the best attended, so naturally that's where she is going. She wanted to meet other strong hunters from around Remnant, maybe even get some good fights out of them. She was particularly looking forward to meeting Glynda Goodwitch, a world wide renowned hunter who she had heard many stories about. Even the thought of a potential fight with Goodwitch brought a grin to her face.
As she entered the hotel, Pyrrha was greeted by a receptionist with an awestruck expression. “Welcome to the Vale Hotel Ms Nikos, if you need anything just blah blah blah” He began his greeting, but Pyrrha quickly tuned him out, gesturing to her manager to take care of him. Although he was cute, he was also boring, he looked at her with the same awe as everyone else - something that immediately made him uninteresting in her mind. Her blunt and uncaring personality was quite well-known, so her manager wasn't at all surprised by her lack of interest in the receptionist's greeting.
Pyrrha walked away from the dejected looking receptionist, who was now talking with her manager. With a relaxed sigh, she settled onto a plush leather sofa in the lounge, sinking back into the cushions with satisfaction. After a minute, her leg began to bounce with irritation; her short attention span making her instantly bored. She took out her scroll, hoping to find some better stimulation than the wall. As she scrolled through her Delaygram feed, she found herself uninterested in most of the posts she saw, whether memes, sports news, or random crap.
Then a video caught her eye, featuring a masculist shouting at a girl on a podcast about how women only want sex and are all pieces of trash. Pyrrha scoffed and quickly scrolled on; her disdain for the masculist agenda was well-known. On camera, she had no filter and spoke her mind openly, which often caused controversy.
She had been accused of sexism and labeled a supporter of the matriarchy so many times that she had lost count. The defamation attempts rolled off her like water though. While the media tried to attack her with as much aggression as a pitbull chasing a four year old, she ignored them, instead she focused on her skills and continued to dominate the tournaments, earning even more fame in the process. After all, with controversy came publicity, and she had more than enough of both.
Apparently, a lot of people liked her blunt and straightforward personality, something that actually surprised her. Unlike politicians and many other celebrities, Pyrrha didn't hide behind a mask or a fake agenda. This transparency had won her an incredibly devoted following, as well as an army of haters. There were even compilations and edits of her most heated arguments with masculists on camera, which she found hilarious.
Growing bored of Delaygram, she decided to switch to MeTube, hoping for better content. As she scrolled through her feed, most of the videos looked uninteresting ‘boring, boring, boring, ooh he’s cute. What's this video about?’ The thumbnail that caught her eye was of a handsome white-haired cat faunus holding a mic, sitting on his bedroom floor. The title of the video was "As the World Caves In." She clicked on it and was met with a piano melody in the background as the boy began to sing.
My feet are aching
And your back is pretty tired
And we’ve drunk a couple bottles, babe
And set our grief aside
Pyrrha was very impressed; it was some of the best singing she had ever heard. ‘He's probably using auto-tune or something,’ she thought to herself, ‘no way his voice sounds that good naturally. Regardless, he's incredibly talented.’ She checked the view count and saw that it was already at fifty thousand despite only being posted today, with countless compliments in the comment section. ‘Did he write these lyrics himself?’ she wondered. ‘If so, he definitely has the potential to make it big.’
As she listened to the song, Pyrrha decided that she liked it so much she added it to one of her playlists. When the song came to an end, she clicked on the artist's MeTube profile, wanting to hear more of his work. "JustMatt?" she read aloud, surprised to see that he only had two thousand subscribers. "I guess this was his first song," she mused to herself.
Scrolling through his profile, Pyrrha saw that he had another song uploaded called "Natural." clicking on the video she was met with the sound of Matt humming in harmony as the beat kicked in.
Will you hold the line
When every one of them has given up and given in? Tell me
In this house of mine
Nothing ever comes without a consequence or cost, tell me
Will the stars align?
Will heaven step in? Will it save us from our sin, will it?
‘Cause this house of mine stands strong
As the beat of "Natural" picked up, Pyrrha found herself enjoying the song even more than "As the World Caves In." She liked faster tempo music, things like rock or rap were her favorite. She could also relate to the lyrics a bit, the life of a hunter was dangerous after all.
Wanting to turn up the volume, Pyrrha put on her headphones and settled back into the comfortable couch cushions. The more she listened, the more impressed she became with JustMatt. ‘He's definitely got potential, although it's possible these are flukes or he stole the lyrics from somewhere. There aren't many people who can come out of nowhere and produce two bangers back to back.’ she thought to herself.
And you’re standing on the edge face up
‘Cause you’re a natural
A beating heart of stone
You gotta be so cold
To make it in this world
Yeah, you’re a nat-
As the song played in her ears, she was interrupted by a tap on her shoulder. She turned to see her manager standing there, and with a slight frown, she removed her headphones. "Your room is ready," her manager informed her, "and you'll be staying in the luxurious penthouse located on the 50th floor." With the keycard in hand, she added, "If you need anything, contact me. I'll be staying in room 496 on the floor below." She knew Pyrrha preferred straightforwardness, so she got right to the point without any delay, excusing herself after getting a nod from her.
As Pyrrha stood up and stretched, she took one last glance at her scroll, quickly subscribing to JustMatt's channel before closing it. ‘I wonder if he'll create more good music,’ she mused to herself.
‘I usually don't like music made by men, but this guy's good. Maybe I can even get in touch with him.’ However, she realized that since he was just starting his career, he was likely busy writing new music.
Matt was sprawled out on his bed, wearing nothing but a pair of boxers. He had a bag of chips resting on his stomach, which he was absently eating to satiate his munchies. A glass bong sat on his bedside table, still slightly smoking. In front of him on the TV was an anime which should not exist in this world.
“Are you asking me why people eat potatoes?" a redheaded boy said in confusion, causing everyone around him to stare in horror. Looking at the potato regretfully he broke it in half 'Tch, you can have half..." He said while handing an intimidating woman half a potato.
Last night, after his escapades he earned a reward, the only thing it said was: ‘If there's a hole, there's a goal’ giving him 2x common gacha tokens. He thought it was pretty funny but he wondered why he didn't get one for losing his virginity, maybe the God that sent him here forgot.
After getting back to his room he opened both of them, the first one giving him one hundred lien. However the second one he was really excited about:
Received 1x Full Attack on titan saga(Reverse Remnant edition)
This included both the manga and the anime, all of them currently sitting on top of his dresser. Attack on titan is one of his favorite animes so he was excited to get the full saga, which included the ending. He had not read the manga so he had no idea how it ended since the anime wasn't fully released before he was sent here. Luckily he got a completed version of it.
So he decided to rewatch the whole thing in order to refresh his memory before he got to the end. Also, he wanted to see what this ‘reverse remnant edition’ was all about. After watching a bit he realized it was the same exact thing, except all the genders were reversed. The second change however, was that all the Eldians were Faunus. This didn't change much besides giving all the characters animal traits.
The more he watched, the more he wondered if he could release this version himself. After all, he had already uploaded two stolen songs from his original world to YouTube without any consequences. However, he knew that releasing the reversed version would likely stir up a lot of controversy, especially considering the themes of human-faunus relations. Scenes that depicted Marley's mistreatment of the Eldians were now depicting humans abusing faunus, which could lead to a heated response, whether good or bad he had no idea.
Lost in thought, he felt a buzz from his scroll and looked down to see hundreds of notifications from MeTube. With wide eyes, he opened the app and was stunned to see the view count on his songs skyrocketing to sixty thousand and thirty thousand. "What the hell!" his mouth opened in disbelief. He knew his videos were mediocre at best, with poor syncing and minimal visuals. Hell he was just sitting on his floor halfheartedly singing. "People actually want to watch my content?" he wondered, utterly confused, yet excited at the same time by the unexpected success.
Scrolling through the comments he read them a lot with varying degrees of disbelief.
“Great music king! Keep it up”
“Damn this guy's collar doesn't show enough pecs. Lower that V-line and show some skin!”
“I’d let him step on me not gonna cap”
“What a shitty song, go back to menagerie”
“Hey, if you need a producer, hit me up. I'm good at making beats and i'll work for feet pics”
“I wonder what size he is?”
As he read the comments they kept getting weirder and weirder, some just downright degenerate. Reading comments about himself was a surreal experience. He was used to seeing similar comments about other people, but to have them directed at himself made him feel a bit self conscious. Now he was wishing he spent more time on his content instead of just halfheartedly putting it together.
Well there was only one answer left that would make him feel better, ‘I have to make better content that I can actually feel satisfied with’ he thought with determination, however looking over at the bong on the bedside table made him change his statement slightly 'tomorrow though' He thought, picking up his bong for another hit.