Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Inside the digital utopia named Elisyum, there is a city known as Xenokuni that can be described to be like a local version of Japan, full of craftsmen and Japanese aesthetics. Food carts where citizens can stop by and check out the handmade delicacies, stages where locals can perform shows and musical performances, and home to a couple of guilds like in your average DnD game.

And in that city there are places galore for individuals to hide from the public eye; tunnels, sewers, alleyways, you name it! The sand colored alleyways had a pattern of blocks of light and dark yellow going down diagonally as it provided cover for those hiding. And at this time of night of January 31 2024, there’s someone hiding in one of those alleyways; She was wearing a green jacket over a white upper top, while she also wore a sleeveless purple corset dress. She softly sang the lyrics to a familiar song to some people to herself as she had a hood over her head to cover it up.

“Happy Synthesizer, let me play for you. A melody that will reach into your heart~” When she got done with the first verse, she heard someone clapping for her. The person had medium length light hair and some purple hair streak marking with golden orange eyes. They were wearing a robe alongside a purple hoodie to keep warm from the cold of the night. When they spoke out, it was a male voice as if they were confident.

“Sorry for interrupting but I couldn’t help but listen to your singing which was fantastic by the way.” The male told her while having a smile on his face. Suddenly, the confidence was lost when he accidentally dropped a bottle of a potion he worked on at his workshop which caused him to panic. “CRAP CRAP CRAP!” He shouts as the bottle breaks, shattering into pieces after he crouches to attempt to catch it.

“Umm are you okay? Want me to help?” The hooded woman asks him but he puts up his hand.

“No no I’m okay, lost cause now anyway. By the way, have I heard of you somewhere before? Feel like I’ve heard your voice somewhere else.” The male says while getting up. The woman’s eyes suddenly widen and she gets nervous.

“H-Have you heard of me? I’m not known from anywhere around here so I don’t think you would’ve heard of me…” She says while looking away, the male sighs and looks at her.

“In any case, let me introduce myself since I haven’t already. My name is Magni Dezmond, former member of the guild Tempus of Holostars English. Pleasure to meet you, ma’am.” He introduces himself and reaches his hand out to her to shake.

“Oh yeah, Nenechi did tell me there has been an English branch of Holostars now. Now I don’t have to hide my identity from you.” She says as she takes off her hoodie revealing two uneven horns and a smile forms on her lips. “Where are my manners? My name is Aloe Mano, former member of the fifth generation of Hololive Japanese branch. Nice to meet you, Dezmond-san.” Aloe says, shaking his hand as both stomachs start to growl. They both hear it and start to giggle, heading to a food cart that sells ramen as the night continues on with a starry clear sky with a moon in its waning gibbous phase.

The atmosphere was welcoming and calming with the delicious homemade ramen and udon noodles adding onto the fact. As the two ate out of their bowls, a conversation started up between them, exchanging stories.

“So why is someone like you hanging around in a city like Xenokuni? Thought succubi lived in the underworld or something.” Magni asks Aloe, becoming curious as to why she was hiding.

“I wanted to get away for a while, do some self-reflecting while also sightseeing. I’ve only seen a few cities in Japan and I’ve explored most of the underworld too. Did you know they have a weird hotel for those who want to redeem themselves?” Aloe began to explain. “Being a succubus-in-training, I’ve been almost all over the Demon Realm itself to become the best diva down there but it changed when an acquaintance told me about aboveground and about Hololive.” She finishes explaining as she takes a sip of her drink from a straw.

“I see. And I guess cities like Tokyo, Nagoya and Hiroshima didn’t satisfy your interests? If so, you’ve come to a particularly unique place since Elisyum has quite the reputation for having some of the greatest places to see and discover.” The proclaimed alchemist explained to her with a smile before slurping some of the ramen into his mouth, albeit too fast, causing his tongue to burn a little. “Ah hot! Gotta be careful of that.” That causes Aloe to start giggling as a smile forms on her face.

“Hehehehe. You’re a weird but funny man, Dezmond-san. Wait didn’t you say you were part of a guild? What was that like?” Aloe asks Magni who was finishing gulping down water.

“Formerly part of a guild. I left a few months ago actually. It was some of the best years I had with the gang, even before joining the Holostars branch itself. When I wasn't working on a substance known as Copium, I was the guild’s main publicist. Helping with flyers for the guild, promotional material, and just helping with publicity in general. Hehe....hm....." Magni replies and sighs, looking longingly into his drink, pondering the past. Especially his time with
Altare, Axel, and Vesper. “Sometimes I wonder if I made the right choice leaving though.”

“I know the feeling too well, leaving something before thinking back if it was the right thing to do.” The succubus says quietly as she looks away and spots a particular building. It seemed abandoned yet no signs of it being abandoned. As if it was kept polished and clean by some unknown person or people. “Hey, has that building always been there?” Aloe asks Magni, pointing to said building and when he looked where she was pointing, his eyes narrowed.

“First time I’ve seen it. What do you think is inside?” Magni asks as he was now interested in what was inside the mysterious building, it was as if they were drawn to it. They look at each other and look back at the building, then back at each other, the both of them shrugging. They both agreed that there was only one way to find out and once they were finished with the ramen, they got up and headed towards the mysterious building. Once they entered the building itself, the lights were off, there were cobwebs everywhere, and black sheets covered mostly every type of furniture the two accidentally bump into with the occasional toe stubbing from the both of them. But at the same time, it had decent air conditioning and very polished windows. It was indeed abandoned but wasn’t at the same time, which made Aloe and Magni even more confused.

“Wonder who had this building before? Whoever did must’ve taken good care of it. Besides the absence of lights and whatnot.” Magni said before hitting his hip on a corner of the table that was covered by the sheets which a barely held back agonizing scream followed soon after.

“I don’t know. Just hope we don't get caught snooping in here.” Aloe replies while looking around, her accidentally hitting the same table which caused her to hold back a scream from the pain. “Oww…”

“Hey, it was your idea to waltz in here and look around like Scooby Doo. But still I agree since we’re technically trespassing.” Mangi told her while making sure not to bump into anything. Aloe then spoke up.

“Yeah besides, we’re the only two people who were out around here. It’s not like anyone’s gonna find o-”

“What the FUCK do you two think you’re doing?” Someone said loudly, causing both Aloe and Magni to turn around and see two other people. Magni had a deadpan expression on his face as he turned towards Aloe whose eyes were widened and jaw dropped.

“You had to say somethi—”

“I KNOW!” Aloe interrupts, shouting back at Magni as she looked back at him.

Chapter Text

“You had to say somethi—”

“I KNOW!” Aloe interrupted, shouting back at Magni as she looked back at him. However, she then looked back at the two people and saw some details about them.

One had dark hair tied into a ponytail with a leather jacket based on the game “Yakuza” while the other one had a black t-shirt with a tear in the front and stitches that fell over his left shoulder to reveal a white pattern on the front of the shirt. He also had dark hair and red eyes with a kitsune inspired hat on alongside red sunglasses. The male was a few inches taller than the female but seemed familiar, which turned out to be Kson and Kuro Kurenai.

“Coco-senpai? Is that you?” Aloe blurts out loud, causing Magni to be in shock. Kson was surprised that Aloe knew her Hololive identity out of the gate.

“Huh? How did you know about that? I don’t have any distinctive features to go off of.” Kson asked Aloe as she tilted her head with Kuro in shock as well.

“Your voice is pretty recognizable, your use of foul language, plus your tail.” Aloe said pointing at the big purple tail behind Kson which caused the gang leader to look behind her and panic a bit.

“SHIT! I forgot to take that out before I went out tonight! Henya said I looked fine too…” Kson mutters to herself, Kuro snickers before clearing his throat to speak.

“Anyway, who are you two and what are you doing here in an abandoned building like this one?” Kuro asks Aloe and Magni as the both of them thought of an answer that won’t make them sound suspicious.

“Well this is Aloe Mano and I’m the great Magni Dezmond and we’re uhhh… pretending to be Scooby Doo?” Magni says nervously with a nervous smile, sweat running down his face as Aloe facepalms, sighing in frustration.

“Wow, real convincing, oh great Magni Dez—”

“I KNOW!” Magni interrupted her.

Kson gave a smile and shook her head, signaling the both of them to try again.

“Well to tell you the truth, we’ve never seen this building before and for some reason it was like we were drawn to it.” Aloe explains honestly to the once dragon and the other companion that was with her. But then she asks them a question. “But what are you two doing here then? Surely you guys didn’t follow us right? Right?” A sweatdrop appears on Aloe’s left cheek and Kson and Kuro stay silent.

“Wait, don’t tell me you guys are here for the EXACT SAME REASON. Are you?” Magni asks them before Kson clears her throat and explains their reasoning.

“We’re here because Kuro asked me to help him look into this building actually. And not why you two are here at all…yeah that’s it.” She says as Kuro nods in agreement, smiling proudly.

“That’s right. Actually since you two are here, wanna help? Four heads are better than one after all.” Kuro says while looking at the two of them. Aloe and Magni nod while smiling at Coco and Kuro, the two of them do the same.

As they looked around the abandoned building looking for clues as to what it was originally, (hitting hips against corners along the way) Magni found a large door with a speaker and a button on it.

“Hey guyyyyyyys? Think I found something.” Magni said as he pointed to said door, causing the others to speed walk up to where Magni was. The door seemed to be blue but the color of the door was washed out, as well as covered in dust from the years of being untouched.

“What do you think is in there? A hole leading to a new room?” Aloe asks as Kuro inspects it, brushing off the dust from the door and sees the button.

“Well as they say, when there’s a hole, there’s a goal.” Kson says out loud which caused both Kuro and Aloe to giggle and snicker. “HEY! WHAT ARE YOU TWO LAUGHING AT?” Kson looks at the two of them back to back.

“Sorry sorry. Should we push the button since we don’t know what else to do?” Kuro asks as Aloe and Kson both think.

“It could be a way to open it. It might be locked from the inside.” Kson adds as Aloe nods her head.

“Though we probably shouldn’t press it; Who knows what might happen afterwards and we don’t know if it’s booby trapped.” Aloe says as Kuro started to snicker but then cleared his throat and observed the door. Then Magni lets his intrusive thoughts win and presses the button on the door.

“MAGNI!!!” The three of them yell at him and suddenly the door starts to shake as a bright light flashes, causing the four of them to cover their eyes. When the light dimms, there was suddenly a handle on the door and a sound indicating that it was unlocked.

“Was that handle there before?” Kson asks out loud as the other three look at the door. “Oh well, now at least there’s a way to open the door now.”

As the four of them went inside the now unlocked room, looking around for what the purpose of the room might be, the lights suddenly turned on and there were four doors leading to four separate rooms, a main living room type area where there was a couch and a TV on a stand was a orange circular device that had a blue button on it. The four Vtubers see the device and Aloe, Kson and Kuro look up at Magni who was eyeing the device and then suddenly look at the three of them.

“Hey come on, we all want to know what it does.” Magni says as Aloe facepalms, Kson lets out a frustrated sigh and Kuro just shakes his head.

“Magni, what do you think happened the first time when you pushed an unknown button in this building?” Kson asked, now having her glasses above her eyes while using her fingers to rub said eyes.

“It led us to this cool looking place.” Magni simply responded which caused her to facepalm herself.

“Magni please don’t let your intrusive thoughts win again.” Kuro says to the publicist, hoping it would be enough for him to think…

It wasn’t

“Too late already let them win!” Magni says back as he touches the device with his finger.

“MAGNI!!” The three yell at him again but instead of the ground shaking like before, the TV turns on with someone appearing on the screen through static.

“I..th….ing on? Hello?” It sounded like a female was speaking through the static. Once it tones down a little, the voice and visuals become clearer. “Okay good. HAI-DOMO!” The voice was definitely clear who it was.

“Is that…” - Aloe

“Yep.” - Kuro

“One of the very first Virtual Youtubers herself.” - Magni

“Kizuna Ai in the flesh.” - Kson

“If you’re watching this, that means you found it! Congratulations fellow graduates and welcome to the Clubhouse! This place is for Virtual Youtubers who have graduated or have been terminated and wanted a safe space for them to talk about their time as a Vtuber whether it was good or bad without the prying eyes of the public. The cafe part is just a front but you can do whatever you want with it. Kizuna Ai explained through the recording playing on the screen.

The four of them did not believe their eyes at what they were watching. “That’s all for this prerecorded message, BYE BYE!” The recording turns off, leaving the four confused.

“So does that mean we were always meant to find this place?” Magni asked as the other three collectively thought for a few seconds before one of them spoke up.

“Hey I got an idea! Why not use the cafe to fund the secret clubhouse? There’s a lot of Vtubers who left the scene, right? We just need to find a couple who can help us out and we can somewhat do a test run!” Aloe said as Kson smiled and nodded in agreement before the other two followed suit.

“If it’s a cafe, I know just who to call to help us.” Kuro responds as he pulls out his phone that surprisingly still had signal and taps on a contact that says “Pomu Rainpuff”.

A few days later the Aloe, Kson, Kuro, Magni, and now also Pomu Rainpuff, the yellow haired fairy who was wearing comfy jeans and a Metal Gear Solid hoodie had recently finished cleaning the cafe and now someone else entered through the door. The person was wearing a gray/brown coat that had a green sleeve on the left arm, gray long pants and also had long white hair and glasses on. And he also had a rectangular sign that Magni had commissioned to be made

“Oh Vesper, you brought the sign! Just put it on that table near Aloe-senpai.” Magni says with a smile on his face which causes Aloe to look back at him, surprised when Magni calls her his “senpai” Vesper Noir walks to the table near Aloe and introduces himself to her.

“Hello, Aloe was it? I’m Vesper Noir, the academic advisor of the guild Tempus. I was surprised to find out a place like this existed.” Vesper says as he places the sign on the table that simply says the new name of the cafe.

Virtual Reincarnation

The Place for the Gone but Not Forgotten