Chapter Text
Keiwa was a bum.
He had lowkenuinely known that for a long time by now. He contributed absolutely nothing to the household and was the deadbeat sibling between him and his sister. The author is definitely not self-inserting about her own life here.
What matters most about his current situation is that he needs money at any cost. How else was he going to keep sending superchats and subs to his favourite streamer, Kurama Neon? Because even rich people need monetary donations from time to time…
As Keiwa was staring into his bowl of tanuki soba and his beautiful, amazing sister Sara was yapping away about how adorable Neon was, a rabid monster with an oddly phallic-shaped head busted through the restaurant out of nowhere and stabbed the shit out of the head chef.
Safe to say, the tanuki soba at this place will never taste the same ever again.
But there were bigger things to worry about. Keiwa had to get his ass out of there as more monsters started flooding the restaurant, relentlessly trying to stab him with their swords. As much as he cared for his sister, she ultimately seemed stuck behind some sort of invisible, impenetrable wall as she cried out for help.
He eventually made his way to the underside of a random building’s stairway. As he panted breathlessly and tried to ignore the few cuts they were able to get in as he ran away, he noticed someone else next to him in the same shape.
Kurama. Fucking. Neon.
He would have totally started fanboying if it weren’t for the fact that they were in mortal danger, and if he wasn’t more focused on the fact that he swore that he had seen the exact outfit Neon was currently wearing on his sister’s bed the other night, when she had told him that she was having a “friend” over and that he was absolutely not allowed to come in. At one point, she left the door open, and Keiwa, being the little dog (tanuki) that he was, might have sneaked in to peek out of curiosity.
BUT THERE WERE BIGGER THINGS TO WORRY ABOUT.
Like how they were being surrounded and circled by literal dickheads with swords pointed at them. They were fully expecting to die right then and there in a horribly painful bloodbath (RIP to Keiwa’s dreams of filling in that new vacancy as head chef of the tanuki soba place). Just before the swords swung down on them, though, two random guys in animal-themed costumes came in and started beating the hell out of the monsters with plastic-looking weapons.
Keiwa had sworn the furry convention was last week (he would know, because he was there and blew all his money on buying things he absolutely did not need). He wasn’t going to complain, though, because whoever these fellow furries were, they just saved their asses. Their suits also looked quite nice…
The one in the panda helmet told Keiwa and Neon to get their asses out of there, kindly leading the two of them to a random rooftop. Once he and the buffalo-man took off their fursuits, they proceeded to get into a vague-posting competition akin to the likes of Zeztz’s writing. Not that Keiwa would know what that even is, considering he’s like three years in the past. All Keiwa heard was something about scoring points, a reward, and some other guy in a castle. As far as he knew, this was about some weird, sexually charged post-convention activities that are too graphic for a fic of this rating.
Fed up with being left out of the conversation, as he may or may not have wanted to join in, he asked the two of them what the hell they were talking about. Only for the beautiful, chiseled, buffalo furry man to tell him that the world was about to end.
Welllll shittttt…
On the one hand, if everybody died in some horrible apocalyptic event, including him, he wouldn’t have to worry anymore about the crushing embarrassment of being unemployed and broke. On the other hand, he kinda didn’t want his sister to die.
All that came out of Keiwa’s mouth in response was a limp “huh”.
He also kinda didn’t want to be dealing with this giant tentacled slug-castle that just came out of nowhere and K.O’d the man who was wearing the panda helmet earlier into a wall. The man disintegrated into a pile of colorful dust as the buffalo man laughed like the little shit he was.
The next thing he knows, the entire building is collapsing from an explosive blast caused by the eldritch castle creature, and Kurama Neon is about to fall to her death. Keiwa tries his best to run over and catch her, but goddamn that tanuki soba had him feeling full, and he sure as hell wasn’t exercising in his free time outside of walking to different places to get job interviews.
Luckily for Neon, some lad with absolute aura driving a motorcycle caught her before this chapter had to be retitled, “The Night Kurama Neon Died”.
The man who saved her turned out to be an incredibly handsome, slightly annoying, and condescending rizz-god once he took off his helmet. The madman even dared to ask if Keiwa was Neon’s boyfriend, and upon them instantly declining the notion, said that he still seemed to have a chance.
Neon hurriedly pulled Keiwa aside to ask, “What’s with this guy? We just met, and he’s super cocky.”
Mmmmmm.
Cock.
Before Keiwa could think about anything else, the chad known as Ukiyo Ace pushed the two bozos aside so he could get his job done. In an attempt to sound intellectual to impress Ace, Keiwa started spouting some diatribe about how depressing, fruitless, and desolate the world seemed now that everyone around them was probably dead or in a coma.
And he was kinda right, but Ace, being the legend he is, showed his true powers of pure hopium as he stated that the world could still be saved.
Henshin or something, IDK. I know you aren’t reading this for well-written fight scenes.
Ace proceeded to aura-farm and single-handedly take down the entire mob of monsters, then kicked a hole through the living castle creature that was so large it could rival the likes of your mom.
Being the incredibly confused little guy that he tended to be, Keiwa asked the man who he *really* was, only for him to reply:
“Geats. Kamen Rider Geats.”
Like that was supposed to mean something to him.
He was, admittedly, really cool, but Keiwa was still trying to comprehend what had even just happened today, what it meant for his nonexistent future (considering this Geats guy doing cool poses with explosions in the background didn’t exactly change the fact that everyone around them was dead), and why all of these superpowered furry cosplayers were kinda incredibly hot and sexy.
Before he could actually finish asking this “Kamen Rider Geats” anything that was going through his mind, though, the air around him started feeling heavy and weird. His vision blurred as he felt his consciousness splitting into two and doing some sort of obscure cosmic dance that left his brain full of fuzz.
Next thing he knew, he was back in his bedroom exactly as that very same morning had played out.
Except this time, he was greeted by a random woman who appeared to be around his age, staring at him as if she were watching him sleep the entire time and waiting for him to wake up. She wore an extravagant black-and-white layered dress and had her hair done in a side ponytail with a headband, like she was some sort of eccentric manic pixie mascot character.
Keiwa heard her say something in her high, upbeat yet largely rehearsed voice about him being “chosen” for something and that he’d be some sort of men rider or whatever (he already was, so why was she acting like it was news to him?). He was more preoccupied by noticing that little chucklefuck Ukiyo Ace standing in the corner of his bedroom, staring at him as if they had some sort of business to be settled.
The woman who introduced herself as Tsumuri then pushed a box into Keiwa’s hands, urging him to open it and see what was waiting for him inside. He obliged, if only to make these two literal strangers GTFO of the bedroom so he could go back to filling out job applications on Indeed that were going to get auto-rejected by some shitty AI screening system anyways.
It contained a plastic-looking belt buckle along with an emblem-type item that was engraved with the image of a tanuki on it. Confused as ever, Keiwa fiddled around with the belt buckle item, trying to figure out if there was some sort of catch to it. Once he put it near his waist, a strap materialized out of nowhere and fastened the entire apparatus firmly to his body.
Before he could start freaking out and ask what just happened, Tsumuri gave him the whole (vague) spiel about him being selected for a game and him being given a complimentary “Desire (?) Driver”. He had zero idea what any of this meant.
"So this is a Desire Driver?" Keiwa questioned, innocent as ever.
Ace smirked at his obliviousness and cute charm. "Yep...welcome to the game."
He winked at Keiwa as Tsumuri stepped closer with a smile on her face and stated, "Welcome to the Desire Grand Prix! Congratulations on being selected!"
Keiwa's heart started beating out of his chest, unsure of what to think (it was incredibly hard to think when he was in the same room as the giga-baddie Ukiyo Ace).
But little did he know... He had misheard Tsumuri.
And he had actually been entered into the DGP.
The DIH-sire Grand Prix.
And Ukiyo Ace was about to make him see stars (of the stars of the stars)...
