Chapter Ninety-Three: Cyber Offensive [First Update]

Sorry to have kept you Qian fans waiting so long. But I have not disappointed you. Those nasty rumors were nothing but malicious distortion by idiots. See the news report below for the full story.

A very short post from Ren Qian, yet it carried ironclad facts.

Countless fans of Qian breathed a collective sigh of relief, though they had always placed absolute trust in Ren Qian.

Still, when three people repeat a lie, it becomes a tiger.

With so many people online insisting that Ren Qian had been grinning at the scene of the accident, even his most devoted fans had been tormented beyond measure.

If the rumor had been true, what they would have lost was more than a singer. Listening to Ren Qian’s songs would forever bring to mind that flaw, and a thorn would lodge in their hearts.

Fortunately, Ren Qian brought uplifting news, and that news sealed the mouths of every hater. The clamorous talk died on the spot.

After all, this was a genuine news report.

It was objective. It was real. Unlike those sensationalist print tabloids and microblog rumors.

No one questioned that. In that instant, all of Ren Qian’s fans felt as though they had emerged once more into the sunlight.

Then other media seized on the contrast and rushed to report it as well.

The headline in the entertainment section of Search Tiger News was “Ren Qian Misjudged After Saving Lives at the Scene of a Car Crash.” The article focused on the phenomenon of distortion.

The report said that the usually low-key superstar singer Ren Qian had accompanied his girlfriend to inspect a property when they happened upon a car accident. He immediately joined the rescue effort, and the people nearby were moved by what he did and also stepped in to help.

But when the rescue was over, the commemorative photo taken to celebrate that no one had died was exploited by people with ulterior motives, who twisted the facts to accuse Ren Qian of smiling at the scene, as though he lacked morality and compassion.

Within only a few hours, dozens of famous microblog influencers and public commentators launched a collective attack. In the end, it was proven to be nothing more than a farce, and now Ren Qian had answered everyone with the facts.

The editor felt that there were not many stars left who were as handsome, talented, and willing to help others as Ren Qian, so he gave him a thumbs-up.

Search Tiger Entertainment merely cleared Ren Qian’s name, but the headline from the Memory Entertainment outlet was even harsher.

That editor was probably one of Ren Qian’s fiercest fans. She first posted the factual news report and used ironclad evidence to vindicate him.

Then came the real blow.

Although those irresponsible posts from the public commentators and big-name verified accounts had already been deleted, she had long since taken screenshots and now dragged them all out for public display.

One image, one pitfall, and the readers remembered every one of those brainless influencers and commentators.

The move was ruthless. That very night, the followers of those commentators and big-name accounts began dropping like flies.

No one had expected public opinion to reverse so quickly.

At nine o’clock sharp, a few minutes after Ren Qian reposted the eight o’clock evening news segment, Hong Tao’s microblog, the official microblog of Jiangnan Satellite TV, and several other singers’ accounts all reposted it as well.

At once, the fans of Qian were fired up.

Before Ren Qian had spoken out, they had had no evidence and could not recklessly defend him. Now that the truth was out, they were determined to repay the humiliation from earlier, no matter what.

Blood for blood. An eye for an eye.

“Qian fans, march with the army and cut down every mindless hater in our path. Leave none alive!”

Someone shouted this on the microblog, and to his surprise, it was met with a unanimous response from Ren Qian’s fans. Most of them did not know one another in real life, but that did not stop them from banding together like sworn brothers and fighting side by side.

The moment they set their hearts on revenge, those microbloggers who had once attacked Ren Qian without thinking were doomed. Countless fans of Qian flooded into their personal pages, and in an instant the place was packed to the brim.

Strangely enough, Ren Qian’s fans did not curse or swear. They simply copied and pasted Ren Qian’s microblog posts and the eight o’clock news clarification everywhere, under every post and every update, line after line, dense as a swarm of ants.

The account owners could not delete them fast enough.

The result was that, if a person possessed even normal intelligence, one glance at such a microblog page was enough to tell that its owner was unquestionably a brainless loudmouth.

How could someone like that still be worth following? Was that not just a roundabout way of admitting one’s own stupidity?

In old times there had been Guan Ning tearing his robe and cutting away the mat between himself and a false friend; today, with a nod to elegance, they came up with “unfollow to protect one’s intelligence.”

Soon, those account owners whose pages had been overrun by Ren Qian’s fans discovered in dismay that the popularity they had accumulated over a year, or even several years, had been wiped out in an instant.

Damn, that was ruthless. Not a single one left. How were they supposed to survive on microblog after this?

That was the fate of the self-employed microblog haters.

As for the big-name verified accounts and public commentators who had maliciously smeared Ren Qian all along and had amassed huge numbers of followers, they stood to one side and watched the spectacle.

When a fire starts in an ordinary house, it never reaches the county magistrate’s home.

Those fans, after all, were only a spontaneous, leaderless retaliation; they were harmless enough, nothing to fear.

Delete the posts attacking Ren Qian first, lie low for a while, and once this matter passed, they could come back out and continue cheating and deceiving as before, free and untroubled.

One well-known online moral crusader posted a microblog calling them out by name: the government had repeatedly warned people not to spread rumors, yet certain media outlets, big-name microblog influencers, and public commentators had ignored the law and gone their own way.

In order to grab headlines and boost attention, they often spread and reported things without even thinking. There is only one word for such behavior: brainless.

Did they not realize that their careless reposts could inflict enormous harm on a person’s reputation and psyche?

Most infuriating of all, the cost of spreading and amplifying rumors was far too low for these people. After the fact, they would not even offer the most basic apology; they would simply delete the microblog and play dumb.

I just do not understand it. When they were condemning others for moral collapse, they sounded so righteous and lofty. What an amusing media landscape, what amusing public commentators and microblog influencers.

Yet no matter how others condemned them, those people remained silent. At most, they cursed under their breath.

What a pain in the neck. If I stay quiet, can’t that be enough? Once the storm blows over, I’ll still be a hero, just the same.

But then,

At nine forty, Ren Qian’s verified official microblog posted a new update, and it completely ignited the emotions of the fans of Qian.

“I have come to understand this very clearly: some public commentators and big-name influencers have impure motives. They use microblog to seize benefits rather than to serve the public.

“As public figures, they have repeatedly failed to live up to everyone’s expectations. Every day they spread rumors on microblog, chase popularity, and follow trends blindly. Calling them a cancer on microblog would not be an exaggeration.

“Below, I will list some names...

“All of these people should no longer have such enormous influence on microblog.

“Fans of Qian, a holy war awaits you. Bombard their microblogs for three months straight, until they mend their ways and become new people!”

When the fans of Qian saw this post, they were momentarily stunned.

What?

Qian himself had taken action and struck back?

A holy war? Clearing the microblog skies to blue once more?

Their blood boiled. Earlier battles had always been local affairs. Even the biggest leader could not command every fan of Qian, but Ren Qian was different.

Just look at the repost count, and anyone could see how terrifying it was for Ren Qian to step in personally.

By eight o’clock the next morning, this microblog had been reposted 645,328 times, and commented on 2,459,875 times.

Over a million comments.

Many well-known microblog users understood at once: this time, those big-name accounts had really overplayed their hand.