“Don’t make that surprised face. Are you trying to hide that we know each other? That’s not exactly something to be ashamed of, is it?” Tang Nai spoke calmly.
Hearing her words, Irina couldn’t help but arch an eyebrow and said, “You’ve got a lot of nerve. Being associated with someone like you is clearly the biggest stain of my life, you know.”
“Still as hurtful as ever with your words. It’s a shame the debt between us is so unbreakable—otherwise, you would’ve run off and left me behind a long time ago, wouldn’t you, Irina?”
Watching Tang Nai force her lips into a sad expression while still wearing her usual dead-fish eyes, Irina just curled her lips and didn’t respond.
That’s not entirely true…
“Forget it. Your only job right now is to focus on being my Psychological Counseling. Leave everything else aside.”
Watching Tang Nai seize the game controller again, Irina sighed inwardly, ‘This girl is really childish.’
“Little Su Mu, I’m not available right now. Just remember one thing: stay away from Tang Nai for the time being. I won’t be able to help you these next few days—if you run into trouble, you’ll have to handle it on your own.”
With that, Irina cut off the call, leaving Su Mu staring blankly at the screen.
‘What’s that supposed to mean? Did I just get abandoned? Tang Nai’s out of commission, Luo Jialan is gone, which means in the whole of B City, the only ones left to handle things are me and that Ye Wanqing girl?’
According to Lu Shan, that guy called Justice has gained over a million followers now…
‘A million followers—that’s insane.’ Su Mu could more or less grasp what that meant, since she herself was a case in point.
Even an idiot could guess where her years of Dark Magic Power had gone.
After all, Irina has enough strength to defeat Edma.
Edma stopped a bullet train with a single slap; naturally, she could just as easily turn Su Mu into a pancake.
‘I have to hurry and find a way to get rid of that guy.’
***
“How’ve you been these last few days?”
The buzz of the message dragged the pink-haired girl from her dreams.
Su Mu rubbed her messy hair, frowning as she looked at the message from Luo Jialan.
She wanted to say everything was fine, but the situation just didn’t allow for it.
“Not so great.”
“What’s wrong? Need my help? Is it that Tang Nai girl?”
“It’s nothing, don’t worry about it.”
After editing her reply several times, Su Mu still deleted all the words pent up in her heart, and sent just that brief message.
Rather than let Luo Jialan worry needlessly, it was better to just think of a way by herself.
After a rushed wash-up, Su Mu made herself a cup of instant noodles, jammed the fork in haphazardly, and once again opened that pop-up from the fire-lacquer app.
“16 hours and thirty minutes until the next livestream.”
‘So he’s already found the next “sinner”? Is this guy really in B City?’
According to Tang Nai, nearly all monsters below B-rank had been rounded up in B City by the Combat Division, so if Justice was included in that, there’s no way he could’ve found so many judgment targets from all over in such a short time.
But the reality was, he managed to find one every single day, and started his livestreams at exactly midnight.
It just didn’t make sense.
Unless he was faking it—but everything looked flawless.
As long as everyone believed he was punishing evildoers, the truth or falsity didn’t matter at all.
They’re all just hyping themselves up, thinking they’re some kind of cyber Light Yagami.
Maybe those people didn’t get the punishment they deserved, but this so-called “judgment stream” was nothing but a product of extreme emotions—petty theft would be punished with brutal execution in a frenzy of rage, slowly warping everyone’s sense of Justice.
But the biggest headache now was that there was no way to catch any clues about Justice.
Su Mu’s scanning couldn’t search through the void, and Tang Nai had only given her permission to access the forum, which made it nearly impossible to catch Justice lurking in the corners of the net.
She’d been tearing her hair out over this for days, only able to watch Justice’s soaring follower count and feel helpless.
She’d tried everything—even reporting him to the Internet Police—but of course, it got her nowhere.
‘There’s no way I can pretend to cooperate and try to dox him offline—who knows who would get exposed in the end.’
‘Justice probably started out as a C Class Monster, but after the streams, he should have powered up. Still, he wouldn’t have had enough time to absorb all that power; at most, he’s close to B-rank but he’d still have no trouble kicking a D Rank like me to death.’
‘But why am I even thinking about confronting him directly? This is all happening online—shouldn’t I be playing to my strengths?’ With that thought, Su Mu opened the forum, started a new post, and began pondering what to write.
First off, direct criticism or fake praise was useless—his stream had so many restrictions, there was no way to draw in extra traffic.
Justice clearly handpicked his audience from the easily manipulated, keeping the more rational people out.
If you tried to criticize him, his fans would just tear you to shreds; if you tried to fake-praise him, you’d just be met with uniform approval.
Su Mu could already imagine what would happen after she posted.
The online opinions would be sharply divided.
Some people would say: Our Lord Justice is truly magnificent!
Others: Who’s Justice?
Then his fans would spread his “deeds” with slanted rhetoric, leading the clueless onlookers to side with Justice, only fueling his momentum even more.
‘Ugh, what am I supposed to do about this?’
Su Mu knew the main challenge she faced now was this so-called information cocoon.
But unlike a data-built cocoon, Justice’s was constructed with magic and ability—making it even more closed off and more persuasive.
Normal people simply couldn’t keep their wits about them.
It felt like this wave Justice had stirred up was just getting stronger and stronger—unstoppable, and any obstacle was just an ant trying to block a raging tide.
Thinking hard, Su Mu rummaged through all her memories of the internet, searching for a way to break through, but what first came to mind were mostly insults people had flung at her.
“You’re playing God.”
‘So what if I play God… Wait.’
Thinking about a certain two-character game, Su Mu had a sudden flash of inspiration.
It was like the white glow from God’s opening page shone upon her—her clear blue eyes sparkled brightly.
‘That’s it—if I can’t stop the wave, why not ride it to the end?’
‘Justice’s rabid supporters are even crazier than the KouPii crowd. After all, what they’re watching is real, bloody, bizarre content.’
‘If I can get this mob to act even crazier, to make Justice notorious everywhere, maybe I can whip up a powerful enough army of haters and to do that, wouldn’t my best weapon be the art of “reverse trolling”?’