– Hello? Guardian Yu Jitae?
It was 7 in the morning when a call came from the PR team. The voice sounded quite rushed.
“Yes.”
– Sorry for calling you so early in the morning. Did you see it by any chance?
“I am seeing it right now.”
There was a news report.
+++[Superhuman Today]WDT, “You dare upload something like this?” Excessive anger of the community…+++
PR team.
Keeping Lair’s image and protecting the professors, cadets and staff members from the turmoils of the media was their job.
They often referred to their job as the ‘rainy season’ as a joke. It was because there were countless problems occurring from tens of thousands of people which caused their work to fall like heavy rain.
“Yong Dohee here. Are you okay, sir guardian?”
– Yes
A calm voice resounded from the other side of the phone. Though she felt doubtful for a second, Yong Dohee spoke urgently.
“For now, there is no need to be too worried. It’s not that big of a problem, you see.”
Following on from the rainy season analogy, what happened today was like water leaking from the ceiling. It wasn’t a massive deal.
However, the issue was that Guardian Yu Jitae tended to be overprotective regarding Yu Kaeul. Therefore, Yong Dohee decided to pacify Yu Jitae.
“The WDT has a wrong focal point.”
– Focal point?
window.pubfuturetag = window.pubfuturetag || [];window.pubfuturetag.push({unit: "64ce79d606107d003c23ea27", id: "pf-5140-1"})“Yes. Rather than doing that out of hatred against Cadet Kaeul, they’re just venting their anger. They are hardcore fans that follow every single event of Professor Wei Yan and those lunatics also visited Professor Wei Yan’s hometown in China, saying that they were visiting a sanctuary.”
– …
“Because of the unfortunate death of Professor Wei Yan, they’re shocked. They’re angry but there’s no target to vent at and it would be meaningless to point the blame at the monsters or the fissure. And then they chose the blameless Cadet Kaeul as their target.”
Yong Dohee looked at her screen. If her prediction was right, the media would probably reveal a different attitude.
To prove her right, the superhuman fandom communities and Lair’s fansite offered differing opinions.
[The WDT guys are a bit weird;;;]I understand that Professor Wei Yan passing away is sad… but why are they blaming Yu Kaeul for that;;?? Am I the only one finding this weird?
[They’re overreacting. WDT has always been a full-on fanboy and fangirl group]They’re super violent in their fan activities and it made me take a step back. I used to be Professor Wei Yan’s fan, but not anymore because of them…
[But it is a delicate timing]Guys, fucking think about it. How long has it been since Professor died? And yet casually uploading something like that? Isn’t it time for everyone to be careful? They themselves should fully know of the discord that happened between them and yet look at how thick-skinned they are. Don’t you get angry, you fucking idiots? ᄂ Next WDT member please… ᄂ Bro, this isn’t your camp…;;; ᄂ This guy’s lost.
While monitoring the reaction from the communities and the news reports being written, Yong Dohee bit on her nails.
“Sir Guardian. Cadet Kaeul is not aware of this yet right?”
– She isn’t.
“In case Cadet Kaeul finds out about it through other means, please give her a word about it beforehand, so that she can shield herself before seeing them.”
– I think so too. What about the video uploaded illegally.
In response to Yu Jitae’s words, Yong Dohee turned her gaze over to the display screen.
[Yu Kaeul video] (12 hours ago)Views: 3,894,334Likes: 31k / Dislikes: 27kComments: 999+
After she reported this being an illegal upload it went down from the trending list. However, since the vicious deeds of the WDT were intense, it was still a trending topic in other websites and the number of views was still on an increase.
“I’ve requested for it to be deleted, so it’ll go down in 3 days at the latest. We will also go through the legal measures regarding the illegal upload.”
– Three days, is it.
window.pubfuturetag = window.pubfuturetag || [];window.pubfuturetag.push({unit: "64cc9e79c7059f003e4ad4b0", id: "pf-5109-1"})“The PR team will try everything we can to help Cadet Kaeul, so please don’t worry too much.”
– Thank you.
As she ended the call, Yong Dohee felt doubtful.
Why was he so calm?
She thought about Guardian Yu Jitae. Like alcohol and water mixed together, he always had an unfocused gaze and a bored expression but would form a serious and scary expression whenever things were related to Kaeul.
But isn’t he too composed now that something actually occurred?
Is there something he was believing in?
While the middle-aged woman was in doubt, her phone rang once again. This time it was from the Education Department.
“Yong Dohee of the 3rd PR team speaking.”
– This is Daniella from the Education Department. There has been a notice from the Strategy Office of the Association.
Yong Dohee was dumbfounded.
From the Military Strategy Office of the International Hunter Association?
What notice?
From the phone came the secret of Professor Wei Yan and the schedule for an urgent conference regarding that.
“Sorry? What did you say just then…? Professor Wei Yan…”
Her head seemed to have gone empty from the unbelievable news. After ending the call, she blankly stared at nothing as unnecessary thoughts surfaced before anything.
Did she have to work overtime for the next few days?
Team Leader Yong Dohee murmured to herself.
window.pubfuturetag = window.pubfuturetag || [];window.pubfuturetag.push({unit: "663633fa8ebf7442f0652b33", id: "pf-8817-1"})“That’s fucked…”
Windows were shattered from the heavy rain.
***
Kaeul and Gyeoul were in the middle of completing a puzzle together. It was 1.6 metres in width and 1.1 metres in length – an extremely large puzzle with 10,000 pieces. The living room was filled with puzzle pieces and the two children were struggling as they attempted to solve the puzzle.
“Uuuh! This piece, I think it goes there?”
“…?”
“No? Maybe it’s here?”
“…”
“Hmm, you’re not sure either. What about you, Chirpy?”
Chirp!
It was a toy bought by Yu Jitae.
When the holidays began, all her friends went back to their hometowns and Kaeul who was left with nothing to do, played around with her watch all day. She appeared to be searching things related to the baby chicken or food everyday.
Thus, Yu Jitae ‘accidentally’ broke her watch and it was currently being fixed elsewhere. He bought them a puzzle to make sure they weren’t bored and unexpectedly, they were rather seriously solving the puzzle.
“You guys. You can’t use magic okay.”
“Yess!”
Since Yu Jitae had taken few of the puzzle pieces, it would take a lot more time. By the time they finish solving the puzzle, all the storms should be gone and it would be good to slowly chat about it then.
Meanwhile, Bom was sitting down on the sofa checking the comments being written realtime. She had a deeply sunk expression as she checked the comments and news reports being refreshed.
When the children were about 500 pieces into the puzzle, Bom spoke with a very soft voice.
“Ahjussi.”
“Yeah.”
“I think I understand what ahjussi was worried about.”
The emotive expressions of the WDT were becoming more and more intense.
Their hatred began even before Kaeul’s video was well-known.
From the sudden news of Wei Yan’s death, various communities had several waves of people showing their condolences.
However, the WDT was different. Their beginning was based on hatred and Kaeul’s video was just a trigger.
“…”
An image of self-injury; an image of a letter admiring the dead Wei Yan, written in blood.
Words reflecting their rage at Lair which failed to protect Wei Yan; words saying they would inflict harm on Kaeul.
The excessive people even marched into the joint incense altar and destroyed the images and incenses of everyone excluding Wei Yan.
“…”
Bom gazed at Kaeul.
She was solving the puzzle with Gyeoul. With her tongue hanging out, she was seriously pondering about the two puzzle pieces hanging in her hands.
“I think there are lots of scary people.”
Gold dragons found value in their identities for being guardian deities. They protected nations and sheltered their precious ones and were praised for doing so.
However, it felt like that could never happen in this world.
“What wrong did such a kind girl do…”
Just watching it made her upset but the more she became upset, the more she realised how futile it was. At least in Askalifa, casual dissatisfaction and anger of others wouldn’t be relayed so easily.
The reason Kaeul couldn’t stand in front of a crowd:
It wasn’t because Earth was wrong, nor was it because Earthians were unique. It was just a systematic problem that naturally existed in a highly scientifically advanced world.
“Don’t worry too much.”
“Yes.”
The moment she was made to face the fact that this world and gold dragons contradicted one another, Bom finally realised that Yu Jitae’s protection hadn’t been from overprotectiveness.
There was a reason he had to do it.
“This isn’t your last Amusement. Don’t take it in too seriously.”
“Nn… You’re right, ahjussi.”
But since she still felt somewhat depressed, Bom continued reading the renewing texts.
Meanwhile Kaeul, Gyeoul and the baby chicken had completed 1,000 pieces or so. The face and neck of a savanna giraffe revealed itself.
“Uwah…! This part’s finished!”
“…!”
“Gyeoul, we did it!”
While Kaeul and Gyeoul were doing high fives, a different news report came up.
“…?”
After checking the headline, Bom’s grass-coloured eyes shot wide open.
[Today Lair] (Exclusive) The deceased Professor Wei Yan was belatedly confirmed to be a demon as the investigations start once again…
The situation was flipped in an instant.
***
[??? Guys what’s this.]
[Where’s the proof? A report without even supporting it with a proof?]
[Ah what the fuck. Are you fucking retards crazy?]
[These Lair retards are fucking crazy. How are they going to handle it later if this is false?]
When the exclusive news was uploaded by Today Lair, the blazing WDT community had a tremendous amount of oil added to the fire.
They could not accept it. Even they knew that demons were bad and that they were the enemies of humanity.
In other words, there was no way Wei Yan was a demon… that should never be the case.
The devout believers of Wei Yan filled their forum with all sorts of profanities and words of hatred. Before long, they even went around other sites to pour out their discontentment against Lair.
Conspiracies also began being shared.
[I think I know what this is about. When Captain was trying to form the Azure Dragon study group, Lair fucking restricted him, about how the size couldn’t be too big. Because other study groups have to grow as well.]ᄂReally? WtfᄂFor real???ᄂYeah. People just don’t know. I work at Lair and I heard it from others. Apparently that’s why Lair and Captain had a bad relationship.
The post was soon deleted after around ten minutes, but the truth of the matter was not important for the WDT community members who had lost their sanity.
[Hello? Where’s the proof?]
[Lair, you shouldn’t ever think about easily going over this matter.]
In rage, they organised a donation to hire a lawyer while spouting more and more posts of malice.
Soon, they all gathered at Haytling and began protesting in front of Lair’s entrance. Regardless of gender and race, people gathered from worldwide and amounted to around 300 in total.
In front of the large main entrance of Lair that resembled the entrance of a shrine, the protesters shouted.
“Quickly provide correction for the preemptive news report and apologise!”
““Apologise–!””
The insane crowd burned a living pig to death, overturned and destroyed vehicles and created noise throughout the night with a megaphone. Some of them laid down on the ground refusing to eat anything.
“This is Haytling Local Police. Calm down everyone! What do you think you’re doing here?”
“You are all in cahoots! Aren’t you!?”
A conflict was formed with the police but they struggled and stood firmly. Around three days into their maddened protest, a high-ranked staff member of Lair appeared in front of them.
“Hello. I’m the Deputy Director of the Lair Investigation Authority, Zhang Haoyu.”
During the past three days, Lair had repeatedly spoken of how they were in the middle of an investigation. Due to that, the WDT members were slightly more assured of the fact that Lair’s report had been a speculation.
Facing the deputy director, they screamed for a correction to the report.
“Yes. Please calm down everyone. There are several reasons why I, who usually scribbles with a pen at the back, stood here instead of the Judicial Affairs or the Promotion team… One is because it has finally been confirmed through investigations that the deceased Professor Wei Yan had been a demon.”
“Ehh…?”
“…W, what was that?”
The voices of the WDT stopped immediately. ‘Finally confirmed through investigations’? Those weren’t the words they had been waiting for.
“Where’s the proof? F, fuck! Every time, there’s no proof!”
Someone near the back of the crowd shouted as it caused a ripple in the silent crowd.
“R, right! What is that based on!”
“Stop insulting the deceased and show the proof!”
“Show us the proof!”
When they were once again about to raise their voices, the deputy director of the Investigation Authority lifted his hand and stopped their words.
A bitter smile appeared on his face. He flicked his fingers and a hologram began displaying itself in mid-air.
“This is a video taken by a guard under Japan’s Royal Family. The Association has given permission for this to be shared and by now the video should have been revealed on the news with several reports regarding it.”
The moment Lair actually provided what they referred to as proof, the crowd turned quiet. While their doubtful gazes were showering down like arrows,
“This is the proof you had been asking for.”
The deputy director pressed on the button of a remote controller.
