Now It Was Certainty
Sirius headquarters, Platform Business Division conference room.
5:50 p.m.
Ten minutes before launch, the air in the conference room was drawn taut as a bowstring.
"Banner setup — final checks complete."
"Server traffic distribution is done. We can handle up to three times the usual load."
The reports kept coming, but the division head's expression remained rigid.
He had every reason to be tense. For Sirius, this launch was an all-or-nothing gamble.
"Any issues coordinating the other launch schedules?"
"No, sir. We asked the management companies for understanding and pushed everything back one to two weeks. There was some grumbling, but we sealed it with promotional compensation packages."
They had bulldozed every existing launch schedule and cleared the entire stage for a single work. The production directors had spent more than a week apologizing and begging for understanding just to force a slot that hadn't existed. That was how serious they were.
Still, the division head's fingertips trembled faintly.
Just because it did well on Munpia doesn't mean it'll do well here.
It was an unwritten rule of the industry. Munpia, the stronghold of male-oriented fantasy, and Sirius, with its broader mainstream tastes, were cut from different cloth. Hunter stories and status-window setups that Munpia readers went wild for often became entry barriers — or felt downright childish — to Sirius readers. Sometimes the age demographics simply didn't match.
The so-called coin-farm stories and divorce dramas were a perfect example. They posted solid numbers on Munpia, but once they crossed over to Sirius, most of them stalled out at average.
It'll succeed to some degree. But some degree isn't enough.
The terms Sirius had offered this work were extraordinary — a fifteen percent commission. That wasn't an investment you could recoup with a mere hit. It needed to rank among the all-time top performers of Sirius's exclusive titles. At least close. Anything less, and they were just breaking even.
"One minute, sir."
"Hoo…"
The division head scrubbed his dry face with both hands.
What worried him most was the territorial hostility. Famous works migrating from other platforms often got hit with rating terrorism from existing readers — malicious one-star reviews that had nothing to do with quality and everything to do with not wanting outsiders on their turf. If the ratings collapsed early, new traffic was a pipe dream.
Aspiring writers, too, sometimes left nasty comments on works that were doing too well, simply because it stung. Dismissing it as paranoia was hard when the data pile was big enough to call big data.
Please… just no rating terrorism.
He prayed silently.
Six o'clock sharp.
"We're live!"
The app's main screen transformed in an instant. The most prominent top banner. Pop-ups. Push notifications. Every weapon in Sirius's arsenal poured onto The Regressed Hunter is Merciless.
"The Munpia numbers give us plenty of justification. Even if we ride the banner boost through today and tomorrow, after that it's pure writing power."
The division head stared at the real-time data window on his monitor.
Gulp. Someone swallowed hard.
And then—
"Huh?"
One of the staff members made a startled sound.
"The comments… why do the comments look like this?"
"What! Hate comments? Rating terrorism?"
The division head jolted and checked the screen.
On secondary platforms, where a hundred-plus chapters dropped at once, readers normally needed time to actually read — comments didn't flood in immediately. A flood of comments this early was clearly abnormal.
But what unfolded before him completely defied his expectations.
"What… is this?"
It wasn't rating terrorism.
It was a bombardment. A carpet bombing of perfect tens.
Munpia readers normally found platform-hopping a hassle. Even when they did cross over, it usually took time. But this — thousands of loyal readers had stormed in the instant of launch and seized the comment section, as if they'd been waiting on standby.
Their purpose was singular.
It has to succeed on Sirius for the webtoon adaptation to turn out well.
They couldn't stand to watch their work, their characters, get ruined. That pure fan desire had become a tidal wave crashing over Sirius's shores.
"Division Head! The traffic—!"
"We've exceeded projections! Server load is spiking!"
"Uh… uh…"
The division head stared blankly at the screen. The graph was shooting straight up. Even Sirius's new visitors, curiosity piqued, were pouring in like a rising tide along the flower path the existing fans had laid down.
The word "success" wasn't enough for this.
It was the beginning of a phenomenon.
The web novel communities were in an uproar as well.
Plenty of hardcore veterans had been following the story since Munpia, but compared to giants like Sirius or Kakao Page, the community reader pool was a handful. Launch news from other platforms rarely became this much of a topic.
This time was different.
The enormous traffic Sirius had generated was, in reverse, setting the communities ablaze. Every popular post was plastered with talk about this one work.
Munpia readers and Sirius readers mixed, and a conversation opened up.
Voluntary reader marketing. The phenomenon on Sirius was so enormous that the aftershock spilled past the web novel communities and into the webtoon ones.
It was an analysis post on a webtoon community. The content was simple: web novel readers, desperate for a high-quality webtoon adaptation, were voluntarily carpet-bombing the Sirius launch with perfect ratings.
The response was scorching.
But where the light is strong, the shadows run deep. Self-proclaimed industry insiders of dubious credibility began to appear.
The rumor put on flesh and spread in an instant.
Negative public opinion that the webtoon adaptation was doomed. The content was reimported back into the web novel communities.
Anxiety bloomed like poisonous mushrooms.
But it was still a rumor no one truly understood — the quiet before the storm. The cute overreactions of people who had no idea that a real nuclear bomb was buried at chapter 150.
Hiss—!
Cool beer foam surged up the glass.
"Cheers!"
Clink.
The clear ring of glass on glass filled the chicken restaurant.
It was Sirius launch day. My brother, Representative Kang Suk-woo, and I had gathered at a chicken place near the office.
"Ahh… that hits the spot."
Kang Suk-woo drained his beer and wiped his mouth. His face was flushed red.
"Congratulations, Author. And you too, Boss. This isn't just a hit — this is a mega-hit."
Kang held up his phone screen for us.
Numbers don't lie.
Honestly, the work had done well from the start, but there'd been no shortage of twists and turns. Cash-flow crises. The Ad Like acquisition. The decision to produce the webtoon in-house. Not a single easy road.
But today, every one of those choices had been proven right.
"Comments climbing this fast, and getting bombarded with perfect scores instead of rating terrorism — I've never seen it before."
Kang said it with genuine awe.
"Normally you'd struggle for a few days because of the territorial hostility. I never imagined the Munpia readers would bring this much firepower…"
"Tell me about it."
My brother laughed as he tore into a chicken leg.
"The hard metric — view counts — will update overnight, but just looking at the comment velocity and payment conversion rates right now, the answer's already clear."
Every supporting indicator was pointing at a massive hit.
"This proves it, then."
I opened my mouth.
"It doesn't just work for heavy web novel readers. It works for the general public too."
That had been my biggest worry. Was my writing too niche? A private league that only the hardcore veterans loved?
But success on Sirius meant something different. This place was a giant melting pot — light readers, female readers, teenage readers, all mixed together. Landing here meant my story had universal entertainment value.
"In that case…"
I turned my beer glass in my hands.
"I feel certain about the direction we've taken — adapting the web novel almost as-is, or maybe even elevating it, into a webtoon."
If the web novel worked, a webtoon that visually realized that story to perfection would absolutely work. It would explode even bigger.
Those rumors floating around the internet about the webtoon adaptation being doomed? I could laugh them off. The further those rumors spread, the more devastating the webtoon's impact would be when it finally dropped.
"Exactly."
Kang nodded.
"The bad rumors circulating right now are actually a boon. Lower expectations, then — bang — detonate at chapter 150, and the reversal effect will be enormous."
"I'm already looking forward to the reaction."
My brother snickered.
"The Sirius servers might go down a second time."
"Come on, no way. They said they finished the server expansion today."
We traded jokes and laughed. But there was steel inside that laughter — not mere banter, but a strong premonition that it would become reality.
The anxiety was gone. What filled its place was nothing but excitement and certainty about the future rushing toward us.
"Come on, another round!"
"Yes! Tonight we drink till we drop!"
Our night shone brighter than any night before.
The taste of success was sweet. And the real sweetness — still unwrapped, still waiting for us — was sweeter still.
Chapter 150.
When that day came, the world would be turned upside down once more.
Now, it was certainty.