The Vultures of Celt Gallery

Heo Jaeyeon had shown plays that were hard to believe from a rookie in every single match, but that was only the starting line for NCX's Glen player.

It was simply the level he was expected to perform at.

So obvious that no one was particularly impressed.

Instead, people would say ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠things like, “Hmm, but he’s the NCX Glen laner. Shouldn’t he be doing a bit more than this?” turning the expectation into a demand.

Heo Jaeyeon had been crushed under that pressure.

And when it finally exploded…

It was the shocking elimination in the quarterfinals of Worlds.

A flood of criticism aimed directly at Heo Jaeyeon.

Countless accusations.

And mockery.

In the end, mentally broken, Heo Jaeyeon could only collapse on the spot at the moment of defeat and shed bitter tears.

And for the trash of Celt Gallery, that situation was nothing but prime prey.

The users of Celt Gallery had been casting hostile glances at Heo Jaeyeon ever since his debut.

The reason was simple: the large percentage of female fans who supported NCX.

Those female fans treated Heo Jaeyeon almost like a celebrity and went wild with their fandom.

They encouraged bromance between teammates to the point it made people frown, and flooded the gallery with cute-filtered photos of him.

Even when he made mistakes in gameplay, they blamed external factors instead of him and fiercely defended NineStar.

And that created a massive wave. Any streamer or caster who so much as pointed out one of Heo Jaeyeon’s errors would be buried under such an avalanche of malicious comments that they could never speak again.

DC Inside had always held a negative view toward female-dominated communities.

In a place like that, there was no way they would look favorably on Heo Jaeyeon, who monopolized the love of all those female fans and commanded a locust-like fandom that devoured everything in its path.

After Worlds ended and before the next season began, countless users on Celt Gallery wrote thousands of defamatory posts about player Heo Jaeyeon.

It was to the point where it was hard to even look at with open eyes.

It started with digging up his unfortunate family history from childhood,

then twisted his old trainee-era comments with their own delusions and grossly overinterpreted them in disgusting posts.

Anonymous false testimonies claiming to be former classmates, saying he had been one of the delinquent kids in school.

Maliciously edited clips of minor solo queue mistakes used to undermine his skill.

Posts comparing him one by one to the legendary TwoStep, claiming the NCX management had no eyes for calling up such trash.

Videos and posts that maliciously edited casual teammate comments to imply Heo Jaeyeon was so bad that the team was quietly ostracizing him.

And the comments that called it karma and celebrated it with glee.

Even after massive lawsuits were filed, the mockery showed no sign of slowing down.

And then—

At the peak of the conflict between both sides.

Celt Gallery was already burning fiercely as usual.

Then came an incident that poured even more fuel on the fire.

Right now, Lulu was considered the weakest champion.

And Goro was considered the strongest.

From Ha Yunseo’s perspective, Goro was actually a very favorable matchup for Lulu, but that didn’t matter to ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the public.

A professional gamer getting his soul completely shredded by a trash-tier champion.

And not just any amateur—an actual player in solo queue.

To them, only that fact mattered.

And that was the perfect weapon to tear apart the already mentally collapsed NineStar—Heo Jaeyeon—and his fandom.

Like hyenas driven mad by the scent of blood, there was no way they would miss such a massive, bleeding wound.

The bait burned through the gallery for several days.

The fire showed no sign of dying down.

Sharp, unfiltered words poured out without a second thought.

A festival for trash.

Cruel verbal violence meant only to drag one person down to the bottom.

The disgusting laughter of people who had lost their humanity.

If someone were to ask them, “Why are you tormenting him this much?”—

They would casually reply, “Well, he should’ve stayed out of our sight,” without batting an eye.

It was just for fun.

For no greater reason than that, they used the shield of anonymity to rip apart the heart of a young man who had only just begun his professional career.

Nothing more than entertainment to relieve their boredom.

To those who moved only for amusement, this kind of bait was simply like a fresh lump of coal thrown into the furnace.

If it can burn, they burn it.

Even if it doesn’t seem like it will catch fire, they set it ablaze anyway.

That was their principle and their motivation.

If there was any silver lining, it was that even they couldn’t burn the same piece of bait forever.

After only about three days, the bait slowly burned through all its fuel and turned into pale white charcoal.

Just as the incident was about to settle into nothing more than an occasional weapon used to mock him,

just as everyone was starting to look elsewhere for the next fun scandal,

just as they were yawning and wondering if there was anything interesting today—

Another bomb dropped without warning.

It was like a second nuclear explosion falling on Nagasaki after Hiroshima had already been bombed.