The Tables Turned
The Dimensional History Gallery.
It had been founded with a single purpose: to record and preserve only accurate historical facts.
And the manager of that Dimensional History Gallery was both its most active participant and its most famous figure.
No question post, no debate, ever escaped his notice. With elegant prose and precise source materials, he would neatly organize everything like a teacher.
And so one of the greatest questions among users of the Dimensional History Gallery was this:
And then one day that very figure uploaded a single post to the gallery.
The claim that the most famous classical poem of the empire had been adapted from lyrics sung by tavern prostitutes immediately rocketed to the top as the gallery's hottest topic of all time.
All manner of debates and discussions erupted, and the Dimensional History Gallery began to throng with activity.
Naturally, the manager's original post ballooned past several thousand comments and became the absolute center of the storm.
And just as naturally...
Elsi Bwener himself heard the rumor and came looking.
I was currently logged into the Dimensional History Gallery like a man possessed, devouring every post.
Even inside the gallery the debate over whether the manager's claim was true still raged, but the overall consensus was steadily leaning toward it being factual.
Which made the opinion of the manager who had started the whole firestorm all the more critical.
I posted with a desperate heart, but the answers that came back were crushing.
Is this some kind of mysterious persona?
From what I was hearing, the depth of knowledge and insight was enough to astonish actual scholars.
It was a shame, but meeting the manager face-to-face looked impossible.
That didn't mean I was giving up, though.
This was a matter of life and death for Soulnet.
With that single post of mine, the Dimensional History Gallery quite literally exploded.
Please.
Please.
From the direction things were heading, it didn't seem like the manager had simply made something up or told an outright lie.
I watched the Dimensional History Gallery with desperate prayer in my heart.
And the power of collective intelligence truly was magnificent.
A verifiable primary source existed!
I moved at once.
"Magic Tower Lord! Please put an op-ed in the newspaper!"
"Understood! You'll join me on it, of course! Let's work out the wording together like last time!"
"No. I have something else I must do."
"Hm? What else?"
"An op-ed is just a declaration. When scholars speak, the weight is completely different."
The Dimensional History Gallery.
Its users were no ordinary people.
Historians. Archaeologists. Respected masters and scholars from every nation—those were the main clientele.
And if they all made the same declaration at once, the impact would be on an entirely different level.
I left the post on the gallery.
And I made one more request of the Magic Tower Lord.
"I wish to submit a formal petition to the Senate. Magic Tower Lord. Please help me."
The Imperial Language Association had struck first and head-on. Now I intended to answer them head-on with the most powerful weapon I possessed.
The Imperial Language Association was in complete uproar.
Soulnet.
They had assumed it was nothing more than a snickering lowbrow subculture—easy to smack down—and had charged in without a second thought...
They had never imagined it would grow this large.
"This is actually perfect."
The flames had spread farther than expected, yet the association president remained unconcerned.
Controversy had been anticipated. If anything, the affair had successfully planted his name in the public mind, so he judged it a net gain.
But at a certain point the blaze leapt beyond any range he could control.
Rising approval among the lords and the voting older generation was welcome, yet the atmosphere of open hostility toward him that had formed across the entire dimensional realm was an unmistakable problem.
On top of that, the grave-digging had begun. His past actions, mistakes, old records and writings were being transformed into weapons and turned against him. As the rumors spread, the president could no longer simply smile.
"Damn it all! Where in the hell are they even finding these stories?!"
Past remarks and writings he himself had long forgotten were being excavated without end and broadcast across the dimensional realm.
At that rate, no matter how high his approval climbed, the losses would eventually outweigh the gains.
Entering the Senate was not the end. Longevity inside that body required reputation as well—and that reputation was currently being smashed to pieces.
Hypocrite.
An arrogant man who had dismissed a culture enjoyed by the majority simply to feed his own lust for power.
Such a reputation was the last thing that would help anyone survive long in the Senate.
The president circulated letters frantically, fighting to shore up his standing, but a reputation already crumbling and painted as a target did not return easily.
Worse still—
"Because of the president, the rest of us are catching flak as collateral."
"Where are they even dredging up things that old..."
"Aren't the losses starting to outweigh the gains at this point?"
Negative sentiment toward the president began to rise even inside the Imperial Language Association itself.
The situation was hurtling toward the absolute worst.
The words "How about we just call it a draw?" rose all the way to the tip of his tongue, yet if he did that he would be remembered as the man who started a fight and then failed to clean it up. He could not retreat.
He had no choice but to keep forcing hard-line editorials into the newspapers, tears of frustration in his eyes.
Public opinion only worsened with every one of them, yet he could not reverse course now.
All the president could do was pray that things would not deteriorate any further.
But—
"A petition has been submitted to the Senate?!"
"Yes, Dorfin. Public sentiment has already swung quite far away from your position. Even your own supporters."
"But why—?!"
"The phrase 'vulgar culture' became the problem. Read the petition yourself."
The situation did not stop there.
President of the Imperial Language Association.
Dorfin hurriedly read the petition that Elsi Bwener of the Black Magic Tower had sent flying into the Senate.
And his eyes went round as saucers.
"The founding emperor's Victory to the Empire was a classical poem adapted from the lyrics of tavern courtesans...?"
"The elders asked historians and masters individually. Every one of them testified that it is historical fact. That was the decisive blow."
"I didn't know!"
"I know. If you had known, you never would have said it. Even so—by your own logic, does that not make Victory to the Empire vulgar lower-class culture as well? Think carefully about the stature that poem holds inside the empire."
"No! No! I swear I never meant any such thing!"
"Yet the result is that you have insulted the poem. A fair number of the elders have already been persuaded by Elsi Bwener's logic. If Soulnet's expressions are vulgar, then the founding emperor's poem is also a vulgar poem—which is absurd. Therefore Soulnet's expressions must be accepted as part of culture rather than censored. It has become difficult to refute."
"My lord Count, I absolutely never—!"
"This is the mess you created. You will have to clean it up. Even among the elders, the number who feel revulsion at your coarse rhetoric is growing. I trust you will handle it well, Dorfin."
After one of the Senate elders departed, the association president—Dorfin—could only clutch his head and tear at his hair.
How had everything gone so catastrophically wrong?!
What even was Soulnet supposed to be?!
The expressions were crude and idiotic—that much was certain!
That was why he had gone after it!
So why...
Why did the founding emperor's most famous poem have to have a backstory like this of all things?!
President Dorfin found himself driven into a corner.
And then the finishing blow landed.
The Black Magic Tower's contribution appeared in the newspapers.
Eldrad Kamion, Lord of the Black Magic Tower, had clearly sharpened his blade before writing; the piece was a bomb packed solid with razor-edged criticism aimed at the poets and scribblers of the Imperial Language Association, and it was hurled straight into their midst.
Some of the rumors that had been circulating through Soulnet finally found their way into print under the bylines of actual newspaper reporters, and the collapse at last reached its climax.
Only one choice remained for Dorfin.