Wings of Jealousy
Someone’s knocking pulled him into the light.
The man who appeared next was a college friend whose name had already grown hazy.
“Hey, wake up! Class is over.”
Lee Shin thought, It’s a dream.
“You pulled another all-nighter, didn’t you? Tutoring again? How many sessions are you running now—four? Five?! Are you insane? A scholarship student squeezing in five tutoring gigs?”
At the mention of five tutoring sessions, Lee Shin realized this was his third year of university. Back then his older brother had just started working at the hospital, and he had been desperate for money. His decent academic background had at least let him land high-paying part-time work; without it, he would never have managed.
“I don’t get you. Why do you live like such a loser? With your height and looks, if you ditched that checkered shirt and threw on an S-ranked varsity jacket, the game would be over.”
“Forget it. Come with me today. Who said you have to pay? Just follow me. Hyung’s treating you to the full course.”
The friend had been famous in their department—a walking cheat code. Wealthy family, handsome face, excellent grades, and a natural social butterfly. Even when Lee Shin’s wallet was empty and he asked for food, the guy never once frowned; he would simply buy him a tonkatsu set.
He really had everything, Lee Shin thought. The only thing he lacked was the top-student title Lee Shin had stolen from him at entrance exams.
Once the memory clicked into place, he understood exactly which moment this dream was showing him.
Ah. That day.
The day he had gone to the most incomprehensible place in his entire life.
As expected, the problematic space soon appeared.
Colorful lights. A beat that hammered straight into the heart. Sparks flying from bodies burning with youth.
Yes—a club.
“Pretty awesome, right? You’ve gotta know how to have fun too. Oh—hey! Guys, this is my friend. Lee Shin. Family name Lee, given name Shin. Looks like a total playboy, doesn’t he?”
The first club he had ever visited was pure shock to Lee Shin. Noisy, dark, dizzying with alcohol, perfume, and body odor. People writhing on a tiny stage like earthworms trapped in a plastic bottle. And two hundred thousand won for a table that wasn’t even worth it.
So he had asked: Is this actually fun?
“Fun? Of course it’s fun! Why, you don’t think so? Hey! Everyone, my friend says this isn’t fun!!”
His friend insisted that this was how everyone played and told him to loosen up, but Lee Shin couldn’t. It wasn’t about money or fatigue. Fundamentally—
There was zero fun in it.
For Lee Shin, fun had always meant rest. When loneliness struck as a child, when reality grew too heavy later on, he needed an escape from that harsh reality. He found it in GM—his one true sanctuary.
Lee Shin leaving the club.
He had probably thought the same thing back then.
This time……
·
·
“Guild Leader!!”
At the shout, Lee Shin opened his eyes and turned his stiff neck. Chae Dong-ha stood before him wearing the most frantic expression Lee Shin had seen in recent memory.
“……What character are you raising?”
“……”
“……”
“……”
Crack!!
A vein popped on Chae Dong-ha’s forehead.
The man was barely keeping his temper in check, and the first thing out of Lee Shin’s mouth was “character”? Chae Dong-ha ground his teeth and forced the words out one by one.
“……We. Have. A. Serious. Problem. Guild. Leader!!”
The phone Chae Dong-ha held up displayed the following.
In that instant, Lee Shin understood the meaning of the dream he had just had.
“Ah…… So it was a prophetic dream.”
That friend had probably taken a leave of absence because of school violence too, right?
* * *
The “Lee Hye-jung School Violence Incident” video uploaded to the YouTube channel began with the informant’s interview: “Lee Hye-jung was a demon.”
— “Smoking was the basics. The kids she hung out with were all delinquents. You know, the so-called ‘iljin.’ That was her crowd.”
— “The hardest part was the money. Money, money, money—she extorted it from the kids every single day. One time there was a friend whose family was struggling financially. When they said they had no money, she told them to pay with their body and slapped them…… *sob!*”
The way she ran a multi-level extortion scheme on her classmates, or forced loans and collected interest—it sounded less like a student and more like a loan shark.
— “I wanted to keep it buried, but seeing her strutting around as a successful hunter was just too disgusting to bear. If you do bad things, you should be punished. That’s only right. *sob sob*”
A tightly constructed narrative ending with the victim’s tears. A perfectly crafted exposé video.
And as if on cue, videos targeting Mir Guild hunters began flooding YouTube.
— “I first met Jeong-seok oppa five years ago. Back when he was in the 5th Division League, a friend introduced us. I was drawn to his blunt but considerate side, and he said he liked how bright I was compared to him. That’s how we started living together……”
— “Is it right to abandon the woman who stood by you through the hard times just because you’ve become a little successful? I’ll leave that judgment to you all.”
— “If you weren’t going to show up, you should have at least called. When self-employed people like us get no-shows, the damage is huge……”
·
·
Other videos covered swearing, smoking, dating history, debt, and even borderline scam accusations. Every starting member from both the raid and the league teams—anyone connected to Mir Guild—was suddenly the subject of sensational videos.
An unusually large number of negative videos were being mass-produced, all aimed at Mir Guild.
Yes.
The rackka YouTubers had arrived.
* * *
Mir Guild Representative Office.
The office, already lively on a normal day thanks to its owner’s personality, was especially chaotic today. Judging by the long line of hunters, it looked like the noise would continue for quite some time.
“Guild Leader!! This is all fabricated!! It’s true that I lived with Ji-young for about two years after meeting her through a blind date, but she was the one who cheated and she was the one who ended it! She said she couldn’t see a future with me while I was bouncing between 5th Division teams……!”
“Calm down, Jeong-seok. I believe you. It’s fine. So you never two-timed anyone like the video claims?”
“*sigh*…… A little while after we broke up, you scouted me, Guild Leader. Not long after I moved here, I met Noona Sarang. There’s no overlap.”
“Hmm~ Then what was the reason you broke up with this Sarang noona?”
“That was…… our personalities just didn’t match. Anyway, there was never any two-timing or anything like that.”
“I know. I believe you.”
After repeating “I believe you” nearly a hundred times without a single joke, Lee Shin finally managed to send the agitated Park Jeong-seok out of the office.
But that was only one person.
Plenty more still needed Lee Shin.
He gently patted the shoulder of Lee Hye-jung, who was crying in a way completely unlike her usual self.
“*sob* I’m really not like that, Guild Leader. Why would I steal my friends’ money? I don’t even know that kid’s face.”
“I know. I believe you.”
“It’s so unfair, *hic*.”
He gave advice to a troubled Yu Ri-ra.
“Guild Leader, it’s unfair! Stalking? I was just going to the convenience store the oppas frequent or following their schedules like a normal fan……”
“Shut your mouth.”
“……Yes.”
To Park Su-bin, who entered with an anxious face, he said only one thing.
“Guild Leadeeer……”
“Bokchi, go back.”
“Yes……”
By the time he finished counseling everyone, morning had turned into evening.
Lee Shin looked at the dark sky, chuckled, and checked his monitor. Even now, sensational gossip about Mir Guild—private lives, family matters, past stories, relationship issues—was being churned out as videos.
“Twenty videos in just two days since the first one dropped…… They’re being awfully cute about this.”
Anyone with a functioning sense of reality could tell this wasn’t normal.
After all, it was far too blatant.
Then again, given Mir Guild’s current momentum, it made perfect sense. The guild had not only recovered its form but was pulling ahead in both raids and league matches.
“Right, hyung?”
Chae Dong-ha, who had entered the office at some point, placed Lee Shin’s favorite matcha frappuccino in front of him and answered.
“Are you certain another 2nd Division guild is behind this, Guild Leader?”
“Our guild’s performance leaves no openings. Even a passing kid could tell you it’s impossible to catch up through in-game means alone.”
“……Still, they poured so much money into recruitment. Would they really give up so easily?”
“Look at this!”
Chae Dong-ha’s voice trailed off uncertainly.
Lee Shin immediately caught the lack of conviction.
“Be honest. You started having doubts while saying it, didn’t you? You probably thought, ‘If they’re chaebols, they could burn that kind of money if they really wanted to……’”
“……”
“And what’s so hollow about it? Flip your perspective. They spent that much money, which means they’re even willing to sit at the same table as us right now. It’s like a friendship fee.”
“A friendship fee? Do you know how much the average recruitment budget for 2nd Division guilds is this season? Two friendships and a few mid-sized companies would go under.”
“Kuh-kuh-kuh-kuh-kuh!”
Lee Shin laughed like a villain for the first time in a while, then sipped his drink through the straw and changed his expression.
“Still, credit where credit is due. Whoever it is, they hit one point perfectly.”
“……You mean they targeted the other members instead of the guild or you, Guild Leader?”
“Bingo! Nailed it. Impressive.”
Chae Dong-ha was right. This scheme was aimed squarely at the Mir “raid team.”
“It’s not strange for hunters who do well to attract this kind of nonsense. The better their results, the more famous they become, the more flies gather to take their share. Views up close, recognition from afar, and if they bite properly, a pretty decent profit too.”
Why resist such easy, visceral stimulation? That was why they used those childish, clickbait thumbnails.
And it worked extremely well.
“People enjoy watching someone fall more than watching someone succeed. That’s why there’s that saying—‘Those who fall have wings.’ People with wings are hoping they’ll drop.”
“……That’s not what the saying means.”
“Anyway, what I’m trying to say is that this isn’t a ‘strange incident’ at all.”
And this was exactly why Lee Shin rated this childish scheme so highly. It exploited people’s petty jealousy toward others’ success and spread it in bulk to manufacture public opinion.
“Look. The rackka YouTubers who were active at the start are already quieting down, and now new ones are sniffing around.”
“You’re right. They really are.”
“Another point worth praising! They deliberately chose a lowbrow theme from the beginning.”
“Because it’s childish, anyone can jump in without needing evidence, and it resonates more. Plus, when they go this low, it becomes awkward for us to respond at the guild level.”
“That’s right~! Smart is always best.”
Chae Dong-ha was correct. The controversy was so childish that responding was difficult. If they got serious and threatened lawsuits, people would say, “Touched a nerve, huh?” If they ignored it, people would say, “See? They’re guilty!” Either way, the conclusion was the same: “They must be hiding something.”
An invincible logic.
“Agitation takes one sentence. Refutation requires dozens of pages of evidence.”
“……That’s Goebbels the Word of Power user, isn’t it?”
“In this context it’s a Word of Power user. Anyway, to summarize: thorough personal targeting, cheap videos designed to stoke jealousy, and an invincible logic that makes any response look suspicious. In other words—”
“A trade with zero downside.”
“Zero-downside trade, yeah.”
“It’s a different flavor, but the same principle as when I keep dragging Kirin Guild’s name through the mud whenever my cooldowns are up.”
“I understand immediately. They can stir things up freely, but if we touch them, we lose.”
“Exactly. I don’t know who it is, but someone who knows how to use their head set this up. I’d like to meet them face-to-face if I get the chance.”
Chae Dong-ha’s expression grew serious.
“If this was orchestrated by someone, isn’t the situation serious?”
“Hmm? A little?”
If Lee Shin had pulled something like this, the next step would be to fan the flames while staying hidden, then dig relentlessly until he found one real piece of dirt. Just one fact. Then he would drop it at the perfect moment, turning all those inflated rumors into genuine disasters.
“Tearing the raid team apart in the resulting chaos.”
“Hey! That guild is us right now!”
“Ah……! Right.”
“Right? The person who should be coming up with countermeasures is happily talking about tearing his own guild apart!”
Chae Dong-ha huffed, then asked,
“So you do have a plan, right?”
Lee Shin answered with his usual mischievous smile.
“Hyung, who do you think I am?”
The devil’s mouthpiece. The troublemaker. The king of schemes.
What more needed to be said?
“I’m Lee Shin.”
The “Shin” of “bottom-tier aggro” stood right here.
A mud fight? He welcomed it with open arms.
“It’s been a while since I’ve had this much fun.”