Chapter 152. Only I Can Beat Up My Viewers
Chapter 152. Only I Can Beat Up My Viewers
We returned home, changed into comfortable clothes, and sat down quietly in front of the computer.
Like always, we turned on the computer and the lights, and prepared for the stream.
"Hoon, are you ready?"
"Yeah, I think we can go live now."
Just as I was about to press the 'Start Stream' button—
"Hm? Hold on..."
My smartphone rang, and Lee Chae-hyun was calling.
"Huh? At this hour...?"
Laila, watching from the side, tilted her head.
"Isn't this when she'd normally be working at the foundation...?"
I answered with a puzzled look.
The moment I answered, Lee Chae-hyun's voice burst out.
"C-Chairman!! Are you transferring to another platform!?"
Lee Chae-hyun's voice sounded genuinely startled. Even through the phone, I could feel her tension. Eyes wide, I exchanged a glance with Laila.
Laila shrugged and said, "Well... she's an internal staff member and close to the CEO, so she might know."
"That could be."
Don't tell me she called so urgently just to ask that? I chuckled and answered, "I was not transferring. I just had a meeting, that's all."
Then Lee Chae-hyun let out a long sigh of relief and cried out.
'But seriously... was where I stream really such a big deal?'
"Whew... that's a relief. Things have gone completely crazy because of that right now!"
"Crazy?"
"Viewers from both sides are fighting like mad! The communities are in chaos, and people keep talking about you and your sister transferring!"
"What the—what's that supposed to mean?"
Even I was taken aback by that. I looked at Laila, and she tilted her head as if she was hearing it for the first time too.
"Chairman, you're going to stream now, right?"
"Yeah, I was just about to start..."
"Then your viewers will tell you all about it! I have to run into a meeting right now...!"
─ Click.
The call ended, and an awkward silence hung in the air for a moment.
"Right now... what does she mean by 'chaos'?"
"Hmm... why don't we just turn on the stream first?"
[ World's Strongest Hero : Lecture's over, I'm home. ]
The moment the stream went live, the viewer count skyrocketed.
"...Something feels off, doesn't it?"
The chat was scrolling by frantically. It was that familiar flow—the precursor to controversy I'd seen somewhere before. The pattern that only emerged when an incident was brewing.
[Ex-]
[plain]
[Ex-]
[plain]
[Ex-]
The chat was being buried under just "[Ex-]" and "[plain]".
"Everyone calm down. Let's start by calmly explaining the situation."
[Ex? plain?]
[Hero-ham, how could you abandon us like this?]
[Are we seriously just gonna get devoured and discarded like this???]
The chat was nothing but pure chaos.
[ Overflowing Holy-Power Pouch has donated 10,000 Watts! ]
- You fucking bastard, are you saying you've sucked all the juice out of us? Leaving us for Amazon? I'm disappointed...
"???"
I stared blankly at the screen. Laila, beside me, couldn't close her mouth, looking just as dumbfounded. I tried my best to grasp what was happening.
'Amazon? How the hell did the story spread like that?'
The viewers' outrage was swelling immensely. This wasn't the usual WWE we always had—this was UFC.
"Hold on. I'm trying to get a handle on the situation..."
Just then, a messenger window quietly popped up.
[ Saintess's Foot Wiper : Chairman, this is the post with the most up-votes right now. Please read it! ]
She'd sent me a link. I could see the title underneath.
[ The Complete Summary of the Unknown Hunter Song Hoon & Laila's Alleged Amazon Transfer ]
I pressed my lips together, moved the mouse slowly, and clicked the link.
"Let's take a look at this first, then we'll talk. I'll explain everything afterward."
I temporarily blocked the chat and read through the link Lee Chae-hyun had sent. It was organized by timeline, starting with my meeting with the Amazon TV rep, and included the fights between the two sides' viewers.
"Ah..."
Reading it made everything clear. Countless wild speculations had exploded from the fact that I'd met with the Amazon rep.
"Everyone calm down. Let me get straight to the point."
[?]
[Let's hear him out.]
[No way?]
"I'm not transferring. The truth is, those people showed up this morning..."
I explained the situation before meeting the rep, and then everything that happened, all of it calmly. I also said it firmly.
"I didn't take any kind of ambiguous position. I made it clear when I met them today. I will absolutely never transfer."
Even if they held a knife to my throat, there would be no transfer.
Only then did the flow in the chat begin to settle down a little.
"So, is the misunderstanding over now?"
[Misunderstanding's over, but... something else remains lolol]
[The gallery's literally about to explode.]
But that peace lasted exactly three seconds.
"Now that you mention it, our manager was saying the same thing earlier."
[Those Amazon monkey bastards are being sarcastic as hell and cussing us out.]
[Yeah, both sides are seriously tearing into each other right now.]
"...What?"
So, in other words, my viewers were fighting with the Amazon TV viewers?
"Hold on."
With a serious expression, I connected to the community. It was always a very active community, but now, every time I hit refresh, new posts were piling up.
[ Author: Anonymous ]
[ Title: The Traits of Pajijik-Watching Bastards ]
[ Content: They're just broke-ass school-meal kids with no money, trying to feel superior while watching streams lolol ]
↳ If you're broke, just watch public broadcasting, you cunts
↳ It's so funny how these no-name fucks form a collective as if they're fans lolol
↳ How could you donate when your mom won't give you an allowance? lololololol
↳ Still better than a bimbo starving herself and going into debt to donate lolol
↳ You beggar, get lost lolol
"Hmm..."
They really were fighting like crazy. It wasn't just a fight between my viewers and Amazon TV's viewers—it had devolved into a war between the platforms' viewers.
And what's worse...
[ Author: Anonymous ]
[ Title: Pajijik Streamers? ]
[ Content: Ugly looking bitches hiding behind their boards, trying to rizz guys with their voice lolol ]
↳ For real lololol, don't you feel ashamed acting cute with a face like that?
↳ If it were me, I'd have just killed myself lolol
↳ Why? All you need was a pretty voice, hide behind a board, call them 'babe, babe', and they throw money at you lolol. You definitely have to do it.
They'd even started dragging in completely unrelated streamers and lumping them into the insults.
'Had the trend changed a lot in the five years I was gone?'
The Amazon TV I'd known in the past had mainly been a mix of aggressive gaming streams, mukbang, and female cam streams. Even back then it was spicy compared to Pajijik, but...
[Whoa... what are you doing right now?]
[Hey, you bastard.]
[Huh? Why are you searching that word?]
I couldn't contain my curiosity. I immediately searched for 'Amazon TV' and went to the site.
"I mean, I'm just trying to check how things even got this bad."
Amazon TV's main page—the very first screen was unfamiliar.
"...What the hell is this?"
It was a location that looked like they'd rented out some broadcasting station's studio. Under the noisy music and flashy lights, countless people were sitting. And the donation history was so sprawling it almost covered the entire screen.
"Well, I can't even see anything."
At the bottom, the total donation amount was listed. And they were ranked 1, 2, 3. Also, whenever a donation came in, the female streamer would get up and do a suggestive dance.
"Am I just not keeping up with the meta now?"
Frowning, I hit the back button.
[That's an Excel broadcast, yeah. Ranking the female cam girls by donations.]
[And the low-ranked ones get kicked out periodically.]
[We don't call it a cyber room salon for nothing.]
"..."
A deep sigh welled up from inside me. Still thinking that surely not everyone was like that, I looked for another stream.
"...What's this asshole?"
It was a good-looking male streamer. He was doing a casual talk broadcast, but I couldn't just gloss over the content.
- Brothers, who? Ah... but that person is active on Pajijik, aren't they?
It wasn't a terribly problematic statement, but it raised a slight question. Unlike Pajijik, where mentioning another streamer was taboo unless you're personally close, this was a little different.
- That person is coming to Amazon? Wasn't it officially stated they're not coming?
Then a donation exploded in his room.
[ OverflowingMoney, thank you for 5,000 I-leaves. ]
- Don't you fucking betray us and go, you bitch.
- Oh my! Brother~ of course! I'll make sure not to even mention things like that!
It must have been a fairly large sum, because he stood up and bowed repeatedly.
"Is it still 100 won per leaf?"
[Yeah.]
[Whoa, so that's 500,000 won?]
[Ah, a big spender lolol?]
- And you know how much I love you brothers. I do a lot of events with the I-leaves I get, anyway.
He wasn't just saying it, because his chat was pretty friendly. I was aware of this. Amazon had events like lunch dates and phone calls. And before I knew it, my story had passed, and they'd started talking about Pajijik.
[Fucking Pajijik entertainers are on a whole different dimension lolol]
[They break their backs trying to pay off the loans they took to make their boards.]
[lololol come to Amazon and bow your heads, I'll shoot you some I-leaves for real.]
The male streamer waved his hands and laughed. But I could subtly feel the comparison in his tone.
- Oh, come on~ you shouldn't say it like that~ it's still a good platform.
[A good platform?]
[lololol a platform that eats the scraps the previous platform left behind...]
- Well, I don't know how much those streamers give back to their viewers, but...
Another scoff.
- And I'm sure they need living expenses~
There was nothing left to see, so I closed the stream. That subtle habit of comparing Pajijik and Amazon...
'Hmm... it's irritating for no good reason.'
What?
Pajijik streamers couldn't do events because they had no money?
Pajijik viewers were all beggars?
'Only I could mess with my viewers.'
You're supposed to curse your own kids yourself; hearing it from someone else pisses you off.
I rested my chin on my hand and pondered. How could I get under those bastards' skin...
'Hmm...'
You bastards, shall I show you what a real money flex looked like?