Part 1: This Must Be What Collective Madness Means

The term collective madness must have been coined for something exactly like this.

It had me feeling just a little flustered, yeah. I'd expected an explosive reaction, but not this intense.

So, you asking if I hated it? 'Nah, I fucking loved it.'

That just proved how insane the destructive power of this face was. Thanks to it, I could feel my life of freeloading getting one step closer as I watched the chat scrolling nonstop.

A big-corp streamer room where I could legally stir up chaos. Looked like even the aggro addicts who couldn't get enough had heard the news and swarmed in.

The chat, which had been flowing fine just moments ago, started lagging. The viewers lost their shit over that too.

Even I, who knew the situation, was flustered enough—what must it have been like for the newbies just connecting after hearing the stream was live?

Newbies pouring in, spitting out confused chats that tangled with the existing flood, sending Sena's stream chat racing toward utter chaos somewhere in the abyss.

Sena's expression was rotting away in real time. She was probably realizing it now too. This wasn't something she could just ignore and move on from.

Managers, sensing the boss's foul mood, mobilized en masse to rein in the chat vibe, but new messages flooded in several times faster than they could demand manners or delete spam.

"Ugh.. fuck.."

Watching Sena scratch her innocent head in frustration at this mess, I felt a twinge of guilt. She'd mentioned a collab stream tonight— no way content would go smoothly in this atmosphere.

If it kept going like this? It'd be a nuisance to the other streamers she'd collabed with. No way these rampaging bitches wouldn't carry the chaos to other rooms.

For a big-corp streamer like Sena, who put effort into image management, this was as awkward as it got. The distress on her face was surely because of that.

My guess about Yuhan hit the mark. Sort of. Only sort of.

In reality, right then, Sena was feeling distressed. But not for the reason I'd guessed.

'This is fucked..'

Watching the chat fill up with demands to bring out Yuhan like she'd pawned him off somewhere, she gave a bitter inner smile.

She'd warned him not to come in during the stream precisely because she knew it'd turn out like this.

'Fuck..'

She didn't need to check to know what the community sites looked like right now. They'd no doubt screenshotted Yuhan's brief appearance on stream and were spreading it everywhere.

With aggro-bait titles like 'Boyfriend? Time to rate his face.'

Then the suckers lured in would spread those pics further... In about an hour, every stream watcher would know Yuhan's face.

That was the problem.

One fact she'd learned naturally from making a living off this: fame wasn't always a good thing.

Like that hero movie line—great power comes with great responsibility—fame always dragged side effects along.

Now the chat wasn't just fast; it was lagging hard with filthy spam nonstop, proving there were way more crazy bitches in this world than people thought.

She'd gotten hate comments, even death threats. Of course, she'd shown them all their lives were forfeit.

She was prepared to handle it, since she ate because of streaming and fame.

But Yuhan? Was he prepared?

'Like hell he is—'

Yuhan had dealt with tons of headaches thanks to his standout looks. Hell, some psycho bitch had stalked him back in his 3rd year of middle school, tailing him everywhere.

Later it turned out she was a teacher at his school, forcing an unwanted transfer.

Of course, Yuhan always laughed it off like it was nothing... But having watched from the sidelines, she knew. It wasn't that he was fine; he was just pretending.

She'd invested most of her earnings to move to this neighborhood for him. This housing complex had ironclad security—no non-resident could set foot inside.

And now, after all that, the same shit happening to him? She couldn't even imagine it.

One person's malice and a mob's were fundamentally different.

'Driving me insane for real..'

What to do? How to minimize the attention crashing toward Yuhan?

'So why the hell did you come in..!'

Frustration at Yuhan bubbled up momentarily in the desperation, but she already knew. It wasn't his fault.

This was her screw-up. She'd said she'd stream tonight but not when exactly.

So he'd assumed 8 PM like usual, leading to this mess.

Even the audio glitch during a past collab hadn't flustered her this much... Who knew 30 seconds of face time could cause this?

'Fucking unnecessarily handsome..'

Grumbling inwardly, she racked her brain for solutions. But nothing solid came.

"What, you guys never seen a guy's face before? Why the overreaction?"

So.. she went full shameless.

Resistance was fierce, as expected. It was bullshit even to my own ears.

"He's handsome..? For real?"

I doubled down on the shameless act anyway. Furrowed my brows like I genuinely didn't get it, tilted my head—and chat exploded.

"Where's that cursing coming from? Manager, ban the bitch who just swore."

'Good.'

Up to here, it was going as planned. Chat some, pinpoint and ban the clueless edgelords as examples—and I could see the chaotic, laggy vibe calming toward normalcy.

Repeat a few more times, mention he's a civilian, warn that unauthorized photo use won't fly, and anyone with a brain would back off.

Of course, couldn't stop the pics spreading entirely.

Just as I was smoothly shifting topics to the upcoming collab—

Bam-bam-ba-bam~!

The donation sound hit, followed by content that made anyone jump, flowing through my earbuds.

Took a sec to react given the bombshell, but I didn't panic. This was manageable.

Pretended to be focused on chat, casually glanced over like I'd just noticed, then frowned subtly at the message.

"Me and him family? Obviously not."

"Enemies. Enemies. Y'all don't know? All siblings in this world are designed to hate each other from birth? Oh, thanks for the donation."

Thought I'd dodged it smoothly..

"Yeah, so you're not the same species as me either."

Lingering suspicions crept back up.

I ignored them. No ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠point engaging.

"Well, yeah, I'm definitely better-looking than him. Admit it?"

"No, why do you need his name? Y'all come to my stream to see my bro?"

"Chat's really gone to shit. Ugh, from now on any 'civilian' mentions get banned."

"Told you not to and ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠you still do it. Manager?"

"Yeah, gonna keep chasing, yeah there's drama."

It seemed to be settling down somehow. If only that chorus hadn't hit the moment she frantically hopped into Discord as collab time rushed up.

""Welcome, Big Bro!""

Big Bro. The term a wife uses for her husband's older sister—it twisted Sena's face horribly.

"Big Bro, I prepped everything, so just accept the invite and join."

"What bullshit. He's my Big Bro?"

"Nah uh? He's our Big Bro?"

"Sena, wanna call me sister-in-law from now on?"

'These fucking bitches..'

Yeah. While Sena slaved over damage control, the straw Yuhan had stuck in her back had glitched and multiplied fivefold.