Chapter 283: A Disturbance On The Forums (1)
After emerging from the Lich Palace, Shen Jingbin and Quiet And Steadfast formed a party with Qi Mu's group and brought them along to clear their dailies. In the midst of their quest, Shen Jingbin found out that there were a fair number of players from Life At First Sight who were eyeing them like a tiger watching its prey. However, their fear of Quiet And Steadfast ultimately caused them to shrink back and watch the group from afar.
Inking A Message sighed. "Even after so long, today's been the first time we've been able to clear our dailies without being harassed."
Daily quests were filled with pointless busy work, but they gave pretty good experience. So, to players whose Levels weren't that high, daily quests were a decent way to level.
Once they were done with their dailies, the group of five started working on their event quests. Quiet And Steadfast still needed another ten General's Directives, which he wanted to finish collecting before New Year's Eve and exchange for a mount. After completing their event quests, everyone gathered around and opened their event boxes together.
Inking A Message and Gentle Kite weren't so lucky and didn't manage to get a single General's Direction. Qi Mu and Quiet And Steadfast received one each, while Shen Jingbin was the last to open her event box and got herself five whole General's Directives.
Quiet And Steadfast felt like he was about to die from frustration. Why wasn't he so lucky?!
The General's Directives were useless in Shen Jingbin's eyes, so she handed all of them to Quiet And Steadfast, with the latter feeling very conflicted about it.
Should he accept the General's Directives? If he did, it wouldn't feel right to exchange them for a mount that he was going to present to her. On the other hand, rejecting them meant that he might not be able to collect enough of them by New Year's Eve.
The Great God was in quite a pickle.
Shen Jingbin didn't know why he was feeling so conflicted. She just pushed the General's Directives into his arms while she stared at him. Either way, she wouldn't be able to gather enough of them on her own in time, and she was too lazy to sell them herself, so giving it to Quiet And Steadfast would be better than leaving them to rot in her inventory.
A specific Great God who'd been stared at just rubbed his nose and silently accepted the items.
Qi Mu enviously looked on. If she hadn't seen it for herself, she wouldn't have believed that Nutjob was the dominant one in their relationship. She smiled when she thought back to the rumours that she'd previously heard. Rumours really couldn't be trusted.
Nutjob and Quiet And Steadfast logged off after opening their event boxes.
Over the next two days, both of them were busy helping their respective families with their New Year preparations, so neither of them had the time come online. They didn't keep up with the happenings in the game either and weren't aware of the new developments.
A video of Shen Jingbin insta-killing someone at White Cloud Temple in front of everyone, coupled with the vicious ultimatum that she'd issued afterwards, had been recorded by someone using the in-game recording function and posted onto the game's forums. Paired with an eye-catching title, the thread quickly became popular on the forums.
Of course, the thread's title couldn't be anything good.
"White Cloud Temple's Great Senior Sister: is she an exceptional beauty, or is she just beyond ugly? I feel like Yiju has deceived me."
The excitement generated by the game's trailer had yet to die down completely. There were still many people who browsed the forums daily asking for information about the beautiful Senior Sister. The thread's appearance attracted the attention of countless people who excitedly clicked in to have a look.
The resulting reaction was one that you could imagine.
Although the Administrator hadn't explicitly stated that the Senior Sister in the trailer and the one in-game were the same person, at some point, the thoughts of the masses had shifted in that direction. In their minds, the equation was as follows: the beautiful girl in the trailer = the Great Senior Sister of White Cloud Temple = Shen Jingbin.
In reality, while that really was the case, Shen Jingbin's in-game appearance was the furthest thing from the word 'beautiful'. When they found out, people who'd believed in that equation couldn't accept this outcome and felt like they'd been deceived.
The original poster was one of the crazed fans of the beautiful woman in the trailer. And, he was also present in the crowd when Shen Jingbin had performed her insta-kill. At that time, fear of Shen Jingbin's threat had prevented him from speaking out, but anger built within him till it consumed him once he'd logged out. Unable to bear it, he ran to the forums and posted his thread.
He'd started recording the moment he'd heard the Great Senior Sister had made an appearance. His original plan was to record the beauty so that he could admire her from the comforts of his own home, yet who would've thought that he wouldn't be able to see her… But, looks like it wasn't all for naught.
"Hehe, Yiju's marketing strategies are becoming more and more impressive by the day. Look, they even managed to trump up an ugly woman till she became an earth-shattering beauty. What happened to basic human decency? I'm really disappointed with Yiju now."
"I was there too and saw everything. The Senior Sister from White Cloud Temple… hehe… Forgive me for being blunt, but even calling her trash would be speaking well of her. Not only is she ugly, but she's also vicious and merciless. If it were in the real world, a woman like her would've committed a crime sooner or later. She's basically a ticking time bomb."
"You shouldn't look down on others. From what I've heard, this Senior Sister may be a little ugly, but she has the support of the number one God in the game. With his backing, she's been doing whatever the hell she wants in the game. Do you see the guy protecting her? That's the number one player in the game. He could take all us small fries out with just his pinkie."
"Hehe, what's the point of looking beautiful in this day and age? You need to live well. ( ̄ω ̄)"
"Don't you guys think you're going a little overboard? I don't think the Administrator said anything about the Senior Sister in the trailer being the same person in-game. Is it right to casually humiliate a girl in-game? Isn't insulting someone just because of how they look the actions of those lacking in character?"
"+1. What if she intentionally made herself look worse? Would men of character make fun of a girl just because of how she looks?"
"You look like a social justice warrior. Tell me, in this day and age, which girl would actually do that to herself? Aren't all of the girls these days jumping at the opportunity to beautify themselves to the point where even their parents wouldn't be able to recognise them? So, stop talking about pointless things like 'what ifs'; she's ugly, and that's that. She's already terrified all of us by showing her face, and you're telling me I can't even talk about her?"
"Exactly. Even if she isn't the Senior Sister from the trailer, she's still in the wrong because she's holding a title that she doesn't deserve. That title belongs to our beauty. Isn't knowing oneself a virtue? Where'd she work up the courage to actually dare take up the position of Senior Sister in spite of her being so ugly?"
…
The replies in the thread started turning into a slugfest, becoming increasingly gruesome the further down one went. But, this wasn't the highlight.
Another exposé appeared on the afternoon that the original thread was posted.