Chapter 29: Clarification

"I can't say I brought trouble upon myself." Xingye Ying shook her head in denial. "I was indeed in a bad mood at the time; if it had been any other day, I probably wouldn't have reacted so intensely."

"I was wondering why you were still smiling and laughing when we met for the second time. I thought you were hiding a dagger behind your smile." Luo Quan recalled the scene when they were backstage at MS. At that time, Xingye Ying's attitude was indeed much better than it had been on the beach. Perhaps Xingye Ying had originally intended to apologize, but after being snapped at by a few of Luo Quan's words, she immediately abandoned that thought.

"I was at fault, too. My tone shouldn't have been so sharp back then." Luo Quan had a rather straightforward personality; if she saw something she didn't like, she would say it directly, and if she was wrong, she would admit it. In her hometown dialect, this was called being "upright," a personality trait she shared with Wen Xia.

Xingye Ying lowered her head and said, "I'm the one who should be apologizing. I should have told you the whole story sooner."

Luo Quan laughed, "Actually, it's quite a coincidence. If we hadn't had that conflict, I wouldn't have come to your house to find you today, and you wouldn't have been saved."

Xingye Ying also started to laugh. "Come to think of it, it is quite a coincidence. Perhaps this is fate."

Just as she was laughing, she suddenly stood up, took a comb from the cabinet nearby, and while tidying her messy hair, said, "You saved me once, and I don't know how to repay you, but at least I can help you clarify the rumors about us on the internet."

After combing her hair, Xingye Ying sat down next to Luo Quan and opened the selfie function on her phone. "Smile, let's make it look like we have a great relationship."

"Wow... I'm really not good at this." As soon as Luo Quan parted her lips, she remembered the "Abyssal Bawanghua" incident from a few days ago and immediately closed her lips tight, only slightly lifting the corners of her mouth to strike a 'YES' pose.

"Click," Xingye Ying pressed the selfie button.

After opening Twitter, typing a paragraph of text, and attaching the photo, Xingye Ying clicked post.

"Although the internet public opinion has completely fermented, this photo can at least save your career. As for the rest, we can only slowly investigate who the mastermind is."

"What about you? How do you plan to deal with that big shot from the Zhuji Society?" With her own affairs coming to a temporary close, Luo Quan began to worry about Xingye Ying's problem.

Xingye Ying shook her head. "These two underworld members were sent here, so they must have been prepared to be caught. I estimate the police won't be able to extract any useful information; we can only let the company handle it."

Wen Xia said, "Sony is such a big company, they should be able to handle it properly."

Xingye Ying shook her head with a worried look. "It's not that simple. Large organizations like the Zhuji Society have their people in all walks of life, including politics. If it were just an ordinary leader, it would be fine, but this time it involves a 'Wakagashira' (underboss). The outcome is really hard to say."

Luo Quan sighed, "If there's no other way, we can only expose it and mobilize internet public opinion."

In Japan, for ordinary people, even celebrities, once they provoke the underworld, it is a huge problem.

Don't be fooled by those soft articles on the internet, thinking that the Japanese underworld is a group of hot-blooded youths who don't bully civilians, help with disaster relief, and are even full of 'moe' points.

In reality, the underworld is the underworld; they have always been involved in gambling, drugs, and prostitution. Murder, arson, kidnapping, and extortion are even more common. It can only be said that ordinary commoners rarely provoke these people; if they really run into them, the outcome is hard to say.

After waiting for about fifteen minutes, the shrill sound of police sirens came from outside the house, followed by three male police officers walking in. They were shocked to see the two men lying on the floor and the four girls sitting on the sofa.

"Miss Xingye!"

"Miss Sister Quan Shui!"

"Miss Wen Xia!"

The three celebrities in the room were the idols of these three police officers, respectively. Liu Sheng Chunzi watched from the side, feeling very envious.

"Am I dreaming? I didn't expect to meet you here!" The lead police officer was so excited that his hands were trembling. However, after seeing the two men on the floor, he immediately reacted and said, "These two are the criminals who carried out the home invasion kidnapping, right? I didn't expect you four girls to subdue them. You are truly amazing."

"Do we need to go through any procedures?" Xingye Ying didn't waste words and went straight to the point.

"Uh... please come with us to the Metropolitan Police Department. It's just to record a statement; it will be very quick."

"Then let's go." Luo Quan stood up, walked outside with the other three girls, and got into the police car.

It was said that it would be done quickly, but they still spent nearly an hour at the Metropolitan Police Department. Because this was a relatively vicious home invasion kidnapping case and even involved the underworld, there were many details that needed to be understood.

Although the police officer in charge of the case promised the victims that he would enforce the law impartially and get to the bottom of it before they left, Xingye Ying didn't believe it at all.

This matter might not even be properly resolved by Sony.

As for Luo Quan's matter, there was some progress. First, the photo of her and Xingye Ying broke the "rumor" that the two were not on good terms.

Xingye Ying said on Twitter: Although I haven't known Miss Sister Quan Shui for long, I always feel that we are fated. Her personality in private is absolutely not as unbearable as the internet says. She and I have no conflict.

How many people are now staring at Xingye Ying with eager eyes? A single tweet is enough to settle the entire incident.

After this tweet came out, the rhythm brought up by 'Shukan Bunshun' immediately collapsed. Luo Quan's fans finally sounded the horn of counterattack, and Xingye Ying's fans were also drawn into the battle.

Immediately afterward, as if they had received authorization, many artists under Sony also spoke up to support Luo Quan. Sony's official account also tweeted to denounce the rumor-mongers and promised to find the mastermind and deal with them according to the law.

After thinking for a long time, Luo Quan finally filtered out a person who might be the mastermind, and that was the Avex Entertainment company that had tried to recruit her before.

When Luo Quan's songs were just released on YouTube, Avex and Sony were the first companies to approach her, but because of the system's mandatory tasks, she did not sign with these two companies.

At the same time, Avex's overly low offer failed to compete for the rights to those three songs from Luo Quan, and it was instead snapped up by the very sincere Sony.

Perhaps Avex saw that Luo Quan chose Sony after rejecting them. Whether they wanted to teach this newcomer a lesson or simply strike at a competitor, they had sufficient motivation to act.

After Luo Quan told San Mu about this suspicious candidate, San Mu immediately reported it to Director Shi Cun and sent people to launch an investigation.

As the saying goes, if you don't want people to know, don't do it. Anything anyone does on the internet leaves traces. After spending a lot of money, Sony finally collected evidence that Avex had hired a certain 'water army' studio to smear Luo Quan.

Subsequently, Luo Quan sent her emails with Avex to San Mu, and the latter handed the evidence and email content to the public relations department.

At 8:00 PM, Sony issued a tweet denouncing Avex for unfair competition and hiring a water army to deliberately attack artists under Sony. The cause was merely that they were rejected when they wanted to sign Luo Quan.

Below the tweet were several chat screenshots and email contents, which could be said to be solid proof.

As soon as the tweet came out, it immediately caused an uproar.

"Three million yen to buy the copyright of these three songs? Isn't that too stingy?"

"I knew Sister Quan Shui was wronged. Don't those people who scolded her feel ashamed?"

"The truth has finally come to light, but the damage caused to Sister Quan Shui and her fans is irreparable."

"It's hard to imagine that so many people used such vicious words to attack an eighteen-year-old girl before, and they were all just listening to some groundless rumors!"

"The number of water army members is at most five hundred, but today, there are at least one hundred thousand people scolding Sister Quan Shui. This world is truly disappointing."

"There is always malice between people, and the virtual internet has infinitely magnified this malice!"

"I think those 'black' fans should apologize to Sister Quan Shui, if their conscience hasn't been completely lost."

In one day, Luo Quan went from being an internet sensation to being hated by everyone, and then instantly had her reputation reversed, becoming a victim. She tasted the ups and downs of life.

And as this Sony tweet was pushed to the top of the trending list and attracted intense discussion from nearly two hundred thousand netizens, Avex, which had solid evidence and could not defend itself, finally yielded to public pressure and responded. ===== CHAPTER 30 =====