Chapter 146:

Chapter 146:

As soon as I pressed the ‘Yes’ button, a brief flash of light came from my fingertips and disappeared. I didn’t even read the explanation layer properly and skipped it reflexively, so I didn’t know what the reward was, but it didn’t matter.

The quest title itself was telling me to go screw myself, so I might as well do as I please.

They were barely 20 years old, and they had no right to say anything even if I acted like a jerk.

There was a certain line that I could tolerate as an adult, and they crossed it.

I would have preferred someone who was greedy and asked for things that would help them.

But they didn’t even show up, so I had no idea what they wanted.

‘Let’s see how you like the bus ride I prepared for you.’

I showed them the new data I had organized and asked the production team for their contact information.

It took an hour or so before one or two of them started checking the data I sent them.

[^^] Wow, amazing 5:34 PM

[^^] Ise is really reliable 5:35 PM

[^^] We just have to trust him 5:35 PM

Yeah, go ahead and trust me blindly like you do now. See what happens. The original plan for Climax was to do our best individually.

But in the end, I was doing the work of five people. I gritted my teeth and prepared my revenge slowly.

After a few days of running around alone, from directing to choreography, to arranging, I finally had a rough outline. It was the day of filming for the first mission ranking announcement.

“Ugh, I’m nervous...”

It felt like a month had passed since the view count and likes period ended, and the final ranking was as follows:

Flosss

AtoX

Vesper

Climax

P2CK

Playground

Flosss

Climax

Vesper

AtoX

P2CK

Playground

There was no big change in the lower ranks. The order of Vesper and AtoX changed in the view count, and ours and Vesper’s changed in the likes count.

AtoX’s view count soared because of a kind of noise marketing.

Their stage was so bad that people reacted negatively, and even a separate video of comments was made, which increased the original video’s view count.

It was not a good meaning for the view count to rise, so the actual participants must have been... not happy at all.

I felt lighter when I thought that they were ruining my outfit in the unit mission.

“Oh...”

We were the third group to enter the set. I didn’t know how much that had to do with our actual ranking...

We all sat down with a mix of anticipation and nervousness, and opened the door that led to the center of the stage.

As the fog for the entrance cleared, we saw Flosss and Playground watching us from their seats.

“Hello! We are Climax!”

We bowed to the camera and the groups that were waiting for us, and found our seats from last time.

Behind the familiar chairs, there was a screen. It showed the likes and views rankings, which we had already learned from the script, but they were marked with question marks, as if they would be revealed later.

[Current Rank] ?th

[24-hour Trend Index] ? points

The text seemed different from before. I felt a strange sense of curiosity and looked up at the screen. Kyunghwa pointed it out.

“The text has changed.”

“Huh? Really?”

Yi-jun also noticed the screen late and rubbed his eyes to read the text again.

Maybe there was something inappropriate about dividing the rankings by 24 hours based on the views. I didn’t know the reason, but it wasn’t a big negative issue for us.

6th [?]

The internal evaluation ranking was based on the sum of the scores given by each team to the other teams, from 1st to 5th place, with 10 points for 1st, 8 points for 2nd, 6 points for 3rd, 4 points for 4th, and 2 points for 5th.

“Wow... I’m nervous seeing this.”

We had just submitted our ranking of the other teams at the team hideout before entering the shooting site.

It was hard to give the rankings as we felt at first, knowing that our scores would affect the other teams’ rankings.

The so-called check pick. We didn’t know how the editing would show which team gave which rank to which team, so it was difficult to make a noticeable check pick, but I thought everyone would have a lot of trouble from 2nd to 5th place.

We were no exception.

‘I wish I could give AtoX and Vesper a tie for last place.’

Unfortunately, there was no such option. I didn’t want to give Playground 5th place, even if they were pitiful, and if I gave 5th place to either Vesper or AtoX...

AtoX deserved 5th place for showing a disappointing result that didn’t meet the expectations.

Vesper had nothing special, but their stage wasn’t bad.

This was the ranking we gave after making our decision.

1st place [Flosss]

2nd place [Vesper]

3rd place [P2CK]

4th place [Playground]

5th place [AtoX]

Damn. I felt bitter about having to give Vesper the second place. But objectively speaking, giving P2CK a higher rank than Vesper would have looked like a blatant pick to sabotage them.

Just bear with it. Just a little bit. I calmed myself down and then the MC announced the view count ranking with a powerful voice.

“First, let’s reveal the view count ranking! The view count is based on the final number of views until the designated period, and it may differ from the data after the aggregation period.”

At the end of the MC’s remark, the question marks on the screen flickered once and turned into numbers.

Flosss 3,298,732 views

AtoX 2,675.442 views

Vesper 2,154,323 views

Climax 1,723,894 views

P2CK 1,693,139 views

Playground 1,025,845 views

Seeing the concrete figures, I realized how much of a gap there was between us and Floss.

AtoX’s number was inflated by people who came to mock them.

Vesper’s number was boosted by their foreign fans.

If I think about it that way... our rank wasn’t that bad.

‘I have nothing to say if this is a mental victory.’

This was all information that everyone already knew. So what mattered more now was how the voting scores and the internal evaluation turned out.

“Next, we’ll announce the audience ranking!”

The total number of audience members who entered was 120. I thought again that the sample was too small, but for a team like us with a weak fandom, that could be an advantage.

“But before that! Let’s go back to the stage and relive the heat of the performance!”

As expected, they didn’t show it right away. They had to get more footage, of course.

I sat up straight and looked at the screen. I wondered if they edited it differently from the YouTube version. This version seemed to have more time and effort put into it.

The first batter was Floss.

They were not bad when I saw them on YouTube, but the edited version made their grandeur even more impressive.

“They really did well.”

Seon-woo exclaimed again as he watched the screen. They did well, they did well, but...

What was the main spotlight of that stage doing right now?

He didn’t leave the group chat, so he didn’t seem to have completely cut off contact. But he still hadn’t replied to the message I sent him personally.

‘What’s wrong with this kid?’

I couldn’t do anything about it even if I was worried, but seeing Yu-geon shining on the screen made me anxious again.

‘He’s not thinking of retiring for real, is he?’

A sudden uneasy thought crossed my mind.