Caleb immediately turned and approached John, trying to let him see the contents of the three papers.
"This is…" John's face was instantly filled with terror; his eyes widened, and his mouth hung open, but he couldn't utter a single word.
Then, Caleb found his vision being pulled by a powerful suction, strangely drawn towards John's eyes. His pupils began to spin, and Caleb entered a faded, yellowish memory.
July 16th. The camera focused on a desk clock with a calendar, lingering for a moment.
John, with messy hair and a scruffy beard, sat in a messy, dirty small bedroom, the ashtray beside him overflowing with cigarette butts. On the computer screen in front of him, he was discussing a 'big deal' with a 'big client'. The client sent a screenshot of a news website, with a red line circling a piece of content: "No matter what method you use, push this topic's popularity up. As for the commission… each comment will be two cents more than last time, and if the popularity exceeds ten thousand, there will be an additional bonus."
John's eyes lit up, and he quickly clicked on the website link sent by the client. The title of the content read: "Campus Bullying Is Widespread, XXX Middle School Senior Students Stage a Real-Life Fight on the Street." Scrolling down revealed an abnormally filmed video clip. In the video, a strong blonde teenager was grabbing another shorter, thinner teenager by the collar, repeatedly punching him in the eye socket, while loudly cursing at him. After knocking him to the ground, the blonde teenager, still not satisfied, went on to kick him several times.
"Good news material." John licked his lips. Although he wasn't a professional journalist in his line of work, he did possess the ability to judge the sensitivity of certain events. Recently, 'campus bullying' incidents have been common, with various reports emerging endlessly, always attracting a certain level of attention and discussion. The vast majority of the public are blind, emotional creatures; when they see such news, they always become righteously indignant without thinking. Out of cheap pity for the vulnerable, their voices are easily manipulated, thus evolving into a one-sided situation.
John only needed a glance, and several plans to boost the content's popularity had already formed in his mind. He quickly left a comment below: "Such scum is unforgivable, they should just die immediately!"
Then he immediately switched to his many alternate accounts and began to play a duet under that comment. The replies from his alternate accounts were quite convincing; some supported John's view, while others opposed it and criticized John for being too extreme in his words. He even simulated some casual passers-by quite accurately, giving off the vibe of—'Everyone in this group is my alt account, if you don't believe me, I'll reply to you and see.'
After this 'performance' successfully pushed the comment replies to over a thousand, and many ignorant netizens joined in the fun, John promptly moved to a new battleground, throwing out a new topic—"Those who commit school bullying should all be sentenced!" On this topic, he could introduce the imperfections in the national legal system, the lack of social moral awareness, and so on, expanding the depth of the topic to attract the attention of trolls, patriots, and those who generalize, once again igniting the comment's popularity.
By this point, the client's news content had firmly landed on the website's homepage, its popularity already exceeding ten thousand.
"Hehe, this is enough, the bonus is easily in hand." At this moment, John felt he was the undisputed god in the field of 'internet trolls'!
His client expressed great satisfaction: "You did very well. If you can maintain this popularity on the homepage for more than three days, I will give you an extra large bonus."
Upon hearing there was more money to be made, John became even more energetic and immediately replied to his employer: "Mission accomplished."
The forum was John's battlefield; he was experienced, had extraordinary combat power, and possessed numerous ultimate moves and trump cards. He continued to fully utilize his 'adding fuel to the fire' talent under that report, leaving a new comment: His parents must bear primary responsibility for this! This is a failure of family education!
He once again guided the battle. If the previous comment attacking the imperfect national system was a shotgun, with scattered damage and too many targets hit, leading to a lack of unified opinion. This new comment was like a precise sniper rifle, directly locking onto 'parents' and 'family education', hitting the soul with one shot. Thus, countless online trolls, whether sharing John's goal, purely wanting to vent, or mindlessly following the trend, immediately found a unified outlet for their emotions.
They spoke shamelessly, eloquently, commenting on current affairs, with passionate words, standing on the moral high ground that made them invincible. Across the computer screen, the keyboard was their sharpest weapon.
John, with a successful smile, sat in front of the computer. Though he only wore the worn-out skin of a defeated loser, the aura he exuded was that of a king looking down on all living beings.
The memory ended here.
The spinning pupils stopped, and Caleb's vision gradually pulled back, returning to normal. Only fifty seconds remained before the 'Adding Fuel to the Fire' device activated.
"It's over, it's over… I'm going to die, I don't want to die yet. Oh, f—k… you silver-haired bastard, are you deliberately stalling for time? You definitely want to kill me…" John, tied to the red-hot iron pillar, had lost his sanity, roaring with eyes wide and bloodshot.
'I'm not really sure I want to save this guy anymore.' Caleb pouted, a vein throbbing on his forehead. He crumpled the three pieces of paper in his hand into a ball.
The phenomenon of this public trial, although John played a crucial role in promoting it, was primarily due to the public's lack of independent awareness. Listening to and believing event reports, being blind, following trends, echoing others, never learning to judge independently—their becoming puppets and tools of premeditated designers was an inevitable outcome.
'As for the timer's password, it's already very obvious.' After entering John's memory, the first frozen image was the desk clock showing the date. Besides that, no other specific numbers appeared in the memory. Therefore, 716 was clearly the correct three-digit password. The password setter's original intention… was probably to make John remember this special day, right?
Caleb walked to the timer device, turned the password wheels, and entered the numbers 7, 1, and 6 in sequence.
Click… Clank clank clank…
After a series of noise, the password wheels unlocked, and the death countdown on the timer also stopped.
—Your accurate deciphering increased Concentration Stance proficiency by +100.
Phew… It worked. Caleb finally wiped the sweat from his forehead.
"Ha… Haha… I didn't die, I survived, thank goodness, my life is not meant to end!" John, who had been closing his eyes, waiting for death, heard the series of sounds and noticed the timer stopped at the last 10 seconds, immediately bursting into tears of joy. "Hey! Buddy, I knew you could do it, you're truly my great savior, an angel sent by God, I will definitely repay you…"
This guy's change of face was incredibly fast; he had just been cursing Caleb as a silver-haired bastard, and now he was shamelessly uttering all sorts of praises, the transition in content completely seamless. He completely relaxed and began to fantasize about the future: "Great disaster survived, great fortune awaits! When I get out of here, I'll definitely find a bar to get drunk first, then find a few hot girls, hehe, to celebrate properly…"
Is it really appropriate to speak so soon? You haven't even gotten out of here yet, have you?
Caleb seized the time, approaching the 'Adding Fuel to the Fire' device, preparing to free John from it.
But just then, the timer device positioned above his head suddenly began to emit a rapid 'beep… beep…' countdown sound again.
Oh no! Caleb looked up; the last 10 seconds, which had been frozen, indeed began to count down again, and the countdown speed had increased significantly. Only four or five seconds passed at most.
When the last 1 second turned to 0… the traction device connected to the other end of the timer immediately activated, the clanking of the rotating shaft sounding like the death god's summoning magic tune.
The iron wire connecting the fuel barrel's cork was pulled… John stared at the falling cork above his head, dumbfounded:
"Oh… F—k me!"