Just as Jiang Qin finished listening to the messages, You Wei's call came through.
His tone was cautious. "Miss Jiang, have you seen what's been posted online?"
"Online?" Jiang Qin was puzzled. "I just woke up."
She clearly heard You Wei breathe a sigh of relief.
"That's good. Don't check StarNet for a while. It seems like someone from a rival is targeting us. I'll have people handle it.
Just stay safely in your apartment. Your work can wait—come back only after I give you the all-clear."
Jiang Qin didn't understand what was going on but nodded in agreement.
After hanging up, she went online to check.
What started as some negative gossip about a small bar on a second-tier planet had exploded into one of the top ten trending topics across the entire network. It was clear someone had spent a lot of credits behind the scenes to push it that high.
According to You Wei's guess, it was probably a smear campaign from competing bars on the same street.
But Jiang Qin wasn't so sure.
She had rejected offers from several companies just yesterday—was it possible these people wanted to teach her a lesson?
On the new song charts, "As Desired" had climbed to eighth place.
Yet downloads had plateaued, and netizens were questioning her integrity, accusing her of plagiarism.
There were also scornful comments about her being a low-tier female from a poor star, and disgust over her so-called "ungrateful" behavior.
No one from the Jiang family stepped forward to defend her.
That was no surprise.
From the beginning, when the Jiang family had secretly sent a private ship to bring her home, avoiding public notice, and never revealed her existence, she had known.
They looked down on her origins. They even disliked that when she first arrived, she didn't know how to operate a housekeeping robot or recognize many characters.
Her ability to read now was only because of the memories from her previous life after being reborn.
In that first life, she never went to school—but she never gave up. She always remembered the phrase posted on the school wall:
Knowledge changes fate.
So when she couldn't attend school, she took online courses on StarNet, starting from kindergarten lessons.
Though she wasn't a prodigy now, calling her illiterate was really an exaggeration.
But no one knew that. Everyone had already decided she was a complete illiterate—couldn't recognize a single character, never been to school. How else could she know so many new songs?
Obviously, she must have plagiarized them.
Now everyone was demanding the removal of all three of her uploaded songs from the platform, claiming it was unfair to other artists.
Jiang Qin fell into deep thought.
She suddenly realized that even though she rarely left her apartment, she had a lot of enemies.
First were the people she had rejected—there could be someone wanting revenge for losing face.
Then there were the rival bars.
And then the new song charts.
"Anonymous Comfort" was about to break into the top ten. If all went well, by the end of the month, she would have at least two songs in the top ten.
If her songs were taken down now, the rankings would shift accordingly…
The difference between being in the top ten and falling to eleventh was huge—a clear dividing line.
Moreover, she was just a C-level female, an unbacked consoler who already occupied two spots on the chart. It wasn't surprising someone wanted to take her down.
The last suspect was Jiang Ruming.
Though the Jiang family disliked her, she was still blood-related to Jiang Yulian, so no one dared to attack her directly.
Even Jiang Ruhai could only hurl insults.
The only one who might actually do her harm was Jiang Ruming—but that person was illogical, and Jiang Qin had no clue what motives she might have.
Because in her past life, Jiang Ruming, despite being disliked by Jiang Yulian, still sabotaged her—but then tried to help her afterward.
It was like a strange cycle of harming and atoning at the same time.
What You Wei meant by "handling it" was to keep reporting the posts, deleting comments, and hiring a lawyer friend to send lawsuits to those marketing accounts one by one—for online bullying, unauthorized release of personal information, and other charges.
But regarding rumors and defamation, he didn't dare to sue.
Though he didn't know Jiang Qin well, much of what was said online was partially true.
So he couldn't be sure whether Jiang Qin had plagiarized or not.
To be safe, he just ignored that part—there were enough other charges anyway.
People in the Interstellar Federation paid close attention to matters involving females.
After some reports, by noon all the posts and trending topics had disappeared.
But the accusations of plagiarism continued to spread widely.
Pan Yangxia, a music student at Mocha University, had become a devoted fan of Jiang Qin after watching her piano videos online.
He refused to believe the sudden negative gossip, choosing instead to trust what he had seen with his own eyes.
So he posted online with the title:
"The Piano: One of the Ancient Instruments"
After just one night, negative news about his idol had spread all over the internet.
"She's just a comforter working in a small bar," Pan Yangxia wrote. "I don't understand whose interests she could've threatened."
"I can't speak to the rest of the rumors, but if you're questioning her music—then I have to speak up."
"Let me educate you all on the instrument Jiang Qin plays during her performances. It's called a piano, and its origins date back three thousand years.
"It's an ancient instrument, now only mentioned in scattered historical texts. So it's no surprise that most people today don't even recognize it.
"But Jiang Qin not only knows it—she plays it beautifully. Doesn't that alone speak to her skill?
"In an era when any sound can be synthesized, someone who masters an ancient instrument like this—shouldn't they be considered a true musician?
"Or is it just that you're all discriminating against her because she's a female from a barren-tier star?"
Although Pan Yangxia was just an ordinary student, he occasionally livestreamed himself singing and had gained a decent following.
After all, he was good-looking, and even before graduating, several entertainment companies had reached out with offers to sign him.
He simply hadn't accepted because he wanted to finish school before officially debuting.
The moment he posted his message, his fans received a notification—and eagerly logged in, excited to see him active again.
Only to find that their beloved streamer was… speaking up for someone else.
[Speechless… I thought Xia Xia finally remembered the password to his comm ID. Didn't expect him to log in just to defend someone.]
[Xia Xia, better take the post down. This kind of thing—whoever sticks their neck out first gets chopped. Better to play it safe.]
[Exactly. You don't even know that female personally. What if the rumors are true? People will come for you next.]
[Sigh, I really liked those two songs too… such a shame. Probably won't get to hear them again.]
[They'll probably be taken down soon, right? As long as enough people report them, they'll go into review.]
[But wait, don't you need an original to copy from? If she really plagiarized someone, then why hasn't that person come forward yet?]
[Whoa, are you psychic? The so-called original creator just spoke out. Everyone, go check it out!]