Jiang Qin, having been tagged by several people, followed the link into a livestream room.
The person streaming was a female—looked like a perfectly normal human, with long flowing golden hair and distinctly Western features.
"Hello everyone, welcome to my livestream. I'm Lilia," the girl greeted brightly.
She appeared to be around twenty years old, though appearance was hardly a reliable indicator—after all, interstellar cosmetic technology was quite advanced.
Besides, the aging process for female beastkin was notably slower.
Seeing that the livestream had drawn over ten million viewers, Lilia's smile grew even more radiant.
Jiang Qin watched silently. She was certain she didn't know this woman—had never even seen her before—which only made her more curious as to how this person planned to claim those songs as her own.
After all, it was true she'd copied them, but she had copied them from Earth.
She had purchased the sheet music from the system legally—everything was properly documented and licensed. There shouldn't have been any loopholes.
Soon, the livestream soared to the top of the Federation's largest short video platform, landing on the trending homepage.
The scrolling comments were all demanding that Lilia prove Jiang Qin had plagiarized her, or questioning why, if she were the original creator, she had never applied for copyright.
Perhaps sensing that the attention was finally high enough, Lilia began her performance.
She tapped a few times on her holopad, projecting the interface onto the screen.
Displayed were the three songs Jiang Qin had uploaded.
However, she hadn't been entirely foolish—she had only copied the sheet music. The titles and lyrics had all been changed.
She renamed "As Wished" to "Wishing You Well," "Ningxia" became "Summer," and "Anonymous Comfort" was changed to "Secret Crush."
The original lyrics, which had been fresh and elegant, were completely transformed into sappy, tangled lines—full of melodramatic love triangles.
After all, the interstellar society leaned toward a polyandrous structure. One-on-one relationships were rare, mostly seen only among pure human females and half-beast females.
"I chose to livestream today," Lilia began, "because I can't stand people who steal others' work.
Back then, she was so popular, I didn't dare speak up. But now, with everyone here to support me, I've finally found the courage to step forward."
"I'm currently a music major at Dolun University on Azure Star. These three songs were composed during my university years, but I had delayed applying for copyright because I couldn't settle on lyrics.
I never imagined that a month ago, after Miss Jiang came by our dorm to deliver something for the Jiang family's eldest daughter, my handwritten scores would go missing.
At first, I thought I might've just misplaced them… until I saw the trending post online—and realized she had taken them."
A comment popped up:
[You lost your things, and you never suspected the person who visited that day?]
Lilia sighed, exasperated. "Of course I had my doubts, but she's Rumeng's sister. I didn't want to wrongly accuse someone and create awkwardness with my roommate."
[Oh my god, Miss Lilia is so kind—even when her things were stolen, she didn't want to suspect her roommate's sister.]
[So it's true! That low-tier star girl stole someone else's song. How shameless can she be?]
[Hah, people from barren planets don't know shame. Theft is probably a life skill for them.]
[Dolun University is the top university on Azure Star, and Miss Lilia is a genius!]
[…Wait a second. Are we seriously just taking her word for it? Honestly, I think Jiang Qin's lyrics suit the songs better.]
[Things on the internet—who knows what's real or fake?]
[Jiang Qin has legal copyrights for all her songs. What proof do you have for your claims?]
Faced with these questions, Lilia's eyes welled with tears, and she began wiping them in front of the camera.
"I have no way to prove it. Writing songs by hand has always been my habit—and the originals are gone.
The sheet music I'm showing now is what I rewrote from memory. I even wrote lyrics and was planning to release them next month. I never expected something like this to happen.
Writing a song isn't easy. I've been preparing these three since high school. I originally planned to use them for the charts and my graduation project. Now that they've been stolen, I might not even be able to graduate…"
A pretty female sobbing pitifully in front of the camera—no doubt it earned her a flood of sympathy.
The comments attacking Jiang Qin grew even more vicious.
One was a highly educated girl from Dolun University.
The other, a female who'd never even attended school.
Public opinion had clearly shifted.
Jiang Qin watched quietly, her pale face expressionless.
Her jumbled memories finally aligned—she did, indeed, go to the university a month ago to deliver something to Jiang Rumeng. It was Jiang Yulian who'd asked her to go.
At the time, she had not yet been reborn—still a naive girl clinging to hope for her family.
She'd arrived while Rumeng was out and waited in her dorm.
There had been another girl in the room, but she'd left soon after. About five minutes after that, Rumeng returned from class.
Jiang Qin handed her the space pendant as instructed, then left.
So yes—there was a window of time she couldn't fully account for.
The mastermind behind this was sharp. They had quickly spotted the only gap in her alibi.
As for why Lilia stepped forward to frame her—well, that was easy: fame and fortune.
For someone aiming to break into the entertainment industry, using someone else's popularity to launch herself required no second thought.
Jiang Qin stared at the barrage of hate comments in the livestream chat, her pale face stubbornly composed.
She contacted You Wei through her holopad and asked him to deliver all the instruments they'd prepared to her apartment.
While waiting, she washed up, changed into a simple white gown, and applied a light touch of makeup.
You Wei arrived swiftly.
Whenever Jiang Qin made a request, he never delayed. Within half an hour, he had delivered everything.
Along with the instruments came some daily necessities and a month's supply of nutritional supplements.
He repeatedly warned her not to leave the apartment before finally departing.
He looked rushed—probably busy investigating who was really behind all this.
But the culprit would be hard to track down. The account that made the post was registered in the Empire—likely a fake ID.
Regardless of what he said, Jiang Qin had nodded obediently, appearing quiet and agreeable as always.
What he didn't expect was that the moment he left, Jiang Qin would start a livestream—and directly request to connect with Lilia.
She didn't hide herself at all, reverting her account name back to her real name.
Everyone in the livestream was stunned that Jiang Qin dared to confront her live. They excitedly urged Lilia to accept the request.
The blonde girl raised her eyebrows, confidence radiating from her face as she connected the stream.
Her opening line was:
"Jiang-jie, are you here to apologize? If you're willing to admit your mistake, I might be kind enough to forgive you for Rumeng's sake."
Watching the stream from afar, Jiang Rumeng felt utterly disgusted.
A D-rank female trying to launch her career as a celebrity—and she thinks she has the right to call me 'jie' so intimately?