The Turncoat Water Army

Chapter 286

In Qinglin University's No. 2 Cafeteria, the area by the window was bustling with noise.

Gu Ran sat sprawled in his dining chair.

He held a piece of spare rib in one hand, gnawing on it with great relish.

His other hand was idly scrolling through his phone.

On the screen, the search term for the MicroChat-Unicom data-free SIM card had already surged to the top of the trending list with unstoppable momentum.

He lifted his eyelids, looking at Ye Zhenzhen opposite him. He raised his eyebrows, unable to hide his smile.

"Dr. Ye, please remember this golden rule of the future internet that I'm telling you today."

"Getting things for free is the primary productive force of humanity."

"As long as they don't have to spend money, the potential of users is limitless."

The aloof girl was taking small sips of her soup.

Hearing this twisted logic, she curled her lips in disdain.

She then skillfully picked up a piece of broccoli with her chopsticks and stuffed it directly into the mouth of the boy opposite her.

"Just eat your food."

"You bad apple, all your wicked ideas are used to scheme against people."

Gu Ran naturally chewed the broccoli and retorted indistinctly.

"How vulgar, this is called business wisdom!"

"Do you understand business?"

Hearing this, Ye Zhenzhen rolled her eyes at him and slowly swallowed her food.

Then, with a flushed face, she pushed her phone over to Gu Ran's hand.

"Um, help me grab one too."

"The internet in our dorm has been too laggy lately."

"Of course, I'm not just trying to get freebies, I need it to look up medical materials."

Gu Ran looked at the girl's tsundere appearance, saying one thing but meaning another, and laughed out loud. He couldn't help but reach out and pinch her soft cheek.

"Alright, alright."

"So that our Dr. Ye can smoothly look up her materials, let alone one data-free card."

"I'd even bring the whole Unicom store back for you."

Seeing this, Ye Zhenzhen slapped his hand away and glared at him reproachfully, but did not argue further.

The two bantered back and forth, the atmosphere exceptionally relaxed.

Meanwhile, on the top floor of the Penguin Building in Shenzhen.

The air pressure in the office was low.

Liang Dong stood in front of the floor-to-ceiling window.

His eyes were bloodshot, full of anger and unwillingness.

The tablet on the desk was still playing the joint announcement on loop.

Those bold words highlighting "data-free" made his cheeks sting with pain.

He was unwilling to be like Su Wan, losing to a hillbilly company.

He turned around, grabbed the landline receiver, and dialed the private number of the internet water army leader, Brother Hei.

The call connected.

He gritted his teeth and said word by word.

"Brother Hei, it's me."

"The budget is doubled, spread the smear articles immediately."

"Just say that MicroChat secretly drains data and stealthily deducts phone credits."

"I want to make sure they can't sell a single one of their trash cards!"

On the other end of the phone, Brother Hei's spirits lifted when he heard the budget was doubled.

He patted his chest and guaranteed, "President Liang, you can rest completely assured."

"We take people's money and eliminate their disasters."

"Wherever Penguin points, our brothers will strike."

"Within ten minutes, I guarantee MicroChat will be drowned by the spit of the entire internet."

After getting the guarantee, Liang Dong finally exhaled a breath of stale air, then slumped into his leather swivel chair.

Seeing this, the assistant nearby immediately put on a smiling face and stepped forward to flatter him.

"President Liang, this is a brilliant move."

"Under heavy rewards, there are bound to be brave men."

"Once this wave of public opinion warfare is launched, even if MicroChat doesn't die, they'll lose a layer of skin."

Hearing this, Liang Dong picked up his cold coffee and took a sip.

"That trash company GR thinks they can turn the world upside down just by making a data-free card."

"They don't understand what it means that a repeated rumor becomes a fact."

"As long as the seeds of doubt are planted in the users' minds, they can forget about selling their cards."

On the other side, Brother Hei hung up the phone and rubbed his hands together.

He opened the large water army group chat of two thousand people.

He skillfully typed on the keyboard, sending a message to all members.

"Brothers, a big job is here!"

"Our sugar daddy Penguin is paying double the price!"

"Spam smear articles all over the internet targeting MicroChat's data usage issues!"

"You must push the heat to the number one spot within ten minutes!"

The message was sent.

Brother Hei picked up his teacup, leisurely waiting for a response.

One minute passed.

Two minutes passed.

The group chat, which usually responded by the hundreds to a single call, was dead silent at this moment.

There wasn't even a single person following up.

Brother Hei frowned, thinking the network was lagging.

He deliberately refreshed it, but there was still no activity in the group.

This bizarre silence made anger flare up in his heart.

He directly called out a few top generals in the group.

"Where the hell did everyone go?"

"You don't even want to make money, is there water in your brains?"

A moment later, Core Member A finally replied with a message.

"Boss, please wait a moment."

"I'm lining up at the Unicom store over here."

"There are still three people in front of me, it's almost my turn."

Brother Hei looked at this message, a bit dumbfounded.

But before he could react, Core Member B posted a screenshot in the group.

"I grabbed a data-free card with a premium number!"

"The last three digits are sixes!"

"???"

Brother Hei stared at the glaring screenshot of the data-free card.

His eyes went wide and round, somewhat unable to believe that his elite troops were actually lining up in the enemy camp?!

A surge of anger rushed straight to the top of his head. He held down the voice record button and roared into the group.

"You bunch of ungrateful brats!"

"You bite the hand that feeds you, don't you!"

"Penguin is offering double pay!"

"Where is your professional ethics!"

"You have no backbone at all!"

"Believe it or not, I'll deduct all your bonuses for this month!"

The roaring echoed in the group, and the group fell silent once again.

A moment later, Core Member A sent a long voice message.

Brother Hei clicked to play it.

The other party's steady voice came out from it.

"Boss, it's really not that the brothers have no backbone."

"It's because MicroChat is truly completely data-free."

"Think about it, we idle our phones to farm comments every day."

"One person has dozens of phones, running multiple accounts."

"The monthly data fees are a huge expense."

"Using this card, we can save several hundred a month."

"That little bit of water army fee from Penguin, once distributed to the brothers, isn't even enough to pay the phone bills."

"Now you want us to smear MicroChat."

"Isn't this smashing our own rice bowls?"

After listening to the voice message, Brother Hei was completely stunned.

His mind rapidly calculated the studio's data reimbursements.

That was a huge sum of money that made his heart ache, but if they all switched to MicroChat data-free cards, the money saved would be more than taking on ten orders from Penguin.

The moment this math became clear, Brother Hei's attitude changed immediately.

He rapidly recalled his cursing voice message, his hands typing furiously on the keyboard.

"Are there any quotas left?"

"Get one for me too!"

"Quick, quick, quick, help me reserve one with an eight at the end!"

"I'll transfer the money to you right now!"

As for Penguin's smear campaign task, it had long been thrown to the back of his mind.

The entire water army studio was immersed in the joy of getting freebies, exclaiming how sweet the deal was.

In the face of absolute interests, any smearing was ridiculous and laughable.

The law of true fragrance had completed the most perfect dimensional strike.

Half an hour later.

In the executive office of the Penguin Building.

Liang Dong crossed his hands, his eyes locked tightly on the computer screen.

He was waiting for the smear campaign to fully ferment, and had even thought about how to report this beautiful counterattack to the board of directors.

But as he continuously refreshed the page, the overwhelming black material he imagined didn't even show a shadow.

Instead, after consecutive refreshes, a new update popped out.

Liang Dong fixed his eyes on it, and his face turned deathly pale.

It was not the smear campaign he had expected, but a status update from the official account of Brother Hei's studio.

"Just got the MicroChat Unicom free-data SIM card."

"The internet speed is crazy fast."

"Unlimited data."

"It's amazing!"

Below it was a high-definition photo of the free-data SIM card.

Liang Dong stared at the update, his vision going dark and his chest heaving violently.

He grabbed his mouse and smashed it fiercely against the floor.

The sound of the plastic casing shattering was exceptionally piercing in the room.

He collapsed into his swivel chair in despair, the melancholic background music of falling snow involuntarily echoing in his mind.

Qinglin University, Unicom Store.

Gu Ran held his cola, looking at Ye Zhenzhen's rosy cheeks with a triumphant and breezy smile.

"Dr. Ye."

"Times really have changed."

The young woman leaned forward and bit the straw of her cola, shooting the smug boy an exasperated glare.

"Get my free-data card sorted out first before you start bragging."

Gu Ran smiled and leaned in close to her, lowering his voice.

"I will."

"I absolutely will."

"For you, never mind a free-data card."

"I'd even give myself to you entirely free of charge."

Ye Zhenzhen's ears burned hotly at his blunt words, and she discreetly reached out her foot to step on his toe.

"Shameless~"