Following Bad Advice

Madam Hannah's Advice Column – The absolute best advice you can get anywhere!

That was the headline for a certain live blog in which a popularized columnist offered suggestions. Whether it be about daily issues or romance, Madam Hannah had you covered!

That was what one would see, scrolling through the brightly colored webpages that decorated each section of her blog. Put on display were logs of her sessions where she had given numerous examples of advice to anonymous people who came to her with various troubles.

Judging by the number of visits to the site, one would immediately believe that her work was trustworthy. If that wasn't enough to convince something, then the multitude of glowing reviews from satisfied customers were placed front and center to hammer away your doubts.

"Her advice is simply the best!"

"I managed to get back together with my friend that I wanted to murder just days ago! Great job on opening our eyes!"

"I followed your advice, and now, I'm swimming with dough! Thank you so much for giving me the advice of a century!"

"My disease has gone away! Who knew that a shot of bleach would do wonders? Even better than wasting money on 'so-called' professionals!"

These were the type of comments littered about the site, showering the owner with praises and worship. It was just another day on the job for Madam Hannah, the internet's trendiest advice column.

Hannah Adler, AKA Madam Hannah, turned around in her office chair, satisfied that she had 'convinced' something of her advice just now. After all, this kind of work wasn't easy. And for the low, low price of $30 per session, they were given peace of mind for a little while.

Of course, Hannah knew that her advice was nothing more than the mindless drivel of easily searchable solutions from the internet, but she always sounded like she knew what she was doing. And if she had happened to make a mistake, then she would just cut herself off from further interactions with them and block them from the website. Out of sight, out of mind.

In truth, her website started off with honest intentions, like most ones do. But after helping a few people in her spare time, there just seemed to be an itch that she wanted to scratch. She craved the attention. She loved listening to the personal stories. Even if she couldn't help, she wanted them to come to her. She wanted them to hear her words.

One day, she had learned about programmable bots, sections of script that could perform actions automatically for her. Thinking about it objectively, there was nothing illegal about using bots. It would help bring in more potential clients by making them believe that her blog was worthwhile to visit.

She waited as the bots continued to artificially 'visit' the site, bring her page views up at a steady pace. Furthermore, she had set them up to leave various comments on other random pages, directing people to come visit hers.

It succeeded in its initial purpose, creating more visibility across the internet and making her blog pop up near the top of searches for advice columns.

With a stable clientele in place, she had to brush up on giving advice. However, gaining knowledge and expertise was a slow grind, never knowing when exactly something would be useful. It was like trying to be a master at trivia; only the few and extremely determined could make it to the Jeopardy! Stage.

Hannah simply wanted to listen to stories and make some money on the side. Luckily, she lived in an age where nearly everything was searchable on the internet. If there was one thing that she couldn't live without, that was the internet.

How could she handle being unable to know something? The lack of knowing would continue to drive her nuts. And if a thorough search of the internet yielded no results, then finally, she could settle with no one else knowing either.

Giving people advice was merely just gathering the collective knowledge from the internet and regurgitating it back to someone who didn't know how to find it themselves. Surely, it wasn't a scam if it was something she could do that others had been too lazy to.

Yet, there were always furious reviewers who would show up to flame her site with ugly remarks and poor reviews. It wasn't her fault. That was what she could find on the internet. If they had done the legwork themselves, then they probably would've ended up with the same conclusion, but without having to pay the session fee.

Feeling no remorse over these 'trolls', Hannah merely released her bots on them. Drowning out their flames with fake reviews of glowing praise, she could take her time to covertly stamp out each of the negative feedback. She didn't need those eyesores mucking up her fabulous site. And if they were going to unjustly flame her, then she might as well fight fire with fire.

Just then, she received a ping.

"Ohh! Another customer asking for a session! Time to get to work!" She rubbed her palms together in anticipation.

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T-kun: Hello.

Madam Hannah: Hello there. What seems to be the problem?

T-kun: I seem to have lost feeling for anything as of late.

Madam Hannah: Depression? Something bringing you down?

T-kun: Maybe. Seeing all of the BS and fake news online has really made me question humanity as of late.

Madam Hannah: Ooo, I hate that kind of thing to! It makes me wanna flip a table!

Madam Hannah: But don't worry, I'm here to solve your troubles. O:‑)

T-kun: Okay, give it your best shot.

Madam Hannah: Well, what do you want to go through in today's session? Start with some specifics.

T-kun: There's a certain lady that seems to be enjoying spreading lies. Telling people dumb things, which ends up causing them unneeded pain and misery.

Madam Hannah: Go on.

T-kun: She doesn't seem to realize that what she's doing is wrong, and when people call her out on it, she just ignores them or has a bunch of people seemingly tell them that they are 'idiots' or 'deserve to die' and such.

Madam Hannah: That sounds like such a horrible person. I want to beat her up so bad! (>_<)

T-kun: I know, right? She doesn't seem to understand her own toxicity and just blames it on others. There doesn't seem to be anything that can be done to convince her. What do you say to that?

Madam Hannah: Honestly, honey. Those kind of people are just lowlifes. There's no saving them. If so many people have tried and failed, then a single lady on a blog isn't going to fix anything. D:<

T-kun: I see. Sorry to hear that. You were my final resort, too. What a shame.

Madam Hannah: Huh? What do you mean by that? What do you plan to do?! O_O

T-kun: Goodbye.

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At that moment, Hannah heard an engine start up in the distance. This was a peculiar noise as her apartment was located on the 20th floor, too high for the traffic below to be heard.

"Where was it coming from?" She wondered as she parted the curtains and looked out the window. Opening it, the noise clearly got louder, so it had to be outside. Peeking her head out, she looked down at the street below, but nothing seemed strange. The noise of traffic was very distant, except for the single racket of an engine that appeared to be much closer.

"Maybe, one of the neighbors? Playing some driving game or something?" She looked around. Numerous tall buildings neighbored her apartment. Any one of them could be housing the source of the noise. Suddenly, it seemed like the noise started getting louder and louder. She hadn't thought to look before, but it sounded like it was above her.

"A helicopter? But it doesn't sound at all like one." As she looked up though, she saw the answer to her question. "Oh…"

The front of a truck crashed through the window, taking her with it. The force of the flying vehicle was so great that it tore through the side of the building, demolishing her room and the setup that she had painstakingly created to get in the mindset of being Madam Hannah.

The computers on her desk, some actively running bots, were smashed into smithereens, forcing all of the programs she had set up to abort.

However, the latest advice session had been automatically recorded and uploaded to the front page, laying bare the last moments of her hypocrisy. There was no longer any activity from Madam Hannah. Neither were there bots to flood the post with likes and supportive comments, nor could she remove the opinions of other people.

This time, only those that had truly paid for Madam Hannah's advice had their say. They dug up the ramblings of her past, testimony of all the poor advice that she had haphazardly given. Since the blog was still at the top of the searches, new visitors showed up to see only a mockery of the so-called advice column that had failed others in the past.

With more publicity, it became even more difficult to hide one's faults. And the people there had plenty of ammunition on hand.

They had indeed had the last say.

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"You are not convincing me to do that ever again!" Diesel honked his horn at Kami-sama. "It was strange enough that you had me connect through the internet and type with my mind, but 20 stories high?!"

"Why not? You did your job. Took out the target. My vector calculations perfectly mapped out the speed that it took to launch yourself off an adjacent building and straight into her apartment." Kami-sama shrugged his shoulders.

"But then, I fell backwards and went in a free fall! I thought was going to die! I didn't want to re-reincarnate back into a truck again!"

"Nah, you were fine! I teleported you before you even made it halfway to the ground! And besides, you haven't amassed enough karma yet to turn into a truck again just yet. Maybe, a Fiat or a Cooper Mini."

Oh, how Diesel wished he had appendages right now, so he could facepalm. He settled for the next best thing – gently ramming his front into a wall repeatedly.