The next morning, the internet was still buzzing with memes, remixes, and conspiracy essays dissecting every noodle Aria Lane had eaten during her comeback stream.
But Aria herself?
She was still hungry.
She opened her next livestream with her trademark deadpan expression and said,
"Good morning, world. I'm still alive. Still not arrested. Still eating."
The chat erupted instantly.
💬 "She's BACKKKKKK 😭😭😭"
💬 "Her entire brand is being chaotic and hungry and we love that for her."
💬 "Miss Lane, please open a restaurant, I beg."
This time, her countertop was stacked high with various canned foods — tuna, beans, soup, and one suspiciously unbranded tin that just said "Fortified Protein: Batch 09."
She tapped it thoughtfully. "Looks like a secret experiment. Let's risk it."
She pried it open with her dagger instead of a can opener.
The lid clanged against the counter.
"Ah," she said flatly, peering inside. "It's meat. I think."
💬 "That's 100% alien food."
💬 "Batch 09 sounds like a CIA side project."
💬 "She's fearless for eating anything unlabelled 😭"
Aria spooned it onto a pan and tasted a small bite.
Then she blinked.
"Wait," she said, surprised. "This canned food is actually good."
She looked at the label again, shrugged, and kept eating.
Chat lost its collective mind.
💬 "SHE SAID IT. SHE SAID THE LINE."
💬 "Batch 09 stocks up 400% in one hour."
💬 "No way a single comment is about to ruin the economy again 💀💀💀"
Within four hours, every can of "Fortified Protein: Batch 09" sold out worldwide.
Hashtags exploded:
#ThisCannedFoodIsActuallyGood
#AriaEatsItSoWeBuyIt
#QueenOfConsumption
Online stores crashed.
Companies panicked.
Governments quietly called suppliers demanding to know what exactly Batch 09 was.
The answer terrified them.
It wasn't a commercial product.
It was a discontinued military ration prototype from a classified Agency nutrition program — one Aria herself had tested years ago as Agent A-01.
In a secure Agency bunker, alarms lit up.
"Sir, the prototype's packaging wasn't supposed to exist outside our inventory!"
The supervisor's voice was low and sharp. "How did she get it?"
An analyst turned his monitor. "The footage shows an unmarked distributor. She must've intercepted a black-market crate."
"Can she trace it?"
The analyst hesitated. "No, sir. She made it."
The supervisor's expression darkened. "Then she knows we're watching."
Back in her kitchen, Aria leaned on the counter, finishing the last bite.
She glanced at the chat, eyes glittering with amusement.
"So apparently," she said, "the internet thinks I just endorsed military-grade protein."
💬 "You did 😭😭😭"
💬 "They say it's secret government food!"
💬 "You literally caused a rationing crisis in two countries."
Aria smirked. "Well, I did say it was good."
While the world was laughing, a few viewers noticed something strange.
At timestamp 14:27 in the livestream, when she tilted the can toward the camera, a faint code had appeared stamped under the label — just for a second.
"01X-Return: Signal at Dawn."
It was subtle, almost invisible.
But her Signal Circles caught it instantly.
Within hours, decoded versions of the image spread across underground forums.
Some said it was coordinates.
Some said it was a warning.
Some said it was an invitation.
💬 "'Signal at Dawn' drops tomorrow. She's planning something again."
💬 "The message is real. Look at the can reflection!"
💬 "She's turning product placement into espionage 😭"
By evening, even Rift Media's replacement PR director had to comment.
"She's not under contract," he said stiffly at a press conference. "We do not control her content."
A journalist asked, "Does anyone control her?"
He hesitated. "…Next question."
In her tiny kitchen, Aria ended her stream with her usual casual wave.
"Remember," she said with a smile that didn't reach her eyes, "you are what you eat.
And some of us just digest chaos better than others."
She winked, and the screen went dark.
Noah Hale watched from a safehouse halfway across the city, a single brow raised.
"She's baiting them," he muttered.
His handler's voice came through the radio.
"She's not just baiting, Hale. She's building a network."
Noah stared at the paused frame of her smile.
"Then they're already too late."
Hours later, hidden in the metadata of Aria's latest video, a new encrypted signature flickered alive:
A-01 ONLINE
SUBJECT STATUS: ACTIVE
NEXT OPERATION: FEED THEM
💬 "I feel like she's using us to talk to someone else 😭😭😭"
💬 "'Feed them' — she's feeding the world AND the system."
💬 "Queen turned food reviews into war strategy 💀💀💀"
And just like that, the woman the world once mocked for being weak had weaponized a can of beans.
The Foodie Queen had officially risen — and no one realized she'd just launched her next operation.