Chapter 7

"That's the theory, but how can you prove you didn't cheat?" The moment Emilio finished speaking, a security guard rushed in. "You need to come quick — students are making a scene downstairs!"

All three of them changed expression at once. They pushed open the window and looked down. Someone had started a protest, demanding the school punish Jessica and Marlon and return the competition spots to the students who'd been wronged.

A crowd was already gathering.

"Everyone, the school is handling this! Please stay calm — we will give you a satisfactory answer!" Emilio was sweating through his forehead and had no choice but to go out and try to settle everyone down.

College students who hadn't yet entered the real world carried the purest sense of justice, and they weren't buying a word Emilio said.

Just as the situation was about to spiral out of control, Jessica stepped forward and raised her voice. "I know everyone hates cheating — so do I. But you can't take one side of the story at face value. Don't let your sense of justice be used by people with ulterior motives."

"To prove my innocence, I'm willing to accept whatever arrangement the school sees fit and retake the test. In the interest of fairness, any student is welcome to sign up and compete against me."

Jessica's voice wasn't loud, but it carried weight. Everyone looked at each other, stunned — including Anna, who had been lurking in the crowd hoping to watch the drama unfold. Even she looked completely thrown off.

"Are you out of your mind?" Marlon, standing behind Jessica, nearly lost control of his volume.

It wasn't that he doubted Jessica's ability. But this was a top-ten university in the world — the kind of place that never ran short of once-in-a-million talents. She was a sophomore. And she was taking on the entire school?

"It's the fastest way to prove I'm innocent." Jessica's eyes held a stubborn edge. She didn't want to drag Marlon down with her, and she refused to let anyone smear her name.

The midday sun filtered through the trees and cast dappled shadows across Jessica's shoulders. Her face, bare of makeup, was striking — carrying a refusal to back down, vivid and sharp like a weed that refuses to be uprooted.

She turned to Emilio. "What do you think of my proposal?"

Emilio turned it over in his head and couldn't come up with any other solution. After a long silence, he gave a slow nod.

At that, the crowd erupted again.

News that Jessica was challenging the entire school spread like wildfire. Within a single afternoon, the whole campus had heard.

Some called her reckless. Others admired her nerve. But no one dared talk behind Jessica's back anymore.

Because what kind of person with nothing to show would make a claim like that?

Jessica's once-quiet life was completely upended by the approaching test. She'd become the most talked-about person on campus overnight. Wherever she went, eyes followed.

It didn't seem to affect her much. The library was too crowded, so she kept to her usual spot — the campus café — to study.

Plenty of curious onlookers showed up under the pretense of grabbing coffee, really just hoping to catch a glimpse of the girl bold enough to issue that challenge. The café's foot traffic doubled.

"Ms. Whitmore, were you the one who filed the report?" Two young men in police uniforms walked in, looking entirely out of place, and immediately drew every eye in the room.

The noise died down at once. A charged, gossip-tinged tension settled over the café.

One of them walked over to Jessica, who had her head down looking at her notes, and lightly knocked on her table.

"Yes, I filed the report." Jessica looked up and pulled out screenshots she'd saved as evidence.

"Someone illegally leaked my personal information and spread rumors claiming I had an inappropriate relationship with my advisor."

The entire café went dead silent. Jessica's clear voice cut through it, deliberate and steady. "This has seriously disrupted my personal life. The post has been viewed over five thousand times and shared more than five hundred — that meets the threshold for a criminal offense."

The officer looked slightly surprised that a student had such a thorough grasp of the law. He took the evidence and read through it line by line, his expression growing more serious. "The evidence is solid. We'll need you to come with us to assist with the investigation. Our technical team will help identify the person behind this anonymous account."

"That won't be necessary. Before filing the report, I had my attorney submit an evidence preservation request. The forum provided a preliminary response — the phone number and the most recent login IP tied to the anonymous account have already been flagged. The official confirmation still needs to be retrieved by law enforcement through proper legal channels."

As she said this, Jessica turned her head and looked directly at Anna, who had gone pale in the crowd. "But based on the preliminary response, the phone number linked to the anonymous account is an exact match for Anna's."

The moment those words landed, every gaze in the room sharpened like a blade and snapped to Anna.

Standing in full view of everyone, Anna forced a smile. "How could it be me? There must be some kind of mistake."

"Anna, we'll need you to come with us." The lead officer was experienced enough to see right through her — she was holding it together on the surface, but the guilt behind her eyes was impossible to hide.

"Officer, there's definitely a misunderstanding here!" Anna's composure was starting to crack.

She stepped forward and looped her arm through Jessica's with practiced warmth, squeezing out a bright smile. "You don't know the whole story — Jessica and I are practically sisters. We've lived under the same roof for years. Why would I ever say something like that about her?"

"Please don't." Jessica pulled her arm away and stepped back, putting a clear distance between them. "If this is how you treat someone you call a sister, I'd hate to see what you'd do to an enemy."

The instinctive recoil hit like an open slap across the face.

"So the post was made up?"

"Obviously — she filed a police report."

"They've got solid evidence and she's still playing the devoted sister card."

"Always acting so sweet and innocent, turns out she's been stabbing people in the back."

The looks directed at Anna grew complicated. The chatter came from all sides, unfiltered, washing over her like a rising tide — relentless, suffocating.

"It wasn't me. It really wasn't me!"

Anna stumbled back, eyes welling up, her slight frame looking like a fragile flower clinging to the edge of a cliff — one gust away from falling. "Even if the phone number matches, that doesn't prove I did it."

Something seemed to click. She scrambled through her bag, pulled out her phone, and opened the forum to show everyone her account page. "I just remembered — the account I registered with this phone got hacked a while back. The appeal process was too much trouble, so I've been using a new account ever since."

"Someone is obviously trying to set me up and turn Jessica against me." Anna's voice broke as she said it, and tears spilled down her face, one after another.

She cried like she meant every word of it. Her makeup was half streaked. Her shoulders trembled slightly. She looked genuinely pitiful — enough that the people watching started to wonder if they'd been too quick to judge her.