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The classroom buzzed with tension as Xu Haomei stormed inside, a crowd of girls following in her wake. She stopped in front of Jiao Jiao's seat with accusation in her eyes.

"You must have cheated, right? There's no way you scored higher than I did! Lili and Yuyu sit right behind you, and they told me all about how lost you are in class."

The two girls lowered their eyes as Xu Haomei threw their names out, and chaos erupted as the Pinnacle students fought to defend Jiao Jiao.

"You can't just accuse someone like that, Haomei!"

"That's slander, someone go get Mr. Liu!"

"She's just jealous because she's still not in the top fifty!"

"Why are Lili and Yuyu hiding all of a sudden? Scared you'll be caught lying?"

Xu Haomei's face reddened, and she shouted, "All of you just shut up!"

As the star of the show, Jiao Jiao hadn't even had a moment to frame a reply before her classmates jumped to her defense. She was about to respond when the figure beside her rose to her feet.

"Xu Haomei," she began, with gravity tempering her voice. The class suddenly quieted, and attention turned to Zhou Xiaoyu.

"As my former seatmate, I'll give you a chance to take back your words."

Jiao Jiao's eyes widened in shock. This was quite the plot twist! She was sitting at the evil queen bee's old desk in her old classroom with her old seatmate?! This was too dramatic!

Zhou Xiaoyu continued. "You know as well as I do why you didn't score well on the placement test for Year 3. You were so busy preparing for your piano tour that you didn't study. And you quite look down on us scholarship students – what did you call me last year? Rubbish, was it?"

"Zhou Xiao Yu!" Xu Haomei snarled at Xiaoyu's words, her face getting redder and redder.

"Also," Xiaoyu added, "You've been touring for the last month overseas. It's no wonder you didn't do well in the assessments this time."

Down the hallway, one of the Zenith boys slid past the doorway and caught the jam just in time to jolt to a stop. "Haoran, bro! Get to Class 1 right now, Haomei's bullying Jiao Jiao!"

Chi Yang was out of the door before Xu Haoran could get to his feet, and another flurry of people rushed to Class 1. The doorway was clogged with melon eaters, so Chi Yang and Xu Haoran muscled in and pushed to the center of the room.

Xu Haomei was locked in a tense eye battle with Zhou Xiaoyu, neither willing to relent now that the threat had been made.

Before things escalated further, Jiao Jiao decided to respond. She rose to stand with Xiaoyu and patted her gently on the shoulder to get her attention while Xu Haoran grabbed his sister by the arm and pulled her to his side.

"Xu Haomei," Jiao Jiao started, "before you accuse someone of cheating, you should have some proof. Do you? Or are you just going by the words of Wang Xinyu and Chu Lili?"

"What the hell?" Chi Yang was enraged and turned to glare at the girls in question. "Who's accusing Jiao Jiao of cheating?"

She turned to Chi Yang and assured him, "It's fine, Yangyang, don't waste your time on them."

As annoyed as Chi Yang was, he couldn't help but glow a little at her nickname for him.

Xu Haomei quirked an eyebrow and curled her lip sarcastically. "Oh, Yangyang, is it? Who are you to call him like that?" She yanked against her brother's hold, but he wouldn't budge and glared at her fiercely.

"To be clear," Jiao Jiao raised her voice over the fuss, "I didn't cheat. I've worked hard for my marks, so don't think about slandering me because you're not happy with your ranking."

Xu Haomei exploded at seeing all the accusing eyes staring at her. "Why are you all so obsessed with her? She's just a scholarship student who got lucky! She's probably got no talent either – I don't get it!"

Her tirade fizzled out when no one came to her defense. Jiao Jiao gazed at her calmly, then said, "No talent, you say? How about we make a wager? Do you promise to apologize if I can win the talent show after midterms?"

Whispers rose around Jiao Jiao, and the room started to buzz. Didn't she know that Xu Haomei was a genius pianist? She won the talent show every year and had practically secured early entrance to the Shanghai Conservatory of Music for university.

A wicked smile spread across Xu Haomei's face. "Sure, I'll take that bet. And if I win, you'll get down on your knees in front of the school and bark like a dog. How about it?"

Xu Haoran was furious. "Mei, that's too much!" His thoughts were echoed throughout the room, but Jiao Jiao nodded.

"It's a deal."