Chapter 4

Mr. Lister looked completely bewildered. "What admission letter? How could you have an admission letter when you weren't even accepted into any university?"

He quickly took out the list and pointed at it. "You can take a look at it yourself! Here's the school's official list of those who didn't get admitted into any university—and your name is on it!"

Brandon swayed and took a few steps back. "T-That's impossible!"

He frantically took out his phone, and once he confirmed the lack of any admission update, he completely broke down and screamed. "How can this be? Why did I fail to get admitted?"

He rushed forward and grabbed Mr. Lister's sleeve. "You know what my scores were, Mr. Lister! You know that I met the requirements!

"I saw the acceptance announcements for Caldoria University's School of Foreign Service online this morning, and people with lower scores than I got in! Why was I left out? Did the university make a mistake? How could this happen to me, Mr. Lister?"

Mr. Lister was equally surprised. "You should have been admitted to the university by all accounts."

I couldn't help but smirk when I looked at Brandon, who had completely broken down right in front of me. He had decent grades and plenty of confidence, which was why he had only applied to Caldoria University's School of Foreign Service and nowhere else.

He had listed several prestigious universities among his remaining options, but his scores fell far short of their requirements. In the end, he wasn't admitted to any university.

Peter couldn't help but ask, "You didn't get admitted into any university as well, Brandon?"

He seemed worried outwardly, but I could still hear a hint of suppressed joy in his voice.

Brandon went completely pale, utterly lost for words.

In the meantime, as the situation grew increasingly tense, Mr. Lister's phone rang a few times. In about ten minutes or so, every single classmate who hadn't been accepted into a university showed up at Vivian's house.

They all had scores high enough to get admitted to a university. There were others with the same or even lower marks who had already received acceptance letters, yet they had somehow been rejected.

They were frantic, but their parents were even more panicked, constantly pestering Mr. Lister to find out what exactly went wrong.

"Why didn't my daughter get accepted into a single university even though she has decent scores for her SAT? Did your system glitch or something?"

"You're well aware of my son's capabilities, Mr. Lister! He should have easily qualified for a standard university placement. How is it possible that he's completely unplaced?"

Mr. Lister was even more baffled. He then stated firmly, "I'm certain that there is a glitch in the system somewhere."

I cleared my throat and said softly, "I know why it happened."

In that instant, everyone turned to look at me. Brandon finally took notice of my presence and asked with a scoff, "Didn't we break up already, Mabel? Why are you still shamelessly following me around?"

Those surrounding classmates joined in the snickering. "Isn't it obvious? I mean, all of us failed to secure admission, so her presence here is undoubtedly because she was also left without a placement!"

"Did you come here because you still can't let go of Brandon, Mabel?"

I ignored their taunts, merely asking, "Aren't any of you curious about why you actually got rejected?"

I pointed directly at Vivian as I met their bewildered stares. "You ought to know that the reason you are all without a university placement is entirely due to Vivian, our class belle!"

"You'd better stop making things up, Mabel!"

"What does Vivian have to do with any of this?"

I swallowed hard, then solemnly explained to them the absolute importance of the official records envelope.

Mr. Lister got a massive headache just listening to this. He exclaimed, "Did you guys actually tear open the official records envelope?"

He looked at everyone with frustration and asked, "Do you have any idea how important the official records envelope is?"