Walking Away From Their Downfall

When I was poisoned and on my deathbed, Mona Culver arrived by my bedside with reporters in tow. She cried sadly. "When every classmate of mine was willing to give up going to Northrind, the country's top university, Celeste Somner insisted on reporting this issue. Because of her, I ended up in community college instead.

"Celeste used to bully me back in high school because she always thought I was stupid. She would look at me condescendingly whenever I had questions about our homework and insult me, telling me that a girl with an IQ like mine should just quit school and marry a man.

"When I started at community college, she was jealous of me when she found out James Holden had a crush on me, so she paid some hooligans to assault me. Regardless, we were still classmates, so it makes me so sad to hear about her getting poisoned."

Mona's sadness touched the internet, and a huge discussion erupted online. "Which is more important? A person's character or their education level?"

Our classmates came forward as witnesses, backing up Mona's story. They claimed that Mona had always maintained good results, but she had 'accidentally' gotten food poisoning before her final exam, which affected her usual standard of performance.

The local education department held a last-minute meeting and decided to make an exception for her, giving her a spot in college. James had even knelt on one knee to propose to her, and their love story garnered huge popularity among netizens.

While all this was happening, an extremist with mental illness snuck into my parents' home to break their legs and burn them to death. While they were begging through their locked door to be saved from the fire, James was standing outside with his arm around Mona. "If it wasn't for your daughter snitching on us, Mona and I could have gotten together earlier! She wouldn't have suffered so much at the hands of that b*tch, Celeste, either.

"Mona and I should've reunited in Northrind, but we were forced to be apart for such a long time because of your daughter's doing. Your family deserves to die like this. This is your retribution!"

My soul was roaring in the air as bloody, angry tears flowed down my cheeks, but no one could see me. When my eyes opened again, I was reading my class's group chat, which was filled with messages.

[Celeste, James is just asking us to apply for community college together as a group so we have some negotiating power with Northrind's admissions team. Why are you acting this way when we're just pretending?]

[Yeah! Besides, you're not our mom. It's none of your business if we're willing to compromise our high results by choosing community college.]

[Come on, guys! Don't you get it? She's just jealous that Mona is the most popular girl in school and that James likes her. It's a love rivalry! She really is disappointing, isn't she?]

I bit my lip hard and tasted blood in my mouth. I finally realized I had been reborn the day before the university application deadline. I quickly quit the group chat as my hands trembled with excitement.

Our class was renowned for being the top-ranking in the country. All thirty of us had a 4.0 GPA, but my classmates were all willing to apply to community college for the sake of the most popular girl in school, Mona, who was from a low-ranking class.

University applications were extremely important, and as the top scorers in the country, we could easily get into Northrind if we filled out the application accordingly. However, if all of us missed the opportunity to submit our applications to this top-ranking university, we would not be able to get into Northrind. We might even miss the application deadline for other universities. It would be a waste of our high school years.

I was worried about everyone's future in my previous lifetime, so I secretly informed the school and everyone's parents of their plan, only to be hated and to cause my own family's destruction. This time, I looked forward to watching my classmates destroy their own futures.

If they wanted to be Mona's bootlickers, I wanted to see how they would end up without a prestigious degree to show for it.