The Reclaimed Rose (Annalise and Steven)

The ex-classmate continued, "And yet, in front of everyone, you're trying to pin all your past mistakes on Annalise? Do you really think that's going to work?"

"Everyone from our school knows exactly what kind of person you were. You threw your weight around just because your family was rich and had connections. If you didn't like someone, you bullied them. It was as simple as that."

"When students complained to the teachers, nothing ever changed. They had no choice but to endure it."

"Since we're talking about the past, why don't we go over all the brilliant things Yelena did?"

"Who was it that kept stealing the awards Annalise earned through her hard work? How did Yelena manage to get the awards when her grades were terrible, and no one wanted to associate with her?"

As more people spoke up, Yelena's expression darkened.

Of course, she couldn't admit to anything, so she quickly tried to twist the narrative. "My grades only went downhill because Annalise hurt me so badly that I lost all confidence in studying!"

"Oh? Then how did you manage to win all those awards when Annalise was still around, but the moment she left, you couldn't win a single one? Meanwhile, Annalise transferred schools and only won more awards."

Yelena opened her mouth but couldn't come up with an answer.

Then, someone pulled up competition records, revealing that Annalise had participated in numerous math contests throughout high school and had consistently ranked first in most competitions.

That only confirmed what her classmates had been saying all along-Annalise couldn't have bullied Yelena as she didn't have the time.

Subsequently, some former students and even parents stepped forward to reveal that aside from studying, Annalise had also been tutoring her classmates to earn extra money.

In between tutoring, she was also running small side businesses, finding ways to stretch every cent she had.

With a schedule like that, Annalise was bound to get some sleep any free moment she got. And yet Yelena wanted people to believe that Annalise still had the leisure to go around bullying her classmates?

The sheer absurdity of it made everyone laugh. Was that even possible? Absolutely not.

Everyone had deduced from Annalise's academic record that she simply didn't have the time to do anything malicious and began digging into Yelena's past instead.

As a result, Yelena said in frustration, "You're all just ganging up on me to help Annalise bully me! I won't let this go!"

With that, she fled without another word.

Meanwhile, Zane continued monitoring the situation. He deliberately looked into Annalise's business ventures, noting the names of her companies andnoveldrama

investigating their background.

What he found was

intriguing-though none of the

3UT

businesses were particularly large in scale, Annalise had built them entirely on her own without relying on anyone. She had also branched out into multiple industries.

It was impressive that Annalise could have grown her business to this scale. The only strange thing was that, shortly before her divorce from Steven, these companies had all encountered financial difficulties.

Zane finally understood why Annalise was in such a dire state during the divorce

even though she had companies under her name.

Another question arose in his mind.

Annalise's businesses had been thriving, so why had the cash flow suddenly hit a crisis?

Deep in thought, he reached out to some contacts for more

information. He realized Annalise hadn't built those companies just for business. Her true purpose had been to counter Otis.

Even after Annalise left her old city, her employees remained vigilant and helped her monitor Otis' whereabouts.

The moment they detected any sign that he was planning to target Annalise

again, they moved first and quietly sabotaged him from the shadows.

Zane approached me and asked, "If Steven hadn't cheated on you and hurt you

so badly, Otis wouldn't be having an easy time right now, would he?"

I replied honestly, "Pretty much. The company finally started recovering in the past

few days. That's when they told me what they'd been doing all this time. However..."