Chapter 1

The prettiest girl in our class, Vanessa Harper, sent a letter of complaint to the principal's office, accusing me of embezzling class funds.

The school immediately dispatched an inspection team and demanded that I hand over the funds.

Even the counselor, Caroline Blake, tried to convince me to confess for a lighter sentence.

I nodded and agreed to hold a class meeting to admit my actions.

As I looked at Vanessa standing in the front of the room, I grabbed the microphone and spoke firmly.

"You say I embezzled funds? Where's the evidence?"

I held a USB drive filled with payment screenshots, watching as a look of panic flashed across Vanessa's face.

Ever since I saw my father, who worked as an accountant, take the fall for his boss, I had understood one thing. When money was involved, you must keep records.

It was this very lesson my father learned the hard way when he ended up in prison.

From then on, for every single penny that passed through my hands, I made sure to keep meticulous records.

My USB drive was full of dense Excel files, down to the exact minute and second.

I could say that even a dog walking out of my USB drive would have its exact number of hairs accounted for.

The reason for this meticulousness? I didn't want to meet the same fate as my father.

Little did I know that this caution would come in handy at this very moment.

When the counselor called me into her office, I was still in the dorm room eating spicy snacks.

Since I was the class president, going into her office was nothing new for me.

So, I assumed it was just a routine matter.

But when I entered, I found everyone with strange expressions on their faces.

I thought something serious must have happened.

In the past, whenever a student jumped from a building or attempted suicide, the teachers in the office looked about the same way.

I had just walked up to the counselor's desk when she slammed several books down with a loud thud.

"Bertha, why did you embezzle the class funds?!"