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Chapter 3

Author: Strawberry Softie
I looked at the mob closing in on me and took a deep breath.

If I pushed back now, I was sure what had happened in my last life would happen again.

This time around, I did not just want to watch them crash and burn. I needed to keep myself safe while it happened.

Besides, none of them knew that students on national scholarships had their records handled outside of the regular application system.

As the gold medalist in this year’s National Physics Olympiad, I had been personally selected by Pemberton's dean for guaranteed admission. My file had been pulled into Pemberton's system long ago.

Even if I put Cloverfield Community College in the portal, my records were already sitting safe and sound in Pemberton's admissions office.

I put on my best frightened look, bit my lip, and let a flicker of ‘surrender’ cross my face.

"Fine, I'll change it. But I can't bring myself to do it. Gavin, you do it for me."

I gave him my username and password.

Gavin let out a smug, triumphant scoff, as though he had just won the war. He immediately logged into my account and deleted every top-tier university I had listed as the entire class watched. He hammered in the diploma mill's name with obvious glee and slammed the ‘submit’ button.

"Done!" He held up the phone for the whole class to see.

The classroom exploded into thunderous cheers. Phoebe flicked her hair with a satisfied toss and typed my name into the chatbot.

"There, Maren. Babble has already replied. Your Pemberton spot is locked in. Make sure you thank me properly when the semester starts."

I looked at the staggering stupidity on Phoebe's face and smiled with a nod.

"Of course. When the semester starts, I will definitely 'thank' you properly."

I walked out of the classroom with my bag slung over my shoulder. Behind me, I could hear them making plans to go out and celebrate all night.

I looked up at the blinding sun and felt lighter than I had in a long time.

I wanted them to go ahead and celebrate, to let it all out. The higher they flew, the harder they would break when they fell.

The long, sweltering summer passed in a haze of manic excitement for the rest of the class. The group chat blew up every single day, hundreds of unread messages piling up without end.

Phoebe ruled the chat like she had crowned herself queen.

Phoebe: [Has everyone bought their Pemberton spirit shirts yet? I’ve already got mine! We're all wearing them when we show up to Pemberton on our first day!]

Gavin: [Got mine! Whatever Phoebe wears, I wear! I can't wait to see the look on the Pemberton security guards' faces when 43 of us show up at once!]

Keira: [I'm so excited! Oh, by the way, did everyone get the acceptance letter from that vocational college? I'm dying of laughter. They actually mailed it to me!]

Sure enough, by mid-August, the physical acceptance letters from the vocational college had landed in their mailboxes one after another.

The group chat panicked for about half a minute. Then, Phoebe sent a screenshot from Babble.

In the screenshot, Babble was spouting its usual nonsense with perfect confidence.

Babble: [Dear user, receiving the vocational college acceptance letter is a standard part of the operation’s protocol. Please do not be alarmed. Your internal Pemberton student file has been fully registered. Simply present your ID at the Pemberton freshman check-in desk on September 1st.]

With Babble's stamp of approval, the class threw caution to the wind entirely. They ripped up their vocational college acceptance letters, burned them, and even filmed themselves doing it for social media.

Meanwhile, I had quietly signed my own acceptance letter at the beginning of August. It was an exclusive guaranteed-admission letter, personally signed by Pemberton's dean.

I locked it away in my desk drawer and waited in silence for the first day of the semester to arrive.

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  • Scammed by Chatbot University   Chapter 10

    Gavin was hiding at home at that very moment, still fantasizing about how he could help Phoebe through this crisis.The front door was kicked open. Several furious fathers rushed in, pinned Gavin to the ground, and beat him senseless without a word."You little sh*t! You wanted to impress a girl, so you sacrificed my son's future to do it?""Playing the big romantic hero? You destroyed over forty families! You can pay for it with your life!"Gavin was beaten until he could barely see straight, howling for help. "Dad! Mom! Help me! They're going to kill me!"Gavin's parents looked at the mob of parents with murder in their eyes, then at the list of compensation demands that added up to tens of millions of dollars. They went white with terror.They were an ordinary working-class family. They did not have that kind of money.Gavin's father stared down at the son who had brought catastrophe on the entire family, and something cold and final settled in his eyes.He stormed into the

  • Scammed by Chatbot University   Chapter 9

    Just as that boy's father had said, someone had filmed the entire scene at Pemberton and posted it online. It hit the top of the trending page that same day.[Unbelievable! 42 High School Students Storm Pemberton with AI Chat Logs, Claim System Was Hacked!][The Tragedy of Modern Education: They Trust AI Gibberish Over Acceptance Letters!]Every major news outlet picked it up and ran with it. The comment sections were flooded with mockery from one end of the internet to the other.They had not just lost their shot at college. They had become the biggest joke in the entire country.A few days later, the so-called ‘future Pemberton freshmen’ were dragged home from the city by their parents, tails between their legs. What awaited them was the wrath of every adult in their lives and a bottomless pit of despair.The Jones household had already been reduced to a war zone.A brick sailed through the floor-to-ceiling window of the Jones family's villa, and glass exploded across the floo

  • Scammed by Chatbot University   Chapter 8

    Chancellor Hollister waved his hand. "Security, escort them off the premises. If they cause any more trouble, hand them over to the police."Over a dozen guards moved in immediately and herded all 42 of them out of the plaza without an ounce of sympathy, pushing and shoving them through the gate like stray animals.Under the unblinking lenses of countless phone cameras, the entire class was driven out beyond Pemberton's gates and deposited on the curb of the road across the street.The sun beat down on them. Their knockoff Pemberton t-shirts looked even more pathetic and ridiculous than ever."It's over... It's all over..."One of the boys, someone whose grades would have easily gotten him into a good university, broke down sobbing. "I could've gotten into a real school! My parents are at home waiting for the good news. How am I supposed to face them?"Reality had finally sunk in. After twelve years of grinding through school, Phoebe Jones had destroyed all of it for them.In th

  • Scammed by Chatbot University   Chapter 7

    "What’s going on here? It's the first day of the semester, and you've already turned the front gate into a circus?" Chancellor Edmund Hollister frowned slightly as he surveyed the students sprawled on the ground in their knockoff t-shirts.Gavin was the first to rush at him, carrying himself like a loyal subject who had suffered a grave injustice."Chancellor Hollister! Thank God you're here! You have to help us!"He snatched Phoebe's phone and shoved the chatbot interface in the chancellor's face."Look at this! This is the evidence we have! There's a mole in your admissions office who transferred all forty-two of our internally approved spots to one person, Maren Caldwell!"Phoebe threw herself into the performance right behind him, sobbing. "Chancellor Hollister, we're all outstanding students. You can't let some hacker and thief destroy a hundred years’ worth of Pemberton's reputation!"Chancellor Hollister squinted at the Babble chat window on the screen, then looked at the

  • Scammed by Chatbot University   Chapter 6

    All 42 of them surged forward like a mob, clawing and shoving, trying to break through the security line to get to me.The guards jumped and grabbed their radios. "Requesting backup at the main gate! We have a group of possibly unhinged individuals trying to storm the entrance!"I stood on the other side of the barrier, watching the twisted fury on their faces, and could not help but laugh."Phoebe, is there anything between your ears besides sawdust?"I crossed my arms and looked down at her."I stole your spots? Do you think Pemberton is a flea market where admissions can just be packaged up and moved around? You’ll believe whatever an AI tells you. If it told you I was the Queen, would you kneel?""Don't you dare try to talk your way out of this!"Gavin jabbed a finger in my face and screamed. "Babble already gave us the proof, yet you're still denying it! Security, you need to arrest this thief right now! That acceptance letter in her hand belongs to Phoebe!"The crowd of f

  • Scammed by Chatbot University   Chapter 5

    My acceptance letter, decorated with Pemberton's signature purple, shone brightly under the sunlight. Every single one of my former classmates flinched at the sight of it.I paid no attention to the looks on their faces, each one staring at me as though they had seen a ghost, and handed my letter and ID to the senior volunteer who had been sweating through his shirt moments ago.He took the letter and ran it under the scanner.The scanner beeped once, and the screen flashed green.The exhaustion on his face vanished, instantly replaced by an eager smile. "Oh, you're Maren Caldwell! Your advisor already told us about you. You're a guaranteed-admission scholar, so there's a priority lane set up for you. Follow me!"The security guard dropped his mocking expression just as fast, pulled back the barrier rope for me, and even gave me a respectful nod.This seamless, red-carpet treatment left all 42 people on the other side of the barrier standing in stunned silence.The air went comp

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