Alaricka quickly put her hand down, looking calmly at their backs, as if they hadn’t seen anything.

From Alaricka’s point of view, she saw the man and woman lift their hands, suspiciously breathe into their palms, and then cautiously sniff to check if they had bad breath.

The corners of Alaricka’s mouth curled up sarcastically.

Two idiots.

A moment later, the judges finished calculating the scores. Paloma took the score sheet, went on stage, and grabbed the microphone.

The rankings for the preliminary and semi-final rounds were announced, starting from first place.

The first place in this preliminary round, as expected, was Roschelle.

This was what Alaricka expected. Roschelle had copied her piano pieces before, but she did have some real talent. She just couldn’t write anything truly impressive.

Plus, for this preliminary round, Roschelle used a classic piece. That was the piece Roschelle was best at, so of course there wouldn’t be any mistakes.

As soon as the name of the first place came out, there was frequent and intense applause from both the audience and the judges.

Roschelle stood up from her seat. Her long white dress made her look even slimmer and more graceful. She looked confident and elegant, with a bright smile. She really stood out in a crowd and was very eye-catching.

In front of everyone, Roschelle looked down and gave Kieran a little smile.

She lifted her dress and gracefully walked onto the stage, taking the certificate for first place in the preliminaries from Paloma.

There was another round of loud and frequent applause from the audience.

Alaricka didn’t really care about all that. She cared more about her own ranking.

Watching Roschelle step off the stage, then seeing a bunch of famous contestants go up one after another, but still not hearing her own name called, Alaricka’s brows slowly furrowed.

There were over a hundred contestants in the Mcintosh Piano Competition, and after the preliminary round, only about sixty were left.

When they got to sixty names, Alaricka still didn’t hear her own name.

Alaricka’s palms got sweaty.

When Paloma read the sixty-third name, it still wasn’t Alaricka’s name.

Alaricka’s face was already looking a bit dark.

Sixty-third place, already the second to last spot.

That is to say, there was only one spot left to get into the semifinals.

Alaricka looked up, her clear black-and-white eyes calmly watching Paloma on the stage, and she didn’t seem nervous at all.

Maybe only Alaricka herself knew how nervous she was. Her palms were already covered in tiny beads of sweat, and she couldn’t even hold her hands together.

Many people turned to look at her and secretly sneered.

“I told you a long time ago, Alaricka couldn’t possibly make it to the semifinals. Some of you didn’t believe me. Now what? See if I was right or not.”

“Isn’t there still one last spot? Let’s check it out first.”

“You didn’t even check who else made it to the semifinals.”

“Who was it?”

“Here, one of them was the judge’s niece, so it was definitely going to be her in the end, not Alaricka. Alaricka was done for. This was what you call a one-day trip to the competition. If it were me, I’d be too embarrassed to show my face.”

“Real or fake, would the Argent family really just watch Alaricka get eliminated? The Argent family had raised Alaricka for years, wasn’t it super easy for them to get Alaricka into the semifinals?”

“Don’t even mention the Argent family. Look at Mr. Argent–from the start till now, did Mr. Argent ever care about Alaricka? Alaricka was abandoned by the Argent family a long time ago. She made such a fuss–if it were me, I wouldn’t acknowledge Alaricka either. Not to mention, the Argent family are all civilized people, so they definitely couldn’t accept Alaricka.”

Everyone talked like they really knew what they were saying, like it was a big deal.

Roschelle listened, lowered her eyelids, and there was a hint of a dark smile and sarcasm in her eyes.

This was what happened to Alaricka when she went against her.

Couldn’t even get through a simple preliminary round.

Roschelle looked down at the first place certificate from the preliminaries in her hand with satisfaction, and the smile in her eyes grew deeper.

She and Alaricka were worlds apart.

She hoped Alaricka wouldn’t want to go against her anymore after today.

She also hoped that after today, Kieran could clearly realize that Alaricka was nowhere near as good as her.

But before that, she still had to put on an act.

She pressed her lips together, looking worried and concerned, and said softly, “Don’t say that, there’s still one last spot. Alaricka still has a chance to get into the next round.”