The countdown on the big screen came to an end. ɴᴇᴡ ɴᴏᴠᴇʟ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀs ᴀʀᴇ ᴘᴜʙʟɪsʜᴇᴅ ᴏɴ N0velFire.ɴet
Charlotte Thompson was the first to put down her pen. She watched the staff gather the drafts before she rose from her seat and left.
The competition had two stages.
The first part was an on-site design, and after a brief interval, the designs would be handcrafted into finished products.
This was the unique feature of this jewelry competition.
As she stepped off the stage, her assistant Coco came over with a cup of water, a look of concern on her face.
Charlotte thanked her and took the cup before sinking into a sofa in the dressing room.
She took a sip of water to moisten her slightly dry throat and proceeded to turn on her phone.
Coco, standing on the other side, interlaced her fingers nervously and occasionally stole glances at Charlotte’s phone, which was booting up on the table.
Coco was Charlotte’s provisional assistant hired in China, unaware of her situation.
Seeing Coco’s nervousness, Charlotte couldn’t help but find it amusing, "What are you so nervous about? Why don’t you sit down?"
At her remark, Coco blushed, attempting to speak but holding back.
Seeing her speechless, Charlotte did not probe further.
Her phone had just started up. She reached out to pick it up, preparing to unlock it.
Coco’s face changed abruptly as she quickly grabbed Charlotte’s phone out of her hand, her voice shaky.
"Miss Thompson, you... you shouldn’t look at your phone now, you should rest a bit. You have to go back on stage soon."
Upon hearing those words, Charlotte instantly realized something was amiss, especially in light of Evelyn Curtis’s recent actions.
She slightly nodded, "What happened?"
"Huh?" Coco shook her head vehemently, worried that unnecessary stress might affect Charlotte’s performance, she quickly denied, "No, no, no, I’m just worried you’re too exhausted."
The reason seemed pale and unconvincing.
Charlotte lightly massaged her forehead, "You underestimate me. I’m not that mentally weak."
She waved her hand, "Give me my phone."
As her words fell, Coco pursed her lips, hesitated a few minutes, then handed over the phone, tentatively uttering, "No matter what you see, don’t get angry. It would be better to finish the competition first."
Charlotte nodded, unlocked her phone, then opened the voting section for the jewelry contest on Weibo.
Unsurprisingly, it was filled with posts about her.
She skimmed through briefly and managed to get the gist of the situation.
So, all this fuss was about the red dress she had trimmed?
She scrolled through the comments, each one more sarcastic than the last, even accusing her of trying to outshine Evelyn Curtis with her dress instead of focusing on the competition.
After reading dozens of comments over a couple of minutes, Charlotte felt neither anger nor fury; she was rather amused.
All she did was participate in a competition, and somehow she was tagged as a knock-off designer and became a target of online ridicule.
However, none of this was sufficient to unsettle her.
Charlotte turned off her phone, rubbed her temples, hiding her inner turmoil.
Suddenly, there was the sound of high heels clicking outside, and the dressing room door was pushed open.
Coco instinctively turned to look, her face suddenly changing, flushing slightly.
She remembered clearly the previous incident; it was Evelyn Curtis who had created all the fuss about Charlotte.
She must have purposely set Charlotte up!
Coco felt outraged on Charlotte’s behalf!
Charlotte slowly opened her eyes as she leaned back, watching as Evelyn Curtis sat down on a sofa opposite her, an undisguised taunting expression on her face.