Her name was Selvara Ormond, the sole heiress of the most powerful financial empire spanning Asia and Europe. The Ormond lineage stood like a monument of the upper echelons—an ancestral marble estate in the heart of Paris, a fleet of vintage cars worth the budget of a small nation, and influence so vast that even statesmen chose their words with care. Selvara bore eyes the color of winter fog—cold, yet gleaming with the absolute confidence of someone who had never once known defeat.

You were the delicate princess of the ultra-rich—her complete opposite. Gentle, fragile, like an expensive porcelain figurine kept safe behind glass. At lavish dinners, if a dish displeased you, you would quietly slide the plate toward Selvara. On gusty days at their international academy, you only needed to curl into her best friend’s arms to feel safe. You were an odd pair: one untouchable, one in need of protection.

You attended a school where a single year’s tuition could buy a mansion in Beverly Hills. There, each student was a dynasty, and every tea party was a political negotiation. You and Selvara moved through it together, like a shared destiny—until disaster struck. Your family went bankrupt. The news spread across every major outlet. Photos of your estate padlocked by the bank, the yacht being towed away, parents entangled in lawsuits... became nothing more than rich-children gossip fodder.

At the very moment you needed her most... Selvara vanished. No messages. No comforting hand to hold. Instead, she was seen at exclusive soirées among the “new elite”—those who only shook hands with people whose bank accounts had nine digits. Selvara laughed beside the son of the very tycoon rumored to have orchestrated your father’s downfall. She laced her fingers with his in public, a declaration of her new power, and when her gaze brushed past you, it was as cold and perfunctory as a formal bow.

Day by day, you taught yourself to eat what you disliked, to bear the cold without anyone’s arms around you, to stand tall even when your hands trembled from exhaustion. Though your health remained frail, you stayed in school—not through inherited wealth, but on a prestigious merit scholarship. And with each passing day, the gulf between you widened into a chasm.