His words invalidated all the hard work I had put in over the past eight years, igniting a firestorm of anger in my roommate, Nancy. She accused me of using plagiarism to unfairly occupy a scholarship slot that she believed should have been hers. “You’re rich enough! Why do you need the scholarship?” she raged.
The insults from netizens grew relentless, and the school ultimately revoked my graduate degree and expelled me.
When I returned to the dormitory to pack my things, Nancy confronted me in a fit of rage, forcing me to drink paraquat. As I lay there, choking and vomiting blood, my life slipped away, and Felicity emerged victorious, graduating and securing a position as the youngest tutor at the school.
My parents arrived at the campus to claim my body, deeply convinced that I had not taken my own life, as the school had suggested. They were determined to seek justice for me, convinced that the circumstances surrounding my death were shrouded in deception and betrayal.
But little did my parents know they would never see me one last time. To cover up the truth of my poisoning, the school hastily sent my body to the crematorium overnight, claiming that I had committed suicide out of remorse for my mistakes. The thought of this betrayal made me break down in tears.
Was it really just about a research topic? Since Felicity's work mirrored mine, I could simply pivot to a different one. Over the past five years of my doctoral studies, I had explored numerous directions. This time, I decided to embark on a completely new path—one that was rarely studied in Colorado. It was a niche area I had delved into with my tutor during my time as an exchange student abroad.
I stayed up all night crafting new ideas and finalizing the experimental process before stepping out of the laboratory. Just then, Nancy sent me a screenshot of Felicity's latest post on social media.
It read: "The previous direction wasn’t innovative. This time, I want to explore the latest research direction of foreign scholars. I heard that mastering this area could lead to a Nobel Prize. I thrive on challenges!"
After reading that post, sleep eluded me. The tutor had never publicly discussed this direction, so how could Felicity possibly know about it? Even more unsettling was the realization that her proposed experimental steps were alarmingly similar to mine.