Professor Wen kept her promise.

She locked the USB in the hospital’s evidence safe and made three encrypted copies before contacting anyone.

Then she turned back to me.

“Now we deal with you.”

I knew what she meant.

“My cancer won’t disappear because you ignore it, Nien So.”

“I didn’t come here for treatment.”

“And Zhao Rong didn’t protect this evidence for four years so her last student could die the moment she delivered it.”

That silenced me.

Professor Wen ordered another CT scan.

Two hours later, I was sitting in a hospital gown while she studied the images.

Her expression told me everything before she spoke.

“The prison diagnosis was correct.”

I nodded.

“How long?”

She hesitated.

“Without an effective response to treatment, perhaps six months. Possibly less.”

I had already heard those words once.

They didn’t frighten me anymore.

What frightened me was dying before Professor Zhao’s name was cleared.

“Can you keep me alive long enough to finish this?”

Professor Wen removed her glasses.

“I can try.”

That was enough.

When I left the examination room, someone was standing at the end of the corridor.

Giang Tu Hanh.

He had followed me.

His expensive black jacket looked absurd beneath the hospital’s flickering fluorescent lights.

For a moment, neither of us moved.

Then his eyes dropped to the medical documents in my hand.

“Late-stage lung cancer?”

I walked past him.

He caught up.

“Nien So.”

I continued walking.

“Nien So, stop.”

I stopped.

Not because he asked.

Because my lungs suddenly contracted.

A violent cough tore through my chest.

I covered my mouth.

When I lowered my hand, blood stained my palm.

Giang Tu Hanh went completely white.

He reached for me.

I stepped back.

“Don’t.”

His hand froze in midair.

“How long have you known?”

“Three months.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

I looked at him.

The question was almost funny.

“Would you have believed me?”

His face changed.

I walked away.

This time he didn’t follow.

But the next morning, when Professor Wen entered my room, she was carrying a thick folder.

“Your brother was here all night.”

I looked toward the window.

“I don’t care.”

“He requested every record connected to your case.”

That made me turn.

Professor Wen placed the folder beside me.

“He also requested the original security logs from Zhao Rong’s laboratory.”

I laughed softly.

“Four years late.”

“Yes.”

Four years ago, I had knelt in the snow outside the Giang family home.

I remembered every second.

My knees had gone numb.

My hands were blue from cold.

I kept begging the guards to let me see my brother.

On the third night, Giang Tu Hanh finally came outside.

He stood beneath an umbrella.

Song Uyen Nghi stood beside him.

Warm coat.

Red eyes.

His scarf around her neck.

I crawled toward him because my legs were too numb to stand.

“Brother, please.”

He looked down at me.

“Confess.”

“I didn’t do it.”

“The equipment was found in your locker.”

“Someone put it there.”

“Uyen Nghi saw you.”

“She lied!”

His expression immediately hardened.

“Enough.”

I grabbed his trouser leg.

“Check the original laboratory data. Professor Zhao has evidence.”

Song Uyen Nghi began crying.

Giang Tu Hanh removed my hand from him.

Then he said the sentence I remembered every night in prison.

“If you still refuse to admit what you did, then prison may be the only place that teaches you.”

The next morning, I was arrested.

Now, four years later, he had finally decided to check.

At noon, Professor Wen received a call.

Her expression changed.

“What?”

She looked at me.

“When?”

Another pause.

“Send everything.”

After hanging up, she remained silent.

“What happened?”

“They recovered the backup server.”

My fingers tightened around the blanket.

“The one from Professor Zhao’s laboratory?”

She nodded.

“The security system stored secondary access records separately. Those weren’t included in your criminal case.”

My heartbeat accelerated.

“Why?”

“Someone marked the server as damaged.”

“Was it?”

“No.”

The room became quiet.

Professor Wen opened her laptop.

“Your brother’s people recovered it this morning.”

A list appeared.

Dates.

Times.

Identification numbers.

At 9:42 p.m. on the night of the alleged theft, my laboratory card entered the research wing.

That had been used against me.

But at 9:39 p.m…

another card had entered through the staff elevator.

Song Uyen Nghi.

Three minutes before me.

I stared at the screen.

“There.”

My voice trembled.

“I told him.”

Professor Wen said nothing.

“There was someone else there.”

I had told the police.

I had told the prosecutor.

I had told Giang Tu Hanh.

Nobody believed me.

Professor Wen scrolled further.

At 10:17 p.m., Song Uyen Nghi accessed the storage room where the supposedly stolen equipment had been kept.

At 10:31, her card accessed the locker area.

My locker.

My vision blurred.

I wasn’t crying.

At least, I didn’t think I was.

Then a tear fell onto my hand.

Four years.

Four years of concrete walls.

Four years of being called a thief.

Four years in which cancer quietly grew inside my lungs.

All because evidence that could have saved me had been sitting on a forgotten server.

The door suddenly opened.

Giang Tu Hanh stood there.

He had clearly seen the records too.

His eyes were bloodshot.

“Nien So…”

I closed the laptop.

“Get out.”

He didn’t move.

“I found the officer who handled the digital evidence.”

“I don’t care.”

“He admitted someone instructed him not to recover the backup.”

That caught my attention.

“Who?”

Giang Tu Hanh’s jaw tightened.

“Song Uyen Nghi’s lawyer.”

I laughed.

“Wonderful.”

“But the payment didn’t come from the Song family.”

I looked at him.

His next words came slowly.

“It came from Giang Group.”

Silence.

Professor Wen stood.

“Who authorized it?”

Giang Tu Hanh didn’t answer.

My stomach sank.

I knew that expression.

“What did you do?”

“I didn’t authorize the payment.”

“Then who did?”

He looked at me.

“I’m finding out.”

I smiled bitterly.

“Now you like investigations?”

His face went pale.

“Nien So…”

“I begged you.”

My voice remained quiet.

That made it worse.

“I begged you for three days.”

He lowered his head.

“I know.”

“No, you don’t.”

I got out of bed.

Professor Wen tried to stop me, but I pushed myself upright.

“You went home after that.”

One step.

“You ate.”

Another.

“You slept.”

Another.

“You continued running your company.”

I stopped in front of him.

“I went to prison.”

His eyes filled with tears.

“I know.”

“You don’t.”

My voice finally broke.

“You will never know.”

He covered his face.

For four years, I had imagined this moment.

I thought seeing him regret it would make me feel better.

It didn’t.

His regret couldn’t give me healthy lungs.

It couldn’t return Professor Zhao.

It couldn’t give me back twenty, twenty-one, twenty-two or twenty-three.

Regret was simply another useless thing that had arrived too late.

That evening, something unexpected happened.

Professor Wen received confirmation from the university.

Professor Zhao’s original data matched the timestamped backup on my USB.

An independent committee would reopen the academic misconduct investigation.

And the police agreed to review my conviction.

For the first time, there was a real possibility my name would be cleared.

I should have been happy.

Instead, I asked:

“How long will it take?”

Professor Wen understood why.

“Weeks, perhaps months.”

“I might not have months.”

She squeezed my hand.

“Then we’ll make them move faster.”

Three days later, Song Uyen Nghi came to the hospital.

She entered carrying white lilies.

Still beautiful.

Still delicate.

Still wearing the expression that had convinced everyone four years ago.

When she saw me, her eyes immediately filled with tears.

“Sister…”

I almost admired her.

“Don’t call me that.”

Her lips trembled.

“I heard about your illness.”

“Did you come to see whether prison finished the job for you?”

Her expression froze.

Only for a second.

Then she smiled sadly.

“You still misunderstand me.”

“No.”

I looked at her.

“For the first time, I understand you perfectly.”

I placed a printed copy of the recovered access logs on the table.

Her face changed.

She recognized them.

That was obvious.

“Where did you get this?”

I smiled.

“You’re asking the wrong question.”

She stared at me.

“You should be asking who else has copies.”

Her fingers tightened around the flowers.

Then the door opened behind her.

Giang Tu Hanh entered.

The moment Song Uyen Nghi saw him, tears appeared.

“Brother Tu Hanh…”

He didn’t go to her.

That was probably the first time in her life that calling his name hadn’t worked.

He placed a document on the table.

“Explain this.”

She looked down.

A bank transfer.

Two million yuan.

Paid through a Giang Group subsidiary four years earlier.

Her face went white.

“I don’t know anything about this.”

“Your lawyer received it.”

“I didn’t—”

“I checked the authorization.”

She stopped.

So did I.

Giang Tu Hanh’s hands were trembling.

“The payment was approved using my executive seal.”

Song Uyen Nghi immediately said:

“Then you approved it.”

“No.”

He looked directly at her.

“Because that night, I was in Beijing.”

Silence.

“And the physical seal was here.”

Her breathing changed.

Giang Tu Hanh continued.

“There were only three people authorized to access my office.”

His secretary.

His father.

And Song Uyen Nghi.

She stepped backward.

“You think I stole your seal?”

“I think I destroyed my sister’s life because I believed you.”

For the first time, her gentle expression disappeared.

She looked at me.

There was hatred in her eyes.

Pure hatred.

“You want the truth?”

She laughed.

“Fine.”

Giang Tu Hanh stiffened.

Song Uyen Nghi pointed at me.

“She was never supposed to go to prison for four years.”

My heart stopped.

“What?”

“I only needed her gone for a few months.”

Giang Tu Hanh stared at her.

“Why?”

Her eyes returned to me.

“Because Professor Zhao was going to publish the real data.”

“Yes.”

“And the real data didn’t only prove I manipulated the experiment.”

She smiled.

“It proved something much worse.”

I felt cold.

“What?”

She looked toward my medical chart.

Then she said:

“Ask Professor Wen what Zhao Rong was researching before she died.”

Professor Wen’s face changed.

I turned toward her.

She didn’t answer.

“Professor?”

Slowly, she sat down.

“Zhao Rong’s project studied environmental carcinogen exposure.”

My fingers became numb.

“Specifically,” she continued, “industrial compounds associated with elevated lung-cancer risk.”

Nobody spoke.

I suddenly remembered something.

Professor Zhao had insisted on testing everyone in our research group.

At the time, she told us it was routine.

Then, two weeks before my arrest, she had called me into her office.

She had looked frightened.

She asked where I had lived as a child.

Where my father worked.

Whether Giang Group had ever operated factories near our family estate.

I hadn’t understood why.

Now I did.

I looked at Song Uyen Nghi.

“What did Professor Zhao discover?”

Her smile vanished.

Giang Tu Hanh stepped toward her.

“Answer her.”

She looked at him.

“You really don’t know?”

Something in her voice made his face change.

Then she laughed.

“Oh, Brother Tu Hanh.”

She almost sounded sorry for him.

“You’ve spent four years blaming Nien So for destroying Professor Zhao’s research.”

She glanced at me.

“But Zhao Rong wasn’t investigating me anymore.”

My chest tightened.

“She was investigating the Giang family.”

The room became completely silent.

Song Uyen Nghi turned toward my brother.

“And if Nien So wants to know why she developed lung cancer at twenty-four…”

She paused.

“…she should stop looking at the prison.”

My brother went white.

Song Uyen Nghi smiled.

“She should start with your father’s factory.”