Ye Ci pursed her lips tightly and her hands under her sleeves were tightly clenched.
That was a direct question asking if she cheated.
“No.” Ye Ci answered decisively. “The results of the preliminary round are my own effort.”
“Then how do you explain these two exams, as well as your recent progress?”
Li Guangyuan stared at her closely.
“You should know that your competitive physics class teacher, Zhou Fei, used to be a student in Capital First High as well. I taught him back then. According to him, your performance in the competitive physics class in Yunzhou Second High in the past several months had been mediocre. The only good score you have is from the preliminary round.”
Li Guangyuan did not mean to suspect the students, but Ye Ci was indeed suspicious.
Anyone could see that there had to be a problem there.
Ye Ci’s heart turned cold. She suddenly understood that these teachers had started to investigate her some time ago.
For a while, Ye Ci was shocked and vexed, but also very humiliated.
There were 52 students in the winter camp from every province, but they only suspected her.
They had already secretly investigated these without her knowledge.
“Even if you had guessed the questions, you couldn’t have guessed so many.”
Even an old teacher like Li Guangyuan, who had many years of experience in competitions, could only bet on a few questions.
How could Ye Ci have coincidentally guessed almost all of them correctly?
“So…you suspect me of cheating?”
Ye Ci asked with a slightly raised voice. She seemed to be somewhat agitated.
Zhao Ping said, “Ye Ci, we want to reiterate that we’re not suspecting that you cheated. We just hope that you can explain this matter clearly. Now, there are two solutions. Either you tell us the original story and give us a proper reason, or you can redo the provincial preliminary round’s spare paper. This backup paper is equivalent in the difficulty level to the version that was used before. Everything will be clear to us once you get a good score on that paper.”
Li Guangyuan took out another sealed file bag from the drawer as Zhao Ping spoke.
It was very thin.
“Exam paper B is in here.”
Li Guangyuan put it on the table and looked at Ye Ci.
“You can choose for yourself.”
The office was dead silent.
Ye Ci felt like she was sitting on pins and needles. Her chest felt like it had been compressed with a boulder till she felt it hard to breathe.
After a while, she looked at the teachers.
At this time, the expression on her face was calm.
“I didn’t see the preliminary exam paper in advance. I was able to do well on the exam because…I looked at Ning Li’s notebook before the exam. Almost ninety percent of the topics in her notebook coincided with the preliminary exam paper.”
After Ye Ci said that, all three of the teachers were shocked.
“You said…Ning Li?!”
Ye Ci had just dropped too much information on them at once.
If that was true, then the one with the problem was probably Ning Li!
Ye Ci nodded her head.
“Yes, Mr. Li. Previously, my performance in the competitive physics class was indeed very average. I was able to score well in the preliminary round because I had read Ning Li’s notebook. I never hid it as well. I even mentioned it in front of Mr. Zhou Fei and the others that a big part of why I could get into the finals was because of her. At the very beginning, I didn’t know that there was something wrong with that notebook until I finished the preliminary round and realized that almost all of the questions on the paper were the same.”
Li Guangyuan frowned.
“If that’s the case, why didn’t you tell Zhou Fei at that time?”
If there were really so many questions that coincided, Zhou Fei would have noticed the problem.
Ye Ci pursed her lips and said in a soft voice, “I thought it was strange at that time, but because her grades have always been good, I didn’t care too much and thought it was just a coincidence. Plus…she’s my sister, after all…”
Li Guangyuan and the other teachers had some understanding about the complex relationship between Ning Li and Ye Ci.
What Ye Ci said was already very obvious.
At first, Ye Ci had felt that something was wrong, but because it had involved Ning Li, she did not make it public.
“Do you know what this entails?”
Zhao Ping shook his head disapprovingly.
Cheating in the provincial competition had extremely serious consequences once discovered.
The relevant awards would be withdrawn and would lead to a series of problems.
Ye Ci lowered her head. “I’m sorry…”
Li Guangyuan pondered for a while and waved his hand.
“Now is not the time to pursue this. The key is…”
‘Did Ning Li cheat or not?’
“Ning Li has outstanding grades and talent, so there’s no reason for her to do this, right?”
Li Guangyuan admired Ning Li.
Zhou Fei was his favorite student, and Ning Li was taught by Zhou Fei and now himself.
He had read her papers and discussed some questions with her.
Ning Li had a quick mind and was extremely perceptive.
Li Guangyuan had been leading the competitive physics class for so many years, and Ning Li was definitely among the top students he had seen.
There was no need for such a genius to do this.
Zhu Jingyuan, who had not spoken, finally opened his mouth.
“Where is that notebook now?”
Ye Ci paused and said softly, “In my dorm.”
Li Guangyuan’s brow furrowed.
‘She had actually brought that notebook along with her to the winter camp?’
Zhu Jingyuan nodded. “Good, then go and bring that notebook over now. Also, have Ning Li come over as well.”
