At 8:32 on Friday morning, my student card failed at the Administration Building.
The red light appeared before I remembered that failure was expected.
Mr. Kim placed his faculty card against the reader. The door unlocked for him, and a security officer checked my temporary hearing pass before allowing me through.
"You may enter the review chamber, the assigned waiting room, and the ground-floor restroom," the officer said. "All other access remains restricted."
"Understood."
Students crossed the plaza behind us carrying laboratory coats and coffee. Their Friday quiz began at nine, the same time as my hearing. Kitty had positioned her phone in the lecture room in case Student Affairs allowed me to watch the recording later.
Nobody knew whether I would still be enrolled when the recording became available.
Mr. Kim walked beside me through the administrative corridor.
"Last chance to tell me you did not sleep," he said.
"I slept."
"How long?"
"Long enough to qualify as sleep."
"That is not a number."
"Neither is pending."
He stopped outside the hearing chamber.
"Do not become clever when you are frightened."
"What should I become?"
"Honest."
He opened the door.
The disciplinary panel contained five people.
The Dean of Student Affairs sat at the center. Beside her were a Medical Sciences faculty representative, the university counselor, an external professional-ethics adviser, and one senior student representative from a program unrelated to ours.
The Sleeping Man occupied a separate chair near the wall as Acting Rector. He was not listed as a voting member, but every person in the room noticed when he entered.
A recorder rested at the center of the table.
The Dean explained that this was an administrative review, not a criminal trial. I could answer, decline to answer, submit evidence, correct the record, and request a short break. Mr. Kim could advise me but could not answer for me.
I confirmed that I understood.
The Dean opened a folder bearing my name.
"The panel is reviewing a pattern of violent conduct," she said. "This includes your involvement in the nightclub disturbance, assaultive conduct toward security staff, participation in the VT Legacy tournament, an intentional prohibited strike, and continued application of a choke after an official order to release. Do you dispute that summary?"
"No."
The student representative looked up.
"You dispute none of it?"
"I dispute some descriptions in the nightclub report. I do not dispute that I fought, struck a bouncer, intentionally fouled NS, or failed to release immediately."
Mr. Kim did not move beside me.
The Dean opened the nightclub security footage.
KM's crew entered from the right side of the screen. JP pushed the first man away from Kitty. The football supporters collided near the dance floor. Within seconds, the camera contained more bodies than motives.
Then I appeared.
The footage showed me strike KM, turn toward the bouncer, and throw the uppercut that dropped him beside the railing.
"The bouncer was attempting to separate the fight," the Dean said. "Why did you attack him?"
"I believed he was joining KM's group."
"Why?"
"I was intoxicated, angry, and no longer interpreting people correctly."
"You previously told Campus Health that you saw NS's face when looking at KM."
"Yes."
"Did you see NS when you struck the bouncer?"
"I don't know. I remember believing everyone reaching for me was an attacker."
The counselor made a note.
"Do you offer intoxication or perceptual disturbance as a defense?"
"No. I chose to drink after I was already angry."
The external adviser placed the police closure beside the university report.
"The Yandong file attributes the disturbance and possession of prohibited substances to a man named Mr. Joe. Yet Mr. Joe does not appear in any of the footage submitted to this panel. Do you know him?"
"No."
"Did you see him inside the club?"
"No."
"Why did you accept the police closure without correcting it?"
"I was released after four hours. By the time I learned who the report blamed, the case had already been closed."
"Did anyone instruct you to remain silent?"
I thought of VT's table above the dance floor and the officers who refused to approach it.
"Nobody needed to. The police made it clear the decision was finished."
The Dean marked the discrepancy for separate review.
The police had once made VT's intervention disappear.
Inside the hearing chamber, the absence finally became evidence.
The ethics adviser opened the commission footage.
"Why did you strike below the belt?"
"I was losing and chose winning over the rule."
"Was the act planned before the bout?"
"No."
"Did anyone instruct you to do it?"
"No."
"Did VT's manipulated recordings force your decision?"
"No. They contributed to my anger. The strike was still my choice."
The counselor watched me rather than the screen.
"You have previously reported memory disruptions and episodes of emotional disorientation. Were you experiencing one during the final choke?"
"I don't know how to label what happened."
"Describe it without labeling it."
I looked at the recorder.
"I heard the referee. I understood the words individually, but they did not feel connected to what my body was doing. I kept hearing another meaning inside them."
"What meaning?"
My throat tightened.
"That NS would not let me go. That everything happening was his fault."
"Was it?"
"No."
Thunder moved beyond the chamber windows.
The Acting Rector shifted in his chair.
"You are seeking an international medical pathway," the Medical Sciences representative said. "Why should this institution trust you near a vulnerable patient when you could not release an unresponsive opponent?"
The same question had stopped my breathing the previous afternoon.
It did not become easier because I had prepared an answer.
"You should not trust me because I ask you to," I said. "I broke that trust."
The faculty representative waited.
"I knew the medical risk and continued anyway. That makes the decision worse, not better. I am asking for the opportunity to earn trust again through counseling, supervised work, and conduct that proves I understand knowledge without restraint can become another way to hurt someone."
"And if we decide the opportunity is too dangerous?"
"Then I will accept that I caused the decision."
The Sleeping Man spoke for the first time.
"Accepting consequences after creating them is not discipline."
I faced him.
"No, sir. It is the first thing left after discipline fails."
The recorder continued turning.
The witnesses entered separately.
NC testified about the nightclub, the tournament buildup, and the group messages sent from anonymous accounts before both events. She did not defend every decision I made.
"XH became violent," she said. "That is true. It is also true that people around him were being touched, threatened, humiliated, and deliberately provoked. The full sequence matters."
Jihye connected her laptop to the panel display.
She showed the original event recording first, including continuous timestamps and camera metadata. Then she displayed the videos VT's cyber team had sent to NS and me.
"The voices are manufactured," she explained. "There are discontinuities in the background noise, mismatched compression between the face and surrounding image, and frames where mouth movement does not align with the consonant sounds. The files were encoded after the dates they claim to document."
The senior student representative leaned toward the screen.
"Could an ordinary viewer recognize that?"
"Not without slowing the files and comparing them to originals. They were designed to be believed quickly, not examined carefully."
"Can you identify the creator?"
"No. I can establish manipulation. Attribution requires access I do not have."
Jihye did not look toward the Acting Rector when she said it.
Everybody else did.
Kitty entered next.
She described the corner, the repeated knockdowns, my refusal to stay down, and the final minute. She confirmed that she threw the towel because I was no longer responding normally.
"Did XH instruct you not to stop the fight?" the Dean asked.
"Earlier, yes."
"Why did you eventually ignore him?"
Kitty's hands remained folded before her.
"Because being in his corner meant protecting him after his pride became unsafe. I understood that too late."
I thought of JP's mother.
The same lesson had entered two corners at different times.
June followed.
She confirmed that TZ's towel and Kitty's towel entered close enough together that no clear sequence could be established. She also confirmed NS had become unresponsive and that the referee had not formally stopped the fight before the horn.
The ethics adviser asked whether my rivalry with NS involved her.
June looked at me once.
"Yes."
"To what extent?"
"Enough that both men used me as a reason for decisions they wanted to make anyway."
The answer hurt because it was accurate.
"Did XH ever threaten you?"
"No."
"Did he behave possessively?"
June paused.
"Yes. So did NS. So did I, in different ways. None of us handled the situation like adults."
The Dean recorded the answer.
June returned to the waiting room without looking at Kitty.
NS entered last.
The bruising around his throat remained visible above his shirt. He declined a chair and stood at the witness table.
"Did XH intentionally foul you?" the Dean asked.
"Yes."
"Did he fail to release after the referee's command?"
"Yes."
"Do you believe he should remain in the Med Track?"
NS looked toward me.
"I believe the panel should judge everything, not only the part where I was injured."
"That does not answer the question."
"Yes. I believe he should remain."
The Medical Sciences representative studied him.
"Why?"
"Because I entered willingly. I ignored several opportunities to resolve the conflict privately. I allowed manufactured videos about June and my father to decide what I believed about someone I had known for years. Then I entered a cage designed by VT and tried to break him in public."
"That does not remove XH's responsibility."
"I am not asking you to remove it. I am asking you not to use me as a reason to pretend he acted alone."
The Sleeping Man leaned forward.
"Your father submitted notice that he was considering criminal action."
"He did. I refused to support it."
"Why?"
"Because the statement described XH as the only aggressor. That was false."
"You are prepared to say this despite the prohibited strike and choke?"
"I am saying it because they happened, not despite them."
NS placed his signed statement on the table.
"If you expel him solely to protect me or my family name, you will be doing it against my statement."
For the first time, the Acting Rector wrote something down.
The power failed during closing statements.
The recorder continued on battery. Emergency lights turned the chamber red while rain disappeared against the dark windows.
Mr. Kim spoke without standing.
"XH's conduct deserves consequences. Temporary removal, mandatory counseling, conduct probation, supervised return, and loss of extracurricular privileges are all available. Permanent expulsion should be reserved for a student the institution has determined cannot learn from correction. The testimony today does not establish that."
The Acting Rector looked toward me through the red light.
"Do you have anything further?"
I thought of the white towel, JP behind the ICU glass, Chuu's spare key, June's note, Kitty's arms, and NS's four-page statement with three grammar errors.
"Only that I am sorry," I said. "Not as an argument."
The emergency lights remained on after I finished.
The Dean closed the file.
"The panel will review the digital evidence and written submissions. A final recommendation will be issued within five business days. The Acting Rector will then approve, modify, or return that recommendation. Your interim suspension remains in effect."
"Five days?"
"No later than five."
Nothing in the room suggested sooner.
Everyone waited near the campus lake.
The Friday quiz had ended while the hearing continued. NC, Anna, Jihye, Bunny, Cherry, TZ, Kitty, and June stood beneath the covered walkway. The grand fountain remained dry beside them despite the rain.
"Well?" Bunny asked.
"Pending," I said.
Cherry looked toward the Administration Building.
"They required four hours to invent the same word?"
"Apparently."
Anna gave me a bottle of water from the supplies she had been saving since the purification shortage began.
"Did they listen?"
"I think so."
Jihye closed her laptop.
"They asked for copies of the forensic report. That is a good sign."
"How good?"
"Good enough that you should not fight anybody before the decision."
Everyone looked at me.
"Why did that sound directed?"
"Because it was," NC said.
June returned NS's umbrella without speaking. He accepted it and placed it beneath one arm.
The rest of the group began walking toward the cafeteria. NS remained beside the lake.
I stayed.
"You didn't have to submit the statement," I said.
"Yes, I did."
"Your father disagrees."
"My father disagrees with weather when it inconveniences him."
Thunder answered from above the library.
"He will blame you for that," I said.
"He can add it to the complaint I refused to sign."
The silence between us was no longer comfortable, but it was no longer trying to become violence.
"I found three grammar mistakes," I said.
NS looked offended.
"I should have let him charge you."
The laugh escaped both of us before either decided whether it was allowed.
It lasted less than a second.
That was enough.
NS adjusted the umbrella beneath his arm.
"No more videos," he said. "No more messages through other people. If you have something to say to me, say it yourself."
"Same rule for you."
"Agreed."
We followed the others without calling the agreement friendship.
Across Yandong, VT received the hearing summary before the panel members left the building.
NS's statement had reduced the value of the family complaint. Jihye's report had reduced the value of the deepfakes. Mr. Kim's proposal gave the university a punishment that did not require expulsion.
The probability beside XH's name shifted away from removal.
VT read NS's warning again.
Do not use June, my father, or XH again.
He opened the live campus feed and watched XH leave beside NS.
Then he sent one instruction to an anonymous account.
If the panel wants proof he can change, give him a reason not to.