Academic torture had a new name.
Silver had barely recovered from the emotional whiplash of the common room gossip session before Professor Dawes announced the pairing assignments for their mid-semester comparative analysis project. The poisonous whispers about Eli's alleged history of destroying competitors were still circulating through her mind like a virus she couldn't purge, making it impossible to think clearly about anything else.
Now she sat glaring at the stack of annotated books on the seminar table as though the leather-bound volumes had personally conspired against her wellbeing. Group projects were challenging enough when you were paired with relative strangers who at least maintained professional courtesy. Being forced to collaborate with Eli Hayes while his name was still echoing in her head alongside accusations of calculated cruelty? That qualified as a special circle of academic hell that Dante had somehow neglected to include in his famous work.
