“Why should I yield the opportunity to others?”
Peng Guoqing’s face turned green as he posed the soul-searching question: “Just because my family has money, does that mean I do not deserve to get into a good university?”
The family’s money was not earned by Peng Guoqing himself; he spent it without a twinge of heartache or reluctance.
The marks on the exam paper, however, were earned through his own study; each point gained had been so laborious, every single one crystallised from Peng Guoqing’s time and sweat; he cherished them dearly, and if anyone had reason to deduct his points, he would fight them to the death!
Peng Guoqing was so anxious he was jumping up and down, but Xie Qian remained unmoved.
“Whether you deserve it or not, I do not decide, nor do others; only you decide.”
You are on the verge of giving up yourself, yet you blame others for lacking faith in you; what about your face?
Peng Guoqing’s face burned with embarrassment, shame rising in his heart; in a place where Xie Qian could not see, he mentally slapped himself twice.
The word “give up” was simple; once such a thought took root, the drive to press upward dissipated.
Yet if he gave up, all his efforts over the past year would be for naught.
What would Teacher Liang think of him?
What would Xie Qian and his friends think?
His family, far away in the capital, believed in Peng Guoqing’s goal of entering a 211 university; Tai Wu and his pack of fair-weather friends had gone from mocking to silence.
Seeing that Peng Guoqing was truly studying, Tai Wu had called last week to ask if he needed any study materials bought and posted over.
Xie Qian was eyeing the gaokao countdown on the blackboard; Peng Guoqing, sitting in his own classroom, eyed it too.
The difference was that Xie Qian viewed the countdown with confidence, while Peng Guoqing gritted his teeth: just over a hundred days left; whether he became a dragon or a worm, it all hinged on these hundred-odd days!
Peng Guoqing gritted his teeth, counting down the gaokao days as he studied, and the end-of-term exams arrived.
Teacher Liang was deeply concerned about this university slag Peng Guoqing; this was the greatest crisis to her reputation in her teaching career, and whether her golden signboard could be preserved depended on how Peng Guoqing performed in the future.
Thus, for the end-of-term exams, Teacher Liang was the first to check Peng Guoqing’s papers.
While Peng Guoqing was sitting his maths exam, Teacher Liang had someone mark his Chinese paper from that morning.
By the time Peng Guoqing was doing English, his maths paper had already been marked.
When Peng Guoqing was tackling the comprehensive sciences paper, the scores for Chinese, maths, and English were already on record before Teacher Liang.
None of the subjects had particularly high individual scores.
Some slag students had strengths in single subjects; Peng Guoqing did not.
But this fellow also had no subject with particularly low scores; Chinese, maths, and English had all passed!
Chinese, maths, and English, each out of 150 marks; all three passing meant Peng Guoqing had at least 270 points in the bag… well, this chap was rather promising; each subject exceeded the pass line by a few marks, totalling 291 for the three.
The comprehensive sciences totalled 300 marks.
If Peng Guoqing could score 210 in comprehensive sciences, no, no, even just 209, his total would be over 500!
500 in Rong City Province’s key high school was a bit lacking.
Forget the capital; just in Rong City, last year’s arts and sciences first-tier line was 560; at first glance, Peng Guoqing was still far off!
However, a gold-medal teacher like Teacher Liang would not judge Peng Guoqing’s gaokao based on his current paper scores; she saw his potential.
Moreover, the difficulty of end-of-term exams at a provincial key school; could they be the same as at an ordinary high school?
At Rong City Province Key, it was not purely about exam scores; it was about post-exam year-group ranking.
Year-group position basically corresponded to which score bracket in the gaokao, since the key school’s first-tier admission rate was always extremely high; theoretically, as long as one did not rank in the bottom segment of the year group, one could make the first-tier line!
After the comprehensive sciences exam, students had to move desks and chairs, and clean each class’s hygiene before leaving school.
While Peng Guoqing was doing these odd jobs, Teacher Liang had already pulled his comprehensive sciences paper.
Scribble, scribble, scribble.
Marking a single paper was exceedingly quick.
Teacher Liang soon finished marking Peng Guoqing’s comprehensive sciences paper; goodness me, it was right on the pass line again, 183 marks, averaging 61 per subject; talk about precisely treading the line.
183 marks, still short of the 209 Teacher Liang had hoped for; she felt a twinge of regret.
But thinking back to Peng Guoqing’s abysmal scores when he first transferred last year, Teacher Liang felt a swell of gratification; after all, every point Peng Guoqing improved in exams was not only from his own efforts, but also from the hard work of Teacher Liang and the others!
The other subject teachers who had once tutored Peng Guoqing gathered round.
Several teachers pored over Peng Guoqing’s scores together, clucking their tongues:
“This question, he actually got the marks; was it a guess?”
“This idiot, he lost marks right here; I emphasised that trap just the other day!”
“And here, absolutely carelessness…”
“It is infuriating; I am going to thump him!”
In the office, the teachers squabbled into a knot, but Teacher Liang was smiling.
Exams, well, every student made mistakes, had those utterly foolish lost points in the teachers’ eyes.
When Peng Guoqing first transferred, his papers were not even worth the teachers’ scrutiny; a casual glance showed how poor his foundation was, and they scarcely knew where to begin lecturing on errors.
Single-subject passes proved Peng Guoqing had basically built a knowledge framework for each subject.
No more, no less; when teachers lectured on mistakes, Peng Guoqing could understand where he had gone wrong.
Truly cause for celebration.
Downstairs in the teaching block, Peng Guoqing wielded a large broom to clear the corridor, sneezing wildly as he swept, and vaguely sensing several unkind gazes; looking up and around, yet nothing.
How strange!
…
The end-of-term exams were over, and Wen Ying and Li Mengjiao could rest for two days; Li Mengjiao declared she would sleep for three days straight, and whoever woke her would be her sworn enemy for life.
Li Mengjiao said this right in front of Xie Qian, and it was clear for whose benefit.
Xie Qian, ever the strict one, surprisingly did not refute.
Whipping slag students required measured leniency too; occasionally, one had to give the slags a little sugar, so they could swallow greater bitters.
The donkey in the production brigade pulled the millstone, with a carrot dangling in front to tempt it!
Moreover, if Li Mengjiao slept three days lazy, Wen Ying could rest three days too; Xie Qian thus tacitly approved Li Mengjiao’s slacking.
Li Mengjiao demanded Wen Ying honour her promise of a “fried skewer feast” today; the three waited at the school gate for Peng Guoqing, but just as they exited, Wen Ying spotted an acquaintance.
Li Mengjiao’s mind was full of fried skewers, so Wen Ying could only nudge this daft one lightly.
“Look.”
“Look at what?”
Li Mengjiao followed the direction of Wen Ying’s finger and froze at once.
Under the sycamore tree that had shed all its leaves stood Wang Shuang, whom they had not seen in ages.
It was hard to say what had changed, but this Wang Shuang felt rather unfamiliar to Li Mengjiao.
The two had played together since childhood; kindergarten, primary, junior high, and senior high all at the same school; until Wang Shuang went to the magic city for university, they had never been apart so long.
Though Wang Shuang messaged and called Li Mengjiao every day, that was not the same as seeing the real person face to face!
Only when Wang Shuang strode up to Li Mengjiao, casting a shadow, did Li Mengjiao suddenly understand.
Li Mengjiao reached out a hand towards Wang Shuang’s shoulder, and Wang Shuang’s heart quickened.
But she saw Li Mengjiao measuring back and forth between Wang Shuang’s shoulder and her own head height, puzzled: “Did you not say the food in the magic city is unpalatable? Then how did you grow taller?”
Wang Shuang’s self-proclaimed perfect smile cracked on the spot: just now, she had nearly thought Li Mengjiao was reaching for a hug!
