Shuangling: Braving the Rapids

After seeing his father off, Yue Chuan grabbed his books and headed straight for his new classroom. He thought he was quick enough, but found the classroom was already full. Seeing his classmates engrossed in their studies, Yue Chuan was quite surprised—this was the first self-study class of high school, how come everyone was working so hard?

Without a second thought, Yue Chuan quickly sat down in the back row to preview the textbook. The classroom was so quiet you could hear a pin drop, except for the soft sound of the girl next to him moving her chair.

But in this silence, an untimely "rustling" sound appeared.

Yue Chuan heard it most clearly because the source of the sound was very close: a pretty girl in a tennis shirt was vigorously scribbling a pen, the nib making a sound on the hard tabletop.

Seeing that she was about to tear the letter, Yue Chuan casually pulled out a workbook and handed it to her: "Use this as a writing pad, otherwise the noise..."

Before she could finish speaking, the girl suddenly burst into tears, and immediately all the students' eyes turned to her like spotlights.

Just as Yue Chuan was completely baffled, a short-haired girl with high cheekbones rushed up to him and loudly demanded, "Tell me! Did you make her cry?"

Clumsy and tongue-tied Yue Chuan blushed and waved his hands repeatedly, but the short-haired girl took a step closer: "I saw you take her things just now, what? You dare to do it but not admit it?"

Yue Chuan's face turned a deep purplish-red. He stammered, and the more he explained, the more suspicious he became. He was so embarrassed that he wanted to disappear into the ground.

Just then, an elderly teacher appeared at the door. He waved his hand and shouted sternly, "Students, be quiet! Go back to your seats!"

The one who said this was Zhou Wenyao, the homeroom teacher of Class 1, Grade 11. He walked over quickly, whispered a few words to the crying girl, and then the girl got up and left her seat.

"This student wasn't feeling well, so I took her to the school clinic. The other students can continue with their evening self-study."

As soon as Teacher Zhou spoke, the students stopped their commotion, and Yue Chuan's "suspicion" vanished—hey! Who would have thought that a misunderstanding would become the opening act of his high school life...

The next day, Class 1 of Grade 1 organized a class meeting. Since it was the first class meeting in high school, it naturally started with each student introducing themselves.

"My name is Li Baihui. I graduated from Yanghe No.1 Experimental High School. My hobbies are drawing and playing the piano, but my dad always says I play terribly..." The girl stood confidently on the podium, even switching to English to add a playful remark: "I hope to have a happy and fulfilling three years of high school with everyone, making the most of our youth!"

Li Baihui's sweet smile, coupled with her fluent speech in both Chinese and English, instantly won a round of applause. Only Yue Chuan seemed dazed; of course he remembered this female classmate—wasn't she the one who cried yesterday?!

Yue Chuan simply couldn't reconcile the confident Li Baihui in front of him with the girl crying her eyes out. Just as he was pondering this to himself, he was suddenly called out by the homeroom teacher.

"Qin Yuechuan, please introduce yourself."

Under the watchful eyes of the entire class, the dark-skinned boy staggered onto the podium, his accent thick with the Shuangling dialect: "I...I'm Qin Yuechuan, from Shuangling Village, Songyue Town, I'm sixteen..."

The introduction, delivered in a manner reminiscent of recounting a household registration, drew chuckles from the audience. Yue Chuan, clutching the hem of his clothes, froze on the spot, his ears turning bright red, unable to utter a single coherent sentence.

"Qin Yuechuan won first prize in the city's math competition. He can interact with his classmates more often in the future!"

Zhou Wenyao's intention was to help Yue Chuan out of a predicament, but he unexpectedly stirred up a hornet's nest. Just then, a boy in the front row suddenly pointed at Yue Chuan's hands and shouted, "Why are your palms so black! Did you go coal mining somewhere?"

His words caused the students to burst into laughter, and Yue Chuan's face flushed red instantly. He quickly pulled his hand behind his back, but then tremblingly stretched it out again: "No, no, no! I'm not a coal miner! My hands... my hands were stained by green walnuts, you don't believe me... you can rub them against me and see!"

The male student actually reached out and wiped it, then laughed and said, "Hey! It really doesn't fade!"

A new wave of laughter nearly lifted the roof off. Zhou Wenyao glanced at the honest-looking mountain boy, tapped the blackboard, and explained, "Tanoferrin is non-toxic; the skin will recover after it metabolizes... Yue Chuan, please return to your seat. Next up is Zhao Aying."

Yue Chuan walked down from the podium with his head down, almost bumping into Zhao Aying—this short-haired girl was none other than the one who had caused him trouble yesterday because of Li Baihui's crying.

Zhao Aying glanced at Yue Chuan, then walked straight to the podium. "My name is Zhao Aying, and I graduated from Chengguan No. 1 Middle School! I love sports, and among my group of friends, none of them could outrun me!"

This girl with an oval face and high cheekbones has a very loud voice, speaking like firecrackers. She clearly has a tomboyish personality, which explains why she so impulsively "interrogated" Yue Chuan.

Who would have thought that the two had long harbored resentment? It turned out that Zhao Aying was the daughter of Zhao Sumei, a street vendor. During summer vacation, her mother constantly talked about the "glorious deeds" of her classmate surnamed Qin, who made money through street vending, and she was thoroughly annoyed. When Yue Chuan made a fool of himself on stage, Aying laughed along with everyone else, but the moment she saw those withered, dark hands, her smile vanished. After her parents' divorce, Zhao Aying had been working tirelessly with her mother at the street stall, knowing all too well what those marks on her hands meant. Both came from humble backgrounds, but this other person worked much harder than her; what right did she have to mock him?

After the students finished their introductions, their homeroom teacher, Zhou Wenyao, gave a concluding speech: "Students, as your homeroom teacher and math teacher, I welcome you once again to Yanghe No.1 High School! You are the most outstanding students in Yanghe County. I hope you will study with passion throughout your three years of high school, and I sincerely hope that each of you can get into a top university!"

Zhou Wenyao's hair was already gray, but his speech was powerful and resonant. Rather than a passionate speech, it was more like a "war mobilization".

"Since the college entrance examination is like a thousand troops crossing a single-plank bridge, you must summon the courage of the brave to prevail in a narrow encounter! Finally, I'd like to leave you with this advice: if you're afraid of hardship, don't enter this door; if you seek comfort, find another path!"

The students were already fired up, eager to jump right in, but little did they know, Teacher Zhou had a backup plan. He leisurely pulled three stacks of papers from under the podium and then announced some bombshell news:

"Seeing how eager you all are to get started, let's stick to the old rules and have a diagnostic test in Chinese, Math, and English! Bonus questions are a prize; those who do well get priority in choosing their seats!"

The classroom erupted in chaos as soon as he finished speaking.

These top students have seen it all, but having an exam on the very first day of school is truly a first for them. Before the groans had even subsided, exam papers were already falling onto everyone's desks like snowflakes.

Faced with this sudden situation, most students were scratching their heads in frustration. After a summer vacation, they had forgotten many of the knowledge points, not to mention having to deal with those extra questions that were beyond the syllabus. This diagnostic test really caught them off guard!

However, a top student is a top student. Li Baihui, a city girl, finished her English test paper with her delicate fingers flying across the paper; her summer oral English class hadn't been in vain. Meanwhile, Yue Chuan, the mountain boy, was even more remarkable. He managed to solve the last analytical geometry problem while biting his pen. This was all thanks to the math olympiad problem book given to him by Uncle Aimin, which happened to contain a clever trick for solving complex geometric areas using algebraic equations. By grasping the wonderful connection between numbers and shapes, and applying that knowledge to other problems, Yue Chuan became the only student in the class to successfully solve the problem.

The worst off were Zhao Aying and her group who had been playing wildly during the summer vacation. They were all dejected and had completely lost their former air of pride. They were in trouble now. If they didn't do well on the exam, they would definitely be assigned to the last few rows of the classroom. They used to be at the forefront, but in Yanghe No. 1 High School, which is full of talented students, things might not be so simple.