Impressive!

For Xiao Yi, the hour and a half of this math exam was probably the most torturous hour and a half he had experienced in a long time.

Why an hour and a half? Because the math exam lasted two hours, and papers could be handed in half an hour early.

He had finished every question in just twenty minutes, without using his scratch paper at all.

For such simple questions, did anyone really need scratch paper to calculate step by step?

Shouldn't they be able to answer directly on the answer sheet with their eyes closed?

In the end, after finishing all the questions in twenty minutes, he had nothing left to do. There were still a full seventy minutes before he could hand in his paper, so he spent thirty minutes reviewing what he had learned in his mind, then another forty minutes challenging himself to find the simplest solution to the final problem.

Only after successfully condensing the solution to five lines, totaling forty-three characters, did he find it mildly interesting.

Compared with the nine lines and eighty-six characters on the answer sheet, it had been cut down by exactly half.

This was also the simplest method he could find within forty minutes.

At last, the bell rang. He immediately raised his hand to signal that he wanted to hand in his paper.

The invigilator came over quickly. Since he had not invigilated the Chinese exam that morning, he had no idea this was already the second time Xiao Yi had handed in his paper half an hour early.

However, all the other examinees in the room knew perfectly well.

What the hell?

Why had this guy handed in his paper early again?

It had already been surprising enough that he could hand in his Chinese paper half an hour early that morning. But handing in a Chinese paper early could only make people a little surprised. Some others could also finish twenty or ten-odd minutes early, so at most, they could only marvel at how fast this guy wrote.

But math was different.

Handing in early might mean someone could not continue, but in their exam room, that possibility was very small. It was basically a complete display of ability.

Everyone in the exam room could keenly feel just how difficult this math test was. Both the multiple-choice and fill-in-the-blank questions were insanely hard, especially the final questions. Plenty of people had wasted dozens of minutes on those two questions without solving them. By now, with only half an hour left, most of them might have only just reached the solution problems, or only just finished the first two.

There were still questions worth dozens of points left unanswered!

So why could this guy still hand in his paper early?

Could it be that he wisely chose not to do those two questions, saving a huge amount of time? Then, for the later solution problems, perhaps he had only written the ones he knew and skipped the ones he did not, which was why he could hand in his paper half an hour early?

But no matter which possibility it was, their hearts had already begun to tense up.

Chen Wei, who was in the same exam room, watched Xiao Yi's departing back, and his eyelids twitched.

He could not help thinking of what Xiao Yi had said before—that he was the mysterious sophomore who had solved several Math Olympiad problems in the Senior Year Department.

Could it really be this kid?

Impossible. Absolutely impossible!

After all, they had agreed to stay in Exam Room 4 together until the end of time. Xiao Yi should keep his word...

Right?

"Stop looking at others and continue working on your own questions. Whatever someone else writes is theirs. Whatever you write is your own."

Seeing that the other examinees had been affected by Xiao Yi handing in his paper early, the invigilator spoke up to remind them.

Then he picked up Xiao Yi's test paper and looked it over. Soon, amazement appeared in his eyes.

This student...

He was impressive!

He had actually finished everything in an hour and a half?

And the multiple-choice questions... all correct. The fill-in-the-blank questions... the first three were correct, and the fourth...

This invigilator was a math teacher. During the exam, he had solved some of the questions himself out of boredom. His answers matched Xiao Yi's for all the others, but on the fourth fill-in-the-blank question, they differed. Xiao Yi's result had one extra "0."

After thinking carefully, he immediately realized that he had failed to consider the case where the condition was zero.

Therefore, Xiao Yi's answer was the correct one!

Perhaps he had overlooked that case because he was an invigilator rather than an examinee, and thus had not been careful enough. But at this moment, he could not help admiring this student named Xiao Yi.

Impressive!

And when he looked at the class, it was actually Class 3 of Science Stream.

Wasn't this even more impressive than students from Class 1 of Science Stream?

Shaking his head, he was about to look at the solution problems.

However, at that moment, Xiao Yi's scratch paper suddenly caught his attention.

When he picked it up and looked at it, he frowned slightly.

Hm?

Why was the scratch paper filled with the same question?

It seemed to be the final question?

He examined it more closely. In the end, once he understood what was written on that scratch paper, the invigilator—

Went numb.

Inside the monitoring room.

"He... handed in his paper early again."

"If we saw correctly, he had actually finished every question at around the twenty-minute mark."

Silence fell.

Otherwise, there was no way to explain why Xiao Yi had stared blankly into space for a full thirty minutes after the exam began, then scribbled on his scratch paper for another forty minutes.

"Finishing in twenty minutes... isn't that a little too outrageous?" Chen Liang could not help saying.

Luo Penghua said, "Maybe... just a little?"

Qin Song said, "But that is the fact."

Another silence followed.

In the end, Luo Penghua laughed. "At least for now, this exam truly does not seem to pose much of a problem for Xiao Yi."

Qin Song nodded. "That is indeed the case."

"Alright, today's exams are over. Tonight, we'll go straight to check on their math grading. Hopefully, they can bring us a surprise."

Chen Liang said, "Remember to let me know once the results are out."

"No problem."

The final half hour quickly passed. As the bell rang, it marked the end of all of today's exams.

The students would have two hours to rest before evening self-study began at seven.

Meanwhile, the teachers for today's two subjects would begin grading the papers. Normally, all scores had to be compiled within one day after the exams ended.

Thus, the Chinese and math teachers were exceptionally busy that evening.

At the sophomore math grading site.

"These questions really are a little difficult this time. Not a single student in Exam Room 1 got full marks."

"The highest score is Shen Xing's, 148. He lost points on the last step of the final solution problem, though that step truly was difficult."

"148 is already good enough. It should be the highest score in the entire grade."

The teachers chatted while grading papers.

Most of them agreed with the conclusion that 148 would be the highest score.

But just then, one teacher suddenly said, "Not necessarily. When you get to Exam Room 4 later, there might be a student who gives you all a shock."

That teacher was none other than the one who had invigilated the math exam in Exam Room 4!