When Chen Zhao woke up the next morning, he found himself lying on the floor. He was instantly baffled. How had he spent the whole night sleeping on the cold floor?
He turned his head to look at the clock, and his mind went blank. It was already seven!
His first class started in fifteen minutes!
Chen Zhao's face turned deathly pale. How had he overslept? He was so dead! And of all days, his first class was with the homeroom teacher! If he still hadn't arrived by the time class started, wouldn't he get the full treatment: standing punishment, a lecture, and a call to his parents?
He couldn't worry about anything else. Chen Zhao grabbed his schoolbag and charged out of the house. He made it downstairs in ten seconds and started sprinting toward school like a mad dog!
He hurried as fast as he could, ran two red lights, and finally hurtled through the school gates. By the time he reached the classroom, the homeroom teacher still hadn't arrived. Chen Zhao breathed a sigh of relief. It seemed he'd run fast enough.
Chen Zhao's seat was beside the classroom's back door. He dropped his schoolbag by the door and collapsed over his desk, panting heavily. Sweat streamed down his forehead.
"Why do you look like a dog that's been run ragged? Did you get chased all the way here after harassing someone?"
The speaker was Chen Zhao's deskmate, Xu Lanlan. She had a pale face, big eyes, stood six feet tall, and wore her wavy hair loose. Even her school uniform couldn't hide how beautiful she was. If the class held a vote for its prettiest girl, Xu Lanlan would probably have a fifty-fifty chance of winning. She was gorgeous, but her sharp tongue could really leave you speechless.
"Harassing someone? Do I look like the kind of gentleman who'd do that?" Chen Zhao caught his breath a couple of times before replying irritably. "I overslept, so I ran. It usually takes twenty minutes to get here, but I made it in ten! I'm exhausted! My legs hurt!"
"Oh, so you're a natural runner. Why not sign up as a student athlete?" Xu Lanlan blinked, then added, "Oh, never mind. It wouldn't help. Your grades are worse than an athlete's anyway..."
Chen Zhao really wanted to hit her, but he couldn't bring himself to, because Xu Lanlan was telling the truth. All anyone had to do was look at his seat: in the back corner by the rear door, so far away that you'd need binoculars to see the whole blackboard. It was the kind of lousy seat reserved for the class's very worst student.
Since she sat beside the class's worst student, Xu Lanlan's grades couldn't be much better. She'd never managed to climb out of the bottom five.
But Chen Zhao couldn't tease her by saying they were in the same boat, because Xu Lanlan's situation was different from his. She was rich. Her father drove her to school in a ten-million-yuan Maybach.
Chen Zhao had even looked up the jet-black Maybach Xu Lanlan's family owned. It was incredibly flashy and started by voice command. There was no car key; Xu Lanlan's father only had to say "Start" to the steering wheel, and the whole car would roar to life like a waking beast.
A student whose family car alone was worth ten million yuan was only going to school for the experience. She was immune to any criticism about her terrible grades.
The bell rang.
The homeroom teacher walked into the classroom right on time.
"Take out the math test you did over the weekend and pass them forward. Anyone who didn't finish can stand at the back of the classroom and complete it there," the homeroom teacher said sternly, glaring at the class.
The students at the front of each row stood up and began collecting the tests from behind them.
Xu Lanlan pulled a sheet of paper out of her desk and placed it on the desktop. It was covered in writing, every question filled in. She definitely hadn't worked out those long problems herself; she'd searched for the answers online and copied them.
Chen Zhao rummaged through his schoolbag and pulled out a...blank test.
He hadn't done it!
He'd planned to come to class early that morning and copy someone else's work, but then he'd overslept!
The hairs on Chen Zhao's back stood up like steel needles pressing against his clothes. Sweat poured down his forehead!
"Oh, you haven't done it." Xu Lanlan leaned over to look at Chen Zhao's blank test and clicked her tongue a few times. "You've got some nerve. Aren't you afraid of dying? Have you forgotten what happened to Jin Peng?"
At Xu Lanlan's reminder, Chen Zhao's face turned even paler!
Jin Peng was a classmate. The previous Monday, he hadn't done his math homework, and the homeroom teacher had flown into a rage. Grabbing a textbook as thick as a brick, the teacher had beaten Jin Peng all the way from inside the classroom to outside it, leaving him in a terrible state. The teacher had even called his parents! Jin Peng had been sent home for three days of reflection!
Chen Zhao panicked completely. His mind was in turmoil! Was he going to get beaten, have his parents called, and be sent home to reflect too?
Searching now was definitely too late!
If he claimed he'd finished the test but had forgotten to bring it, the homeroom teacher wouldn't be fooled! The teacher would just ask him about the long problems and their answers, and he'd be exposed on the spot!
It was over. He was done for!
Chen Zhao's face was ashen. Heaven really wants me dead!
Xu Lanlan grinned from ear to ear, taking pleasure in his misfortune. "What is there to celebrate in life, and what is there to fear in death? Chen Zhao, go bravely to your doom! Eighteen years from now, you'll still be a hero! Once you're gone, I can stash snacks in your desk."
Chen Zhao didn't hear Xu Lanlan's taunts. He was already engulfed by an overwhelming fear.
In his utter despair, Chen Zhao's gaze fell on his blank test.
He'd only looked at it unconsciously, out of confusion and helplessness. But when his eyes landed on the writing, a strange feeling came over him.
The words on the test suddenly became extraordinarily clear!
It wasn't that they looked clearer to his eyes. Rather, the questions became incredibly clear in his mind. Before, he'd had to read a question over and over, laboriously, just to understand it. But now, at a single glance—possibly in less than 0.1 seconds—the first question's contents appeared in his mind!
"Given the sets A={x|x²-4x+30} and B={x|2x-30}, then A∩B="
Chen Zhao froze. A strange feeling surged through him. At that instant, time seemed to slow down, while his mind raced! He wasn't consciously trying to do anything; his brain had started working automatically as soon as he saw the question!
In less than a second, the answer to the first question suddenly appeared in his mind:
"(3/2,3), choice D."
Chen Zhao froze, then turned to look at Xu Lanlan's test. Sure enough, her answer to the first question was D!
Chen Zhao couldn't believe it. He'd calculated the answer in his head in less than a second?
And he'd done it despite being the worst student in the whole class, someone who failed every math test?
Chen Zhao lowered his eyes to the second question. The same thing happened: with a single glance, in less than 0.1 seconds, the entire question was in his mind:
"Given that the sum of the first nine terms of the arithmetic sequence {aₙ} is 27, and a₁₀=8, then a₁₀₀="
It was a common sequence problem. Usually, Chen Zhao would have to scribble on scratch paper for several minutes before coming up with an uncertain answer.
But today, as soon as he finished reading the question, an answer appeared in his mind:
"98, choice C!"
He looked at Xu Lanlan's test. Sure enough, the correct answer was C!
How...could this be?
He could understand a question at a glance and calculate the answer in his head in less than a second?
Wasn't this ridiculously incredible?!
Suddenly, Chen Zhao remembered what had happened the night before!
The system that had spoken in his mind and told him to recharge his intelligence!
He raised his left hand and looked. Sure enough, there was an iron-ring-like ring on his little finger! The System Ring!
On the way to school, he'd thought back to the system and assumed it had been a dream. Now Chen Zhao knew that it hadn't been a dream at all. It was all real!
His speed at solving problems had skyrocketed because he was in the trial period with his intelligence raised to 400!
His intelligence had gone from 79 to 400 overnight! That was why solving these easy problems now took no effort at all!
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