The placement test

Over the next two days, Yang Rui spent half his time copying out and organizing test papers, and the other half browsing the papers and books buried deep in his mind.

Back when he was a graduate student, he had taken his reading and experiments quite seriously, and had even dreamed of doing research full-time after graduation. But with graduate enrollment expanding, it was simply too difficult for a biology graduate student to find a genuine research job. Unless they were willing to work as temporary staff feeding lab mice or washing flasks, research and graduate students might as well have been strangers.

Now, however, things were different.

Even setting aside the vast number of papers and books already in his mind, the knowledge he had mastered alone, those utterly familiar theories and experiments, would have been enough to get him into one of the country's top research institutions.

What Yang Rui considered more was how to make full use of them.

Slowly, meticulously, and to the greatest possible extent.

Unlike Yang Rui, who thought and copied in silence, Wang Guohua was almost constantly bobbing his head as he memorized problems.

The more he memorized, the more effective he found it.

Although many of the problems Yang Rui gave him were very simple, whenever he encountered a new one, he always seemed able to apply an old one to it.

Wang Guohua did not know these were classic examples tested by later generations' strategy of drilling endless problems, but he knew his scores had definitely improved.

For a student repeating the year, that feeling was like a stimulant.

For two whole days, Wang Guohua sat beside Yang Rui. Apart from occasionally asking him a question or two, he ignored everyone and did nothing else, devoting himself entirely to memorizing problems.

When the Chinese teacher came to teach, he memorized example problems; when the English teacher came to teach, he memorized example problems; during study periods, he memorized example problems; during breaks, he still memorized example problems.

The teachers at Xibao Middle School were neither especially good nor especially bad, but Wang Guohua knew that not one of them could raise his score in a single subject by thirty points.

Wang Guohua decided to trust Yang Rui.

Their unusual behavior naturally attracted some attention. Whenever anyone asked, Wang Guohua brushed them off with a single sentence: "I'm in Yang Rui's study group, learning a new method."

Then he buried his head in his problems again.

When people asked Yang Rui, he only said it was a new method he had learned, without offering any particular explanation.

Convincing others with words was difficult. He was on good terms with Wang Guohua and knew his disposition well, and only after giving a demonstration tailored to him and devising a targeted study plan had he won his trust.

He did not want to do it all over again.

He would simply use Wang Guohua as his demonstration.

Wednesday.

The placement test arrived on schedule.

All sixty-eight members of the repeat-year class filled the classroom to capacity.

The classroom was exceptionally bright.

Although it was only a single-story building, by the standards of later years it was a spacious property with north-to-south ventilation and ceilings four or five meters high. Its interior furnishings were merely a little shabby: a cement-plastered blackboard, backless wooden benches, a solid rammed-earth floor...

Yang Rui sat in the middle of the classroom,

The placement test was not as formal as the college entrance examination. Of the seven subjects, only five were tested, all in a single day. The scores did match the entrance examination, however: 120 points each for Chinese and mathematics, and 100 each for physics, chemistry, and English. Politics, worth 100 points, and biology, worth fifty, were not included in the placement test.

With the college entrance examination totaling 690 points, a science student needed at least 350, more than half the total, to have any hope of getting into university.

At Xibao Middle School, anyone who could score 300 was considered a top student.

Yang Rui's previous scores had only been a little over 200, placing him in the middle of the graduating class but at the bottom of the repeat-year class.

The Chinese teacher handed out papers smelling of printing ink, then sat on the teacher's desk and watched the students below like a hawk.

The paper was very thin and slightly yellowed. The writing varied in darkness and was entirely handwritten, though it was still legible.

There were no multiple-choice questions anywhere on the paper. The first section consisted of pinyin questions, asking students to turn sentences written in pinyin into Chinese characters. They were as simple as elementary-school questions, but worth only two points.

The second section was a fill-in-the-blank test of literary knowledge. Its twelve questions were worth twelve points, yet they gave Yang Rui considerable trouble. Fortunately, he had memories he could search through, and managed to answer blanks asking which five works made up the Five Classics. As for which work was Lu Xun's collection of lyrical prose, he could only put down a random answer.

The reading comprehension, language structure, classical Chinese, composition, and other questions that followed could be answered even without revision. Yang Rui watched the time as he completed the Chinese paper, then estimated his score. He had certainly been routed on the textbook-related questions, but might earn more points on the major sections such as reading comprehension and composition. Altogether, he might still scrape a pass, much like his previous results.

The bell rang right on time.

Still sitting on the teacher's desk, the Chinese teacher swept her gaze around the room and said sternly, "Everyone, pens down. Class monitor, collect the papers."

A girl rose in response and began collecting papers from the back toward the front.

When she reached Yang Rui, she noticeably paused, seemingly looking over his paper.

Somewhat surprised, Yang Rui raised his head and looked her over without ceremony.

In his memories, this girl named Liu Shan had skipped a grade and been in his class during his first year of high school. If he had any impression of her, it was merely of an ordinary girl with fair skin who did well in school.

But now, Yang Rui could say with certainty that his memories were wrong.

What did they mean, an ordinary girl? Had they ever seen an ordinary girl whose hips stretched green army trousers as tight as jeans, while her thighs turned them back into baggy hip-hop pants?

There was no need to look at her conservatively dressed upper body. Those **** lovely legs alone would have made her a first-rate beauty on a campus in later years.

In another year or two, once her features matured, with a little makeup and an outfit that showed off her figure, she would be an undeniably sexy beauty.

Who knew which man with no appreciation for romance would get lucky with her?

Yang Rui shook his head regretfully.

"Putting on an act," the girl suddenly said. She straightened and continued forward.

Yang Rui had no idea what she meant, but his gaze could not help following her steps.

A graceful maiden was a gentleman's worthy pursuit.

As he watched, Yang Rui reassured himself that he was merely watching a model walk the runway. Even thirty years later, models who could show off beautiful legs in green army trousers would be rare.

Liu Shan gathered all the papers and went with the Chinese teacher to deliver them to her office.

When she returned, Yang Rui was looking around in boredom, while his deskmate Wang Guohua remained busy memorizing example problems.

Seeing how seriously Wang Guohua was working, Liu Shan paused, changed direction, and marched up to Yang Rui rather aggressively. "You're leading a fellow student astray!"

"What?" Not only did Yang Rui look up in surprise, but the surrounding students also turned to look.

With contempt all over her face, Liu Shan said, "I read your Chinese paper. You'll barely pass at best. With grades like yours, you're teaching Wang Guohua some new method? What is that if not leading him astray?"

Yang Rui opened his mouth, but had nothing to say.

Explaining it would be far too complicated.

"Nothing to say now, have you?" Liu Shan pressed her advantage, snatching Wang Guohua's notebook. "Stop memorizing this stuff. Who knows where he found these dubious problems to fool you with? You may think you have a whole year to revise, but time flies. It'll be over before you know it. Ask the repeat students in class. Who hasn't heard of memorizing problems? It doesn't work at all."

Liu Shan had a cold exterior but a warm heart, and was well respected in class. As soon as she spoke, several people chimed in to support her.

"That's because your problems weren't any good." Wang Guohua had asked Yang Rui similar questions before, and now did his utmost to defend him.

Liu Shan snorted, planted a foot on the crossbar of a desk leg, her long leg straight, and declared, "The problems used by all these classmates weren't good enough, but his are?"

Turning back, Liu Shan lowered her voice and told Yang Rui, "If you want to form your own little clique, that's your business. But I can't stand by and watch you play games with other students' futures!"

For a moment, Yang Rui felt as though he were the villain.

He realized he had been looking at the problem the wrong way.

If he wanted to run this study group and be a "teacher," he first had to stand above the others. Mediocre answers and mediocre efforts would not make him a leader.

First, he had to win these students over with his own grades.

Although he did not intend to take all of them into his study group, if he could not even handle a single class of students, how could he talk of having pupils everywhere?

"I understand." Yang Rui suddenly stood up, his height immediately lending him an imposing presence.

Liu Shan stared into Yang Rui's eyes for a few seconds, then suddenly looked away rather bashfully. "What do you understand?"

"I'll make a proper effort on the mathematics test. Whether my study group works or not, we can debate that after the results come out. How about it?" Yang Rui's tone was brimming with confidence.

"Hmm?"

Liu Shan looked up at Yang Rui's sharply defined profile and suddenly felt inexplicably flustered. She gave a nasal "Mm," then turned and returned to her seat.

Watching her hurried steps, Yang Rui could not help touching his own face and smiling.

This world that judged people by their looks really was full of goodwill.