After National Day, military training also came to an end. The freshmen had familiarized themselves with every corner of campus and finally faced the first major battle of their college lives—”How to snag your desired elective courses on the crappy campus network.”
Course registration was a battle fought without gunpowder. Every freshman rolled up their sleeves, determined to grab an easy, laid-back course.
Come on! College was for enjoying life. Required courses you skipped, electives you definitely skipped. Surely no one would actually set their freshman-year goals on grad school admissions, studying abroad, civil service exams, teaching certificates, bar exams, and interning at top companies all at once… right?
Hehe—Xia Yiyang certainly wasn’t that person.
But unlike his bewildered classmates, Xia Yiyang had a secret weapon to rely on—ta-da! Sheng Lin!
Ling Ge was his direct senior in the same department. He definitely knew which professors were lenient, which gave high grades, and which never took attendance.
However, when Sheng Lin heard Xia Yiyang’s plea, the man’s face displayed an expression of ignorance and bewilderment for the very first time: “All the professors’ classes are pretty good.”
Xia Yiyang: “But I heard Professor XXX is really harsh with grading.”
Sheng Lin: “Really? I got a 98.”
Xia Yiyang: “And Professor OOO always does surprise attendance checks.”
Sheng Lin: “As long as you go to every class, surprise checks don’t matter.”
Xia Yiyang: “What about Professor XOX? I heard they’re totally unhinged—random pop quizzes, and they count for 50% of the grade!”
Sheng Lin: “That professor does give quite a few quizzes, but as long as you review and preview before every class, you can handle it easily.”
“…………??!!” Xia Yiyang was horrified: “Ling Ge, I’ve known you for this long, and I never realized you loved being tortured so much!”
If he’d known Ling Ge had a masochistic streak, maybe he, Xia Yiyi, could have finally topped!
Qin Zaozao appeared out of nowhere, fanning herself with a piece of advertising paper folded into a fan, looking insufferably smug.
She swayed her head and said: “Little Xia, if you want to slack off, you’ve definitely asked the wrong person. A sparrow knows nothing of a swan’s ambition—how could a straight-A student understand the struggles of a slacker? You’re better off asking me than him.”
Sheng Lin feigned surprise: “A sparrow knows nothing of a swan’s ambition? Are you sure you didn’t get that backwards?”
The young man cut in, looking disgusted: “No, no, it’s right. Ling Ge, you’re the sparrow. Sparrows chirp annoyingly on branches every morning, and right now you’re just as annoying lecturing me about studying. If you keep being this annoying, I’ll dump you!”
Before Qin Zaozao, who was watching the show, could say anything, the myna bird on her shoulder mimicked: “He’ll ~ dump ~ you ~!”
Sheng Lin: “…”
Qin Zaozao flicked her wrist, and that flashy piece of advertising paper transformed into a transcript.
It listed all her grades from all four years of college—more than half of them were in the 60–62 range. Whether the professors had taken pity on her or she’d calculated her way to barely scraping by, no one could tell.
Qin Zaozao pointed at a few courses on the transcript and said to Xia Yiyang: “Good little brother, listen to me carefully—this professor never takes attendance; that one just reads off PowerPoint slides the whole class; oh, and this one—in a 45-minute class, the professor spends 30 minutes talking about her time as a visiting scholar in North America, her husband being stationed in Europe, and her daughter going to an Ivy League… Just copy my course schedule exactly, and I guarantee you’ll sail through college happy and carefree!”
The young man’s eyes lit up, and he immediately took the transcript.
Sheng Lin tried to stop him but couldn’t—and in the end, he was pestered and persuaded into logging onto the campus network to help grab classes, aiming for a 100% replication of Qin Zaozao’s schedule.
As for exactly how the young man “pestered” and “persuaded” him… well, due to privacy concerns, we won’t go into details here.
On the day of course registration, Xia Yiyang returned to his dorm, while Sheng Lin specially went to his alma mater’s library. The two of them fought side by side from opposite ends of the internet connection.
As for Qin Zaozao?
He contributed the most—he was responsible for going to the school’s computer lab to chant incantations and perform rituals.
The three of them worked together and finally managed to snag all those easy courses!!
“Wait…” Xia Yiyang didn’t have time to celebrate before he noticed something off about his schedule. “Brother Qin, why is the PE elective Aerobics? I thought we agreed on Tai Chi?”
“Oh, I forgot to tell you—that professor stopped teaching Tai Chi and switched to aerobics.” Qin Zaozao said breezily. “Aerobics is great! Aerobic—beauty—healthy and beautiful…”
Sheng Lin suspected Qin Zaozao wasn’t speaking human language, because he couldn’t understand a word of it.
Xia Yiyang was on the verge of tears: “But I don’t know how to do aerobics at all!”
How could Sheng Lin bear to see him cry? He quickly comforted him: “Xia Yiyi, don’t panic. It doesn’t matter if you don’t know aerobics—take a closer look at your schedule. Which course do you know? Do you know calculus? Physics? Mechanical drawing? If you don’t know it, just learn it—you’ll pick it up as you go.”
Xia Yiyang cried even louder.
Because he didn’t know calculus, physics, or mechanical drawing either.
…
Before they knew it, Xia Yiyang’s first semester at Rongda University had passed.
To celebrate Little Xia’s successful survival of finals, Qin Zaozao organized a dinner gathering.
And what else would they eat in Rongcheng but hotpot!
At the table, Xia Yiyang had dark circles under his eyes and was nearly falling asleep over his food.
Qin Zaozao asked with concern: “How did your finals go, Little Xia? The schedule I carefully picked for you was pretty good, right? The exams shouldn’t have been too hard?”
Xia Yiyang said weakly: “Not bad. Did okay.”
Qin Zaozao spoke with the authority of someone who’d been through it: “Don’t be too hard on yourself. Sixty is enough!”
Sheng Lin raised an eyebrow: “His average is 92. His highest required course score is 96. One course dragged him down, but he still got an 88.”
Qin Zaozao: “…”
She put down her chopsticks, her tone full of resentment: “You know who I hate most in this world? It’s not academic gods like Sheng Lin—it’s the frauds who pretend to be slackers, buddy up to me, say they didn’t study and did badly, and then soar to the top at finals!! I thought we agreed no one would be competitive in college!”
Xia Yiyang felt both guilty and sheepish. He blinked: “I should be able to get a scholarship next semester. Brother Qin, this hotpot’s on me~”
Qin Zaozao picked up her chopsticks, smiling like a spring breeze: “Little Xia, I always knew you had extraordinary potential—sharp-eyed, clear-minded, a reincarnated literary star destined for greatness. Even if you don’t get the national scholarship, you’ll definitely get the top university-level one! —Speaking of which, I heard this place just added Australian original-cut marble beef ribs and New Zealand lamb. How about we order a couple more plates?”
“Two plates won’t be enough, right?” Sheng Lin spoke up. “There are three of us—we’ll need at least four. But since Xia Yiyi hasn’t gotten his scholarship yet, this meal’s on me.”
Qin Zaozao was delighted: “Oh my, Boss Sheng is so generous!”
Sheng Lin even offered to order more for her: “This is mainly to thank you for helping him pick such a great course.”
Qin Zaozao was confused: “Huh? Which one?”
Sheng Lin: “Aerobics.”
Before he could finish, someone kicked him hard under the table.
Sheng Lin turned his head sideways. The young man beside him was blushing furiously, doing his best to look composed as he said: “You two start eating the meat—it’ll get tough if you wait too long.”
As he spoke, the young man kicked Sheng Lin a few more times under the table.
How could Sheng Lin be so mean?
Even all that food couldn’t shut him up.
Qin Zaozao across the table: “?”
What were these two playing at?
Aerobics was a new PE course offered this year. Most students who signed up were girls; the boys usually dropped out after two classes.
That was because the teacher spent half of every class having them do stretching and flexibility training—and many boys couldn’t handle it, groaning in pain.
Luckily, Xia Yiyang was naturally quite flexible.
After class, he was even more flexible.
Just how flexible?
Sheng Lin thought about Xia Yiyang’s usual performance—
Attended every night class without missing a single one.
Aced every surprise quiz.
Proactively previewed, diligently reviewed, and made significant progress.
Didn’t that deserve a perfect score?
Aerobics was truly a great course.
In the process of in-depth study, all three characters in the name were important—none could be missing.
Sheng Lin wondered—next semester, would Xia Yiyang still choose this course?
Leave a Reply