He Wasn’t Playing By the Rules!
Xu Mang finally awoke, glancing at the time. He had thirty minutes left before the end of the exam. Thirty minutes might have meant death for other people, but for Xu Mang, it was the perfect time for a comeback.
It was all he needed!
Thirty minutes was enough for him to get full marks!
Spending all his skill points, Xu Mang started writing at a tremendous speed, his many years of experience being a single-male-teenager had bestowed upon him such a superpower, adding on to the fact of his training at school to be the fastest homework-copier in class.
Nature and nurture both played important roles in skill development, and Xu Mang was adamant about this fact.
25 minutes and 37 seconds,
Xu Mang had created a new record. Ignoring the fact that no one knew about this record yet, it would cause waves of commotion throughout the school in due time.
Ring, ring, ring!
"Please put down your pencils and leave the classroom in an orderly fashion."
The invigilator had declared the end of the exam, and Xu Mang used his last few seconds to check his name, school, class, and student number, making sure there were no problems there.
The hallway outside of the classroom was eerily silent. If it was any of their previous exams, students would be huddled together exchanging answers or boasting about how many questions they had gotten right and wrong, but today… everyone had their mouths sealed shut, their bodies reduced to lifeless husks roaming around aimlessly.
Among the crows, Xu Mang found Yang Xiaoman. It wasn't that she was outstandingly pretty or anything, it was just that her concave chest was quite the eye-catcher, or at least that was the case for Xu Mang.
"Hehehe… The Math exam was hard, huh?" Xu Mang asked slyly. "Is someone suddenly feeling a sense of uselessness? Don't look at me like that, I'm a full-mark scorer!"
"Hmph!" Yang Xiaoman couldn't help the scorn she felt toward Xu Mang. It wasn't that she was looking down on him, the Maths paper was indeed a little over their syllabus, but of course… it was only a little. Yang Xiaoman still had a pretty easy time with it.
"You…" Yang Xiaoman had barely gotten her first word out when Lin Yishan walked over with a dark expression, and she immediately turned to greet him instead. "Good afternoon, Mr. Lin!"
"Yes…"
Facing Yang Xiaoman, the thunder clouds that hovered over him dissipated in a blink of an eye, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth again. "Yang Xiaoman, you were able to perform this time too, right?"
"Yes!" Yang Xiaoman nodded.
"Good, good!" Lin Yishan was pleased. "Keep up the good work, I have a feeling that you have a spot in the city-wide top three!"
And with that, he turned to face Xu Mang.
"Xu Mang!!!!" Lin Yishan suddenly shouted.
What the hell was this!
Someone should give this man an Oscar for being able to change expressions like that!
Xu Mang flinched a little, asking carefully, "What's up?"
"Come with me to my office!"
***
At the office, Xu Mang stood as straight as a statue, the lazy aura he usually emitted was long gone. Xu Mang knew the rules of society, the closer you got to this point, the more honest you'd better be. Anyone who told you that you should "always stick to your guns"... was definitely lying.
"Seems like you did well on your Math exam!" Lin Yishan joked sarcastically. "Everyone else hung their heads low as they left the exam hall, only you were left still laughing."
"Well of course! You already know who I am, after all!" Xu Mang laughed.
"And who exactly are you?" Lin Yishan wasn't joking around.
That got Xu Mang to shut up. He knew he had just made a major mistake, this wasn't the time for him to get excited and boastful.
"Let me ask you. Can you get full marks for this exam?" Lin Yishan asked.
Xu Mang nodded enthusiastically. "I've already gotten full marks!"
Lin Yishan:@#￥%...&
Lin Yishan had a sudden bad taste in his mouth. He had prepared a 10-step plan to slowly whittle down Xu Mang's confidence, but the kid had KO'd him with just one line. He must've known of his plan!
"Then leave! Remember to close the door."
"OK…"
After closing the door, Xu Mang heard a crisp smacking sound coming from inside the office.
Smack, smack!
Xu Mang knew that his teacher was probably slapping himself for not noticing his student's mathematical genius earlier.
Back in the classroom, Xu Mang took out a few ten yuan notes and immediately ran to the cafeteria. What he didn't expect was that the cafeteria was packed with other students, and by the time it got to Xu Mang's turn, all the bread was sold out.
@TheDreamOfAllFemalesInThe Universe: [The croissant you wanted is sold out.]
@LifeInPieces: [Then buy something else.]
@TheDreamOfAllFemalesInThe Universe: [There isn't anything else, it's all gone.]
@LifeInPieces: […]
@LifeInPieces: [Instant noodles, the seafood one.]
@TheDreamOfAllFemalesInThe Universe: [OK]
Xu Mang bought two tubs of instant noodles, four ham sausages, and two braised eggs before rushing back to the classroom.
"Your instant noodles, ham sausage, and braised egg."
"Do you want me to cook it for you?" Xu Mang asked.
"Hmph! Of course!"
Yang Xiaoman tilted her head arrogantly. "You'd better make it correctly, the noodles can't be too hard or too soft, too salty or too plain, the sausage, egg, and noodles have to stay balanced, if you fail any one of those conditions, you'd better book your ride to the hospital early tonight!"
Did you hear that! Her chest was small, but her head certainly wasn't!
"Yes, ma'am!"
Based on his past experience with instant noodles, Xu Mang quickly prepared the noodles to the flat-chested beast's exact specifications, creating a perfect cup of Master Kang's Seafood Instant Noodles.
Slurp, slurp…
"Yang Xiaoman? Can you cook?" Xu Mang asked.
Yang Xiaoman glared at him. "I can't!"
Xu Mang sighed. Why was a girl who couldn't do anything still have the courage to be so bossy and arrogant? Only Yang Xiaoman would have skin thick enough.
She couldn't cook,
She had a bad temper,
And she didn't even have a nice figure… A living model of a woman with
Which N's and C's you may ask?
Never cleaning, never doing the dishes, never cooking; Can't be hit, can't be scolded, can't be told what to do, can't be touched!
Oh, how times had changed.
That afternoon, Xu Mang had another two papers on Politics and English, and he performed as well as he always did, handing them both in completely blank.
He had already decided that for every subject other than Math, he was going to hand in a blank answer sheet. A failed midterm didn't mean much in the grand scale of things, the real war was during the finals next June.
Perhaps some may find his actions a bit extreme, but when you aren't able to get into a good college, now that was extreme, and you wouldn't be the only one suffering either, your entire family would fall with you.
A faint memory of his neighbor's tragedy floated into Xu Mang's mind. A second-round university acceptance letter, a young man full of dreams and life… thinking back to it now, Xu Mang still got chills down his spine.
The story wasn't supposed to turn out this way, but their neighbor's kid had always performed so well, only to slip up during the college entrance exam. The difference between being loved and being discarded by your family was only ten or so marks, and the difference between life and death was just as small.
When all the hope of a family was placed on the shoulders of their child, every single action and consequence was magnified and scrutinized. Good for you if you succeeded, but it wouldn't be easy for you to get back up if you failed!
After school had ended, Yang Xiaoman glanced at Xu Mang standing by her side. He was being strange. The guy had been completely silent ever since the English exam had ended, it wasn't like him.
"What's wrong with you? You haven't said anything since the English exam and you have this sad look on your face," Yang Xiaoman asked, concern in her voice.
"I wanna play Mid… When we play later, let me play Mid." Xu Mang said softly.
You…
I…
What…
Yang Xiaoman almost passed out. This guy had been moping about for almost three hours all because he wanted to play Mid! And to think that she had spent even the tiniest bit of effort being worried about him!
"Go take the d*mn bus!"
Xu Mang nodded, taking a few steps before suddenly rushing back to Yang Xiaoman. "So I'm playing Mid, right?"
"Scram!!!"