Zhao Youyue was called out of the classroom directly by the homeroom teacher, Teacher Qiu. What followed was, naturally, a round of criticism and lecturing in the quiet hallway. In the end, he told her to write a three thousand word self-criticism. Only after she handed that in would her phone be returned. Otherwise, it would stay with him until the end of the semester.
Three thousand words?
Her face fell instantly. Her brow furrowed as she stared at the linoleum floor. How was she supposed to write that many words? She might as well just give up on the phone. It would be easier to buy a new one.
Seeing her miserable expression, Qiu Yingchun actually felt that his punishment was already pretty light. He hadn't even made her do a public self-criticism in front of the whole grade. In his view, letting her trade a written reflection for her phone without calling her parents was already generous enough.
Thinking back, when he first caught her reading comics on her phone during morning reading, he had been furious. But after calling her out and seeing her fair, delicate face, he just couldn't bring himself to stay angry. These days, being good-looking really did come with advantages. On top of that, Zhao Youyue's attitude after being caught had been decent. She admitted her mistake readily and didn't make a fuss about having her phone confiscated.
If it were another student, seeing a phone worth six or seven thousand taken away would probably have brought them to tears, even though teachers usually returned them eventually.
Qiu Yingchun figured that with such a proper attitude, she would submit the self-criticism within three days. That would be enough to leave a deep impression and stop her from doing it again.
Zhao Youyue returned to her seat in low spirits. Her deskmate, Zhou Fang, felt a bit of schadenfreude inside. Zhao Youyue had been brazenly playing with her phone whenever the teacher wasn't around, and only now had she finally slipped up. The karma had come late, but it had come. Still, Zhou Fang comforted her verbally. "It's fine, right? Lao Qiu is really sneaky, coming in through the back door like that."
For some reason, Zhao Youyue suddenly thought of those funny images that had circulated online. A student sitting by the back window, seriously playing on his phone, while a teacher outside stared in through the glass with a death glare. Or students playing Honor of Kings in class, only for the teacher to confiscate the phone and put it on the podium, making them watch helplessly as their character went AFK and dragged their teammates to a loss.
She couldn't help laughing a little, the sound soft and melodic. Then she said gently, "It's okay. Thanks for worrying about me."
Hearing that, Zhou Fang's face warmed slightly. She had just been secretly gloating, after all. She also realized that when Zhao Youyue smiled, she really did look gentle and soothing. More importantly, her temper was that good. If it were Zhou Fang herself, she thought she might already be lying on the desk crying.
Without her phone, Zhao Youyue could only helplessly take out her Chinese textbook. The paper felt slightly rough under her fingertips. She read silently, too lazy to read aloud, let alone memorize anything. She even flipped to the later essays and read them like short stories. Since the writers in this world were different, it actually felt pretty fresh.
If Qiu Yingchun had known that she hadn't reflected even a tiny bit, he would probably have been hopping mad.
As soon as morning reading ended, quite a few already sleepy students immediately collapsed onto their desks, greedily using the ten minutes before class to catch up on sleep. Most of them were boys. The classroom fell quiet at once, filled only with the sound of rhythmic breathing and the distant chirp of birds outside.
When Zhao Youyue went to the water dispenser with her cup, she moved lightly. Her porcelain cup wasn't cheap either. It was from a well-known luxury brand's "Oriental Horse" series. A full set of six cups and saucers cost 15,900 yuan. One set alone was 2,650 yuan, something most of her classmates couldn't even imagine.
She mixed some hot water with cold, took a sip, and frowned. The liquid hit her tongue with a sharp, unpleasant edge. Without hesitation, she poured it all out the window. There was a strong bleach-like disinfectant smell lingering in the air. It felt as if the so-called purified water barrel had just been filled straight from the tap. It was supposedly produced by a school-affiliated factory too. What a rip-off.
She decided that from now on she would just bring a thermos filled with water from home. She was absolutely done with the school's purified water. She had originally wanted to make tea or coffee here. Forget it. She would just have Uncle Liu prepare drinks in the car and have them after leaving campus.
Without her phone, Zhao Youyue felt uncomfortable all over. She really couldn't stand even a moment of it. She decided that at noon, she would immediately go buy a new phone.
As for the self-criticism, she wasn't worried at all. She clearly remembered that back in student days, every class always had a few talented writers who even ran side businesses writing love letters for others. Writing a self-criticism on commission should be possible too, right?
She wouldn't ask for help for free. One hundred yuan per thousand words meant three hundred yuan for a three-thousand-word piece. That should be enough to tempt anyone. If that didn't work, she could always find a template online and muddle through it herself.
Deep down, what she hoped most was that Lao Qiu would forget about the whole thing. As for the confiscated phone, if it was gone, it was gone. She would just treat it as if she had dropped it into a river while skipping stones.
The first period arrived quickly. It was Gu Yaoyan's math class. This Teacher Gu was quite young and handsome, with an easy, stylish manner. As someone with a strong preference for good looks, Miss Zhao listened seriously for a rare twenty minutes. He was going over the placement test paper, his chalk clicking rhythmically against the blackboard. After those twenty minutes, she drifted off again, staring into space through the window.
"Student Zhao Youyue, why don't you come up and explain this problem for everyone?"
Gu Yaoyan had noticed that she had been daydreaming for at least five minutes. He didn't know her well, so he glanced at the seating chart on the podium before calling her name. He had no real hope that she could explain the problem. He just wanted her to stop spacing out.
It was only after Zhou Fang nudged her that Zhao Youyue snapped back to reality, drawing a bit of laughter from the class. Looking a little dazed, she took her test paper and walked up to the front. This actually surprised Gu Yaoyan slightly. He had thought she would brazenly stay seated, giving him an excuse to explain it himself.
"Um, Teacher Gu, which problem is it?" Her voice was still gentle and calm.
The laughter in the class grew louder. Everyone thought that the girl who had just been scolded during morning reading was about to embarrass herself again.
Gu Yaoyan couldn't help smiling. He had always been good-tempered, and now he found Zhao Youyue rather cute. He pointed to the problem on the paper.
AB equals AC. AD is perpendicular to BC. AM to MD equals two to three. MN is parallel to AC. Find the ratio of AN to NB.
It wasn't a particularly difficult question, but Zhao Youyue hadn't solved it during the exam, nor had she corrected it afterward.
Gu Yaoyan sighed inwardly. Cute as she was, she really did seem a bit lazy when it came to studying.
The rest of the class wore expressions of anticipation, ready to watch the show. Only the math representative, Chen Haoran, looked anxious. He almost wanted to rush out and help her, staging a perfect heroic rescue to earn goodwill.
What no one expected was that after a moment of thought, Zhao Youyue recalled the memories of being obsessed with studying inside the Dimensional Gate. She really hadn't known how to do this problem before, but now, she could see the solution at a glance.
Still, the impression she gave was more like someone bluffing their way through, pretending to understand. There was no helping it. She simply didn't have that top-student aura.
She picked up the chalk, her fingers feeling the dry dust. She drew a geometric diagram based on the given conditions and began to explain.
"Draw DE parallel to AC, intersecting AB at point E. Since it's an isosceles triangle, BD to DC equals one to one. Similarly, AE to EB equals one to one. Since AN to NE equals AM to MD, which is two to three, assume AE equals EB equals five a. Then AN equals two a, NE equals three a, NB equals NE plus EB, which is eight a. So AN to NB equals two a to eight a, or one to four."
As she wrote, she explained in that same gentle voice. Her logic was clear, and she arrived at the correct answer smoothly.
In the end, she put down the chalk, feeling rather pleased herself. She pressed her lips together and smiled slightly, looking at Teacher Gu.
The classroom was completely silent.