Senior Year

The Labour Day holiday had already ended, and school reopened the next day. Gu Xiqiao looked at her reflection in the mirror of herself wearing a blue and white school uniform. Her hair was tied up in a simple ponytail, and she looked like an average high school student.

She breathed deeply before pushing the door and exiting her room.

She studied in the third year, or senior year of high school in N City's First City High, which was the same school that Gu Xijin studied at. Differently, Gu Xijin was in the rocket class while Gu Xiqiao was in the parallel class.

From top to bottom, the classes in high school were the rocket class, experiment class, normal class, and parallel class. In terms of student and teacher quality, the parallel class couldn't compare to any of the classes in front of it, especially the rocket class. Most of the talented students in the city were concentrated in this class, and so it had quite the reputation.

Most of the students that came out from the rocket class all got in prestigious universities.

In contrast, the parallel class was virtually forgotten by all of the directors of the school.

There was only around a month until finals would come around, and most of the students in class were busy studying and brushing up on their academics, so they didn't pay attention to the new girl in class that always had her head lowered and never talked to any of them.

Maybe they would glance at her sometimes, but that was only because there weren't many people that could look so good in a school uniform.

Unparalleled beauty without even putting on makeup, no wonder the boys from the other classes always came by to look at her.

[The system has detected that Xiao Yun is an upstanding citizen and a righteous girl, do you want to add her to your friend list?] The system suddenly told her seriously.

Gu Xiqiao heard the system spirit talk and looked up at Xiao Yun who was handing out math papers. This girl was her deskmate and the math representative of the parallel class, and while she didn't get acquainted with her in her past life, she had heard the news of her entering the entertainment industry after she didn't do well in her finals.

"No need," Gu Xiqiao quickly refused the system spirit's offer.

[You must add her as a friend, Beauty Qiao! Xiao Yun is a determined girl with lots of potential, and you must make more friends so that you can have someone to lean on in the future! Most importantly, I scanned her family background and she is very! Very! Rich!]

"Do I look like a poor person to you? Also, aren't you the strongest system? Why would I need any friends?"

The system spirit didn't know how to reply to this mistress that didn't listen to its advice and decided to just be a mascot system.

After the system spirit stopped talking, Gu Xiqiao looked at her exam results.

Chinese, 122 points. Normal, too many points deducted because of the essay section.

Maths, 140 points, average. Her math had always been decent. And she probably got a few questions wrong this time purely by accident.

General sciences, 272 points. Pretty good, but she didn't manage to answer the harder questions.

English, 72 points. She basically got all the fill-in-the-blanks questions and reading questions wrong, while she left her listening section completely blank.

Gu Xiqiao quietly put down her test results. Her English was quite terrible back in the day, but she had managed to improve on it later on. She had also seen countless books in the virtual space, and there were many English books too, so a high school level exam was a breeze for her now.

There was only a month left until her finals, and what she was worried about wasn't English, but mathematics. She had already returned all her math to Karl Marx, and she needed a lot of time to relearn all the systematic mathematics taught to her in high school. It seems that she had to resort to buying virtual space time with her points from the system.

The system spirit knew what she was thinking and started bouncing around in the air again. [Your choice is correct! The time flow in the virtual space is completely different than outside in the real world, and you can have all the time you need to revise!]

"Hey, if you have a lot of spare time go check Weibo, won't you? Don't analyze me, do you have nothing better to do?"

The system spirit: [...]

The classes in high school made Gu Xiqiao's head hurt, so she decided to find math books in the virtual space.

And so, in the eyes of her classmates, the situation looked like this…

In chemistry class, Gu Xiqiao was sleeping.

In language class, Gu Xiqiao hadn't woken up.

In biology class, she was still sleeping as soundly as a baby!

A lot of the teachers in First City High were quite irresponsible, in a way. They cared way more about good students, and so they didn't even care when they saw a student from the parallel class sleep in class.

The teacher in charge of the parallel class had gone by the window of the class three times, and from his angle, he could see Gu Xiqiao sleeping very clearly. He went back to the teacher's lounge and checked on her exam results, and then he slammed his palm on the table.

The fourth class was math class, and the teacher brought the exam results into the class with a dark expression. He looked around at the entire class, and the girl that sat by the window was still sleeping, as expected. He threw the exam results on the table and turned around, writing a coordinate geometry question on the blackboard with a flourish.

"Gu Xiqiao, come solve this question!"

[Someone is calling from the outer world, so the system will summon you back in three seconds. Please prepare to leave.]

Gu Xiqiao sat in the blank white space with a stack of remedial books and practice questions, and after hearing the electronic-sounding voice in her head her black pupils flashed with confusion, before coming back to her senses.

"How long have I been in here?"

[Beauty Qiao, you have used thirty points to exchange a month's worth of time in the virtual space, and eighteen of these points are overdrafted from the system. That being said, you must take care not to work too hard and have enough rest when you exit the virtual space. Staying in the virtual space for too long isn't good for you!]

Xiao Yun reached over and prodded Gu Xiqiao a bit, and upon seeing her look up confusedly, she said, "The teacher wants you to solve that question on the board."

Gu Xiqiao massaged her temple and nodded in thanks, before getting up and walking towards the blackboard.

The question on the blackboard was adapted from the hardest question in last year's final exams. That question was created by an old man that researched competitive mathematics, and when it came out that year there were no more than five people that could solve the question in N City. The teacher picked this question with the intent of letting the students in class settle down and not get too proud.

With his back to Gu Xiqiao, he advised all the students in class, "Life is a never-ending process of picking up and letting go. The high school finals are probably the last chance in your life to get noticed aside from your family background. The choice is yours, whether to take the chance or to evade and let go of it…"

He was one of the more responsible teachers in the school, and even though he was in charge of the worst class in First City High he never neglected them, always giving them advice whenever he could. Every sentence he said made the students in the class lower their heads in thought.

Seeing that the students were listening seriously to his words, the class teacher couldn't help the swell of pride in his heart. He looked back at Gu Xiqiao, and continued, "Student Gu, I know your math is average, but you can't give up until the last moment in your final your, and it's alright to not know how to…"

He had wanted to continue lecturing her, but his words were stuck in his throat.

The girl that was facing the board was wearing a school uniform too large for her frame, and while this school uniform made the average student look plump, it made this girl look even thinner. Those that looked at her could only see her pale and elegant neck, and even though she was just solving a simple math question, she gave off the aura of a leisure artist at work.

Of course, this wasn't what made the class teacher stop speaking.

Gu Xiqiao checked on her answers thoroughly before putting down the chalk and turning around.

The class teacher came back to his senses and coughed softly, letting Gu Xiqiao sit down before pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose and checking on the answer she gave. He realized that Gu Xiqiao had not only answered properly, and the steps were even tidier and more concise than even the standard answer and nodded in satisfaction. "Very good. Student Gu has answered perfectly, so if anyone has any questions about math, you can ask her about them."

This praise of his made everyone in class look at Gu Xiqiao in shock.

Most of them couldn't even understand how to start on the first small part of the question, and Gu Xiqiao not only solved all three sections, and got praise from the teacher that she did it perfectly.

This made it hard for them to accept.

The class teacher rubbed away the questions on the board, and because this question was too hard to understand, it wasn't suitable for the parallel class at least at this point. He glanced over at a certain girl that was nodding off again and tapped the teacher's table with a piece of chalk in frustration. "Gu Xiqiao, you're the only one who got the easiest multiple-choice questions wrong, so sit up and listen!"

Gu Xiqiao sat up straight and rubbed her eyes groggily, looking at the exam paper and trying to look for the question that the teacher was about to discuss.

The class ended quickly, and after everyone in the class left Gu Xiqiao took out a lunch card with the school's front door printed on the front of the card.

….…

Two young men stood there with basketballs in hand in front of the canteen, attracting the gazes of the people that went by.

One of them had closely cropped hair, and seeing a dainty girl walk over slowly, he tugged at the sleeve of the handsome, tall young man next to him. "Brother Wu, Brother Wu! Isn't that girl pretty? Isn't she the girl that wrote a love letter to you called… Gu Xiqiao, right? I saw her when I looked for Xiao Yun at their class, she's quite the looker, ain't she?"