Chapter 4: Fighting Back in the Classroom

After two weeks of resting at home, Lin Mingyang's parents thought that he had almost recovered, and he himself also put forward the idea of returning to school. After another checkup at the hospital, Lin Mingyang finally returned to school.

High school life was not as difficult as Lin Ming Yang had imagined, and with the diary left behind by Felix, he quickly familiarized himself with his surrounding classmates and teachers. Of course to fit in, he still needed a long period of time to get used to it.

"Confucius was born in 551 BC into an ancient and prestigious family. This dwarfs us Westerners! Are we really that young? 500 years before the birth of Jesus, my homeland did not exist. Nebuchadnezzar (King of Babylon) had just disappeared from the Babylonian coastline, the first great temple in Jerusalem had been vandalized only a few years before, Thoreau (ancient Athenian statesman, poet, and consul-elect to carry out economic and political reforms) had just died, and the city of Athens would have had to wait for a century before the Parthenon was built. As for Rome, it was merely a country town then, fighting to the death to survive against its own rivals, the Idarians, before it was called the center of the empire more than 400 years later." In this class, Mr. Matthew, the social history teacher, taught them a lesson about Chinese culture.

The small classroom was sparsely filled with more than thirty students, although the lecturing style of Mr. Matthew on the podium was very different from many of the history teachers that Lin Mingyang had contacted in China before, the students below still had a listless look, in addition to knowing that the sneakers underneath their feet and the cheap goods in the store came from China, the average American high school student did not have a clear understanding of how glorious the history of that country far across the ocean was. The average American high school student is not interested in the glorious history of the country across the ocean.

As everyone drifted off to sleep, a dissonant voice suddenly emerged, "Mr. Matthew, I don't think you're using the word 'we' accurately enough, you seem to have forgotten that we have a guy in the classroom who is one-half Chinese. I think he can tell us something more intuitively about China!"

This request that suddenly interrupted the rhythm of the classroom was like a shot of stimulant to the dull classroom, many heads lying on their desks lifted up, and everyone's eyes were coincidentally focused on the corner on the left side of the classroom that was leaning against the window.

There, Lin Mingyang was boredly propping up his head with one hand, while the other left some scribbles haphazardly on his notebook. The other party's question made him frown slightly as he recognized the white teenager asking the question as Jerry, and in Felix's diary that was an annoying guy.

This Jerry guy was good in all aspects of the class and his father was also a school board member of Moss Middle School, perhaps more because of the latter reason, although he was a little displeased with Jerry's sudden interruption of his class, Matthew didn't show this emotion. American education had always encouraged students to ask questions freely in the classroom, and Jerry's approach was not excessive, the key was that he had timed his question well this time.

"Felix, can you introduce us to the China you know?" Matthew was well aware of the conflict between Jerry and Lin Mingyang, so he gave the initiative of whether or not to answer this question to the only mixed Chinese teenager in the corner of the classroom with a thick head of black hair without leaving a trace.

In the eyes of many teachers, Lin Mingyang was a very special student, his mother was of Jewish descent, but his father was an authentic Chinese. Because of his mixed Chinese and Western blood, the guy was born with a handsome face comparable to Hollywood movie star Keanu Reeves.

At first, Lin Mingyang would do the silly thing of looking in the mirror to self-indulge, because this body's outstanding appearance is really enough to be proud of. People around him always liked to compare him with that big star in Hollywood, and in this match that seemed to have some obvious disparity of strength, Felix, who had no fame to speak of, actually surprisingly overpowered the popular Hollywood idol.

The reality was a bit different from what Lin Ming Yang had learned in his diary, and he finally attributed the difference to the weakness of Felix's original character. Generally people with delicate and rich inner emotions were not very good at expressing themselves, and it was because of his introverted personality that the original Felix lacked an adequate understanding of his own abilities. It was also because of his personality problems that a small group of guys in the class, represented by Jerry, would often find trouble with him.

"Hey Felix, I heard that your Chinese dragons have snake-like bodies and can fly in the sky without wings?" One of Jerry's cohorts picked up at this point causing even more small laughter in the classroom.

If it was the Felix of the past, this matter would have passed if he had endured it, but now that his body had been changed into Lin Ming Yang, the situation was a little different, and in the smug expressions of Jerry's gang, that timid and fearful Felix actually stood up.

In full view of everyone, Lin Ming Yang had no qualms about pointing his finger at Jerry and said arrogantly in an almost challenging tone, "Since your curiosity is so urgent, not satisfying you would make me feel a bit overwhelmed, but there's the hope that you're resilient enough to the blow, or else you'll be so ashamed of your own ignorance that you won't be able to stand up for yourself!"

"Are you issuing a challenge to us, coward?" The speaker was a boy beside Jerry with his cuffs rolled up, revealing strong muscles and a tattoo with no beauty to speak of on his small arm; his name was Johnson, and he habitually acted as a punching bag in Jerry's gang, and was even more reckless in his threats at this point.

"Challenge?" Lin Ming Yang looked like he had heard a very funny word, "You're saying I'm issuing a challenge to you guys?"

"Yes!" Johnson realized that his vicious gaze actually failed at Lin Mingyang, something he had never encountered before.

"Then what am I challenging you to?" Lin Mingyang hummed contemptuously, "What qualifications do you have to be worthy of my challenge? Is it to challenge Mr. Carton Jerry for his little bit of academic performance that has no advantage over me, or is it to challenge you, Mr. Ben Johnson, for muscle?"

"Of course, I can't make the move that you do that only bullies the weak, and if you follow the Fire Foxes games then you should know that I once broke a rib on the court by a guy who was way stronger than you! On the pitch that was an accident of course, but I can't guarantee that this kind of accident will not happen off the pitch!"

Lin Mingyang wasn't boasting, one had to admit that Jerry was an excellent student in his class, but he was excellent in front of Felix, but he was somewhat powerless. Probably inheriting the qualities of the two excellent bloodlines, Chinese and Jewish, Felix's academic performance was as commendable as his handsome looks. In many academic competitions of the school, as long as Felix participated, then Jerry could only ever take the second place, which made Jerry very depressed, which was why he always tried every possible way to find Felix trouble.

As for physical fitness, I don't know what kind of training Felix had received as a child, anyway, the body that looks well-proportioned but not particularly strong contains amazing strength. To be able to play the starting position in the school basketball team, Felix's body is not weak, even with in Lin Ming Yang's opinion, people like him in school as long as they do not bully others is already a blessing, actually there are still people who bully to his head, this body owner's previous character is really some let Lin Ming Yang is very speechless.

Johnson would like to explode, his clenched fists show that he is now angry mood, but Lin Mingyang's words but let him not without concern, has been Felix weak character so that Johnson instinctively ignored the other side of the basketball court is a strong defender, Moss Middle School Firefoxes game results in general, fighting in the league is well-known, inside out can be a tough character!

"Okay, this is a classroom, not the Colosseum of Ancient Rome, so Felix and Johnson, both of you please watch your tone of voice!" Mr. Matthew timely stepped in to stop this classroom conflict that was about to erupt, he found that ever since that accidental elevator accident, Lin Ming Yang's personality had changed drastically, could it really be due to being overstimulated?

Thinking of that accident still having palpitations in his heart, Mr. Matthew was definitely emotionally biased towards Lin Ming Yang who usually excelled in his grades, "Felix, in the movie 'Shawshank Redemption', there is a famous line, 'Beautiful birds know how to treasure their own feathers', and this is the line I'm now give it to you in the hope that you can understand the meaning! Now please start your speech!"

This implicit knock from Matthew caused Lin Ming Yang to have a great deal of restraint in his next speech, "Today's United States is very powerful, but let's not forget that the young United States of America was founded just over 200 years ago. In front of China's long history, the United States is just a newborn baby. While the ancestors of the West were but savages who lived in mud huts and painted their faces the color of the sky, the Chinese had already learned to eat their meals on beautiful china plates, to decorate the four walls of their houses with fine paintings, and to paint with a mastery of the art unsurpassed by any modern artist."

"China, an ancient nation historically known throughout the world for its silk and porcelain production, once built a vast empire that spanned Eurasia and encompassed today's China, Central Asia, Russia, and half of Western Europe, so while you all marvel at the majesty of Alexander and Napoleon, please don't forget that the Chinese once trampled half of the world under their feet! "

"If we look at the evolution of civilization, when Westerners were still recording words on tree trunks, stones and sheepskins, the Chinese had already invented the earliest paper; and Genghis Khan's Mongol army swept across Eurasia with the Chinese-invented fire yao; the Chinese invented the earliest movable-type typesetting and printing, a technology that spread around the world and facilitated the spread of civilization; And the compass allowed Chinese ocean fleets to traverse the Indian and Pacific Oceans before Spain and Portugal, and perhaps the Chinese language would be spoken in the United States, Australia, and even South America today if the Chinese emperors had not closed their ports at the time."

"And now China, after a period of historical sinking has begun to rise again, this country's population is six times that of the United States, the economic growth rate has been maintained at more than double-digit every year, even though China's total economic output is less than half of that of the United States at the present time, but at this rate of development, in the foreseeable future, the United States' position as the No. 1 economic power in the world will inevitably be replaced!"

"I believe that everyone here will become the backbone of American society in the future, on the one hand, the rise of China will inevitably form a considerable challenge to the United States, but now the United States is facing challenges can not only come from China, the European Union area has begun to use a unified currency, and the total economic output of its region has also surpassed that of the United States, even if there is no China, the United States in the future pressure is also not easy. "

"On the other hand, China's development has indeed brought great benefits to the United States, from the national level, China has a broad market that American companies need in the future, for individuals, cheap and beautiful Chinese products for everyone's life to bring more benefits, all these obvious facts tell us that this is a country worthy of serious consideration! "

This speech spilled out from history to the economy, the surrounding students are with a kind of untruthful eyes watching his calm and collected performance, in everyone's previous memories, it seems that only in the basketball court Lin Mingyang will have such a sharpness, and his performance today greatly exceeded people's expectations.

After the speech was over, Mr. Matthew on the podium was the first to applaud, and except for Jerry's group, everyone's applause was enthusiastic, and could even be described as a kind of fervor. It's been a long time since I've seen Johnson so painfully reprimanded, and on the contrary, he dared to be angry, and he could only swallow in his stomach even after he knocked down his front teeth.