The Young Matriarch

Even though Teacher Huang had a short temper, she was rather popular with the students and would often receive small gifts on Teacher’s Day. Therefore, she thought that these were normal candies that Bai Chuwei had gifted her. The fragrance was so tempting that she swallowed her saliva. However, when she recalled her toothache, she restrained herself and carried it back with her to the office.

When she returned to her desk and saw her soiled pants that stunk of poop, her expression darkened. Thankfully she had a spare set of pants which she changed into earlier. She immediately threw the dirty trousers into the trash can.

*

Bai Chuwei came out of Class 11 and entered through Class 9 backdoor. Just as she walked in, she saw Duan Xingye winking at her and an eerie sneer could be heard from the podium. “Your lackluster grade is pulling down the class average and you dare to skip class? You’re really something else!”

Bai Chuwei turned towards the language teacher, Mrs. Li, and smiled as she corrected her. “Teacher Li, I believe my grades are rather good and if I had honestly skipped class, I doubt you will see me inside the class right now.”

Duan Xingye quickly winked at Xu Xingchen and hastily added. “That’s right, it’s only considered tardiness at most. Weiwei only joined the school yesterday and she might have lost her way.”

Xu Xingchen also smiled and said, “Teacher Li, Student Bai is a transfer student and we should give her a little more time to adapt.”

All the female students in class were secretly cursing her. “Vixen!”

To think that Duan Xingye and Xu Xingchen had spoken on her behalf together!

Duan Xingye was from the Duan Family, a century old wealthy family, and Xu Xingchen was an outstanding student. Teacher Li could not possibly harp on the issue with both of them speaking up for the girl and so, she merely said in a mean tone, “Take a good look at your language paper when you sit down. If there is a repeat of such marks, please get out of this class. Class 9 only accepts the best students!”

Bai Chuwei raised her brows in curiosity as she returned to her seat and saw the language test paper on her table.

There were numerous bright red crosses all over the test paper.

As it was a simulated classroom test, ninety marks were considered as a full score as there was no need for them to write a composition that was worth sixty marks. She had obtained fifty-two marks out of ninety marks.

Her grades were not considered extremely bad, but within Class 9, she was at the bottom of the list.

Duan Xingye leaned over to look at Bai Chuwei’s test papers. After some moment of silence, he finally found a praiseworthy point and said with difficulty, “Actually… your handwriting is pretty.”

Bai Chuwei’s smile was distorted.

Did Duan Xingye mean to say that throughout the entire test paper, only her handwriting was worth looking at?

Bai Chuwei stared at the test paper where there were some questions with zero marks given.

“Analyze what the author was thinking at that point in time, based on the scenery depicted in the last couplet of this poem.”

The answer which she wrote was: “There’s no special meaning. Old Li was drunk at that time and casually wrote that to act cool.”

“In chapter 15 of ‘Memory of the Mountain Moonlight’, in the scene ‘Banquet of the Mountain, Sea and Sky’, Yue Ji attended the banquet in a white embroidered and plain dress. Please analyze why did the author plan for Yue Ji to dress up in this way? Please explain the meaning behind it.”

Her answer was: “There’s no special meaning. It was just written casually.”

Duan Xingye wanted to cover his face. What kind of answers were these? How was she to score marks with such answers?

Bai Chuwei was feeling complex at this moment. Old Li was indeed drunk when he wrote the poem, and it was written purely to act cool. There was no hidden meaning behind it.

For the question on ‘Memory of the Mountain Moonlight’, the Banquet of the Mountain, Sea and Sky was one of the climax scenes and Yue Ji was the female lead of the novel. However, Yue Ji’s clothing description was added merely to hit the word count quota and earn the manuscript fee. There was really no hidden meaning!

Bai Chuwei looked at those bright red crosses all over her test paper and fell into a state of self-doubt.

Could it be that as the author, she did not understand her books better than these experts from the latter generation?