This humble Taoist priest wants to take the college entrance exam.

Chapter 37 Women's Minds Are the Hardest to Guess (3700 words)
Young Master Dong Wenyu, suffering from kidney deficiency, almost couldn't stand up while carrying about 30 jin (15 catties) of water.

The class monitor carried 20 pounds of books for more than ten minutes under the scorching sun with ease;
It’s clear who is strong and who is weak.

All the students in the class had arrived, and the class bell rang.

Feeling sleepy isn't the most torturous thing; the most torturous thing is that when you're feeling sleepy, the first class you attend is Lao Liang's Chinese class.

"What are you doing? You all look so listless after coming back from a two-day holiday? Take out your monthly exam papers, we'll go over them in this class."

Going over test papers is more boring than giving lectures, and with Chinese language... it's hard to get a low score, and even harder to get a high score.

The students' Chinese scores were all within a relatively concentrated range, with the highest score being 139 and the lowest being 116. The student with the highest score couldn't guarantee that they would get the highest score again next time, and the student with the lowest score wasn't necessarily going to fail to get above 130. The exact score depended entirely on luck...

Being in the top class, it's impossible to create a huge gap between yourself and other students just by relying on Chinese language skills.

Therefore, most students don't value Chinese language that much; they just want to avoid dragging the class down.

Even Mr. Liang himself did not aim to cultivate top scorers in Chinese, but rather to raise the average level of the entire class.

Of the sixty students in the class, Chen Shi'an was undoubtedly the one who listened most attentively in Chinese class.

Chinese is the only subject he can keep up with in his current high school studies, and the only subject he can understand the teacher's lectures.

He has a solid foundation in Chinese language, but he lacks standardized test-taking skills. He can temporarily skip other subjects, but he still needs to attend Chinese language classes.

Chen Shi'an took out the Chinese test paper he had done during the diagnostic test, which was the same one everyone had taken during the monthly exam. Teacher Liang was reviewing the test papers, and Chen Shi'an listened attentively with his pen in hand, while also revising his answers according to Teacher Liang's standards.

Lin Mengqiu stole a glance at his test paper.

Her handwriting was really good; it was the first time she had ever seen a classmate write so beautifully.
His answers to the reading comprehension questions were quite novel, logically consistent, and with clear arguments. I can't say he was wrong, but I really don't know how to score him.

The essay was actually written in classical Chinese... Many of the words and phrases were quite profound, and she didn't quite understand them. However, judging from the structure and style of the essay, it seemed to be a rather profound and well-written piece.

It's not that you can't write in classical Chinese, but her classmates, including herself, didn't dare to try it easily...

Chen Shi'an dared to do that. Not only did he write in classical Chinese, but he also used traditional Chinese characters throughout, including his answers to other questions.

If it weren't for the fact that these traditional Chinese characters form phrases and sentences, and that the cultural heritage ingrained in the genes of the Chinese people allows Lin Mengqiu to read without much difficulty, she really wouldn't recognize some of the traditional characters if they were taken out individually...

The girl felt a chill run down her spine and looked at the nine-leaky fish with renewed respect.

Anyway, she felt that if it were her, she would never have been able to complete such a test paper without ever having been to school.

He shouldn't have taken the college entrance exam; he should have taken the imperial examination instead...

The imperial examinations did not include mathematics, English, physics, biology, or chemistry, which are often the most troublesome subjects for high school students.

Chen Shi'an seemed to sense something and turned his head in the direction of the gaze.

Lin Mengqiu, however, turned her head away without showing any emotion.

Chen Shi'an: "..."

The class monitor is really obsessed; why does he always seem to want to watch what the other person is doing?
……

Fortunately, the afternoon Chinese classes were not consecutive.

After class, Teacher Liang stepped down from the podium, came to Chen Shi'an's side, and chatted with him briefly.

"How's it going, Shi'an? Is he keeping up?"

"I can keep up; Teacher Liang's classes are very good."

"hehe."

Old Liang was very pleased, looking at these brats in the class who didn't know their stuff!

"I'm giving you some homework. Take the test paper you did, combine it with what I've explained, and rewrite your answers in a more organized way before handing it in to me."

"Teacher Liang, I've revised it. Please take a look."

"So fast!"

Teacher Liang took the paper from him and looked at it. After the revisions, Chen Shi'an's paper looked much more 'neat'. However, many of the revisions still looked a bit off-topic and unfamiliar, but this was not a big problem. He could just practice more on a regular basis.

"As for composition... you should practice modern Chinese writing more. Unless you can maintain the same level of classical Chinese writing every time, it's fine to write in classical Chinese... However, you should also practice modern Chinese writing more, because some topics are indeed not suitable for writing in classical Chinese. Mastering more of it will not do you any harm."

"Okay, thank you, Teacher Liang."

After Teacher Liang left, the vice class monitor Qiu Yufu walked towards Group Four.

Chen Shi'an noticed. He just saw the girl glancing at him and then at Lin Mengqiu beside him, and he didn't know who she was looking for.

"Chen Shi'an, classmate."

Qiu Yufu stopped beside his table and then took out a form.

“Our class has a system where students take turns doing chores every day, such as wiping the blackboard and cleaning the classroom. Since you're new, you haven't been assigned to a chores class yet. This is our current seating chart. Chores are assigned according to seating arrangement. Take a look, sign your name in your seat, and then I'll assign you chores according to the chart.”

"Okay, I'll take a look."

Chen Shi'an took the seating chart from her. This was the latest seating chart, with each student's name corresponding to the others in the class. He glanced at it and memorized it, so he wouldn't have to worry about not knowing who was who in the class anymore.

"Besides erasing the blackboard and cleaning the classroom, is there anything else?"

"We need to take the trash out."

"it is good."

Chen Shi'an picked up a pen and signed his name next to Lin Mengqiu's name on the seating chart.

Qiu Yufu took the watch, but instead of leaving immediately, she leaned forward slightly and spoke to Lin Mengqiu, who was quietly doing her homework.

"Mengqiu, then... will you still be doing chores with Yining and the other two from now on?"

Zheng Yining and Xie Mengxuan were two girls sitting at the table in front of Chen Shi'an. They usually did their cleaning duties together, but Lin Mengqiu didn't have a tablemate before, so she did her cleaning duties with the two of them.

Now that she has a deskmate, it would be inappropriate for her to leave Chen Shi'an behind and do chores with Zheng Yining and the other two.

Qiu Yufu didn't dare to make the decision for her, so she specifically asked for her opinion.

Lin Mengqiu didn't even look up. After a moment of silence, she said in a low voice, "Just arrange it normally."

"OK."

Qiu Yufu left and walked to the blackboard at the back of the classroom, where she wrote the names of the students on duty for tomorrow: [Chen Shi'an, Lin Mengqiu]
Chen Shi'an turned his head and glanced at him. "Class monitor, I'll do duty with you tomorrow."

"Ah."

Where should we take the trash?

Lin Mengqiu glanced at him, realizing he wasn't familiar with the school and didn't know how to describe the exact location of the garbage dump, so she simply said, "You'll know tomorrow."

Fortunately, Chen Shi'an was very frugal. After hearing her say that, he stopped being curious about the location of the garbage dump.

Ignoring her words, the young Taoist priest tidied his desk, preparing for the next lesson.

"Near the right side of the north gate of the school." Lin Mengqiu added unexpectedly.

"..."

Chen Shi'an glanced back at her and felt even more strongly that his master's words about how women's minds are the hardest to fathom were very true.

……

The last two classes in the afternoon were physics and chemistry, which were also for reviewing the monthly exam papers.

Chen Shi'an tried listening, but couldn't understand it, so he gave up.

He currently lacks too much foundational knowledge, and even for someone as efficient a learner as him, improving his grades will not be a quick process.

Chen Shi'an made a simple study plan for himself.

That means first improving the three main subjects: Chinese, Mathematics, and English. These three main subjects account for 450 points, especially Mathematics, which is the foundation of Physics, Chemistry, and Biology.

Chinese and English are relatively easy to learn, as they mainly rely on memorization and practice. He can simply study on his own during regular Chinese and English classes. As for math, he will need to spend more time on it.

Of course, Chen Shi'an was unwilling to spend more time after class, and felt it was unnecessary, since the study time in a day was already long enough.

There are still physics, chemistry, and biology classes, so wouldn't it be perfect to use them to learn math...?

The science teachers were speechless.

If a child's foundation is this bad, it's a blessing for the teacher if the child doesn't sleep or cause trouble in class. What does it matter if the child is learning math in class?
So in physics class, Chen Shi'an studied one more chapter of the seventh-grade math textbook, which he had already studied two chapters on his own.

With only one chemistry class left, Chen Shi'an took out the seventh-grade math workbook that Lin Mengqiu had given him and started practicing the three chapters he had already studied on his own.

I guess I still need to practice more.

The exercises in the textbook are relatively basic and lack variety in question types. However, these variations are an important way to cultivate mathematical thinking.

The workbooks were all ones that Lin Mengqiu had already completed years ago, and they contained her written answers.

These answers didn't bother Chen Shi'an much; he could control himself from looking at them... and when he discovered that Lin Mengqiu's answers were occasionally wrong, he also began to be skeptical of these 'answers'.

Lin Mengqiu five years ago... Her handwriting has changed quite a bit since then. Back then, her handwriting had a kind of clumsy simplicity, and she wrote each stroke carefully, unlike the many smooth cursive strokes she writes now.

Moreover, she made many mistakes and corrections when answering questions, which was completely different from her brilliant answer sheet with a score of 150. Is this her way of getting here?

Chen Shi'an couldn't help but ask her out of curiosity.

"Class monitor, how were your grades when you were in seventh grade?"

"generally."

"What does 'generally' mean?"

"Top ten in the class."

"Oh--"

Chen Shi'an nodded, unaware that he had lost another point.

He read, wrote, and did the exercises as he went. Apart from the variety of question types, the questions in the workbook were not particularly difficult; they were all just content from the textbook.

At first, he was quite slow, but after gradually getting used to the changes in question types, he became much faster.

Of course, there will also be some complex problems that are part of this stage, which will make him slow down and think.

For example, this dish—

Lin Mengqiu's usual blue penmanship when answering questions was blank; only the red penmanship was used for later revisions.

This question was indeed quite difficult; you could tell she couldn't solve it at the time.

Next to the question was a small, cute drawing of a crying bunny in pencil. The pencil marks had long been worn away, but it still allowed Chen Shi'an to glimpse the scene of the girl being unable to solve the problem from the long river of time.

Seeing Chen Shi'an approaching with a workbook, Lin Mengqiu subconsciously straightened her back.

I thought you knew everything, but now you finally have someone you don't know and have to ask me?
But as Chen Shi'an pushed the workbook in front of her and pointed to the cartoon of a crying bunny, the girl's expression froze.

"Class monitor, did you draw this?"

The stinky Taoist priest wore an expression of astonishment, as if he had discovered a new continent.

Those eyes clearly say, "[I never thought someone as aloof as our class monitor would draw something so cute!][Ah, so adorable][Our class monitor must have a soft, sweet heart too!]"
Whether it was her own imagination or the stinky Taoist priest really thought that way, in that instant, the girl's pretty face turned red with embarrassment!

It's like a little hedgehog covered in thorns whose soft little belly has been accidentally discovered, and someone is about to reach out and scratch it!
She was quick; she grabbed the eraser from the table and erased the 'crying bunny' pencil cartoon drawing clean in just a couple of swift movements...

"Hey? How did it get wiped off?"

Chen Shi'an realized what was happening and tried to stop her, but the cute and adorable 'Little Bunny Crying' had already met its tragic end under Lin Mengqiu's eraser...

"I didn't draw it."

"Then there's no need to..."

"No, it wasn't me who drew it."

"..."

Chen Shi'an didn't dare to say a word and carefully took the exercise book back from her hand.

We can only perform a ritual to help the little rabbit pass on to the afterlife later...

(End of this chapter)