Huayu: That year, I withdrew from the Super Boy competition.

Su Wei stood in the corridor, watching Feng Tuo's figure disappear at the top of the stairs.

He knew that the teacher meant well and was genuinely looking out for him.

Besides, a high school teacher finally manages to cultivate a student who can get into Tsinghua or Peking University, and now that the student is about to fly away, who wouldn't feel heartbroken?

But Su Wei also knew that her future would not be bad.

This is not because he is blindly confident.

After all, his past life's experiences were all stored in his mind.

He knew he had made the right choice, and he knew what this path would lead to.

He won't regret it.

…………

Time flies, especially after entering the senior year of high school.

On December 18, the registration channel for the provincial unified examination in Sichuan Province officially opened.

Su Wei had already read the notice on the Education Bureau's website several times, and packed all the necessary documents and copies into a file bag, afraid of forgetting anything.

On December 26, he took a day off and took a bus to the admissions office in his registered residence area.

The admissions office is located in an old government building, with long queues of students waiting in the corridors to register for the art exams.

When it was his turn, the staff asked him to sit in front of an old-fashioned digital camera, and with a "click," his picture was taken on the spot.

Official ID photos like these usually don't turn out very well.

Fortunately, Su Wei himself was of excellent quality, and his outstanding appearance made up for the lack of equipment.

On March 4, 2008, I registered for the professional exam.

Su Wei neatly wrote the four characters "Acting Major" on the registration form, paid the fee, and received her admission ticket.

The examination venue was located at the Wangjiang Campus of Sichuan University, the old campus, where the plane trees were very tall and their branches were bare.

The exam will be held for five consecutive days, from March 7th to March 11th.

The provincial unified examination has a total score of 400 points, with 100 points each for vocal music, diction, physical expression, and performance.

After the exam, Fatty Wu texted him: "How was it?"

Su Wei replied with a single word: "Wait."

In mid-April, the results of the provincial unified examination were released.

Su Wei scored a total of 362, with 98 in vocals, 86 in diction, 93 in physical expression, and 85 in acting.

This score wasn't top-tier, but it was enough to pass the exam without any problems.

The real major expense is the college entrance exam.

Registration for entrance exams at various universities began as early as mid-February.

At that time, the provincial unified examination results had not yet been released, and Su Wei was preparing for both options—regardless of whether she passed the provincial examination or not, she had to register for the school examination first.

He applied to two schools in Beijing: Beijing Film Academy and Central Academy of Drama.

On February 15th, the ninth day of the first lunar month, before the New Year celebrations were even over, Su Wei set off for the capital.

The Spring Festival travel rush wasn't over yet, and the trains were packed with people. He had bought a hard seat ticket and sat for nearly thirty hours. By the time he arrived in Beijing, his buttocks were numb.

As for why they didn't fly, it's because they couldn't buy a ticket.

Stepping out of the station, a cold wind hit me in the face. Beijing was much colder than Chengdu; it was dry and biting, and the wind felt like knives on my face.

He found a decent little hotel near the Beijing Film Academy, which cost eighty yuan a night.

The downside is that the room is so small you can barely turn around, but it's close to the school, only a ten-minute walk away.

After settling in, the first thing I did was go to the school gate to look at the exam room layout map.

February 19th, Beijing Film Academy's preliminary audition.

A long line formed in front of the performing arts academy's teaching building. The candidates were all shivering from the cold, but each one was neatly dressed.

Su Wei was wearing a black down jacket and a gray scarf, and she didn't stand out much in the line.

The preliminary test consisted of recitation and talent show. He recited a passage of prose and sang a song. After it was over, he felt that it went well.

February 21st, the preliminary audition for the Central Academy of Drama.

The Central Academy of Drama is located in Nanluoguxiang. The school is not large, but the atmosphere is different.

The content of the preliminary exam at the Central Academy of Drama was similar, and he performed as expected.

The waiting days are the hardest to endure.

He didn't go anywhere during those days; he just stayed in the hotel reading books, listening to music, and occasionally going out for a meal.

On February 24th, I took the second round of interviews at Nortel.

It's over.

February 26th, the second round of auditions for the Central Academy of Drama.

It's over.

On March 2nd, the third audition for Beijing Film Academy took place.

The third round of testing was very detailed, with performance playing a significant role, and impromptu questions and answers were also added.

The examiner asked him a question: "Why do you want to be an actor?"

Su Wei thought for a moment and said, "Because some emotions and stories cannot be clearly expressed by words alone, I want to try to express them in other ways."

Not outstanding, but acceptable.

The examiner didn't say anything, just nodded.

On March 3rd, the third round of auditions for the Central Academy of Drama took place.

The third round of auditions at the Central Academy of Drama was more serious, with a row of examiners sitting in the examination room, creating a very tense atmosphere.

When Su Wei was doing his impromptu performance, one of the examiners coughed midway through, which almost distracted him, but he managed to stay focused.

After finishing all the exams, Su Wei took the train back to Chengdu.

On the train, he leaned against the window and thought, "I've done everything I could; all that's left is to wait."

At the end of April, the results from both schools were released one after the other.

Su Wei first checked the Beijing Film Academy.

He found an internet cafe, opened the Beijing Film Academy's admissions website, and entered his admission ticket number.

He paused for two seconds when the page popped up.

He ranked first in the country in the performing arts major.

He also checked the Central Academy of Drama.

He ranked second nationwide in the acting program at the Central Academy of Drama.

Su Wei leaned back in her chair at the internet cafe and stared at the screen for a long time.

A few days later, something he hadn't expected happened.

While he was waiting to take the entrance exam at the Beijing Film Academy, a reporter took a picture of him.

It was indeed a sunny day. He was standing at the school gate wearing a black overcoat, holding his admission ticket in his hand, looking down at something.

The photo was later published in a local Beijing newspaper.

Coupled with the popularity he had gained from participating in "Super Boy", the news spread very quickly.

They certainly made quite a splash.

During those days, he was browsing the news at an internet cafe and noticed that several portal websites' entertainment channels had reposted this news, with all sorts of comments below.

Su Wei didn't pay much attention to these things.

He knew that the excitement was temporary, and what would truly allow him to gain a foothold was what lay ahead.

After receiving her art exam results, Su Wei could basically relax.

With his professional qualification certificate, ranking first in the performance major at the Beijing Film Academy, and given his strong academic foundation, he wouldn't be unable to get into university even if he missed one exam.

But Su Wei did not let her guard down.

He knew that there were people like that every year.

I did well on my professional exam, but I was more than ten points behind in my academic subjects, and I ended up feeling utterly hopeless.

He doesn't want to be that kind of person.

After returning to school, he buried himself in the exam papers.

In the last two months, he went through his error notebooks for all subjects no less than five times.

On June 7, 2008, the National College Entrance Examination (Gaokao) officially began.

The results came out at the end of June.

Su Wei's total score in academic subjects was 623.

This score might not seem like much on a national scale.

But for performing arts majors, it's already far too high.

Last year, the minimum score for the cultural subjects in the performance major at Beijing Film Academy was just over 200 points.

He scored more than 300 points higher.

When Fatty Wu saw his grades, his mouth dropped open so wide it could fit an egg:

"Are you even human? Are you really an art student?"

Besides, how long did you actually study after that? You're inhuman!

As he spoke, he even gave Su Wei the middle finger.