I turned reality into a romantic comedy.

After muttering this in a low voice with her head slightly lowered, Xu Youwei looked up at Chen Junqian again and winked at him playfully.

"But don't worry, Qinqin, I've already made a birthday wish in advance. You'll definitely win the final championship."

"How come I remember you said your birthday wish this year was to come to Beijing?"

"There's no conflict, because I haven't used up my birthday wishes from the past few years. Dad used up last year's unused wishes, and Qinqin used up this year's."

"Then I'll take your good wishes."

At this point, Xu Youwei confirmed with Chen Junqian again:

"The semi-finals can be recorded in just one day, right?"

"Well, it won't interfere with your birthday the day after tomorrow. I can take Youyou around then. Is there any particular place you'd like to go? The Forbidden City? The Summer Palace? The Temple of Heaven? Or something else?"

“I feel like if we go to these places, it will definitely be more than just the two of us. Besides, I already traveled to Beijing with my parents once when I was little. The place doesn’t matter. As long as Qinqin is with me, that’s enough.”

Xu Youwei has never forgotten that Shen Nianqiu and Zhu Wenyun are still in Beijing. Chen Junqian's free time after recording the show means that they will also have free time at the same time. So, compared to where to go, she would definitely prefer to confirm that there are only two of them.

"Okay, it's your birthday after all, so you get to decide."

After hesitating for a moment, Chen Junqian nodded in agreement.

Xu Youwei smiled contentedly at his answer, then lowered her head to continue working on the peacock painting that was not yet finished being colored.

Actually, when she first started playing those picture books with hidden objects, Lin Mu had asked her why she had to color in the objects with colored crayons after finding them. If she used a pencil or didn't color them at all, she could have lent them to other people or played with them again herself.

But Hsu Yu-wei never thought that way.

Her things belong to her alone, so they should be painted in her own color.

----------------------------------

About ten days later, Chen Junqian returned to the recording site of the semi-finals of the "Chinese Character Dictation Competition". The four teams from Zhejiang, Guangdong, Anhui and Hunan, who broke through the four rounds of the semi-finals, were divided into the upper half of the bracket and will compete today to determine the first spot to enter the finals.

Unlike the first semi-final recording, when they were "eighteen years old and standing like lackeys at their alma mater's dance," Chen Junqian and Zhu Wenyun could clearly notice the cameramen's lenses and the gazes of many audience members as they entered the venue and walked towards the 100-person group's question-answering position.

After all, in the two episodes that have already aired, the 100-person team, which was originally just a background or an appendage to the main team members on stage, has gained a lot of attention because of the sudden rise of these two, even surpassing the main team members of many provincial teams, and is regarded as one of the favorites to enter the finals and even win the championship.

The post-production of the program is a matter for later. The on-site recording was still carried out without any delays. After the team members, judges, audience members and members of the 100-person group were all seated, the chief examiner immediately announced the start of the dictation.

The semi-finals were significantly more difficult than the preliminary rounds. The easy vocabulary was greatly reduced, and the contestants were immediately presented with two challenging words: 【舴艋 (ze, meng) (describing a small boat)】 and 【颉颃 (xie, hang) (birds flying up and down, also describing being evenly matched)】. However, the contestants on stage were all elites who had fought their way through the preliminary rounds, so they were not stumped at all. They all wrote the words correctly within the allotted time and passed the round smoothly.

When it was Shen Nianqiu's turn to go on stage, the word she received was 【戆直 (zhuang, fourth tone), which describes someone who is honest and upright】. It was a word that looked difficult to write, but Chen Junqian had indeed reviewed it with Shen Nianqiu and Zhu Wenyun. 【戆】 is the character '赣' (Gan), an alternative name for Jiangxi, with the radical for "heart" added. After memorizing this, she was able to easily break it down and write it out. The audience below the stage also gave her encouraging applause.

The Guangdong team member, eliminated in the first round, fell victim to the word "hunger rumbling." She subconsciously wrote the last two "rumbling" characters with the same radical as the character for "hunger," forgetting that the word's original meaning is an onomatopoeic word, using the sound of a cartwheel to describe the rumbling of a hungry stomach, thus regrettably leaving the stage.

Starting with this team member's departure, the situation on the field was suddenly disrupted. One team member after another began to fail in the face of increasingly difficult words. By the time Shen Nianqiu returned to the field, six of the original twenty contestants had been eliminated, and the second word she was given was "rainbow trout".

To be honest, when Chen Junqian heard this word, he was a little worried for his sister, because it was too easy to write "red trout" as the word. After all, the description of a red body can easily make people think of the color and mistakenly think that the word being tested is the second character, "trout".

Even the teachers leading the Zhejiang team backstage were misled by the meaning of the words. While Shen Nianqiu was struggling with the words "red" and "rainbow," they were puzzled and even prayed that she would not change them again. When the correct answer was revealed and Shen Nianqiu, who was determined to use the word "rainbow," successfully passed the test, everyone cheered and jumped up from their seats in surprise and joy. Xu Youwei, who was also backstage, subconsciously curled her lips and showed a disdainful expression. She obviously did not understand why these people were so happy about the word that Chen Junqian wrote down so quickly.

The photographer, who was backstage specifically responsible for capturing the reactions of the teams' friends and family, keenly noticed this detail and, in the instant he captured it, suddenly discovered a fact.

This girl who just arrived today has an unusually rich range of expressions...

It seems to have the potential to become a meme!

P.S.: Thank you for reading and subscribing.

P.S.: Happy Qixi Festival everyone!

Chapter 51: How Can It Not Be Considered a National Conference? (Part 2)

That's right, emojis.

The development and popularization of the Internet always have an impact on all aspects of industries, including television programs. In fact, in the past two years, compared with the declining traditional television ratings, the number of views and discussions of online programs has become more direct and explosive.

In this increasingly fast-paced and fragmented internet era, a GIF or a few funny emojis can often boost publicity and traffic. The production team of "Chinese Character Dictation Competition" had already tasted the benefits of doing this before. After all, the most widely circulated footage of Chen Junqian in the first semi-final was released through this channel, which brought a lot of attention to the program.

The only slight pity is that, because both the contestants on and off stage need to concentrate fully on answering the questions, their expressions often show either deep thought or a confident smile. There's not much to analyze, since the show isn't scripted or purely staged. The producers can only give the contestants a few more hand gestures; they can't actually instruct them to make corresponding expressions like actors to follow the show's rhythm. It's really too much to ask these middle school students to do.

That's why, compared to the serious and tense atmosphere on stage, the backstage area where friends and family gather is the place where photographers carefully aim their shots. Just like the reaction videos that are always popular on video platforms, people always like to watch other people's reactions to something to gain all kinds of emotions. And the friends and family backstage are the best material. For example, there was a female contestant from the Zhejiang team who was eliminated in the semi-finals after only two rounds, but she was completely immersed in her role backstage.

But the photographer had to admit that the young girl who suddenly came with Chen Junqian's family and friends today was indeed a great subject, even more suitable than the young girl from the Zhejiang team.

Not only is he good-looking and photogenic, but more importantly, he has completely immersed himself in the perspective of an audience member. Every move, every smile, is natural in response to Chen Junqian's performance on stage and the reactions of others backstage. His various small expressions and details are quite amusing. Even though he is currently at the recording site, he has already thought about what kind of sound effects and subtitles to add here during the later editing and production of the program.

Completely unaware that she had become prime material in the eyes of the cameraman, Xu Youwei was fully immersed in cheering for Chen Junqian, frequently standing up and raising her arms in a shout. Chen Jun, who was also sitting in a chair backstage, glanced at her a little, but when he thought that she was his boss's biological daughter and that she was cheering for his son, he felt that it was not appropriate to say anything and let her be. After all, she wasn't the only one shouting and cheering backstage.

Xu Youwei was actually quite clear-headed. Although Shen Nianqiu and Zhu Wenyun seemed to be closer to Chen Junqian on stage, a little thought would reveal that the three of them were actually rivals and enemies. Only she stood firmly on Chen Junqian's side and was his strongest supporter.

Of course, being on the Anhui team and being from Anhui themselves, Chen Jun and Xu Youwei cheered for Chen Junqian and also applauded whenever an Anhui team member went on stage to answer questions. However, when faced with the regional specialty noodle dish, Hele, the Anhui team member couldn't hold on, and the first contestant had to leave the stage. The two instructors quickly went to the stage exit to bring the child back and comforted him for a long time.

"Even if Qinqin and the others answer incorrectly, it seems like they won't be eliminated."

Seeing the girl on the other side looking annoyed and saying, "I've seen this word before," Xu Youwei subconsciously asked her the same question.

"Yes, the contestants in the 100-person group will only stay in the entire venue. Unlike the contestants on stage, they will be compared based on the overall accuracy of all the questions. The top three will advance directly to the finals."

Teacher Zhang, who was leading the team, explained to Xu Youwei that although one person had been eliminated, the Anhui team still had four players left, making them the team with the most players among the four teams. Therefore, she didn't seem too worried. Moreover, even if the provincial team was eliminated here, Chen Junqian and Zhu Wenyun were enough to represent their Anhui team and advance to the finals to compete for the championship.

"Chen Junqian's accuracy rate in this game is still 100%. He must have read a lot of books. Making he luo noodles was not difficult for him at all. I remember Guoning is a city in southern Anhui. He should not have seen this before."

"Qinqin does read a lot of books; she reads a lot while she's with me."

Faced with Xu Youwei's blunt claim that their past experience of reading magazines like "Happy Detective" and "The Beast" together was equivalent to reading many books together, Chen Jun thought of the kindness shown to her father, his chairman, and decisively kept quiet. He didn't say anything like, "He's right here on stage, genuinely having read many books with his son."

After three rounds of competition, Teacher Zhang nodded and smiled, saying:

"Alright, now the remaining students on stage should all get a VCR edited into the semi-final episode. Junqian's father happened to be here this time, so the production team will probably come and film you after this episode is finished."

"Hey, if you really want to talk about family education experience, I don't know what to say. I've been working in Tangshan for the past two years, and I can only see him a few times during winter and summer vacations. Actually, it's all thanks to the child's own hard work."

Just as the parents and teachers were getting used to the mutual flattery, the difficulty of the vocabulary on stage increased significantly after three rounds. Soon, another member of the Zhejiang team stumbled on the rather obscure word "碌碡" (liu fourth tone, zhou second tone), which means a stone farming tool used for crushing.

Sitting on the stage in the Zhejiang team's camp, Shen Nianqiu subconsciously pursed her lips. On the one hand, she felt sorry for her teammates' departure, and on the other hand, she was also nervous. She had just imagined that if she were standing there and heard this word, she probably wouldn't be able to write it correctly within the time limit.

Thinking this, she turned her gaze to the first row of the 100-person group, which was not far from the stage and located behind the judges' seats, and looked at the boy with the number 001.

It's not just as Teacher Zhang just mentioned that Chen Junqian only had a 100% accuracy rate in this round. In fact, in the past eight rounds of the semi-finals, her younger brother's accuracy rate has remained at 100%. As a result, after both episodes were broadcast, netizens had already discussed which difficult and obscure word would cause Chen Junqian to fail. They even specially searched for a lot of complex words that looked more like pictures than words from various ancient books as candidates.

"The correct writing rate of this round of 100 participants is one percent."

It was that familiar one percent again. Upon hearing the broadcast, Shen Nianqiu breathed a sigh of relief. She was happy that Chen Junqian could write it correctly, and also relieved that Zhu Wenyun couldn't write it correctly either, since she hadn't been able to write the word either.

As someone who has watched all three seasons of "Chinese Character Dictation Competition," Chen Junqian understands very well that for these carefully selected contestants on stage, many of the words that stumped them were not actually difficult to write, but rather simply because they didn't know such a thing existed. Just like the previous "heluo" (a type of noodle), the biggest challenge for everyone comes from the names of various local specialties, customs, and places that are either known to locals or unknown to outsiders.

That is why, during the many days of preparation for this dictation competition, Chen Junqian has been focusing on strengthening his training in this area, trying his best to become an expert in encyclopedic knowledge, rather than just repeatedly reviewing those Chinese characters that are difficult to write and easy to forget.

His strategy quickly proved effective once again.

This time, the contestant on stage was sent off by a place name: [Zhifu Mountain (pronounced fu er sheng), located in Yantai City, Shandong Province, is China's largest and most typical land-connected island].

Compared to the previous one, [Luzhu], which almost wiped out the entire hundred-person team, it was somewhat better. Zhu Wenyun, who had also reviewed various domestic place names under Chen Junqian's guidance, successfully wrote it down.

For her, remembering place names wasn't particularly difficult or torturous. Just thinking that it was preparation for her and Chen Junqian's upcoming trip made her feel much more relaxed. In fact, when she wrote down the place name "Zhifu Mountain," Zhu Wenyun had already thought of other nearby attractions and that this was the place where Qin Shi Huang once carved a stone inscription in his quest for immortality during his eastern tour.

After Zhifu Mountain, the program shifted to more common and obscure vocabulary. A series of terms like "罅隙" (xia si sheng) meaning crack or crevice, "保墒" (shang yi sheng) meaning soil moisture retention, "嫘祖" (lei zu) meaning the legendary wife of the Yellow Emperor and the founder of sericulture in ancient my country, and "出粜" (tiao si sheng) meaning to sell grain, no longer stumped the contestants on stage or Chen Junqian and Zhu Wenyun in the audience. Instead, it was the Buddhist terms "楞严经" (Lengyan Jing) and "五蕴炽盛" (Wu Yun Chi Sheng) that caused the two main contestants to make consecutive mistakes.

After a struggle, the situation on the field once again closely resembled what Chen Junqian remembered.

The Hunan team was completely eliminated, the Guangdong team had one player left, the Anhui team had three players left, and the Zhejiang team was saved from elimination because of Liu Yichen's small contribution. Shen Nianqiu also persevered until now, and after correctly writing words such as 【铁蒺藜】【倥侗】【酬酢】, he still stubbornly held on to the last hope of the Zhejiang team with Liu Yichen.

It was from this moment on that, as the eliminated team members returned backstage and the atmosphere on the field became increasingly heated, the entire backstage area was also in a more intense atmosphere than the first half of the competition. Almost every contestant who went on stage attracted everyone's attention.

Especially for the Guangdong and Zhejiang teams, who were down to only one or two players, the cheers and applause almost drowned out the Anhui team sitting next to them. Xu Youwei, who was in the middle of it all, unconsciously covered her ears. She really felt that the bloody elimination system on stage was much more exciting than just answering questions offstage. After all, losing once meant elimination, not to mention carrying the expectations of the entire team. It was just like a competition in anime, which made people's blood boil.

However, what Xu Youwei didn't know was that Chen Junqian thought the same thing.

Besides wanting to fulfill a wish he had in his previous life, another very important reason he came to participate in this "Chinese Character Dictation Competition" was to try and trick the system.

As a classic plot in Japanese manga, and even a theme in itself, the national tournament, representing 'friendship! Effort! Victory!', is also an indispensable part of romantic comedies. Whether it's the intense competition on the field, such as the preliminary rounds, semi-finals, and finals, or the secret training camps and summer retreats behind the scenes, they are all classics. It's easy to recall a long list of related plots.

But it's impossible to find any Koshien baseball or soccer field football in a place like Guoning. Chen Junqian is quite good at making up a bunch of jokes related to the Chinese national football team. Since the essay competition obviously doesn't meet the system's requirements, he can only try to see if the "Chinese Character Dictation Competition" can fool the system's stupid review. After all, it has preliminary rounds, semi-finals, and finals, as well as team efforts and cooperation. Considering the representative teams from various provinces, how can it not be considered a national competition?

In fact, his strategy was quite successful, because since Chen Junqian was selected for this dictation competition, several related achievements have been subtly showing signs of being triggered. This was probably because he was only a member of the 100-person group and had not actually stepped onto the stage to represent his school or province as a contestant.

Just then, the last member of the Guangdong team on stage collapsed on the word "gourd," which drew sighs and lamentations from backstage. You could even hear some contestants sobbing quietly because they couldn't accept the fact.

And so, the situation on stage became two against three.

Undoubtedly, Shen Nianqiu's rise has relieved a great deal of pressure on Liu Yichen. After all, if it were a one-on-three situation, then according to the rules, Liu Yichen would have to go into battle every time the opponent sent out someone, which is equivalent to fighting a war of attrition. But with two people, the pressure would be much less.

It was precisely because of this that Anhui team's defeat came even faster than in Chen Junqian's previous life.

With the remaining three members making consecutive mistakes, Shen Nianqiu, who has stepped back onto the stage, only needs to spell the words correctly this round to lead the Zhejiang team into the final round and truly compete against Chen Junqian and Zhu Wenyun, who have almost secured their spots in the finals.

Then, she heard this word from the examiner.

Coriander (pronounced yán sui yī) is a plant and medicinal herb.

The examiner hardly needed to read out the remaining explanations.

Shen Nianqiu on the stage and Zhu Wenyun offstage wrote out the two characters almost simultaneously. Xu Youwei, backstage, belatedly learned the meaning of the word from the discussions of other teachers and classmates around her.

"So that's the ancient name for the cilantro we usually eat."

Unlike the two girls on and off stage who couldn't speak, Xu Youwei, who, although unable to write the word, could express the first thought that came to their minds, sat there resting her chin on her hand and smiled:

"Qinqin doesn't like to eat this."

Shen Nianqiu on the stage stopped writing and bowed.

So she never orders this when she eats with him.

Zhu Wenyun, who was sitting in the audience, also stopped writing.

So she never puts this in when she cooks with him.

Couples' tastes tend to converge over time.

But knowing all of each other's likes and dislikes is also a happy thing.

P.S.: Thank you for reading and subscribing.

Chapter 52: Double D (Two-in-One)

After finishing two semi-final recordings in one day, Chen Junqian finally had a long-awaited break. The two individual revival rounds were contested by the contestants with the highest accuracy rates from the eliminated provincial teams. The final three spots in the finals would be decided among them. Chen Junqian and Zhu Wenyun, who had already secured their spots in the finals based on their performance in the previous ten semi-finals and preliminary rounds, did not need to go to the recording studio to participate.

Theoretically speaking, Chen Junqian and Zhu Wenyun only have the recording of the final competition left to do.

However, unlike the situation in the original timeline, whether it was due to his intrusion or the world's will being artificially distorted again, Chen Junqian soon learned another piece of news from Teacher Zhang after returning to the hotel.

Due to the show's unexpected popularity and some controversial plot points, after careful consideration, the final competition will no longer be pre-recorded and edited, but will be broadcast live. The timing should be around the National Day holiday this year.