After the teachers from Qizhi finished checking everything from beginning to end, the results were exactly as Jiang Tinglan had predicted.
Jiang Tinglan let out a sigh of relief. Thank goodness—they hadn’t embarrassed the school.
She was about to head back to her group when, unexpectedly, a student from Mingde called out to her. “Hello. Would it be possible for you to share the materials from Shengde’s experiment notes on the testing procedures with us? We don’t have time to do a second round, and we really want to compare them and figure out where our mistakes were.”
Jiang Tinglan turned back to look at her classmates. “You’ll have to ask everyone. This wasn’t my achievement alone.”
The students from Shengde discussed it among themselves and all agreed.
The two schools began sharing their materials.
At first, some of the Mingde students were rather awkward about it, but they really wanted to know where they had gone wrong, so they eventually gathered around as well.
The students from both schools formed a circle, comparing their detailed materials.
Zhao Chengyu stood at the back of the group, secretly watching Jiang Tinglan’s profile. The regret in his heart deepened with every passing moment.
Ever since Jiang Tinglan had blocked him in front of everyone, she truly hadn’t paid him any attention.
After wrestling with himself for a long time, Zhao Chengyu finally summoned the courage to walk over and say, “Jiang Tinglan, your chemistry grades may be pretty good, but you’re still not good at your other subjects. No matter how hard you work, the best you can hope for is a second-tier university. But I can…”
He hadn’t even finished saying “help you study” when Jiang Tinglan cut him off without mercy.
“Stop looking down on people. Worry about yourself, you piece of shit.”
With that, Jiang Tinglan turned and walked away.
Hearing what Zhao Chengyu had said suddenly reminded her of The Painted Veil by W. Somerset Maugham, which she had read during the summer vacation not long ago.
When Walter said to Kitty, “I know you’re foolish, frivolous, and empty-headed, but I love you. I know you’re second-rate, but I love you,” she hadn’t felt any tenderness as a reader. All she had felt was a deep discomfort—though she hadn’t been able to say exactly why.
Now that a boy had said something based on essentially the same logic to her, she finally understood what had bothered her.
Because he was genuinely arrogant.
That repeated “I know” pinned Kitty down as an object under observation. Every single thing he mentioned about her was a flaw, completely ignoring her beauty, her lively personality, and all her other virtues.
Then, with that final turn, he elevated his own love into an act of charity, proclaiming to the entire world: Look at how devoted I am. I know she’s such a piece of trash, and I still love her.
But if you truly loved someone, how could you bear to describe them that way?
When you love someone, you make them sound extraordinary.
So what that male character truly loved wasn’t Kitty at all. He loved the tragic, heroic version of himself who was capable of loving a second-rate woman.
It was nothing more than the ultimate male act of self-romanticization.
She really wanted to ask on Kitty’s behalf: What gives you the right to look down on me? What gives you the right to label me second-rate? Are you really such a first-rate person yourself?
And now she wanted to ask the same thing for herself: What gives you the right to decide that I can only get into a second-tier university? I’m only in my second year of high school. How do you know what will happen from here on out? And how do you know that your own grades, which are good now in your second year, won’t decline in the future?
But she wasn’t going to ask him. She didn’t want to give him the satisfaction and end up trapped in another round of his pestering.
She walked out into the hallway alone.
A few reporters who hadn’t left yet were interviewing people about Qizhi’s emergency response measures.
When someone spotted Jiang Tinglan, they immediately headed toward her.
“Shengde” had also become a major buzzword over the past few months.
If the news wanted to attract traffic, it had to keep piling on the buzzwords!
“Hello. Are you one of the competition students specially cultivated by Shengde? How do you usually rank at Shengde?”
Faced with so many cameras all at once, Jiang Tinglan was a little dazed. She answered honestly, “I… I’m an average student. I usually rank around one hundredth in my grade because I’m not very good at Chinese and foreign languages.”
The reporter asked another question. “Then why didn’t your school choose top students to come and take part in this practical session? Is that fair to the students who work hard at their studies?”
Jiang Tinglan felt somewhat uncomfortable. She hadn’t wanted to answer them at all.
But then she suddenly thought of the way her mother usually handled the media—how she managed to answer every question without leaving the slightest opening.
After thinking for a moment, Jiang Tinglan imitated her mother’s media responses and said, “In the past, it was always the top students who participated. But after Board Director Yu took over this year, she said that Shengde’s educational philosophy is to provide education for everyone. She wants to give every student an opportunity.”
“We signed up independently this time, and other students will have the chance to sign up in the future as well, so I didn’t take anyone else’s resources.”
“Besides, it’s not as though I don’t study or make an effort. I simply don’t have much talent for language-based subjects.”
“For students like me, who are strong in some subjects but weak in others, Board Director Yu cultivates our strengths.”
“For those whose overall performance in academic subjects isn’t very good, she has even established training programs for the arts-track entrance exams to help them find other paths forward.”
“Board Director Yu doesn’t use grades as the sole criterion for eliminating students. She refuses to give up on any of them—and I won’t give up on myself, either!”
…
Not far away, Zhong Wenxin watched from the side.
At this point, Qizhi had no choice but to take the initiative and seek to renew its contract with Shengde.
On a personal level, the Yu siblings had helped her father the night before. That was a tremendous favor.
On a practical level, the new renewal terms Qizhi had proposed earlier had indeed contained insulting conditions. She had only gone over them that morning… If she were Yu Xiaxing, she wouldn’t have signed them either. She wouldn’t let her students suffer that kind of humiliation.
From a public-opinion standpoint, Shengde’s students had helped Qizhi resolve its public-relations crisis today, and the two schools would be mentioned together in the upcoming news coverage.
If news immediately came out afterward that Shengde and Qizhi had terminated their contract, the public would certainly start speculating about Qizhi… Other schools would probably begin to question Qizhi as well.
From the standpoint of achievement, Jiang was practically a guaranteed candidate for the national competition!
Chemistry was a science, but it wasn’t as purely logical as mathematics.
Many of its judgments required innate intuition and sensitivity, and Jiang had both in abundance!
She truly had remarkable talent. If they invested resources in her, she could make a name for herself at the national chemistry competition two months from now!
And from the standpoint of future development, Shengde might not have been impressive in the past, but it was now a school rising rapidly. Of course it should cooperate with a school that was moving upward!
Supporting each other and rising together—that was the true achievement for both schools!
There was no longer any reason not to renew the contract with Shengde!
Zhong Wenxin immediately instructed her assistant to retrieve the termination agreement.
A few minutes later, Zhong Wenxin drafted a new contract.
Then she walked toward Lu Yanzhao, who was standing in the distance.
“Assistant Lu.”
Lu Yanzhao turned around and gave her a polite nod. “President Zhong.”
Zhong Wenxin got straight to the point. “We sincerely hope to renew our contract with Shengde. All the restrictive conditions in the previous contract are void. Qizhi will also give Shengde preferential access to its resources.”
Lu Yanzhao asked, “What kind of preferential access?”
Zhong Wenxin glanced toward the Shengde students in the distance. “The Starfire Chemistry Competition begins in two months. It’s a very high-level competition. Generally speaking, anyone who reaches the finals can be guaranteed admission to a prestigious university, even if they don’t win first place and only place in the top ten.”
“Jiang has outstanding talent in chemistry. Qizhi can establish a dedicated training team for her and provide full support to ensure that she reaches the finals!”
“If Shengde has students who excel in physics or mathematics but are weak in other subjects, we’ll provide them with the same treatment—full support and the highest level of resources from start to finish!”
“So, let’s renew our contract!”
