Chapter 160: Wits And Courage In Monthly Exam Review
“So why did I think math was very simple at the start of school?”
Xiang Chuan sat in front of the desk, her temples throbbing as she stared at the problem on the light screen that was clearly beyond the level of 21st Century middle school students.
Trigonometric functions? Solid geometry? Isn’t this thing something that should be learned in first year high school? Xiang Chuan, who hadn’t been a high school student for seven or eight years already, had pretty much forgotten all knowledge except English after graduation, but her muscle (??) memory still existed. She at least remembered that in her wild first year high school days, she hadn’t encountered this kind of problem that looked like it had just a few words but exploded into a word count comparable to an English composition once you started solving it—a mask of pain.
Is this really a problem that first year high school new students should face? Xiang Chuan silently complained in her heart. The reason she didn’t say it out loud was because she’d said it too much in the past few days, and the club members except Liang Gong had warned her that if she brought up the topic again, they would deduct her fruit milk.
One against two, and the other side was noble young master and young lady. Not to mention the disadvantage in physical fitness, she had already lost in momentum. She could only shout loudly, “You’re rebelling!”, then silently reduced the frequency of her complaints.
No way around it, the club members she recruited herself, she could only pamper them herself. Xiang Chuan comforted herself like this. At least there was still the obedient child Liang Gong.
Just as she was thinking this in her heart, Liang Gong brought beverages for everyone on behalf of Little Star One and Little Star Two, who were busy greeting guests. Xiang Chuan gave him a grateful look, then saw his hesitant expression. He seemed to struggle inwardly for a moment before finally speaking: “By the way, Club President, why have you been staring only at math? I remember your physics is also…”
Xiang Chuan: …
Fine, this one also knew how to poke at sore spots, the kind with no malice but devastating damage.
“Physics… heh.” Xiang Chuan gave a light hum, twirling the straw in her hand.
This composed demeanor stunned Ainuo and Ouyang Yating beside her. It was the first time they had seen their club president so confidently full of herself since starting monthly exam review.
She was actually so confident in physics! When did the Club President master physics! Liang Gong was stunned.
Xiang Chuan elegantly raised her head, looking at the fluorescent wallpaper ceiling pasted with Q-version flowers, grass, and trees that she had casually drawn, and said: “Physics? What’s that?”
The three: …
Alright, this was someone who had given up to the point of choosing to forget this subject entirely.
The bet between Xiang Chuan and Xiang Weiguo had also reached the ears of the other Xiang Family members. Regarding Xiang Chuan’s demand for an oven, Lin Minzhi was not too approving either, but seeing her daughter’s diligent appearance of rushing back to the room to review homework right after finishing dinner, Lin Minzhi felt some heartache, so out of familial consideration, she took a neutral stance.
Xiang Qi, who was about as busy as the parents but still very caring toward his sisters, and Xiang Xue, who worshipped her sister immensely in her heart, gave Xiang Chuan emotional support out of sibling affection as compatriots from the same mother.
—After all, they were also very curious what delicious things could be made with this so-called “oven,” which was why Xiang Chuan was so obsessed after seeing the ancient recipes in the information turbulence.
“Sister, you’re not even good at Chinese and history?” Xiang Xue brought freshly baked apple cream small cakes to Xiang Chuan’s room. Looking at the supplementary information on Xiang Chuan’s light screen, her eyes widened round.
“Dear sister, for the sake of our sisterly bond that’s starting to flash red lights, please shut up.” Xiang Chuan twitched her mouth. Was her little sister despising her as a sister with a bad brain? She was just a tiny bit bad at every subject—did she have to output criticism right to her face like this?
“Sorry, sorry, that’s not what I meant.” Xiang Xue said this, but her mouth twitching from holding back laughter still exposed her schadenfreude, making Xiang Chuan unable to stop rolling her eyes.
It was no wonder Xiang Xue let out such an exclamation. Leaving aside the history that was about to become a record in astronomical literature, most of the articles in the Chinese language class textbook were even adapted from past news on the space-time network. The overly familiar narrative style made Xiang Chuan always feel like she wasn’t reading Chinese language class texts, but news newspapers, so when writing answers, she unconsciously leaned toward ideological angles, which made Ouyang Yating and Liang Gong spend a long time correcting her wording style.
But the problem was, what sentimental views could she express on the current situation of social stagnation caused by the replacement of entertainment forms and entertainment culture development brought by information technology development? Was she supposed to write something like “Compared to the 21st Century, you all suck”? Would that definitely not make tomorrow’s news headlines?
After going back and forth, Xiang Chuan’s Chinese language grades also dropped.
It could only be said that if it weren’t for Xiang Chuan having Geegle, this space-time turbulence super weapon that brought enough shocking cultural value and agricultural value, Xiang Weiguo and Lin Minzhi, the couple, would probably have to prepare to throw money at the school to ensure that this modern illiterate could smoothly enter university.
“Is this my fault? The articles I read are all masterpieces that make one’s heart surge and thoughts flow like a spring. I originally thought that after entering high school, the Chinese language articles would change, but they turned out to still be such dry news novels.” And the wording wasn’t even as good as those web novels from Qidian and JJ. Xiang Chuan added in her heart.
Xiang Xue recalled how her sister had stayed indoors for most of the winter vacation for over a month and thought, was she just reading novels in the information turbulence all this time? But recalling the Count of Monte Cristo that she had authorized from Xiang Chuan and was only halfway through reading on her terminal, Xiang Xue couldn’t help but nod silently in her heart.
The Historical Research Institute valued even more the historical value behind these three books that Xiang Chuan brought out. Napoleon, Qing Dynasty, European knights—these terms thrown out greatly enriched the Historical Research Institute’s database, and some of the terms were even linked to records submitted by previous information turbulence contactees, which could be said to have put all historians into an unprecedented chicken blood state.
And what the general public saw was the cultural value of these three books. The modern era was not without text creation; on the contrary, there were quite a few novels on the space-time network. But most of these novels were created by text-assisted AI, where creators only needed to provide the outline in their minds and set the key nodes of the story to have the text-assisted AI produce an epic tale, and they could even set random endings, so the creators themselves wouldn’t know the final outcome of the story or the emotional directions of the characters. But after venturing into the sea of stars, people’s thinking seemed to be constrained instead, with story stages almost all revolving around the universe, universe spaceships, and between planets, with almost no fantasy or supernatural style novels to be seen. So the sudden appearance of The Count of Monte Cristo, Dream of the Red Chamber, and Don Quixote was a nuclear bomb-level impact for modern people who had read universe-background novels for centuries. When they learned from the introductions of these books that they were actually hand-written novels from ancient times, the shock was no less than the recently learned fact that “river fish can be eaten.”
Novels could originally be fully created by hand, people in the past could still create such novels, novels could have so many backgrounds.
Everyone who obtained reading authorization for these three books through various channels had such sentiments while reading the text inside.
Recently, the reader groups for these three books have also become more apparent. The one most favored by the Historical Research Institute is naturally Dream of the Red Chamber, which can be called a treasure trove of late Qing culture. Literature enthusiasts especially love Don Quixote, full of satirical meaning, and what ordinary people like most is, of course, The Count of Monte Cristo, which was even recognized as a satisfying read in the 21st Century. This was the first time modern people had contact with the concept of “satisfying read.” It had to be said that it appealed to all ages; even Xiang Xue and Lin Ming, who were still junior high students, would gather to discuss The Count of Monte Cristo before streaming My Own Swordsman at night.
As for the great ancient literature sharer Xiang Chuan, she had now let her brain fly free in front of the math problems in front of her, escapingly thinking: It’s already 30,000 years later, why haven’t humans invented Doraemon’s memory bread yet?
