Chapter 33 - The Contaminated Cla.s.s 8
Originally, the hard-earned but frail friendship between the bookworms and underachievers were on the verge of collapse due to the test results. But unexpectedly, Huo YeRui barged in halfway through and single-handedly saved the sinking ship that was their friendship.
As soon as Huo YeRui left, the atmosphere in the small office cooled from red-hot anger into mild awkwardness. Dong MingEn, a little embarra.s.sed, turned towards the top students and said: “Huo YeRui wasn’t talking about you guys, you didn’t have to say all that.”
Lou XingGuang also looked at Jiang TingJun. “Yes, ah, even you didn’t scold me that hard…”
Jiang TingJun snorted. “How can it be the same? I’m your tutor, but who is Huo YeRui to me?”
Xu Yao also chimed in: “Internal conflicts must be settled internally. How can we stand an outsider pointing fingers at us?”
Fu YiFei pulled down the non-existent sleeves that he pushed up moments before and said: “I may be a person without merit, but I do value loyalty. I’ll beat up anyone who scolds my friends.”
This att.i.tude of total support made Dong MingEn and his friends feel warm in their hearts. But some people also felt a little upset.
Pan Qibo, who hadn’t spoken all this time, uttered a sigh. “Your grades really are sad though. It puts our reputation as tutors in a bad light.”
Dong MingEn, Lou XingGuang, and Zhou Daota looked at each other. At last, Lou XingGuang stood and scratching his head, said: “I’ll study harder next time.”
Dong MingEn followed. “Me too.”
Zhou Daota: “Me too…”
Xu Yao looked at them, gratified. “Alright, you’ll have to keep your word. Definitely.”
Zheng PingQing, who had been waiting for some kind of improvement from them all month, didn’t particularly trust their word. He suddenly asked: “What if you guys can’t do it?”
The underachievers: “…..”
Lin Qian tapped his chin: “I have an idea.”
The underachievers suddenly felt a chill down their backs.
Lin Qian then wrote everyone a study plan and a reward and punishment plan. Afterward, the underachievers trembled and hugged each other for warmth. They began encouraging each other: “Jiayou!”
“We can’t afford to lose!”
“I’ll try to memorize 20 words tonight…No, 30!”
“This Master is a heavenly brother of No.12, how can I be punished so openly!”
With great determination, Dong MingEn made a decision. “I’ll learn from the Boss and work on some problems later tonight.”
Zheng PingQing: “…” d.a.m.n it; this guy is putting salt in my wounds! Just you wait until I find an excuse to beat him.
Looking at the several students cheering each other on, Fu YiFei suddenly asked: “Don’t you guys have a good relationship with Gou XinDou? Why not call him over to get some tutoring too?”
Pan Qibo nodded. “We have an extra tutor, might as well have Gou XinDou over.”
They were all friends who had slept together. Because of this, the bookworms now began to subconsciously take responsibility for all the underachievers.
Dong MingEn and the others looked at each other and smiled evilly.
Since Gou XinDou was their precious friend, it was only natural for all of them to face this difficulty together!
Dong MingEn replied: “I’ll invite him.”
While he said it would be an invitation, on the next day, Gou XinDou was instead given a summons.
Gou XinDou, who was suddenly told to go partic.i.p.ate in a tutoring session: “k2026;.”
At the thought of the many indescribable scenes he would possibly witness between the two giants, Gou XinDou immediately shook his head back and forth like a rattle. “I’m perfectly fine being a mediocre student.”
Lou XingGuang pinned Gou XinDou down by the shoulders and threatened him: “Do you know how hard I had to fight to give you this opportunity?”
Dong MingEn nodded. “You’ve been living plenty without appreciating it.”
Zhou Daota leaned towards Gou XinDou and pragmatically applied what he had learned. “The well-fed cannot know how the starving suffer.”
Gou XinDou: “….” I don’t know. I don’t know anything, I don’t know.
Lou XingGuang narrowed his eyes. “We’ll bully you until you agree!”
Dong MingEn: “I’ll force you to drink a gla.s.s of water every hour.”
Zhou Daota: “And you won’t be allowed to go to the toilet.”
Gou XinDou wanted to cry but didn’t have the tears for it. “…study, I’ll study!”
Satisfied, Lou XingGuang let him go. Gou XinDou began to wonder if he should buy some sungla.s.ses so he wouldn’t go blind during the tutoring sessions. Then Zhang FanFan suddenly came over and timidly poked at Lou XingGuang’s shoulder. “Are you recruiting people for your tutoring group? If so, ah, I-I….”
Zhang FanFan was stuck and kept repeating ‘I’ for a long time. Fortunately, it wasn’t hard to guess what she wanted to say. Lou XingGuang scratched his head. “Sorry Cla.s.smate Zhang, our tutoring group is full now.”
Zhang FanFan looked disappointed. With a soft ‘ah,’ she said: “Sorry for disturbing you.”
Seeing her devastated expression, Dong MingEn tried to comfort her. “Don’t be sad; this tutoring group isn’t very suitable for you anyway. The punishment for getting a question wrong is so bad. I doubt you’ll be able to bear it.”
Gou XinDou: !!!!
Lou XingGuang also began comforting Zhang FanFan: “Anyway, we’ll give you a copy of ‘National College Entrance Exam Questions For The Decade’ in a few days. And if you want to ask questions, you can come by anytime.”
Zhang FanFan smiled. “Thank you so much.”
When Zhang FanFan left, Dong MingEn turned back to Gou XinDou. “See her? The perfect image of a starving man. You don’t treasure-”
As soon as he saw Gou XinDou, he abruptly stopped. Gou XinDou’s face was pale white, and his expression was horrified. Gou XinDou stammered: “You didn’t tell me there was punishment in this tutoring!”
Lou XingGuang patted him on the shoulder. “Don’t worry; you’ll be able to bear it.”
Gou XinDou felt like he was being forced into prost.i.tution. “But I don’t want to bear it…”
……
……
Due to the guilt from Lin Qian’s declining performance and from Huo YeRui’s provocation, Zheng PingQing’s young brothers finally found their determination and enthusiasm for learning.
The students of Cla.s.s 8 were shocked to see the most unruly group of their cla.s.s surpa.s.s even Zhang FanFan’s diligence. This once rebellious group was now the first to arrive in cla.s.s, and the first to partic.i.p.ate in self-study.
“I think our cla.s.s got contaminated…”
“I thought they were what embodied Cla.s.s 8 the most. I really didn’t expect that they would be the first to jump ship.”
“We should’ve expected it; they’re in cahoots with Lin Qian and his friends after all.”
“So they shook hands with the top students just so they would help them study?”
“Tch, not only are they impure underachievers, but they also make friends for impure reasons. What a bunch of cheaters....”
…several students shook their heads, sighing that their campus friendships had been tainted.
“But even Dong MingEn suddenly wanted to study. I-I kinda feel guilty.”
“Haha I wanted to skip cla.s.s yesterday, but Boss Zheng found out and forced me to recite 15 words before I was allowed to go home…”
“I just surrendered. I asked them for some pointers for my study plan and…they gave me an even better one!”
“I heard that Zhang FanFan’s score was so good she shot up in the rankings. It was because she used Lou XingGuang’s study plan apparently…”
“If that’s true, is it bad that I feel a little moved…”
“To be honest, me too…”
“This contamination is pretty contagious…I think we’ll all end up infected…”
……
It has to be said that the impact of Zheng PingQing and his brothers have on the cla.s.s was still very strong, especially to the students who saw them fight and create chaos in the past. Because of their influence, most of the students would now carefully listen in cla.s.s, while the others didn’t dare do anything rash.
Dong MingEn and Lou XingGuang’s notebooks, which were previously neglected, suddenly became popular. Because there were too many people trying to borrow their notes, Zheng PingQing finally relented and helped photocopy dozens of pages that were then given to each student of Cla.s.s 8.
The learning atmosphere of Cla.s.s 8 had visibly gotten better. Not only were there more and more people attending self-study, but students could also be seen discussing schoolwork during recess. This was a phenomenon that had never happened to any bad cla.s.s of No.12 before.
Naturally, the teachers felt the change too. During cla.s.ses, they could see that the students were listening more attentively, and after cla.s.ses, the students would ask questions. In the past, teachers wouldn’t even get an echo when they asked if anyone had any questions.
The change of atmosphere caused the teachers to experience an emotional shift too. Most of the teachers used to be apathetic towards the students of Cla.s.s 8, with some even feeling too lazy to do their lectures seriously. But now, with the students’ sudden enthusiasm for learning, their hearts were touched.
With the return of the prodigal son, cla.s.ses undoubtedly became livelier. Although they were behind schedule, although it was hard for them to understand complicated things, and most of the questions they asked were ridiculous, seeing how hard the students were now working, the teachers all decided to devote more of their time and energy and help them.
In the teacher’s shared office, more and more teachers would talk about the changes in Cla.s.s 8. Bai YanZhu, the homeroom teacher of Cla.s.s 8, would have a smile on his face nowadays. He would actively talk about the progress of his students with the teachers of other cla.s.ses. He turned from the unluckiest teacher in the entire grade into the happiest person in the office.
This unprecedented transformation made all the other teachers feel a sense of crisis. Cla.s.s 8 was the gathering of students with the worst grades. In the past years, teachers who had been a.s.signed to be their homeroom teacher would always be full of complaints. But how come they’re so pa.s.sionate now?
The main issue was that Cla.s.s 8 would always be defaulted to be the cla.s.s with the worst grades. Now that they were studying hard, it wouldn’t be that surprising if they surpa.s.sed other cla.s.ses. This made the other homeroom teachers worried that they might lose face. Or even worse, that their bonuses might get deducted because they would be accused of neglecting their own cla.s.s.
Therefore, the sudden change in Cla.s.s 8 not only changed the att.i.tudes of their teachers, but it also affected the mindset of the teachers in other cla.s.ses. They all suddenly became much stricter with their students. But unlike Cla.s.s 8, which had Zheng PingQing to lead them, students from other cla.s.ses couldn’t feel the same unrest their teachers did. So while many teachers became as fierce as tigers, their students didn’t change much.
Resulting in teachers becoming panicked.
On a certain day, Dong MingEn and his cla.s.smates arrived early, as usual, to prepare for self-study. But as soon as they pa.s.sed the school gate, they found themselves surrounded by their fellow students’ strange looks.
Some students who were more familiar with Dong MingEn approached him and said: “Brother Dong, you’re such a risk-taker!”
Dong MingEn was puzzled. “What are you talking about?”
The student took out his phone and opened a picture for Dong MingEn to see.
Dong MingEn glanced at the screen. “….”
The student continued: “All the teachers have gone crazy lately, you know. They’re forcing everyone to study at twice the speed, all because of you guys…”
The corner of Dong MingEn’s mouth twitched. “Where did you get this?”
The student replied: “I don’t know who took the photo in the teacher’s office, but now the whole grade is going crazy. You actually signed a contract with the top cla.s.s…”
The picture on the student’s phone was the contract Dong MingEn wrote back in that abandoned building. it showed the typos and the signatures of both Lin Qian’s and Zheng PingQing’s group in great clarity.
“You’ve put a lot of pressure on all the students because of this contract of yours. Now we don’t know whether we should study harder or laugh at you first…”
Dong MingEn: “…”
Dong MingEn calmly pushed the student away. “Whatever, don’t bother me. I need to memorize my words.”
The student: “…”
The student was incredulous. “…Brother Dong, you’re THE Brother Dong of No. 12 High School. Are you sure you really want to start memorizing words?”
Dong MingEn looked at the student straight in the eye, then opened his mouth. “abandon，a-b-a-n-d-o-n-，abandon——”
The student looked at Dong MingEn for a moment, then sighed. “…Alright, I give up.”
Dong MingEn praised: “yes， very good.”
The student: “….”
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