Chapter 14: A Load of Crap About a Private Aristocratic School
“You’re from the affiliated elementary school? This incident was even talked about at our school. They made a big deal about it at the morning assembly. So it was you all along,” a girl exclaimed, her voice thin and tinged with a delicate air.
Zhou Wanfeng opened her pencil case and took out the new fountain pen she had bought. She couldn’t help but think of Yun Jingya’s neat and beautiful handwriting. She seriously wrote her name in her notebook, then looked up to examine it. The three characters were neat and proper, but they looked unremarkable.
In just a moment, the empty seats were all filled.
Especially when she looked up and saw a tall, thin back in front of her. Even if she pressed her head against the back of his neck, the blackboard in front was still completely blocked.
So tall, and sitting in the first row?
Her deskmate was a girl with a round, chubby face. She leaned over and whispered, “My name is Mai Jiaqi. What’s your name?” She smiled, revealing two small canine teeth.
“My name is Zhou Wanfeng,” Zhou Wanfeng said, putting the fountain pen back in her pencil case. She looked around the classroom, which was now in an uproar, like five hundred ducks quacking at the same time.
The boy in front was too tall, blocking her view and making her feel suffocated. If possible, she wanted to switch seats with him.
“Which elementary school did you go to? I’m from Qiushi Elementary…” Just as Mai Jiaqi finished speaking, the sound of a desk and chair scraping against the floor came from behind.
“Damn it, what’s wrong with me kicking your chair? If you have the guts, kick it back,” a sturdy, tall boy with an arrogant look on his face pushed his desk forward, trapping the boy in front between the desks.
That boy was no pushover either. He pushed himself up with his hands and jumped out, then kicked the desk of the boy behind him with a crash.
A few seconds later, they were fighting, the desks and chairs in the back scraping and clattering, a complete mess.
Zhou Wanfeng turned around and was surprised to find several bags of small snacks on her desk.
Mai Jiaqi was still pulling snacks out of her bulging backpack and distributing them to the surrounding classmates. “Try this, this is pork jerky, this is beef jerky, and this is a chocolate-flavored lollipop.” She tore open a package and popped one into her own mouth.
“Wow, you brought a game console! Can you play Tetris on that?” A boy with glasses behind her was playing a handheld game console, his face muscles twitching with concentration. He didn’t forget to show off while playing. “This is the latest model. It can even play the upgraded version of Tetris.”
“You’re eating snacks? Can you let me play later?” Mai Jiaqi leaned over to look, immediately captivated, and turned around completely in her seat.
Zhou Wanfeng looked around. People were chatting, reading comic books, reading wuxia novels. It seemed everyone had brought something to pass the time. The fight in the back row had ended in a draw, and they were pulled apart by a few other boys.
When the bell rang outside the classroom, the few boys and girls who had been standing around outside slowly walked in.
But at this moment, the classroom was so noisy it made one’s scalp tingle, as if five hundred mouths were speaking at the same time.
Zhou Wanfeng’s expression darkened, and her gaze fell on the front door of the classroom.
Five minutes later, a teacher in her early twenties, wearing a white short-sleeved shirt and a knee-length black skirt, finally walked in. She had a simple ponytail and a beautiful watch on her wrist. She walked in and stood in front of the podium.
She seemed a little nervous. She pursed her lips, as if looking for a blackboard eraser or something, but couldn’t find one.
She was seen slapping her notebook on the podium twice.
The noise in the classroom gradually subsided, like a receding tide.
The female teacher scanned the classroom and gestured for them to be quiet. “Everyone, please be quiet. It’s the first day of school. Everyone is very excited to be at a new school, in a new class, and meeting new classmates. But the bell has already rung, so everyone must abide by the classroom rules.”
While she was speaking, there was still a low buzz of conversation. Zhou Wanfeng even heard a crisp crunching sound. She turned her head and found that the sound was coming from her new deskmate, Mai Jiaqi.
Her cheeks were bulging, and in her hand under the desk was a small bag of chips-like snacks.
Seeing her looking, she even enthusiastically offered her the snacks.
Zhou Wanfeng raised her eyebrows and chin, indicating that the teacher was in front. But all she got in return was a squinting smile. The girl lowered her head and quickly stuffed another piece into her mouth.
“Let me introduce myself first. My name is Sun Mulan. I’ll be your English teacher, and I’m also your homeroom teacher. You can call me Teacher Sun,” Teacher Sun’s voice was soft, and she was already trying to raise her voice as much as possible.
But the noise in the back continued unabated.
“Teacher Sun, do you have a boyfriend?”
“Teacher Sun, did you just graduate from a normal university this year?”
“Teacher, is Mulan the Mulan from the ancient story who took her father’s place in the army?”
Sun Mulan picked up a piece of chalk and wrote her name on the blackboard. At the same time, she reminded the students in the back to stop talking. She picked up a class roster and began to call the roll.
“When I call your name, please stand up and say ‘here,’ and also give a brief introduction of yourself. You can talk about which elementary school you came from, what positions you held in the past, what you like, what you want to do in the future, and so on,” Sun Mulan encouraged the students.
“Chen Hao.”
“Here. My name is Chen Hao. I graduated from Bali Elementary School. I like to eat meat.”
The “like to eat meat” part instantly drew a lot of laughter.
Sun Mulan stood at the podium and covered her mouth with her hand, then called the next name.
…
“Jiang Yi.”
Zhou Wanfeng realized it was the boy in front of her. He slowly stood up. He was even taller than she had thought. “My name is Jiang Yi,” he said in a cold, clear voice, and then sat down.
There were forty-two students in the class. After the brief introductions, the classroom became noisy again.
Sun Mulan clapped her hands, trying to get everyone to be quiet. When she found it was useless, she frowned, pursed her lips, and stood quietly to the side, as if she would only speak when the classroom was quiet.
Zhou Wanfeng let out a soft breath and touched her forehead. It felt like she had walked into a kindergarten, a classroom full of unruly children who couldn’t understand what was being said.
After two minutes, there were still people whispering in the back of the classroom. The students in the front had already sensed the atmosphere in the classroom and kept turning to look at the back, trying to see who was talking.
“If you don’t listen to me, all of our subsequent activities will be delayed. If this continues, you won’t be able to leave when the other classes are dismissed at noon. I don’t mind,” Sun Mulan was clearly a little angry.
The noise in the back subsided.
Only then did Sun Mulan continue, “Now that we’ve met our new classmates, classes will officially begin tomorrow. Now we need to temporarily select a class president, vice president, sanitation monitor, sports monitor, and class representatives. Students with experience can volunteer, and those who want to try can be bold.”
As soon as she finished speaking, no one in the classroom responded.
There were, however, some stifled laughs.
“Teacher, I don’t think anyone sitting in this class has ever done any of these things. You might as well just randomly pick someone. It’ll be faster.”
“Anyway, I don’t want to be a class president or a class representative or anything. It sounds like too much trouble.”
“Don’t you have to have good grades in that subject to be a class representative? It would be embarrassing if you didn’t. After all, you have to interact with the teacher often.”
The classroom once again erupted in a self-discussion.
Zhou Wanfeng looked at the now-silent Teacher Sun, afraid that she would just stand there and waste more time. She raised her hand and said loudly, “Teacher, you can just randomly pick someone from the roster. Don’t we still have to get our textbooks, clean the classroom, and rearrange the seats?” This young teacher clearly didn’t understand the situation of the students in this class.
Zhou Wanfeng’s good mood from the morning had now hit rock bottom. When she raised her hand and gave her suggestion, the surrounding students all looked at her with some curiosity.
Sun Mulan stood at the podium and looked at the students below. Some had their heads down, some were talking to each other. In the back row, there was even a girl painting her nails, and a boy tearing paper to fold a paper airplane.
“The girl in the second to last row by the wall, are you painting your nails during class?” She then pointed to the other side. “And the boy over there, you’ve been talking since I came in. Haven’t you rested your mouth for a single moment? Aren’t you tired?”
“Reporting, Teacher, my mouth is not tired at all,” the boy replied with a cheeky grin.
“Teacher, this isn’t nail polish, it’s a nail hardener. My nails are uneven. My parents took me to see a doctor during the summer vacation, and he told me to apply it every few hours to improve my nails,” the girl said, spreading her ten fingers to prove there was no color on her nails.
Sun Mulan’s face turned shades of green and white. She took a deep breath and looked down at the class list. “Since no one is volunteering, I’ll just appoint someone. Qin Chao will be the class president, Chen Yisen the vice president, Mai Jiaqi the sanitation monitor, Ding Gaoming the sports monitor. We’ll choose the class representatives later. Now, the president and vice president will organize the boys in the class to go to the dean’s office to move the books…”
Before she could finish, the appointed Qin Chao, the boy with glasses behind Zhou Wanfeng, stood up with a whoosh. “Teacher, pick someone else. I don’t want to be the class president. I won’t do it.”
A boy named Chen Yisen slowly stood up from the back row. “Teacher, me too. Please pick someone else. I can’t do it.”
“Teacher, why should only the boys move the books? Isn’t there gender equality? Look at her, she’s so fat she doesn’t have a neck, and her arms are thicker than my thighs. She can do the work of three people,” a boy in the back row stood up and pointed at a chubby girl in front of him, even gesturing to show the thickness of her arms.
Many boys followed suit. “That’s right! Why should only the boys move them, while the girls sit back and enjoy the benefits?”
“It’s fine if the boys move the books. Then the girls can clean the classroom, and the boys can rest,” a boy suggested.
“Teacher, please hurry up and pick someone else to be the class president. I really won’t do it.”
“Change the sports monitor too. Teacher, you can’t force people to do things they don’t want to do.”
Zhou Wanfeng supported her forehead with her hand. From time to time, she would hear a crunching sound. Her new deskmate, Mai Jiaqi, swallowed the food in her mouth and slowly raised her hand. “Teacher, I don’t want to hold any position either.”
Zhou Wanfeng looked up and saw that the new homeroom teacher’s eyes were slightly red with anger, and tears were welling up in her eyes. The next second, they were about to fall.
Unexpectedly, the new teacher picked up her things from the desk, quickly turned around, and ran out of the classroom.
With her departure, the classroom erupted with a roar, the noise growing louder and louder.
“Why did the new teacher leave?”
“Hey, can you boys go to the dean’s office and get the new books? The teacher already told you to.”
“We can get the books, but can you girls clean the classroom yourselves? That’s a fair division of labor.”
“You boys have some shame. Look at the few girls in the class. There are forty-two students in the whole class, and only sixteen are girls. How can you be so shameless as to ask the girls to do it?”
“It’s nineteen. She counts as three.”
“Hahahahahaha, you’re so mean.”
“In other classes, it’s always the boys who go. The boys in our class are too lame.”
“We’re lame? Then you go.”
The class was on the verge of descending into a chaotic mess. The fat girl who had been mocked was lying on her desk, sobbing. Qin Chao, the boy with glasses who had been appointed class president, had taken out his handheld game console and was playing again.
No one in the entire class seemed to care that the new homeroom teacher had been angered to the point of leaving.
Zhou Wanfeng turned to look at the boy with glasses and asked coldly, “Aren’t you going to organize everyone to get the new books?”
“What does it have to do with me? I already said I wouldn’t be the class president, but she still insisted,” he said, his eyes glued to the game console, without even looking up.
At this moment, there was a commotion outside the classroom. A student by the window stood up to look. “The other classes are all moving their new books back.”
Zhou Wanfeng’s brow furrowed. The entire classroom was a mess. She couldn’t help but curse inwardly.
Damn it, this is the good school Yang Yijun found for her. A load of crap about a private aristocratic school. The whole class is a bunch of delinquents who deserve a good kicking.