Chapter 1 Group Video Chat

  It's been a week since Xia Zhi and Xia Fei Han left. As the two brothers settled down and became familiar with their new environment, Zhang Liuliang and Xia Lixiu also welcomed a relatively new life.

  Because school has started.

  It's still Qingyang High School, but I've been promoted from the junior high school department to the high school department. The environment and teachers are almost all familiar faces, and the only new things are some new classmates. After all, even if it was originally Qingyang Junior High School, the proportion of students who can be directly promoted to the high school department is not too high. Just like Dà Pàng classmate, he has already been successfully brushed out of Qingyang, but he's still in Shíyàn High School, right across from Qingyang, so I won't be leaving my good brothers and friends too far behind.

  With his outstanding performance in the high school entrance examination, Zhang Li continued to be in the same class as Li Qiu, still the top class of the grade. The end of the happy and free summer vacation was immediately followed by a cruel prison. In the morning, they had just finished reporting for duty and hadn't even had time to get in touch with their new classmates when they were forced to review old knowledge in the afternoon - a diagnostic test.

  The inhumane mock exam, two and a half days, five subjects, Chinese, math, English, physics and chemistry. For Zhang Wanwan, this is simply a nightmare!

  On the fourth day, when everyone thought the torture was over, the results of the first day were announced. Many people cried while looking at their scores and individual rankings, while listening to the teacher's rather intense advice.

  Then so, another two and a half days passed. This week just went by like this...

  Is this high school life? I'm a bit disoriented from being beaten up.

  Luckily, it's just the weekend ahead of her and Xia Zhi Gege's sweet date.

  There is a 13-hour time difference between Zhan Juju and Xia Zhi. To take care of each other's rest, as soon as they arrived in Boston, Xia Zhi made an appointment with her. At 10 pm on Saturday Beijing time, it was 9 am for Xia Zhi; at 10 am on Sunday Beijing time, it was 9 pm on Saturday for Xia Zhi. The two would have a half-hour video chat online.

  Nothing special, just saying hi.

  After a long wait during the day, Wara Wara finally made it to the evening, Xiao Penguin had been hanging online for a while, just waiting for Xia Zhi Gege Dodo's login sound reminder.

  The days of Cowherd and Weaving Maiden! At least four years! Not including the possibility that Xia Zhige may read a master's or doctoral degree after graduation...

  In her dazed and distracted thoughts, the long-awaited online reminder finally arrived. Xia Zhi's avatar flickered a few times before appearing at the top, followed by a video invitation.

  The excitedly opened it, then discovered... this is a group video.

  Still a happy quartet. Xia Zhi, Xia Fei Han, Xia Li Qiu, Zhan Zhu Zhu.

  Zhan's eyes welled up with tears instantly.

  Ma Tencent, when are you going to develop this new feature?! Her private time and sweet words have been ruined.

  Zhan Zhan wants to cry, but still has to smile! Xia Zhige arrived there and studied business administration while also taking music electives. How can he be so idle and video chat with her after finishing a video call with Li Qiu?

  Time is precious!

  No big deal, just enlarge the window of Xia Zhi's brother, put Li Qiu in the middle, and squeeze out Xia Fei Han, haha haha too smart.

  "Xiao Xiao, what are you doing?" Xia Zhi's warm voice came from the earpiece, across the computer screen, and Xia Zhi could also see Xiao Xiao's suddenly happy, then sad, and then strange expression.

  "She magnifies you and belittles me." Before Zhan Lu could respond, someone who knew her very well spoke up coldly.

  "It's not cold in summer, you don't speak and nobody thinks you're mute! Don't slander my character, how can I do such a thing without integrity?" Warmed up, Xiaofei immediately retorted with vigor.

  "Do you believe me if I remotely control your computer to take a screenshot as proof?" The screen was almost invisible with Xia Fei Han, but the devil's voice still pierced through, making Zhan Doudou's head spin.

  She subconsciously hugged the keyboard, as if this could protect her computer well. She stared vigilantly at someone in the corner: "Xia Feihan! Try invading my privacy!"

  "Brother, shall we start a separate video and let the second brother and DouDou argue for a while?" Xia Liqiu finally spoke up after being an audience member for a while.

  "I think it's okay!"

  "No!"

  Xia Zhihe and Zhang Zhizhong's voices sounded at the same time.

  "Alright, alright, I've adjusted my state, guaranteed not to be affected by some unknown onion fumes, adults have a lot, adults have a lot..." Zhan Dandan self-hypnotized, then assumed a standard sitting posture: "Alright, let's begin!"

  "What's up?" Xia Zhi smiled and asked. Besides the busy homework, the relaxed atmosphere was especially relaxing: "The beginning of autumn, how's the new semester?"

  "Uh, okay." The screen's Xia Liqiu slightly tilted her head, and the three people who knew her well understood that she was thinking, but after thinking, it still ended up being such a simple answer.

  Xia Zhi's face was sweating, speechless. The two best friends were indeed extreme and absolutely complementary, with Xia Zhi being too standard and Li Qiu being too typical.

  "Xia will answer this question, I'll make sure to tell you everything! Haha!" Zhan Zhan smiled and quickly took over the conversation: "What kind of thing do you want to hear?"

  "What kind of what type?" Xia Zhi was a bit confused, and Xia Liqiu, as one of the parties involved, also looked puzzled.

  "Do you want to listen to official or gossip?" Zhan Peng listed two types.

  "What's the difference?" Xia Zhi was speechless.

  "The official version is like this... Qingyang High School, as a national model high school, continues to lead the province in both admission rate and enrollment rate this year..." With a loud and clear tone, standard Mandarin pronunciation, CCTV-style broadcasting.

  "Go away, it should be 10 o'clock Beijing time now, not 7:30," Xia Zhi scolded with a smile, "Who wants to listen to you say these things."

  "Haha, just kidding." Waruwaru smiled and found that this state was also good. Liqiu and Xia didn't speak much, although there were four people, it was almost like just her and Xia's older brother, as long as they paid attention to their image, quality, and boundaries.

  "I'm still in the same class as Lì Qiū. This was actually reported via email, but there's someone hiding in the corner who doesn't know, so I'll help him out: "High school is literally the darkest period of life, do you know what we've been doing this week? Exams! Exams! And more exams! Reviewing test papers! Reviewing test papers! And even more reviewing test papers! Are those old men and women boring or what? I know high school students in their final year might be like that, but we're only first years! Can't they give us a good impression and let us have some hope for learning itself?! They came at us with a stick as soon as we started, and from then on, we just hated studying..."

  A warbler warbles melodiously and pathetically, one man one play, with three faithful audience members.

  Actually, DouDou would be quite good at hosting a talk show later on. Xia Zhi thought to himself with a smile as he looked at the scene in front of him. His window was relatively normal, with a square screen divided into four equal parts, one person per quadrant, clear and unusually fair.

  Xia Liqiu was also very fair, she hardly touched the computer settings. She is lazy with words, looking at her brothers is good, and there's nothing special to say, just listening to Tangtang's embellished account of school affairs, suddenly finding that school life seems quite interesting too.

  Xia Fei's two computers were side by side, one with a parts diagram and the other with a video screen. His interface was almost divided into two halves, with Zhan Doudou and Xia Lixiang occupying nearly half of the screen each. Why did he guess so easily that Zhan Doudou was adjusting the video size? Apart from being familiar with her personality, it was also because he was doing the same thing.

  It's obvious that he doesn't need to look at himself, Xia Zhi is just next door, whether he looks or not, it doesn't matter, what he misses are those two girls.

  One was eloquent and talkative, while the other was calm and quiet, but as he watched and listened, his heart became very peaceful.

  "...... Xia Zhi Gege, how are you guys doing over there? Is Harvard a big school with lots of lawns and do teachers not scold people in class?" It's all portrayed like this in American dramas: "Compared to that Massachusetts Institute of Technology or whatever, which one is better?"

  "It's MIT, the best science and technology university in the world." Xia Zhi corrected her seriously, taking a glance at Xia Feihan's profile picture, which only showed his side face without any expression change. "I'm fine, just slowly adapting to the teaching style here, selected my major courses and got in touch with teachers, everything is going smoothly! As for Feihan, you can ask him yourself."

  "I don't want to," Zhan pouted, turning his face forty-five degrees away, as if saying he himself wouldn't say it.

  "Tell her what's the use, she won't get in anyway." Xia Fei Han said without even lifting his head.

  The dry grass suddenly burst into flames, and she wanted to shout "Who says I won't get in? I'll show you!", but her rationality hadn't completely disappeared, so she forcibly suppressed the fire in her heart. She had already risked half her life to take the middle school entrance exam, and as for this world-class university, she didn't even dare think about it: "I won't get in, why not just come for a day trip?"

  "Brother, tell me, I want to hear it, and I can also tell Grandpa and Mom and Dad." Xia Lixiu's voice was as melodious as heavenly music, appearing at just the right moment.

  Xia Fei's gaze finally returned to the screen, and after a moment of contemplation: "It's okay, actually similar to Xia Zhi."

  Pfft...... Listening carefully with perked up ears, it turns out that Xia Fei and Li Qiu are actually biological siblings!

  ……

  Video chat twice a week, each time half an hour, the time always passes quickly. When Zhan Zhuang told Jiang Xinyue about this appointment, Jiang Xinyue adjusted her glasses and gave a speechless comment:

  This is somewhat similar to the frequency and timing of marital life needs for men over 35 years old.

  Her messy life was influenced by her young aunt's teachings, rather than being tainted by the group of athletic men.

  It's another new week, but this Monday is destined to be a gray and black series as well, because today the results are announced, the ranking of the mock exam.

  Life is all about rankings!

  Every class has a ranking list, posted in front of the blackboard, with student ID, name, scores for each subject, individual ranking, total score ranking, class ranking and grade ranking. The whole teacher's office suddenly became noisy, with a crowd of people squeezing in front.

  Of course, there are exceptions.

  For example, the Chinese teacher who stood with his arms crossed and eyes slanted to one side watching the play, a thin little old man, Lu Feng, with a small parting in his hair and big glasses, looked like a scholar.

  For example, Xia Lixiu, who has never cared about such things, sees the exam as a way to test her own learning effect. Rankings are not important to her.

  For example, the broken pot was broken and scattered, and the results of the 10th grade in junior high school were cleared. Now, in the top class of high school, it's almost at the bottom. No way, the top class has almost gathered all the excellent talents in the city and even the whole province! The middle school exam was beyond expectations, but this time's mock exam... hehehe...

  However, apart from these people, there are also a few others who are quite calm, some of whom can't squeeze in and want to wait, some of whom are like Zhan Zhu Zhu, indifferent, and some of whom... are super confident?

  "Warriors! How was your exam? Don't you care about your scores and ranking at all? One should have the spirit of self-improvement, know shame and then be brave. Our class is a key class, our grades are supposed to lead the whole school, don't drag us down with your sloppy attitude..."

  The old man looked at the warlike girl, who was looking around with a mischievous expression, and felt annoyed. The warlike girl's reputation was well-known throughout Qingyang Elementary and Middle School, who didn't know that she was a little devil? It was already a miracle that she could get into middle school, but she actually got into the top class?

  Mr. Lu suddenly felt that his late life might be ruined. His class honor, his class discipline, his total score of the class, his promotion rate...

  War is a time bomb that will explode into a scandal at any moment!

  He's going to retire after this semester... The old man felt very helpless...

  Warrior was taken aback by Lu's loud and clear rebuke, shrinking his head slightly. Respect for the elderly, love for the young, respect for teachers and emphasis on morality are traditional virtues that are fully embodied in her. She smiled awkwardly: "Ah, Teacher Lu, isn't this to provide convenience for our classmates first? Alright, I'll go take a look, I'll go take a look."

  Holding a chicken feather as a token, he charged into the crowd with a loud "Banzai!" and easily squeezed his way to the front. His mouth still shouting: "Sorry, dear classmates! Respected Teacher Lu asked me to take a look at the exam results first, sorry, sorry, everyone..."

  Lu Feng fell down beside her again, he let her see it, but didn't give her any priority.

  Drilling to the front of the list, Zhan Da's first glance was upwards, and he saw Xia Liqiu's name standing firmly in the first row. He burst out laughing. Damn, except for the Chinese composition being deducted points, all the other four subjects were full marks. This is simply annihilating the entire universe! Each subject was ranked first, class total score was first, and annual total score was also first. Liqiu remained as low-key and fierce as ever.

  After finishing the first, Zhan Zhu Zhu immediately went to the last row to look. Oh, Meng Ke Ran? This kid helped her block the last cannonball, what a good brother! Oh, Su Ye Qiu? Not bad, not bad, two difficult brothers. The third from the bottom, Zhan Zhu Zhu was pleased to find his own name, relying on the pre-exam crash training, her old skills were still working well for the time being. Zhan Zhu Zhu felt extremely honored to have obtained the 38th place in the class and the third from the bottom, after all, she was able to maintain a position within the top 100 in the grade.

  After reading this, Zhang Yuchan also took a look at the whole list. It's not scary if you don't look, but it's frightening to see that Li Qiu's score is still so fierce, firmly occupying the first place with a nearly perfect score. However, looking down, it can be seen that she has lost the huge score difference advantage of her original junior high school department. The scores of the second and third places are only one-tenth different from hers.

  Especially the second place, Zhu Ling, scored two points less than Xia Liqiu in Chinese and two points less than Xia Liqiu in math, and all others were full marks.

  It wasn't until later that Zhan Yu realized how difficult it was to be a high school elite, like Xia Fei Han, Xiong An An, and now the new first-year goddess Xia Li Qiu, these are all characters worthy of admiration!

  Looking at the scores from 4th to 10th place, the difference is also within another tenth. The scores from 11th to 30th are almost another level of a tenth. After 31st, there are about ten people scattered around, most of whom are like Zhang Sanfeng, either performing exceptionally well in the high school entrance exam or underperforming in this test.

  It's getting thick, if the last ten don't turn over in the next exam, I'm afraid they'll become Old Lu's key targets. Actually, sometimes I think, why bother with the top class? It puts so much pressure on yourself, always being at the back of the line and feeling bad about it. Better to be a chicken head than a phoenix tail.

  In this era of education where only high grades matter, people like her who are not ambitious and have low self-expectations are indeed a minority. Some people are extremely dissatisfied with their own grades.

  Just as he squeezed out of the crowd, he saw a very dissatisfied comrade, for example, the second place.

  Zhu Ling, another beauty-level academic tyrant, came from a neighboring city's key school and was the school's sensation at that time.

  It seems that her ancestors had some foreign blood, and when it came to herself, the genes became more prominent. Her facial features are three-dimensional and somewhat like Barbie dolls, making her stand out among the delicate and flat-faced national beauties; what's even more amazing is that she also has a perfect figure with a protruding front and back, which doesn't look like a 16-year-old girl at all.

  At first, when she saw her for the first time, Zhan Ling was also shocked and thought that her figure was a joke. At this rate, when would she be able to grow up to be as curvy as Zhu Ling?

  Empty life, even school uniforms can't hold up.

  The beauty of a beautiful woman is boundless. As the original school flower, Zhu Ling not only got in herself but also brought along several infatuated boys. At the beginning of the semester, she showed off her popularity, and wherever she went, she was surrounded by boys, and this team gradually grew stronger.

  No way, where can you find a beautiful and excellent girl? Moreover, Zhu Ling is not only young and vibrant but also passionate and outgoing, she's simply a magnet for bees and butterflies.

  Zhan Zhan thinks that Lao Lü should keep a close eye on this kind of person, otherwise it will definitely trigger a bunch of boys to neglect their studies.

  At this moment, the goddess was unhappy, and several boys were surrounding her to comfort her. Zhu Ling, on the other hand, looked at Xia Liqiu.

  Digression

  Hehe, a new volume begins... The male lead and second male lead took up too much space in the first part, so we should let the third male lead appear for a bit, right? Can't just have our heroine always chasing after someone without getting to experience being chased herself, or else life would be too bleak and imperfect. Of course, could our male lead and second male lead really not appear for four years? Don't even joke! How is that possible? The fan will die from longing!

  Occasionally, we have face-to-face meetings. No matter how far the distance is, it can't stop the magic of our love! Hahaha