The proctor looked at this spectacle and shook his head.

The difficulty of this midterm exam was clearly much higher than the questions they usually did at school.

After several exams, everyone felt utterly hopeless. Exhausted, they didn’t even know how they had done this time.

“It’s over, it’s over, this time it’s really over.” When the bell rang to collect the last exam, Luke Carter handed in his paper and had to support himself against the wall as he left the exam room. He finally made it back to the classroom, and as soon as he entered, he shouted, “Comrades, come on, let’s report on the battle.”

Logan Wright: “At the end of the road.”

Quinn Shaw: “Can’t defy fate, can’t change destiny.”

Wanda: “Fallen in battle.”

In the whole class, only Ethan Young and Henry Howard looked like nothing had happened.

Henry Howard was moving the desks and chairs back. Hearing Luke Carter call out, he raised his hand too, propping up the desk and chair with one hand and said, “Performed beyond expectations!”

“”

Luke Carter felt his already battered heart shatter completely.

Ethan Young was half-sitting on a desk, waiting for Wanda to move the desks and chairs to the front. They were blocking the way, so he couldn’t move his either. He reached out, grabbed Henry Howard by the back of his collar, and pulled him over: “Didn’t learn your lesson? If you keep talking, a mouse might jump out the window any second.”

The teachers of each subject were also quite worried about the exam results this time. Judging from the proctoring situation, the average score might hit a historic low.

In the teachers’ office, several teachers gathered to discuss the scores: “It’s looking tough. Before, the gap between us and other schools was only two or three points. This time it might be five or six.”

“Especially math. The math test was way too hard this time. We usually focus on the basics, and they rarely do these kinds of questions.”

Halfway through the conversation, the teachers remembered something and called out, “Mr. Thompson, aren’t you going to No. 16 High School this weekend to grade papers?”

Four schools were holding a joint exam, and each school would send a few teachers to help grade the papers.

This time, the teachers sent from the second-year group to grade papers were Thomas Thompson and William Warren. Old Tang had just finished packing up and was about to go to the class. Hearing this, he nodded and said, “Yes, I’m going with Mr. Warren.”

Grading papers is a tough job. After a whole day, your eyes feel terrible. Few teachers are willing to spend their weekends grading papers.

“Thanks for your hard work, you two,” the other teachers shook their heads, then quietly sighed, “I wonder how those two in your class did this time.”

Referring to those two in Class Three.

The office fell silent, then everyone sighed together.

Near the end of the school day.

When Ms. Miller called to say she was already at the school gate, Henry Howard was being chased and “beaten up” by Luke Carter and Logan Wright for saying “performed beyond expectations.”

Seeing the low mood in the class, Henry Howard cooperated, letting them chase and hit him, which lightened the atmosphere a bit.

After being chased for a while, Henry Howard changed course and climbed out the window, supporting himself on the bed frame, his feet dangling for a moment: “—Is this how you treat your classmates, using violence?”

After climbing out, Henry Howard squeezed in next to Ethan Young: “Old Young, save me.”

Logan Wright stopped, and before rolling up his sleeves, asked Ethan Young for his opinion: “Brother Yu, can I hit him?”

On the phone, Ms. Miller said a lot, but Ethan Young didn’t really listen. He absentmindedly replied to Ms. Miller: “Mm.”

Logan Wright: “Thanks, Brother Yu! Then I won’t hold back!”

Henry Howard: “”

Ethan Young: “”

Old Tang came out of the office holding a stack of homework and saw these guys horsing around in the hallway. He breathed a sigh of relief. He was worried the kids would be affected by the exam, but it turned out their mental resilience was pretty good: “Alright, everyone go back to the classroom and sit down. Running around like this, what does it look like?”

Luke Carter stopped in his tracks and put his hands away: “Teacher, when will our scores be out?”

“If nothing unexpected happens, the papers should be graded over the weekend.”

Old Tang thought for a moment and added, “But it’ll be a few more days before the results are released.”

That’s what he said, but when Thomas Thompson left early the next morning to take the subway to No. 14 High School to grade papers, he never expected that the unexpected would come so soon.

“Thank you for your hard work, teachers.” A female teacher with glasses handed out the papers, and then a dozen teachers squeezed into one classroom. No one spoke again; the only sound was the flipping of exam papers.

No. 14 High School is a leading regular high school in City A.

Its college entrance rate isn’t as high as the key schools, but it’s quite stable.

This time, No. 14 High School specially prepared a few empty classrooms for the teachers to grade papers. William Warren and Thomas Thompson sat right next to each other.

After grading two papers, William Warren took out his glasses case, put on his glasses, and continued filling in scores in the answer boxes.

The grading process is tedious, but occasionally, when teachers see some ridiculous mistakes, they’ll share them: “This student has some creative ideas for auxiliary lines in solid geometry. Let me count, drew thirteen lines in total?”

The teachers buried themselves in grading for a while.

One of them was a very influential math teacher at No. 14 High School, who had been teaching for decades and was also the author of this joint exam. After finishing one paper, he picked up another from the side.

But this paper made him frown deeply.

“Mr. Wayne, what’s wrong?”

“What’s going on with this exam room? What are they doing?”

Mr. Wayne said as he flipped another page—becoming even more certain that almost all the answers in this stack of papers were copied from each other, even the mistakes were exactly the same. This kind of trickery left him speechless: “Sharing answers, collective cheating, they’re really united.”

United is an understatement—it was beyond imagination.

Mr. Wayne lost patience and quickly finished grading most of them.

Only two papers were left. He flipped them over carelessly, just wanting to be done with this “united” exam room. But when he saw the writing on one paper, his hand suddenly froze.

The tip of his red pen hovered in midair.

—It was a very impressive answer sheet.

------------

100. Chapter One Hundred

The teachers spent the whole morning grading papers, with a thick stack of exam folders at hand. The highest score they’d seen all morning was only 138.

The test was hard this time; getting over 130 was already considered a high score.

But this answer sheet in front of him—not only was the handwriting beautiful, but the logic was tight, hitting every key point, and there was hardly a single mistake from start to finish.

Full marks.

The light in Mr. Wayne’s eyes grew brighter and brighter.

“Not easy,” after finishing grading and putting down his pen, he almost forgot there was still one more paper left. He kept flipping this perfect paper over and over, unable to help but praise, “Full marks, so impressive. I wonder which school this student is from.”

A full score was rare, and not only was it a pleasant surprise, but the fatigue of grading all morning was swept away by this perfect paper.

The other teachers sitting next to Mr. Wayne heard and came over: “A full score?”

“Check the folder, it should say which school.”

A teacher turned the folder over, looked closely, and was a bit surprised. He raised his voice: “—No. 2 High School?”

William Warren was sitting a bit far from the teachers from No. 14 High School.

The more he graded, the more worried he became about the kids from his own school. He thought, other schools already have a full score, and sighed, planning to take a break.

But just as he unscrewed his water bottle, he suddenly heard the words “No. 2 High School”: “”

“Hey, Mr. Warren, it’s your school!”

William Warren screwed the cap back on: “You must be mistaken.”

“Liyang No. 2 High School, it’s right.”

William Warren was completely stunned. When he stood up, he almost tripped over the table leg: “Impossible, the best our students can do is barely 130.”

Mr. Wayne took a moment to recover from the joy of the full score, then remembered there was still one more paper left. He flipped past the perfect paper, and his hand froze again.

This time, it wasn’t just frozen—his fingers even started to tremble slightly.

William Warren walked over to Mr. Wayne, missing the perfect paper from before. He followed Mr. Wayne’s trembling finger and incredulous gaze, and saw the next answer sheet, which was outrageously bold.

Next to the score box, the owner of this paper had written a striking score in black pen: 150.

The handwriting was free and easy, with strong strokes.

William Warren: “”