"I have few requirements in my class. Being late, or even not coming at all, is no biggie…"
Turning around, Xin Qi declared, "However, that is on the grounds that you can answer my questions satisfactorily!"
Shen Zhe's face cramped.
He ran as fast as possible, but he still arrived late. How unlucky!
"Considering your grades, I won't give you a hard time. It's a simple question. What are the characteristics of the Hundred Beard Grass we learned in the last class?" asked Xin Qi.
"The Hundred Beard Grass?"
Shen Zhe scratched his head.
It was the former Shen Zhe who took the class. How could he possibly know what had been taught in the previous class?
He did read a lot of books in the previous afternoon, but certainly not all of them. He had never heard about the Hundred Beard Grass before. How was he going to answer the question?
Awkwardly, he hesitated for a moment and ventured, "Is it… a grass with a lot of beards?"
"Haha!"
"Is the Hundred Beard Grass an herb with a hundred beards?"
"He didn't sleep through the last class, did he?"
…
The students burst into laughter.
Xin Qi nearly exploded in fury, "You are truly unteachable!"
He had taught so much in the last class, but Shen Zhe didn't remember a thing… The student was truly hopeless.
Ling Xueru frowned.
Hadn't he changed his attitude?
He answered Ms. Bai Yu's question precisely in the last class, and he even beat Lu Zihan up just then…
Why was he making a fool of himself in the drug class?
"Cui Xiao, you will answer this question!" Xin Qi sniffed and said.
"Yes, sir!" Cui Xiao stood up and declared proudly, "The Hundred Beard Grass, also known as the Hundred-Year-Old Long-Beard Grass, is an herb which has a white rhizome that looks like the beard of an old man. It has a great effect on the wounded and the weak and can lengthen their life spans. Its full name means that it can make a person live beyond a hundred years. It's about three to five inches long when mature, and it prefers coldness!"
"To melt it with other herbs, it has to be dried first. Its melting point is 377 degrees, which is the best temperature for the herb to take effect. Every degree above that temperature will result in a 0.13% loss of the effect. Iron-made furnaces and high-temperature coal should be avoided when such herbs are refined."
"After they are refined, they cannot be contained in wood-natured containers or raw porcelain made of mud, because they will absorb the effect of the herbs…"
"…This is the end of my answer!"
Cui Xiao elaborated on the nature, effect and methods for refining the herb in great detail.
"…"
Shen Zhe's eyebrow twitched.
It was so detailed. He couldn't have memorized it in three days.
Should he remain a bad student instead of trying to become a good one?
"Very good!" Xin Qi nodded in satisfaction again, because it was the same as his interpretation in the last class.
He looked at Shen Zhe angrily and said, "Did you memorize it?"
They were students from the same class, but why were they so different?
"I…" Shen Zhe scratched his head.
Cui Xiao had spoken too fast for anyone to remember.
"I have no time to waste on you today. Get in and take the test. If you get more than sixty points, I'll forgive you for being late; if not, you will take two punches from me as punishment!" Xin Qi said without asking further.
The most important issue was to find out the master who had made the perfect herb liquid. If he could learn from him, it was possible that the conundrums that haunted him for years could be resolved.
As for Shen Zhe…
He had always been the last place. It would be fine as long as he didn't cause any trouble in class.
Not every teacher had Mr. Xin Qi's sense of responsibility.
"Yes, sir!"
Shen Zhe returned to his seat gloomily.
What were the bad students most scared of?
Exams!
Every exam was a chance for the geniuses to show off, but it was also a time of embarrassment for the bad students.
While Mr. Xin had temporarily let go of him, getting more than sixty points in the test was even more difficult than a slap.
"This is the question. Copy it down. I have to start calculating…"
Wang Qing, who was sitting next to him, gave him a piece of paper.
Shen Zhe hurried to copy the question, but then he was stunned. "The Masculine Sun Grass and the Purification White Lotus? Aren't they the ingredients to make the body polishing liquid?"
He didn't know much about other herbs, but he remembered those two clearly because he had just melted them the day before.
"Was this the question?"
He held his chin and recalled.
It seemed that he didn't use any other things to refine them the day before, right?
Well, no, he did use oil!
After he inserted the Masculine Sun Grass, he added some oil to improve the temperature. That was when the Purification White Lotus had melted…
"Fantastic! I actually know this one…"
Confirming the question on his friend's paper, Shen Zhe was quite excited.
He had thought that he was doomed, but it was a question he knew how to answer.
How lucky!
"I shouldn't be too cocky even though I can answer it… I should study the pencil when the school is over. Something will happen sooner or later after I lose it…"
He realized that the pencil was gone in the morning, but he had little time to investigate it. He planned to conduct some tests when the school was over.
He was not certain that he could be that lucky, that every question he were to be asked would be something he knew.
Making the decision, he didn't hesitate at all and simply wrote "oil" on the paper.
He was about to drop the brush, when he noticed that everyone else was running calculations.
Would it be too eye-catching if he were to submit the answer that quickly?
Should I write something more?
The paper was rather spacious, and it would take a lot of time to fill it up. Shen Zhe remembered how he refined the herbs the day before and wrote on.
"After the Masculine Sun Grass is put in, you need to lift the pot and keep it away from the fire. The remaining heat of the pot is enough to melt it. When you lift the pot, you'd better wear thick gloves, or cover the handle with a wet towel, in case your hands are hurt by the heat. If it's still too hot, you can clutch the handle with pliers. However, I have never tried it in person, and I speculate that it could be inconvenient because you might accidentally drop the pot when you roll it. Also, you should wear a mask and a hat, because the grease and the smoke are rather overwhelming…"
Shen Zhe nodded as he wrote on.
It was his precious real-life experience. He was certain that it was a standard answer!
Smiling in satisfaction, he wrote on.
While his handwriting was not good with the brush, he didn't think he would be beaten that day, because he had offered the answer.
"He knows the answer to this question…"
Ling Xueru, who was not getting anywhere, was astonished to see that Shen Zhe was writing fast.
Even she had a rough time producing a speculation and was not sure of its correctness.
However, Shen Zhe was getting more and more confident as he wrote on.
It seemed that he had been truly working hard in that semester, and would not be a bad student anymore.
Ling Xueru was satisfied and comforted again, being able to witness a classmate changing from a tailender to someone who could answer a question that she couldn't.
She smiled and ignored him, focusing on her own calculations.
Not knowing that someone observed him, the more Shen Zhe wrote, the happier he was.
"…After the Purification White Lotus is put in, move the pot back to the fire. At that moment, the coal will be too hot for the pot. To prevent it from being burnt through, you have to pour an appropriate amount of oil…"
Shen Zhe hesitated when he wrote "appropriate amount".
He had poured the oil randomly and didn't measure it. It would be inaccurate to give a specific number. "Appropriate amount" sounded much better.
Every exam was a headache for him in his previous life, but he could pay attention to such tiny details at the moment. He was truly a new person!
No wonder everybody wanted to answer questions and impress the teacher. It truly felt great.
It seemed that he had taken the first step to becoming a real genius…
"Fire will spring when the oil enters the pot. After about three breaths, the Purification White Lotus will melt. Then, add a fair amount of pepper powder into the liquid, and the herbs will integrate perfectly… Right, don't add too much salt, or the liquid will taste awful. This is my lesson. You must remember it carefully…"
The paper was filled up very soon.
He wrote all the steps he performed when he refined the herbs the day before, even with notes about the smell and intensity of the smoke.
Shen Zhe was finally relieved after it was done. He looked around, only to discover that a lot of students were still frowning. Some even hadn't written anything yet.
"Don't they know the answer?"
Shen Zhe scorned them.
They did not know the answer to such a simple question, yet they called themselves good students? How embarrassing!
"Is this a difficult question?"
Seeing that Wang Qing was also chewing his brush, puzzled, Shen Zhe asked him.