Yang Dan and her friends naturally had no idea about that one-sided matchmaking attempt in Jianglin Village on Saturday, but upon their return, they ran into Song Xiaoli, the big mouth, spouting nonsense beside the girls' restroom.
She was saying how Jiajia had tried to seduce her cousin's son, and after the family came to propose marriage, she turned them down because they didn't meet her standards. She also claimed that Jiajia, who seemed so proper on the surface, was actually crazy in private, that she had toyed with so and so from their village, and that she was flaunting her looks all over…
Yang Dan couldn't bear to listen anymore, and she didn't give Song Xiaoli the chance to continue, walking right up to her and slapping her across the face.
Since she was accompanied by a few girls from Class Two, and those from Class Two were always united, when Yang Dan lashed out, they weren't just going to stand by and watch, which made those girls who were idly gossiping retreat immediately, afraid to help.
A few of them at the restroom entrance beat up Song Xiaoli. The girl who had just entered the classroom to persuade Yang Dan to calm down and not to resort to violence actually hit the hardest, and it was she who had yanked a patch of hair from Song Xiaoli's head.
Well, there was no helping it, they were athletes after all, with a lot of strength in their hands.
After hearing Yang Dan's description, Jiang Yan sneered, "Your cousin really is a 'fine blade'." But she's a bit of an idiot.
Song Xiaoli was the daughter of Song Jiawen's great-uncle and was two years her senior.
At the start of their education, she was two grades above Song Jiawen, but after failing to get into high school in her third year of junior high, she had to repeat the grade. Meanwhile, Song Jiawen skipped a grade and took the middle school exam as a second-year, so they ended up in the same grade in high school.
As a result, Song Xiaoli inevitably became an object of comparison, both at home and in the village, but how could she possibly outdo Song Jiawen?
Leaving aside appearance and height, their intellects weren't even in the same league.
Because of this, Song Xiaoli often faced ridicule at home, with her parents lamenting how she lacked the intelligence someone else had, questioning how could that person be so smart and even skip a grade.
And her?
Let's not even talk about skipping grades; she had to repeat her third year of junior high just to get into high school.
Originally, when she didn't pass the first year, her parents wanted her to stop schooling, arguing that for a girl, completing junior high was enough; there was no need for further education and wasting money.
But Song Xiaoli was not willing to give up. She wanted to go to college like Song Xiwen, work in the city, and never return to the rural life.
So, she knelt down and pleaded with her parents, eventually earning one more chance to retake the year.
Who would have thought that, after a year of hard work and finally getting into high school, she would be overshadowed by the more youthful Song Jiawen, who skipped a grade to take the middle school exam?
This left her, despite finally having made it into high school, without a shred of happiness.
Because everyone knew that she only barely managed to get into high school after repeating a year, while Song Jiawen effortlessly earned the title of county's top student without even finishing junior high.
Because of this, her parents were extremely disgusted with her.
But that was just the beginning. Once she started high school at Jianghai Middle School, she truly realized the horror of living in Song Jiawen's shadow.
Although they were cousins, as children, everyone in their village said Song Jiawen was a weirdo—unsociable, uncommunicative. Their families weren't on the best of terms either, so Song Xiaoli had little to do with Song Jiawen growing up, and before high school, she was always two grades ahead and never paid attention to her achievements.
After reaching high school and being in the same grade, even though they were not in the same class, within just six months, the whole school knew that the advanced freshman, Song Jiawen, was a study freak.
Especially in the sciences, scoring full marks was almost a normal occurrence for her on exams.
What made it even more infuriating was that she didn't seem to study very hard, sometimes drawing during study periods, and being able to skip evening self-study to sleep in the dormitory if she felt tired...
And the teachers were extremely tolerant of her behavior.
This left Song Xiaoli, who was studying hard to the point of dizziness every day, with a bitter sense of injustice... How can such people exist in this world?
As a result, Song Xiaoli detested Song Jiawen deeply, and over the two-plus years from their first to last year of high school, she took every opportunity to badmouth her.
She said that, although Song Jiawen had good grades, her parents didn't care for her because she was stubborn and cold-hearted; or she would recount how Song Jiawen had seriously injured someone in a fight as a child, showing no mercy even to older boys...
With a crowd comes gossip. Although some didn't believe it, others were skeptical, and still others listened with relish, eager for the drama.
But with Song Jiawen's fame being what it was, various versions of rumors about her spread throughout the school.
In their second year of high school, their homeroom teacher became Mr. Yu, who was annoyed by these idle rumors circulating the campus. Worried that they might affect his prized student, he consulted with the head of teaching and the principal. During a school assembly, he made a point of emphasizing and warning that any further spreading of unfounded rumors would result in expulsion!