"Our class finally got a beauty."
"This handsome guy looks pretty good, too."
"Great, the school beauty is finally going to change, let them from Class Six swagger all they want."
"This sister can throw Deng Tao two streets away."
...
Realizing the reason for everyone clapping, Teacher Gao didn't know whether to laugh or cry, a bunch of wild kids.
He put on a stern face and pretended to scold, "The college entrance exams are coming up, and this is what you're focusing on? Xiao Qi, Yu Hang, you two go downstairs and help the new students bring a desk up."
The last row against the left wall only had one empty desk and chair, so another one had to be moved for both of them to sit down.
Jiang Yan handed his backpack to Song Jiawen and said with a smile to the two boys who had stood up, "I'll go down with you guys to help move it."
He was good at socializing and had become chummy with them by the time they reached downstairs.
After returning and pushing the desks together, he and Song Jiawen became desk mates.
Everyone observed the two new transfer students carefully, noticing that Jiang Yan laughed whenever he spoke and seemed easy to get along with. But Song Jiawen, beneath her refined eyebrows and eyes, seemed colder and more reserved, and not too talkative.
Indeed, since entering the classroom until now, she had not said a single word, not even introducing herself—Jiang Yan did it for her.
It became clear to everyone that they both came from the same school, but the school they transferred from was a town middle school.
After settling their desks and backpacks, the two still had to go take care of their dormitory registration.
Xiao Qi and a slim tall girl sitting in front of Song Jiawen volunteered to take them there.
After several people left, Yu Hang muttered to his desk mate, "Why does Jiang Yan look so familiar to me?"
His desk mate replied while doing exercises, "The name also sounds quite familiar."
Jiang Yan, the same name as the guy who was expelled from Experimental Middle School for fighting.
But it must be a coincidence because this person came from a town middle school, and his personality was completely different—the one from Experimental Middle School was notoriously violent and fond of fighting.
But this one seemed to have a good temper.
There weren't many boarding students at Jianghai No. 1 Middle School. The girl who took Song Jiawen to handle the dormitory procedures was named Wang Xiaole. She took the initiative to ask the dorm manager to place Song Jiawen in her dorm room.
"Now with you joining, our dormitory finally has four people. Oh, right, Song Jiawen, the study committee leader is in our dormitory. If you have any questions about your studies, you can ask her. Besides the class president, she has the best grades in our class, especially in English. She often scores 140—isn't that crazy?"
Song Jiawen didn't know how to respond to this question because in her usual exams, she scored 150 in English, a perfect score.
Of course, she also knew that the difficulty of the town's test papers might not be on par with those in the city, so their 140 could actually hold more value than her 150.
Wang Xiaole was very enthusiastic, helping Song Jiawen move her things to the dorm and even making her bed. After almost everything was organized, she accompanied Song Jiawen back to the classroom.
"Do you know why those boys were clapping so hard for you just now?"
The girl was chatty, and even though Song Jiawen didn't respond much, she kept talking excitedly.
"Our class's Teacher Gao is also the grade director, and our class's grades are the best in the whole grade. Every exam, at least three of the top ten are from our class. But, generally speaking, the looks in our class are not great..."
Wang Xiaole saying 'not great' was actually putting it mildly—Class Six, their archrival holding second place in grades, straight-up called them 'Class Zhu Bajie'.
It was also a coincidence that both the class president and the study committee leader's surnames were Zhu.
And this year's school beauty and school hunk were both from Class Six, and their grades were also decent.
Compared to them, the appearance of their classmates from Class One did indeed all coincidentally...
Coincidentally quite ordinary.
"But now that you're here, Song Jiawen, I bet our classmates definitely see you as the beauty standard of our class behind closed doors."
Song Jiawen wasn't particularly concerned about this. To her, appearance was only superficial and not worth fussing over.
The two of them returned to the classroom, with twenty minutes to spare before the first class of the afternoon began.
Jiang Yan had already returned and was sitting at his desk engrossed in solving problems. As Song Jiawen approached, he stood up to let her through.
"This is a test paper given by Teacher Gao. I looked at the math section, and the difficulty is indeed a bit higher than Jianghai Middle School's, and there are also some new types of questions that I haven't seen before. Do you want to try doing a set?"
At Jianghai Middle School, under normal circumstances, Song Jiawen no longer did the usual practice papers because there was no need.
Unless some teachers wanted to see her problem-solving steps, then she would do them.
But here, she decided to start from scratch again.
After all, they had come from the countryside, and their grades were inflated, not highly substantive.
Jiang Yan spoke these words in a low voice, just loud enough for Song Jiawen to hear.
Song Jiawen glanced at the math paper in his hands. He had finished one side but had made mistakes on three questions.
However, Song Jiawen didn't point them out and took a pen to start writing quietly instead.
Twenty minutes before class, she completed the last two pages of the test paper.
The front was all basic, which she didn't bother with.
In contrast, Jiang Yan had just finished the second side and hadn't even started on the big questions on pages three and four.
He glanced over Song Jiawen's test paper and sighed resignedly.
This freak...
By the end of the afternoon, the entire senior three year knew that a great beauty had transferred to Class Eight Bajie, her looks surpassing that of the school's belle, Deng Tao.
Therefore, during the breaks, there was a continual stream of students running to Class One to admire Song Jiawen's face.
Song Jiawen remained unmoved by this, while Jiang Yan's attention was wholly focused on the test papers, managing to complete all three papers given by Teacher Gao during the breaks.
Then, before the last self-study period, he went to the office to ask Teacher Gao for their previous practice papers.
They had already done and reviewed those papers, and the leftovers weren't of much use, so when Jiang Yan asked to take all of them, Teacher Gao simply gave them to him.
While giving them, Teacher Gao was quite gratified, thinking to himself how earnest this child was in learning. Regardless of his grades, at least his attitude towards studying was very serious.
So, during the last self-study period that afternoon, Song Jiawen saw Jiang Yan come in with a thick stack of test papers.
"I got these from Teacher Gao, about three to four sets each. Pick out the challenging ones to do, then send them to Old Yu."
Being from Experimental Middle School, the review materials were much more comprehensive than those at Jianghai Middle School. Sending these papers over, they could keep busy for a week at least. Most importantly, they would be exposed to many new types of questions, which could help lift their level a bit more.
Thus, during the last self-study period, Song Jiawen went through the tough problems in that stack of papers thoroughly and selectively.
By the time the bell rang for the end of class, she had already finished doing the problems and begun helping Jiang Yan to review the papers.
"Jiang Yan, it's time to eat," said Xiao Qi, who was sitting in the middle of the last row, just across the aisle from Jiang Yan. He had witnessed the miraculous question-solving process of these two transfer students all afternoon.
Jiang Yan did every single paper scrupulously, with a standard pace and an earnest attitude.
But Song Jiawen...
Honestly speaking, Xiao Qi couldn't discern any pattern to her problem-solving. A test paper lasted at most ten minutes in her hands. After doing a portion of it, she'd switch to another, and during the breaks and the self-study period, she had flipped through nearly a dozen papers.
Yes, "flipped through" was how Xiao Qi would describe it because he couldn't think of any other word for it.