I am a Big Player
Chapter 148 - 147. This is an Unconventional Top Scholar (Second Update)_1

Chapter 148: 147. This is an Unconventional Top Scholar (Second Update)_1

Although Director Liu had confirmed that Ren He really did snag the top score in the middle school exams, he simply had no intention of trying to persuade Ren He to stay at their school for high school.

Not to mention how baffling the results were, just dealing with the commotion was too much for his heart to bear!

Under normal circumstances, if a student from his school became the top scorer, he would have rushed to the student’s home with gifts of daily necessities, plus a cash reward, and even promised a tuition-free high school experience with an additional 500 yuan per month!

But now...

Director Liu could only hope that since the kid scored so well, regardless of how it was achieved, he would quickly move on to a high school that matched such high scores, like Luo City First High School!

At this thought, Liu was quite pleased. When Xie Miaohan had told him that Ren He wanted to attend their high school, he nearly lost his mind! Now, since the kid scored so high, he would certainly go to a better school.

Ha-ha, this meant that both his and Xie’s worries were gone!

Director Liu called Xie Miaohan and said, "I have some good news for you!"

Xie Miaohan, completely confused, asked, "What good news, are we getting a raise?"

"A raise? That’s for the city’s finance department to decide, not us. Listen, Ren He is this year’s middle school exam top scorer!" Director Liu said with a smile.

"What?!" Xie Miaohan was stunned at the moment: "How is that possible?"

"Don’t be too shocked. I’m just asking you, if you scored that high, would you still attend Luo First High, a second-rate school?" Director Liu said.

Yeah, on hearing this, Xie Miaohan was overjoyed. Who wouldn’t want to attend the most prestigious school possible? With such high scores, how could Ren He possibly stay at their school? This was indeed good news!

Director Liu continued, "So, normally, I’d have to talk to his parents and him to see how to keep him at our school, but think about it, I don’t even have to bother with that for him. Even if I wanted to meet him, I’m not high-ranking enough to meet Secretary Ren! Now, I’m just hoping that he’ll hurry up and go mess with the teachers at Luo First High!"

"Ha-ha, Liu, that’s not right. That’s a brother institution, you can’t think like that!" Xie joked, now in the mood for laughter himself.

"Cut the act, I’m just sharing the good news with you in advance. The announcement of the top scorer won’t be until this afternoon. Don’t go blabbering about it everywhere!" After giving his instructions, Director Liu hung up the phone and picked up his tea cup, contentedly returning to his newspaper.

Today was a day of double happiness. They had produced a top scorer to boost next year’s student recruitment and could send off a calamity. He’d have to drink in celebration tonight; he and his wife hadn’t had a tender moment in a long time, maybe tonight...

When afternoon arrived, the recruitment office suddenly announced this year’s middle school exam top scorer: 13 Middle School, 8th Grade Class 2, Ren He!

Those who didn’t know Ren He wouldn’t feel much about it, but those who did...

Xu Nuo looked bewildered, and whispered to Ren He at his side, "You’re way too fierce, aren’t you? Risking being caught for accepting leaked exam questions from Uncle Ren?"

By this point, Xu Nuo was almost certain that Ren He had gotten the actual exam papers through his Uncle Ren...

Ren He gave Xu Nuo’s "pig face" a shove, his face dark, "Get lost, get lost, get lost, I don’t want to see you right now."

To accidentally become the top scorer, damn, while it’s cool to be a top scorer, this came about way too mysteriously. How many people who knew him would believe it?

"Extraordinary performance" doesn’t even begin to explain it!

And Ren He had never wanted to become famous through something like this. What good was that fleeting fame and a bit of prize money to him?

Nor did he know what the physics and chemistry paper markers were thinking. They really dared to award those marks! At that time, no one knew that the famous "joke paper" was Ren He’s. Even the marker didn’t know whose paper it was since the name was covered. Only the teacher recording the marks knew, and they recorded them subject by subject without seeing the total score.

When Yang Xi congratulated Ren He for becoming the top scholar, she did so with laughter, saying, "Your chemistry and physics exam papers really pulled through for you!"

"Hehe..." Ren He was speechless, thinking if the provincial exam administration ever discovered the truth, who knows what kind of trouble they’d stir up.

But being the top scholar was ultimately a good thing, and Ren He didn’t have much to complain about. Accidentally becoming the top scholar would make quite an impressive story to tell his future kids—a form of unintentional boasting, the most lethal kind!

By then, he could tell his children: Your dad didn’t intend to be the top scholar originally, but, lost in the moment, I wrote an entire paper of jokes and ended up as the top scholar...

As per tradition, the provincial top scholar’s exam papers had to be archived at the exam administration office. A few teachers joint forces to fish out Ren He’s papers from the sea of exam scripts, but when they started to seriously go over this set of papers, they were dumbfounded!

It was him! It was actually him!

The dense array of jokes on the physics and chemistry papers made them instantly grimace in discomfort!

"Who graded this paper..."

"Who knows, with so many teachers grading papers at the same time, who can tell which one of them did this?"

The people from the provincial exam administration inhaled sharply, "This is a big deal. The provincial top scholar writing jokes on their exam paper and still scoring high! If this gets out, won’t the next batch of students follow suit? Next year’s exams will just be everyone waiting to read jokes on their papers!"

Just imagining the scene was unbearable—everyone grading papers together, then gathering around to share the jokes they found?

Damn it, this is a top scholar without any seriousness!

"But we’ve already made the information public, what do we do now?"

"What else can we do?" Director Liu took a deep breath, "Seal the papers and act as if nothing happened. If anyone lets slip about this set of papers, they’re going to have a problem with me!"

"Right, right, the director’s right, just seal them and pretend nothing happened!"

So Ren He’s papers were sealed away in the archive cabinet of the provincial exam administration office, and everyone acted as if they were in on a huge secret, resolving to keep their lips sealed...

Meanwhile, Ren He hadn’t yet received any change of information from the provincial exam administration when he got a call from Old Ren. Old Ren had never imagined his own son could achieve the top scholar of the provincial exam; he always thought Ren He wasn’t cut out for academics and hadn’t paid much attention to his studies.

Even though he could confuse what grade Ren He was in, this time he was certain—the top scholar of the provincial exam was his son indeed!

Learning this news, Old Ren felt the world was full of surprises; this was an enormous delight!

After Old Ren’s call came one from Mrs. Ren, who on the spot decided over the phone to give Ren He 500 yuan as a reward!

A paltry 500 for being the top scholar, but Ren He was used to Mrs. Ren’s stinginess before his graduation. After he graduated, it’s all about buying houses and cars, but as long as he hadn’t graduated, it was difficult for Ren He to even scrape 100 yuan from Mrs. Ren Min!

However, what surprised Old Ren and Mrs. Ren was, why hadn’t any school leaders from 13th Middle School contacted them? Even if they were busy, they knew how it worked: if a student from their school became the top scholar, the school’s leaders would definitely contact the student’s parents to discuss awards and other matters.

But for them, they hadn’t received any call from the school whatsoever...

Something felt off...

...

There are two more Chapters of sponsored updates, thanks to the generous donors. I’ll take a short break and continue writing.