Push Me Away When I Come, Don't Hold Me Back When I Leave - Chapter 22

Chapter 22: You Ask For My Strategy? Draw the Sword and Sever Fate!

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The next day, Xia Ruoming sat in her seat, ignoring both Xu Fengwu’s gaze and Ji Chuan’s somewhat gloomy look.

Xiao Qinghan walked into the classroom and began announcing the test scores. She always prioritized encouragement in her teaching, praising students who showed improvement, and never publicly mentioning how many points someone had dropped, only giving private guidance later about where problems occurred.

“Xu Fengwu, 625 points, improved by 6 points, very good.” Xiao Qinghan smiled at Xu Fengwu from the podium. She had already asked about Xu Fengwu’s college aspirations, and although Tsinghua University was still far off, her current score had already passed Zhejiang University’s projected liberal arts threshold. With a bit more improvement, getting into Zhejiang University should be almost certain.

Applause and cheers erupted from below.

“Xia Ruoming, 618 points, improved by 36 points from the last test. Keep up the effort, maintain this and you’ll have no pressure getting into a top national university.”

Unlike the previous reaction, after Xiao Qinghan’s words, the entire class fell silent, including Chu Suhe and Xu Fengwu, all staring at Xia Ruoming in disbelief. Everyone knew she wasn’t the type to cheat for attention, which made it even more unbelievable.

It was well known that she had been dumped by Xu Fengwu just days ago, and everyone had seen how close to breakdown she had been. Everyone had assumed Xia Ruoming would definitely bomb this test, especially after turning it in early that morning, they thought she had given up, and were practically ready to find her ID card and copies among playing cards.

Instead, Xia Ruoming achieved a better score than ever before, with such significant improvement.

Could severing emotional ties really lead to such transformation?

Xia Ruoming just gave a slight laugh. This was actually her holding back, deliberately getting some answers wrong. If she had improved by 50 or 60 points, probably no one would believe it and it would only cause unnecessary trouble. She wondered how shocked Xiao Qinghan would be when she gave it her all in the final mock exam.

“Ji Chuan, 556 points, improved by 28 points, also very good. You’ve already passed the projected first-tier university line, worthy of praise.” Xiao Qinghan looked at the shocked Ji Chuan and led the applause.

Ji Chuan’s eyes nearly popped out, unable to believe he had improved so quickly.

This was actually part of Xia Ruoming’s plan. Ji Chuan had good aptitude, but could he really improve that much in one day? That was impossible, but Xia Ruoming knew what important questions would be on the upcoming test and had tutored Ji Chuan on similar problems beforehand. This way, with his talent, he could solve these problems during the test using the knowledge he had learned.

People only strive when they believe they have potential; otherwise, even with talent, those who consider themselves worthless might only waste time.

Xia Ruoming wanted Ji Chuan to know he had the potential for learning. She was very satisfied with her results, and Xiao Qinghan was equally pleased. Ji Chuan had always presented an image of being playful and careless, with a casual attitude toward lectures, seemingly not very serious.

Xiao Qinghan had thought that after Xia Ruoming’s emotional blow, hanging out with Ji Chuan would make her grades even worse than imagined. But not only did she improve her own scores, she also helped improve the grades of Ji Chuan, who usually had poor performance and attitude. This showed she not only had a unique and effective learning method but was also good at tutoring others.

As the saying goes, one takes on the color of one’s surroundings, whether red or black. This seemed to apply to Ji Chuan as well.

“Xia Ruoming, since you’re so happy, could you share with everyone your study methods that allowed you to improve so quickly while helping those around you benefit as well?” Xiao Qinghan asked the seemingly cheerful Xia Ruoming, half-jokingly.

“You ask for my strategy? Draw the sword and sever fate!”

Xia Ruoming stood up, responding with an equally playful answer, while winking at the teasing classmates behind her and making a hushing gesture.

The well-groomed Xia Ruoming wearing light makeup could be described as peerlessly elegant, and this gesture made some of the female students who already secretly admired her blush.

Among the many teasing students, only Xu Fengwu’s face turned pale. She hadn’t even had time to be happy about her own score before hearing Xia Ruoming’s score, and then hearing Xia Ruoming’s response to Xiao Qinghan about drawing the sword and severing fate.

Could her own words about going to Zhejiang University and them no longer being in the same world have motivated her to work so hard?

She knew exactly how big the score gap between them had been, but now their scores were only a few points apart, and theoretically, Xia Ruoming had also passed Zhejiang University’s liberal arts threshold!

She had proven that she really could follow in her footsteps to Zhejiang University, but now she wouldn’t follow anymore.

Because she held a sword and cut the threads of love, or rather, it was Xu Fengwu who held the sword and cut Xia Ruoming’s threads of love.

In these few days, she had wanted to cry more times than in the past 5 years combined.

“Oh? Now that you’ve severed fate and achieved enlightenment, can you ascend directly to become the top scholar and bring glory to our class monitor?” Xiao Qinghan, completely dropping her teacher’s demeanor, continued joking after hearing Xia Ruoming’s response.

“Of course! As long as Sister Qinghan promises that if I become the top scholar, you’ll honor me by letting me treat you to dinner at the Crowne Plaza five-star hotel?” Xia Ruoming’s expression hadn’t changed, maintaining a confident look throughout.

The entire class was stunned. What was this blatant flirting trying to accomplish? Wasn’t chasing Xu Fengwu enough? Now you want our class dream girl Teacher Xiao Qinghan too? Moreover, everyone thought to themselves, you’re actually making a move, with a 7-8 year age gap between you, are you kidding! Are all lesbians into older women in this world?

Xiao Qinghan also paused at this moment, not only because of the dinner invitation — usually, wasn’t it about getting treats from teachers? — but also because of her informal way of speaking, not even calling her teacher anymore, directly addressing her as Sister Qinghan.

Hadn’t she said before that if she exceeded expectations in the mock exam, she would get her to treat her to dinner?

What kind of person was this, so unrestrained, so wild?

Clearly not expecting Xia Ruoming to answer this way, Xiao Qinghan laughed after her momentary surprise: “Alright, if you can become the top scholar, I’ll treat all of you to Crowne Plaza Hotel. I’ll cover all expenses, even if it costs six figures, I won’t bat an eye.”

Amid the cheers of everyone, Xia Ruoming still pretended to look disappointed: “Ah, looks like I’ve missed another chance for a candlelit dinner and private world with Sister Qinghan.”

Before she could finish speaking, a piece of chalk flew over, hitting her right between the eyebrows.

“Sit down, getting carried away, aren’t you? You haven’t even become top scholar yet.”

Xia Ruoming stuck out her tongue and sat back down.

Then Xiao Qinghan signaled Chu Suhe to come up and distribute the answer sheets, then asked students to take out their test papers to compare answers, and began teaching.

“The difficult point of this question is… many students made mistakes because…”