The class bell rang.
Footsteps echoed outside the classroom.
Old Man Liu walked in carrying a few test papers.
There weren’t many papers—these were the brutally difficult, nonstandard City High‑School Math Olympiad selection exams from yesterday. Only a handful of students in the class, including Mia Chen and Evan Lin, had even taken it.
Seeing Old Man Liu come in, Mia Chen instantly tensed up.
Yesterday’s exam was insanely hard—she wasn’t confident she’d scored well.
“Yesterday, a few students took a math test. I’ll hand out the papers now,” Old Man Liu said, glancing at the stack.
“Mia Chen, eighty-five points.”
When Old Man Liu read out her score, Mia Chen’s face visibly fell—she was clearly not happy with it.
Old Man Liu seemed to notice her mood and softened his tone: “This paper was out of 120. Scoring eighty-five is already excellent—fewer than ten students in the whole grade broke eighty.”
Old Man Liu’s words made Mia Chen feel a little better. She accepted her paper and returned to her seat.
“Whoa, less than ten people in the whole grade got over eighty? What kind of test was this?” someone whispered in shock.
“I heard Old Man Liu wrote the questions himself. Supposedly it’s nuclear-level hard. I asked Zhao Tianxiang from Class Eight—he said if he got seventy, he’d thank the heavens.”
“Zhao Tianxiang? The guy who always got perfect scores in math back in freshman year?”
“Yeah, that’s him!”
…
The whole class was buzzing—everyone was stunned by how tough the test was.
Up at the podium, Old Man Liu picked up the next paper and announced, “Next, Evan Lin—one hundred and ten points.”
Old Man Liu’s voice was calm, his face mostly expressionless, but Mia Chen still noticed that as he spoke, he lifted his chin slightly and squinted at Evan Lin sitting in the back row.
“One hundred and ten? Evan Lin!”
Mia Chen was stunned at first, then felt as if she’d taken a punch to the chest.
During the exam yesterday, Evan Lin had handed in his paper halfway through. At the time, Mia assumed he’d given up because the test was just too brain-melting.
Because of that, Mia had quietly looked down on Evan for ‘retreating in the face of difficulty’—she thought it was pretty shameful.
But now, as she turned to see Evan Lin lazily getting up from his seat, her mouth fell open and a bitter taste rose in her throat.
“Holy crap!”
“Did I hear that right? Evan Lin got one hundred and ten?”
For a moment, the whole class went silent—then the room exploded with shouts of disbelief.
Every eye in the room landed on Evan Lin—some shocked, some confused, most just unable to believe it.
Evan walked up to the podium, took the test paper from Old Man Liu, and glanced over it calmly.
Most of the points he lost were for not writing out full solution steps. The last problem was hit especially hard—six points gone. Other than that, the paper was basically perfect.
“You did great this time. I never realized you had real math talent before—that’s my mistake.” Old Man Liu looked at Evan Lin with rare warmth on his usually stern face, even smiling slightly. “Also, get ready to come with me to River City tomorrow for the City High‑School Math Olympiad. Do you have time?”
“Did I just see that right?” The students stared at Old Man Liu’s expression, totally dumbfounded.
“The math teacher actually smiled? What the heck!” a boy blurted out, jaw dropping.
“Old Man Liu’s always been known as an iron-faced hardass. I’ve never seen him smile before!”
“And the City High‑School Math Olympiad? He’s letting Evan Lin join? Is he serious?”
Old Man Liu’s attitude left every student in the room totally stunned.
All these years, only top students like Mia Chen ever got praised by Old Man Liu. But today, not only did Evan Lin get called gifted, Old Man Liu even smiled at him! You could tell he was so happy he couldn’t hide it anymore.
“City High‑School Math Olympiad?” Evan Lin frowned slightly—he didn’t care about these contests. Even winning first place meant nothing to him.
“Yeah, I think your family will definitely support you. If you win a prize, they’ll be really proud.” Old Man Liu nodded, speaking gently.
He’d paid special attention to Evan Lin these last few days, even asked around with other teachers about him.
Most of what Old Man Liu heard was negative, but he still noticed something interesting.
For example, back in tenth grade, Evan Lin got into a fight—not because someone insulted him, but because they insulted his mother.
That actually fit Old Man Liu’s personality pretty well. And with Evan’s math scores getting more and more monstrous, Old Man Liu found himself liking the kid more and more.
“Uh.” Evan Lin paused, lost in thought.
It was true—his grades had always sucked before. He’d never given his mom a reason to be proud. If he could go to the City High‑School Math Olympiad and win something, she’d be over the moon.
Thinking this, Evan nodded—he agreed to go.
Even though this was what Old Man Liu expected, when Evan nodded, he actually felt relieved for once. He nodded back: “You don’t need to come to class tomorrow morning. Sleep in a bit—just meet me at the school gate at ten. Bring a couple changes of clothes.”
After giving all these instructions, Old Man Liu finally let Evan Lin go back to his seat and started the lesson.
But everything that just happened had already left a deep impression on the students.
Mia Chen felt complicated. She turned to glance at Evan Lin sitting in the back row.
Evan sat there, flipping through his test paper, then stuffed it in his desk. He yawned, and—right in front of Mia’s dumbfounded stare—casually lay down on his desk and went to sleep.
“City High‑School Math Olympiad… I hope the problems are actually challenging.”
“Perfect. I’ll use this chance to look for some spirit herbs in River City. Breaking through to Foundation Establishment is still the real priority.”
Evan Lin quietly pondered, his mind calm and peaceful.