C5

　　He was right! He was right!

　　Chen Yan only felt cold, this midterm exam was a joint exam, and the standard answers he had made had been sent to each school two days ago. If… if it was pointed out to him by teachers from other schools, not to mention his own face, even the face of Dongliu Middle School wouldn’t look good.

　　Most importantly, he was the head of the biology teaching team! In order to this team leader position, he did a whole year of preparation, working and spending a lot of money, just waiting for the formal appointment. He was waiting for his appointment to be made official, but there was a mistake.

　　Teacher Zhu probably saw what Chen Yan was thinking and spoke up, “Young man, mistakes are always inevitable.” Casually consoling Chen Yan, he turned his head to look at Li Zheng with great interest.

　　”Not bad for a young student, he has a wide range of knowledge!”

　　Liu Huiying didn’t expect Li Zheng to change the situation in just two words, and to get Chen Yan into such a mess.

　　Moreover, Li Zheng’s words just now were justified, what with Bejerink and Wendell, not many people knew about it even if they were teachers at the school, right?

　　”Little Zheng you… “Liu Huiying’s mood was unexplainably complicated, but more than that, she was delighted, did this mean that Li Zheng could still saved.

　　”I just usually like to read a little.” Li Zheng scratched his head and curved his smiling eyes to look at Liu Huiying, the warmth coming from those eyes made it seem as if he was under a warm sun.

　　Liu Huiying’s face showed a hint of a trance, through Li Zheng she seemed to see another similar face.

　　”It’s good that you love to read books. But Little Zheng, you’re in high school now, it’s the most critical time, you’ll definitely be able to get into college if you spend your time reading school books!” Just for a moment, Liu Huiying had come back to her senses, and she grabbed Li Zheng’s hand and instructed in detail.

　　”Your teacher Liu is right, it’s good to love reading, but you have to realize the importance of the college entrance exam, and whether you want to wind up in the fields or sit in the office in the future will depend on these two years.” Teacher Zhu was obviously very impressed with Li Zheng and said a few more words in a rare moment.

　　At this time, the class bell rang

　　Li Zheng quickly walked out of the office, but didn’t expect Chen Yan to follow. When the two of them walked into the classroom, Li Zheng realized that this was a biology class.

　　Chen Yan was in a bit of a trance, and he was probably still thinking about the standard answers.

　　When Li Zheng entered, he saw Li Chaoyang with a questioning look of concern, and he nodded to him that he was fine.

　Going to sit on the seat, Li Zheng flipped through the biology textbooks, which were all very basic biological knowledge, because Chinese biology started late, and many of the theories were copied from the West.

　　The objective existence of the language difference between China and the West made it very difficult to translate professional works, and many of the Chinese expressions in the textbooks seemed completely crude and messy.

　　If in his last life, his students would have dared to submit such an answer to him, they would have been thoroughly scolded by him. However… he now had to memorize this textbook properly.

　　That was right, memorize it. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be good if he accidentally wrote some great discovery in the history of biology.

　　Chen Yan stood on the podium for class, but his heart was like a bucket of water hanging in the air, and when he saw how Li Zheng was hanging on to his biology textbook and quickly flipping through it, his heart burst into flames.

　　Remembering the rumors he heard on the way, Chen Yan suddenly spoke with a cold smile, “Some people haven’t come to class for days, and probably don’t know what grade they actually belong to in the school with these papers. There are more than 500 students in the school, and only 60 of them have a total score of 250 or less. What kind of face do students with such scores have to sit in the classroom at Dongliu High School!”

　　Li Zheng’s hand flipping through the book paused, his total score seemed to be 249….

　　On the podium, Chen Yan’s speech continued, “Poor academic performance is not scary, what is scariest is a person’s poor character! Many of us in the class were born fishermen and know what this season means to fishermen, and I’ve already heard of several parents who have been out on their boats day and night these past few days and won’t even take a night off, but!”

　　When he heard this, Li Zheng’s eyes had narrowed, and he probably knew what Chen Yan wanted to say. But it had only been a few days, and this rumor had already reached the ears of a teacher in the next town, was it possible to say that no one was fueling the rumor?

　　”And yet, I am told that someone in my class has allowed a boat that should have gone out to sea to be locked up on the dock all alone for his own selfish reasons! One more boat, how many fishermen can make one less trip to the sea, how many families can have one more bite to eat. I didn’t think that a student who had received a moral education in New China would do such a thing, this is simply moral turpitude!”

　　Chen Yan spoke with great emotion and feeling, and his words were infectious. Many of the fishermen-born students in the class also wore expressions of righteous indignation on their faces, after all, the ones who went out to sea day and night at a time were their first cousins.

　　”That’s Li Zheng, right.”

　　”No, I heard that Yang Kaijian’s father even went to his door personally to do his thinking and sent the old hen, but Li Zheng still won’t let up.”

　　”How selfish.”

　　”Exactly!”

　　There were more and more rustling noises, and many students began to look at Li Zheng in a bad light.

　　Li Chaoyang got anxious, “Don’t talk nonsense, Li Zheng is just a student like us, those adults are stupid, he said he won’t let the boat sail, there must be another reason!” He stood up and said loudly.

“Che, it’s still those people who were kind enough to say something about his dad just passing away. Li Zheng’s dad is a dad, our dads are not dads, my dad almost didn’t come back from a night out to sea two days ago to get more harvest!” A young man in the back row suddenly stood up and roared.

　　Hearing this, Li Zheng slowly stood up from his seat, he turned around and suddenly bowed to the class. The crowd was shocked by Li Zheng’s sudden action, and the anger in their hearts that had been stirred up by Chen Yan’s words suddenly subsided by half.

　　The corner of Li Zheng’s mouth, who maintained his bow, slightly quirked, although in his last life he had spent most of his time in the lab, how could the information of the twenty-first century be compared to this era?

　　In the field of biopharmaceuticals, there was this saying circulating, America’s scoundrel, China’s Taiji, Japan’s apology, those pharmaceutical companies that accidentally had drug experiment accidents relied on these means to gain public understanding time and time again.

　　America’s rogue was relying on its great overall strength, which Li Zheng did not have. China’s Taiji Shifting Technique was too profound for him to cultivate at this level, and the only thing he could learn from was the Japanese apologetic technique.

　　Li Zheng’s bow remained for some time, seeing that the entire classroom was as quiet as a chicken, he slowly straightened up and spoke, “First of all, I would like to apologize, because of my father’s sudden death, I haven’t had the heart to care about the ship, and I never thought that a ship not sailing for a few days would have such a big impact.”

　　If Li Zheng opened his mouth to argue, the students who were in the midst of their anger would definitely be preoccupied and think that Li Zheng was being sophomoric. But Li Zheng bowed first, and the anger of the crowd, who were at a loss for words, subsided by half, plus his apology and the fact that Li’s father had passed away, which was inadvertently mentioned in his words, made the crowd’s minds clear.

　　Li Zheng was just a high school student like them, and in a different position, if this happened to them, they were afraid that they wouldn’t be able to hand over the ship so selflessly.

　　The students in the class looked at each other and lost their voices.

　　Li Zheng’s voice turned, and his sharp gaze stared at Chen Yan, who was on the podium and looked surprised as Li Zheng instantly turned the situation around, “Teacher Chen, you have just said that you are hearing. Do you think it’s a teacher’s proper behavior to spread an unconfirmed rumor in front of his own students? I even think that you are deliberately trying to provoke a fight!” Li Zheng said in a stern voice.

　　The Chinese leadership, which had just emerged from the turmoil, placed great emphasis on stability. If the pot were to buckle, Chen Yan might not even be able to keep his job.

　　Li Zheng’s voice was loud, the school building in the eighties was not as spacious as it would be in later times, the teachers’ offices including the principal’s office and the classrooms of each grade were crowded in this small floor, and it happened that the principal’s office was right next to the eighth class of the senior class, so Li Zheng’s words easily reached the ears of Principal Zhang who was working in his office.

　　Principal Zhang came at the sound of the news and stood in front of the back door of Senior Class 8, his face very grim.

　　Chen Yan didn’t notice Principal Zhang’s arrival, but his anger was aroused by Li Zheng’s words, and when he thought of what had just happened in the office, his face actually became a little grim as he looked at Li Zheng.

　　”Even if you didn’t hand over the boat because your father died. But as a student of communist ideology… But as a student educated in communist ideology, you can’t tell the difference between your big self and your small self! At the end of the day, it’s selfishness and capitalist egoism at work!” Chen Yan pointed at Li Zheng’s face and roared.

　　Li Zheng smiled instead of anger, the sun shining through the glass just right on the side of his face, making it look like his hair strands were glowing.

　　”Egoism? According to you, you should pay your family’s share of food stamps a little more, after all, it’s self-interest for you to take more and for others to take less.”

　　”How it’s the same! I pay public food in exchange for my food stamps, and I let the land the state allotted to me be put to good use, that’s contributing to the country, and naturally I deserve them! And you! And yet you don’t go to sea but still occupy the boats of the production team, making them less productive!”

　　Li Chaoyang couldn’t hear any more, “Alright Mr. Chen, Li Zheng has apologized, so you can’t be unforgiving. Let’s start class.”

　　”Yeah, yeah.” The students in the class echoed sparsely.

　　Chen Yan’s face stiffened, he thought he had caught Li Zheng’s sore spot, but he couldn’t continue to play, he was really a bit unhappy. But at least he had some sense of being a teacher, and when he saw that everyone had taken such a stand, he wasn’t going to continue, so he gave Li Zheng a cold glance and said with attitude, “Some words don’t need to be made clear, but I can’t rub the sand in your eyes, so some of you should take another good look at your ideological and moral textbooks.”

　　As he said that, he took out his textbook and planned to continue his lecture.

　　But Li Zheng suddenly said, “I wonder where you heard, Teacher Chen, that I was occupying the production team’s boat to prevent it from going into the sea?”