TL: Hua

Chapter 118: So high?

Regarding the college entrance exam, ordinary families mostly care about how their own children or the children of relatives and friends performed.

However, within the entertainment industry, fans, haters, and even some celebrities themselves have a much broader scope of concern. They pay attention to the scores of every single artist who took the exam this year.

To facilitate comparison, netizens even created a list, waiting for each team’s scores to be released before filling in each artist’s score and sorting them from high to low, making it easy for everyone to mock, ridicule, or praise and congratulate.

The college entrance exam can be considered a small-scale online gathering for entertainment fans, and it’s usually very lively around this time every year.

This year, with Lin Yanran’s participation, the exam scores have become even more eye-catching.

Minutes before the results were released, the comments under Lin Yanran’s Weibo began to refresh constantly, second by second.

Haters or passers-by who want to watch a good show keep repeating the same sentence.

[Has the score been released yet?]

Lin Yanran is 23 years old. Having graduated so many years ago, ordinary people would have long forgotten their high school knowledge.

For someone like him returning to campus, he was inherently at a disadvantage compared to serious high school students who had just spent three years consistently studying.

Additionally, he is a celebrity. In the impetuous environment of the entertainment industry, few people believed he could truly settle down and remain completely unaffected.

The haters might never have been celebrities, but most of them had experienced the college entrance exam.

Everyone knows how much effort must be put into that final year of high school to achieve a good score.

During the year, they saw Lin Yanran juggling between filming, performing in musicals, and producing an album…

So, in the eyes of the haters, the evidence they previously used to claim Yanran was unmotivated and wasn’t working on his career now shifted: since he was taking the college entrance exam, the fact that he was doing all these flashy things meant he surely wasn’t taking the exam seriously…

Watching these comments, Hong Huixue couldn’t help but feel nervous as well.

She had previously asked Lin Yanran for a rough estimate of his score, and he had replied that he should have done quite well.

Though she trusted Lin Yanran, seeing the aggressive momentum of the people online made her very worried.

If Lin Yanran really failed to get into a decent university, these people would likely mock him to death.

After all, while Lin Yanran hadn’t had many activities for half a year, his data metrics remained strong, and with a movie and an album coming out soon, there were plenty of people looking for any reason to prevent his success and attack him.

While the netizens were excited, Lin Yanran was calmly chatting with Gu Siye.

He had originally intended to meet Gu Siye after returning from his trip, but his flight was delayed. By the time he returned, it was already late, so he went home with his parents instead.

Of course, he knew very well that his parents cared deeply about his college entrance exam results. Though they didn’t say it out loud, they were desperate to witness this important moment with him.

Lin Yanran looked up quietly at his mother and father, who were constantly checking their phones, and smilingly typed a line of text.

light: My parents have already checked their phones ten times.

Gu Siye replied to him immediately.

moon: All parents are like this. They are probably more nervous than you right now.

Gu Siye was stating a common phenomenon, and Lin Yanran knew it too.

He typed a line, then deleted it. Like an outsider who had nothing to do with the situation, he instead teased Gu Siye.

light: What about you, Teacher Gu? As a family member, how do you feel right now?

Gu Siye’s gaze fell on the words “family member,” and a smile he couldn’t hold back touched the corners of his mouth.

moon: If the family member tells the truth, will he be blocked?

light: So that means you’re not nervous or concerned at all then.

light: [shrug.jpg]

moon: No.

moon: Rather than being nervous or worried, I’m more curious about your ranking.

light: How so?

Lin Yanran found Gu Siye’s words quite interesting.

Most people care about the score, but he went ahead and skipped that step, caring instead about the ranking.

moon: If I said first in the province, it might not be humble enough, so let’s keep it low-key and guess the top three.

Gu Siye wasn’t speaking nonsense. He usually accompanied Lin Yanran while he studied, so he knew his level.

Seeing this slightly relaxed message from Gu Siye, Lin Yanran’s eyes filled with a smile.

light: Teacher Gu, you trust me that much?

Lin Yanran waited to see how Gu Siye would reply, but what the other sent next was a reminder.

moon: It’s ten o’clock.

At the same time Gu Siye’s message appeared, his mother’s voice reached Lin Yanran’s ears: “Baby, the scores can be checked now.”

Lin Yanran responded with a sound, put away his phone, and went straight to the laptop that had already been set up.

His father and mother sat on either side of him, their eyes never leaving the screen for a moment.

Lin Yanhui even took out his glasses and put them on to see more clearly.

Following the steps to check the results, Lin Yanran clicked on the search button on the website.

However, because there were too many people accessing it at this moment, the scores did not pop up immediately.

At this time, every minute and second of waiting became an ultimate test of patience.

The page kept spinning, stuck for two or three minutes without loading.

After waiting a while longer with no score, Lin Yanran prepared to refresh the page.

Just then, his phone lit up.

He glanced over and saw that it was a unified college entrance exam text message sent to candidates throughout the province.

The score was also in this message, but it was obscured because the text was too long.

Lin Yanran picked up his phone, intending to read it.

But just as he lowered his head to check the text, he heard his father’s vigorous shout.

“It’s out!”

Lin Yanran looked up, and a magnificent transcript appeared before his eyes.

National Unified Examination for Enrollment of Ordinary Higher Education Institutions in XX Province 20xx

Name: Lin Yanran

Candidate Number: xxxxxxxxxxxxx

Literature: 135

Mathematics: 150

Foreign Language: 147

Comprehensive Science: 282

Total Score: 714

Provincial Ranking: 2

The text message on the phone was opened at the same time, and the score on it was exactly the same as the one displayed on the screen!

Xie Roufei, who was usually elegant and gentle, hugged Lin Yanran tightly, so excited that she was speechless.

Lin Yanhui also checked the score several times. Immediately after, he started a WeChat video call with his parents and his parents-in-law in their family group.

“Total score 714, ranked second in the province, a perfect score in mathematics, 147 in English…”

Lin Yanhui, who rarely showed his emotions, spoke with uncontrollable excitement and thrill. In just a few seconds, he had memorized his son’s score for every single subject clearly and reported them one by one in detail to the elders.

Too promising !!

Their precious son was truly too promising!!

In all these years, no one in the Lin family had ever achieved such a high score!

Listening to the joyful voices of his parents sharing the news, Lin Yanran took a screenshot of the transcript and sent it to Gu Siye immediately.

He had previously estimated his score to be around 700, but he didn’t expect the actual score to be so much higher than his estimate.

light: Teacher Gu, congratulations, you guessed right.

After the results were released, Lin Yanran, like any other examinee, received a lot of attention from his family and friends.

His phone line had been busy since ten o’clock, and WeChat notifications kept ringing non-stop.

Lin Yanran truly couldn’t keep up with the replies, so he simply posted the transcript directly to his Moments.

Most of the people on his WeChat were family and friends, people who genuinely cared about him.

Yanran: Thank you all for your concern.

[Screenshot of Transcript]

As soon as this Moment was posted, the comments hit double digits within minutes.

The younger generation mostly replied with: [Holy crap!!!! Congratulations!!! You’re a beast!!!]

The older generation replied with: [Thumbs up] [Thumbs up] [Thumbs up]

While Lin Yanran’s Moments were refreshing rapidly, the comments on his Weibo were refreshing even faster.

Even though he had scored so high, Hong Huixue had made a special arrangement to intentionally withhold the public announcement for the time being.

Consequently, seeing that Lin Yanran’s team remained as quiet as a chicken, the haters swarmed his Weibo to spam the comment section.

[Look at Liang Zhishi, who is on the same crew as you. He scored 534 points and announced it immediately. What about your score?]

[Didn’t your fans brag about you tutoring your little brother? The kid got over 500; it’d be unjustifiable if you didn’t get at least 600, right?]

[Relax, everyone knows the celebrity routine by now. Those who do well show off immediately. For someone to stay silent for this long, I’m just going to default to the score being too embarrassing to show.]

[Yanran won’t be like that celebrity from a few years ago who kept talking about taking the exam, doing homework, and reviewing just for show, only to end up with a total score of 200, right?]

[Even an elementary student guessing randomly would get more than 200.]

[You guys actually think he’ll release his score? This whole thing was just hype for his upcoming movie. There’s no way he actually took the exam seriously.]

The haters were mocking him vigorously, but someone anonymously made a leak on the forum.

[I heard Yanran scored over 700 this time. I overheard it by accident, I can’t guarantee if it’s true or not.]

[Holy crap!! For real!!?]

[With that score, he can get into University A or B easily, right?]

[Is Yanran that amazing!!! What a beast!!]

[OP, did you mishear?]

[Must be someone with the same name…]

[I beg you Yanran fans, stop making up lies. If he can score 700, I’ll kneel down immediately and call him daddy.]

[Tsk, another Yanran fan has gone crazy. If he had that score, would his team still be stalling and afraid to announce it?]

[Yanran, if you don’t announce your score soon, your fans are going to lose their minds.]

The discussion raged on for an entire night.

Seeing that Lin Yanran’s side seemingly had no intention of announcing the score, those who were ranking the celebrities’ scores placed Lin Yanran at the very bottom with the note: [Shrinking Turtle].

The haters were overjoyed, busy photoshopping those words onto Lin Yanran’s photos to use as emojis to spread the word.

Halfway through the photoshopping, news broke that someone had reposted the latest update from the Education Bureau of Lin Yanran’s region.

In the screenshot, the Education Bureau’s official Weibo account directly @Yanran, announced his score, and gave him high praise.

The haters rushed to the scene. After looking at the image over and over again, only three words remained in their minds: Is this fake?

Then they thought: It must be photoshopped!

A celebrity could get a score that high?? Who are you kidding!!

Unwilling to believe it and refusing to give up, the haters went to search for the official account themselves.

The result: it actually existed.

Clicking on the @Yanran link redirected them exactly to Lin Yanran’s Weibo…

The region, the Weibo account… everything matched…

The haters were stunned.

Not just the haters, but netizens in general were dazed by the news.

Almost every year, artists in the entertainment industry take the college entrance exam. Usually, if an artist can score in the 500s, they are automatically considered a scholar by the public…

Yet here was Lin Yanran, dropping a bombshell, silently raising the bar to 714 points!!

What does 714 mean?! It’s the top tier even among the nation’s best students!!

How the hell did Yanran endure it? Holding such a high score and actually managing to refrain from showing off!

Staring at the score for a long time, the haters felt, for the first time, like total clowns…

After the local Education Bureau announced the score, many official big-V accounts forwarded the news.

Lin Yanran was truly a role model among celebrities; his score and his experiences provided a very positive incentive for the youth. Thus, without the fans even needing to try, the official accounts sent him straight to the top of the trending searches.

This was the second time Lin Yanran had been praised on such a grand scale, and compared to the last time, this was achieved entirely through his own strength, making it all the more convincing.

Looking at the overwhelming news about Lin Yanran’s college entrance exam in the search results, the haters were dumbfounded, rendered speechless for a long time.

Meanwhile, under Lin Yanran’s Weibo, many netizens flocked to the previous top comments to flog the corpse.

[Bumping you up so everyone can see how embarrassing you are.]

[Spectating the face-slapping (Yanran is amazing!)]

[Sweetie, here is the answer you wanted. Yanran’s score is 714, second in the province and first in the city~]

[You salty haters who were jumping around so much last night, are you satisfied now??]

[I heard someone was going to kneel and call Yanran daddy~ Where are you? Not gonna post a video of the kneeling?]

[This score is truly impressive. Yanran is likely the first of his kind in the entertainment industry.]

So what if the industry’s water armies were deployed or professional haters controlled the narrative?

Lin Yanran used this ultra-high score to shut everyone’s mouths; no one dared to say another word.

Has your life been as full of twists as his?

Can your idol rank second in the province?

If you dropped out for several years and then took the exam, could you get his score?

Seeing the netizens praising Lin Yanran all over the screen, the haters could only tuck their tails between their legs. While clutching their faces, which were stinging from the slaps, they deleted their previous arrogant and ignorant comments and disconnected from the internet for three days.

They couldn’t look at the online discourse these days; looking at it made their hearts ache.

This face-slap saga from Yanran was just too painful.

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