ALL NOVEL Chapter 20: The Restless Situation
As the long October holiday approaches, even though students know that major exams will follow after the holiday, classrooms are inevitably filled with a sense of restlessness.
For instance, during self-study sessions without a teacher present, most students used to be able to restrain themselves and maintain seriousness and focus.
But now, when the teacher is absent, some students completely let loose. The boldest ones play with their phones directly, while others secretly read magazines, novels, or comics, or pass notes or chat about how they'll enjoy the holiday...
Xanthia, however, doesn't subscribe to the idea of letting loose.
Apart from attentively listening in class and completing assignments on time, she never wastes a moment on studying during the time she saves.
Self-study class?
It's more like self-entertainment class!
While others are serious, she joyfully indulges in her own activities. It feels so great!
Happiness is always relative!
It's like secretly sleeping during class; waking up feels exceptionally refreshing, doubling the joy.
She doesn't listen attentively in every class because some are about topics she's already mastered. When she's confident she knows everything, she happily dozes off.
She even gets her docile desk mate to watch out for her, but this guy ends up nodding off himself in various creative ways, often getting caught by the teacher, while Xanthia, well, the teachers just turn a blind eye.
With her extremely influential background, the teachers are well aware. She's just sleeping in class, not disrupting the class order with snoring, so let her sleep in peace!
What's a wealthy heiress... just a tactical recline.
It's the top-performing students in the class who get the most attention from teachers. They understand studying is like rowing against the current: if you don't advance, you retreat. Unless you're consistently in the top ten of the school, securing a spot in a top-tier university, what privileges do you get?
Anyway, Thessaloniki First High School manages things very strictly. It treats everyone equally for the most part because super-rich students and super achievers are in the minority and don't affect the overall situation.
One thing they're strict about is holidays. Longer holidays only come once a month with the "Monthly Holiday," and even the half-day on Sunday is hardly considered a break; it's more like a change of scenery in prison oftentimes attributed to french culture if exists.
Because these "long holidays" are so rare, rumors always circulate in the class before each one, speculating on which days might be included. If the holiday is cut short after such speculation, students erupt in anger, uniting to curse Principal "Georgiou El Konstantinos "—
Since the principal's surname happens to be "Konstantinos," "Down with the Konstantinos Family Shop" becomes their slogan.
Some students with strong initiative might take more radical actions out of anger, but it's futile. Thessaloniki First High School has too strong a background and too prestigious a reputation. As long as it maintains its perfect college admission rate, it's coddled by higher-ups.
It's Saturday today, the day with the most self-study classes. Throughout the day, there are self-study sessions, but sometimes, the main subject teachers might utilize these sessions to address mistakes and such.
Usually, on Fridays, each main subject teacher assigns a large amount of homework, including notes exclusive to the school, post-class exercises, designated supplementary materials, and so on.
These assignments consume a lot of students' time; there's no room to slack off during self-study.
Of course, the most exhausting part is for those "competition experts." They not only have to complete homework but also free up time in the evening to attend specialized competition training classes.
Attending such would give one higher chance to pass entrance exams of universities they want to get into.
At the beginning, when the school started offering various competition training courses, students from Class 1 and Class 2 experimental classes all rushed to participate, and even the top-ranking students from Class 3 of the first year were no exception. They all competed eagerly, fearing they would "lose out at the starting line."
As time passed, not to mention Class 3 of the first year, many students from the first two experimental classes gave up, directly quitting the competition training.
Firstly, the competition questions were too difficult, with no positive feedback. Secondly, the time they wasted on competitions would affect their original grades. Trying to do both things at once, they ended up achieving neither. What was the point?
Luciel, who had a strong inner drive, initially participated in the competition training. She even chose three subjects in one go: mathematics, physics, and chemistry...
As a result, even though she was very driven, she ultimately chose to withdraw. First, she withdrew from chemistry, then from physics. She stubbornly clung to mathematics for a while because she thought it was her best subject, and it was said that attending math competition training would greatly help with the final one or two difficult questions in entrance exams.
But the harsh reality was, whether you had the intelligence and agility to solve super difficult problems without attending competition training or not, further training would be of no use.
On the contrary, difficult competition problems would greatly undermine your confidence because no matter how difficult the problem, there would always be someone who could solve it, yet you couldn't. That's the unevenness of the world...
Luciel was still very wise. After realizing that the competition training was of little benefit to her, she decisively withdrew from all competition training. With the extra time, she could calmly deal with the content of the college entrance exam. Every day, she could feel her progress, and her mindset improved.
As for the negative example, it was Xanthia's desk mate, Dematero. This guy was still attending "mathematics" and "physics" competition training until now.
Naturally, during the training, he behaved as if he were listening to a book from who-knows-where, but he didn't care at all. He just stayed at the back of the competition classroom, secretly writing articles and papers. Yes, he was a "competition expert" with a "literary dream."
In the restless atmosphere of self-study classes, Dematero got tired of doing homework. He glanced to his right and saw Xanthia reading comics again. He felt somewhat resentful. Why does this girl get to do this? Has she finished her homework already?
Dematero certainly didn't believe it. He even suspected that Xanthia's homework every day was probably copied from Luciel, otherwise how could she finish it so quickly?
What he didn't know was that Xanthia's efficiency in doing homework was extremely high because she knew everything already; she could almost write without thinking.
Xanthia tried to finish her homework as quickly as possible every day, just to have more time for fun...
For assignments given on Fridays, she often finished them during the evening self-study on the same day. Even if she couldn't finish, she could easily complete them after going home. This way, she could enjoy herself during Saturday's self-study class.
After Dematero became annoyed, he didn't bother talking to Xanthia. He simply turned his head and started talking to Jimmy in the back seat. Jimmy was also a talkative guy, so he and the verbose Dematero got along perfectly.
And, of course, this talkative guy was also paired with a quiet girl as his desk mate by the cunning class teacher, Emmanuel El Alcantara.
The two of them were chatting enthusiastically about the holiday plans, but little did they know, the cunning Emmanuel had long been lurking near the back door of the classroom, secretly observing, taking note of everything...
