Rebirth to Save Myself

Since the three of them sat together, they've casually become acquainted with Chen Wenwei's good friend, Lin Mohan. Lin Mohan is also a good student, but compared to Chen Yuan, Chen Wenwei, and Su Xia, he's only among the top students in the grade. Plus, boys are naturally playful, so his grades fluctuate wildly, giving the teachers a headache.

Lin Mohan was naturally a lively person, which made Chen Yuan and Chen Wenwei more energetic as well. However, with Su Xia sitting next to Chen Yuan, Su Xia occasionally reminded Chen Yuan not to go too far. So the teacher originally wanted to separate them, but seeing that Su Xia could keep them in check, she gave up on the idea.

After previewing the junior high school textbooks during the summer vacation, Su Xia is now continuing her studies in her spare time. She asks her teachers questions whenever she encounters something she doesn't understand, especially in English class. At first, the teacher was surprised that Su Xia was asking about junior high school material, but then the homeroom teacher told the teacher to teach her if Su Xia came to ask her questions again.

After the midterm exams, Chen Yuan and Chen Wenwei ranked second and third in the grade, respectively, and were praised by their teachers.

"I originally thought that with you all sitting together and Lin Mohan leading the way, you wouldn't have time to study. But these results have put my mind at ease. Since you're sitting next to Su Xia, you should learn from her and study hard," the homeroom teacher said at the class meeting.

"I disagree, teacher. Why are they praising them and criticizing me?" Lin Mohan raised his hand to express his dissatisfaction.

"You're not satisfied? Look at you, you ranked fifth in the grade last semester, and this time you've dropped to tenth. Why don't you just stay out of the top ten? You're getting lower and lower." The homeroom teacher cursed, truly furious.

Lin Mohan immediately shut up. His grades were indeed lagging, and he was sure to get a scolding from his parents at the parent-teacher conference. But Chen Wenwei, who he played with, was still third in the grade. He nudged Chen Wenwei with his elbow and whispered, "Hey, you're such a good buddy, why don't you include me in your exams?"

"I've been studying all summer. What about you?" Chen Wenwei glanced at Lin Mohan.

"Play, play as much as you want." Lin Mohan knew he was in the wrong, so he stopped trying to appeal to Chen Wenwei's brotherhood. No wonder he couldn't get Chen Wenwei to come out and play during the summer vacation; it turned out the guy was studying hard.

"Su Xia continued her stable performance, scoring 99 in Chinese, 100 in Math, and 98 in English, ranking first in the class and first in the grade. Everyone should learn from Su Xia. Why can she get high scores or even full marks on the same test paper, while you can't? Is it because you didn't study hard, or because you didn't ask the teacher if you didn't understand something?"

The homeroom teacher was still lecturing on the podium, while most of the students below had already gone blank.

Vivian Chow looked down and spoke to her deskmate Zhang Xiurong: "The teacher mentions Su Xia every day, it's so annoying."

"Yeah, at school I have to listen to the teacher talk about Su Xia, and at home I have to listen to my parents nagging about Su Xia. It's so annoying to hear Su Xia."

They were all from the same village, so everyone knew that Su Xia was a good student. She became the "other people's child" that parents talked about, used as an example to teach their own children to study harder. However, Zhou Huimin was already unhappy because she had failed to befriend Chen Yuan, and seeing Chen Yuan previously ignoring her attempts to please her while fawning over Su Xia, she felt resentful.

“What’s the use of good grades? Haven’t you heard her cousin say she stole money?” Yu Qing said from the back row.

"Really?" Vivian Chow turned to look at Yu Qing, clearly she hadn't heard of this.

“Really, I know too. Not just us, everyone who lives in our neighborhood knows that she often steals money from her grandma, and she even makes her cousin give her a pen, otherwise she beats her,” Zhang Xiurong added.

"So domineering! Does she think she can do whatever she wants just because she gets good grades?" Zhou Huimin couldn't understand. This kind of thing isn't something you can do just because you're good at studying.

"It's because nobody's taking care of her; her parents aren't home," Yu Qing explained.

"No wonder, a wild girl born of a mother but without any upbringing." Zhou Huimin glanced at Su Xia with disdain, silently despising her in her heart, and plotting to find an opportunity to tell Chen Yuan about this.

The three people weren't speaking loudly, but Lin Li still heard them. He already disliked Chen Yuan; last time, she caused him to call his parents. He got a beating when he got home, and now that Chen Yuan and Su Xia were getting close, he naturally felt that if he couldn't deal with Chen Yuan, he could go after Su Xia. Anyway, they were all in cahoots, and this was his way of getting revenge for what happened last time.

During the class meeting, the teacher mentioned the midterm exam results, then informed everyone that there would be a parent-teacher meeting next week, and asked the students to inform their parents at home. The teacher also gave some safety instructions, and then dismissed the class.

When Chen Yuan returned home, she told her mother about her ranking, and her mother was so happy that she immediately called her father to share the news.

"Yuanyuan got second place in her grade this time, isn't that amazing!"

"Great! Ask her what reward she wants, and I'll bring it to her when I go home in a while."

"Yuanyuan, what reward do you want?"

“I’ll say it myself.” Chen Yuan rushed to the phone, took the receiver from her mother, and said to her father on the other end, “Dad, I want all five Olympic mascots, I want every single one of them.”

"Okay, Dad will go buy it for you." Mr. Chen would still fulfill this small request, after all, his business was growing bigger and bigger. Last year, he and Mrs. Chen bought an apartment in the city, so Yuanyuan wouldn't have to live at school anymore.

"I need two sets, one for Xiaxia," Chen Yuan emphasized.

"We need to get a set for Xiaxia. If she hadn't dragged you to study together during the summer vacation, your ranking definitely wouldn't have improved," Chen's mother added.

"Okay, okay, no problem." The three chatted for a while longer before ending the call.

Not long after the midterm exams, Su's mother gave birth to a boy in the city, just as she had wished. Su's father rushed from the provincial capital to the city to hold his son, whom he had longed for for many years.

Grandma was delighted when she heard the news. Since she gave birth in the city, she'll be back home for her postpartum confinement. Because Su Xia had always lived alone in her parents' room, she'll have to move to the back room to live with her cousin now that her mother is back.

My cousin used to live in a warehouse where rice and grain were stored. Since it wasn't appropriate for girls to share a room with their parents as they grew up, the warehouse was cleared out for my cousin to live in. My mother needed to be in confinement after childbirth and couldn't be exposed to drafts. If Su Xia also lived there, the constant coming and going wouldn't be good for my mother's recovery, so Su Xia moved in with my cousin.

Three days later, Su's father and mother took their son back to their hometown, along with Su Yue. Su Yue was of kindergarten age, and they sent her there as soon as they returned.

When Su Xia saw Su Yue return, she remembered that Su Yue had fallen into the river during the second semester of fifth grade and almost drowned. If an older man hadn't heard her cries, Su Yue would have been swept away by the current. Su Xia needed to keep a closer eye on Su Yue to prevent such a tragedy from happening again. And then there was Su Yaoche; when he was one year old, he had accidentally knocked over a kettle of boiling water, which had scalded his thigh, leaving a permanent burn scar.

“I can intervene in these two matters. I’ll write them down first.” Su Xia took out her small notebook, which was filled with things related to her from her previous life. She ticked off the things that had been avoided and the things that hadn’t been completed, and wrote down the approximate time for the unfinished ones. She would take it out to look at it from time to time.

This notebook involves too many things, so Su Xia usually carries it with her at all times. If she doesn't carry it with her, she puts it in a cabinet and locks it to prevent anyone from seeing it. Here, the focus is on her cousin, Chen Xin.