Xiaoqi took a nap for over an hour. When she got up, she washed up and first practiced calligraphy inside her room.
She had already borrowed a new calligraphy copybook from the library to practice calligraphy. She was practicing regular script as a beginner, writing each character neatly and properly.
There was no need to grind ink; she just poured the bottled ink right into the bowl.
Sometimes when the previous ink dried up, she would just add some water.
Xiaoqi practiced for half an hour, then got up and took a walk outside, before coming back to review Japanese.
Mr. Zhou's teaching pace was slowly picking up, and there was quite a lot of content. Perhaps because there would be an immersive reading experience, Xiaoqi felt Japanese was very intimate and easy, not difficult at all, so reviewing it was also easy.
After memorizing everything and reviewing it well, she took her phone and headphones, planning to go running at the school next door. She would be back just in time to take a shower and cook.
On the way there, she listened to English audio recordings. Xiaoqi was already very familiar with the voice. From the school gate, she went inside, but the security guard uncle actually stopped her today, before letting her in.
She was wearing headphones and didn't hear the security guard talking to someone else inside, "It's this young lady. I watched the livestream this morning. She's a student at our school."
Xiaoqi started running slowly, then sped up after getting used to it. The wind at her ears blew up her hair while the trees and school buildings on both sides retreated as she ran, breathing, breathing, breathing...
Finally, she somehow felt a kind of indescribable feeling dissipating in her chest with each breath.
The moments after posting on Moments, her friends' praises and inquiries, the lively class group chat yelling for her to give out red packets, her parents' reactions, the feeling of standing on the champion platform, the reporter's microphone, the camera, the leader raising a toast...everything, everything was slowly fading away and dissipating.
She was still her, Su Xiaoqi.
A country girl from Gumu Village.
She was about to attend an expensive private university.
She had tested in herself. Although it was because she underperformed, this would be her path going forward.
She was going to university.
Everything else was preparation for this.
Thinking this way cleared her mind quite a bit.
Xiaoqi kept running, slowing down her pace a little, yet still steadily. She ran for a very long time.
When she saw her pedometer was nearing 30,000 steps, and she was also completely drenched in sweat, she slowly walked back.
When she got to the security guard station, Uncle Guard stuck his head out smiling, "Not bad young lady, keep up the daily exercise."
Xiaoqi smiled but didn't know what to say. She was also a bit tired and didn't feel like talking much, but her smile was very bright.
She had just walked out of the school gate and not yet crossed the street to the hospital opposite, when the mechanical voice sounded in her ears, "Host is spreading youthful and sunny positivity to those around her by active exercise. System level unlocked, system upgraded to Level Seven Improvement System. Host will gain 0.7 yuan for every step walked, capped at 30,000 steps daily."
Xiaoqi had a deadpan expression looking at the interface in front of her. The money displayed had already exceeded 270,000...
Today's step count was ending and the money would stop increasing, but starting tomorrow, there would be 21,000 yuan daily. Xiaoqi felt another burst of excitement in her heart, like a little pony galloping.
She didn't know what to make of it anymore.
It seemed with this, the money for the house could really be gathered.
Xiaoqi returned to her aunt's dorm. She saw Aunt Simei cooking. She had bought a lot of ingredients and was stewing a whole chicken.
The smell of chicken soup wafted out into the corridor.
"I saw you on the patient room TV. There were so many sanitation tasks in the morning, and five more patients were admitted, so much going on. I could only catch glimpses when I passed by. Our family's Xiaoqi looks the best." Aunt Simei had a huge smile, very proud.
Originally, she was going to eat with a niece who studied at the Number One Middle School, the only pride Aunt Simei could talk about with patients.
But now that her niece had graduated, that in no way diminished Xiaoqi.
That morning she did the same dirty, tiring sanitation work as usual, but patients would smile and proactively chat with her from time to time.
Aunt Simei felt her body was also more flexible now, not like before where after squatting down and working for a while she'd be covered in gross sweat that made people not want to get close.
"It was slower in the afternoon so I also caught a replay. Even the Head Nurse asked about you." In Aunt Simei's eyes, the Head Nurse was usually the most fierce, yelling at people all day, and had never been cordial before. She was shocked today that the Head Nurse had spoken to her politely, it was like she had been favored.
"The competition must have been tiring. Have chicken for dinner to recover your strength. Go take a shower. I'll cook here. The Head Nurse specially let me off work early so I could go the market. It's not as good as the native chickens we raise, but it should be a full grown chicken brought from the village, very firm meat."
Xiaoqi was surprised that participating in a swimming competition could affect her aunt and the Head Nurse. But seeing Aunt Simei so happy, smiling an actual smile instead of the silly grin she normally had when others mocked her helplessly, Xiaoqi could understand her feelings.
Xiaoqi went to shower, greeting patient after patient along the way.
Even the nurses she ran into were like this. Xiaoqi was shocked. She was starting to understand her aunt's feelings, because normally when she went upstairs to the patient rooms to shower, the nurses would never crack a smile and seemed very fierce.
It seemed to the nurses that it was one thing for Aunt Simei the janitor to use the patient bathrooms out of convenience for herself, but to bring relatives along to use them too created extra trouble when there was already so much going on at the hospital and the nurses were the busiest, always rushing here and there. To get a smile out of a nurse was no easy feat.
She didn't expect the nurses to not only be cordial with her today, but to take the initiative to greet her. Xiaoqi also experienced the feeling of being favored.
She smiled back politely.
Xiaoqi didn't know that the nurses weren't actually very old themselves and were fun-loving girls at heart. While the job was tiring, they also liked to play in private. Their friendly attitude wasn't because they saw any livestream or anything since they hardly watched TV, but because they liked scrolling through Douyin.
The hottest Douyin video in the city today was made by Jiajia.
"My Home Tutor Teacher Breaks the Cute-Hot Scale Again" Casually swimming and becoming the provincial swimming champion, do you believe it or not?
Paired with clips from the swimming competition, Jiajia rushed home to immediately produce the video with epic music added in. With official endorsement, it shot straight up to become a trending topic in the city, bringing all her previous Douyin videos along.
Likes skyrocketed to over a million.
And the likes on her previous videos swelled rapidly too.
Home tutor teacher recites New Concept English fluently.
Home tutor teacher has gorgeous handwriting.
Home tutor teacher's singing captivates me.
Home tutor teacher can even do bamboo weaving...
Teacher's swimming training...
One video after another showcasing different sides of an unfussily dressed teacher in plain T-shirts and athletic pants, very simple-looking, clearly not deliberately shot videos, with perfect bare-faced visuals.
At least among Douyin users, Su Xiaoqi was now an online celebrity in Lvshan City.
And a positive energy one at that.
Good English, also learning Japanese. Nice singing voice. Can swim. Persistently runs every day... What kind of fairy girl is this?
The nurse finished greeting Xiaoqi and excitedly went back to tell her colleagues, "Wow, she looks so cool but her smile is so warm. What a gap moe, I'm sold!"
