"What's the emergency?"
Fang Bai put on his clothes and reluctantly opened the door. "Mom, aren't you at the mall? Why did you come back?"
"Son, you are the top scorer! The top scorer!"
Liu Fengqing excitedly picked up her son and spun him around once, only once, which left her breathless.
"Oh, is there anything strange about it? I was among the top three in the third mock exam in the city, so isn't it normal to be the city's top scorer? As long as I can be admitted, that's fine." Fang Bai was just about to go to school to check his scores, but it seemed the scores had already been announced.
"Oh my, my son has such a big heart. He's the provincial top scorer, with 675 points!"
"Oh, 675 points, that's about right."
Fang Bai was only slightly surprised. It was roughly the score he expected, a bit higher than his estimated 665 points. It seemed his essay score was quite high.
"Huh, Mom, did you just say provincial top scorer?"
"Yes, the school gate has a huge poster, and they even got a small car to promote it throughout the city. What a commotion so early in the morning." Liu Fengqing chuckled, extremely satisfied and proud.
Once the admission notice arrived, she absolutely had to host a dinner for relatives and teachers.
"Provincial top scorer!" Fang Bai's calm demeanor turned into surprise. He hadn't expected to be the provincial top scorer.
There were many top students in the provincial capital and Ning City. It wasn't easy to become a provincial top scorer; it depended on luck.
Hmm, hard strength.
Suddenly, Fang Bai received a Golden Finger notification.
[Notification 1: National College Entrance Examination Top Scorer, Honor +1]
[Notification 2: Index Finger Golden Finger can be upgraded. Upgrade now?]
...
Fang Bai's eyes widened, and he couldn't help but jump up and shout, "Holy cow!" Then he shouted, "Yeah!"
It turned out he wasn't just the provincial top scorer, but also the national top scorer!
Liu Fengqing looked at her son's expression and behavior. This was more like a student!
He was still so young, why act so profound!
"Mom, you go ahead and get busy. I'll go to school in a bit to check." Fang Bai wasn't in the mood to deal with his mother right now. He closed his room door and carefully studied his Golden Finger.
All this time, he had thought that only academic advancement could lead to upgrades.
He hadn't expected that being the national college entrance examination top scorer would directly give him an upgrade!
"Upgrade!"
Instantly, his index finger leveled up to LV2!
Suddenly, he felt a warmth in his right index finger and a slight coolness in his head.
A moment later, the warmth subsided. He saw that his index finger's swelling had reduced slightly, almost back to normal, and it was a bit more flexible than before.
Now his middle finger was LV4, and his ring finger was LV3. Their appearance no longer had noticeable swelling, but his index finger's swelling was still quite obvious.
After upgrading, a new function was added.
[Index Finger LV2: When studying by touching books, memory and comprehension ability are enhanced by two times, and permanently increased by one time.]
After reading the information, Fang Bai was overjoyed. He took an English book from the corner and immediately tried it out.
Ten minutes later, Fang Bai felt it was easier to memorize English words and he could quickly solve math problems.
Overall, he felt his mind was more agile.
"Awesome."
Fang Bai exclaimed. Learning foreign languages would be even easier in the future. If his spoken language wasn't good, he could just rely on rote memorization of daily phrases.
He knew too many people, but sometimes he couldn't remember their names, which was embarrassing.
Now with a permanent one-time enhancement, he didn't have to worry about this anymore.
He was planning to buy some professional materials to study, and now with a significant increase in learning ability, it felt even better than earning tens of millions for him.
After a moment of excitement, Fang Bai went downstairs for breakfast and then headed to school.
Outside the school gate, dozens of people were already gathered around a large display board. Fang Bai also wanted to squeeze in, but he was criticized by an elderly woman next to him.
"Young man, why are you pushing? You should give way to the elderly."
"That's right, young man, you should learn from this provincial top scorer, Fang Bai."
Fang Bai heard several elderly women chattering and didn't want to push his way in. Fortunately, he was tall enough to barely see the content of the poster.
[Warmest congratulations to our school's student, Comrade Fang Bai, for achieving the top score in the 1991 College Entrance Examination for Science and Engineering in the province, with a total score of 675!]
Besides the text, there was also his photo.
The photo was of Fang Bai giving a speech on the podium, taken by his sister. It was clear and the angle was excellent, capturing Fang Bai's handsome appearance.
Fang Bai looked for a while and didn't want to squeeze in anymore. He was about to turn and enter the campus when Old Wang, the gatekeeper, saw him from afar and walked over to greet him warmly: "Fang Bai, congratulations, congratulations! You're the provincial top scorer!"
"Haha, thank you! Just a bit of luck." Fang Bai said modestly.
With the gatekeeper's shout, the crowd gathered in front of the poster instantly looked at Fang Bai: The college entrance examination top scorer was right before their eyes!
They then carefully compared him to the photo on the poster and found that their appearances were identical. It really was the college entrance examination top scorer!
The crowd instantly became enthusiastic towards him. The elderly women who had criticized him earlier felt very embarrassed.
Fang Bai immediately fled the scene and slipped into the campus.
As soon as he stepped into Zhan Feng's office, several teachers immediately congratulated him on becoming the college entrance examination top scorer.
"Fang Bai, you're amazing!"
"The school is proud of you. Several school leaders are smiling all day, especially the principal. He said that the most glorious moment of his life is now." Zhan Feng congratulated him. After the scores came out, all the teachers in the school were shocked. The principal personally came to her and praised her for bringing out such a good student.
Anyway, this year's outstanding teacher award was definitely hers, and she might even receive an award from the city.
"Thank you, teachers. Without your guidance, I definitely wouldn't have scored so high." Fang Bai said modestly, attributing the credit to the teachers.
"Haha, among all the students in the school, Fang Bai is the best at talking."
Zhan Feng handed the transcript to Fang Bai and said with slight excitement, "Your Chinese score was excellent this time. The Chinese teacher rarely smiles so happily."
"Three subjects with full marks, that's insane!" exclaimed a teacher in the office.
Fang Bai took the transcript, which had a line printed on it: Chinese 110, English 100, Mathematics 120, Physics 95, Chemistry 100, Politics 85, Biology 65, Total score 675.
"My luck was indeed good. I didn't expect to get full marks in three subjects at once."
"Oh my, don't you know how well you scored, how amazing you are, haha."
"I felt like I wrote quite smoothly, maybe my mindset was good. It was a bit of a pleasant surprise." Fang Bai chuckled. Once Chinese went smoothly, the rest followed.
110 points for Chinese was definitely a high score. If Fang Bai were to take the test again, he definitely wouldn't get that score.
But he was confident in getting full marks in English and Mathematics.
As for Politics at 85 points, it was still pretty good. It was extremely difficult to get above 90 points.
Politics mostly consisted of subjective answer questions and multiple-choice questions. Incorrect choices, missing choices, or choosing too many options would result in no points, making it very difficult.
He still remembered the last big question, worth 12 points, which was about China's ten-year plan and the Eighth Five-Year Plan outline, aiming to quadruple the gross national product by the end of the century compared to 1980. It asked to analyze and explain why adhering to the people's democratic dictatorship was necessary to achieve these goals.
For such questions without a definitive answer, even if Fang Bai answered perfectly, it would be difficult to get full marks; it depended on the mood of the grading teacher.
"Hmm, exam mindset is very important." A teacher agreed with a smile, envying Zhan Feng for having a top-scoring student under her.
Fang Bai then asked about other matters: "Homeroom teacher, how did the other classmates do in the exam?"
"It's not much different from the third mock exam." Zhan Feng handed Fang Bai the statistical table of the class's college entrance examination scores, saying, "This year, the key university cutoff is 547 points, the general undergraduate cutoff is 524 points, and the vocational college cutoff is 507 points. The cutoffs are not low."
Fang Bai took the class score table and looked at it. Only four people in the entire class passed the key university cutoff. Besides him, the other three just barely passed.
A total of 12 people passed the undergraduate cutoff, and less than half passed the vocational college cutoff.
They were a key re-study class, and their previous college entrance examination scores were all above 430 points, with four or five students in their fourth to sixth years of high school.
Zhang Xiaoai 508 points, Zheng Ran 503 points, Li Feiyu 495 points...
Passing the cutoff was one thing; being admitted was another. Many classmates would definitely not be selected.
Fang Bai left school after checking the score cutoffs. He didn't plan to go back to the classroom to see his classmates. Besides showing off, what else could he do?
When classmates saw him, those who scored poorly would feel even more disheartened.
Comfort them?
That's thinking too much; it's easy to talk when you're not in their shoes.
Fang Bai planned to go to the bookstore to find some materials, and at the same time, think about what the first product of Xinghai Mechanical Company should be.