Novel.
Qin Yuanqing sat in his seat, listening to Teacher Chen explain the Chinese exam paper while looking at the blackboard. He suddenly realized that everything on it was incredibly clear.
Ever since the second year of middle school, his eyesight had hovered around 4.7. He disliked wearing glasses, and sitting in the back row meant the blackboard was always a little blurry—he usually relied on guessing and listening.
But now, everything was crystal clear. His vision felt no different from when he was in elementary school, at least 5.1.
Qin Yuanqing felt secretly delighted.
He had always believed that if you were nearsighted, it was best not to wear glasses, otherwise the prescription would only get worse. His surroundings seemed to prove this theory repeatedly. One of his classmates had similar eyesight in the first year of high school; after wearing glasses, his myopia had reached over 400 degrees by the second semester of senior year.
(This is purely a personal view based on experience and has no scientific basis. If you are nearsighted, you should still get glasses as soon as possible.)
Now, fortune had finally turned in his favor. A miracle had actually happened—his nearsightedness was completely gone.
"And my memory seems to have improved a lot too," Qin Yuanqing thought excitedly.
His mind felt extraordinarily clear. He could understand lessons almost instantly, and remembering things felt effortless.
Perhaps it was because he had been reborn, carrying more than ten years of memories in his head.
At that moment, Qin Yuanqing suddenly understood why Brother Qiang had once spoken so painfully about college boys losing their vigor and masculinity.
He silently reminded himself to stay far away from all those messy distractions.
"Meng-ge…" When the class bell rang, the skinny monkey Lin Ping looked at Qin Yuanqing in surprise. His desk mate felt different somehow. In the past, Qin Yuanqing never listened attentively—if he didn't ask to go to the bathroom two or three times per class, that was already considered good.
There was a reason Qin Yuanqing always chose to sit in the last row, by the door or the window. It wasn't because of the cool breeze in summer—it was because those seats attracted the least attention. Even if he spaced out, the teacher wouldn't call on him.
Lin Ping couldn't remember the last time he'd seen Qin Yuanqing listen so intently.
"Skinny Monkey, what Teacher Chen said earlier was right," Qin Yuanqing said, patting his shoulder. "This is our final year of high school. If we don't work hard now, we'll definitely regret it later."
Lin Ping had always ranked in the middle-to-lower tier of the class, roughly at the level of an average second-tier university. Qin Yuanqing remembered that Lin Ping hadn't done well in the college entrance exam and ended up repeating a year at Shuixian No.1 High School before finally getting into a provincial second-tier university.
Later, Lin Ping worked in real estate. On the surface, he seemed successful—dress shirts, suits, polished appearance, like a social elite making big money. But reality was far from that. Qin Yuanqing had heard him complain before: after a whole year of hard work, he barely saved anything. After seven or eight years of struggle, he still had no savings. When it came time to get married, he had to borrow money from classmates and friends just to scrape together enough for the wedding.
Buying a house later on was the same—borrowing from everyone he could, barely managing to put together enough, yet still drowning in debt.
After being reborn, Qin Yuanqing was still a little dazed and hadn't fully adjusted yet. But toward this desk mate—his companion throughout all three years of high school—his feelings remained unchanged.
That bond had never faded, even after graduation. Qin Yuanqing wasn't good at socializing, but they still met once a year and chatted occasionally on WeChat.
Lin Ping rolled his eyes. Bro, it's not that I'm not trying. I listen to class more than you do and actually finish my homework. You never even did yours. But damn it—my exam scores are always half-dead.
High school life was packed: four classes in the morning, three in the afternoon, plus evening self-study. Almost all their time revolved around studying. Qin Yuanqing was gradually adapting to this rhythm again. No smartphones, phone calls made with calling cards at phone booths or dorms. Classroom multimedia was only used to play music during breaks. Boring—but Qin Yuanqing found it deeply satisfying.
He flipped open his high school math textbook, feeling complicated emotions. His math had never been outstanding, but he usually scored around 130. However, once he started reading novels in his senior year—drowning in endless web fiction—he barely touched his textbooks. As a result, he scored only 72 out of 150 in math on the college entrance exam, not even passing.
His total score was 568, just one point below the first-tier cutoff. That single point separated heaven and earth.
When the results came out, Qin Yuanqing felt miserable. He didn't even want to continue studying and planned to go straight to work. It was his father who repeatedly talked sense into him, convincing him to casually fill out a university application.
He was deeply grateful to his father. Without him, if he had gone straight to work, no matter how hard he tried, he might have earned only five or six thousand yuan a month.
Studying doesn't guarantee success—but it is the most reliable path toward it, and the average outcome is far better than the alternative.
The best investment is investing in education.
Qin Yuanqing skimmed through the math textbook and checked the table of contents. This book mainly covered analytic geometry: introducing coordinates, slope, inclination angles, equations of lines, relationships between lines, angles between lines, and distances from points to lines.
Analytic geometry required combining figures with formulas. The first thing to do when facing a problem was to draw the coordinate system, sketch the lines and points based on given conditions, and then solve.
After reviewing it, Qin Yuanqing felt confident. He had basically mastered the content. With eight years of work experience involving calculations, plus improved comprehension and memory after rebirth, understanding came easily.
"Congratulations, Host. You have basically mastered Level 1 Analytic Geometry. Reward: 1 Learning Coin."
The system's voice suddenly echoed in his mind. Qin Yuanqing saw his Learning Coins increase from 0 to 1.
"So reading books also earns Learning Coins!" He was overjoyed. This was great news. There were plenty of textbooks to study in senior year—just reading them could earn him around 20 Learning Coins.
At this point, Qin Yuanqing stopped caring about teachers lecturing in class. Regular lectures mainly catered to average students; only the exam explanations at the end were truly valuable. Normally, Qin Yuanqing preferred self-study combined with practice problems, which allowed him to grasp most knowledge points efficiently.
Lin Ping watched his desk mate study nonstop all day, utterly speechless. If he'd worked this hard earlier, he'd already be in the experimental class. Why waste time here in a regular one?
But Qin Yuanqing was completely absorbed. His draft paper was filled with dense notes—tools to aid understanding, organize knowledge, and strengthen memory.
A good memory is not as good as writing things down.
Teachers always emphasized this, but students often forgot. Taking notes alone wasn't enough—you had to revisit, understand, and reinforce them. Otherwise, notes left untouched were useless.
Qin Yuanqing understood clearly that studying required methods and techniques. These determined efficiency. Some students didn't seem to work hard yet consistently topped the rankings. Others woke up at five and slept at eleven, yet remained stuck in the middle or bottom. The difference lay in methods.
After an entire week of the new semester, classmates grew curious. Qin Yuanqing had become strange. He no longer slept in class or zoned out—he was always reading, far more serious than before.
Even the teachers noticed his change. They didn't interfere—in fact, they were pleased. For teachers, attentiveness wasn't the key; results were. Good scores could cover up all flaws.
On the other hand, students with poor grades—even if obedient and hardworking—often drove teachers crazy when called up to solve problems, failing to understand even after repeated explanations. That sense of despair was real. That's why being a teacher, especially a science teacher, wasn't easy—at the very least, their mental resilience was strong.
"Yes!"
After finishing the final math textbook of high school, Qin Yuanqing couldn't help but clench his fist in excitement. Over the week, he had accumulated a full 20 Learning Coins. The sleepless nights and late study sessions had paid off—reading until midnight, waking at seven every morning.
Studying was completely different from reading novels. Novels followed plots, letting imagination flow effortlessly—reading millions of words a day was easy. Studying, however, demanded constant understanding and memorization, transforming knowledge into something truly your own.
His sudden outburst caused students in the evening self-study session to look at him. Qin Yuanqing felt a little embarrassed, but with his thick skin, he simply waved back.
"Meng-ge, what's wrong with you? You're not sick, are you?" Lin Ping swallowed nervously. "You've been acting strange lately. Did you… get a mental illness?"
As his desk mate, Lin Ping knew best. The thick stack of books beside Qin Yuanqing included not only this semester's textbooks but also next semester's, borrowed from the library—normally distributed two months later.
High school moved at breakneck speed, like a highway. All subjects had to finish teaching content in the first semester of senior year. The second semester was entirely for review—revisiting all three years' material, refining key points, and drilling past exam questions to prepare for the college entrance exam.
"I'm fine. Never been better," Qin Yuanqing said.
At this moment, his excitement was indescribable. He had essentially finished all high school coursework. What came next was review—revisiting first- and second-year textbooks, strengthening memory, organizing key exam topics, and analyzing past college entrance exam questions.