CH 3

To Gain Fame With One Battle

It was really unexpected for Zhou Kao to have bumped into Wen Le tonight. Not only to have met Wen Le, but also for Wen Le to have chosen the School of Economics and Management, and for everyone around him to also know Wen Le — all these were outside Zhou Kao’s expectations.

“It’s because we have the Campus Grapevine,” Cheng Liang waved his phone and grinned brightly.

The Campus Grapevine was an app officially released by University A for students to exchange information. After several generations of students’ development, the Campus Grapevine became an entertainment app exclusively for the use of A University students.

Zhou Kao had downloaded the app at the start of school, but because of its strong nature as an entertainment app, it was not very useful for Zhou Kao, so he uninstalled it that same night.

Lan Zhixin gave a weird laugh, and looked at Zhou Kao sympathetically, but his tone was gloating, “Without BBS*, you naturally wouldn’t know the glance and smile that made my goddess famous overnight.”

*BBS (Bulletin Board System) – a system that allows users to exchange messages and information, refers to the Campus Grapevine app

As early as the start of freshman year and before the end of military training*, news of Wen Le spread through the whole university with just one video. At that time, the newly enrolled freshmen had not even remembered the names of their classmates but had already remembered Wen Le’s name.

*military training – a course (sometimes compulsory) in schools and colleges

Wen Le’s fame was purely accidental.

Next to A University was D University, an art college with countless handsome men and beautiful women, with many celebrities in the entertainment industry currently attending the school. The starlet, Li Lexue, who debuted as a child star, was one of the celebrities.

A University and D University were next to each other, and the surrounding streets filled with food vendors were connected. Students from the two schools thus often encountered the other due to food.

When the fifth day of military training ended in the afternoon, Wen Le and her roommate went to an internet-famous beverage shop near the school. It so happened that Li Lexue and her assistant were filming nearby. At that time, a certain video app just became popular, and it was the trend to take videos of oneself smiling while looking back. Naturally, Li Lexue hopped on the bandwagon.

Wen Le was chatting happily with her roommate while holding a cold drink, when she suddenly heard someone shouting behind her, “Le Le!”

Wen Le turned around subconsciously and looked around blankly, only to see that there was another person in the middle of the crowd who also looked back. She realized that it was not her that they were calling, and could not help but laugh at herself, then turned around to leave with her roommate.

Li Lexue was as pure as a lily with an exquisite profile, and had a large fan base. When the video was uploaded, it had hundreds of thousands of likes and shares, and it went viral on the app.

Hopping on the bandwagon, someone posted a fan-cam of Li Lexue shooting the video at that time.

Unlike Li Lexue’s own video where only she was in frame, there were inevitably more people included in the fan-cam taken by the passersby. 

It was such an unintentional shot, but it clearly captured Wen Le who looked back and laughed behind Li Lexue.

Even beauties were most afraid of comparison.

Wen Le’s looks were even more outstanding than her grades. From the remote mountains of a certain southwestern province to the capital, she had never suffered a defeat once along the way.　

In the video, Wen Le was wearing a camouflage outfit looking valiant and confident, with a face void of any make up, and glancing back tenderly and beautifully. Yet this gentle glance of hers thrusted an explosion of beauty to others. By comparison, even the starlet, Li Lexue, captured in the fancam, was reduced to being a foil.

The video exploded in views rapidly, even surpassing Li Lexue’s original video.

Someone in school found out that the girl in the viral video was actually a freshman in the School of Economics and Management of A University, and forwarded the video to the BBS forum which caught a lot of attention. This was not surprising as after all, it was human nature to yearn for beauty.

Later, the online video was deleted, but the video posted in the forum was kept. 

Lan Zhixin took out his phone as if he were offering a treasure, opened BBS, and bestowed it to Zhou Kao, saying, “Let me show you the god-level scene of my goddess. Pay attention to your image, and don’t get a nosebleed!”

Zhou Kao only took a quick glance, then looked away. If this was god-level, then it was because they hadn’t seen sixteen-year-old Wen Le’s ability.

Thinking about it made Zhou Kao frown slightly, and he shook off the image in his mind and decided not to think about Wen Le further.

Soon after the start of school, clubs began recruiting new members. In the evening, the Student Union prepared for their first round of interviews in Room 202 at the J Hall.

As the newly appointed vice-president, Wen Le was one of today’s interviewers.

Although University A was a top university filled with the country’s cream of the crop students, the students’ personalities were not the same, and their way of thinking was also bizarre. After interviewing the entire night, there were all sorts of candidates. During a break, a guy next door grumbled under his breath, “This is even more tiring than participating in a physics competition.”

Wen Le’s group was still alright and did not have any weirdos showing up, thus were unable to understand the guy’s feelings. 

Guan Yue, who was also one of the interviewers along with Wen Le, whispered near Wen Le’s ear, “One of my roommates is in the External Relations Department of the Student Union; and during one of the interviews, a guy turned up and started babbling in a foreign language. My roommate and the rest of the interviewers were stunned and couldn’t understand him at all. Then the guy sneered and said contemptuously, ‘Do none of you guys know any foreign language in the External Relations Department? It seems that this department is rather disappointing.’ and he just left after saying that.”

Guan Yue rolled her eyes as she said, “My roommate was so bewildered, and was practically bursting with rage.”

Wen Le curled her lip and said, “I recommend your roommate to use XX translator. Next time, even if he speaks Arabic, it will still be able to translate it, and can even point out the parts he got wrong.”

Wen Le acted as if she were a drama queen, and said: “Hey, classmate, your pronunciation is not right. Tsk tsk, your oral speech is terrible, even this translation software can’t recognize it at all.”

After hearing it, Guan Yue laughed till she was out of breath, “Hahaha, can’t stand you and your antics, Wen Le.”

Of course, normal people and outstanding interviewees still accounted for more than 90% of the interviewees. However, there were always a few who were self-conceited, which would catch the interviewers off guard.

Wen Le never expected that as soon as she ridiculed others, she would be hit next.

When the interview reached the last two candidates, the penultimate candidate was a xue di* with quite a personality.

*xue di – a term to refer to a male lowerclassmen

The xue di did not seem nervous at all in front of the interviewers, and instead was relaxedly slumped in the chair while staring at Wen Le.

Wen Le scrunched her brows in a frown, as she felt somewhat offended with the way he was blatantly staring at her.

What happened next was even more outrageous.

Faced with the question asked by an upperclassman, the xue di turned a deaf ear to him, and instead stared at Wen Le and started chatting unscrupulously.

“Xue jie*, I came especially for you. I’ve seen your photo on BBS before; you’re even prettier in person.”

*xue jie – a term to refer to a senior sister

“Xue jie, do you have a boyfriend?”

“Xue jie, what’s your ideal type like….”

He completely ignored the questions asked by the seniors, and like a peacock with its feathers on full display, he acted absolutely unbridled, seemingly forgetting that this was an interview.

Wen Le and the rest of the interviewers, who were sitting, all had visible scorn on their faces. Wen Le knocked on the desk with a darkened expression and said, “Tong xue*, this is an interview. Please correct your attitude, otherwise please leave.”

Tong xue – the direct translation is classmate, this term can also be used to refer to said student

Hearing this, the xue di changed his posture with a smile, and said, “Xue jie, why be so serious…”

Wen Le closed his application form and said, “OK, tong xue, your interview is over, next please.”

The xue di spread out his hands nonchalantly, and said, “To be honest, xue jie, I only came because I heard that joining the Student Union would get me your WeChat. Since I’ve already come, you can’t possibly let me return empty-handed right, xue jie?”

The male interviewer at the scene had already stood up and was about to escort him out with an impatient look. It was at this moment, the interview in Room 203 ended. Zhang Lin pushed the door and walked in. He frowned upon hearing what the xue di said.

Zhang Lin snickered while leading over two other guys from his department, and said to the shameless guy, “Don’t bother. Your xue jie is not single. Her boyfriend is Zhou Kao from the law school. Is there a point for you to pester endlessly here?”

“What the f**k?” The guy looked at Wen Le begrudgingly, but as he was apprehensive about Zhang Lin and the rest of the guys present, he got up and left in embarrassment.

At the present moment in the huge room, all the interviewers turned their eyes onto Wen Le, and no one bothered paying attention whether the rascal stayed or left. They had a more concerning topic at hand—the news just mentioned by Zhang Lin.

A girl softly cried out in surprise, “Oh my God, is what Zhang Lin said, true? Wen Le?”

Everyone in the room stared at Wen Le with beseeching eyes, waiting for her reply.

At the moment, Wen Le’s head was full of the stupid things she did yesterday, that she failed to realise why the people around her all seemed to know who Zhou Kao was.

The moment Zhang Lin appeared, Wen Le turned completely stiff. Just thinking about the stupid things she did last night, made her toes curl up together in awkwardness.

What had she done?

She used Zhou Kao, whom she had not seen in three years, to act as a couple to reject Zhang Lin.

Wen Le thought that she must have been crazy last night, as she had never thought about what she would do if Zhang Lin were to confirm about the relationship with her in public.

Maybe she had anticipated such an embarrassing situation at that time, but her brain numbed by alcohol affected her judgement, so in the end, she impulsively did something that she now regretted.

Under everyone’s gaze, Wen Le went completely stiff. No words were able to describe her embarrassment at the moment. She could not deny it in front of Zhang Lin yet she also could not admit it in front of everyone.

The taste of being unable to advance or retreat was incredibly diabolic.

But Wen Le had a heavy burden; how could she lose face in front of everyone? Thus she kept her expression in check, coughed lightly while smiling embarrassedly, and said, “What’s with you guys? Interviewers, we still have interviews.”

Avoiding the topic was sometimes the best answer.

When everyone saw that she didn’t say anything, they just thought she was too embarrassed to talk about her relationship in front of everyone. Thus, they took her silence as a ‘yes’ and didn’t pursue the topic any further. They then asked the last person to come in for the interview.

As soon as the interview was over, Wen Le took advantage of the fact that everyone had yet to react after finally finishing the interviews, she picked up her bag, and escaped claiming that she had something to do.

Wen Le rushed back to the dorm in a somewhat pitiful state. After closing the door, Wen Le then remembered something was not quite right. Why did they all know Zhou Kao? Was Zhou Kao very famous? Then why did she just get to know that Zhou Kao was also at A University?

While mulling it over , Wen Le heard her roommates’ excited screams. Upon hearing these screams, she knew at once that they were spazzing while watching handsome hunks.

Wen Le put her bag down and went over, “What are you guys doing?”

Author has some words to say:

The background of the plot is a parallel universe. A University is not referring to any university. Li Lexue is not referring to anybody. Everything was set to serve the plot. ~