Chapter 16. Elderly Exam Candidate
Morning was language, afternoon was mathematics. Lord Jellyfish seriously focused on the questions and quickly completed the paper.
After the exam, Hua Ji still waited by She She's car. Spotting Lord Jellyfish walking out, he instantly waved him over.
"This year's Mathematics exam wasn't difficult."
Lord Jellyfish wanted to apply for the Practical Computer Skills course, so the exam he took was for Mathematics. The questions were either calculation or reading questions so Lord Jellyfish felt the paper wasn't difficult.
When Hua Ji heard how confident Lord Jellyfish was, he could also rest his worries. She She drove them back to the hotel and originally intended to bring his Fox Bro and Lord Jellyfish out to have some fun, but after considering that Lord Jellyfish hadn't finished his exams, he could only postpone those plans.
Hua Ji, who was sitting in the passenger seat using his phone, suddenly smiled.
"Lord Jellyfish, this year B city's mathematics exam was not difficult, yet other provinces' are not the same!"
He passed his Pear Plus to Lord Jellyfish who took a look at the screen. The page that was open was the little fox's Weibo[1]. He was searching up the University Examinations and countless Weibos with the University Examination questions posted popped up.
One thing that frequently showed up was how the Hubei candidates cried the most wretchedly.
Bie? Yang Ma?[2]
What the hell are these? Why would a mathematics question come out with this sort of thing? What if the candidates didn't recognise the words?
Lord Jellyfish's eyebrow twitched. "Isn't this from the The Nine Chapters on the Mathematical Art? They don't know about this?"
Hua Ji silently pondered for a while, before speechlessly saying, "Even if it were spirits and monsters, the ones who intensively studied The Nine Chapters on the Mathematical Art are not many, let alone these exam candidates."
Lord Jellyfish shook his head, seemingly wanting to say something but ultimately blandly said, "There's still tomorrow, after the Comprehensive Science test, there won't be any more problems."
Hua Ji blanked. "Lord Jellyfish, in the afternoon there's still English."
Lord Jellyfish said, "For English, there's no issue."
She She said, "Wow senior, you're really amazing. Many monsters who came down the mountain were troubled by English!"
Lord Jellyfish only spoke after mulling it over for a long time, "…… I've once travelled the entire world, seen this world step forwards from savagery to civilization. I know many languages, from the earliest languages created to the latest evolution of these languages. I know all of them."
He looked at the scenery outside the car window flying by at high speeds. The scenery blurring into multi-coloured streams outside was just like the rising waves in the long river of history, bubbles popping with a light touch. His tone was plain, ordinary as a bowl of white porridge.
"I'm just worried I'll slip into Old English by accident."
Hua Ji & She She: "……"
Lord Jellyfish jinxed himself.
His Comprehensive Science paper was a mess= =
Hua Ji was very understanding. Lord Jellyfish had only revised for a month, and while Mathematics had formulas that one could memorise, for Language…… Lord Jellyfish had lived in China for not a small amount of time and could pick it up that way. Even for English, he could reason it out from Old English, it was just Comprehensive Science.
No, it was Physics, Chemistry and Biology.
These three Science subjects, when clumped together, severely troubled Lord Jellyfish.
Hua Ji could not resist saying, "Actually, Lord Jellyfish you can study Humanities. For you, Humanities would be much easier."
Comprehensive Humanities tested history, politics and geography. Putting aside politics for the time being, history and geography, to Lord Jellyfish, were simply too easy. Lord Jellyfish himself was basically a walking history textbook. As for geography, even less needed to be said since Lord Jellyfish accompanied the Earth as it grew up.
Lord Jellyfish blankly stared at the Pear Laptop in front of his eyes. Displayed on the screen was the results of this year's B city University Examination answers. His silvery-white hair suddenly dimmed and lost all its luster. The ash-grey pupils also seemed to have become brittle pieces of glass, as if a slight bump would cause them to leak tears. The whole image seemed extremely pitiful.
He drily said, "My Comprehensive Science……"
Besides the formulas having no problem, the theories in biology were solid and the laws of physics were accurate. Only, the questions that mixed the three of them scored…… zero points.
Looking at the pitiful appearance of Lord Jellyfish who seemed as if he was going to melt into water in the next second, Hua Ji's heart hurt a lot.
The Lord Jellyfish who had up to this point always been wildly tyrannical and cool was about melt into water. It could be seen how devastated he was.
Hua Ji hurriedly said, "It's all right, Lord Jellyfish, us monsters have extra credit."
Lord Jellyfish still looked as if he wanted to cry but had no tears. "I'm afraid that even with the extra credit, it won't be enough to reach the first band[3]."
Lord Jellyfish's Language…… his composition went off topic; Mathematics was amazing, but this year's B city Mathematics exam was easy, it wouldn't be helpful in narrowing the score difference; Comprehensive Science…… better not to mention it; there's no problem with English, Lord Jellyfish reckoned he should be able to get quite a good score.
Having nothing but English was worth jack shit!!
Hua Ji cautiously asked, "How many points do you think you can score?"
For Language, just the composition was worth 60 marks, even if the examiner marking the paper was merciful, for going off topic on such a major question, at least 30 marks would still be deducted, right? The reading comprehension questions never had what was considered a 'right' answer and Lord Jellyfish's Three Views [4] were different from ordinary people, the answers he gave would also not be anything spectacular, discounting his firm foundation for the question on the Classics. After adding and subtracting, he would roughly be able to score 110 points.
Mathematics was not a problem, he would be able to get an estimated 140 points. English was also around that standard. As for Comprehensive Science…… Lord Jellyfish being able to get 100 would already be cause for celebration.
110＋140＋140＋100=490
This was to say; Lord Jellyfish would only be able to score around 500 points.
However!! He was a monster! Going by the Mystical Protection Department's policy, Lord Jellyfish could still get an extra 100 points!
Then he'd have 600 points!
In B city, this sort of place, scoring 600 points could barely be considered the first band ~
After calculating, Hua Ji let loose a long breath, solemnly vowing, "Lord Jellyfish be at ease, even if you apply for Tsinghua University, there is absolutely no problem."
Lord Jellyfish was still unhappy, he actually needed to use the extra credits before he would be able to get into the university? This was too shameful! This was as hard to take as cheating in the Imperial Examinations.
Hua Ji, on the other hand, was ecstatic. He enthusiastically began taking care of the matter, preparing to give a call to the Mystical Protection Department.
"I recall back then when you registered at the Mystical Protection Department, you had your age put down as 2000 years? 2000 years is enough to qualify for adding 100 points."
Lord Jellyfish said in an unhappy tone, "Why do monsters get to add points?"
"In the eyes of the people nowadays, monsters are all uneducated and backwards in thinking." Hua Ji shrugged. "Actually, this sort of thinking is not wrong, when spirits and cultivators go into seclusion, one session lasts hundreds to thousands of years, being separate from the goings of society is a very normal thing. To the Chinese Government, if a 2000 year-old great monster could clearly understand the world's rules, obey the law and be a good citizen, it was a cause for joy and would shake people's hearts.”
Lord Jellyfish wrinkled his brow. "I don't understand."
"Very simply, without talking about Lord Jellyfish who lived for so long, a 200 year-old little fox like be already had a lot of value. At the very least, in my eyes, the entirety of modern history is transparent." Hua Ji meaningfully said, "Not to mention I personally experienced all the foreign battles occurring after the Opium Wars. If I were to reveal everything I know, this would create great influence and change in the entire country."
"Just based on the fact that countless skills that have disappeared could once again be recovered, this could signify the continuation of the culture from a country's nationality, not to mention the soft power it would hold."
"Not to mention every monster was the recorder of a civilization. The longer a monster lived, the more they knew. If they entered the work force, they would be very useful; the country could not be happier. What was a measly few extra points?"
"Just like how you said you've seen Emperor Xuanzong, you just need to explain a few records of the Tang records and you would become the number one professor on Tang history. Countless precious historical relics and materials from the Tang dynasty would be delivered to your hands for appraisal and restoration. This is something people can't do but we monsters can.
Lord Jellyfish was stunned, only after a long time did he say, "There are also many people who can live for a long time……"
"But they will still die, even if they continue passing it down from generation to generation, there will still come a day when it is lost. Yet we monsters hold the knowledge within our blood. As long as we live, this knowledge can reappear again.
Hua Ji smiled.
"Even if the world ends, even if heaven and earth collapses, as long as the bloodline of the monster race survives, this passing down of knowledge will not end.
"Furthermore, compare to humans, the desires of monsters are simpler, they're much easier to control than humans."
Hua Ji stared off into the distance.
"Of course, monsters are incredibly lazy, not to mention their innate nature is hard to restrain. Few monsters will be able to adjust to living in today's society. This is why the people above tested out giving extra credit for the examinations to attract monsters to experience human life, however……"
"Cough cough, basically everyone had gotten used to fake IDs, they weren't patient enough either to learn these things, so……"
Lord Jellyfish was unhappy. "I am the first?"
"No, you are the first elderly exam candidate. The previously oldest inhuman candidate was only 72 years-old."
Lord Jellyfish: "……"
[1] Weibo is China’s equivalent of Twitter since you can’t use Twitter in China (nor can you use Facebook, YouTube, even more…)
[2] They’re terms in The Nine Chapters on the Mathematical Art but the literal meaning is so much funnier. I kept them in their pinyin forms because I wouldn’t know how to translate them otherwise. Bie is the word for soft-shelled turtle, while Yang Ma literally means sun horse hahaha.
[3] This is the University Examinations’s way of classifying grades. It’s similar to the A’s, B’s and C’s of typical school grades. The first band is the best, think the A’s of the school.
[4] Three Views is the Chinese way to refer to their world views/morals/common sense. The three views are ‘World Views’, ‘Moral Views’ and ‘Life Views’. You can read more about it if you can read Chinese (or can stand google translate).