Chapter 78 Stereotype Cheng Xin returned to the dormitory, opposite...
Cheng Xin returned to the dormitory. The parents of her roommate in the bed opposite her were still helping her pack her luggage. She saw that her roommate's name was Hou Feifei.
Seeing Cheng Xin coming in, Hou's mother put on a polite smile and asked in Mandarin with a distinct Shanghai accent: "Young lady, are you back? Was the guy who helped you move your luggage and make the bed just now your brother? The young man is very skillful."
Cheng Xin responded vaguely: "Yeah." She didn't want to explain to a stranger.
Hou Feifei was sitting on her made bed, chattering to her parents in fast and urgent Shanghai dialect, looking Cheng Xin up and down with a critical eye as she spoke.
Although Cheng Xin didn't understand a word, she could still understand the contempt in the tone and the look of obvious superiority.
She saw that Hou's mother frowned and said something in a low voice, while Hou's father shook his head calmly and also responded with a few words in a low voice.
Cheng Xin caught a few words, which seemed to be "countryside", "not dressed appropriately", and "don't judge a book by its cover".
Hou Feifei didn't take it seriously. She curled her lips and turned her head away from Cheng Xin, as if Cheng Xin had something unclean on her. She muttered to herself that her roommate "smelled poor", but she couldn't help but feel jealous of Cheng Xin's pretty face.
Cheng Xin's curiosity and excitement when she first entered the dormitory were instantly extinguished. Hou Feifei's undisguised gaze and contemptuous tone were like a bucket of cold water poured over her head, even though she didn't understand the specific content. She suddenly felt angry, but she suppressed it.
She understood that in the eyes of her roommate named Hou Feifei, she was just a "country bumpkin", a poor student who would return to her hometown after graduation. She was not worth making friends with at all, and she was even afraid that she would be relied on in the future if she said hello.
This blatant contempt and rejection aroused her inherent unwillingness to admit defeat, and she instantly lost her favor for Hou Feifei.
"Hello!" A clear and pleasant voice broke the awkward silence.
Cheng Xin looked in the direction of the voice and saw the round-faced girl who was sleeping across from her. She looked easy to get along with and was waving at her with a smile.
"My name is Chen Yuan, and I'm from northern Jiangsu. Here, these are the salted duck eggs my mother asked me to bring. They are homemade and very delicious! Everyone, try them."
Chen Yuan enthusiastically took out a few wrapped salted duck eggs and handed one to Cheng Xin first, and then to Hou Feifei's parents.
Hou Feifei's parents took it with a smile and thanked her repeatedly: "Thank you, Xiao Chen, you are so polite!"
Hou Feifei seemed not to notice the duck egg that Chen Yuan handed over, and was flipping through the book. Chen Yuan's hand paused in mid-air, but she didn't care and naturally took it back.
Cheng Xin felt much better when she saw Chen Yuan's cheerful smile. She opened her luggage and took out the spicy dried fish she brought from home.
"Chen Yuan, this is a snack I made myself, please try it."
She smiled and handed a packet to Chen Yuan, then took another packet and placed it on the table of the last empty bed, but she did not give any to Hou Feifei.
Chen Yuan happily took it: "Thank you! Wow, it smells so good!"
At this time, the dormitory door was pushed open, and a girl with neat short hair and fashionable clothes walked in dragging a suitcase, followed by a middle-aged man who looked like a driver who helped her carry the big bag.
"Hello, I'm Guan Shengnan." The girl's voice was clear, with a hint of Shanghai accent.
As soon as Hou Feifei heard the standard Shanghai accent, her eyes immediately lit up. The coldness and arrogance just now disappeared instantly, replaced by an extremely enthusiastic smile. She even jumped off the bed and greeted him.
"Hello, my name is Hou Feifei, and I'm also from Shanghai! Which district do you live in? Hey, is your box heavy? Let me help you!"
Her attitude towards Guan Shengnan was completely different from how she treated Cheng Xin and Chen Yuan just now.
Cheng Xin and Chen Yuan looked at each other silently, and it was clear what kind of person Hou Feifei was.
When everyone was almost settled, Chen Yuan clapped her hands and suggested, "Everyone in our dormitory is here! We're a family from now on. According to the old rules, shouldn't we arrange them by age? Or how about age?"
Hou Feifei was trying to get close to Guan Shengnan, and immediately shouted, "It's boring to judge by age. We are college students, so of course we have to judge by real ability. Rank by college entrance examination scores, whoever has the highest score will be the boss!"
She had a confident smile on her face. She was a local candidate from Shanghai, so she would have no problem crushing the country girl Cheng Xin and the northern Jiangsu girl Chen Yuan.
Guan Shengnan didn't say anything, but just watched the show with interest.
Cheng Xin frowned, thinking that the proposal was a bit childish, but she did not object.
"Okay, then report your scores." Chen Yuan agreed readily, "I'll go first. I'm from Subei and I got 451 points."
Hou Feifei raised her chin and said with a sense of superiority: "I am a local candidate from Shanghai, and I got 425 points in the college entrance examination."
After saying that, she looked at Cheng Xin provocatively, waiting to see her make a fool of herself. She thought to herself, the Shanghai Stock Exchange score line is low, and her score is also acceptable in the local area. Wouldn't it be easy to crush a country boy?
Cheng Xin's voice was not loud, but it was very hurtful: "Cheng Xin, Zhejiang Province, 625 points in the college entrance examination."
The dormitory instantly fell into silence and the air froze.
The smile and provocation on Hou Feifei's face froze in an instant, her eyeballs almost popped out, and her mouth opened into an exaggerated O shape.
625 points?! The total score of Zhejiang Province is only 640 points! This score is simply not for human beings! All the previous sense of superiority and provocation turned into a hot slap in her face, which made her so ashamed and angry that she wanted to disappear on the spot.
Chen Yuan covered her mouth and took a deep breath, "625?! Oh my God! Cheng Xin, you...you...you are the top scorer in the province, right?! No! You could even be the top scorer in the country!"
The look she gave Cheng Xin was no longer one of admiration, but one of awe, almost like looking at a god.
Guan Shengnan's calm expression shattered, and her cold eyes did not hide her shock. She stared at Cheng Xin, truly getting to know this plainly dressed roommate for the first time.
After several seconds, she managed to utter a sentence with an unbelievable sigh: "Monster." Then she asked, "With this score, you can choose any university major in the country, right?"
There was only pity in her eyes when she looked at Hou Feifei. This was not just a slap in the face but a dimensionality reduction attack.
Facing her roommates' shocked reactions, Cheng Xin just smiled, as if she didn't care about this terrifying score.
Her eyes swept across Hou Feifei, whose face was ashen, and landed on Chen Yuan, who had not yet recovered from the shock. She replied calmly, "Well, the admissions office teachers from Yenching University and National University came to see me."
She lightly gave the ultimate Versailles reason: "But I think our school is closer to home, so I chose this place."
There was another suffocating silence.
Close to home?!
In order to be closer to home, I gave up on Yenching University!
Chen Yuan's jaw dropped completely. How calm and self-willed was she? !
Hou Feifei only felt that her vision was dark and her chest was stuffy and she couldn't breathe.
She scored 625 points in the college entrance examination, and she didn't want to go to the top university in the country just to be closer to home. Does she have any brains?
Every word Cheng Xin said was like a heavy hammer, smashing her pitiful sense of superiority. The huge gap and humiliation made her almost faint.
Guan Shengnan let out a long breath and looked at Cheng Xin's calm and indifferent profile. His eyes were extremely complicated, with wonder and inquiry, which eventually turned into a chuckle. This roommate was really a hidden talent.
She spoke slowly, with a relaxed tone: "Guan Shengnan, a native of Shanghai, 468 points."
The results are clear at a glance: Cheng Xin ranked first with 625 points, Guan Shengnan ranked second with 468 points, Chen Yuan ranked third with 451 points, and Hou Feifei ranked last with 425 points.
The dormitory became quiet.
Hou Feifei's face turned red and white, and the domineering aura she had just displayed disappeared without a trace.
She originally wanted to outshine others with her academic performance, but ended up being the last in the class, and was slapped in the face by the "country boy" whom she looked down upon, and another local student.
She lowered her head and couldn't utter a word.
Chen Yuan tried hard to hold back a smile on her round face and said, "Alright, alright, the scores are in the past, let's work together in the future! Now the order is set, Cheng Xin is the oldest, Guan Shengnan is the second oldest, I am the third oldest, and Feifei is the youngest. Cheng Xin has the highest score, and her age... um, Cheng Xin, how old are you?"
Cheng Xin: "Twenty-one, June. I dropped out of school for two years." She didn't say that she was studying at home.
Chen Yuan: "I am in the same year as you. I repeated a grade in November."
Guan Shengnan: "I'm twenty, and my birthday is at the end of the year."
Hou Feifei muttered reluctantly: "Twenty, April." She was a few months older than Guan Shengnan, but the youngest.
"Haha, Cheng Xin is still the eldest, I'm the second, Sheng Nan is the third, and Fei Fei is the youngest!"
Chen Yuan concluded with a smile, then looked at Cheng Xin, "Boss, you will be the dormitory leader from now on! Lead us forward!"
Cheng Xin looked at the scene in front of her. Hou Feifei, whose pride was frustrated and whose face was flushed, Chen Yuan, who had a mischievous smile on her face, and Guan Shengnan, who had a calm expression and seemed to have a lot of ideas.
She was a little helpless, but she could only nod: "Okay, everyone will take care of each other in the future."
Guan Shengnan nodded: "No problem." This was considered as an acknowledgement of this ranking and Cheng Xin's status as dormitory head.
Hou Feifei was completely depressed, sitting on the edge of her bed, never talking about the college entrance exam again. Cheng Xin, the "country bumpkin", not only became the dormitory head, but also the boss who was above her, which made her feel as uncomfortable as if she had swallowed a fly, but she was helpless.
Geng Yunye did not leave Shanghai immediately. Instead, he took several buses and arrived at the most prosperous City Department Store in Shanghai.
The tall windows display a dazzling array of goods, a veritable palace of luxury goods. Geng Yunye moves between the orderly counters with a clear goal in mind.
Two hours later, he appeared again downstairs of Cheng Xin's dormitory, carrying several brown paper bags with the department store's gold-stamped logo printed on them, and the bags were full.
Cheng Xin had just finished arranging the dormitory duty roster with Chen Yuan and Guan Shengnan, and was discussing who would be on duty first for the first week when the loud voice of the dormitory manager downstairs came up: "302 Cheng Xin, someone's looking for you!"
Cheng Xin ran to the window in confusion and looked out, and was surprised to find that Geng Yunye had come back again, holding a few conspicuous large bags in his hands.
She ran downstairs quickly.
"Brother Yunye? Why haven't you left yet?" Cheng Xin took out a handkerchief and stood on tiptoe to wipe the sweat from his forehead.
"I went to the department store," Geng Yunye handed her the bag, "and bought you some things that you'll need in school."
Cheng Xin took it quickly and put her hand down: "Oh, what did you buy? So much, you spent money indiscriminately again!" She looked at his dusty face with heartache.
Geng Yunye didn't allow any explanation, and glanced at the dormitory building: "Don't treat yourself badly at school, I'll buy you more when you run out of things. Come on up, I'm going to the train station now."
She felt warm in her heart: "Then be careful on the road."
Geng Yunye watched her enter the building before leaving in big strides.
As soon as we entered the door, several conspicuous large department store bags immediately attracted everyone's attention.
Hou Feifei, who was hanging a small mirror on the bedside, paused, glanced over from the corner of her eye, curled her lips, and muttered softly: "Hmph, you just arrived in the city and you want to act rich like the city people." But her eyes couldn't help but glance at the bag.
Chen Yuan put down the rag in her hand and came over: "Cheng Xin, what good things did your brother buy you? So many bags!"
Cheng Xin put the bag in front of her desk and exhaled tiredly: "I don't know what he bought. The bag is so heavy."
As she spoke, she started to take things out.
The first thing she took out was a beige women's windbreaker. Cheng Xin shook it open and saw that the windbreaker was made of crisp material and had a simple and neat cut. It was the most fashionable style at the moment, and there was an exquisite silver brooch pinned on the collar. The label was printed in a foreign language, so it was obviously imported.
Chen Yuan screamed in surprise and couldn't help but reach out to touch it: "This windbreaker is so beautiful! It feels so comfortable. Did you buy it at the City Department Store?"
Hou Feifei's eyes were fixed on the fashionable windbreaker as if attracted by a magnet.
Then, Cheng Xin took out a soft wool scarf that was as red as fire. The color was very bright and it felt soft and warm to the touch.
Chen Yuan exclaimed again: "This scarf is so beautiful, it will definitely be warm and beautiful to wear in winter!"
Cheng Xin continued to dig, and this time she took out a large enamel hot water bag with a silly bear pattern printed on it, which was a circle larger than the ordinary ones and thicker. Then there was a long dark blue velvet box. When she opened it, she saw a brand new Hero brand gold pen inside, with a shiny cap.
When Guan Shengnan saw the gold pen, he couldn't help but exclaim and took a few more glances at it.
Then, Cheng Xin carefully took out a paper box with the French words "L'Oréal" printed on it from another bag.
Open the lid and you'll find three small glass bottles and jars inside. Cleanser, moisturizer, essence, the bottles are very delicate and give off a faint fragrance.
"What is this?" Chen Yuan smelled it curiously. "It smells so good. Is it for facial cleansing?"
Cheng Xin picked up the small bottle. She couldn't understand the French on it: "I think so."
Hou Feifei's breath stopped for a moment, staring at the exquisite bottle and the foreign letters on it. She recognized this! L'Oreal, an imported product that her mother had mentioned several times but she was reluctant to buy.
Finally, Cheng Xin took out two iron boxes and a glass jar from the largest bag.
She first opened the big golden box with foreign words printed on it, and inside were individually wrapped chocolates of various shapes.
"Chocolate! So much!" Chen Yuan clapped her hands in surprise.
Cheng Xin translated the eye-catching letters on the box: "Lindt? Lindt Chocolate?"
She then opened the large round tin can with a beautiful blue castle painted on it, revealing a can full of cookies that smelled richly of butter. Each piece was baked to a golden brown with clear patterns.
"Cookies! Such a big jar!" Chen Yuan felt that her eyes were not enough to see all of them.
Hou Feifei was completely speechless. Danish blue jar cookies! Her classmates treasured the empty jar.
Next to all these hard goods, a few packs of Guanshengyuan White Rabbit milk candy and glass bottles of Maxwell instant coffee seemed to have almost no presence.
Cheng Xin's desk instantly turned into a small counter.
The things were piled up like a small mountain, and they were obviously very valuable. She was touched and felt sorry for him. Especially the set of foreign skin care products and two large boxes of imported snacks, the prices on the labels must have been scary.
The atmosphere in the dormitory became weird.
Chen Yuan was simply filled with joy and envy. She walked around the table, carefully touching the windbreaker, smelling the skin care products, and drooling as she looked at the chocolates and cookies: "Cheng Xin, your brother really loves you! You will look stunning in this windbreaker!" She was genuinely envious.
Guan Shengnan's eyes lingered on the skin care products, pens and imported snacks for a moment. To be able to buy the best things in Shanghai so accurately, and they are all both practical and high-end, this "brother" has the knowledge and financial resources of an ordinary countryman.
The way she looked at Cheng Xin was completely different. Her previous coldness was replaced by curiosity. She pointed at the skin care products and said naturally, "My aunt has used this brand. It's pretty good. It's expensive at the Friendship Store."
Hou Feifei's expression became extremely interesting, even more embarrassed than when she learned Cheng Xin's score just now. She wanted to say something sour, but the things were really there, breaking her stereotype of the poor country people.
She turned around and pretended to make her bed, her fingers tugging at the corner of the quilt, her heart was full of jealousy and embarrassment. Although her family was a local dual-income family in Shanghai, it was impossible for them to buy so many expensive imported goods for her, a student.
Cheng Xin felt the subtle changes in her roommates' attitudes, especially Hou Feifei's aggrieved and speechless look. The pain in her heart from spending money was instantly replaced by confidence.
She picked up the chocolate, unwrapped it, and generously handed it to Guan Shengnan and Chen Yuan first: "Yuanyuan, Shengnan, try some chocolate. My brother bought too much. Let's eat it together."
Cheng Xin took the box and walked to Hou Feifei's bedside, calling her in a normal tone: "Hou Feifei, would you like to try some too?"
Hou Feifei's body froze. Without turning back, she refused bluntly: "No, I'm losing weight." Saying one more word would reveal her embarrassment.
Cheng Xin didn't force herself, she peeled one and put it in her mouth, the rich sweet fragrance melted on her tongue. She knew that Geng Yunye showed her meticulous care in his own way, and built a solid barrier for her in the dormitory so that she would not be looked down upon.
She walked to the window and looked in the direction where Geng Yunye left.
The lights in Shanghai were just coming on, and cars were coming and going on the streets. The familiar figure was no longer visible, but Cheng Xin felt extremely relieved.
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