That afternoon, news of Ruan Chen and Fu Jianzhi's affair spread.
Ruan Chen could roughly guess that Nan Jing was probably tired of the fact that no one deleted posts on the school forum this time.
That's true.
When the first post about Ruan Chen and Fu Jianzhi appeared, the administrator applied to Nan Jing to see if Fu Jianzhi's name should also be added to the blocking list—because Fu Jianzhi was a semi-public figure, the public opinion supervision on Fu Jianzhi's side was much weaker than that on Ruan Chen's side.
Nan Jing chuckled through his nostrils and spat out a mouthful of tea leaves. "No need. Just remove Ruan Chen's name from the school forum's blacklist as well."
The administrator hesitated for a moment and asked, "South Institute, won't this cause unnecessary trouble for Researcher Ruan?"
"They're young people, aren't they? They'd like to play these tricks. Then let them play them properly." Nan Jing leisurely flipped through a post discussing the relationship between Ruan Chen and the Fu family. In this post, Ruan Chen's background had been revealed as Fu Jianzhi's half-sister.
"yes."
"By the way, Ruan Chen is just an ordinary student now, no longer a researcher, so please don't call her that anymore."
——
After that day, Yan Bin consciously placed himself next to Ruan Chen. Although Ruan Chen still ignored him and did her own thing every class, Yan Bin intuitively felt that if he could get along well with Ruan Chen, it might help his future.
As for Fu Jianzhi, his attendance rate was about half and half, but everyone seemed to understand, after all, he was the person in charge of such a large group.
Li Xiaorui, on the other hand, would save a seat for Fu Jianzhi in every class, and Fu Jianzhi, for some reason, actually tacitly approved of her behavior.
So Li Xiaorui danced even more enthusiastically in front of Ruan Chen.
Because she had once tentatively asked Fu Jianzhi why he called Ruan Chen "sister," and Fu Jianzhi smiled gently, but the four words he answered made Li Xiaorui's heart ache.
He said they were childhood sweethearts.
Li Xiaorui's family also had some small businesses, and they had been trying their best to climb up the social ladder over the years. So, the moment Li Xiaorui saw Fu Jianzhi, she had the idea of currying favor with him.
But Fu Jianzhi said that he and Ruan Chen were childhood sweethearts, so the first step Li Xiaorui had to take was to test Fu Jianzhi's bottom line regarding Ruan Chen.
Then comes creating misunderstandings and conflicts, sowing discord, and taking advantage of the situation to eventually become the one standing beside Fu Jianzhi.
She thought it was easy and simple, because her sister, her mother, her aunt... her family had climbed up the social ladder step by step over the years using such methods.
Fu Jianzhi was absent on the day the school notified them to submit their modeling competition registration materials.
After obtaining Fu Jianzhi's consent via the chat software, Li Xiaorui walked to the front, to the position of class monitor, reached out and took two registration forms, and deliberately raised her voice to say, "I'll take one for Fu Jianzhi, and I'll also fill out his registration information for him. We'll submit them together."
These words were not only spoken to Ruan Chen, but also to Li Xiaorui's perceived potential competitors.
Yan Bin said to Ruan Chen, "How come I never noticed how bitchy she was before? Hey Ruan Chen, do you know? Actually, after Fu Jianzhi came, a lot of girls in the class disliked Xiao Rui and called her a tomboy."
Although Ruan Chen's eyes were on the book in her hands, she chuckled.
Yan Bin was quite surprised; this was the first time he had seen Ruan Chen smile.
Encouraged, Yan Bin then rummaged through the bits and pieces of information he had heard and told Ruan Chen, “They said Li Xiaorui pretends to be innocent and carefree, but she’s always hanging around Fu Jianzhi. Anyone with eyes can see what he’s up to. Just like before, when she was hanging around me, everyone knew what she was after, but I was the only one kept in the dark.”
“Well, it’s not too late for you to realize this now,” Ruan Chen said.
Over the past few days, Yan Bin has gained a fairly good understanding of Ruan Chen's personality.
She's just aloof and doesn't really care about what's going on outside.
Overall, he has a pretty good temper and is very thoughtful; otherwise, he wouldn't have been asked to apologize to those girls that day.
As a result, Yan Bin dared to say a few more words in front of Ruan Chen.
“But she’s clearly provoking you now. I’ve heard that Mr. Fu has had a white moonlight all these years. Apparently, he was studying abroad a few years ago and only came back this year,” Yan Bin said. “It must be you, right?”
Ruan Chen was too lazy to pay attention to his nonsense, and she saw through Li Xiaorui's competitive intentions at a glance.
Ruan Chen simply found it boring and unnecessary.
She made a shushing gesture to her lips and casually ordered, "Go get the registration form for the modeling competition. What are you standing there for?"
In the end, when the number of participants in the statistical modeling competition was tallied, more than 130 people from the whole school registered, and surprisingly, 15 of them were from the basic physics major.
The class monitor stood on the podium and checked the number of participants one by one, "Li Xiaorui, Fu Jianzhi... Ruan Chen... Yan Bin..."
When Ruan Chen's name was mentioned, a low chuckle rippled through the room.
The school issued an announcement on its official website on the same day regarding the previous joint complaint.
Regarding Ruan Chen's absence in the report, the school's official website explained that Ruan Chen went to attend some academic conferences and went through the normal leave application process—this point was quite controversial. In the words of his classmates in the basic physics class, he didn't even know how to come up with a reliable excuse. What kind of high-level academic conferences could a third-year student attend?
As for bringing unrelated individuals into the school, the school explained that it had also been approved.
In short, Ruan Chen is innocent; the contents of the whistleblower's letter are all baseless speculations by others.
Regarding the only cheating incident, the school's response was that it is still under investigation and they will strive to provide the investigation results before the end of the month.
This is something worth pondering. Many people believe that while the other allegations were addressed directly, this one was avoided, suggesting that Ruan Chen's grades may indeed be problematic.
And Ruan Chen, oblivious to his own danger, dared to sign up for the modeling competition.
In their small group chat for basic physics, a discussion immediately ensued.
[Didn't she know that modeling competitions release real-time results? The results are based on the immediate performance after the three-hour competition ends, leaving no room for cheating or modifying scores.]
[I'd say it's highly likely. She even dared to tamper with her final exams, changing several of her grades to perfect scores. She's shameless enough to do anything for that little bit of honor. I bet she's trying to pull the same trick again in this modeling competition.]
[Anyway, it's a nationwide live broadcast, monitored from every angle. If she wants to participate, let her participate. It'll be a good opportunity to see what her true level is; she acts all aloof like a goddess every day.]
Yan Bin, who was watching the commotion from the sidelines, first glanced furtively at Ruan Shen, then looked at Ruan Chen's thick foreign language book, which he couldn't understand a single word of. He silently lowered his head and typed, "[Seriously, didn't you guys ever consider that he might actually have real talent?]"
Li Xiaorui: [Yan Bin, did you catch her infection from being her deskmate for a few days?]
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