Chapter 175 - A Hardened Man

Students from Beijing University didn’t think that there anything wrong with building on the reputation of their school.

If you were capable and talented enough, you should go ahead and do well on stage. Tsinghua wanted to be able to maintain its reputation. They didn’t want to give Tan Mo an unchallenged avenue to display her talents and take any chance away from them.

Sadly, however, you guys from Tsinghua are not talented enough.

It was even more embarrassing the way they had all acted so arrogantly when they didn’t even have any talent.

At that moment, no one except the Tsinghua teachers and students felt that Tan Mo was in the wrong.

Although only a small part of the audience were guests from other schools, there were many viewers watching through the livestream.

The students of Beijing University were exceptionally pleased.

“Marvelous!”

“Tan Mo is so awesome! Why were they being so arrogant?”

The dormitories and internet cafes were all buzzing with these sentiments, and everyone felt vindicated.

President Mu was also following this event in his office. He picked up the phone in his office and said, “Go and open up the assembly hall. Switch on the screens and livestream this year’s Ancient Text Competition. Disseminate the news, and inform all the students that we have opened up a public area for everyone to watch together. Everyone can go watch if they want to.”

President Mu had personally issued his orders. The people in charge swiftly made arrangements.

An email was sent out to all the students to inform them of the streaming location.

Initially, President Mu hadn’t really intended to pay much attention to this competition.

He only cared about the results of the competition.

However, this year, Tan Mo had earned a place on Beijing University’s team by scoring full marks.

In addition, Tan Mo was someone he had poached after personally agreeing to a whole lot of conditions. What’s more, Professor Guo had approved her.

For all these reasons, President Mu had anticipated this year’s Ancient Text Competition a little bit more than he usually did.

Due to their performance at the past competitions, President Shi had flaunted the results in his face countless times.

President Mu wanted to take advantage of this event and see if Tan Mo was worth all the conditions he had agreed to.

Unexpectedly, Tan Mo had given him a huge surprise!

President Mu’s arrangements were implemented in no time.

A few of the students who had been watching in the internet cafes left and went to the assembly hall.

Those who were viewing it from their dormitories found it less exciting to watch it alone. They went to the hall to join in on the excitement as well.

A few students who previously had been uninterested in the match walked past the assembly hall. When they realized that there was an ongoing livestream, they stopped in their tracks and watched if they had nothing else better to do.

As they watched, it was so exciting that they decided to stay on.

Other students who walked by also stopped out of curiosity when they realized how bustling the assembly hall was. More and more students gathered around to watch.

The crowd in the assembly hall grew and grew..

Back at the competition site, in the stands set aside for esteemed guests…

Professor Guo felt extremely vindicated when he heard Tan Mo’s words.

He also felt extremely pleased.

He glanced at Professor Liu, who had a rather unsightly expression plastered on his face. He giggled and said, “No one from Tsinghua University took us seriously before the competition. You guys behaved as though your team had already pocketed the gold. It doesn’t look very certain now.”

Professor Liu didn’t say a word. His eyes were fixed on the competition.

Both Lin Zhenhui and Zhao Xiaoou had been two of his favorite pupils. Yet, Tan Mo had trampled over them, to the point that neither of them could keep their heads raised.

“We aren’t going to contend for this point.” On the competition ground, the other four contestants appeared to have discussed this beforehand.

The representative from Shuang University spoke up, “We four are going to forfeit. Will the Tsinghua representative try? If you don’t hit the buzzer soon, it will be too late.”

Tan Mo smiled at the other four contestants. Then she turned and asked Zhao Xiaoou, “Senior Zhao, if you don’t press the buzzer, I will.”

Tan Mo placed her hand on the buzzer and waited for a few seconds. She wasn’t feeling anxious yet; there was still time.

She would give Zhao Xiaoou a chance.

But to Zhao Xiaoou, Tan Mo was doing this to humiliate her.

If Tan Mo wanted to press the buzzer, she should just do it.

However, her hand continued to hover over the buzzer. But for some reason, her hand refused to press the buzzer.

This was equivalent to suspending a sword on top of Zhao Xiaoou’s head.

To scare and mock her…

It was almost as though Tan Mo was testing her and seeing if she had the guts to hit the buzzer.

Zhao Xiaoou kept hesitating until the very last second.

Suddenly, she heard a CLANG!

Zhao Xiaoou raised her head abruptly. She realized that she hadn’t been the one who had pressed it.

Her hand was still next to the buzzer. She had been unable to make up her mind.

At that moment, she heard the voice of the host, “Can the contestant from Beijing University please state her answer.”

Tan Mo calmly replied, “I choose option C.”

“Correct!” the host said. “Now, let us look at the rankings at this juncture.”

Beijing University: 19 points.

Tan Mo had answered every question right in this round. She had earned all 10 points.

In addition to the 9 points from the previous round, Beijing had a total of 19 points.

Shuang University: 0 points.

Jiang University: 0 points.

Tong University: 0 points.

Nan University: 0 points.

Tsinghua University: -1 point.

Although zero points didn’t look very good, it was okay. At least their points weren’t in the negative numbers like Tsinghua’s.

The contestants from the four universities were all quite openminded.

The host recited the scores solemnly. “Shuang University, Jiang University, Tong University, Nan University: second place.

“Tsinghua University: sixth place with negative points.” The host said this with great difficulty.

This was such an outlandish situation. It was so strange.

Zhao Xiaoou bit her lip. Before the host could say anything, she had already returned to the competitors’ stand in tears.

Tan Mo watched this.

This situation has put her in quite a tough spot.

Zhao Xiaoou had broken into tears. Wouldn’t that make her look pitiful?

“Not bad.” Guang Yingbai, a contestant from Shuang University, walked over and waved at Tan Mo with a smile.

Tan Mo: “……”

What a stoic man.

Zhao Xiaoou was in tears. Yet he had walked over to tell her that she’d done well…

Tan Mo waved her hand. “Senior Zhao is crying, but please don’t blame me.”

Ge Youyi from Nan University walked over. When he heard what Tan Mo had said, the corner of his lips slipped up involuntarily into a smile.

He hadn’t expected this little girl to be so interesting.

“We understand, don’t worry.”

Chen Qingyue from Tong University also walked over and added, “She cried because she was angry with herself. It has nothing to do with you.”

“The students from Tsinghua are too used to winning. They had assumed that no one could be their match.” Jiang University’s Bi Yingrui walked over. “They can’t even take such a small setback.”

Tan Mo hadn’t expected these four students to be so openminded.

Although she was targeting Tsinghua’s representative…

She had also deprived the contestants from the other four schools of a chance to answer.

They had been implicated by such an absurd calamity.

As innocent victims of such a calamity, they should have been quite vexed by the situation.

She had a reason for targeting the contestants from Tsinghua.

However, she had no hard feelings for the students from these other four schools.

“Do your best in the next round as well.” Ge Youyi grinned at Tan Mo as he waved his hand. Then he returned to the contestants’ stand.

The other three students also encouraged Tan Mo.

Once they’d returned to their seats, the host announced, “Now let us take a look at the theme for the third round.”

In the third round, contestants were to fill in the blanks of certain pieces of ancient literature.

On the surface, it looked simple. However, these were all lesser-known ancient scripts. No one would necessarily know the answers.

The well-known ancient poems and literature were certainly not included in these questions.

Although many documents weren’t considered as classics, it didn’t mean that they weren’t important.

Many were pieces that were currently being researched by experts. However, since they were quite complex and difficult to understand, most ordinary people wouldn’t be interested enough to read them.

Textbooks wouldn’t touch upon them much either. Hence, only real professionals in this field would have any experience with them.