Chapter 142: Winter Passes, Spring Returns

With his alcohol tolerance being mocked, Yan He gave up on being "stubborn as a dead duck" and just lay there to be mocked.

Yan Liang nagged for a long time before finally leaving.

"I'm ready to head out." He said.

He changed into a formal suit, carried a large backpack, and was ready to go.

Yan He: "Good luck."

"Yeah."

On the first day of winter break, Yan He did nothing but start his study livestream.

In the class group chat, Li Cui said: Yan He has started studying again. I'm truly impressed by him now. I used to wonder why he improved so fast, but now I've realized it's all because he's working his life away, studying ten-plus hours a day.

Someone immediately asked: How do you know he started studying again? Are you at school?

Li Cui said with disdain: How long has he been livestreaming? How do you still not know?

That person: Livestream?

Li Cui: Yeah, Yan He opened a livestream room before, livestreaming his studying every day. Even after our evening self-study ends, he's still studying when he gets back.

That person: Is he that driven?

Li Cui immediately threw Yan He's livestream link to him: See for yourself. I'm still lying in bed, and he's already started doing problems.

Mei Ping: That's why he's improved to the top 100 in the grade. Impressive.

Li Cui: Maybe Yan He can really get into a top 30 university in the country.

Mei Ping: Terrifying.

Jiang Haitian: Big boss.

During this final winter break, Yan He's days were unremarkable.

Aside from eating, drinking, and sleeping, it was just studying.

He livestreamed for over 15 hours almost every day, and the people in his livestream room were stunned.

After all, before winter break, Yan He would at most livestream for that long on a weekend, and he would usually end the stream when Yan Liang or Li Zhibai returned.

But this winter break, Yan Liang and Li Zhibai were almost never there, busy with work, having been given a lot of tasks by Zhou Ping'an.

Yan He stayed in the house alone, not having to worry about affecting anyone, so he just shut himself in the room and studied.

The fans in his livestream room were shocked, but as the days passed, they accepted and got used to it.

The platform's backend data was also a bit shocked, noticing the data for this livestream room, with several hundred users showing they were always in the room and never leaving.

Is the fan effect that strong?

Looking again, oh, that study livestream room, okay, not surprising.

Many people just kept this livestream room on as background noise while they studied.

Still, this streamer has some skills; he can really sit at the desk and do problems all day without doing anything else.

Regardless of whether he's building a persona, this perseverance is real.

Just like those who scold public figures for doing charity to build a persona—regardless of whether they are building a persona, as long as they really donated real money and didn't fake it, that's doing charity.

The platform had been silently giving Yan He some recommendations, slowly bringing in traffic.

At its peak, Yan He's livestream room had over 10,000 concurrent viewers, and in normal situations, the viewership was approaching 3,000.

Actually, for Yan He, having such a long period during winter break gave him a feeling of wanting to go all out from the start.

After one semester, the knowledge structure for the three subjects of liberal arts had been built, and this time was perfect for organizing that knowledge structure well. For the three subjects of Chinese, Math, and English, the focus was on tackling difficult problems and weaknesses. For Chinese, it was the classical Chinese part; for Math, it was the final part of the last big problem; and for English, Yan He was focusing on improving his ability to write the final essay.

Before transmigrating, Yan He's Chinese, Math, and English levels had already reached 120, 140, and 135. After half a semester of study, he felt his real level had reached 120, 145, and 140. Chinese hadn't changed at all, because for Chinese, once you reach 120, wanting to raise your score further is metaphysics.

And scores happen to be the least important thing in the college entrance exam—what matters is what rank your score is.

Now, the distance to Zhenhua and Yuming was still in the liberal arts subjects.

Yan He's real level in liberal arts had reached about 230 points (out of 300). But liberal arts, like Chinese and English, are easy to improve in the beginning, but later on, it's all about accumulation and foundation.

It's very hard to improve scores linearly, because in the end, it's really testing literacy.

And literacy is something mysterious, without a clear textual standard.

During this winter break, Yan He basically spent every day like this.

Reading, livestreaming, eating, sleeping, occasionally eating a meal when Li Zhibai or Yan Liang came back, and occasionally playing a game or two...

The company didn't bother him with anything else.

Oh, but another producer came to buy the copyright for "Commemoration," as they wanted a singer to perform it at a gala they were producing.

Yan He took the authorization agreement he had signed with Song Lin Xin before as a template and signed one with them as well, authorizing it.

Thanks to this era where copyright protection has gradually fallen into place; if he had transmigrated 10 or 20 years earlier, it would have been an era of rampant piracy where no one cared if you bought the copyright.

Because the version of "Commemoration" he sang himself was still continuously bringing him a meager income on music platforms, plus two authorizations, including the remuneration for the two previous program recordings, Yan He's wallet was gradually filling up, and his savings finally broke through 30,000 yuan.

Not to the point where he would be kicked out and have to beg on the street one day.

On New Year's Eve, Yan Liang and Li Zhibai both went home.

Yan He went nowhere.

An orphan, the only person who was good to him before he was 14, his grandmother, had passed away, and he was picked up by his uncle and brought to Yuming, becoming truly alone from then on.

His uncle didn't call him, and he didn't call back.

It was as if they had both forgotten the existence of such a relative.

On this night when thousands of lights were bright and travelers from north and south returned to their nests, Yan He sat in his room studying alone, without livestreaming.

From outside the window, cheers and joyful sounds occasionally drifted in. Although the city had a fireworks ban, it couldn't stop people from secretly setting off a few, which appeared fleetingly in the night sky.

Yan He heard the sound of fireworks blooming and occasionally looked up.

He couldn't help but miss his parents, but he didn't dare to think, didn't dare to think too much.

He could only shake his head, clear his distracting thoughts, and continue to focus on reading and doing problems.

This was New Year's Eve, a night no different from every ordinary night in the past.

Yan He knew Li Zhibai and Yan Liang would take advantage of this time to stay home for a few days.

They were usually very busy and had no time to go back, especially Yan Liang, whose home wasn't in Yuming.

Because he ran out of eggs, Yan He went to the supermarket outside the residential area on the second day of the Lunar New Year to buy eggs.

A boiled egg every day provided his nutrition.

At this time, there was basically no one in the supermarket.

There were couplets and red lanterns everywhere, looking very festive.

Yan He walked out carrying two boxes of eggs and a box of milk, his breath turning to frost in the cold wind.

There was basically no one on the road either.

Many people living here were not from Yuming. At this time of the year, they had long since taken their families back to their hometowns, as if half the place was empty.

Suddenly, "beep beep" came from the side.

Yan He didn't react at first, until the "beep beep" sounded again.

He turned his head in surprise and saw Qiu Ling's car on the empty main road.

A bit magical.

Yan He walked over, very surprised, looking at the woman who had already pulled the car over and rolled down the window.

"Qiu Ling-jie, why are you here? Didn't you go home?"

Qiu Ling: "Don't mention it, work. I was summoned back last night, pulled an all-nighter catching someone, and just got off work, ready to go back and catch up on sleep. What about you? Why didn't you go back?"

Yan He paused and said: "Preparing for the exam, the college entrance exam is coming up soon."

"Tsk, high school seniors are really different, so hard-working." Qiu Ling's two dark circles were big and flashing, "Are you eating breakfast? If not, let's go have some noodles? I'll sleep after I'm full."

Yan He carried the eggs and milk, nodded, and said: "Okay."

"Get in."

Qiu Ling took Yan He for two hundred meters, and the car stopped at the side.

It was hard to find a noodle shop that was still open today.

"Qiu Ling-jie, is your work always this busy?" Yan He asked.

Qiu Ling: "Busy, busy is secondary. The key is that sometimes things come up very urgently, and you have to overcome many difficulties yourself. I'm actually doing okay; the police officers in the frontline stations are even busier and more tired, busy like spinning tops, and many have occupational diseases."

Yan He nodded thoughtfully: "Then Qiu Ling-jie, haven't you thought about changing jobs? It's so busy and tiring."

"Change to what." Qiu Ling said, "Although it's busy and tiring, if I didn't want to do this profession, I wouldn't have chosen to enter it. I'll consider transferring to a more relaxed position when I really can't do it anymore. It's not like all police positions are as busy as what I'm doing now."

Yan He still didn't know exactly what Qiu Ling did; he only knew she often had to deal with some very serious cases.

"I've been keeping an eye on that matter of yours." Qiu Ling suddenly said.

Yan He didn't react for a moment to what Qiu Ling was referring to.

Qiu Ling said: "The matter of you being pushed into the river. Because there was no surveillance at the scene and nothing suspicious was captured around, there was only an anonymous letter you received, but it was also impossible to track, and there were no useful clues. Are you sure you were pushed? Could it be that you didn't step firmly, or could it be an illusion?"

Yan He shook his head: "Qiu Ling-jie, I am very sure I was pushed. A very large force pushed me down from behind. Although I didn't see that person, that person never appeared again after that."

"Mainly because we couldn't find anyone suspicious around you; no one had a motive to persecute you." Qiu Ling sighed, "The person with the most malice toward you around you is your agent, who is thinking about terminating your contract."

Yan He nodded: "Yes, that's what I'm confused about. However, Qiu Ling-jie, I told you before, the person in the company who wants to drive me away isn't Zhou Ping'an; he's just acting on orders. He gave me some hints before that the person who really wants to drive me away is someone outside. The superior who instructed him is also acting on someone's behalf. They don't want to drive me out of the company, but want to drive me out of the entertainment industry, making it so I can't be a star or artist. I have a suspicion: is the person who wants to drive me out of the entertainment industry the same person who harmed me? My past is really simple, and I don't have any interpersonal relationships, but these two things happened to me inexplicably. I don't think it's a coincidence, although I still don't know what secret I have."

Qiu Ling nodded.

"I'll continue to find ways to investigate. However, because there are no clues or evidence for your matter, except for me trying to find a way to keep an eye on it, no one else will continue to follow it." Qiu Ling said, "You should also understand. The whole thing is just what you described when you reported the case; there are neither witnesses nor evidence, and everyone has many other cases to deal with, so there's not that much energy to continue with your matter."

Yan He actually understood Qiu Ling's subtext.

The police might even feel that the matter of someone pushing him into the river wasn't true, and even the anonymous letter might not be true, that it was forged.

This feeling of not being believed was uncomfortable, but perhaps because he was also a squatter, when he came to this world, the original body had already been pushed into the river. All the memories were inherited; the fear and terror were there, but they were not as good as his own personal experience. Looking at these things, it was somewhat like looking at someone else's business.

Yan He didn't fully enter into this angry emotion, and there would be no "how can you not believe me" Ma Jingtao-style angry shouting.

"Yeah." Yan He nodded, "Thank you, Qiu Ling-jie. I'm already very grateful that you can take the time to keep an eye on this matter."

Danger certainly existed, but after that incident, it never appeared around him again. And Yan He also adhered to the philosophy of "a gentleman does not stand under a dangerous wall," never going to remote places alone. Every day was school—bus—school, or walking with Li Zhibai and Yan Liang. Except for that one accidental encounter with Zhou Binshi killing someone and hijacking, causing a panic, there was no other danger.

"However, was my parents' death really an accident?" Yan He asked, "The meaning revealed in that anonymous letter makes me feel there's a hidden story behind my parents' death."

"I've checked this matter, and it was indeed an accident." Qiu Ling said, "Your father died of lung cancer, and your mother died of the NIU virus that year. Both are on record. If there really was a hidden story, it should be a man-made cause of death like a car accident. Lung cancer and NIU virus infection are pathological causes of death, which cannot be forged."

Yan He nodded.

What Qiu Ling said was consistent with the original body's memory, with no difference. It seems it really wasn't what he originally thought.

He originally thought that his parents' death must also have a hidden story, perhaps they were persecuted, but the cause of death was disguised.

Pathological deaths like lung cancer and NIU virus infection don't sound like they can be easily caused by humans.

There was nothing else to say.

Yan He and Qiu Ling had a bowl of noodles together and then parted ways.

Qiu Ling went back to catch up on sleep, and Yan He went back to continue studying.

On the sixth day of the Lunar New Year, Li Zhibai ran back.

Yan He was quite surprised and asked him what was going on, why he came back.

Li Zhibai was unhappy and said: "Anyway, staying at home is just being nagged, so it's better to run back early. It's much more comfortable here."

"..."

Li Zhibai asked again: "Old Lu, what have you been doing these past few days?"

"Reading."

"Have you been reading the whole time?"

"Yeah, I've been reading the whole time."

Li Zhibai looked at Yan He in disbelief. Beyond being stunned, he couldn't help but feel some emotion.

"I saw you hadn't livestreamed, so I thought you had given yourself a break and rested for a few days."

"Anyway, there's nothing else to do." Yan He said.

Li Zhibai: "How about playing some games together today?"

"Sure."

The two of them took the controllers and played games for an hour.

Yan He didn't make much noise while playing games, but Li Zhibai could shout "ah, oh, damn, shit, fuck" from beginning to end by himself.

"Let me tell you, I'm really speechless." Li Zhibai suddenly remembered something and said: "Zhou Ping'an wants me to go film a movie in March."

"Film a movie?"

"Yeah." Li Zhibai nodded, "He said there's a crew, a role, and someone temporarily bailed on the crew, so he's preparing to shove me in. I looked at the role, heh, that role is just a crazy, cool rich kid, looks like a total idiot, but Zhou Ping'an insists it suits me, and says something about the persona being good, that I'll be popular if I play it. I really want to scold him."

"Try acting it out first. When you auditioned last time, you acted quite crazy and cool." Yan He said with a smile, "Maybe it's very suitable?"

"Damn, you actually said that too?" As soon as Li Zhibai heard this, his eyebrows instantly furrowed.

Yan He said: "Oh, actually, it's quite good to play a role that's a bit like yourself when you first start acting. Otherwise, people like us who haven't received acting training wouldn't know how to act, right?"

Li Zhibai: "Then wouldn't I be playing myself even more? Damn, am I usually that kind of person?"

Upon hearing this, it turned out the crux was here.

Li Zhibai felt that this role wasn't very high-end, rude, showing off wealth, exaggerated behavior, speaking without thinking, but he happened to be a rich kid, so he easily felt "alluded to."

"Don't think like that. It's all just acting, right?" Yan He said, "Zhou Ping'an, although he's not a decent person, he definitely wouldn't watch his most popular artist play a role that would ruin his image. If this role were really that scold-worthy, he wouldn't have taken it for you."

This sentence convinced Li Zhibai.

"..." Li Zhibai was silent for a moment, "Then I'll look at the script again."

Yan He thought, and besides, if Zhou Ping'an has already decided you're going to act, even if you don't want to, Zhou Ping'an will find various ways to make you want to.

The things Yan He said to Li Zhibai were sincere.

He felt that Li Zhibai should also try to walk the path of an actor.

The entertainment industry in this world is not much different from the world he came from, both at a similar stage, with film and television dramas as king, the music market depressed under the impact of the shrinking physical market, and the domestic environment lacking a mature stage for artist performance, while music festivals are booming, giving some singers who aren't very famous but have style a soil for survival.

The vocal conditions of the three of them, him, Li Zhibai, and Yan Liang, are all about the same, not particularly good, just able to sing. To rely on these conditions to be a singer, honestly, without luck, it's really hard. Even though Yan He has a cheat-like song library, he could sing one "king bomb" a year for ten or twenty years, but "Commemoration" gave Yan He a great feeling—he sang it, it was a small hit, but it was only after it was covered by Song Lin Xin that it really became popular on social media.

Not every song that becomes popular doesn't pick its singer.

"Ah Diao" was only relatively well-known in the folk circle before it was sung by Zhang Shaohan.

It's not even the difference in singers; the difference in stage and promotional efforts will cause a song to become popular to varying degrees.

"Never Left" had been out for many years before it appeared on "I Am a Singer," and it was only because of this variety show that it became popular nationwide.

Yan He's golden finger is just opened on some foundations—he knows many good works, these good works have the foundation to explode in the original time and space, but this doesn't mean that just by moving them over, you can replicate the miracle.

He had thought so before, but the result of "Commemoration" made him feel that things were not as simple as he thought.

Therefore, people must eventually combine their own advantages to do what they want to do.

Coming to such a time and space, he can "create" many songs later, with mature timing and conditions, and there are many film and television works that can be "created," but to stand firm, one must eventually find what truly belongs to oneself.

They all have a bit of acting talent, so they can try this path. Whether it can work and how far it can go are things for the future. Take it one step at a time. This is also why Yan He insisted on seizing the performance opportunity of "Golden Age" at the beginning.

An opportunity is a key. No one knows if it's the key to open the door to your final success, so you can't give up a single one.

The winter break for high school students ended quickly, and immediately, the new semester began, and a group of people started the new torture in full swing.

After arriving at school, on the first day, they took the last monthly exam of the previous semester, which was the final exam, to look at the results.

The school was relatively merciful and didn't announce the results while they were at home.

Yan He's ranking was 148th in the grade, moving forward a bit again.

Li Pengfei reached 274th in the grade, also making significant progress.

Compared to this, what made them both happier was that Su Su had returned.

His injury was supposed to be nursed for a while longer, after all, the knife was inserted directly into his chest.

But he insisted on coming back to teach the students.

Sitting down to teach, because he couldn't speak loudly, he specially got a small microphone, wearing a headset every day to lecture everyone.

Seeing him like this, Yin Xiangyu teased him privately, saying that Su Su could represent the school to run for the labor model and moving person of the year.

As a result, the words spread, and many people thought it was indeed possible. If Su Su's spirit wasn't commended, then who would be?

Commend that gossiping person?

So, Yin Xiangyu, who was originally going to be pushed out to participate in the evaluation based on seniority, was intercepted by her own words.

That's a story for later.

The closer it got to the college entrance exam, the faster time passed. They felt time wasn't enough and that there were still many places that needed to be checked for gaps.

Yan He's sleep time was further compressed.

Before, he guaranteed at least six hours of sleep a day, but now he only slept for five hours.

In March, Li Zhibai went to the crew to report and started filming his first movie. Yan Liang achieved excellent results in the joint exam and started the school exam.

Time flew by in every breath.

Yan He's strength was no longer carefully hidden. A winter break of more than ten hours of study livestreaming every day allowed him to release more strength in the monthly exam at the end of February.

Chinese 115, Math gave up the last small question of the last three big problems and scored 125, English slightly held back some points and got 122, and liberal arts finally reached 241 points under his diligent study, with Politics 87, Geography 88, and History 66.

Yan He's ranking rushed into the top 100 in the grade for the first time, shocking the whole school.

His worst subject was still History.

But their class's history ranking made rapid progress, ranking third in the whole grade in this exam.

Yin Xiangyu's face was black when she saw the students in Class 3 these days.

The former last place in the grade had reached third in the grade after changing a history teacher.

"..."

This was also a slap in her face.

Yan He entering the top 100 in the grade for the first time shocked the entire grade group.

But this time, everyone was only surprised, not suspicious.

During the winter break, Yan He livestreamed his studying for more than ten hours every day, which was known by many teachers and students in the school.

Many people were viewers of his livestream room.

Liu Qin said: "Yan He can improve so significantly, one depends on the teacher's teaching, and two depends on his own life-risking effort."

He was really risking his life.

The students in Class 3 knew how much energy Yan He had put into his studies.

Can a person improve so much in just five or six months?

This was the result of Yan He controlling his performance.

"He really put every minute and every second into his studies, constantly thinking, constantly supplementing his knowledge." Old Chen said in his office to the teachers in the office, "He brings his fans in his livestream room to memorize words every night, ten words in ten minutes, but I see that he actually memorizes ten words in three to five minutes, and then starts memorizing other words. To really memorize this word 100%, it doesn't actually take ten minutes. He can improve so fast because he really wants to learn well."

Lin Jue said in class: "What should everyone learn from Yan He? He will study every knowledge point thoroughly. Why do every warm current and cold current appear? Why do they appear in this place, and what kind of influence do they have on the vicinity? If you study the logic of geography here thoroughly, that is what we call drawing inferences from one instance. You don't even need to memorize by rote. If you are asked about the sea area marked by a certain latitude and longitude, combined with the geomorphological characteristics of the surrounding coastal area, you can even calculate it yourself whether it is a warm current or a cold current."

Every piece of knowledge is actually human experience. Behind the experience, there is the law of its appearance.

Yan He understood these laws, so he learned everything faster.

He almost put all his energy into studying.

Even eating was a race against time. Li Pengfei said that every time he ate with him, it was like someone was grabbing it, and he had to finish it within ten minutes.

Yan He said: "I really take Zhenhua and Yuming as my goals. There are only two or three months left. Let's fight for it. There will be no chance to fight later."

In mid-March, Yan Liang's art exam results came out, and he successfully got into Jingyi, just waiting for the college entrance exam culture score.

Because of this result, Yan Liang also made it to the hot search after a long time.

After all, it's Jingyi.

Then, Yan Liang, who was originally arranged to return to the 13th Middle School to prepare for the exam after the art exam, was also arranged by Zhou Ping'an with a whole set of private tutors to make a sprint for the college entrance exam, tailoring a preparation plan to ensure he got into Jingyi.

In the group of three, only Li Zhibai occasionally bubbled up to complain.

One moment it was that some actor had a sick brain, another moment it was that the director wasn't a human, making him wait on the scene for eight hours in vain, and another moment it was that the scene he was about to act was too stupid, and so on.

Snow melted to reveal the clear sky, and old trees sprouted new buds.

From thick down jackets and cotton-padded clothes, they changed into jackets and windbreakers, and then, slowly, the clothes became thinner and thinner.

Li Pengfei held his face and asked Yan He in the crowded cafeteria: "Have I lost weight? Why do I feel like every time I touch my face, I feel the bones?"

Yan He looked at him speechlessly.

"Go ask Xu Zijun."

As soon as Li Pengfei heard this name, he was like facing a great enemy, immediately turning his head to look around, fearing that Yan He's words just now would be heard by others.

"Keep your voice down! Don't let anyone hear it. I told you, we're keeping it a secret!"

Yan He: "... No one suspects you two now."

Li Pengfei was suddenly a bit melancholy.

"Old Lu, I'm a bit worried about one thing now."

"What is it?"

"What if the two of us get into different places? What should we do?" Li Pengfei said, "Do we have to have a four-year long-distance relationship?"

"Why are you considering this now? Maybe you can go to university in the same place later." Yan He said, "It's useless to consider this now. Why not think of ways to get more points? Then you'll have more choices and be able to stay in the same place as her."

Li Pengfei sighed: "I'm very worried now. What if I perform too poorly and my dad wants to send me abroad?"

Yan He: "I don't think your dad has that idea. If he wanted to send you abroad, he would have sent you away long ago, instead of urging you to study hard every day."

"My grades are too poor. Even if I fight to the death, I can't get into a top university. I'll be satisfied if I can get into a decent second-tier university." Li Pengfei had self-knowledge, "I can get into the top 200, I think it's my family's ancestral grave smoking."

"There are still more than two months. Fight for it. Before the last moment, no one knows what will happen." Yan He said, "And maybe you'll perform exceptionally well in the college entrance exam. Anyway, don't think blindly. Do what you can do now, don't think about what you can't do."

Li Pengfei pouted, looked at Yan He, and said: "The way you talk now is exactly the same as my brother."

Yan He: "..."