Chapter 49: 49. Shen Qinghan’s Secret
After lunch break, Lin Zichen headed to his afternoon practical class.
The first class was the wilderness survival course.
The teacher, Cheng Bei, wasn’t interested in discussing concepts or philosophies; instead, he immediately had the students try doing things hands-on, asking if anyone knew how to start a fire by drilling wood.
As he spoke, he took out several dry sticks of wood and threw them on the ground to see if anyone possessed this skill.
However, he pretty much assumed no one would.
This skill was hardly ever needed in daily life, so who would bother to learn it for no reason?
Contrary to his expectations, Lu Gang and Wang Shujie, the two top students from Nanguan City, both knew how to start a fire by drilling wood.
As soon as he had thrown the wood on the ground, the two of them walked over and started drilling skillfully.
Then, in no time, they managed to produce a flame and successfully started a fire.
“What’s going on? How come you two are so skilled, even knowing how to start a fire by drilling wood?” Cheng Bei said, his face full of disbelief.
Lu Gang replied with a smile, “Teacher, I participated in an outdoor summer camp during the summer break of my eighth-grade year, and I learned how to start a fire there.”
Wang Shujie said indifferently, “I learned it from the internet when I was in elementary school.”
Hearing Wang Shujie, many of the students in the class gaped in surprise.
Are the top students from Nanguan City really that impressive?
He learned how to start a fire by drilling wood during elementary school from the internet?
That’s truly incredible!
Lin Zichen also looked at Wang Shujie, not expecting someone else to be like him, interested in self-learning various skills through online videos since childhood.
It seemed that top students did have certain things in common.
In the following time,
Apart from the two Nanguan City whizzes, the other students in the class followed Cheng Bei in learning how to start a fire by drilling wood.
“Xiao Chen, this is so hard, my hand is almost blistering from drilling, and I can’t even make a hole. How fast do you have to drill to get a fire going?”
Looking at her slightly reddened palm, occasionally throbbing with pain, Shen Qinghan wore a face of frustration.
Li Chuxin and He Yu beside her were in the same boat, unable to drill into the stick on the ground at all.
Seeing this, Lin Zichen said to the three of them, “Come here, I’ll teach you.”
On hearing this, He Yu couldn’t help but express his doubt, “You know how to drill wood for fire?”
Lin Zichen explained, “I also self-learned how to drill wood for fire on the internet before.”
Li Chuxin said with admiration, “Zi Chen, you’re so amazing!”
Lin Zichen just smiled and quickly passed on his little tricks for starting a fire by drilling wood to the three of them, correcting their incorrect drilling movements as well.
Among the three, Shen Qinghan was relatively clumsy, and her drilling movements were consistently incorrect.
Lin Zichen had no choice but to squat next to her and show her how to drill, hands-on.
Having Lin Zichen so intimately holding her hand in front of so many people, Shen Qinghan’s entire face turned red, all the way up to the roots of her ears, looking as though it could drip water.
After the wilderness survival class ended,
The students of Class 1, Grade 1, finally welcomed their homeroom teacher Han Yuanfeng’s martial arts training class.
This was one of the most important courses in the high school stage.
The main content of the course was to understand the human body, exercise it, and learn various martial arts techniques.
Han Yuanfeng started the class by teaching everyone a special breathing exercise.
This breathing exercise, once mastered, could regulate one’s breath and enhance the effectiveness of physical exercise.
However, the improvement was not significant; it was only slightly better than eye exercises.
While listening to Han Yuanfeng’s explanations and watching him demonstrate the breathing technique, Lin Zichen learned it right away.
It wasn’t difficult; you just had to get the rhythm of your breathing right to learn it.
But that was just for him.
Apart from him, not a single other student in the class could get it right; they were all complaining about how tough it was, and how they nearly suffocated several times during practice.
One girl even got so oxygen-deprived from the practice that she ended up leaning against a tree, retching.
“Everyone, don’t rush; this breathing technique is quite challenging. On average, it takes about three days for the top students of previous freshman classes to learn it,”
Seeing defeat written across everyone’s faces, Han Yuanfeng also took the opportunity to offer some timely comfort.
No sooner had he finished speaking than Wang Shujie came over and said, “Teacher, I’ve learned it.”
Shock coursed through Han Yuanfeng. This was only the first class, and yet someone had already learned it?
Before he could fully process his shock, Lu Gang also raised his hand high and said, “Teacher, I’ve learned it too, see if this is how it’s done?”
After speaking, Lu Gang began to practice the breathing technique somewhat awkwardly, constantly adjusting his own breath.
Upon seeing this, Wang Shujie also started to practice the breathing technique.
Seeing that both of them had truly mastered the breathing technique, Han Yuanfeng became utterly excited.
Looking at Lu Gang and Wang Shujie, he did not hesitate to lavish them with praise in front of everyone, “Amazing, really amazing. No wonder you were able to achieve excellent results in the competitive Nanguan City, your learning abilities are truly outstanding!”
The other students, witnessing this, felt overwhelming envy on their faces.
At the same time, a sense of defeat also arose within them.
Everybody who had managed to get into Shanhai High School’s martial arts elite class had been the pride of their own schools during middle school, the academic stars in everyone’s eyes.
However, in front of Lu Gang and Wang Shujie, they felt like fireflies trying to shine alongside the brilliant moon, instantly losing their luster, a rather disheartening realization.
Time flew, and in the blink of an eye, several days had passed.
During these days, the school’s schedule was basically the same every day.
From Monday to Thursday, they had Mechanical Modification and Genetic Fusion classes in the morning, followed by Wilderness Survival and Martial Arts Training in the afternoon.
Come Friday, the whole day was dedicated to elective courses.
During this time, Lu Gang and Wang Shujie continued to actively demonstrate their abilities, earning the esteem of every teacher.
Lin Zichen, on the other hand, kept a low profile, quietly working on strengthening his body each day.
Occasionally, he organized a group of four to clean the blackboard, take out the trash, and water the classroom plants, quietly completing these seemingly insignificant tasks to advance the progress bar for his Social Animal achievement.
After several days, he made quite a bit of progress.
[Achievement: Cooperatively complete tasks 1000 times under the premise of teamwork]
[Reward: Acquire Biometric Attribute—Social Animal]
[Number of tasks completed: 56/1000]
This day, Saturday morning.
Lin Zichen got up early and stood in front of Shen Qinghan’s house, waiting for her to come out.
They had agreed the night before to go to the seaside for fun today.
Just the two of them, without their parents.
Shanhai City is a coastal city, surrounded by the sea everywhere.
The nearest beach was less than thirty kilometers away.
There was no problem for the two of them to go out together.
They could leave in the morning and return at night; both sets of parents were very reassured.
Of course, they were mainly reassured about Lin Zichen.
“Xiao Chen, let’s go,” a sweet voice called out.
Shen Qinghan emerged from the house, wearing a backpack filled with items and smiling cheerfully at Lin Zichen.
Shortly after, they took a ride to the nearest beach for their day out.
It was said to be for fun, but in truth, they wanted to train their swimming skills and also examine Shen Qinghan’s physical condition.
Lin Zichen had always wanted to uncover the secrets of Shen Qinghan’s body, why she had urinary incontinence, why she was naturally such a strong swimmer?
And what was the sound that Shen Qinghan heard under the sea that time? Was it a hallucination, or something else?
Could it be related to the abnormalities Shen Qinghan had been experiencing for years?
These mysteries lingered in his mind, and he yearned to solve them every day.
PS: Setting up the bowl, asking for monthly tickets and recommendation tickets!