Chapter 100: Experiencing Another Life

East Ocean University was only several bus stops away from LingZhao Middle School. Sitting on the rickety bus, Hao Ren leaned his arm against the window and rested his head on his palm. His gaze fell on the band-aid on his elbow.

He tore it off and saw only a small trace of blood on it, which meant the wound was not at all serious. After looking at the cartoon of a pig on the other side of the band-aid, Hao Ren was amused.

Hao Ren was reluctant to toss away this memorable little thing after playing with the band-aid in his hands for a couple of minutes. On second thought, it would be weird to keep such a thing, so he tossed it into the dustbin on the bus.

"Actually, this little girl isn't too bad to me..." Hao Ren thought.

The bus arrived at LingZhao Middle School, and Hao Ren got off the bus and found that it was ten to six. Many cars were lined up along the street on both sides of the school gate, and parents were hurrying toward the school.

Afraid of being late, Hao Ren also hurried toward the gate. However, a middle-school girl stopped him. "Hey, we have Parent-Teacher Meetings happening today, and only parents can come in," she said.

"I'm here for a Parent-Teacher Meeting," Hao Ren said.

The girl looked at him suspiciously and asked, "Whose parent are you?"

Although some parents of middle-schoolers were quite young, they were not as young as Hao Ren.

"Zhao Yanzi from Class Two in Eighth Grade. I'm her brother, and I'm here to represent her parents who are too busy to come to the meeting today," Hao Ren answered. He had made up the story on the bus.

"Ok." The girl nodded before lowering her arm to let Hao Ren in.

"Is Zhao Yanzi this well-known in her school?" Hao Ren thought while walking on campus.

LingZhao Middle School was one of the best middle schools in East Ocean City. The campus was very large and beautiful with rockeries, an Artificial Lake, modern Academic Buildings, a Stadium, and classical-style Art Museum, and a Music Hall. It looked like a multi-functional park.

Since many of the students were kids from wealthy families or political families, the security of the school was tight, and no one could enter without permission. Hao Ren grew up in East Ocean City, but it was his first time stepping into this famous middle school.

In fact, there were two departments in the school, a High School Department and a Middle School Department. Except for the shared Stadium, Art Museum, and Music hall, the departments each had their own facilities including Academic Buildings, and they were divided by the Artificial Lake which ran across the campus.

Following the direction signs, Hao Ren had no trouble finding the Academic Building of the Middle School Department. The classes of the Eighth Grade were on the second floor, and Hao Ren walked up the stairs and followed the class signs down the hall before finally spotting Class Two.

There were many parents who were either resting with their eyes closed or talking to each other in the classroom, and Hao Ren attracted a lot of attention since he was too young.

On each desk, there was a slip of paper with the student's name on it. Hao Ren spotted Zhao Yanzi's name on a desk in the second row, so he walked over, pulled out the chair, and sat down.

The man sitting next to him was a man in his forties, and Hao Ren nodded at him in greeting.

He looked around the classroom. There were the teaching platform and the whiteboard in the front, and a smaller whiteboard with the students' articles posted on it was located on the back wall.

However, the teaching platform in the front was bigger than what Hao Ren was used to seeing, and he was new to whiteboards and colored markers as well since his middle school used blackboards and chalks.

The desks and chairs were made of metal and were brand-new. Hao Ren noticed a small metal name tag on the upper right corner of the desk, and Zhao Yanzi's name was written on it.

"The students have their own set of desks and chairs. No wonder the desks are kept so clean... How come no one thought of this method in our time..." Hao Ren thought to himself.

Hao Ren suddenly had a weird feeling about it when thinking about how Zhao Yanzi sat in this chair in class. He imagined Zhao Yanzi sitting here facing the whiteboard while the teacher was giving a lesson, exchanging glances with Ling who sat close to her, and passing slips of paper to communicate with her best friend when talking wasn't allowed. There were probably some boys messing with each other when the teacher wasn't looking while some boys glanced secretly at the girls they liked. Some of the boys sitting in the back row probably played with the braids of the girls sitting in front of them, and the girls probably turn around to roll their eyes......

Imagining the scenes in the class, Hao Ren glanced at the name tag on the desk next to Zhao Yanzi's and found that it was a girl's name.

"Well, Zhao Yanzi's neighbor is a girl..." Hao Ren was relieved before he caught himself, "What am I thinking about?"

While he was looking around, a middle-aged woman in a suit came into the classroom and stepped onto the platform with a binder tucked under her arm.

"Good evening, parents! I'm Luo Ying, the Class Advisor of Class Two of the Eighth Grade," she introduced herself. Suddenly, she spotted a young man sitting in the classroom and asked suspiciously, "And you are..."

"Oh. I'm Zhao Yanzi's older brother. Her parents are busy and asked me to come in their place," Hao Ren said.

"Since you are her older brother, aren't her parents your parents, too?" The experienced Class Advisor immediately caught the loophole in Hao Ren's words.

She suspected that Zhao Yanzi, embarrassed about her low scores, had asked a random person to attend the Parent-Teacher Meeting. Some students had done such things before; one student from the Middle School Department had asked a student from the High School Department to act as his parent. The teachers were smarter than the students after all, and both of those students ended up being punished.

"Oh, I mean I'm her cousin!" Fortunately, Hao Ren quickly thought of an explanation.

"A cousin in the Parent-Teacher Meeting..." Luo Ying was displeased, but she didn't pursue the topic. After all, the other parents were waiting for the meeting to begin.

"The main purpose of today's Parent-Teacher Meeting is to announce the midterm examination scores. As you all know, the kids are now in the Eight Grade and will soon be entering the Nine Grade. We must prepare them for it since the Ninth Grade performances depend on their Eighth Grade performances a lot. They must build a solid foundation for..." Luo Ying began her speech to the parents.

Sitting in the chair, Hao Ren saw the parents around him listening attentively, and he followed suit, putting on his serious face. However, he knew the Class Advisor was giving a cut and dry speech, and the purpose was to urge the parents to keep a sharp eye on their kids' studies.

It was Hao Ren's first time acting as a parent. Seeing the anxiety on the parents' faces, Hao Ren suddenly thought that he would be one of them one day.

"Some of you have the mistaken impression that you don't have to worry about your children's academic performances since they could go to the High School Department as long as they have passable scores. In fact, children's performances in the Middle School Department will decide their academic levels in high school, which in turn will decide which university they can enter..." Luo Ying continued her speech.

Unlike the other parents, Hao Ren got bored. He lowered his head and began to quietly run through the stuff stored in the drawer of Zhao Yanzi's desk.

There was a bottle of half-empty drink, half a bag of chips, and some unopened bags of dried fruits. Also, there was some girly stuff besides the snacks including a nail clipper.

"This girl even stores food in her desk." Hao Ren pushed those things aside and tried to find out what was behind them.

Luo Ying, who was familiar with students' little tricks, had immediately seen Hao Ren's act. However, she swallowed back her reprimand and continued her speech for the other parents.

"Umm, this is..." Suddenly, Hao Ren hit on something intriguing.