Shift! The Side-Character Heroine

Storm Before the College Entrance Examinations!

Every year, right before the college entrance examinations, some people would get incredibly lucky. Without taking any exams, they would already be scouted by prestigious universities. Among these people were those who had excellent family backgrounds and, of course, those who were specially talented. For example, if someone placed first in the National Mathematics and Science competition, the Capital University would lower the qualifying score threshold by thirty points.

For those who were already capable of placing first in any national competition, a score drop of thirty points just meant that they were guaranteed to get in.

In addition to that, there were also people like Han Leng, who was an ultra-popular innovative writer. Some famous universities felt that his popularity could help attract more top quality students. Thus, they chose to bend the rules and send him an offer…

Of course, there was also Zhao Youyue, who had profound knowledge in the field of music and had also placed first in the national music competition. However, most of the universities that recruited her in advance were famous music academies. Personally, Zhao Youyue was not crazy about music; she did not love it as much as Chu Luoxun. She was more willing to go to a Comprehensive University.[1]

Therefore, Zhao Youyue decided to get into university by taking the college entrance examinations. Wasn’t there such a saying? “A person who does not go through the college entrance examinations would have no youth at all.” Well said indeed!

In actuality, this was how the people who were getting tortured by the college entrance examinations consoled themselves. Did truly great people even need the college entrance examinations?

Recently, the most popular figure around, not only in school, but also in the outside world and even on the internet, was none other than the excellent student —- —- Huang Zongchao!

Of course, it was because Huang Zongchao had been recommended to the Capital University by the school headmaster himself through the real-name system[2]. As long as he passes the interview, he would be accepted!

The school headmaster’s real-name recommendation was based on a new policy that the country had just recently released. However, many considered it to be —- —- another channel for the dignitaries to play around with the unspoken rules.

As the first student to benefit from this policy, Huang Zongchao was shoved right into the limelight!

Some ill-willed netizens began to dig around, looking for information like his identity and family background. They felt that he must have come from extraordinary family background. Nobody gets recommended so quickly, over nothing.

However, after a series of excavations, it was discovered that Huang Zongchao was born from a pretty average family. He had attended a primary school located in the center of a rural area. His junior high school was the best in the district. He attended a high school that was among the two best high schools in the Jiangnan Provincial City

Undoubtedly, Huang Zongchao’s personal experience had been awe-inspirating. He was an incredibly talented and exceptionally hard-working elite scholar. Even Zhao Youyue’s amazing results were incomparable to his.

Thanks to the division of the arts and science students during the second year of high school, Zhao Youyue basically had nothing to do with Huang Zongchao anymore. However, since Huang Zongchao was free from a most dominant threat which was Zhao Youyue, he held on to the science-sream throne, almost every single time. He was so powerful that he took everybody’s hopes and dreams and smashed them into pieces.

When a talented person matched his talent with hard work, it was a frustratingly broken combination. For example, in the game League of Legends, the Demon King “Faker”[3] was such a person. He played the game very well and had a good reputation to boot. There were almost zero negative news about him. He was neither arrogant when he won, nor did he give up after being defeated. His existence crushed all the other professional players of his time…

Therefore, people could only fantasize about defeating the Demon King in a novel. Honestly, if Faker’s e-sports career was written as a novel, it would definitely be an interesting novel. It would have the most noble and incorruptible of all protagonists.

In the academic field, Huang Zongchao was some sort of Demon King. However, he was still relatively young and frivolous. After he realized that he had been pushed into the limelight, he went on Weibo to ridicule the theories of certain conspiration theorists. He had also stated that, even without the real-name recommendation, he would still easily be able to pass the college entrance examinations and get into the Capital University.

The school officials had also noticed that Huang Zongchao was being treated with skepticism by the general public, and took note of the conspiracy theories that were circulating around the internet. Hence, the school issued a statement at short notice —- —-

The students recommended to the Capital University by our school must have two qualities: Firstly, excellent academic development; and secondly, excellent personal growth and development as a whole.

As to why the school confirmed the student list so quickly, Headmaster Ge stated that the school’s work was all based on standardized procedures.

Firstly, the students had to register themselves, and the teachers of respective subjects would recommend them; Next, according to the “recommended regulations” for outstanding students, which had been adjusted and updated accordingly over the years by the school, an evaluation would be conducted; Finally, a decision would be made by the school after thorough consideration.

There were three types of good students: The first type usually had excellent academic performance; The second type excelled in various academic competitions; The third type were those that were constantly actively participating in student activities. Generally speaking, it was not easy to accomplish any one of the things mentioned above. Even so, Huang Zongchao was brilliant in all three aspects. He used to be the chairman of the student council. Moreover, the student council managed by him is probably considered to be one of the most capable student councils in the entire history of the school.

Huang Zongchao’s class teacher, Qiu Yingchun, was very proud of him. He stood by and supported Huang Zongchao, “First of all, based on the school’s record of results for the past three years, it is clear that he had placed first in the entire grade; secondly, he is also a class representative with a bright personality and an exceptional ability to engage in various activities. Everyone had always highly supportive of him. Additionally, he is an expert when it comes to competitions. During his first year of high school, he won the first prize in the city’s English Speaking Contest which was broadcasted on national television. During his second year, he received the first prize in the provincial Physics competition, and was thus recommended for university admissions. Further, he had also placed second and third before in the provincial Mathematics competitions. In short, this student has excellent personal growth and development as a whole.”

In addition to the headmaster and class teacher, Huang Zongchao’s “little brother” also stood up and spoke for Huang Zongchao, even though he was also a good student that was always stepped on by Huang Zongchao. He had already been recruited in advance by Chung Hua University, but he still had to take the college entrance examinations. He was not like Huang Zongchao, who could get into the Capital University as long as he passed the interview.

Almost no one in the school objected to Huang Zongchao receiving such a subsidy. However, there was also another viewpoint —- —-

This benefit would be wasted on Huang Zongchao. He already had such good results. He would surely be able to get into the Capital University! Wasn’t it better to recommend some other students who were more talented than he was?

As the school officials and Huang Zongchao were still “sitting tight in the fishing boat despite the rising wind and waves”[4], Han Leng, an alumnus who held the “rebellious” banner up high stood out and sneered at Huang Zongchao – not in person, but on Weibo. He said that the school had decided on Huang Zongchao a long time ago. It was unavoidable, for they clearly had no one else in mind. They still had the courage to say things like Huang Zongchao being the best student in the school. To him this was a huge heap of politically-fueled fiasco!

At that time, many netizens discovered that this rebellious genius writer and clueless chick magnet who liked to drag and delay his books was actually from the same school as Huang Zongchao. What’s more, he was an alumnus!

Han Leng was originally already known as an influential public intellectual and an “angry youth”[5] who loved to spread hate around. After his words of indignation appeared, it suddenly made the netizens very interested. Was there really an inside story behind all of this?

Or, did Han Leng feel that he was the one who was best suited for the real-name recommendation?

Amid the intense gossipping of the netizens, Han Leng did not hide or disappear. To make things clear, he arrogantly expressed that he did not really care much about the Capital University in the first place…

He was just very upset. Why did the school overlook Zhao Youyue? In what way was she inferior to Huang Zongchao?

What? Who’s Zhao Youyue?

Are you all living in your dreams?

She’s none other than your beloved Lady Ah Yu!

Translation note :

[1] Comprehensive Universities () have a signicant degree of research activity and a wide range of undergraduate and graduate programs, including professional degrees.

[2] The “real-name system” is a system in which when a user who wants to register an account on a blog, website or bulletin board system, is required to offer identification credentials including their legal name to the network service center. One may use an online pseudonym. However, the person’s real identity would be available if rules or laws are broken.

[3] “Faker” is the in-game name of Lee Sang-hyeok, a South Korean professional League of Legends player who is considered by many to be the best League of Legends player of all time. He was given the nickname “Unkillable Demon King” due to his impressive gaming skills. Some call him king. Some call him demon. Some call him a League of Legends god, but everybody calls him something.

[4] “Sitting tight in the fishing boat despite the rising wind and waves” (,) refers to how someone is still calm and unshaken even when confronted with a complicated and perilous situation.

[5] “Angry youth” is the literal meaning of “Fenqing” ().It mainly refers to Chinese youth who display a high level of Chinese nationalism. This term first appeared in Hong Kong in the 1970s, referring to those young people who were not satisfied with Chinese society and sought reform. It has now evolved into a term used predominantly in Internet slang. Whether fenqing is derogatory or not usually depends on the person. Chinese critics often refer to them using the homophone characters “” which are pronounced identically but translate to “shit-youth.” This is often changed further to fnfn () as a derogatory nickname.