CSGM - Chapter 59
Chapter 59: First Assessment
"My book had a lot of incorrect notes, and Chu Xi corrected them all for me!"
Little Curly Hair hugged her copy of History of the Late Eastern Han, glanced eagerly at Chu Xi, and then excitedly told her other two roommates.
Hearing this, the pale, young, and skinny university student with a beauty mark near her eye and their mixed-race roommate both showed expressions of surprise.
Huh?
That's impossible, right?
Knowing that Chu Xi had been sick for the past few days and was inattentive in class, their confidence in the truth of that statement was clearly zero.
The mixed-race roommate held out her hand and asked Little Curly Hair for the textbook, "Let me see?"
She wanted to see what Chu Xi had written for Little Curly Hair, to check if it was just nonsense-if she was pretending to know what she didn't and trying to fool Little Curly Hair with pretentious gibberish.
They all knew that Little Curly Hair wasn't doing very well in her academic classes. When she recited texts in the morning, she often paused in all the wrong places, completely confused.
But after the mixed-race roommate flipped through a few pages of Little Curly Hair's History of the Late Eastern Han-
The further she read, the more her pupils dilated, as if her entire focus was being pulled into the textbook.
The speed at which she turned the pages slowed down.
Of course, she wasn't shocked by the notes themselves.
She was shocked that all these corrections came from Chu Xi's hand!
The pale, young, and skinny university student noticed her expression change and curiously stood beside her, leaning in to look.
Soon, she wore the same expression.
And Chu Xi's handwriting... was surprisingly nice!
The mixed-race roommate looked up at Chu Xi, her eyes filled with astonishment. "This writing in red pen... Chu Xi, did you write all of this?"
Lying on her bed scrolling through her phone, Chu Xi, who was looking at the trending topic #RenZhiJoinsTheCast, let out a simple, "Mhm."
On the dormitory floor, her three roommates looked up at her in unison...
Looking up to her in every sense of the word.
That night, the recently graduated roommate tossed and turned in her bed, unable to wrap her head around it.
She had thought that as a recent university graduate, she would have a significant academic advantage over the others. After all, she was a quick thinker with a solid educational foundation, which meant she could learn new things faster.
But Chu Xi, who had been spacing out and secretly sleeping in class to recover from her illness, had dealt her a heavy blow!
Chu Xi attended class in that state... and still learned everything?!
The university student sat up. "Chu Xi, are you asleep?"
Chu Xi didn't move. Lying flat on her back and staring at the ceiling, she asked lazily, "What's up?"
"It's just... I wanted to ask... how are you so good at the academic classes?"
She just couldn't figure it out!
Chu Xi asked in return, "Isn't it simple?"
You just have to read it once to remember it.
The university student: "..."
Chu Xi's answer was like no answer at all. The student fell silent for a moment, then pulled the covers up and lay back down.
The first Saturday of the training camp arrived amidst a tense atmosphere.
The first assessment was that afternoon. During their final acting class, the trainees were completely focused, trying to cram at the last minute, hoping for a sudden epiphany that would lead to a breakthrough improvement.
During lunch, the conversation revolved solely around the "assessment," reminiscent of the days before major exams in middle or high school.
Chu Xi's five roommates were like five little loudspeakers of different shapes, gathered in a crowd, chattering away.
"Chu Xi might not be eliminated! She seems to be doing pretty well."
"No way. Just a few days ago, the teacher said she wasn't paying attention in class."
"Didn't she have a cold and fever these past few days?"
"Her condition is too poor. I think it's iffy..."
"Sigh, I don't think we need to worry about her. Even if she leaves, she can find acting roles anytime, unlike us."
"Right, right..."
And so it was. As the only female artist with some fame in the entertainment industry, Chu Xi inevitably became the subject of discussion among the newcomers and nobodies.
Moreover, everyone believed that this somewhat famous female artist was about to leave the training camp.
Because she was doing terribly, her assessment results would surely be terrible too. The bottom sixth of the trainees would be asked to leave the training camp after the assessment.
"Alright, alright, let's not focus on her too much. We're the ones who will be staying here for the next five-plus months!"
"Yeah, yeah, you're right."
In the dining area, people were either eating with their noses in a book or contorting their faces from time to time, seizing every moment to practice their acting.
They took the "sharpen your spear right before battle-even if it's not sharp, at least it's shiny" mentality to the extreme.
But someone quietly observed Chu Xi and saw that while eating, she was actually... playing on her phone!
Of course, Chu Xi wasn't the only trainee playing on her phone while eating.
There were several others doing the same thing, and everyone knew what it meant. These were the people who had been slacking off in class recently, whose learning progress had fallen far behind the average. They had lost heart and were just waiting for the inevitable, the "give-up party" ready to pack their bags and leave after the assessment.
Thus, Chu Xi was silently categorized along with the give-up party.
The afternoon assessment began with the first item: acting.
The prompt for the improvisation was: a refugee fleeing in winter.
The one hundred and fifty trainees weren't tested one by one like in an interview. Instead, they were assessed in groups of a dozen or so at the same time on a carpeted mat.
Since the trainees had only just entered the camp, their acting was mostly clueless, clumsy, and bizarre. As soon as the acting coach shouted "Begin," the scene in the performance area became extremely strange-
It was like a group of people going mad all at once...
Some were clawing at the air.
Some were spinning in place, clutching their heads.
Some were jumping around, roaring their lines, afraid the judges wouldn't hear them.
Everyone's eyes were wide, their faces contorted as if every feature was straining.
The mental state of the refugees was certainly... well-captured.
Luckily, Chu Xi didn't have social anxiety.
And a high threshold for finding things funny.
Someone even fell right over, crawling arduously on the mat with one hand stretched far in front of them.
"Aaaaaah- the plane is coming! The plane is coming! It's going to bomb me! Where can I go? God! Spare me!"
"Where is my final resting place? When will this life of exile ever end? Ah! I'm going crazy! I'm about to go crazy!"
"My leg! My leg is broken! Can anyone save me!?"
"Look! It's snowing! Achoo-!"
...
In summary, everyone was crazy in their own way, and bad in their own way.
Being able to hold back laughter and stay in character in a scene like this was, in itself, a test of conviction.
Chu Xi was huddled against the wall with her arms wrapped around her knees, portraying a quiet despair.
She used subtle shifts in expression and the creation of atmosphere to complete her performance.
The acting coach noticed that the moment her hand slowly lowered to touch the floor, her face twitched. With a sharp hiss, she snatched her hand back, cupped her fingers to her mouth to blow warm air on them, then tucked her hand into her sleeve, pressing it between her stomach and thigh.
This was the reaction of a starving and freezing refugee touching an icy surface in winter.
Even though it was a performance without props, the judges could see the scene Chu Xi was portraying.
They nodded imperceptibly, their eyes showing approval.
An experienced actor's skill really is on another level.
Contrasted with the other newcomers and their amateur acting, Chu Xi stood out even more.
The acting coach gave her a high score with a clear conscience. A glance at the other judges showed they had all given similar scores.
After scoring, the acting coach thought to himself, Chu Xi's score for the acting assessment is very high. This should pull up her total score a bit, right? It might save her other three assessments.
The second item on Chu Xi's assessment: archery.
She was seen drawing her bow, her eyes like a falcon's fixed precisely on the bullseye. The arrow flew straight and true-
Thwip- thwip-
She was the first to finish shooting ten arrows and the first to leave the examination room.
She left the scoring teacher staring at ten bullseyes, completely stunned...
This... This is too accurate, isn't it?
It was as if Chu Xi's arrows had auto-targeting!
Before her third assessment, musical instruments, Chu Xi was thinking that the archery test might have been a little challenging if the target had been moving.
The guzheng wasn't difficult either. She had dabbled in it before, and the sheet music and fingerings she had memorized were enough to pass the test.
Besides, the piece selected for the first assessment was exceptionally simple.
After she finished her performance, the guzheng teacher nodded in satisfaction.
I didn't expect Chu Xi's foundation in guzheng to be so good. With her instrument score being a cut above the other trainees, her total score might not be that far behind after all.
Maybe... she might just have a chance of staying after this assessment.
The fourth assessment: the written academic test.
Twenty minutes after entering the examination room, Chu Xi announced she wanted to turn in her paper.
And that was after she had patiently checked her work for five minutes just to make it to the twenty-minute mark.
Meanwhile, the dozens of other trainees in the room were either furiously writing with their heads down or chewing on the ends of their pens and scratching their heads.
The Dark-skinned Girl, who was in the same dorm and exam room, whispered encouragingly, "Chu Xi, don't give up!"
Chu Xi ignored her, walked straight past, and handed her test paper to the proctor.
The gossiping eyes of the others lingered on her for a few seconds as they all thought the same thing: Chu Xi really has given up.
The proctor felt a sense of regret and was about to sigh, but after an inadvertent glance at Chu Xi's paper, the sigh caught in his throat.
This question is indeed C, this one is D, and this B is also correct... The fill-in-the-blanks look right too... Wait, Chu Xi actually answered the long-form questions?!
How did she do it?!
Shock!
That night, back in the dorm, the Dark-skinned Girl found something strange all evening-
Why wasn't Chu Xi busy packing her bags? The results would be announced tomorrow, and some people would have to leave the training camp...
The Dark-skinned Girl had subconsciously classified Chu Xi as one of "some people."
That night, they had indeed heard that some trainees, already sensing they were in the bottom sixth, were packing their suitcases, ready to leave the next day.
Tomorrow was Sunday.
The training camp's day off.
No morning run.
The thought of this put Chu Xi in a better mood for sleep, unlike most of the other trainees, who were too nervous to sleep because the assessment results and rankings were being announced the next day.
Was it really necessary? Their mentality was too weak.
There's no suspense about the rankings. I'll definitely be first.
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