Chapter 52 The National College Entrance Examination Begins

Yang Xingwu watched as his father taught him how to wind the pocket watch. After demonstrating three times in a row, Yang Chunsheng finally handed the timepiece to his son.

Yang Xingwu took it, and within moments, he had mastered the technique, bringing a look of profound relief and satisfaction to his father's face.

"You've always been the smart one! Hurry back to your class now! I'm heading home!"

Hearing this, Yang Xingwu looked up at the blazing sun high in the sky. It was only eleven o'clock, the peak of the midday heat, and walking back now meant a very high likelihood of suffering from heatstroke.

"Dad, why don't you lie down on my bed for a while? You can sleep until mid-afternoon before you leave!"

"I can't do that. If I sleep on your bed, I'll only disturb your roommates' rest!"

"It's fine. They still have classes right now and can't come back anyway. Besides, you brought so many egg pancakes—if we don't finish them, they'll just spoil. The two of us can just have these for lunch!"

With that, Yang Xingwu insisted on pulling his father back toward the dormitory to rest.

Unable to resist his son's persistence, Yang Chunsheng reluctantly followed him back.

Yang Xingwu neatly stowed away the chemical fertilizer bag, clutched the pocket watch in his hand, and finally prepared to head back to the classroom for his lessons.

"Dad, make sure you lie down on my bed and sleep. There's a mosquito net, so you won't be bothered by flies. Catch up on some sleep! I've left the egg pancakes your mother made right here—eat whenever you get hungry! I'm heading back to class now!"

"All right, off you go!"

Hearing his son's instructions, Yang Chunsheng quickly agreed, and upon remembering that his son still had classes, he urged him to hurry back to his studies.

After settling his father comfortably, Yang Xingwu hurried back to the classroom. Once there, he informed his three roommates that his father was sleeping in the dorm, and they all nodded in understanding.

Back in his seat, Yang Xingwu finally had a moment to examine the pocket watch in his hand. Its dark yellow casing looked to be made of brass, and judging by its patina, it was probably older than his father. After playing with it for a short while, he placed the pocket watch inside his desk drawer, intending to test it for a few days to see how accurately it kept time.

As soon as the final morning class ended, Yang Xingwu walked back to the dormitory with his roommates. The moment they reached the door, they heard the sound of snoring coming from inside.

Yang Xingwu put a finger to his lips to signal for quiet, then softly pushed open the door. Treading carefully on tiptoe, the young men grabbed their tin mugs and headed for the cafeteria. Yang Xingwu reached into the fertilizer bag, pulled out a small cloth pouch, took out a stack of egg pancakes, placed them in his mug, scooped out a generous portion of fermented soybean paste, and then set off for the mess hall.

"Here, you guys, try these! My grandmother made these egg pancakes!"

Liu Jiefang and the others turned practically green with envy the moment they laid eyes on the pancakes.

Standing on little ceremony, each of them promptly picked up a pancake and began to eat.

These egg pancakes, formally known as *laomo*, were made by mixing eggs and white flour, spreading oil in a hot skillet, pouring in the batter, and frying until both sides turned a golden brown.

The method was somewhat similar to coarse-grain pancakes, except that while those used mixed grains, these were made with pure white flour. Naturally, both kinds could be made, but Liu Cuihua had felt sorry for her grandson during this crucial exam period, so she had taken the very last of the household's white flour and used it all up to make these egg pancakes with eggs!

They tasted savory and utterly delicious!

Such treats were rarely tasted on ordinary days; they usually only got to eat them once a year around the "Er Yue Er" Dragon-Head-Raising Festival.

Consequently, every child craved this particular flavor intensely!

After Liu Jiefang and the other two had each tasted one, no matter what Yang Xingwu said, they flatly refused to eat any more.

Over the past few days, food had been arriving from their own families in succession, and the group shared a tacit understanding that tasting a bit was enough.

After finishing their meal, the four returned to the dorm. Seeing that his father was still fast asleep, Yang Xingwu chose not to wake him; instead, he climbed up onto Liu Jiefang's upper bunk to rest.

Waking up from his nap, Yang Xingwu saw his father sitting by the table, taking tiny, slow sips of water.

The moment Yang Chunsheng saw his son climb down from the bed, he began insisting on going home immediately, but Yang Xingwu quickly held him back.

"Dad, have some *laomo* and drink some water. It's scorching hot outside right now. Wait until we've finished two more classes before you head back, and rest a bit longer!"

"That's right, Uncle! Sleep a little longer. The sun is vicious out there right now, and you'll easily get heatstroke."

With his three roommates joining in to persuade him, Yang Chunsheng finally agreed to rest a while longer.

The four young men returned to their classroom for the afternoon lessons. After the second class ended, Xu Wenhua walked into the room, handed a stack of college application forms to the class monitor, and told him to distribute them to the students.

Seeing that everyone had received their forms, Xu Wenhua cleared his throat and began to speak.

"Students, the *Guide to College Application* was handed out three days ago. I believe that after a few days of careful thought, you've already made your choices. The application forms have just been handed out by the monitor.

Fill them out and bring them to the office before evening self-study. Don't fill in your admission ticket numbers yet—you can do that at the office later, as it's too easy to lose them if passed around now. I'll hand those out closer to the gaokao. I'll be in the office all afternoon! Don't forget! Did you all hear me?"

"We heard you!"

"Very well, class dismissed!"

With that, Xu Wenhua walked out of the classroom.

Yang Xingwu stared blankly at the application form in front of him, thinking how remarkably crude this thing looked!

It was merely the size of a single sheet of A4 paper.

The full name of the form was the Higher Education Admission Registration Form.

The first row contained four categories. First was the arts and sciences category, where Yang Xingwu filled in "Science and Engineering." Next was the candidate category, for which he wrote down "Rural Fresh Graduate."

Under the foreign language selection column, he entered "English," and for the final item, priority category, he paused to think, realized he didn't qualify, and left it blank.

After filling out his personal information, Yang Xingwu turned to the college selection section. He had pondered this deeply over the past few days and quickly made his choice.

Although USTC and XJTU were formidable institutions in this era with high rankings, neither was where he wanted to go, and their local development lagged behind their neighbors.

Without a doubt, the top schools of this era were located in the South or the capital. However, considering that he couldn't go straight to the Special Economic Zones yet, heading to the capital was superior to going anywhere else in these times.

Furthermore, as a northerner, remaining in the capital would give his future offspring a congenital head start at the starting line, and he wasn't particularly fond of the humid southern climate either.

Thus, after filtering through these criteria, the institutions that met his conditions boiled down to a select few: Peking University, Tsinghua University, Nankai University, and Harbin Institute of Technology.

Yang Xingwu listed four universities in order of preference, followed by provincial choices like Henan University and Shandong University, while the second-batch choices were filled with lower-tier universities.

As for his specific major, Yang Xingwu chose the Department of Economics at Peking University, specifically majoring in World Economics—a signature discipline of the university.

This subject had existed since the university's founding, initially called Business Studies before being renamed Economics, and it was also the predecessor of the Guanghua School of Management.

Since the domestic financial system was still incomplete at this present time, his graduation would coincide precisely with the moment he could spread his wings and make his grand ambitions a reality!

As for how he knew all this? Naturally, it was instilled in him by his mathematics group leader, who had produced such a proud prodigy. The group leader had rattled on about this star student day in and day out until Yang Xingwu grew sick of hearing it, making it impossible for him to forget even if he wanted to!

Thinking of this, Yang Xingwu didn't hesitate in the slightest. As for the other universities, he similarly selected their most renowned signature majors.

Regarding the question of whether he agreed to be reassigned to another major, Yang Xingwu wrote a very confident "No."

Having completed the application form, Yang Xingwu took it to the office and handed it directly to Teacher Xu.

Xu Wenhua accepted the form, gave it a quick look, offered a few parting words of advice, and then allowed him to leave.

Over the next few days, time passed in a tranquil and uneventful blur.

On July 4th, admission tickets were issued and the students were given a break. Admission tickets in those days weren't printed as a unified batch; instead, blank forms were distributed for the students to fill out themselves.

On the afternoon of the 6th, Yang Xingwu and his roommates went to inspect their examination venues. His test center was at No. 4 Middle School, which was a bit far, while the other three were assigned to No. 2 Middle School, considerably closer. Fortunately, public buses were available, so taking a bus on the day of the exam would be convenient enough.

At half-past six in the morning on July 7th, Yang Xingwu and his three roommates finished their breakfast and marched bravely into the battlefield of the national college entrance examination!

Sitting on the crowded bus, Yang Xingwu looked out the window at the throngs of hurried students marching down the street, and his expression naturally grew solemn.