Chapter 77: This Is My Stage
There was complete silence in the entire classroom and you could even hear the noise of summer cicadas crawling on the wutong trees outside the windows.
Sun Mo stood on the rostrum and looked straight at Zhou Yong, giving him an expression that indicated for him to ‘continue questioning him’.
Zhou Yong felt so awkward that he wanted to die. how could he continue questioning Sun Mo?
That was because when they were both 16 years old, instead of other achievements, one should just look at the realms that they had attained. When you compared Zhou Yong with Sun Mo, Zhou Yong’s achievement wasn’t worth mentioning at all.
“How awesome!”
Jin Mujie wanted to applaud as Sun Mo’s counterattack was sharp and overbearing, it was filled with a sense of crushing aura.
As Jin Mujie was seated at the back, she couldn’t see Zhou Yong’s expressions. However, she could have guessed that this fella must’ve felt as uncomfortable as though he was constipated.
“But how did Sun Mo know that Zhou Yong was inferior to him? What if Zhou Yong’s background was better than him? His counterattack would have been useless and people can use it to start attacking him instead.”
Jin Mujie thought about it for a while and concluded that Zhou Yong was a student who liked to stir trouble and was definitely not a fan of cultivation. Hence, his achievements were terrible.
However, this wasn’t the fact. Sun Mo had used his Divine Sight and already had a panoramic view of Zhou Yong’s data.
A gang of scoundrels who were beside Zhou Yong had been smiling mischievously. They had already been prepared to watch Sun Mo make a fool of himself.
Zhou Yong was the beloved son of a tycoon in Jinling and was used to being pampered from a young age Hence, he grew up to become a faultfinder and loved making people embarrassed.
Even though he was a scoundrel, Zhou Yong had a great mind. The tricks that he used usually gave the teachers a hard time, so much so that they had unspeakable bitterness.
Today was Sun Mo’s first public lecture, and Zhou Yong had prepared to ruin his debut and gave him an unforgettable memory. However, he was met with defeat now.
The gang of scoundrels couldn’t laugh anymore.
“Sit down!”
Sun Mo instructed.
“Humph!”
Zhou Yong sat down and crossed both his arms firmly in front of his chest, his right foot couldn’t stop tapping on the floor. He was in such a bad mood as he had always been the one making fun of others. When was he at such a disadvantage before?
This was actually the first time!
Besides, Teacher Xu Shaoyuan had hinted for him to embarrass Sun Mo to no end. If this matter wasn’t settled well, he would be implicated as well. No, this wouldn’t do, he must continue to think of another strategy.
“Teacher Sun is so awesome!”
Qi Shengjia was extremely excited, Teacher Sun had actually defeated that big faultfinder.
Ding!
Favorable impression points from Qi Shengjia +15.
Prestige connection with Qi Shengjia: Friendly (428/1,000).
“Teacher has won!”
Lu Zhiruo held onto Li Ziqi’s clothing and her excitement made her cheeks flush in red.
Ding!
Favorable impression points from Lu Zhiruo +10.
Prestige connection with Lu Zhiruo: Friendly (253/1,000).
“Unperturbed!”
Li Ziqi smiled slightly and had totally forgotten how she had been so anxious just now, racking her brain to help Sun Mo mediate the situation.
The two notification sounds made Sun Mo a little speechless. (This honest lad and papaya girl must be too high yielding, huh? I have merely berated a punk. Why did they admire it so much?)
Moreover, they gave quite a lot of favorable impression points. As expected, the more unsophisticated a person was, the easier they were at trusting people.
Just when everyone thought it was time to return to the normal lesson, a teacher who was 30 years old or so started to provoke Sun Mo again.
“When I was your age, I had broken through the spirit-refinement realm and opened up 31 acupoints!”
Swoosh!
Everyone’s gaze looked over.
Fang Chen looked at Sun Mo with arrogance. (What right did you have to be the fiance of Headmaster An Xinhui? I would be tearing down both your inner substance and reputation and trample on them ruthlessly.)
Sun Mo still wasn’t anxious nor impatient and activated the Divine Sight.
Fang Chen, 35 years old, blood-ignition realm, very experienced teacher but has not obtained the star-level.
Strength: 23, mediocre.
...
Potential value: average.
Remark: he is in self-denial. After he reached 25 years old, there was no more progress in his cultivation. He might not have any more accomplishments in the future.
Sun Mo glanced at him and quickly retrieved the necessary data.
“Oh yes, I was also cultivating the Overflow Rain Sword at that time, but my teacher mentioned that it wasn’t worthy to be cultivated by me anymore. Hence, he found another earth-tier peerless-grade cultivation art for me.”
Fang Chen tilted the corner of his mouth upward. The feeling of superiority within his tone was enough to drown a person.
Sun Mo laughed. “Really? Then how about when you were 20 years old?”
“Haha, I was headhunted personally by Headmaster Zhang Hanfu.”
Fang Chen’s face was filled with complacency.
“Then have you been officially employed at that time?”
Sun Mo continued to inquire.
“Er!”
This time, Fang Chen’s smile became frozen.
Of course, he hadn’t. All intern teachers had to go through one year of internship. Even though Fang Chen’s aptitude was pretty good, he hadn’t been so outstanding to the extent where the school had to make an exception for him.
“Looking at that appearance of yours, it means you hadn’t?”
Sun Mo laughed gently. “Well, I’m now an officially employed teacher in this academy. Do you want me to show you the employment letter?”
“You...”
Fang Chen was so angry that his chest was moving up and down. Luckily, he was still considered quick-witted and quickly found new phrases to continue arguing. “You guys are just lucky. If our batch of intern teachers could also recruit students, I would have passed the evaluation and gotten hold of the employment letter as well.”
“Lucky?”
Sun Mo’s tone became stricter.
“Our batch has a total of 200 intern teachers and only 4 people passed the evaluation in the end.
“To win in a competition of over 200 people, is this an insignificant achievement? Then please open your eyes and look at Zhang Lan and Gao Ben who are in the same batch as me. They are both graduates of the Nine Great famous schools, while Gu Xiuxun is an honor graduate of Myriad Daos Academy. According to your theory, if I’m mediocre, then aren’t they the same? As for those 200 losers, won’t they only fit to be called useless by your standard, huh?
“Also, you may be questioning my ability. Let me tell you, in the competition of student recruitment meet, I’ve also defeated Qin Fen.
“Who is Qin Fen? A graduate of Jixia Learning Palace! Headmaster An headhunted him over herself, do you think he’s a useless person?”
Sun Mo questioned this poor guy like a barrage of gunfire.
“No, that’s not what I meant!”
Fang Chen tried to clarify but didn’t know which aspect he should begin with. His mind was in confusion, and he couldn’t find any reason to rebuke Sun Mo for the time being.
“Then what did you mean?”
Sun Mo talked back at once, “Could we have entered by giving presents through the back door? Could we have received the official employment letter by pulling relations and selling our butts?”
Hearing Sun Mo’s amusing words, many students and teachers started laughing. However, they only realized after laughing that in order for Sun Mo to become an official teacher, he indeed had certain capabilities.
“What terrible eloquence!”
An Xinhui shook her head. It was no wonder that Fang Chen still didn’t have many achievements despite his age. As a teacher, he didn’t even have a strong eloquence. How could he even do a decent lecture?
“Useless!”
Looking at Fang Chen, Zhang Hanfu couldn’t stop cursing and scolding in his heart. However, Sun Mo could talk really well with the gift of the gab.
“Alright, you can sit down now!”
The color on Fang Chen’s face disappeared as he sat his butt down on the stool.
To speak the truth, he had just thrown such a big face away. Hearing the comments of the students around, which seemed to be sneering at him, he wanted to take his leave so badly.
However, he couldn’t. He must stay behind and look for an opportunity to strike back; otherwise, he was going to become a stepping stone for Sun Mo’s career.
The students were all whispering.
The intern teachers, who were present, had expressions of embarrassment on their faces because they were all losers in this competition.
Piak! Piak! Piak!
Suddenly, there were sounds of applause.
Fang Chen was indignant. (Are they trying to slap my face?) But when he turned his head and was prepared to glare at the one applauding, his expression became stiff.
Because the one applauding was Jin Mujie, a three-stars great teacher. The moon-white long robe on her represented her position in the school and the great teacher circle.
When the teachers saw this scene, they were distracted for a moment before the sparse sounds of applause started echoing as well.
Among the teachers who were here to watch Sun Mo’s first public lecture, some belonged to the neutral clan and had only come here out of boredom. All they wanted was to see for themselves who An Xinhui’s fiance was.
This moment, their applause could be considered as acknowledgment of Sun Mo’s performance.
His quick-witted adaptability and nimble eloquence couldn’t be feigned. Just by looking at those students’ reactions, you would know that Sun Mo’s opening was on the winning hand.
(How formidable, huh?)
Jiang Yongnian pouted and thought about it carefully. Everyone was saying that Sun Mo was living off a woman and that he was a graduate from Songyang Academy, so he wasn’t worthy of being with An Xinhui.
Who was An Xinhui?
She was an honor graduate of Heavenly Mystery Academy, one of the Nine Great Aristocratic schools, and she had the reputation of a talent that you would only meet once in a hundred years. Moreover, she was a great beauty that was ranked 7th on the Devastating Beauty Rankings.
If you were to seek such a talent in the various countries of Nine Provinces, you wouldn’t even find more than three of them.
This seemed like the situation of how a national female celebrity had gotten together with an ordinary person, how could everyone accept it?
In everyone’s eyes, the fiance of a national female celebrity should have been the son of a rich and powerful family. If not, he should at least be a national male celebrity to be an appropriate match for her in terms of social statuses.
And what kind of person was Sun Mo?
When everyone saw Sun Mo, they would naturally start to see him in another light. They would nitpick and find all sorts of fault with him. As long as Sun Mo had any single inadequacy, it would be magnified endlessly.
In fact, Sun Mo was indeed not fit to be a match for An Xinhui. However, when you put him in comparison with other ordinary people, then he was considered pretty good. If he was really a useless person, he wouldn’t even have entered Songyang Academy.
“What a formidable specious argument!”
Gu Xiuxun pouted and somewhat admired Sun Mo’s quick-witted adaptability. It could be said that Sun Mo had borrowed her reputation to raise his social value.
“Entirely useless!”
Zhang Sheng looked at Fang Chen and was fuming with anger. (Did he spend the last few years of experience as a dog? How could he have lost to Sun Mo in this verbal battle!?)
Sun Mo nodded toward Jin Mujie as a form of gratitude. His action was so minuscule that nobody had realized it. Following this, he immediately started to speak. “This brief interlude has ended, let’s continue the self-introduction!”
Sun Mo was really afraid that other great teachers would stand up to attack him verbally again. Xu Shaoyuan and Feng Zewen, who had had disputes with him previously, were both present as well.
When compared to Fang Chen, these two persons were genuine elites.
Speaking from conscience, his original self’s aptitude was of above-average standard and not considered bad. However, it wasn’t close to a talent’s standard at all. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have only reached enlightenment for ‘Priceless Advice’ halo just before he was about to drown.
“What use does good eloquence have? A teacher’s best asset is still their teaching ability!”
Feng Zewen was frustrated. Even if Sun Mo was able to say his piece with extravagant embellishments, at the end of the day it was down to whether he could coach students or not. Whether the students improved or not was the genuine test of this first public lecture, and the test had only just begun.
Li Ziqi observed her surroundings and realized that as compared to before, the students’ interests had been evoked.