Chapter 205 - 207: Burping Contest
Chapter 205: Chapter 207: Burping Contest
The English teacher had no choice but to give up on the promising student, Tang Yuxin, and settle for Wei Jiani.
Wei Jiani’s face was filled with smugness. When she looked at people, it was as if her eyes were on her nose, as though her nostrils were the largest part of her entire face.
But Tang Yuxin couldn’t understand why Wei Jiani was so pleased with herself.
Was she really content with eating others’ leftovers, taking what was given to her out of pity?
The functioning of the Wei family’s brains must have been incomprehensible to ordinary people like them. At least, Tang Yuxin certainly couldn’t understand it.
In the end, the qualification for their class’s English competition was taken by Wei Jiani. Unfortunately, her performance was lackluster, and she was even eliminated in the first round of preliminary selections.
Initially, Wei Jiani was quite confident. She’d received extra tutoring in English, so her proficiency was relatively high. At least within their class, she was considered one of the top students. However, she was no match compared to Tang Yuxin, who was consistently excellent in all subjects. Even the class’s number one bookworm could barely match her. The bookworm could write but barely speak.
The bookworm excelled at exams but was not fluent.
The bookworm was intelligent, but his emotional intelligence had room to grow.
On the day of the school’s preliminary competition, Wei Jiani was exceedingly self-confident. Having listened to the competitors before her, she knew that their sentences were not as fluent as hers, their pronunciation was less accurate, their voices were not as sweet, and certainly none of them were as attractive as she was.
As long as she performed as usual, she was certain to pass the preliminary round and win the national prize. Then she could show Tang Yuxin what real success looked like. How could Tang Yuxin, who was as unintellectual as a dumpling, ever compare to her?
After another student clumsily finished reciting a passage, it struck her that this was a mediocre level of English, but given that this English had not yet been widely popularized, it was already impressive enough.
At the very least, they had only started learning English the previous year, so to able to recite at all was admirable.
Finally, it was Wei Jiani’s turn. She had been sitting for so long that her buttocks were starting to ache, but she was eager to take the stage and steal the limelight.
She strode confidently onto the stage. Regardless of anything else, she was pretty and her stage presence was excellent. At least she had been practicing from a young age, having performed in primary school assemblies for Children’s Day, Mid-Autumn Festival, and New Year’s Day.
In middle school, she was always involved in various programs, so her stage presence was naturally impressive.
When she stood in the center of the stage, she felt a bit of anxiety. But it quickly dissipated.
She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and when she opened them again, she was much calmer.
“Hello, everyone. I am Wei Jiani,” she began, beaming sweetly, supremely confident of her appearance. “Today I will be reading ‘Spring in the Forest.’”. It was a lengthy prose piece. If read well, it would be very pleasing to the ear. The English teacher had searched for this piece for a long time, originally intending it for Tang Yuxin. The teacher had thought Tang Yuxin’s ethereal voice would have been a better match for the piece. Whereas Wei Jiani’s voice was overly sweet and sometimes strained, making it seem contrived.
Regardless, the English teacher could only pray now that everything would go smoothly and there would be no hitches.
Wei Jiani had started to recite on the stage, and the English teacher was somewhat satisfied. Aside from their interpretations and memorization, at least she heeded the points that had been emphasized. Up till now, there had been almost no mistakes. As long as she could maintain this performance without serious errors, she would definitely progress to the next round.
The school’s management was also very satisfied, and the English teachers appeared relaxed and pleased.
Just as Wei Jiani was about to reach a high point in her recitation, she suddenly let out a loud burp. Her face turned deathly pale, then flushed red, then pale again. In less than five seconds, she had put on a spectacular display of rapid facial expression changes.
Not everyone could pull off changing facial expressions three times in five seconds.
Wei Jiani quickly composed herself and continued her recitation. But she did not get far before she burped again. She quickly covered her face with her hand, but the burping wouldn’t stop. The sound of it echoed across the schoolyard.
At that moment, you could have heard a pin drop.
“Burp, burp, burp…”
After a few more burps, not only the teachers but also the students who were participating were stunned.
The less than stellar students breathed a sigh of relief. Thank goodness they had merely underperformed. They could always improve. But what Wei Jiani had done was downright embarrassing.
The English teacher of Class 5 covered her face with one hand, mortified. This was an unbearable failure.
Wei Jiani’s face turned ashen, and she started to sob.
Besides losing her own dignity, she had even tarnished the reputation of the entire class and the teacher.
“Wei Jiani, what happened to you? You were fine before. I also taught you well. So what happened? How did you make such a mess of this?”
Wei Jiani burped again, tears streaming down her face. She didn’t dare to speak.
“Teacher, burp… I, burp… I didn’t, burp, burp…”
She managed to get few words in between burps, the noise like a blaring beep, making the veins on the English teacher’s forehead bulge in irritation.
Couldn’t you stop talking? The English teacher frowned, her hand moved behind her back. She was afraid she wouldn’t be able to help slapping Wei Jiani across the face.
“I, burp…”
Wei Jiani burped again and quickly covered her mouth with her hand whilst tear drops continued to fall from her eyes.
“Enough, enough. Stop crying,” the English teacher sighed. What else could she do? She had lost face not only for herself but for the whole class. And here she was, still having to console Wei Jiani.
“The teacher understands that it wasn’t intentional. It was just an accident and I’m sure nobody will blame you. There will be more chances, right?”