Transmigration: On the Gossip Front

Zhao Yadong understood right away. Even with a lock, if someone really has their eye on it, you just can’t guard against them. "Alright, I’ll help you go exchange it."

"But they’ll have to take a look at it first."

"It’s fine." Zhang Yu had no intention of asking for cash; money would depreciate, but Gold wouldn’t.

And if she was going to buy a siheyuan in the future, using Gold to trade would definitely be better than handing over cash, so she wanted to convert as much as possible into gold bars.

As for telling Zhao Yadong that gold bars were easier to hide, that was just to fob him off. Anything that really mattered—ID card, cash and so on—she kept in the space. That was the only truly safe place.

It wasn’t like there was no money in the dorm, just not much, only a little over ten yuan. If there was no money at all, people would feel suspicious.

Before, Zhao Yadong had always taken cash, feeling Gold was too heavy and made noise. Now after listening to Zhang Yu’s analysis, he immediately felt it was better to take Gold instead.

Wrap up the Gold and bury it in the ground, dig it out later and it’ll still be fine. But if it’s cash, it might not keep.

"Oh right, the autumn harvest is coming up. I heard once it starts, everyone will be busy, and you won’t have it easy either." Xiao Hao passed on the news. "After the harvest, we have to go up the mountain to get firewood."

"I know," Zhang Yu responded. Winters in the Northeast were cold and long; they had to prepare enough firewood.

"Need help?" Zhao Yadong knew counting on Zhang Hui to collect firewood was completely unrealistic. In the end it would probably all come down to Zhang Yu again.

"No need. I’ll talk to Zhang Hui and tell her to figure it out herself. If she really can’t manage it, that’s fine, she can spend money to buy it."

Zhang Yu knew the village offered that kind of service. "You can get a whole winter’s firewood sorted for just a few yuan."

"Anyway, if she refuses to spend money, then she can forget about getting firewood from me." It was her first winter in the Northeast; she had to set the rules from the start.

Xiao Hao nodded repeatedly. "Exactly, that’s how it should be. If you help her settle it this year, then it’ll all become your job every year."

Zhang Yu made a sound of agreement. "I’m planning to gather some pine nuts and chestnuts too. When we’re holed up in the house in winter, we can snack on them."

"And read while you’re at it." Zhao Yadong knew that when Zhang Yu went to the city last time, she’d actually gone to the scrap station to get junior-high and high-school textbooks. Whenever he thought about that, he found it really interesting.

"Other people go to the scrap station to hunt for treasures, see if there’s anything good. You go and come back with a pile of books."

"And then you even hauled them all the way back from the city." Zhao Yadong honestly had no idea how Zhang Yu’s mind worked.

"Otherwise what am I supposed to do all winter? And I’m confident that one day, the college entrance exam will be reinstated." Zhang Yu felt Xiao Hao and Zhao Yadong were decent guys and not the gossipy type, so she gave them a little hint.

Of course she also knew that even without her reminder, with Xiao Hao’s brains and the others’, it wasn’t like they couldn’t guess.

Xiao Hao lifted his head and looked at Zhang Yu in surprise. Before he was sent down, his father had talked to him—about the college entrance exam. His father also believed it would be restored sooner or later and told him he must keep reading.

Who would’ve thought Zhang Yu would guess it too? When he first heard she’d gone to the city scrap station to scavenge junior-high and high-school textbooks, the idea had already popped into his mind. But since he had no proof, he couldn’t say it out loud and was too embarrassed to ask.

At his sudden movement, Zhang Yu knew he had a sense of it too. "You think so as well?"

Xiao Hao gave a hum. "My dad said the same thing—told me that no matter what, I shouldn’t give up reading."

Huh??? Zhao Yadong had heard Xiao Hao mention this once before. Back then he’d thought Uncle Qian and his buddy were crazy. How could they come up with something like that? However he looked at it, it seemed impossible.

Who knew that both Uncle Qian and Xiao Hao thought this way, and now there was another Zhang Yu. "Will it really be reinstated?"

If the college entrance exam really came back, then he’d be able to leave this little village. Sure, being an intellectual youth here, he could make money pretty fast, more than back home. But if you asked him to choose, he’d definitely rather go back. Being a farmer was really no easy life.

"I don’t know." Zhang Yu of course knew it would definitely be reinstated, but she couldn’t say it too firmly. It wasn’t something that had any official word yet; she couldn’t be too smug about it, or it’d be easy to get in trouble.

"I just feel that if they don’t bring back the college entrance exam, something’s really going to go wrong." Zhang Yu stuck to it: it had to be restored.

Hearing that reasoning, Zhao Yadong rolled his eyes at Zhang Yu. "That answer of yours basically said nothing at all. I’m even more confused now."

"A lot of projects need talent. Why pick people from universities? Because they’ve studied more. But look at how people get into university now—it’s all through recommendations. In the end, the students’ grades don’t matter."

"What matters is connections." At the start, the selection was at least a bit fair; they’d seriously screen candidates. But now it really was all about who you knew. As for the students’ ability, no one cared.

"Even if those people go to university, can they understand what they’re studying?"

"If you let that kind of person do research and development, it’s only a matter of time before something goes wrong. So..." She’d already said this much. If someone still didn’t get it, Zhang Yu really didn’t know how else to explain.

This time, Zhao Yadong actually did understand. "I see. Makes sense. Smart people are really something—you can figure things out just from the trends."

Xiao Hao didn’t want him to get carried away with the compliments. "So, are you going to study or not?"

On that point, Zhao Yadong scratched his head. "I, I... I might be a high-school graduate, but if it hadn’t been for you, Xiao Hao, I might not have made it through high school at all."

"I barely scraped by on the exams. You really think I can get into college?" Who didn’t want to go to college? It was just that the path had already been cut off. Maybe in a few years the exam would be reinstated, but by then he’d have been away from school for years. He’d probably already forgotten everything the teachers had taught—given it all back to them.

"So you do know your grades are lousy." Xiao Hao said impatiently. "Since you know you’re not doing well, why don’t you buckle down and study?"

"If other people need one or two years, then you study three, four, five years. I refuse to believe that if the exam is restored, you still won’t be able to get a decent score." Xiao Hao knew his friend actually wasn’t that bad.

As long as you gave Zhao Yadong a good study environment, his grades definitely wouldn’t be poor.

"Zhao Yadong, you’re really not stupid. If you had as much time to study as your younger brother and sister, your grades would definitely be better than theirs." Xiao Hao knew that if he wanted Zhao Yadong to hit the books again, he had to rebuild his confidence.

"Yeah, my grades aren’t great either. My mom says I’m dumb—older than Zhang Hui, but my grades aren’t as good as hers." Zhang Yu figured maybe Xiao Hao and Zhao Yadong thought highly of her because she’d had a similar experience to Zhao Yadong.

"Let’s work hard together. We have to fight for our own future at least once."

"If we’d stayed at home, we wouldn’t have this kind of chance. But here, anything is possible. We can’t give up on ourselves." Zhang Yu tried to encourage Zhao Yadong.

"Right, we can’t give up on ourselves." Even Zhang Yu was trying so hard in every way—how could he be thinking about giving up?