It Doesn't Work After All

In the end, Class One won the silver medal in the boys’ relay. At least they had managed to take silver, so the result wasn’t particularly bad. If Sunshine had run a little faster, they might even have had a chance at the championship. After all, the students running the later legs had managed to make up the distance—it was just that they fell a little over a meter short.

Still, regrets weren’t necessarily a bad thing. That was true for Sunshine, and it was also true for Keke, who had once missed out on the championship after tripping and falling.

“Keke, you’re not going to trip this time, are you?” Ye Shuang asked with a smile.

Tang Keke lifted her chin. “Nope, nope. I even put on a sports bra especially for this.”

Ye Shuang glanced at her. Although Keke claimed she was wearing a sports bra, he couldn’t really see any difference. That sort of thing was fairly restrictive, after all. Was it because he didn’t pay enough attention normally?

No, probably not.

Ye Shuang thought about it, but didn’t say anything. Staring any longer might make him seem like a lecher, even though he had accidentally run into her before—and had even witnessed firsthand just how impressive she was.

He cleared his throat and turned his attention back to the track.

“Javelin, Group A…” The announcement came over the loudspeaker at that moment. When Tao Xiaotao heard the event called, she slowly stood up.

“My turn.”

“You signed up for javelin too, Tao Xiaotao?” The other girls looked over in surprise.

“Yeah. Our counselor said it would be best to sign up for two events, and I thought I could give this a try.” Tao Xiaotao smiled.

“Then let’s go watch.”

The javelin competition was being held in another area. Once everyone heard that Tao Xiaotao had an event, they followed her over. With so many people coming along, Tao Xiaotao felt a little embarrassed, but she couldn’t talk them out of it and had no choice but to agree.

“Tao Xiaotao, is Tao Xiaotao here?” The judge looked down at his roster.

“Here.” Tao Xiaotao raised her hand when she heard her name called.

“You’re number seven.” The judge took out a sticker and handed it to her. “Put this on yourself.”

“Okay.”

Tao Xiaotao looked at the sticker marked “7,” then glanced at what she was wearing. Since she had put on shorts that day, she was about to stick it to her chest.

“If you put it there, the number might get crumpled when you throw,” Anshi Yi said from the side.

“Then where should I put it?”

“Your butt.”

“My butt?”

Thunk.

Ye Shuang knocked Anshi Yi on the head, then took the sticker from Tao Xiaotao and stuck it onto her sleeve.

“There. It can go anywhere. Don’t listen to Xiaoyi.”

“Hey, I wasn’t making it up.”

“Behave yourself.”

Once the competitors had finished preparing, Ye Shuang and the others moved aside so they wouldn’t interfere with the event.

“Has Tao Xiaotao practiced before?” Keke asked as she watched Tao Xiaotao warming up in the distance.

“No. Keke hasn’t had time to practice,” Bai Yuyou said. Tao Xiaotao’s schedule was packed from morning to night, so there was no way she had time to train for something like javelin.

“It doesn’t matter. The most important thing is experiencing the process,” Ye Shuang said.

The competition began right then.

The girl in lane one stepped up. She loosened her limbs, then used a running start before throwing the javelin in her hand.

“Number one: fifteen meters.”

“Oh!” The girl raised her fist in delight.

“Is fifteen meters a really good result?” Tang Keke asked curiously.

“That’s already pretty impressive,” An Shiyu said from the side. “It’s one-fifth of my level.”

“Um… were you complimenting her just now?”

“A distance of fifteen meters isn’t really anything special. That girl probably just came here for fun.” Ye Shuang smiled. After all, at the World Championships, every female competitor could throw over sixty meters, and some even broke seventy.

Next came numbers two, three, and four.

None of the girls performed particularly well. Most of them threw somewhere around twenty meters. Clearly, they were just here to have fun.

But when it was number five’s turn, quite a few students around them let out an excited “Wow!”

The girl in lane five had a sturdy build and stood around five foot nine. Her arms were covered in muscle.

“Is she a professional?” Ye Shuang glanced at her. He didn’t know much about javelin, but this girl…

Her entire body radiated the aura of someone saying, “I’m strong.”

By contrast, Tao Xiaotao was petite. Standing among the other girls, she was the shortest one there.

The girl in lane five clapped her hands and shouted before beginning her run-up. Then she threw the javelin with all her strength.

But then—

It landed right in front of her.

“Number five: four meters.”

Ye Shuang and the others stared in disbelief.

This… wasn’t quite what they had expected.

“Oh, how embarrassing!” The muscular girl twisted from side to side, covered her face, and ran away.

Seriously, what was the point of all those muscles if she couldn’t throw?

It was soon Tao Xiaotao’s turn.

“Number seven.”

“Here.”

Tao Xiaotao held the javelin. She didn’t really know the proper way to throw it, but judging from how poorly everyone else had done, perhaps she just needed to put in a little effort and get through the event.

Tao Xiaotao began her run-up, then threw the javelin.

The javelin flew straight—and much farther than any of the girls before her. It landed well beyond their marks.

“Thirty-eight meters.” The judge looked at the result.

“Huh?” Tao Xiaotao seemed surprised too.

“Guess being a country girl comes with a bit of strength.”

Although thirty-eight meters wasn’t anything extraordinary, Tao Xiaotao still brought home the gold medal.

“Congratulations, Tao Xiaotao!”

“Hehe.” Tao Xiaotao was a little surprised by the medal herself. She had only signed up to go through the motions.

“Who’s next?” Ye Shuang looked at the girls.

“Me!” Ducky raised her hand first. “Shot put!”

“Shot put?” Ye Shuang looked surprised. But when he saw the reactions of Keke and the others, it seemed they had known about it all along.

“Are you sure you’ll be okay?” Ye Shuang asked.

An Shiyaya was the one who least embodied the abilities associated with the An surname. Whether it was An Shiyu, Anshi Yi, or that eccentric old lady at the manor—or even the servants patrolling the grounds—every single one of them seemed like a genetically modified superhuman.

An Shiyaya, on the other hand, was just like an ordinary person.

In fact, her physical condition was even a little weaker than that of an average person.

“Trust me. I can do it. No problem,” An Shiyaya said. “I won’t bring shame to the honor of the An family.”

“Okay. We believe in you,” Ye Shuang and the others said with smiles.

And the final result of the shot-put event was—

“Owwwwww, it hurts so much!”

An Shiyaya strained her lower back while throwing the shot and was eventually sent sobbing to the school clinic.

Yep. She really couldn’t do it.