On Thursday, the game got a major update. That night, after Lin Ran got home and finished his homework, he stayed up late selling off the materials he'd been hoarding. Firefly Stones that had gone for just over a hundred gold were now worth several thousand, and the other materials had multiplied in value too. In fact, less than ten seconds after Lin Ran put one batch up for auction, someone snapped it up.

Lin Ran happily sold off the materials, filling the gold reserves on dozens of alt accounts until they all hit the cap.

It was almost midnight by the time Lin Ran finished selling everything. He immediately contacted the server's most reputable gold buyer to sell his gold. The buyer's exchange rate was one or two points higher than the others', but he was trustworthy. Lin Ran couldn't be bothered haggling with other buyers or leaving the gold sitting on his accounts. He had no idea whether the game might flag him for malicious gold farming and ban his accounts the next day.

He kept at it until almost two in the morning, converting all the gold on his accounts into yuan. After fees, the current exchange rate, Su Shijie's fifty-thousand-yuan principal, and everything else were accounted for, Lin Ran had made nearly a hundred thousand yuan! Even he could hardly believe it. He could afford a decent little car now!

In this life and his last, this was the first time Lin Ran had ever experienced having a hundred thousand yuan in his account. It felt amazing!

Once he was done, he went straight to bed. Tomorrow was Friday, the day of the start-of-term exams. They'd finish all the tests that day, get their results on Saturday, and be assigned to classes based on their rankings on Sunday. The thought of finally leaving Class B had Lin Ran feeling a little excited.

But he hadn't slept enough, and he felt awful when he got up the next morning. He was still groggy on the way to school. He was used to going to bed early and getting up early, so staying up late and then waking up at the crack of dawn really wasn't pleasant.

In front of the school building, Lin Ruixue suddenly stopped. She took a deep breath, then called out to Lin Ran as if she were working up her courage. “Brother Lin Ran, good luck on your exams!”

The sudden encouragement left Lin Ran stunned. He couldn't quite figure out what the girl was getting at. But as soon as she'd called out to him, Lin Ruixue immediately fled as if her life depended on it, leaving Lin Ran both amused and at a loss.

Back in the classroom, Lin Ran waited for the exam to begin. When it finally started, he was absolutely miserable. He wanted to sleep so badly. He was exhausted!

So when the papers were handed out, Lin Ran pinched his thigh and got to work while he was still awake enough to focus. The material from his second year of high school wasn't difficult for him now—in fact, some of it was pretty easy. The start-of-term exam only covered material from the previous semester, and as long as you studied properly, your results wouldn't be too bad. That was why, during these exams, not many students actually moved up or down a class. The school held them mainly to encourage students to keep studying.

The exam lasted an hour and a half. Lin Ran finished his paper in forty minutes, didn't bother checking it, and put his head down to sleep. But this was high school, not college. The teacher wasn't going to let him sleep just because he'd finished his exam.

Before long, the teacher tossed a piece of chalk at Lin Ran's head.

“Lin Ran, you're sleeping during the exam? Get up,” the proctor snapped.

“I'm done,” Lin Ran said helplessly.

“Then check it over. Your grades aren't very good to begin with, so go through it a couple more times, just to be safe,” the teacher said.

“Teacher, I know what I'm capable of. What I can answer, I can answer; what I can't, I can't. It's not like I'll suddenly know how to do a problem just because I check it again. I stayed up half the night studying and barely slept, so could you just turn a blind eye this once?” Lin Ran said without lifting his head.

“You're sure you don't want to check it?” the teacher asked.

“Yep,” Lin Ran replied.

“Then hand in your paper and go stand outside,” the teacher said curtly.

Lin Ran stood up and carried his paper to the front of the room. After handing it to the teacher, he went to stand by the window outside, leaned against the wall, and closed his eyes.

Seeing Lin Ran like that made the teacher's blood boil. They grabbed his paper and started checking it. But then the teacher was taken aback. First, Lin Ran's handwriting was neat and attractive. Second, at a glance, every answer he'd written seemed to be correct. The teacher scratched their head. What was going on?

The more the teacher looked, the more they couldn't help picking up a pen and grading the paper. And once they started, they were in for a shock: only about one-tenth of Lin Ran's answers were wrong. The unanswered questions were another matter—they were obviously worth no points.

In the end, Lin Ran scored 123. The teacher was stunned. Was this really the same Lin Ran who barely scraped a passing grade on every exam? Had he suddenly unleashed some hidden power? Had he really stayed up studying last night?

What the teacher didn't know was that Lin Ran could've scored even higher. He was tired, and his mind wasn't at its sharpest, so he'd missed a few mistakes on the paper. If he'd been fully alert, he definitely wouldn't have gotten those questions wrong!

By the time the teacher finished grading, Lin Ran had already “vanished.” The teacher went outside to look—and sure enough, the kid was so tired he'd fallen asleep sitting on the floor.

The teacher could only sigh and call Lin Ran back to his seat to rest.

Lin Ran went on to surprise the teacher again in each of the next two exams!

In short, after the start-of-term exams, the teacher was sure Lin Ran would move up to Class A or Class S. Based on past exam results, his score this time would be enough to get him into Class S. He'd be near the bottom, but Class S was still Class S. Of course, there might be more students than usual who suddenly performed far better this year. Even placing near the top of Class A would still be impressive.

The teacher even wondered if Lin Ran had taken something over the summer. Not only had his appearance changed completely, but his grades had shot up like a rocket. It wasn't unheard of for students to suddenly improve, but someone leaping from the middle of Class B to the very bottom of Class S was incredibly rare. And Lin Ran hadn't even been in top form. What if he'd gotten enough sleep and felt completely refreshed? How much more terrifying would his score have been then?

Since the second- and third-year students had their start-of-term exams, the teachers let them relax a little. They didn't have evening study that day. After finishing the exams in the afternoon, they only had two more classes before school let out. The second-years had no homework this week, at least for now. The third-years, on the other hand, had mountains of it.

After school, Lin Ran picked up his schoolbag and went to find Lin Ruixue and Si Qing. They'd have dinner at school before heading home. This time, Lin Ruixue didn't need to ask—Lin Ran had already told her he'd come to pick her up after school.

After dinner, Lin Ran headed home with Su Shijie.

“What have you been taking lately, man? Why've you suddenly been so nice to Xiaoxue these past couple of days? My guess is your dad warned you!” Su Shijie said with a grin.

“Something like that,” Lin Ran replied.

“Hey, how'd you do on the exams? Don't just tell me ‘so-so.’ How'd you really do? Think you can make the top twenty in your class?” Su Shijie asked with a grin.

“I can,” Lin Ran answered without hesitation.

“That's good. Too bad for you, though—your big brother here did pretty well this time. Unless something goes wrong, I'll make the top ten! You're still not quite there yet!” Su Shijie said, grinning as he patted Lin Ran on the shoulder.

Lin Ran chuckled.

As they reached the school gate, they happened to run into Ye Qingqian. She was carrying a thick stack of papers into the school.

“You're only leaving now?” Ye Qingqian said with a smile.

“I went with him to have dinner with Xiaoxue and Si Qing. Do you still have work to do, Senior?” Su Shijie asked with a grin.

“I'm picking up a few things for a teacher. By the way, how did your exams go today?” Ye Qingqian asked with a smile.

“So-so!” Su Shijie said.

“And you?” Ye Qingqian turned to Lin Ran.

Lin Ran grinned. “About the same.”

“I know what he's like. Maybe he pulled off an unusually good performance this time and made the top twenty in his class. That's what he means by ‘so-so’!” Su Shijie teased Lin Ran.

Lin Ran was speechless.

“This might be obvious, but I still want to encourage you both to improve your grades as quickly as you can. Whether you're in Class A or Class S, the study environment is miles better than in Class B. When everyone around you is improving, you'll naturally push yourself to do better too. That'll help a lot when it's time for the college entrance exams. And the teachers in Class A and Class S are excellent as well,” Ye Qingqian said with a smile.

“We want to, of course. It's just not something we can do overnight. If only we were like you, Senior!” Su Shijie said politely.

“Keep at it! I won't keep you,” Ye Qingqian said, then carried the papers into the school.

Su Shijie and Lin Ran headed home at an easy pace.