“My dear cousin, it’s not good to have double standards,” Tan Mo said.
“I…” Yuan Keqing looked panicked and as if she were about to cry. All the other students saw that she was in a position of weakness, and they pitied her.
“Tan Mo, it is true that you are a student at Beijing University, but you are also my cousin,” Yuan Keqing said, trying to look really concerned. “I can’t just stand around and watch as you do something wrong.”
Tan Mo tilted her head as if she were confused and asked, “What you’ve just said is so strange. I am attempting to solve a problem and am not hesitating to attempt something that is difficult. What did I do wrong?
“In your opinion, if you encounter something difficult, in order to avoid embarrassing yourself, you will back off before even trying to solve the problem. You don’t even have the courage to attempt it?” Tan Mo frowned and commented, “I don’t really understand your logic.
“This type of spirit: the desire to overcome obstacles and the ability to not be afraid of how others look at you… This is not something to be mocked.” Tan Mo scanned the crowd and asked, “When you all encounter something difficult, do you just give up? You don’t even try solving the problem? If you tried and got it wrong, then is it right for others to mock you for trying? Or will they mock you for attempting something that you can’t possibly solve?”
“Tan Mo, I…I didn’t say that you shouldn’t try solving the problem,” Yuan Keqing said quickly. “Don’t cherry pick my words.
“I didn’t say that you should give up before a difficult problem, I just meant to say that this isn’t your area of study, so you…” Yuan Keqing thought for a bit and continued, “I’ll just say it then. You’ve never learned this material before, so why are you even trying to solve it? It’s good to attempt difficult problems, but you have to know where your limits are.”
“But I know how to do it,” Tan Mo said.
She didn’t like being wronged either, and she also knew how to incite the pity of others. Did Yuan Keqing think she was the only one who knew how to do that?
Of course she knew how! She was the grandmaster of it.
Tan Mo said with a downcast face, “Why don’t you ever just listen to what I am saying?
“You always go on and on by yourself, never listening to me, and filling in the empty gaps in the story according to what you want to believe. You never believe what I say, you only believe what you want to believe.” Tan Mo pouted and continued, “I told you already, I know how to do the problem.”
“If you know how to do the problem, then why haven’t you written it down for such a long time?” Yuan Keqing sighed. “Tan Mo, seriously, it’s fine for you to stop now. Just admit your mistake. Is doing so that difficult? If you admit your mistake, no one will laugh at you.”
Tan Mo was an expert in history and language, so Yuan Keqing simply didn’t believe that Tan Mo also knew something like aerospace engineering.
She wasn’t some genius like Einstein.
In history and language, Tan Mo had learned a lot from Professor Zhao and Professor Guo.
But she had never learned aerospace engineering from anyone.
Was it possible to teach yourself aerospace engineering?
Wasn’t the work that she did in the Departments of Finance, Language, and History already enough to keep her busy?
Even if Tan Mo had the ability to teach herself aerospace engineering, how could she possibly have the time?
She had to attend the research teams of Professors Guo and Zhao, she had written the script for wildly successful television series, and she had to manage the massive workload of her classes.
Wasn’t that enough work to do already?
“I have a couple of ways to solve this problem, and, a while ago, I was just thinking which method would be the most simple and elegant to use.” Tan Mo told the truth.
“Tan Mo…although you were always a bit…self-centered, and while you often treat me poorly, and you don’t want to lose face, but…but you’ve never gone this far before. Now…right now, how could you make up such a lie?”
Everyone was surprised at what Yuan Keqing had just said.
Tan Mo was like that?
“I don’t agree with what you have just said.” A cold voice rang out from the crowd.
Everyone looked back and saw Ming Yeqing coming through the crowd.
Ming Yeqing felt a strong sense of responsibility. He had wanted to speak up for a long time now, but Tan Mo and Yuan Keqing kept going back and forth so quickly that he didn’t have the chance to interrupt.
Ming Yeqing was feeling terrible for Tan Mo.
He had heard about Yuan Keqing before from Qin Muye, but, now that he’d heard this, it was beyond anything that he could fathom.
Now, he had finally seen it for himself…what Yuan Keqing was like.
And Tan Mo had had to deal with her all along. The thought of it made him cringe.
If Tan Mo weren’t so smart or if she had had slightly slower reactions, wouldn’t she have been continually bullied by Yuan Keqing?
“I’ve known Tan Mo since I was six years old,” Ming Yeqing said in a cold voice. “I am the one who understands her the most here. She isn’t like you say she is. You are the one who always liked to pretend that Tan Mo did something against you, in order to incite the pity of others. But actually she has not said a single bad word about you.
Seeing that Yuan Keqing was about to argue with him, Ming Yeqing went on, “I know what you want to ask. You want to say, if she never said anything before, how did I know about you?
That stopped Yuan Keqing in her tracks.
“Do you think that everyone is an idiot and can’t see through your little tricks?” Ming Yeqing said coldly. “Many have seen through them, and they have hated it as well, so they have said something about it. Tan Mo doesn’t care to talk about it, because she isn’t shameless like you are. She helps her friends, and she is a generous person, and she is not self-centered.
“You also know that Tan Mo excels in both language and history and is a special student of Professor Zhao and Professor Guo. Both of them want her to change majors, but she insists on staying in the Department of Finance. Why do you think she made such a decision? That way, in the future, she will be able to support her three brothers as they go for their dream careers. If she changed majors, she could get more resources and more importance, but she didn’t. How many others would do something like that? If she is self-centered, then how about those who would never do such a thing?
“Tan Mo said she could solve it, and that means she can solve it,” Ming Yeqing said in a lower tone. “I am her friend, and I trust what she says because she never promises something that she can not achieve.
“When she was in first grade, she said she was going to skip grades, so she skipped grades. She said she would attend Beijing University, and she received a full score on the high school leaving exams. She said that she would get first place in the Ancient Text Competition, and she did. She said she would write something good for Director Liu, and she did, and she got an award for it. She has delivered on everything she promised.
“You keep repeating the fact that she is your cousin, and you are telling her things for her own good. And about how she has always bullied you. If that was true, then why are you the one who is attempting to bully her now? Why must you try to embarrass her in front of this large crowd? Why don’t you believe her, and instead you are attempting to mock her with others who do not know her? Even me, someone who has no blood relation to her, is better than you toward her. And you say you are her family?
“I believe that Tan Mo can solve the problem.” Ming Yeqing looked over at the crowd and said, “Tan Mo came here because I invited her here. My classmates don’t care, so those of you from other classes, you can piss off now. What happens here is none of your business.”
After hearing his last line, everyone had awkward looks on their faces.
So they were the ones who were totally unnecessary?
But what Ming Yeqing said had confused them again.
According to what he said, Tan Mo didn’t seem like the self-centered person they had thought she was.
