Shanhai High School 17

The questions are too easy, and Brother Xing is swelling!

During the National Day holiday, Dr. Lin and his wife were transferred by the hospital to a remote mountainous area clinic for free consultations. They couldn’t fly to JinCheng in person. They could only make a video call to their son every night to remind him not to be bored at home all day long, or to go out and walk around more.

“I know. I’ll go to JinCheng University to watch the musical tonight.” Lin Jing said, “It’s the most recent super-popular ‘Fairy Mountain Village’. The ticket was given by the classmates.”

“Are you alone?” Mrs. Lin interrogated, “What time does it end? Is it safe?”

“It’s safe. Aunt Jiang will come to pick me up.” In fact, a 16 or 17-year-old boy could already completely pretend to be an adult and did not need a parent to pick him up and walk the night. Still, even though he couldn’t stand it because he had ethical consciousness — Lin Jing had repeatedly attempted to refuse and could only accept.

“It just so happens that the night market near Jincheng University is very famous, and we can go to have a late-night snack together after.”

Dr. Lin was initially brushing his teeth. When he heard his son say this, he immediately took a gargle cup to wash it away, and then forced himself into the screen, “The night market is full of junk food and illegal additives; also the E. coli there must exceed the standard, and you are not allowed to eat. After watching the musical, go home, let Aunt Jiang stew some soup for you, otherwise don’t watch the musical. Just hear the name of this fairy, you will know that the content is shallow. Dad will give you some in-depth lectures…hiss!”
“Old Lin, how come you have so much nonsense!” Mother Lin pulled his ear to give him an earful, “My son only occasionally eats at the night market and watches a musical. I think it’s a good thing to relax his nervous brain.”

“Shang WeiWei, as a doctor, how can you keep such sharp nails!”

“In order to pinch you, I just cut it five minutes ago.”

“…”

Lin Jing put the phone on the bracket, and while packing his school bag, he listened to the quarrel between the two people on the other side —the kind of flirtation of argument.

“Mommy, daddy, then I’m going out.”

“Go ahead.” Mother Lin threw her husband aside and waved her hand lovingly, “Be careful on the road. Your father and I will also move to JinCheng as soon as possible.”

…

There were beasts in the mountains of Qingqiu, which resembled foxes with nine tails.

In the evening, the fog filled the whole mountain and forest, allowing the petals also to glaze in translucent dew.

Ji XingLing, who was lying on the grass in the moonlight, with an expressionless face, and under his crooked arms, chest, and legs, all lying down the fluffy nine-tailed fox cubs.

Rolled down for a moment.

A moment later, the cubs climbed up again.

It rolled on again in a moment.

When one tiny paw ignorantly stepped straight on the young master’s nose, he finally reached the limit of his patience. He dragged over the big bamboo basket to put these distant little brothers into it, and hugged them back to the old mansion like a baby chick, “Mom, I’m going to go do my homework!”

Hu MeiMei was chatting with a room full of nine-tailed fox sisters. After hearing this, she asked in surprise, “Didn’t you just finish it?”

“There are still papers that Lin Jing gave me without writing in English.” Ji XingLing said, “Then I will go to study first.”

“Wow! Xiao Xing loves to study so much now ah.”

“Yes, I won’t play with my little brothers anymore.”

“He has grown up and is sensible.”

“Indeed, handsome and well-behaved he is.”

The praise and envy came without any hint of warning. Hu MeiMei was surrounded by the crowd… in the middle of the fox group, for the first time in her life to possess that legendary “son of someone else’s family”, she was temporarily dazzled by immense joy, and didn’t slow down for a long time.

Qingqiu had no wifi, and the mobile phone signal was also very weak. It seems that it could only rely on studying to kill time.

Ji XingLing sat in front of the desk lamp, writing and scribbling on the test paper one after another without a moment’s hesitation.

The questions that Lin Jing picked out were elementary, and it was barely enough for the basic entry side, and even the scum of the bottom of the grade could brush down without pressure. Little Teacher Lin probably wanted to take a step-by-step approach, first letting students enjoy the sense of accomplishment that went smoothly all the way. Still, Young Master Ji had many issues; if it was too difficult to do, he couldn’t do it; if it was too simple, then it wasn’t good either, and he always felt that every question was mocking his IQ in all-around aspects — I’m not so bad in my studies that I don’t even know what the sequence of one, three, and five is, okay!

So Ji XingLing simply dropped the pen and didn’t do it.

Too easy!

Brother Xing was swollen!

The study room was filled with the smell of old sandalwood. Ji XingLing laid on the rocking chair, rocking “squeak squeak” boringly, and rocking himself to sleepiness.

In a daze, Little Teacher Lin suddenly pushed the door and let himself in, picked up the test paper without saying a word apart from anything else, and then criticized him with his hands on his hips after checking, “Ji XingLing, why don’t you even know how to do such simple math problems? Do you have any brains? Come here and copy the ninety-nine multiplication table three hundred times!”

Young Master Ji was jolted up from his dream and sober on the spot.

Wocao, it was quite a fright indeed.

He weighed it up, between “he didn’t finish his homework and was ridiculed” and “he didn’t have anything to do anyway, and the question was so easy, so it was better for him to do it”… Okay ba, let’s do the homework.

Outside the window, the stars were obscured by clouds.

The curtain slowly rose in the JinCheng University Auditorium, and “Fairy Mountain Village” had officially begun.

According to the pamphlet’s introduction, the entire plot of the musical would centre on the supernatural murder case, and followed a suspenseful line of reasoning. As a result, in the first minute of the opening, a group of people dressed as birds was singing. The first five minutes of the opening were still the same scene.
The ten minutes of the opening.

Fifteen minutes.

…

Lin Jing was drowsily lulled by the song, and the elder brother next to him had already started snoring, while some sisters in the back row whispered complaints, what’s an absurd plot? How can this be so viral?

As soon as the voice fell, fire fell from the sky, “soaring” the kind of fire that illuminated the entire theater.

The audience was instantly in an uproar. The snoring big brother, who didn’t know the situation, stood up in a daze and was about to run, but was angrily scolded by the aunt behind him, “That bald head, sit down quickly!”

“…”

The flames light passed over through the theater like a dragon, and the high-row audience could even feel the scorching heat temperature.

The special effects were too realistic.

Sleeping, undoubtedly, that no one would ever sleep again, and it was all replaced by thunderous applause.
And then there would be more fantastic spectacles to play out.

Gou Mang¹hastened the birth of all things on earth.

Huan Cat²was chanting songs in unique languages.

Bi Fang Crane³engulfed the village with flames, and a dozen Firebirds⁴flew out of the thick smoke with their wings waving.

Ji Meng⁵had rained down a thunderstorm.

The gleaming ManJin Moss⁶ was slithering all over the stage.

This was such a grand and eerie dream. It wasn’t until the actors took turns to come out and close the curtain, that the audience finally woke up from the dream and gave them standing ovations.

Lin Jing’s seat was in the upfront row, so the shock was also the most direct. He finally figured out why netizens’ comments of this musical mainly were “fucking amazing”, “must watch”, “Stage design, I respect you as a father”, and the like of other passionate speeches. It turned out that it wasn’t that everyone was virtuous and didn’t want to give the spoiler, but after such a toss down, no one simply could remember what the plot of the play was, because their head would only be filled with special effects of the stage lighting.

In this respect, it was indeed worth the fare.

The security guards held seven or eight bouquets of flowers sent by the audience and went backstage to hand them over to the cast and crew. After pushing the door, the lounge was pitch black. Someone was complaining discontentedly, “Why have you closed your eyes again, Torch Dragon⁷? I haven’t finished removing the makeup.”

“I’ve been staring at the lighting you cast for two hours today, and my eyes are aching. Let Ye Ming⁸ do it in your place.”

“Giant-Gale Bird⁹, what about the gale then. The stage effect is good today. Next time, continue to blow from this angle.”

…

Therefore, it was very reasonable that the crew of “Fairy Mountain Village” strictly prohibited non-staff from entering backstage.

Otherwise, the flower-giving audience may doubt life on the spot.

The sky was drizzling. At 10:30 in the evening, Jiang FenFang appeared at the dispersal site on time. She was holding a big umbrella in her right hand, with a thick coat under her arm, and a thermos cup in her bag. As soon as she saw Lin Jing, she rushed forward, first shook open the coat, and “swoosh” to wrap the person tightly, and then handed the umbrella over, and finally unscrewed the lid, “Come on, drink the red jujubes and white fungus soup to drive away from the cold and nourish the lungs.”

The whole set of actions flowed so smoothly, and it was done in one go. Before Lin Jing realized it, the warm mouth of the cup was already on his lips.

“…”

The night market junk food plan was brutally wrecked. Lin Jing could only drink the healthy, nourishing soup honestly, and better started to pay special attention to maintaining his good health regimen from the teenagers.

In fact, Jiang FenFang was also very distressed. Of course, she knew that she was a bit over-spoiled her employer.

But this was the nature of GuHuo Niao¹⁰. When it saw cute well-behaved children, it couldn’t help but want to clasp them under its wings.

On the empty street, two Hundun¹¹ disguised as stray dogs were baring their fangs at each other. As soon as they were about to fight, and get on one of them, Jiang FenFang just simply fanned her wings, and both were tossed onto the garbage dump heap.

Filthy, don’t you scare my kid!

With a banana peel on their heads, the Hundun dogs were stunned!

What kind of unexpected misfortune was this? Aunty, you were having menopausal early, weren’t you?

Lin Jing was puzzled and turned back, “What is that sound?”

“I didn’t hear anything ne.” Aunt Jiang smiled guilelessly, “Maybe the theater is too noisy, and you haven’t gotten over it yet. Take a rest early tonight.”

Lin Jing said, “Oh”. While waiting for the bus, he sent a WeChat message to Ji XingLing to express his gratitude, overemphasizing that the performance was truly wonderful and the special effects of wind, rain, thunder, and lightning were astonishing.

It was already two days later that Young Master Ji finally received his WeChat messages. As soon as he left Qingqiu, his smartphone started to prompt notifications and alert the news frantically. Yu YiZhou, Ge Hao, the class group, and other Hupeng-Gouyou¹²had sent messages that almost got his phone to hang, and most of them were nothing important and useless bullshit, so whether they were being read or not read were all the same. Only Little Teacher Lin was not very ruthless. He only sent two messages in seven days. One, said that the musical was wonderful, and the other was, asked questions directly to his conscience —have you finished and done the test paper, and are there any questions that you aren’t able to do?

Ji XingLing first rapidly typed a sentence line: I finished it!

Later then, he felt that the exclamation mark had shown how overly excited he was, which made him feel more like a fool, so he deleted that punctuation mark.

When he looked at the words again, and still felt it was offensive to the eye, he simply cleared all of it, then replaced it with the “mhm” word, which was cool and indifferent, also very nice and very much like Brother Xing’s style.

A few seconds later.

Ke Da: What do you mean by ‘mhm’, Ji XingLing, you didn’t do the paperwork, did you?

How do you still look down on people ne? Xuezha also has dignity! So Ji Xing Ling rapidly refuted it: I have finished writing all of them completely!

After pressing send, Brother Xing realized later that he was not very okay about it. Not only was there no lack of exclamation marks, but it also emphasized “all completely”, all my ass, which seemed that I actually cared about it very much, so he was going to withdraw it again, but instead, he accidentally deleted it by hand sliding.

“…”

Qilin was swearing.

The phone screen was lit up again.

Ke Da: Have you really done it all? You are so amazing!

Ji XingLing was so embarrassed that his scalp exploded, and he sincerely doubted whether the other party had a wholesale box of “You are so amazing” cards, or else how he could throw that soulless one on his face without any conscience nor feeling every now and then.

“Lin Jing, if you are talking deliberately ambiguous, I will delete you from being my friends!”

“I can’t praise you ma!”

“Are there any people who praise like you ma!”

“Then how shall I praise?”

“You are not allowed to praise!”

“……okay then.”

Anyway, Little Teacher Lin was not able to exaggerate his true feelings when facing 400 points, which was Ji XingLing.

“You already got off the plane ba. What time will you come home?”

“What do you want again?”

“You are coming to my house to copy the homework, aren’t you?”

“…Copy, be there in half an hour.”

“Then I’ll wait for you.”

Ji XingLing hung up the phone, then dragged over his schoolbag, and touched a pack of tissues, then he felt that something was off.

Two minutes later, he slowly turned his head, “Mom, where are my printed papers ne?”

“How would I know?” Hu MeiMei was confused when asked, “You sure that you weren’t pretending when you said you did it?”

Ji XingLing, “…”

I really fucking had finished them all!

The author has something to say: ————
The basic introduction of the Monster Opera Troupe

————

The monsters in the article are basically derived from "Shan Hai Jing (Classic of Mountains and Seas)" and ancient Chinese myths. Sometimes, some small settings are changed for the plot. Thank you, everyone.

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1. Gou Mang (句芒 gōu máng): Goumang, also known as Jumang (句芒), is an auxiliary god of the Fuxi family. The Classic of Mountains and Seas described his appearance as “bird body and human face, ride two dragons”. He is the god of wood and spring, in charge of the life and health of plants.
2. Huan Cat (讙 huān): Huan is a wild cat-like creature in Chinese Mythology. It is one of the mythical beasts featured in the Chinese classic text Classic of Mountains and Seas (山海经). The Huan resembles a wild cat with three tails and a single eye. It can mimic the sounds of other animals, described as sounding like a hundred sounds. It is said that it can ward off evil, and people would keep them as pets for this reason. Eating its meat or wearing its skin is also said to cure jaundice.
3. Bi Fang Crane (毕方 bì fāng): is a mythological bird, encountered in Chinese mythology. Bifang (毕方) looks very similar to a Red-crowned crane. However, it is possessed of only a single leg, has a greenish body covered in red spots, and displays a long, white beak. The name “Bifang” is supposedly an onomatopoeia for the sound of wood crackling in a fire. They are considered to be ominous. It is said that if it is sighted, then wildfire-related disasters are sure to happen.
4. Firebird (却火雀 què huǒ què): the fire sparrow is the name of the exotic bird in ancient Chinese legends. Its shape is like a swallow black finch-shaped bird, a bird that enters the fire without being burnt, which can extinguish the fire, and when it is placed in the fire, the fire will disperse.
5. Ji Meng (计蒙 jì mēng): is a race of creatures that originate from the old Chinese bestiaries. Eight hundred eighty li farther northeast stands Brilliance mountain. On its heights is much green jade, and at its feet are many trees. The God Jimeng dwells here. His form resembles a human with a dragon’s head. He habitually roams in the depths of the Zhang Gorge. Whirlwinds and violent storms occur whenever he emerges and returns.
6. ManJin Moss (蔓金苔 mán jīn tái): A gleaming moss plant in the legend that can glow. Its color is golden like gold, like countless fireflies gathered together, and its body is like an egg, also known as “Luminous Moss”. When placed into the water, it spreads like a wave, and the light glows, like a fire suffused with the melting sun.
7. Torch Dragon (烛龙 zhúlóng): is a giant red solar dragon and god in Chinese mythology, which is also known as Zhulong or the Candle Dragon. A deity with a human face and a long, serpentine body. It can control day and night simply by opening or closing its eyes; closing its eyes, it became night time, and when he opened them, it became day. It can also control the weather simply by breathing. When he took a breath, there would be a strong wind and heavy rain. It would become winter when it blew. There will be black clouds and heavy snow. When it is sniffed, it will become summer. There would be a scorching sun that could melt stones.
8. Ye Ming (夜明 yè míng): The South Sea Giant Demon, a behemoth in the sea like a big mountain. Its eyes are like two rising suns, which shine brightly, and emit an intense light that illuminates the whole ocean, turning the night into day.
9. Giant-Gale Bird (大风 dà fēng): a vicious bird of prey in Chinese mythology and legend. It is a disaster god who will cause wild winds. Gale” is also known as “Big Phoenix”, and legend has it that it is a relative of the peacock. Extremely fierce, the body is very large, a spread of wings can cover half of the sky, a wave of wings will blow a hurricane, trees are uprooted, houses collapse in batches.
10. GuhuoNiao (姑获鸟 Gū huò niǎo) Guhuo bird which is also a woman ghost called night-going leisure woman 夜行游女 or TianDi young girl 天帝少女, also known as ghost bird 鬼鸟and it later got popular in Japan in Japanese it is called Ubume. According to folklore, the part-bird, the part-human ghost, embodies a woman who died giving birth. It is a bird-woman. It transforms shapes by taking off or putting on the feather coat. It appears during nighttime and hides during the day.
11. Hundun (混沌 hùn dùn) – represents Chaos. It’s a faceless being, sometimes described as resembling a dog or bear. It attacks the virtuous and obeys the commands of the wicked. “Hundun” is also the name of the Primordial Chaos in Chinese mythology.
12. Hupeng-gouyou (狐朋狗友húpéng-gǒuyǒu) – lit. Fox friend dog companion, it’s an idiom of a pack of rogues or a gang of scoundrels, which means evil associates, depraved company, disreputable friend.