Chapter 47

Tao Shushu opened her photo album and scrolled to the screenshot of her initial agreement with the system.
Back then, the cub had just appeared.
Thinking about it, she hadn't known the cub for long, but perhaps because they had fought side by side so many times, Tao Shushu felt as if they had been acquainted for years.
Her mood relaxed at the thought of the cub.
Tao Shushu focused on examining the screenshot.
According to the system's rules, there shouldn't be any other systems in this world, and the system had confirmed it hadn't detected a third one.
But Qin Rui was clearly very concerned about her competition results.
Connecting this to Qin Rui's attitude toward Su Momo, Tao Shushu began to form a hypothesis.
Qin Rui and Su Momo were using the same Academic Genius System.
Lost in her thoughts, Tao Shushu was pondering deeply when a red exclamation mark suddenly popped up on her phone screen. Startled, she instinctively turned off her phone.
Looking up, she saw Qin Rui standing outside the door.
Qin Rui, with an air of righteousness, addressed the students' confusion. "You've performed quite well. Most of you have been studying diligently."
He then glanced in Tao Shushu's direction. "A few individuals should focus more on their studies."
Tao Shushu’s pupils contracted, her suspicions were confirmed.
Gripping her pen, she recalled a line from a screenshot: "Under the same world consciousness, the system’s method of acquiring energy remains constant."
Her system required her to study hard, complete learning tasks, earn corresponding recognition, and achieve certain rankings to exchange for gold coins.
In the original storyline, Su Momo also continuously took exams, improved her rankings, and advanced as an academic genius.
So, all she needed to do was study diligently.
Qin Rui was naturally smarter and more outstanding than Su Momo, but he was also an arrogant rival.
He was harder to deal with than Su Momo and had more fatal flaws.
Tao Shushu steadied herself. After all, it was all about studying, just one Qin Rui. She could handle it!
Tao Shushu studied even more earnestly.
Her parents were the first to notice the change. As soon as she returned home, Tao Shushu would head straight to the study to hit the books.
Her mother expressed concern, "What’s going on with Shushu? Lately, she doesn’t even play on her phone in the car, just holds onto her vocabulary book to memorize words. And at home, she starts studying as soon as she wakes up and keeps at it late into the night."
Her father frowned. "Is she under too much pressure? Maybe what happened last time made her feel insecure. We need to be more attentive."
The atmosphere at the Tao household had become intensely competitive.
Li Anyu also noticed the change in Tao Shushu and cautiously asked, "Shushu, I get the feeling you don’t like Senior Qin Rui, but ever since I showed you his transcript, you’ve been studying so hard, even rushing through meals just to go back to the classroom and solve problems."
On Tao Shushu’s desk was a sticky note with a number: 723.
She glanced at "723", the highest score Qin Rui had ever achieved in a monthly exam during high school.
Qin Rui hadn’t given her a track to run on, so she had to surpass him in every single exam.
After correcting her mistakes, Tao Shushu replied, "Anyu, I just suddenly felt like studying seriously."
She quickly returned to her obsessive studying.
Spurred by Tao Shushu’s relentless efforts, the drama club members of Class One also adopted an extremely serious attitude. Every actor worked hard to memorize their lines, striving not to hold Tao Shushu back during scenes.
The dedication of Class One pleased the oral English instructor. "Fang Le, your attitude is very earnest, and your progress is remarkably fast. I believe you will achieve the best results, especially you, Tao Shushu. Your accent is very authentic, and you’ve captured the queen’s demeanor perfectly."
Turning to the audience, the instructor asked, "Watching these kids perform, does it remind you of your early days abroad?"
Tao Shushu had already noticed the person sitting in the dimly lit area below the stage. She sat alone, wearing a mask and a hat, her face obscured.
Fang Le quietly explained, "That’s a former student of our instructor. She suddenly lost her ability to speak due to a psychological condition, so the instructor brought her along today to experience the atmosphere."
"Aphasia?" Tao Shushu furrowed her brows. "What's her name?"
"Her Chinese name is Gu Lanchun. She went abroad when she was very young, so you might not have heard of her. Gu Tongqiu is her cousin."
The clues connected.
Tao Shushu suddenly realized where Su Momo's fluent spoken English had been "copied" from.
The girl below the stage shrank back, lowering her head.
As if afraid of anyone seeing her face.
Tao Shushu asked Li Anyu about Gu Lanchun and searched for her name online. Gu Lanchun had lived abroad with her family since childhood, studied in multiple countries, and dreamed of becoming a translator. She had translated many children's poems collections.
She should have had a confident youth.
The classmates tacitly avoided looking at Gu Lanchun, but she hunched over even more.
Even when her concerned foreign teacher approached, she refused to communicate.
A surge of anger shot through Tao Shushu's mind.
She had to do something.
Tao Shushu wasn't one for heroics.
She opened the campus forum. Since being elected school belle, many anonymous accounts had been making sarcastic remarks about her.
Tao Shushu used her real name to confront one account: @SuMomo, you said I don't deserve to be school belle because I'm unbalanced in subjects. Then let's have an English debate. Tomorrow at 8 AM, under the flagpole. If you win, you become school belle. If you lose, apologize for your forum comments. You can choose the judges. If you don't, I'll invite authoritative foreign teachers.
The account's latest comment read: "Su Momo is hosting the anniversary ceremony and will converse with overseas seniors in four languages. She's the true representative of Huiwen. Tao Shushu just has good physics and Photoshop skills, she's an embarrassment as school belle."
Tao Shushu didn't care about the title, but Su Momo did. That was enough.
After posting, Tao Shushu calmed slightly. She closed Gu Lanchun's search page and began looking up foreign slang and famous quotes.
[Honey, this is too risky. You're facing someone with ten years of overseas experience, someone who speaks foreign languages like native tongue.]
[No. The one with ten years of experience, constantly studying English and striving to be a good translator is Gu Lanchun. Su Momo is just a thief. She might react without thinking, but she'll never reach Gu Lanchun's level of thinking.] Tao Shushu said.
On screen, Li Anyu happened to send a long WeChat message:
"Gu Lanchun? She went abroad young but was still the perfect child. My mom always held her up as example - said her English was more fluent than my Chinese, yet she still studied grammar and accent daily while I wasn't working hard enough. She was truly remarkable - smart and diligent. I follow her column where she introduces our traditional culture to foreigners. But she's in bad shape now - suddenly developed aphasia. Heard she's been in treatment with no improvement, and an ambulance took her away few days ago."
The system fell silent for a moment, and Tao Shushu noticed her phone screen moving on its own.
[?]
[Darling, you rest and recharge. I’ll help you gather information.]

Tao Shushu’s post on the forum quickly became a hot topic, instantly gaining hundreds of replies.
“This burner account has always targeted Tao Shushu and even cursed her to get into a car accident. And it turns out to be Su Momo’s account?”
“Just here for the drama.”
“Was Shushu hacked? Su Momo’s spoken English is really fluent.”
“Honestly, I’ve been wondering for a while, during the years Su Momo went missing, was she lost in the U.S.? That accent of hers must have taken a lot of practice.”
“I watched the English drama rehearsal in Class One. Shushu’s spoken English is very fluent, looking forward to it. A well-matched competition, flag-raising platform reservation confirmed.”
“This is just a burner account, no one can say for sure who’s behind it. How can Tao Shushu claim it’s Momo and slander our goddess Momo?”
“Exactly, what evidence is there to prove this is Su Momo? She just spoke a few hard truths, and someone’s already rushing to @ her. Am I the only one who thinks someone’s being manipulative?”
“??? Yes, just you. I’ve @‘ed the forum admin. Whoever’s behind this burner account, the admin can find out with one check.”
The comments were filled with all sorts of opinions.
Within just a few minutes, Tao Shushu’s messages were also flooded.
“Shushu! What’s going on with you? Stirring up such a big commotion on the forum?” Li Anyu sent a string of exclamation marks.
“It’s fine, I’ve thought it through carefully,” Tao Shushu replied.
She looked at the information the system had gathered. Unsure about two of the terms, she walked over to the foreign teacher to ask for clarification.
After the teacher finished explaining, their phone rang, and they stepped aside to take the call.
Tao Shushu approached Gu Lanchun, who was hiding in a corner. As she got closer, she could even catch a faint scent of blood and medicine. “The knowledge you’ve worked hard to learn will come back to you. You’re not stupid, and you’re not weak under pressure. Those who took what’s yours will pay the price.”
Gu Lanchun abruptly lifted her head, as if she wanted to say something, but no words came out.
Only then did Tao Shushu notice that Gu Lanchun’s eyes were red, filled with bloodshot veins, as if she had been crying many times.
“So, hold on a little longer, even if it’s just one more day.”
Tao Shushu walked back to the center of Class One.
“Shushu, I believe in you! You can do it!” Fang Le said.
Though they didn’t know why Shushu had suddenly taken such action, they had all heard Tao Shushu recite her lines before, she was amazing.
Tao Shushu opened the forum, planning to press the issue further. Su Momo used eight accounts a day to spam the forum nonstop, there was no way she would stay silent for so long on such a big matter.
With one refresh, Tao Shushu saw the forum admin’s bold, bright red reply.
"@Jasmine @Meimei @xihgny @StudyWillDie @TodayIsAlsoBeautiful and the above five accounts share identical IP addresses and login devices with @SuMomo." One of the login devices is 9.9KM from the school computer lab, confirming with high certainty that the above accounts belong to the same device.”
“xihgny” was the account Tao Shushu had @‘ed.
Well, things just got interesting.
Tao Shushu patiently waited for Su Momo’s response.
In the meantime, she wasn’t idle, she kept preparing arguments.
On her phone, the system found something useful: a handy plugin that could automatically match English sentences and web pages for the arguments she needed.
Tao Shushu tried it out, the interface layout and color scheme perfectly matched her aesthetic taste.
"It's quite user-friendly," Tao Shushu praised.