dragon raja

The Bronze City（1）

With dark circles under his eyes, Lu Mingfei rushed into the classroom on the second floor of the library. The first thing he saw was a pair of long legs in jeans dangling by the desk. The person was wearing a pair of Mary Jane shoes with ten-centimeter high heels that he looked familiar with.

"You're late." Nono, who was sitting at the podium, said expressionlessly.

Lu Mingfei scratched his head, "Did I go the wrong way? I'm here to take the exam..."

"You're not in the wrong place. I'm the invigilator for this exam, and the invigilator is Professor Manstein from the Discipline Committee." Nono pointed down, "Everyone is waiting for you."

Professor Manstein, dressed in a black suit, flashed from behind the door. He glanced at Lu Mingfei coldly through his round glasses and said in a low voice, "Don't make any mistakes. As an 'S'-level Xue Shen, you have the privilege of being seven minutes late, but if you are demoted in this exam, you will lose this privilege. I am warning you."

He glanced at his watch and said, "Everyone is here, let's announce the exam rules now!"

"Cheating is absolutely prohibited, and violators will be disqualified from all exams! In the name of the chairman of the Discipline Committee, I guarantee that the learning atmosphere at Kassel College is relaxed, but the discipline is the strictest. Don't try to peek at other people's test papers. The cameras cover the entire classroom, and there are no blind spots! Don't try to bring any small electronic devices, as radio waves are also monitored in the classroom! I know you are all geniuses, but I can tell you that people who are more talented than you have taken exams in this classroom, and all the cheating methods you can think of now have been tried by others. For example, a voice from the United States developed a special radio wave modulation device. With the help of this device, he disguised the communication waves as radio turbulence caused by solarspot eruptions, but he failed, and Norma easily decrypted his signal. When we presented the evidence, he was speechless..." Professor Manstein glanced at the freshmen and talked eloquently, like a battle-hardened general teaching a group of rookies.

Lu Mingfei seized the opportunity to slip into his seat. Everyone had a name tag in front of their seat, and his seat clearly had "David Ricardo" written on it.

When Lu Mingfei saw the name, he was stunned for a moment. He realized that the name was referring to him, but something was wrong. He looked up and scanned the entire classroom, and saw Nuonuo with his hands folded in his arms and looking out the window, and suddenly he understood.

The brand name was created by Nono. She was the first person in the world to call him "Ricardo". This name, which reminds people of a famous economist, was randomly given to him by Nono.

"Damn it!" He muttered to himself, but he felt a little man dancing shyly in his heart.

He suddenly realized that today was a sunny day. The sun was shining on Nuonuo's expressionless face, and cast a shadow of the window on the walnut desk. The whole classroom was tinged with a faint crimson color. His mood suddenly improved. He thought it was a good sign. Maybe things were not as bad as he thought last night. From the time he bought the ice cream for Nuonuo to the time he encountered Finger at Subway, he had gone through all the troubles. He could actually sit in this classroom with these guys with dragon blood to take the exam!

He wanted to clap his hands like a real gambler and say "Lady Luck is on my side!"

He was always so heartless. Even when he was in the lowest mood, he would be happy because of a trivial matter. In the past, these trivial matters were often Chen Wen crossing several rows of desks to ask him who would be responsible for cleaning the blackboard at night. He was the type who would be happy with a little sunshine. Now he felt that even if there was a giant dragon in front of him, he would have to grab a sniper rifle and take a look, and would never lose heart in the face of battle. In this place, it seems that he can't get by without being a hero.

"Hey! Brother! Lu? Is that you? They all say you're great!" A black student in the front row carefully turned around and gave Lu Mingfei a thumbs up, lowered his voice, and smiled brightly, revealing a mouthful of white teeth.

When Lu Mingfei was feeling very excited... although he didn't know why he was so excited... he gave a thumbs up in response.

"Bradley." The black student introduced himself.

"Lu Mingfei" Lu Mingfei tried to reach over a desk to shake hands with him.

The name was like a depth charge dropped into the classroom. In an instant, everyone's eyes shifted from Professor Manstein's shiny forehead to Lu Mingfei's face. Dozens of freshmen inhaled at the same time, and after a "huh" sound, the whole classroom fell silent. Professor Manstein stopped teaching, revealing an unhappy look.

A boy suddenly stood up and clapped. The applause was so deafening that Lu Mingfei suspected that he had a pair of rubber palms, so it didn't hurt at all when he clapped. Then came the black student Bradley. The other freshmen, who had been exchanging glances with each other, stood up excitedly and clapped their hands hard. The applause was deafening.

Lu Mingfei was stunned. He was once again the focus of attention, like a kettle on the solar cooker. He stood up flattered, but felt that he would look too arrogant if he accepted the applause calmly, so he also joined in the clapping and nodded to everyone, as if he was the owner of a newly opened beef noodle restaurant, and he also sent a brilliant glance to Professor Manstein.

Manstein was so angry at this uncontrolled collective behavior that his nose almost became crooked. Nono shrugged and continued to look out the window in boredom.

As Lu Mingfei nodded to all sides, he noticed that there was still one person who didn't applaud. It was a petite girl, sitting in a corner with her back to Lu Mingfei, wearing a white T-shirt, with her hair braided and tied into a bun, revealing her slender neck. Her skin was so white that it felt "cold". In this noisy occasion, she looked even more like an ice sculpture isolated from the world.

Lu Mingfei's heart skipped a beat, and he had a lingering, strange feeling. But when he tried to figure out that feeling, it disappeared. The first boy who applauded came over to shake his hand. The boy looked Indian, with a very handsome face, black curly hair, black and white eyes, and a muscular body under his T-shirt, like a male star in a Bollywood musical. With a natural and friendly attitude, he introduced himself, "Qilan, the president of the freshman fraternity, Lu Mingfei, you are our idol."

Lu Mingfei put more strength on his hands, with an inexplicable friendly smile on his face, as if he was meeting an old friend who had not been seen for ten years.

"Okay, gentlemen. Now is not the time for club activities. It's the 3E exam. If you fail this exam, what awaits you is not the world-class education at Kassel College, but disqualification." Professor Manstein interrupted the sudden welcome ceremony. "The exam will officially begin in 3 minutes. Turn off your cell phones and place them on the corner of your desk with your student ID."

He tapped his watch, and the black curtain wall silently emerged from the mezzanine of the carved wooden window, and all the windows were tightly closed. At the same time, the wall lamps in the classroom flickered and lit up, and Nono walked along to give each freshman an A4-sized test paper and a sharpened pencil. The students took out their mobile phones from their pockets and turned them off. Only Lu Mingfei had nothing to do, as he didn't have a mobile phone. He looked around and saw the girl, who was as silent as an ice sculpture, stretched out an almost transparent hand and pushed an expensive Vertu phone to the side of the table. He felt a little embarrassed like a country bumpkin coming to the city, and suddenly thought of the student ID card with a balance of one hundred thousand US dollars. He glanced at the student ID card on the corner of his desk and realized that it was indeed something that would change his life. Even if he couldn't do anything else, at least he could buy any mobile phone in the world.

A mobile phone is a small thing, but Lu Mingfei has wanted one for many years. Now it is within his reach as long as he passes this exam.

He made up his mind again, took a deep breath and examined the test paper——

A blank.

There was a sound of people gasping for air. This incredible test paper obviously shocked everyone here. This test paper was just a piece of snow-white watermarked paper, without any words printed on it.

"No problem. The test papers have been distributed. I, the invigilators, and the medical team are all outside the classroom. This classroom is monitored by Norma. You can chat or take a nap, but don't copy other people's answers." Professor Manstein smiled coldly, "You can't copy because each of your answers will be different!"

As the classroom door slammed shut behind Nono and Professor Manstein, all the students began to exchange glances, and the two tables close together spoke in low voices, with faces full of expressions of seeing a ghost in broad daylight. Indeed, they couldn't cheat because they didn't even know what the test questions were? The camera on the roof silently stared at the students who were in a mess. At this damn time, they actually remembered the melodious light music.

"Are they playing some kind of game? Maybe I should have taken Stanford's admission letter... They gave me a half-scholarship." Bradley grabbed his curly hair, obviously extremely frustrated. "I heard there are no exams there."

"If I were you, I would go to Stanford." Lu Mingfei shrugged. "Why would I come here if I'm accepted by Stanford?"

"But don't you want to be with the world's top people?" Bradley turned back in confusion. "If I went to Stanford, I wouldn't be able to meet people like you."

"Someone like me?" Lu Mingfei pricked up his ears to listen to the wind-like sound behind the music while talking to Bradley, "What kind of person am I?"

"Creating a new world?" Lu Mingfei wondered if this matter had anything to do with him. He waved his hand, "This matter belongs to Obama, really, he just won the Nobel Peace Prize, I saw it on the news."

"Qilan said so." Bradley moved closer to Lu Mingfei, "Qilan never says the wrong thing, his words are 'prophetic'."

"Prophet? Word spirit?" This was the second time Lu Mingfei heard of this concept. Finkel said that this was an ability of the dragon language, which could forcibly impose a rule in a small area. However, Lu Mingfei was a little skeptical about this. If this ability really existed, it would be a bug, just like the magical prop in Doraemon's pocket across time and space. If someone's word spirit was "wealth", wouldn't it mean that every time he ate, he could just say "I'm the richest man, and I can get whatever I eat for free" and he wouldn't have to bring money?

"He never said the wrong thing, and he never praised anyone, but he praised you." Bradley whispered, "He was my good friend since childhood. Every time he predicted something, it would come true. Some people were afraid of him and thought he was a lunatic, so they sent him to a mental hospital. He was very depressed for a while, and I was the only one who accompanied him."

Lu Mingfei couldn't help but look in the direction of Qilan. The handsome Indian student turned around and greeted Lu Mingfei, as if he had really anticipated this gaze.

"The Freshman Association all supports you," Bradley said sincerely, "The Lionheart Club and the Student Union have been trying to recruit people from the freshmen for a long time, hoping to strengthen themselves, but Qilan told us that we should not disperse, we should wait, and someone will emerge to lead us. We were all skeptical at first, until we heard that they found an 'S'-level freshman, and that's you!"

Bradley was silent for a while, covering his face with his hands, leaning his elbows on the desk, and crying silently.

Lu Mingfei was shocked. "Damn it, why is he crying? Am I the savior? Is he so moved to see me?... Oh, yes, he said he has been with that Qilan. Is he in a mental hospital? Are these people short-circuited in their brains?"

“Please accept my condolences… Being sad is not the solution…” Lu Mingfei tried to comfort Bradley, but the matter was a bit tricky, as it seemed that Bradley had no reason to be sad.

Bradley placed his tear-stained hands flat on the desk, revealing his tear-stained face, his eyes filled with a heavy sadness that penetrated time... Then he no longer cared about Lu Mingfei, and began to write on the white paper with his head down.

"Damn it... He's not moved by seeing me... It's because the exam has started!" Lu Mingfei became alert.

Finkel's instructions echoed in his mind: "No matter what the other candidates are doing, don't be distracted. Focus on listening to the low sound that is close to the sound of water under the music. That is the dragon spell. For those who resonate with it, the spell will go directly into the depths of their minds, just like someone speaking in their minds. It doesn't matter if you don't resonate with it. You can still hear those subtle sounds with your ears. Write down the pattern of the notes and fill in the answers I give you."

Those nervous students stopped whispering to each other. Some of them sat there blankly, as if their entire family had just died. Some of them dragged their feet in the corridor, with empty eyes, as if they were Qu Yuan walking by the Miluo River or some other zombies. A girl kept writing on the whiteboard with a fountain pen, as if she was painting an abstract painting, and she didn't even realize that the ink in the pen had run dry long ago. There was also a light and charming girl with a face full of joy, as if she saw the sky open up and was dancing in front of her, and she was going to play the role of God from Angel Island. It could be seen that she had practiced and her dance was graceful, but no one appreciated it. Qilan knelt down beside the desk in a standard Hindu posture, muttering, "Yes, is that so? I understand everything." These people would sometimes answer questions on the test paper and sometimes dance in a group, not interfering with each other and enjoying themselves, which made Lu Mingfei feel creepy.

"How did you feel when you first heard the Dragon Spell?" Lu Mingfei asked Finkel.

"It was like a hole was opened in the forehead and someone poured water into it. The space became like countless threads, which suddenly erupted and pierced through time. At the end of time, there was a woman crying." Finkel said, "I don't know why, but I suddenly felt very sad and cried, and naturally wrote down the answer."

Lu Mingfei pondered for a long time and didn't know what that strange feeling was, but now he believed that Finkel saw strange things and heard strange noises at that time, because Finkel did pass the exam, and the people around him were no less crazy than Finkel.

"Concentrate, concentrate." Lu Mingfei forced himself to calm down, looking at the small note in his hand, and concentrating on listening to the sound of ancient ritual singing, like flowing water. Finger taught him several times, but Lu Mingfei really couldn't remember those completely irregular sounds, so he used Chinese to remember the sounds.

Finkel thought this method was good. The pronunciation of "*******" was the spell "**", the pronunciation of "*****" was the spell "**", the pronunciation of "*****" was the spell "**"... This method greatly improved the efficiency, allowing Lu Mingfei to make all the preparations in four hours.

Although this practice is indeed a bit blasphemous to the giant dragons of the ancient mythological era, it is indeed the most reliable for Lu Mingfei, who has completed his early English education by memorizing "BUS" as "Dad Si", "BIKE" as "Bai Ke", and "PEN" as "Pen". Lu Mingfei's powerful imagination amazed Finkel, for example, "The emperor is a i***t", "There is no sound when sesame seeds fall to the ground, so it is quiet". The rational thinking of the Germans was impressed by the ancient skills of the Chinese. In fact, when Lu Mingfei was in the TOEFL class at New Oriental, the teacher also taught her that "CHRISMA" (leadership charisma) can be remembered as "CHINA-RISE-MAO", "China has risen", which is abbreviated to "CHRISMA". Of course, there is leadership charisma, right? Lu Mingfei once again proved the power of exam-oriented education in China on behalf of all Chinese students. In comparison, the standardized tests of Americans are just some foreign tricks. The motto of Chinese students is - I don't need to understand, I just need to get the answer right.

The atmosphere in there must be very depressing right now, right?

After each 3E exam, Teacher Masashi Toyama would provide a long period of psychological counseling. By the way, how did you feel when you first heard the Dragon Mantra?" Professor Manstein leaned against the door and asked Nono.

"I saw my mother lying on the bed, and a shadow came over and took away her soul. She died." Nono said softly, "Because this thing has already happened, I am not terrified, I just watched silently."

"I heard the wind, the wind all over the world." Professor Manstein said in a low voice, "Nono, do you students feel that the education at Kassel Academy is cruel? Few people feel happy when they first hear the dragon spell and come into contact with the true nature of the world. If you had known this earlier, wouldn't it be better not to unveil that veil of warmth?"

Nuonuo shrugged, "I don't care. Everyone wants to see the truth, even if it is cruel. Just like what I saw, it is true. Someone took away my mother's soul and I saw that person's face clearly!"

Lu Mingfei was not sad at all. With the three magic weapons of associative memory, a pair of pointed ears and a small strip on his palm, he easily picked out eight dragon spells from the covered music. Finkel proved his good character with facts. Everything was consistent with what he said. Kassel College turned out the test questions from eight years ago, adjusted the order, and re-tested them. Lu Mingfei used all the eight answers that he bought at a high price without wasting any of them.

Finkel kindly reminded Lu Mingfei that he didn't need to answer all the questions, he just needed to be able to correctly interpret eight dragon spells and he could choose any advanced course. If Fei tried hard to answer ten questions and keep his status as an "S" grade student, it might arouse suspicion of cheating.

"Downgrading to 'A' level only means that the credit limit is reduced to 60,000 US dollars. Caesar and Chu Zihang are both 'A' level, and 'A' level is already very good." Finkel has the thinking of a Chinese philosopher. He urged Lu Mingfei not to climb to the top of the mountain in one step. Anyway, for most people, the result of climbing to the top of the mountain is to go down the mountain, downhill. It is better to leave a step for the future and stop to eat some barbecue.

Sitting next to him was Bradley, who didn't know how many questions he had answered. In short, he was very sad. He held Lu Mingfei's shoulders and told him the history of revolution. He said that he was born in a slum in Queensland when he was a child, and was friends with Qilan, a descendant of Indian immigrants. He talked about his great-great-great-great-grandparents being trafficked to the United States on a broken ship, and the pomegranate tree planted by his poor grandmother behind the house, and his alcoholic father and beaten mother.

Lu Mingfei couldn't shake him off, so he could only give him a soothing look with the kindness of a future leader. He helplessly thought that if the dragon spell was translated, it would surely become a very touching essay, otherwise how could this dark and rough guy like Bradley be hit in his weak spot?

Bradley wiped his tears and continued to write his answers. Behind the light music, the sound like flowing water, a woman singing, and the low hum of an organ continued. The classroom was in a mess.

"No, no, Mom, I was wrong, I was wrong." Bradley muttered to himself as he wrote.

Lu Mingfei thought it was all ridiculous. No wonder the former "S" grade senior committed suicide. However, he had already answered eight questions, so he was a vested interest. He spit twice in his palm and rubbed it on his trouser legs. When he looked at it again, there was only a faint blue ink stain in his palm. He smiled smugly in his heart, feeling the joy of being sober while everyone else is drunk, and singing while you are jumping into the river. Anyway, there was still a lot of time left, so he didn't bother to care about Bradley, the loser, and traced the Korean letters on the desk with a pencil.

When he was in primary school, he would draw a turtle on the back of his math test paper after finishing all the questions to kill time, without checking his calculations. He had not changed this habit for many years... When he thought of this, he was stunned for a moment, and his memory was a little fuzzy. He remembered that his grades were always so-so, so how could he be so lazy to draw a turtle on the test paper? In his memory, every time before handing in the paper, he would look at the answers to the multiple-choice questions from his deskmate and fill them in before hurriedly handing in the paper. But why was the scene of him drawing a turtle on the dim paper in the afternoon when the sun shone on him so clear?

He felt a bit of a headache. So many things had happened in these days that his mind was a bit confused.

While he was casually filling the circles of the "keychains" with solid colors, he stole a glance at the girl who looked like an ice sculpture. When everyone else was going crazy, only her back was as straight as a bamboo shoot, answering the questions normally like Lu Mingfei. Lu Mingfei wondered if Finger would sell the answer twice. Judging from Finger's poverty and shameless style, it was not impossible.

The girl was not there. The person sitting in the girl's seat was looking at Lu Mingfei, who was sitting on the desk, swinging his legs. He was wearing white square-toed leather shoes, a black suit, a white silk scarf, and a pair of light golden eyes.

It was that boy! Lu Mingfei was surprised. It was the boy he had seen in his dream at the Chicago train station. Now he was right in front of him! But where did the girl go? Did she go to the bathroom? How could the chairman of the discipline committee allow this boy to enter the examination room? Lu Mingfei felt that there was something wrong.

The boy slowly waved to Lu Mingfei with a faint, angelic smile. The afternoon sun shone behind him, and his long shadow was cast on Lu Mingfei. Lu Mingfei felt that he had no choice. He pushed Bradley, who was crying beside him, away and walked towards the boy step by step.

The boy gestured to Lu Mingfei, as if to signal him to "sit on the windowsill", and then he flipped over to the windowsill and sat down, swinging his legs outside. Lu Mingfei sat down in the space beside him with doubt. With the light of the setting sun, he could finally take a closer look at the boy. Lu Mingfei had never seen any boy of seven or eight years old as beautiful as him, with a round face and a childishness between a boy and a girl. Every move was gentle and elegant as if he had never stepped on dust. He leaned on the window frame covered with green vines and looked into the distance, his golden eyes glowing with a faint red in the setting sun.

His silence was too much to be broken, so Lu Mingfei could only follow him to look at Kassel Academy under the sunset and the snow-white socks showing at the boy's ankles.

"Hey, my name is Lu Mingfei." Lu Mingfei thought about it and decided that he should still say hello.

"My name is Lu Mingze." The boy looked into the distance and said softly.