When the self-introduction ended, several examiners nodded to themselves.
Huo Xuan adjusted her sitting posture without a change in expression and said,
“Begin your recitation.”
Gu Xiao swept his gaze over the examiners, took out his manuscript, and began calmly:
“After I came north, he wrote me a letter. In it he said: ‘My health is fine, only the pain in my arm is severe. Lifting chopsticks or holding a brush is most inconvenient. I fear the day of my departure is not far off.’”
He paused for a moment, savored the life he had once lived, then slowly continued with the final narration:
“Reading to this point, through the glittering light of my tears, I once again saw that plump figure from behind, dressed in a padded blue-cloth robe and a black cloth mandarin jacket.”
That was right. The piece he had chosen was Zhu Ziqing’s “Back View,” a text everyone present knew by heart.
Gu Xiao, who had rich experience job hunting, understood very well the principle that “to make no mistakes is itself an achievement.”
Compared to standing out, stability was more important.
When his voice fell, the classroom was silent.
There was no exaggerated grief, no deliberately manufactured sobbing tone. He had simply used a calmness that came after sedimentation, speaking slowly and naturally.
The examiners exchanged a glance.
Huo Xuan, the chief examiner seated in the center, saw her stern expression loosen slightly.
“That’s enough.” Huo Xuan raised a hand and gently interrupted the rest of the recitation.
Gu Xiao immediately stopped, put away the manuscript, and bowed slightly. “Thank you, teacher.”
His reaction was crisp and clean, without the slightest hesitation, causing the male examiner in square-framed glasses to glance at him again.
……
……
The process continued. After the final examinee finished reciting, they entered the group skit segment.
The topic given by the examiners was “The Vegetable Market.”
The dozen or so examinees were quickly split into two groups. Gu Xiao’s group had eight people.
With only a brief few dozen seconds to prepare, the scene instantly became chaotic.
“I’ll play a customer.”
“I’ll be the auntie selling vegetables.”
“We should design a conflict.”
Hearing this, Gu Xiao said nothing, but unease began to drum in his heart.
He did not believe that a group of strangers who did not know one another could design a reasonable conflict within one minute. In the end, they were not professional actors.
After thinking for a moment, he still spoke up:
“Let’s have a thief. It’ll be eye-catching enough. Whether he’s caught or escapes, it can enrich the story.”
Everyone’s eyes lit up, but before they could clap and praise the idea, one tall, thin boy instinctively shot back:
“Who’s playing the thief? You?”
He deliberately raised his voice, his gaze sweeping over Gu Xiao with undisguised provocation.
The air instantly froze.
The other examinees looked at one another. Some frowned, some lowered their heads, and some quietly took half a step back—no one wanted to invite trouble at such a critical moment.
Not the slightest anger could be seen on Gu Xiao’s face. Instead, he nodded slightly and said in a mild tone:
“If you’re interested, you can do it.”
The tall, thin boy froze.
He really had not expected Gu Xiao to react like this. For a moment, he did not know what to say. His face flushed somewhat red, and in the end he only forced out a stiff sentence:
“Who’d want to play that kind of role!”
Gu Xiao shook his head lightly in his heart.
Being able to realize that the other art exam candidates around him were competitors and choosing to suppress them was a wise move, but in the end, the boy was too young and too thin-skinned.
In this kind of situation, if he could have stiffened his neck and insisted to the end, he might instead have shown boldness, allowing the examiners to see his determination and desire to perform.
What a pity.
In truth, he really did not care.
An “outsider” who had never intended to pass the exam in the first place did not care what role he played. He had only interjected because he simply did not want things to become too ugly and disgrace the dignity of a transmigrator.
“Since no one wants to, I’ll do it.”
Gu Xiao no longer looked at him. Turning to the others, he quickened his speech. “Let’s simply run through the process. At the entrance to the market, there’s a vegetable stall. The auntie is selling vegetables, a few customers are choosing produce, and I pass through the crowd and take something in passing.”
One minute quickly passed. At the examiner’s command, the skit officially began.
“Fresh napa cabbage, two mao a jin!”
“Cheap tomatoes!”
The boys began calling out with effort, and the clamor of the “vegetable market” was quickly rendered. Several “customers” began picking and choosing in front of stalls that did not exist, their movements appearing somewhat exaggerated and hollow because of their nervousness.
Gu Xiao retreated to the corner of the classroom, slightly hunching his back. His eyes were calm, and he did not deliberately pretend to be flustered.
Pretending to know when one did not was a great taboo. If one could not act, then one could not act.
From the moment he decided to take the art exam, he had set the tone for the group skit—more movement, fewer expressions in the eyes.
Gu Xiao’s gaze rapidly swept over the “stalls” and “passersby,” finally locking onto a “female customer” who was bent over selecting vegetables.
The timing was just right. A “passerby” walked between the female customer and the stall, creating a brief blind spot.
Gu Xiao moved.
Like a slippery loach, he approached with nimble steps. The index and middle fingers of his right hand seemed to hook and tug at the zipper of the female customer’s backpack as if by accident. Then his wrist turned, and an imaginary “wallet” was pinched between his fingers.
The entire process was as fast as lightning, without the slightest hesitation.
“My wallet!”
A cry of alarm rang out at just the right time. It was the female customer he had targeted. Her face was full of panic, though her movements were slightly distorted.
The market instantly exploded.
“There’s a thief!”
“Catch him!”
“Don’t let him get away!”
Gu Xiao showed no reaction at all. He simply lowered his head and walked, all the way until he left the stage.
Several examinees immediately stared at one another, but the skit was still continuing, so they could only bite the bullet and push forward.
The examiners lowered their heads and recorded notes on their papers, the tips of their pens rustling.
Huo Xuan’s gaze lingered on Gu Xiao for an instant, her expression somewhat strange.
She had seen confident examinees before, and even more who were timid and suffered from stage fright. But someone who so blatantly “slacked off” at an art exam site—after all these years, he was truly one of a kind.
Looking more closely, this little fellow’s features were quite delicate. She forcibly suppressed a smile and drew a circle after Gu Xiao’s name.
……
……
Walking out of the Acting and Directing Building, the afternoon sunlight was somewhat dazzling.
Gu Xiao subconsciously reached into his pocket to feel for his phone, but his fingertips only touched a few paper bills.
He sighed faintly.
Everyone yearned to transmigrate, but when one truly did, it was impossible to fit in at all.
Suppressing his stray thoughts, Gu Xiao took two twenty-yuan bills and three ten-yuan bills from his pocket.
Including the three hundred yuan hidden in the compartment of the room’s drawer, this was all the money he could currently allocate.
In this era, when a jianbing guozi only cost one yuan and fifty fen, and a KFC set meal was no more than twenty yuan, three hundred and seventy yuan could be considered a substantial fortune. But if he wanted to use it as start-up capital to leverage the wealth opportunities in his memory, that would be no different from a fool’s dream.
Looking at the art exam candidates coming and going on campus, Gu Xiao already had a rough idea of how to use this money. However, there was still one more important matter to handle right now.
He walked out of the school gate and hailed a taxi.
Gu Xiao said to the driver,
“To the flower and bird market.”