Chapter 164 Dodging Balls

Lying in bed, Chen Yuan was taking a nap.

Meanwhile, he glanced at the group chat for the basketball team and found everyone was quite optimistic.

Zhang Hanwen: Awesome, if we lose the championship, we're still the runners-up!

Li Yuanchen: It's not a knockout tournament, where's the runner-up coming from?

Li Yuanchen: But if we lost to the strongest, then we are indeed the second strongest.

Sun Xin: I'm so afraid Fourth High will win, damn it.

Li Yuanchen: True, if we lose, it's Eleventh High being trash. If we lose together with Fourth High, then it's Xia Hai being trash.

Sun Xin: Alright, quickly lend your strength to Chang Jun.

Li Yuanchen: Chang Jun: You gonna lend me real money too?

It was clear the guys were going crazy.

And the competition was about to start, yet they weren't warming up, practicing teamwork, or discussing tactics.

What a bunch of slackers.

At that moment, Chen Yuan remembered the big screen ranking image posted in the group earlier.

Eleventh High's name was at the very bottom.

Eighty percent chance the basketball game today was going to be GG.

And there wasn't even a safety net, getting thrown off by forty points. Moreover, getting thrown off by forty points by two schools.

As for the other sports, they were probably losing more than winning, grabbing a bunch of guaranteed ten-point scores.

If it continued like this, their total score might only be a third of the first place team's score.

Thinking of this, Chen Yuan felt uncomfortable.

As the Earth's manager, he shouldn't favor any particular school.

After all, these four schools were his personal property.

But imagining Principal Tao being laughed at by the other principals as fodder for gossip, and only being able to laugh along, he felt a little uncomfortable.

How should he put it?

It felt pitiful to see a man in his forties being bullied like that.

Just then, Zhang Chao, who was on the top bunk, sent him a message.

Zhang Chao: For tug-of-war, Liu Yan from our class got selected. For table tennis juggling relay and relay race, and 30-person 31-leg and dodgeball, do you want to choose one?

Because Chaozi was right above him, he gently kicked the bed board.

Then, Chaozi poked his head down and whispered, "How about it?"

At this question, Tang Jian and Zhou Yu also stretched their heads over.

"You guys weren't asleep?" Zhang Chao was somewhat surprised.

"I feel like Eleventh High can't do without me," Zhou Yu suddenly exclaimed.

"It's time to get serious," Tang Jian also said pretentiously.

"Then let's go participate in the selections. There are so many events, there should be some we can pass. After all, Class 18's sports should be considered above average in the school," Zhang Chao said.

"It's just too much." Thinking of this, Zhou Yu was very unhappy. "Our class won the basketball championship for the whole school, but when the school selected basketball players, not a single one was from our class."

Zhang Chao was puzzled. "Huh, isn't there Chen Yuan?"

"He's from Class 15," Zhou Yu and Tang Jian said in unison.

"Make it clear, are you guys using 'he' or 'she'?" Chen Yuan cared a lot about people saying he was Chen Si Niang, without roots and whatnot.

"Let's go, Eleventh High still has to be carried by the people of our Class 18."

With Tang Ting's order, everyone got out of bed.

Then, during nap time, they left the dormitory building.

And as they were leaving, they happened to run into Tang Siwen and He Meng, who were walking together.

"Where are Jiao Jiao and Zhou Fu?" Chen Yuan asked.

"He Si Jiao is He Si Jiao," Zhou Yu reminded Chen Yuan not to be so ambiguous.

"Taking a nap," Tang Siwen said.

No wonder Zhou Fu was so fair and chubby, getting enough sleep during nap time.

"What are you guys going to do?" Chen Yuan asked.

"Table tennis juggling relay race," Tang Siwen said.

"I'm participating in 30-person 31-leg," He Meng said.

"Since it's a race, why not just choose the relay?" Zhou Yu asked curiously.

To this, Tang Jian said, "The relay race relies on hard power. The school only selects the 20 fastest girls. Half are monopolized by the two sports classes, and the rest are also those with strong skills. The competition is too fierce. But because one student can only participate in one event, we directly focused on the fun races that require speed but have less competition, so there's a better chance."

After Tang Jian finished speaking, He Meng and Tang Siwen both gave him a thumbs up, indicating that they had the same idea.

Zhang Chao asked, "Then how's your speed?"

Tang Siwen: "Super fast."

He Meng: "Not bad."

They were clearly answering together, how come the feeling they gave was so different?

Especially Tang Siwen, who said "super fast," He Meng, who was over 1.7 meters tall, didn't brag, yet you were still going on about being "super fast."

"You can only participate in one event," after learning this, Chen Yuan felt a bit thorny.

"But the basketball team can participate in one more," Zhang Chao explained, "After all, basketball is a popular event, the most entertaining one. The competition organizers want each school to field their strongest lineup."

"Indeed, if the basketball players can't participate in more than one event, some schools might just slack off, and put the basketball team in the tug-of-war team, to secure another event that's easier to get first place in," Tang Jian analyzed.

"Yeah, this time the tug-of-war team has a lot of people from the basketball team. They definitely have an advantage participating in this," Zhang Chao said.

"But the other schools also sent their strongest lineups for tug-of-war," Tang Jian wasn't optimistic.

The slaughter had begun.

And so, everyone arrived at the big sports field.

The four schools were all selecting and training, 'recruiting soldiers and buying horses' for the upcoming competition.

But because everyone wanted to participate in different events, everyone split up after arriving at the sports field.

Among them, Chen Yuan and Tang Siwen chose an event, table tennis juggling relay.

"Are you also super fast?" Tang Siwen asked curiously.

"Not really, but I'm really steady at juggling the ball." Since the other party was also showing off, Chen Yuan also boasted shamelessly.

And so, the two arrived at the table tennis juggling relay venue.

Training and selection were being conducted by a new physical education teacher at the school, whose surname was also Chen.

After many people arrived, he began batch selections.

And Tang Siwen and Chen Yuan happened to be lucky, they arrived five minutes before the first wave of selections began.

But it wasn't based on ranking, but speed.

After reaching a certain speed, they could directly be selected.

But the conditions were two-fold.

If pure running speed was fast enough, they could also be directly selected, because juggling could be practiced in a short time.

"I'm going," after being called up in Tang Siwen's wave, she said to Chen Yuan.

And, she held out both hands, with her palms facing herself.

"Good luck," Chen Yuan also used both palms to lightly tap against hers.

And so.

Tang Siwen took the stage.

And rarely tied her hair up, into a single ponytail.

Always wearing her hair down, Chen Yuan only realized after she completely revealed her facial contours like this that her face was so small.

A total of eight girls, 50-meter sprint, this round was purely speed.

As the whistle sounded, the girls quickly ran out.

And to Chen Yuan's surprise, Tang Siwen's speed was really not bad.

In this round, she directly ran 7.8 seconds, ranking second in this group.

This was a pretty good result, considered excellent for a high school girl. According to the "National Student Physical Fitness Standards," Tang Siwen in her second year of high school could get 95 points in the physical test.

But a bit of a pity, only those who ran within 7.2 seconds could be directly selected.

And this, was also as expected.

Relying on speed alone, she definitely wouldn't have the opportunity to run relay for the school, because there were sports students in the school.

Only by adding a little skill, and participating in events that weren't so popular, would there be a certain opportunity.

And so, after a few rounds of running selections, another eight candidates were screened out.

Already, 12 people had been selected.

Which meant, only three spots were left for the girls.

But those eight might not all be selected.

It was possible that not three met the requirements.

It was also possible that more than three met the requirements, and then they could only choose the top three.

Then, Chen Yuan watched Tang Siwen participate in the selection with quite some nervousness.

He had to say, her speed was really good.

Because if the juggling failed, they had to continue juggling from the point where they dropped the ball, so everyone was very steady.

Tang Siwen's juggling was also not bad.

However, it was a bit too steady.

Faster, faster, Bao.

With his heart in his throat, Chen Yuan watched Tang Siwen cross the line in third place.

But it was clear that the speed of the first two was faster.

In the end, after the physical education teacher said something, two girls jumped up happily.

But Tang Siwen didn't jump along, and slowly walked back towards Chen Yuan.

And so, Chen Yuan was like a parent anxiously waiting for their child's exam results, asking nervously and cautiously, "How did it go?"

"...Missed it by 0.5 seconds."

After Tang Siwen finished speaking softly, she turned her head to look at the remaining last group of girls, and then said, "The physical education teacher said that if the rest aren't faster than me, I can still be selected."

"Yeah, there's still a chance," Chen Yuan said comfortingly.

"It's your turn," Tang Siwen clenched her fist, revealing a shallow smile to cheer Chen Yuan on, "Good luck."

"I'll win."

And so Chen Yuan also entered the same audition.

Then, in the first round of running, he came in third place out of eight, barely passing.

Next, among the nine people who passed the first round, another juggling race was held.

Teacher Chen tucked his notebook under his arm and started timing with a stopwatch in his hand.

However, just after he started the timing, he was shocked to see that a boy was very cunning and didn't juggle the ball.

Pressing down on the racket, he ran quickly, and the ball just stuck to the middle of the racket due to inertia, extremely steadily. And because there was no juggling action, the difference between this boy's speed and normal running speed was negligible...

So naturally, he pulled ahead of everyone else.

Directly leading the second place by two seconds!

Seeing this scene, everyone exclaimed in surprise.

Tang Siwen even widened her eyes.

Not bragging, juggling was really steady!

"Damn, that's the Yuan God's juggling."

"Directly leading by a huge margin."

"He should be the first among everyone."

Hearing everyone's discussion, Teacher Chen was shocked. So this was the legendary 'Yuan God.'

I thought he would go to the more popular dodgeball.

Good.

Giving the precious entry spot to my table tennis juggling relay, we can secure a rank, and won't be at the bottom.

Those two seconds really saved my life.

As it should be, Chen Yuan passed.

Then, he waited together with Tang Siwen on the side.

Praying that there wouldn't be any super players in this last group of ten girls.

Fortunately, the speed of this round's 'naked' run was average, and none of them passed the direct promotion line.

Four players entered the next round of juggling run.

"Phew, that's good," Chen Yuan continued to cheer Tang Siwen on.

And she also clenched her fists nervously, holding her breath.

Then, it was the second round of four-person juggling race.

Not good.

One of them's starting speed was a bit fast, faster than the others by quite a bit.

But her juggling wasn't very stable, very wide open.

If she made a mistake at this time, Tang Siwen would be secured.

Mistake, make a mistake quickly...

If there was a gust of wind...

"Yay!"

The girl successfully passed the finish line and jumped up happily.

And after comparing the results, Teacher Chen found that this girl's score not only exceeded Tang Siwen's, but was also faster than many of the players who had passed.

Naturally, Tang Siwen was eliminated.

But before Chen Yuan could open his mouth to comfort her, she raised her head with pursed lips, looked at Chen Yuan, and instead comforted him, "I'm okay, good luck to you, fighting."

You're even encouraging me...

But the disappointment in her eyes was still captured by Chen Yuan.

But sorry, I didn't have the heart to help you cheat.

I didn't want to disappoint the scene of that girl jumping happily after passing, even though I don't even know her...

"You go, I'll wait for you," Tang Siwen squeezed out a smile, saying as naturally as possible.

"Okay."

Chen Yuan nodded slightly and went to Teacher Chen.

Teacher Chen, who was preparing to select the next group of boys, paused slightly when he saw Chen Yuan gathering, and joked with a smile, "Hey Chen Yuan, I thought you would use the extra spot to participate in a popular event like dodgeball."

"Dodgeball is popular?"

Chen Yuan raised his head, looking curious.

"...Yeah, what's wrong?" Teacher Chen was a bit puzzled, and his words lost their confidence.

"I'm really sorry Teacher Chen, please give my spot to another student, I still want to play dodgeball!" Chen Yuan explained frankly.

After finishing speaking, he turned around and left.

Leaving Teacher Chen and some students standing in place, dumbfounded.

Among them, Teacher Chen looked even more desperate, seemingly shouting with his eyes even though he didn't say anything: Come back Chen Yuan! Come back quickly!

And as Chen Yuan walked away, Tang Siwen quickly followed, advising with great concern, "You don't have to worry about me, you finally passed..."

"Let's go to dodgeball together."

However, Chen Yuan directly interrupted her and said, "You play volleyball very well, which means your reaction is strong, your speed is fast, and your strength is quite good. So dodgeball must be your strong point."

"But..."

Tang Siwen also wanted to participate in some activities, so she would still try to find some loopholes, but Chen Yuan had already passed, there was no need to follow her for the selections.

And so, she stopped, not agreeing, and said to Chen Yuan, "I think you should participate in that competition, I'll try something else."

Chen Yuan also felt that what Tang Siwen said made sense.

Because even if they both went to dodgeball, they might not both pass, and Chen Yuan was already secured in the table tennis juggling relay, there was no need to give that up as well.

But, there was a sentence he always kept in his heart:

"It's more fun to adventure with good friends."

---

I only got back from the hospital in Wuhan this afternoon, but I still have to write two chapters!

I'll try to post the next chapter as soon as possible.

The lucky draw ends today, everyone don't forget to cast your monthly votes!

(End of this chapter)