“Junbao is practicing Brazilian dance during his vacant training time, while little Jue is attending the exam and won’t be training today.”
Right, as a second-year junior high school student, Zhang Jue has to take biology and geography exams this year, and next year he’ll face the high school entrance exam.
Madam Mia didn’t call before coming, so she missed little Jue. She wasn’t in a hurry to leave, found a yoga ball to sit on, crossed her legs, and watched Junbao practice core exercises.
It’s rare for athletes to not only avoid gaining weight after retirement but even have more muscles. But Junbao happens to be one of them. He didn’t have many muscles before, which made it difficult for him to jump. However, after retirement, he worked hard to build muscles.
Watching him strive, maybe in a few years, he’ll turn into a real muscle man.
With a great talent to teach it undoubtedly changed Junbao’s entire demeanor.
Madam Mia asked: “Peijia sent back his junior high school notes for me to pass on to little Jue. How is the child’s performance? Hasn’t training affected his studies?”
Speaking of his nephew, Junbao, doing one-handed push-ups, gave her a thumbs up: “Little Jue grades are excellent. He ranked third in the mid-term exams this year. If it weren’t for English holding him back, he would have surpassed the top two.”
Zhang Jue’s academic scores ware relatively balanced, except for his average foreign language talent. He gets dizzy just looking at grammar. If it weren’t for his weakness in English, he had a chance to make it to the top three in his past life.
Fortunately, Shen Liu is a master’s graduate in foreign languages, proficient in English, Spanish, Japanese, and Russian. Shen, as a coach was especially fond of Zhang Jue and even gave him extra lessons after training.
It was also because of Shen Liu’s presence that Zhang Qingyan stopped reducing Zhang Jue’s figure skating training time to send him to an English cram school.
Madam Mia slowly said: “Okay, let’s talk about his training.”
Junbao: “Training?”
Madam Mia proposed: “I hope Zhang Jue can add ballet training. I want to personally train him.”
Zhang Jue’s foundation in ballet was not bad. In his own dance teacher’s eyes, he was good enough to participate in competitions. However, Madam Mia believed that Zhang Jue has more room for improvement.
He has some flaws that are forgivable for a 12-year-old, making his dance look rough. What Madam Mia wanted to do was to refine him further, polish his rough skills into delicate ones, and make his performance more exquisite.
When Zhang Jue returned after the exam and looked at the thick training menu, he was completely confused. Junbao patted his shoulder, sounding very serious.
“I’ll remind you, be prepared for the next psychological challenge. Madam Mia is a very strict person.”
On the other side, Shen Liu has already prepared the sports bandages and waved to Zhang Jue: “Come, Little Jue, let me put on leg guards for you.”
The results of his exam can be checked within a week. Zhang Jue got good grades without surprises. However, before he could celebrate, he found himself immersed in the training hell.
As the former chief of the famous Russian ballet troupe, Mia Rosiyabayeva was known for her superb dance skills and classical and steady performance style. If not for a car accident at the age of 26, she could have gone even further in her beloved dance career.
However, from her still slender figure and straight posture, it can be seen that Madam Mia has maintained a disciplined life after leaving the stage. She never gave up her passion for dance. Before retiring, her dance studio had trained several outstanding ballet dancers.
It was said that this lady made half of the class cry during teaching.
Zhang Jue, who considered himself thick-skinned after going through auditions and being thickened by various comments on the Internet, couldn’t help but feel embarrassed. He didn’t take any comments to heart, but after the class, he was scolded to the point of feeling miserable.
“Zhang Jue, did your legs get run over by a roller? Straighten up!”
“Zhang Jue, why are your insteps stretched like lamb hooves? Did your elegance go into the lamb’s stomach?”
“Zhang Jue, I asked you to spread your wings like a swan, not to dig shit!”
“Zhang Jue, did your soul float to the Atlantic? What about the emotions you should put into dancing?”

….

Heaven knows why this Slavic grandma was so proficient in scolding people in a Northeastern accent, but when Madam Mia, with Zhang Jue pinned down, said she was going to tear his legs, crotch, and waist further, Zhang Jue finally understood how gentle his original dance teacher was with him.
He laid on a long mat, with two coaches holding him down, while Madam Mia pressed his legs down.
At first, Zhang Jue endured it, but when it became unbearable, he started struggling.
“No, my foot is about to touch the ground!”
Madam Mia exclaimed: “Your flexibility is really good.”
After saying that, she actually had Zhang Jue maintain the position of tearing the crotch and pressing his foot until it touched the ground.
Zhang Jue screamed: “Ah—”
Although tearing the crotch was a hurdle that all dancers have to go through, Zhang Jue felt that this hurdle was too terrifying. He even swayed while walking home.
Zhang Junbao comforted him: “It’s okay. Madam Mia has been opening crotches for many students for so many years, and nothing has happened. She knows how to control it.”
Zhang Jue, in a tone imitating a famous TV host, said in frustration: “Really? I don’t believe it! Were you twisted by her like this?”
Zhang Junbao looked regretful: “I became her student when I was already 18, with old arms and legs. She said there was no value in twisting me. In her eyes, you are a jade worth refining while I was just firewood to be burned.”
Fortunately, the program provided by Madam Mia was excellent. After watching the program she gave, Zhang Jue felt that enduring a bit of hardship was worth it.
His short program is “Black Swan.” According to Madam Mia, the inspiration for Zhang Jue’s short program comes from a scene of him and his classmates in the dance studio sneaking snacks.
It was on a Tuesday night when Madam Mia went to Zhang Jue’s dance studio. However, upon reaching the destination, she found that Zhang Jue’s class had already finished.
The kids didn’t change their clothes, wearing dance shoes and chatting with several boys of the same age. Then another boy ran down the stairs, holding a plastic bag filled with dried taro in his hands.
“Zhang Jue, Yumi, Meng Yuancheng, my grandma roasted this dried taro herself. Do you want some?”
“Eat!”
Zhang Jue raised his head, smiled at the boy on the stairs, and tiptoed to receive the dried taro.
This scene caught Ms. Mia’s eye, making her inexplicably think of the four words “Swan feeding.” She stood still for a moment, then went straight home. The next day, she completed the rough framework of this program.
Listening to this, Zhang Jue raised another question: “Then why did you have me skate ‘Black Swan’ instead of ‘Swan Lake’?”
Madam Mia glanced at him: “Because I know you can definitely skate ‘Swan Lake,’ but you might not skate ‘Black Swan’ well.”
Figure skating, also known as ballet on ice, has been a theme chosen by countless predecessors. In many people’s eyes, as long as a young skater shows enough balletic beauty, their performance of ‘Swan Lake’ is considered successful. Zhang Jue has no problem in this regard.
However, in that case, Zhang Jue would have no chance to showcase his expressiveness and give the judges room to give higher performance scores.
Likewise, the Black Swan is wild and cunning, requiring performers to have stronger emotional tension and expressiveness. However, correspondingly, if Zhang Jue can skate this piece well, it can definitely break through the pattern of Chinese male singles having only technical skills without performance. Discrimination in performance scores by judges was common, which was also beneficial for his long-term development.
After discussing the short program, Zhang Jue’s free skate music was also ballet-themed — “The Nutcracker.”
“The Nutcracker” was a ballet adapted from a story called “The Nutcracker and the Mouse King.” It tells the story of a girl named Marie who receives a nutcracker on Christmas, and the nutcracker transforms into a prince in her dreams. Together, they fight against a group of toys and mouse soldiers, play in the Jam Mountain, giving off a strong fairy-tale and fantasy vibe.
Abroad: “The Nutcracker” was considered the most suitable “Christmas ballet” to watch during the Christmas season and is also one of the world’s outstanding ballets.
This was a theme very suitable for a lively young man who can influence others emotionally, especially with Zhang Jue good looks so interpreting the prince doesn’t feel awkward at all — it’s simply perfect.
In the first half of 2010, Zhang Jue officially confirmed that he would work hard to participate in the junior events of the 2010-2011 figure skating season. He began to rehearse his short program “Black Swan” and free skate “The Nutcracker.”
Because he was too busy, Zhang Jue’s time at school became less and less. As the final exams approached, Zhang Jue held a vocabulary review device to memorize words while a glasses-wearing boy walked up to him and dropped a cold sentence.
“Teacher Zhou wants you in the stairwell on the 3rd floor.”
Teacher Zhou was Zhang Jue’s homeroom teacher. Zhang Jue checked his memory and found that the boy with glasses was the vice monitor, Liu Kun, so he didn’t doubt it and went out.
But when he arrived at the stairwell, there was no shadow of a teacher except for a few boys. But Zhang Jue wasn’t nervous and just blinked.
“Why did you guys pretend to summon me? What’s the matter?”
Liu Kun walked to the side, hands in his pockets, looking at him coldly. While the lead guy walked up to Zhang Jue and sneered.
“Sissy.”
As he spoke, he reached out to pat Zhang Jue’s head but Zhang Jue skillfully avoided.
Unexpectedly, he would encounter school bullying again. In his past life, Zhang Jue transferred schools directly after his parents passed away. Before transferring, because he always sat in the first row and had a good academic aura, no one dared to provoke him.
Zhang Jue was inexplicable. He didn’t understand how he got into trouble with these people. He opened the vocabulary review, flipped the tape inside, and the word sound immediately turned into an energetic rock music. Then he rolled up his trouser legs, revealing sturdy calves.
Although he was not tall now and looked thin, with a face that was too pure and beautiful for a little boy, as a figure skater who has mastered five triple jumps, his leg strength was enough to kick each of them into the hospital.
The physical fitness of athletes and normal humans was very diffrent. Zhang Jue, who can mess around with the provincial team and a group of boys, has no problem dealing with a few high school students after training. With Chuck Berry’s “Johnny B. Goode” as the background music, Zhang Jue beat up these people, finally locking the tall guy in a crucifix hold.
“You kid, which class are you in? Why bother this grandpa?”
The tall guy hesitated for a moment, then shouted in humiliation: “I’m in the same class as you. Tell me, are you Chen Sijia’s boyfriend?”
Chen Sijia was Zhang Jue’s classmate, a seemingly quiet and gentle girl. Zhang Jue finally remembered.
“Oh, you’re the dirty and lascivious guy.”
Actually, Zhang Jue usually didn’t care much about school matters. After all, he had too many things to do. Ballet and figure skating took up a lot of time, and when he got home, he had to heal his tired body and mind with Bitcoin, as well as make up classes for Dela.
In this situation, he couldn’t even recognize all his classmates. Chen Sijia sat behind Zhang Jue during the biology exam. They only had a relationship of borrowing an eraser from each other.
When they finished the biology exam, this tall guy suddenly ran in with a cup of milk tea, wanting to invite Chen Sijia to drink. After Chen Sijia refused, he turned to the boy with a little hooligan look and shouted.
“Bro, this girl is not easy to pursue, she doesn’t drink milk tea.”
Another boy shouted back: “Let her drink. If she’s not even willing to drink your milk tea, can you coax her into drinking your milk later?”
Zhang Jue didn’t understand this at first, until Chen Sijia showed a face of embarrassed and indignant tears, he realized that something was wrong.
According to the rules of the world, even if a man verbally provokes, he can’t go further. He was a human, not a beast.
As a person with upright values, Zhang Jue resolutely took out the apple that Dela gave him before leaving and threw it at the head of the hooligan.
With a bang, the hooligan had nosebleeds. If the next exam were not about to start, a fight might have been inevitable.
But because there was no follow-up to the incident, Zhang Jue simply didn’t care. On the way back, Chen Sijia also quietly thanked Zhang Jue, and later gave him the apple as a gift. But the relationship between the two of them was definitely just that of ordinary classmates.
But early love was impossible for him, as a mentally mature adult, he doesn’t chase after girls under 18.
Zhang Jue let go, stood up, patted the dust off his pants, and didn’t bother with these ignorant kids any longer.
“Brothers, this is not interesting. You bullied a little girl and got dealt with. You still want to retaliate afterward. Aren’t you putting yourselves in the category of social scum? At the age when you should be studying and learning how to be a good person, why bother with this kind of thing?!”
He picked up the already finished “Johnny B. Goode” and started playing “Highway to Hell” on the vocabulary review. Then he smacked it on Liu Kun’s head.
“Okay, that’s enough. Selling out your own classmates?”
Liu Kun wasn’t tall. After being kicked in the face by Zhang Jue, his face was swollen, and his explanatory voice sounded muffled.
“Liu Guang is my cousin.”
Zhang Jue chuckled: “Wait until you guys are adults before doing this kind of thing. Grandpa can collect evidence and send you to jail. Why don’t you learn something good? Doing such despicable things as these hooligans!”
He didn’t hold a grudge, and just smacked the heads of these guys a few times. Turning his head, he happened to see Chen Sijia standing on the side panting, and the head teacher Zhou looking at him with a playful expression.
Teacher Zhou gave him a thumbs up: “Young people still listen to AC/DC songs, you have a good taste. Come, join these guys…” Teacher Zhou pointed at a few scum and motioned to Zhang Jue.
“Go to the office with the teacher.”

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