Chapter 6: Admission Letter

After checking off the “exercise” item, Lin Yumo began preparing to enter study mode.

“Physics, Chapter One…” she murmured, pulling Innovative Design from the stack of books.

Sunlight streamed through the sheer curtains, casting mottled shadows across the diagram for Newton’s First Law.

While working through the third example problem, she suddenly realized that the force analysis—which had always been a hopeless tangle in her previous life—was now as clear as the lines on her own palm.

The afternoon sun gradually slanted westward. Lin Yumo stretched, her spine giving a faint, crisp pop.

Reaching for the jasmine tea on her desk, she found the cup already empty.

Right on cue, Aunt Wu pushed open the door, a glass on her tray beaded with fine droplets of condensation.

“Miss, don’t overwork yourself,” Aunt Wu said, setting the freshly brewed tea on the corner of the desk. “Madam says she’ll make your favorite jasmine shrimp for dinner tonight.”

Lin Yumo’s eyes lit up. She thanked Aunt Wu, who then left the room.

She continued tackling the tasks she hadn’t finished for the day.

Gently flipping open 3500 Essential Words for the College Entrance Exam, her gaze fell on “phenomenon,” a word that had still felt unfamiliar yesterday. She blinked—suddenly, it was as if the word had been magically etched into her mind, crystal clear.

“Huh?” she whispered, her pink lips parting slightly in surprise.

Instinctively, she touched the faint jasmine blossom tattoo on her wrist, which was radiating a subtle warmth.

Yesterday, she had forced herself to write the word twenty times before barely memorizing it—yet now she could fluently spell it out: “P-H-E-N-O-M-E-N-O-N…”

Lowering her gaze, she turned the pages, thinking perhaps she had just reviewed it more thoroughly yesterday, and so paid it no mind.

But as she moved on to the next page, she began to realize something was off.

Seventeen minutes—that’s all it took, nearly twenty percent faster than usual—and even the complicated roots and meanings surfaced clearly in her mind.

Everything she had memorized the previous night was automatically linking together, woven into a solid net in her memory.

She unconsciously stroked the jasmine mark on her wrist, her fingertips brushing the faintly heated lines. Now she was certain—it wasn’t her imagination.

Pressing her lips together, she finally understood another use of this “golden finger.”

She took a deep breath to calm herself, her fingers absently caressing the mark. “So that’s how it is…”

Glancing around the empty room, she couldn’t hold back—hugging the vocabulary book, she rolled across the bed, her long black hair spilling over the covers.

This “golden finger” she had received after rebirth was practically tailor-made for her studies.

Thinking of how she might be able to make up for the regret of her previous college entrance exam, her eyes curved into crescent moons, even the tips of her hair seeming to dance with joy.

“I have to work even harder…”

The jasmine tattoo on her arm seemed to warm in response, as if echoing her resolve.

She hurried to sit properly at her desk again, but couldn’t hide the smile tugging at her lips, as she resumed her unfinished studies.

In the days that followed, every morning, Lin Yumo would first check her reflection in the mirror for changes.

She began deliberately eating more jasmine-based foods and drinking jasmine tea—and the next day, there were always some changes.

On a midsummer day, the cicadas’ buzzing stretched long in the heat.
Curled up on a soft cushion, Lin Yumo had a porcelain plate beside her, stacked with freshly made jasmine cakes.

She picked up a small fork, eating as she memorized.

“If I finish this page today, I’ll be halfway there tomorrow.”

Glancing at her English textbook, she realized she had already memorized half of the 3,500 most common words for the college entrance exam.

Over the past few days, she had noticed that the magical effect from the first day had indeed been the most pronounced—like a gift for someone newly reborn.

But she had gradually discovered that other improvements, like memory enhancement, were relatively steady—about a 0.05% increase each day. Not fast, but constant and reliable.

While working through her math practice book, she was amazed to find she no longer needed to frantically copy things down as she had in her previous life.

Complex formulas could now be remembered clearly after just a couple of focused readings.

She even tested herself in secret—writing down a random twenty-digit number on her scratch paper, closing her eyes to count silently to ten, then opening them again and reciting it perfectly without a mistake.

“The forgetting curve has flattened too.”

Ancient Chinese texts she had memorized three days ago could still be recited fluently when she checked today.

What surprised her most was that this ability seemed to be closely tied to her emotions.

When she studied quietly in the warm afternoon sun with a cup of jasmine tea by her side, the knowledge seemed to sink into her mind more easily.

But when she forced herself to memorize while feeling anxious, the effect was noticeably weaker.

Suddenly remembering something, she took out a small notebook and carefully recorded today’s test results:
“July 15 – Memory efficiency increased by 0.048%, forgetting curve slope reduced by 2.3 degrees…”

A dried jasmine petal bookmark slipped from between the pages. She bent down to pick it up, gently tucking it back into the notebook.

This summer, she wanted every petal to witness her transformation.

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By August, the cicadas’ song had grown faint. When Lin Yumo tore open the acceptance letter from A City No. 1 High School, her fingertips trembled slightly.

Sunlight fell across the page, casting dappled shadows.

“Class Seven, Grade One…” she read softly, the familiar name rolling off her tongue.

Scenes from the three years she had spent in that same classroom in her past life flickered through her mind like an old film—
Her lone figure bent over her desk in the first light of morning, the empty seat at lunchtime, the silent packing of her bag after school…

This time, it will be different.

She pressed the letter to her chest. On the windowsill, the jasmine flowers swayed gently in the breeze, as if echoing her resolve.

In her past life, the exhaustion from staying up late to study had made her retreat into her shell like a little snail. She had gone through all of high school barely speaking to her classmates.

Now, she opened a brand-new notebook and neatly wrote Class Seven Friendship Plan at the top—
then paused, and crossed it out, replacing it with Happy High School Life Plan.

She resolved to interact more with her classmates, to learn how to share.

This time, with her “golden finger” to help, she wouldn’t have to stay up until the early hours struggling to finish her work.

She could go to bed early, wake up full of energy for each day’s tasks.

She could greet her classmates with a smile, talk naturally with them, and during breaks… she would no longer be the sleepy girl lying on her desk to catch up on rest.