Chapter 3: Dumbfounded Interviewers!  

His eyes went into a blur!

The surroundings changed!

The sky was blue and the ground was gray!

The first feeling that Zhang Ye had was that of the change in temperature around him. It was August. The air was still hot and disturbing. Eh, why does Zhang Ye like to use this to describe his environment?

It isn’t that his vocabulary is lacking, nor is it because he is lacking in literary knowledge, resulting in him knowing only those few descriptive phrases. It really isn’t. Seriously, it really isn’t. It’s because…because…nevermind. You will never understand, no matter how much I explain our artists’ world!

“The interview is at 10 A.M. Let’s hurry.”

“Brother Sun, what’s the hurry? You will definitely be accepted.”

“That’s not necessarily true. They will only be hiring two people for the radio host position. I heard that there were more than 20 people that applied for the written interview. The competition is fierce.”

As the changes caught him off-guard, Zhang Ye did not catch his footing and stumbled to the ground. As he helped himself up, he looked around. This was no longer the corridor from before. He was now standing in front of the radio broadcasting station’s entrance again. This was where he had previously saved. Even the dialogue of the candidates that had been heard after saving was exactly the same. Looking at the time on his cell phone, he had really returned to a time that was half an hour ago!

God! This…

Let’s not think too much. There are important matters to do!

Zhang Ye thought through it once and came around. Now was not the time to research on what had happened. He absolutely needed to get the job of being a host. Saving had given him a chance to redo it again. Even if he didn’t understand what had happened, he still had to take advantage of the opportunity. He didn’t go up the building. Instead, he searched the internet on his cellphone. As he remembered the first line of the interview, it was very easy to find it. Zhang Ye quickly found the article. It was a research thesis of some unknown student in a university in the South. He guessed that the interviewers had randomly found it on the internet. He only had about 25 minutes or so left. Without saying another word, he immediately started memorizing and reciting it! The 1000-word manuscript was very long. Thankfully, it wasn’t some ancient text or classic. As the entire thesis wasn’t full of abstruse words, and with every word related to the next and being in accordance with common sense and general knowledge, it wasn’t that difficult to memorize it. Besides, Zhang Ye had some knowledge of the law, so he knew some of those words.

He needed to memorize it. Success or failure rested on this!

……

In the broadcasting building, at the interview venue.

A female assistant opened the door and looked at her list, “Zhang Ye.” After calling once, with no one responding, she repeated, “Is Zhang Ye here? It’s your turn!”

At the end of the corridor, Zhang Ye briskly walked over with his mouth seemingly chanting, “I’m here. I’m here!”

The female assistant looked at him with suspicion. Having seen hundreds of interviewees this year, this was the first time that she had seen someone chanting. Were monks and priests prepared to join the workforce?

In the room.

During the idle time between interviews, the eight people were drinking tea and exchanging their views.A 40+-year-old Li Honglian said disappointedly, “This batch of interviewees is too average.”

An older Zhao Guozhou also said, “Yeah. It’s much worse than the interviews from half a year ago. What use is having a good written score? They lack in ability!”

A youth behind him said, “Leaders, there are still quite a few people still to be interviewed. There should be someone good.”

“Hopefully. But I think it’s hopeless.” Zhao Guozhou smacked his lips, “Previously, that Little Xu* was alright. If there’s no other choice, our channel will want him.”

Li Honglian leered, “I think Little Xu isn’t bad, too.”

Now, the door was opened after a knock. The next interviewee, Zhang Ye, entered.

The people stopped their idle chatter and glanced at him, sizing him up.

“Dear teachers, how are you?” Knowing that they would interrupt his self-introduction, Zhang Ye simply changed his introduction and felt free. To put it bluntly, he was still disgruntled and angry. This fellow’s temper was usually bad. If people gave him an inch of respect, he would return a foot of respect. “My real name is Zhang Ye.”

Zhao Guozhou burst into laughter, “You still have a stage name?”

Zhang Ye simply replied, “I have two stage names, one is “Zhang Tenglan”* and the other is “Zhang Jingkong”*.”

This world no longer had these two “great people”. The interviewers did not understand that they had been unknowingly ridiculed by Zhang Ye.

Li Honglian was ignoring Zhang Ye, as she had her head lowered to read his resume.

The result was the same. The same scene and the same expressions. This time, Zhang Ye could sensitively detect two interviewers slightly frowning. This was their dissatisfaction with Zhang Ye’s appearance. It was weird. Even in an industry where the audience could not see the face of the broadcaster, the broadcasting host was still expected to have good looks. What did it mean to be good? It meant that one needed to look better than the vast majority of people. It had always been like this for broadcasting hosts.

Zhao Guozhou and Li Honglian, who was sitting beside Zhao Guozhou, sat in the middle and were the main judges. As the two radio hosts that would be hired were to be directly under their supervision respectively, they were very serious with their selection. No one wanted trouble for themselves, so when they saw Zhang Ye with his average looks, they had already crossed him out mentally. Furthermore, Zhang Ye had zero working experience listed on his resume. He still needed some training before he could take over the job, so they did not even consider him for the position. It was not bad being in a specialized major, but there were many that graduated from the broadcasting specialization major. And how many of them had become a host? Only a handful of people who were extremely outstanding had managed to do so.

Zhao Guozhou and Li Honglian exchanged glances and understood the thoughts of each other. This person was definitely not suitable. They would randomly give him a question and shoo him away – to prevent wasting time!

Li Honglian took out a manuscript in the same posture as before and glanced at Zhang Ye, “There are only two questions for the interview. The first is for you to use your fastest speed to finish reading the manuscript and then read it off script.”

Zhang Ye, who came back from a save record, knew their attitude and wish to make it difficult for him, so he stood up and took it without any expression.

As expected, in just ten seconds, Li Honglian had meanly taken away the manuscript. “That’s it. Read it.”

The other interviewers also knew in their hearts. Ten seconds? Even if it was an experienced person who had decades in the industry, that person would not be able to memorize more than a hundred words in ten seconds, let alone a mere graduate. Eh, it should be said that ten seconds was only enough for them to read 200 words. And even so, they would only get about 40-50% of those 200 words right while reciting. And why would that not even pass? That’s because this manuscript had more than 900 words. It was only about a fifth! If one could memorize and recite 300 words in ten seconds, only then was that a perfect score. But everyone knew it was impossible.

They were purposely making it difficult for Zhang Ye and it was to the point where they were just disguising their intentions of telling Zhang Ye that he lacked the qualities and abilities. But what made them feel strange was that Zhang Ye did not have any questioning reaction with the ten seconds of memorizing time. He remained extremely calm and returned slowly to his seat.

Li Honglian fell into a daze as she tried to find anger and surprise on Zhang Ye’s face, but she could not find anything.

The other interviewers found it bizarre, too. Was this kid really stupid, really stupid, or really stupid? We’d made it difficult for him, yet he did not have a single reaction? It seemed like they had done right. This silly kid would be useless, even if he was recruited. He was so stupid and not sharp-minded. He would not amount to much.

Zhao Guozhou urged, “Begin! Hurry up! There are many people behind you, who are waiting!”Li Honglian and the other interviewers immediately gave Zhang Ye a score on his interview results. They did not bother listening before scoring. One wrote 20 points, while another wrote 15 points. They were all very low scores. Following that, they flipped to the next interviewee’s resume.

Zhang Ye was not in a hurry, even with their urging. He looked at them calmly and recited in a rhythmic fashion, “A notary organization, which ensures judicial activities and the stability of social order in our country, is a special lawful cause. Notarization is done by a notary organization that depends on natural persons, lawful persons or the other applications of other groups. Under the legal procedures set up by the courts, matters that deal with the law or documents that are needed to certify the activity require the procedures of a notary activity to be done in accordance with the law…”

When Zhang Ye went off script for a hundred words, Zhao Guozhou raised his head.

When he went off script for 200 words, Li Honglian gasped and looked at him with surprise.

When he went off script for 300 words, all the interviewers placed the things in their hands down and looked at Zhang Ye in surprise!

Zhang Ye was not affected by anyone and kept going on. “Because if the relevant parties provide false materials or fail to go through notarized procedures to obtain legal certifications, then there is a negative effect on the reputation of the publicly recognized bodies. Hence, faith is the most basic requirement in the notary industry…”

In Zhao Guozhou and Li Honglian’s eyes, anyone who could memorize 300 words was a miracle and was something impossible, but Zhang Ye was still reciting!

“This…”

words!

words!

words!

The interviewers’ faces turned aghast!

When the last paragraph was recited, Zhang Ye remained at his constant pace, “As an embodiment of integrity, a system that builds on the society’s trust, a notary allows people to accept and adopt means to acquire trust.” With a pause, he cleared his throat, “Thank you, Teachers. I’ve finished reciting!”

A female interviewer’s pen dropped from her hand. “Lu Lu”, it rolled down to the floor!

Zhao Guozhou was in shock and turned his head sideways, “Old Li*? This… Was it memorized correctly?”

Li Honglian looked at the manuscript in her hand and gasped, “…920 words, recited verbatim!”

The leftmost interviewer nearly fell from his chair as he said in surprise, “How did you do it? Ten seconds? You memorized it all?”

Zhang Ye smiled. “I read things a bit faster than others and have a relatively good memory. A glance would be sufficient.”

Ten seconds was just enough to sweep through over 900 words. This wasn’t just fast, this was f***ing too fast! The person even wanted to ask if Zhang Ye had previously memorized the thesis, but he knew it was impossible. This thesis was unknown and was randomly found on the internet. Besides, there was no way it could have been disclosed beforehand. Li Honglian also randomly grabbed a topic, so how could that person know in advance!?

F***! Are you even human?

Zhang Ye’s act had shocked them all!

A few interviewers were greatly surprised, as if they had seen a ghost!

*Little surname will be seen very commonly in this translation of the novel. It is usually used when an older person addresses a younger person, it is also shows a bit more endearment.

*Old surname is used in a similar fashion, when a younger person addresses an older person with endearment.

*Zhang Tenglan is a play on a Japanese pornstar’s name, Wu Tenglan/Ran Asakawa.

*Zhang Jingkong is a play on a Japanese pornstar’s name, Cang Jingkong/Aoi Sora.