The Supporting Female Lead Chooses to Mark the Villain [Rebirth] - Chapter 16

Professor Zhang narrowed her eyes, the wrinkles around them deepening as she frowned. She remained silent for a long moment, pondering. Instead of speaking, she turned her gaze toward the class and threw the question back at them: “What do you all think of her delivery?”

The students were silent for a beat before a few scattered compliments rang out.

“It was pretty good.” “The Class Monitor did well; she was very emotional!” “Her pronunciation was clear and fluent!” “…”

Professor Zhang listened in silence with her arms crossed. Suddenly, she let out a cold snort. “Anything else?”

This time, everyone wisely shut their mouths.

The deskmate leaned toward Xi You and whispered, “No way, she’s not even satisfied with the Monitor’s performance? If we get called up later…” She shrank her neck in fear before she could even finish the sentence.

Professor Zhang slapped the table. “Why have you all gone quiet? Weren’t you noisy enough a moment ago?” Looking at the students who were now as quiet as cicadas in winter, her anger flared. “Fine. Since no one can tell me the reason, everyone will copy this entire chapter by hand—”

“Professor.” Shen Nian raised her hand, interrupting her.

Even though she knew it was somewhat impolite, she stood up under immense pressure for the sake of her own time. Professor Zhang frowned and glared at her, and the rest of the students turned their eyes toward her as well.

Shen Nian cleared her throat. “I think the Monitor focused too much on emotional output in her delivery just now, and as a result, she neglected the grammatical stress emphasized in this chapter. Without a sense of cadence or priority, the lines sounded a bit like she was just reading a textbook out loud.”

After she finished her critique, no one in the classroom spoke for a long time. Even Professor Zhang on the podium kept her lips pressed into a tight line.

“Nervous?” In the earbud, Shen Zui’s slightly teasing voice rang out.

Shen Nian didn’t know how she had betrayed her emotions, but she slightly adjusted her breathing and even loosened her clenched fists.

Shen Zui let out another soft chuckle, her tone now clearly carrying a hint of praise. “Mm, you’ve improved.”

In the vast classroom, teachers and classmates surrounded her with their stares. Yet, Shen Zui’s whisper carved out a small, dark, and private space for Shen Nian. She hid within that sanctuary, huddling close to the Shen Zui beside her. All the noise and clamor were shut out.

Shen Nian couldn’t help herself; she made a fake gesture of tucking her hair back while secretly rubbing her burning earlobe.

As she lowered her hand, the professor behind the podium nodded. “Mm.”

It was a very soft sound, devoid of much emotion, but it allowed the students—who had been holding their breath—to finally relax their tense nerves.

Inside Xi You’s dormitory group chat: 【Why do I think Shen Nian is actually kind of hot right now?】 【Ahhh, does this mean we don’t have to copy the textbook?!】 【I apologize for my trash-talking earlier! Even a bad student like Shen Nian has her moments of brilliance!】 【Do you even hear yourself?】

Xi You squinted at her phone and subtly rolled her eyes. Professor Zhang was still scrutinizing Shen Nian, so Shen Nian didn’t dare sit down.

A few seconds later, the professor indeed made her move, pointing toward the podium. “Since you can hear the problem, why don’t you come up and demonstrate the correct way to perform it for your classmates?”

Shen Nian: “Huh?” She clarified, “Me?”

Professor Zhang nodded and signaled for Yang Min to return to her seat. “Shen Nian, come up.”

“Hahahaha—”

Not knowing who started it, the students burst into laughter again. This time, the mockery was even more aggressive.

“Can I cover my ears?” “I need to close my eyes too.” “Letting Shen Nian go up… is this a joke?” “No, Professor, she just got lucky and guessed right! It doesn’t mean she actually knows how to do it!”

Professor Zhang looked at the male student who was shouting the loudest. “Then you come up?”

The student immediately lowered his head, looking as if he wanted to crawl under his desk.

Shen Nian let out a long breath, stood up, and walked to the podium. Professor Zhang was also somewhat in the mood to watch a scene play out. She looked at Shen Nian, took two steps back, and said playfully, “Start whenever you’re ready.”

Shen Nian looked at the class. In an accidental moment, her gaze met Xi You’s. The other girl’s eyes were brimming with mockery. Just as Shen Nian was about to look away, she saw Xi You wordlessly mouth two characters.

Xi You said: “I—di—ot—”

Shen Nian withdrew her gaze and stopped paying attention to her. She lowered her eyes and took a deep breath, gradually letting herself enter the role. When she looked up again, even the light in her eyes had changed.

The protagonist, Claire, had drifted through life for forty years; she had been in a brothel and lost a husband. On her face, besides the arrogant triumph of her newfound wealth, there were the indelible marks left by suffering.

“Forty years have passed. To think, back then, I was just a poor girl driven from her home, a wanderer in the houses of sin.” Shen Nian constricted her throat, making her voice sound sharp and caustic.

In this life, she hadn’t undergone specific vocal training yet, so her control over her tongue and lips was relatively weak. Shen Nian had realized this early on. She worked hard to mask this with emotion and technique, seizing the grammatical and logical stresses of the lines for deep characterization, striving to make the audience ignore the flaws in her voice.

“I once thought the sea of injustice and sorrow was endless… but who knew the world’s fortunes were so fickle? Life is a kaleidoscope of colors.”

“Güllen… you didn’t expect it, did you? I am back!”

As she shouted this line, the students in the first three rows instinctively leaned back. Even Professor Zhang beside her took a step back. Her mouth hung slightly open, her expression one of disbelief, and she even raised a hand to rub her ear.

Controlling her breathing rhythm, Shen Nian continued: “…Ten years of famine, the land is barren. Every trade is stagnant, devoid of life. Hmph. Now I can pay, and I want Güllen to kill a man.”

“I want to trade the corpse of one man for Güllen’s prosperity.”

She didn’t recite the dialogue exactly as it was in the textbook, but rather delivered the lines from memory. Because of this, her narration sounded incredibly smooth. From the opening to the mid-point where she demanded the death of her former lover, she built up her emotions step by step.

At this moment, the dozens of students sitting below had transformed in her eyes into the townspeople who were still hypocritically resisting. She sneered as she confronted them, proudly displaying her jewelry and glory.

In the final moment, she looked down on everyone from a height, her contemptuous voice carrying an endless threat.

“If you do not do as I ask, what awaits you is eternal darkness! Now, it is time for you to taste true pain!”

As her voice trailed off, it took Shen Nian a long time to snap out of it. The hatred and resentment she projected were not entirely fake; with the fire of revenge burning within her, it felt as though she were using Claire’s mouth to spit out the secrets she had suppressed for so long.

While Shen Nian was still dazed, a string of applause suddenly rang out.

Clap, clap, clap—

Professor Zhang’s applause woke Shen Nian up and simultaneously brought back the souls of the students who were sitting there like wooden blocks. A flush rose to Shen Nian’s face. She turned and bowed to the professor with some embarrassment. “Thank you…”

It was only then that the students, who were a half-beat slow, finally caught up.

Clap, clap, clap, clap, clap—!

Thunderous applause erupted, quickly filling the classroom. It wasn’t satisfied with this confined space and squeezed out through the windows and the cracks in the door, spreading to the hallway and even the small garden at the bottom of the building.

“I was so stunned listening to her. That was powerful.” “Holy crap, is that really Shen Nian? Not a body double?” “So amazing! I’ve seen the original play, and this was barely any different.” “Ahh! Has she been hiding her strength all this time?!”

“She’s so amazing!” The deskmate was incredibly excited, grabbing Xi You’s sleeve and wriggling like a worm. Xi You’s face was dark as she shook the hand off. The gloom pooled in her eyes was as heavy as a mountain range. She stared gloomily at Shen Nian as if trying to see into her soul, but she found only a vast expanse of mist.

Amidst the chorus of praise, Shen Nian stepped down and returned to her seat. Professor Zhang looked at her with a smile on her lips, patting her chest to calm her racing heart.

She asked, “Does anyone else want to come up and try a challenge?”

The classroom instantly returned to silence. But this time, the old professor didn’t get angry. She lowered her head and reopened her PPT. “If not, then forget it. Let’s use Student Shen’s case just now to analyze the treatment of stress in dialogue. Come, look here…”

As she re-entered the teaching rhythm, the attention of everyone in the classroom was drawn back to her.

“Niannian.”

Shen Nian rubbed her tingling ear: “What is it?”

Shen Zui laughed airily. “Niannian is so great~”

Shen Nian’s movements paused. Her pen dragged aimlessly across the paper, drawing a tangled mess that mirrored her racing thoughts.