Chapter 311 - 240: I Have Not Disgraced the Mandate

Chapter 311: Chapter 240: I Have Not Disgraced the Mandate

Researcher Zhang rattled off technical terms like "magnetohydrodynamics," "edge-localized modes," and "first-wall heat load." Paired with the dizzying plasma turbulence simulation diagrams on the PowerPoint, his lecture was a passionate, spit-flying affair.

However, while Chen Lin maintained a perfect smile of profound awe and even nodded at all the right times, he was already ranting uncontrollably in his head.

’Who am I? Where am I? What is he even talking about?’

He had indeed crammed the night before, force-feeding himself the basics of nuclear physics, but this was still one of the highest branches on the human technology tree.

It was like a programming novice who had just learned to print "Hello, World!" being suddenly dragged into a deep-dive session on the Linux kernel source code.

He understood each individual word, but when strung together, they became utter gibberish.

Chen Lin’s hand, hidden under the table, fought the urge to pinch his thigh—he needed the pain to keep the profound expression on his face from crumbling.

Just when Chen Lin was about to lose his composure, Vice Minister Liao Yixin, sitting beside him, seemed to sense something.

As a leader in charge of high-tech development, Liao Yixin wasn’t a fusion expert, but he was a keen judge of character.

In fact, before coming, he had made a point of calling Li Weiguo at the National Defense Science and Technology University and Professor Tang Xuebing at the Science and Technology University to learn about Chen Lin’s "problem-solving habits."

He’d learned one thing from them all: Chen Lin might not have a firm grasp of physics, chemistry, or engineering principles, but once a problem was abstracted into pure mathematics, he could solve it perfectly.

"Ahem."

Liao Yixin cleared his throat, interrupting Researcher Zhang’s relentless monologue.

"Zhang, my friend, could you pause for a moment?"

Liao Yixin smiled, waved his hand, and gestured toward Chen Lin.

"The physical mechanisms you’re explaining are important, of course, but we’ve invited Professor Chen here today primarily to solve a mathematical problem."

"Professor Chen is a mathematician, after all. Everyone has their own area of expertise. Let’s not get sidetracked by the physical background of your MHD equations for now."

With that, Liao Yixin turned to a staff member nearby.

"Skip ahead to slide 42. The one where all the physical constraints have been stripped away, leaving only the pure mathematical description."

The staff member immediately operated the computer.

The screen flickered.

The vibrant diagrams of the fusion reactor and the complex, twisting magnetic field lines all vanished.

In their place was a single slide with a stark white background.

It was densely packed with a system of nonlinear partial differential equations.

They were exceedingly dry, abstract mathematical symbols—the kind that could trigger trypophobia at a single glance.

Functional analysis, Differential Geometry Manifolds, non-Euclidean topological structures...

The instant this slide appeared, the engineering experts in the room instinctively adjusted their glasses, a dull ache blooming in their skulls.

But in that same instant, Chen Lin’s eyes—

Lit up!

[Little Mathematician]!

In his vision, these were no longer dry symbols but geometric bodies, pulsing, rotating, and evolving.

All the variables and constraints were constructing a high-dimensional, dynamic model in his mind.

"Phew..."

Chen Lin let out a long sigh of relief in his heart.

’Why didn’t you just show me this from the start?’

’As long as it’s a math problem, I’m pretty confident I can handle it!’

At that moment, an elderly professor from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, sitting across from him, saw Chen Lin staring "blankly" at the screen. Assuming the young man was stunned by the problem’s difficulty, he spoke up kindly.

"Professor Chen, this system of equations is the result of the combined efforts of several academicians from our Chinese Academy of Sciences Mathematics and Physics Department. It involves stability analysis of infinite-dimensional dynamical systems. It’s extremely difficult."

The old professor’s tone was gentle, full of an elder’s concern.

"We invited you here today mainly for you to get acquainted with the situation and for us to get to know you. We’re certainly not expecting you to provide any solutions today."

"That’s right."

Liao Yixin chimed in, gesturing to the circle of experts.

"We’ve gathered everyone here today to answer any questions you might have about the various parameters and details. After all, there are many pitfalls when translating an engineering problem into a mathematical one."

At this, Liao Yixin turned to Chen Lin, his tone thoughtful.

"Professor Chen, considering the complexity of the problem, I’ve already arranged for a secure, dedicated laptop to be prepared for you. It’s loaded with all the project files and data."

"You can take it back to your hotel and study it at your own pace."

"Whether it takes you ten days or two weeks, just coming up with a viable approach would be a tremendous contribution to the nation."

Hearing this, Chen Lin raised an eyebrow.

He couldn’t help but grumble to himself. ’Take it back to the hotel? Study it at my leisure? Ten days or half a month?’

’Didn’t they say they’d already asked my previous partners about me?’

’Did Director Li Weiguo not tell you I solved the hypersonic vehicle bottleneck in just one hour? Did Professor Tang Xuebing not mention I created the solid-state battery screening model in only half an hour?’

’Or is it...’

Chen Lin’s gaze swept over the assembled experts.

’...that top experts in every field share the delusion that only the problems in *their* field are truly difficult, while everyone else’s work is child’s play?’

But rants aside, Chen Lin knew the truth.

Controlled nuclear fusion was, indeed, the crown jewel of current human technology.

Everyone thought it was difficult, impossible to solve on the spot. That was a judgment based on common sense.

"Um..."

Chen Lin suddenly spoke up.

His voice wasn’t loud, but it was exceptionally clear in the quiet conference room.

"Minister Liao, there’s no need to go to all that trouble."

Chen Lin adjusted the cuff of his suit, revealing an inexpensive sports watch. He wore his signature, utterly harmless smile.

"Could I trouble you to find me a few sheets of paper? Standard A4 printer paper would be fine."

"Oh, and a pen. A gel pen would be best, one that writes smoothly."

Silence.

A brief, strange quiet fell over the conference room.

Everyone was stunned.

Liao Yixin froze with his pen in mid-air. Researcher Zhang’s jaw dropped. The glasses of the kind old professor who had just been comforting Chen Lin nearly slid off his nose.

Paper? A pen?

At a time like this?

They were all intelligent people; their minds raced, and they instantly understood what Chen Lin intended to do.

But... how was that possible?!

This was a problem that had plagued the project team for nearly a year!

It was a complex model that could run on a supercomputer for months without yielding any results!

You glance at a PowerPoint slide and now you want to solve it on the spot with pen and paper?

Do you think this is some advanced calculus final exam?

The looks in many of the experts’ eyes began to change.

Some were shocked, others were doubtful, and a few of the more blunt senior experts were already frowning, their gazes filled with a touch of disapproval, as if thinking, ’This young man has no idea of the immensity of the world.’

If not for the massive prestige of the national award Chen Lin had just won yesterday, someone probably would have slammed the table and berated him for being so flippant.

However, Chen Lin paid no mind to the complicated looks around him.

His expression remained calm, even a little expectant.

Liao Yixin, after all, was a seasoned leader who had seen it all. After a brief moment of astonishment, he quickly regained his composure.

Though he didn’t believe Chen Lin could solve it right then and there, since the request had been made, it had to be fulfilled.

"Quick! Get Professor Chen paper and a pen!" Liao Yixin ordered in a low voice.

Soon, a fresh stack of A4 paper and a black gel pen were placed in front of Chen Lin.

"Thank you."

Chen Lin thanked them politely.

Then, he took a deep breath and uncapped the pen.

In the next second, his entire demeanor changed.

His usual easygoing aura vanished in an instant, replaced by a calm, intense focus.

The complex system of equations from the PowerPoint was reflected in his pupils.

Empowered by [Little Mathematician], countless paths of mathematical deduction flashed, connected, and reassembled across his cerebral cortex at a frantic pace.

The relationships between variables, which seemed like a labyrinth to outsiders, quickly collapsed into clear lines of logic before his eyes.

’A high-dimensional Lie group Manifold needs to be introduced here...’

’The boundary conditions here can be simplified using homological algebra...’

’The singularity in the control term can be smoothed out with a special kind of operator...’

SCRITCH, SCRITCH, SCRITCH—

The sound of the pen tip touching paper echoed in the silent conference room.

Chen Lin didn’t write at a furious, cinematic pace, his pen practically smoking.

His writing speed was steady, almost leisurely.

Each equation, every single symbol, was written neatly and clearly, as if it had long been imprinted in his mind and he was simply transcribing it.

At first, the others in the room glanced at each other, unsure of what to do.

But as time passed, watching Chen Lin’s intense focus, completely oblivious to his surroundings, everyone tacitly fell silent.

No one spoke, no one drank water; they even consciously quieted their breathing.

Even though they still found the situation utterly unbelievable, out of respect for knowledge—and for the genius who had just won a first-class national award—they chose to wait.

Time ticked by, second by second.

Ten minutes.

Twenty minutes.

Forty minutes.

Chen Lin filled a sheet of paper, set it aside, and drew a new one toward him, his movements fluid and seamless, without a single pause.

He didn’t frown in concentration, didn’t scratch his head in frustration, and didn’t cross out a single symbol.

Sitting beside him, Liao Yixin watched the fine beads of sweat gradually form on Chen Lin’s forehead, and an inexplicable shock washed over him.

He didn’t understand the mathematical symbols, but he understood this state of being.

It was a state he had only ever seen in the old scientists who had dedicated their entire lives to the nation.

Finally.

As the clock struck eleven.

Exactly one hour had passed.

Chen Lin’s pen drew a heavy period at the very end of the page.

"Haaah..."

Chen Lin exhaled a long breath, slumping back against his chair as if he had just finished a marathon.

He rubbed his sore wrist, then gathered the three A4 pages scattered on the table.

They were covered in writing, front and back.

Six pages in total.

This was the answer he had produced in one hour of burning through his brain cells.

"Minister Liao."

Chen Lin straightened the three pages and gently pushed them in front of Liao Yixin, a slightly weary but still brilliant smile on his face.

"I have not failed the mission entrusted to me."

"Regarding the real-time control algorithm for the edge-localized mode... I believe I’ve found the solution."

The pronouncement wasn’t loud.

But in that moment, it was like a thunderclap, booming through the conference room.

Every gaze in the room shifted instantly from Chen Lin’s face to those three thin sheets of paper.

Liao Yixin’s hand was trembling slightly.

He was just about to reach for them, but before he could touch the pages—

SWOOSH!

Several hands shot out at once.

They belonged to the old academicians from the Chinese Academy of Sciences Mathematics and Physics Department, and a few core theoretical experts from Science Island.

These old scholars, normally so refined and unflappable that they wouldn’t bat an eye if a mountain collapsed before them, were now like starving wolves who had just spotted a priceless treasure. They completely forgot about the presence of their superiors and all meeting etiquette.

"Quick! Let me see!"

"Don’t snatch! How did he derive this step?"

"Heavens... How is this possible? He introduced a completely new topological invariant?"

"Brilliant! Absolutely brilliant! So singularities can be handled this way!"

Several white-haired elders huddled together, their heads nearly knocking as they crowded around the three pages. Their eyes were wide, and some were so excited their hands trembled.

The intermittent gasps of shock and praise left the engineering experts and officials, who didn’t understand higher mathematics, feeling as if their hearts were being tickled by a cat’s paw—they were dying of curiosity.

So is it right or not?

What on earth did he write?

Just give us a straight answer already!