Scholar’s Advanced Technological System

by Stayrr

After suffering from a heat stroke while working under the scorching heat of summer, Lu Zhou, a hardworking but poor university student, somehow becomes the owner of an advanced technological system. With the cheat given by the system, his university life changes overnight. A Master’s degree? Easy. PhD? Not a problem. From a nobody, he quickly becomes a huge celebrity in the wor

26. 815

Read Scholar's Advanced Technological System - Chapter 815 - Elected for Both online free - Novelfull

Chapter 815: Elected for Both

Generally speaking, in order for a species to adapt to changes in their environment, the species would often evolve through reproduction and natural selection.

Because of this, it seemed reasonable that the X-0172 bacteria released spores and pheromones that made the host dormant.

However…

The fact that these two characteristics were contained in the tiny X-0172 bacteria was quite strange.

If it weren't for Professor Liu, Lu Zhou would have never noticed this.

This was indeed quite a coincidence.

It was almost like…

This bacteria was created to help a certain type of species to survive in harsh climates?

Of course, Professor Liu and Lu Zhou were both just speculating. There was no direct evidence that the genome of this bacteria was artificially modified.

If their hypothesis was correct, then it would mean that millions of years ago, there was a technologically advanced civilization on the fiery red planet.

This would undoubtedly be a huge discovery.

Of course, Professor Liu's hypothesis was merely a guess. There was no way to verify his hypothesis. Lu Zhou wrote the hypothesis down and left it aside.

Verifying one's hypothesis was one of the most important processes in scientific research. He wouldn't discredit Professor Liu's idea, nor would he rush to believe Professor Liu's idea before collecting sufficient evidence.

So far, his "crawler" all-terrain survey vehicle deployed on Mars was investigating the geological environment around New Virginia. If there was a space-age civilization on Mars, there should be some clues…

He set the Mars bacteria matter aside.

The days quickly passed by. The red autumn leaves began to fall off the trees. It was October.

After nearly a year of selection, the 2021 academician election finally came to an end in October.

After the second round of evaluations was finished, the final selections would be decided by the academician election committee.

The list of the elected academicians was announced on the official Chinese Academy of Sciences and Academy of Engineering website.

Just like people had expected, the Nobel Prize winner, Fields Medal winner, national scientific research project leader, Lu Zhou, was elected into both academies.

Not only was his elections displayed on the official academy websites, but it was also posted at the Jin Ling University entrances, as well as the front page of the campus news forum. This was great news for the school!

[Congratulations to Professor Lu Zhou for being elected as a member of the 2021 Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Academy of Engineering academician!]

Ever since the 2000s, Jin Ling University hadn't had any new academician professors.

But now, Professor Lu from the mathematics department suddenly won two academician titles. This meant it was double the happiness. Many mathematics professors even lectured with smiles on their faces.

After all, Lu Zhou had always been popular at the university. Many professors watched him grow as a student, especially Professor Liu Xiangping who helped Lu Zhou in the mathematical modeling competition. Back then, during the mathematical modeling competition, he could see that Lu Zhou was an extraordinary person.

Now that Jin Ling University had another academician under its belt, its ranking in the Chinese academic community was much higher than before.

For those who wanted to further their academic career at Jin Ling University, Lu Zhou's election was obviously good news.

The professors and scholars weren't the only ones happy for them, even the students were happy as well.

Even though they had heard countless legends of the great Professor Lu before, being selected into two academies… People couldn't help but feel impressed.

There had never been someone who had been elected into two academies at once…

There probably would never be another one.

A female student stood in front of the news bulletin board. She was carrying a stack of books, and she couldn't help but exclaim, "Amazing, Professor Lu is on both academician lists."

"Yeah…" Another female student with bangs nodded and asked curiously, "Oh yeah, what is above academician?"

"Above academician? I don't think that exists… If I recall correctly, academician is the highest academic title in the country. The elections happen every two years, and every academician has to be approved by more than two-thirds of the current academicians. It is one of the hardest titles to gain!"

Normally speaking, it was extremely impressive to gain the title of an academician in your sixties or fifties.

Being able to gain this life-long title in your twenties was never heard of before.

"Life-long title…" The girl with bangs looked at the bulletin board and said, "He won two titles at once. Which meant two-thirds of the Academy of Engineering and Academy of Science academicians voted for him… That is crazy."

"Of course, it's insane!" The girl with glasses remembered something. She looked at another girl and quickly said, "Oh yeah, Meng Qi, Professor Lu was your teacher, right? Tell me, what kind of person is he?"

"Oh…" Han Mengqi stared at the bulletin board and said, "What kind of person? He's always busy, he rarely comes to his office… I'm not sure."

Obviously, her roommate wasn't satisfied with this answer. The girl in glasses said, "… But he has taught you before?"

"He did…" Han Mengqi was a little embarrassed, and she said, "He's an easy-going person?"

Her roommate looked a little disappointed, and she muttered to herself, "Easy going? I thought he would be the cool and calm type… I saw him eating barbecued meat at the cafeteria, but I was too scared to ask for his WeChat."

Han Mengqi sighed. She twirled her hair and didn't know what to say.

2021 was nearly over.

She already completed her graduation thesis.

She should be graduating by next summer.

What should I do after I graduate?

Should I continue with academia, or work at my mom's company?

I don't want to think about this…

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Chapter 816: Class of Youth

Compared to Jin Ling University's reaction, Lu Zhou himself had a much smaller reaction to his academician elections.

After all, compared to those scholars who had been trying their entire lives to obtain an academician title, this title didn't bring him anything special.

Therefore, when Lu Zhou found out he was elected, he didn't feel anything. He stayed rather calm.

The support and resource he had access to were far beyond what a normal academician had.

Jin Ling University.

Mathematics building office.

Lu Zhou had to deal with his students' theses, so he took time out of his busy schedule and came to Jin Ling University. When he first entered his office, he was shocked by the mess.

He was only gone for a week, he didn't know why his office turned into a storage room.

When Lin Yuxiang saw Lu Zhou, her eyes lit up and she immediately stood up from her desk.

"Professor, you're finally back. There have been countless people looking for you."

Lu Zhou looked at the meter-tall cactus near the wall and couldn't help but ask, "Where did this thing come from?"

Lin Yuxiang looked at the meter-tall cactus and suddenly said, "Oh, Professor Zhang from the physics department sent this here. He told me to say hi to you, and he wished your academic journey would continue to develop further."

There was nothing wrong with this blessing, but it sounded kind of weird to Lu Zhou.

"… Thank Professor Zhang next time you see him." Lu Zhou noticed the vacuum flask on his table and said, "Where did this come from?"

He felt like he had seen this before, but he couldn't remember where. Lin Yuxiang stood up and spoke with a smile.

"Professor Tang gave it to you!"

Lu Zhou finally remembered where he saw this type of cup before.

"He didn't give me his own flask, right?"

That would be a pretty crappy gift, right?

"Why would you say that, what kind of person gives away a used cup? I think this cup is the same model as the one he uses." Lin Yuxiang smiled and said, "When he gave you the cup, he told me to tell you to watch out for your health. He told you to stop drinking coffee and drink more hot water."

Lu Zhou felt pretty warm inside.

He knew a lot of professors at Jin Ling University, but Professor Tang cared about him the most.

Lu Zhou had always been very grateful to the professor who taught him the ropes of mathematics. Even though Professor Tang didn't help him a lot academically, Professor Tang taught him many lessons outside of academics.

Therefore, every new year Lu Zhou would visit the old man's home.

Since Lu Zhou didn't say anything, Lin Yuxiang blinked and asked, "Do you want some hot water?"

Lu Zhou smiled and shook his head. He picked up the vacuum flask and spoke.

"No, thanks. Record the gifts in an Excel spreadsheet, then send it to my email. For the gifts over 500 yuan, send it back to them. For the rest, keep it somewhere else. It is taking up too much space."

"Ok!" Assistant Lin raised her hand and did a salute as she said, "I got it."

Lu Zhou sat down at his desk and opened the drawer. He took out a stack of theses and began reading the first one carefully. Even though it was only a master's thesis, he still had high standards for his students.

After all, he wouldn't allow a student to graduate with a crappy thesis.

They at least had to have produced a half-decent thesis.

This was beneficial both to Lu Zhou and to the students.

Suddenly, he heard knocking sounds at his door.

Lu Zhou put down his pen and spoke.

"Come in."

The office door opened, the principal of Jin Ling University, Academician Xu, walked in with a smile.

"Congratulations, Academician Lu! From now on, you are the youngest elected academician in Jin Ling University. I'm sure it will take a long time for someone to break your record."

"Who knows, we have so many talented young men. Maybe someone will be a better scholar than me in the future." Lu Zhou smiled and stood up. He made an inviting gesture and said, "Come, sit down."

"Yeah, thanks."

The two sat down on the office sofa.

Lin Yuxiang came over with a pot of freshly boiled tea, and she poured both of them a cup.

Principal Xu looked at the rising water vapor and smiled.

"I came here to congratulate you on your two academician elections. I also have something else I need your opinion on."

Lu Zhou smiled and said, "You're too polite. If I can help you with anything, just ask me."

"It's not something troublesome, but your work impacts our country's future. I don't want Jin Ling University to delay any of your work, or else I will have to apologize to the country!"

Principal Xu smiled at Lu Zhou and continued, "Here's the thing. A while ago, the Ministry of Education came to visit Jin Ling University. I talked with the Ministry of Education director, and we think there is still a lot of room for improvement in the current education system. Therefore, we plan on adding an accelerated class for majors such as physics and mathematics. This way, we can focus our training on talented students!"

Lu Zhou nodded toward Principal Xu and said, "We should take undergraduate education more seriously. A scholar often comes into contact with the academic world in their undergraduate years. However, we shouldn't overdo it. Otherwise, the students would be disinterested because of the extra burden."

Principal Xu nodded and said, "I understand, that's why we are starting a trial class. If the trial isn't successful, we will reevaluate our plans!"

"I think it's a good plan." Lu Zhou smiled and said, "But I don't know how I can help."

Principal Xu smiled and said, "Of course you can help. You are the role model for our mathematics students! I heard that there are people who worship the library seat you used to sit at!"

Lu Zhou coughed and said, "You're too kind, the students are just exaggerating."

"They're not, I'm being serious." Principal Xu waved his hand and said solemnly to Lu Zhou, "Undergraduate studies are something us old folks aren't familiar with anymore. We grew up in different times."

"I hope you can be the chief consultant for the pilot class. It won't take up too much time, and you just have to provide us with your valuable opinions."

If it were before, Lu Zhou wouldn't have realized what was going on.

But now, he realized what Principal Xu was asking. The Ministry of Education probably wanted Lu Zhou to put his name on this program as this would make it easier for the Communist Party of China to approve this program.

However, despite knowing this, Lu Zhou didn't say anything.

This favor was a piece of cake for him. Jin Ling University, as his alma mater, had helped him both in academia and outside of academia. He should do something in return.

Not to mention this would benefit Jin Ling University students.

Lu Zhou smiled and said, "Piece of cake, I'll gladly be the chief consultant."

Principal Xu smiled brightly.

"The Jin Ling University students will be grateful, God Lu."

Lu Zhou nearly choked on his tea, and he said, "Haha, please don't say that, it's weird enough that students call me that."

Principal Xu smiled and said, "Haha, okay… Oh yeah, speaking of this pilot class thing, we plan on naming it the Nobel Class. What do you think?"

Lu Zhou thought for a second and shook his head.

"I don't think it's appropriate."

"Why?" Principal Xu frowned and said, "Why?"

"The Nobel Prize is a worthy goal young scholars should fight for, but it's not the end of academia. We plan on using this pilot class to train academic talents, so I don't think the students should be brainwashed to think of the Nobel Prize as the ultimate end goal." Lu Zhou paused for a second and said, "After all, I didn't choose to become a scholar because of the Nobel Prize or the Fields Medal. There are other things that are more important."

Principal Xu: "Then what do you think we should call it?"

Lu Zhou thought for a bit and spoke.

"Young scholars are the future of our country. They will be the leaders of the next decades.

"I think that we should cultivate these young scholars by planting a seed in each of their hearts. After that seed grows, they will grow into useful people in academia, civilization, and society!

"Therefore, I think the class should be called the Class of Youth!"

After hearing Lu Zhou's words, Principal Xu went silent for a second.

After a while, he spoke emotionally.

"This is why I needed your help."

He slapped his thigh and nodded.

"We'll call it the Class of Youth then!"

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Chapter 817: Things to Do Before Resigning

Lu Zhou actually didn't have any extremely high ambitions.

He realized this about himself recently.

In the face of the universe, his influence was ultimately tiny.

He could spend months locking himself in his tiny room, trying to solve an equation or a conjecture by himself. However, for giant system engineering missions, he needed a team of scholars from many disciplines. It was no longer a solo-mission.

Even though he could design the ion thruster propulsion system perfectly, he couldn't build the propulsion system himself. He needed other people to help him.

If he wanted to have an impact on this world, he needed other people's help.

As an academic leader, his responsibilities went far beyond exploration and discovery. He was also responsible for guiding the next generation of scholars.

The more he pushed the boundaries of human knowledge, the more he realized how important it was to push human boundaries.

Just like Lu Zhou had expected, a week after he joined the Class of Youth program, the Ministry of Education approved the program.

The Class of Youth was a class that specialized in training academic talents. Second-year undergraduate students would be allowed to apply, and only 30 of the top students would be chosen.

As the chief consultant, Lu Zhou gave a lot of valuable opinions with regard to the training of the Class of Youth program.

He hoped that he could use his experience to guide these young students onto the correct path…

Even though this took up a bit of Lu Zhou's time, it didn't affect his work at the Lunar Orbit Committee.

As October came to an end, good news came from the China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation.

After countless days and months of design and practice, the second component of the Lunar Mining Program, the automated smelting unit, finally went from a concept to reality.

The Long March 5 vehicle sent the automated smelting unit to the cargo bay of the International Space Station. It was then sent to the Moon through the Magpie Bridge.

After a week of hard work, with the help from the Moon Palace staff members, the automated smelting unit finally landed on the Moon's surface. The automated smelting unit was then connected with the already deployed automated mining unit.

Once the automated mining unit was activated, the sharp drill bit began to crush into the titanium ore deposits in the lunar soil. The titanium ores were then sent to the automated smelting unit.

Even though this production line didn't have high efficiency, the high-quality titanium alloy materials were still being produced at a slow and steady rate.

When Lu Zhou looked at the progress of his system mission, he felt quite good. This meant that the system recognized his automated lunar mining facility.

If this trend continued, he should be able to complete this branch mission within a month.

While the branch mission was progressing steadily, the main Control of Earth and Moon mission was also progressing.

In order to cure the colonist who was still in a coma, and to properly preserve and research the X-0172 bacterial samples, the lunar research facility had received fundings from various countries and was about to begin construction.

If everything went according to plan, it should be finished by the middle of next year.

On the other hand, with the installation of several experimental modules and multifunction cabins, the second phase of the Moon Palace came to an end.

China's Moon Palace project was nearly complete, whereas the American's "Lunar Gateway" project had barely begun. Waves of criticism were directed at the Ares program and NASA.

The public was so supportive of the New Virginia colonists, but it became such a disappointment. Even though NASA had accomplished a lot over the past two decades, all of that accomplishment was overshadowed by the failure of the Ares program.

American public figures said that the past 20 years was a complete waste of time.

Ever since the Cold War, they had been slowly losing their advantage in the space race…

The Chinese, on the other hand, didn't care too much about the space race. They were just happy to see their space station orbiting the Moon.

The entire aerospace industry was changing.

It was almost like there was a rocket, pushing the entire industry forward…

It felt like the entire world was evolving…

…

Only three days remained until the Ares program astronauts would return to Earth.

Lu Zhou took a high-speed rail train to Beijing and participated in the final Mars Rescue conference.

After the conference ended, Lu Zhou didn't immediately return to his hotel. Instead, he went to the State Administration for National Defense and handed Director Li a proposal.

"… Plan for the restructuring of the Lunar Orbit Committee?" Director Li saw the proposal Lu Zhou brought over and adjusted his glasses. He asked, "You're not going to… ditch us, right?"

This happened with the controllable fusion project as well.

After the project was successful, Lu Zhou began working on his next project. Not long after they achieved fusion ignition, Lu Zhou quit his chief designer position.

Lu Zhou looked at Director Li and smiled.

"Not quite. After the lunar research facility is built, I have something important to do. I won't leave my chief designer position until that important thing is done."

Director Li sighed in relief and replied, "Sometimes, I'm quite impressed that you're able to give up power so easily."

"Yeah…" Lu Zhou smiled and casually said, "At least for me, anything outside of research is mostly a waste of time."

Director Li: "Then what? After the lunar stuff is over, what do you plan on doing next? The second generation of nuclear fusion? Mars?"

"Neither…" Lu Zhou shook his head and said, "I've done enough for the aerospace industry, after that… I think I'll set some time aside for myself to explore the things that interest me."

"Oh, I see…"

Even though Director Li didn't know specifically what Lu Zhou meant, he knew what Lu Zhou was feeling.

He spoke solemnly.

"When you step down from your Lunar Orbit Committee position, if I haven't retired yet, you can call me if you ever need anything. I'll do my best to help you."

Lu Zhou gently smiled.

"I definitely will."

Director Li: "Oh yeah, can I ask, before you resign… What 'important thing' do you plan on doing?"

Lu Zhou smirked and replied, "Remember the lunar engineering conference a year ago?"

"Of course I do." Director Li smiled and said, "Time really flies by. Before this, we were talking about how to land on the Moon, and now, we're talking about building houses on the Moon."

"We can do more than just build houses there. We can also bring lunar resources back to Earth." Lu Zhou took out a pen and drew two lines on a piece of white paper.

Director Li stared at the two straight lines and squinted his eyes. He was puzzled.

"What is this?"

"This is the last phase of the entire Earth-Moon transport system." Lu Zhou paused for a second and said, "Remember the mass driver I talked about?

"It will be difficult to build the mass driver on Earth.

"But we can try building it on the Moon!"

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Chapter 818: Local Specialties

The third Monday in October.

This was an extraordinary day for the two space race super countries.

According to the Mars Rescue plan announced in the previous press conference, today was the day the two astronauts would return to their respective countries.

The greatest human rescue in history would finally come to an end.

The two astronauts had suffered greatly over the past couple of months, and they were both mentally and physically exhausted.

After asking the astronauts for their own opinions, Julia, a Dutch citizen, would return to Amsterdam directly on a flight provided by the Dutch government, while Johnson, as an American, would return to his home country on a flight arranged by the White House.

Beijing International Airport.

The Chinese government arranged a grand handover ceremony.

When Johnson stood at the special security entrance, he saw the person who established the rescue plan, the chief designer of the Lunar Orbit Committee—Lu Zhou.

"Thank you." Johnson trembled as he shook Lu Zhou's hand. He said, "Thank you for bringing us back from Mars!"

Even though Lu Zhou was probably the biggest competitor to NASA, this didn't prevent Johnson from giving Lu Zhou the utmost respect and gratitude.

"You're welcome." Lu Zhou smiled as he shook this astronaut's hand. He said, "Come visit China again some time."

"I will." Johnson let go of Lu Zhou's hand and looked at the American diplomat next to him. He took a deep breath and said, "Ok then… It's time for me to go."

"Ok, go on." Lu Zhou waved his hand and said, "Tell Carson I said hi."

"I definitely will!"

Johnson picked up his carry-on luggage and boarded the plane.

After a while, the hatch was closed, and the flight took off.

The engine roared as the plane disappeared into the skyline.

Lu Zhou looked at the plane fly away and squinted his eyes. He then turned around and was about to leave.

The American diplomat standing next to him smiled.

"Thank you for everything you did for the Americans. This moment will be remembered in history."

"No need to thank me. Even though we are from different countries, we are all humans." Lu Zhou shook the diplomat's hand and said, "We should work as one nation."

The diplomat smiled.

"We should!"

There was a banquet scheduled after the handover ceremony.

Lu Zhou didn't like this kind of occasion, so he decided not to attend the Mars Rescue banquet.

As for himself, he returned to his hotel.

In the hotel lobby, Lu Zhou asked to borrow the hotel printer. He told the staff members to send the printer to his room. He then went into his room and took out an unfinished mass driver thesis from his suitcase. He sat at his desk and contemplated it for a while before he began to improve the thesis.

Actually, he had thought about this lunar mass driver idea for a while.

All the way back in 2012, NASA had a similar idea. They even did a technical demonstration, and the relevant theses could be found online.

In theory, the acceleration technology used in this device was similar to maglev trains.

By using a long and narrow track with electromagnetic acceleration, the ore or spacecraft could be accelerated to orbital velocity speeds, then directly "shot" into orbit.

Of course, even though this sounded easy in principle, it was very difficult to execute.

As the chief designer of the Lunar Orbit Committee, Lu Zhou didn't need to create a detailed drawing of the entire project. Instead, he just needed to conduct an overview assessment of the entire project.

For example, how long should the track be? What was the cost per meter of track length? Would it be technically feasible? What were the risks? More importantly, which crater should they build it on?

Lu Zhou already asked the researchers on the Moon Palace to collect all of the relevant resources.

Because he had a level 5 in engineering, and he was the chief designer of the Lunar Orbit Committee, it wasn't very difficult for him to complete the entire thesis.

Lu Zhou clicked his mouse and pressed the printing option.

Soon after, the printer in his room began to hum and spit out freshly printed pages.

Lu Zhou looked at the newly-printed pages and began double-checking the thesis. He felt a little hungry. Suddenly, he heard knocking sounds at his door. Wang Peng came in while carrying a plastic bag.

"You're still working?"

"Yeah." Lu Zhou put down the thesis, and when he noticed the plastic bag, he asked, "What are you holding?"

"I went to the headquarters in the afternoon, and I brought you back some local specialties."

Wang Peng placed the plastic bag on Lu Zhou's desk.

"Is it Peking duck?" Lu Zhou's eyes lit up, and he said, "Delicious, where is it from?"

"Oh, I bought it from this local shop." Wang Peng smiled and said, "It's not very famous, but I think the flavor is authentic."

"It does smell nice." Lu Zhou opened the plastic bag and took a whiff. He looked at the delicious crispy roast duck and said, "If only there were some beer as well."

Wang Peng, who had just sat down on the sofa, stood up.

"What do you want to drink, I'll buy it for you."

"No, it's fine, I can just call the hotel for room service." Lu Zhou opened the drawer and took out a folder. He placed the freshly printed thesis into the folder and said, "Rather than buying beer, there is something I need you to deliver."

Wang Peng immediately asked, "Deliver to where?"

Lu Zhou gave Wang Peng the folder.

"Chang'an Avenue.

"You should know who to give it to."

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Chapter 819: Who Can Stop Them?

The last part of a journey was always the most difficult.

After more than ten hours of flying, the direct flight from Beijing to America finally landed on the Los Angeles International Airport runway.

The airport had been preparing for this arrival since last night.

China and United States flags were displayed along the airport VIP runway.

Local state legislators, representatives of citizen groups, and White House and NASA officials from Washington stood around the airstair. With media cameras pointed at them, they welcomed their astronaut's return.

"Welcome home, my hero." The vice president shook Johnson's hand and said, "You must have gone through a lot."

"Thanks," Johnson said to the vice president. He spoke in an exhausted voice, "Where is my wife?"

"She is here, your kids are here as well."

The vice president moved to the side.

A beautiful blond-haired child ran into Johnson's arms.

"Daddy!"

"Oh, my pumpkin… Did you miss Daddy?" Johnson said as he rubbed his daughter's head. A smile appeared on his tired face.

His daughter's angel-like smile made all of his fatigue disappear.

His wife walked toward him with tears in her eyes. His two other sons were there as well. He gave all of them a hug.

Julia spoke with her husband's arms wrapped around her.

"You finally came back."

Johnson's nose was buried in his wife's hair. He took a deep breath before speaking with a trembling voice.

"I'm sorry…"

Not far away, the reporters' cameras captured this touching moment, displaying it on national television.

However, for Johnson, this didn't matter.

What mattered was that his suffering was finally worth it.

Because he was finally home…

After Johnson let go of his wife, he shook hands with everyone who came to welcome him home.

Even though the Ares program failed, no one blamed the hero who risked his life for the Ares program.

Being able to return from tens of millions of kilometers away was a remarkable thing in itself.

As Johnson sat in the VIP car near the runway, he leaned back in his seat and began to relax. He was waiting for his family to join him, but instead, Director Carson and the vice president got in the car.

The car door closed.

Johnson looked at the vice president sitting across from him and asked, "You plan on sending me and my family back to Arizona in this car?"

"Not quite, we will arrange a hotel in Los Angeles for you first. You will fly home a week after that," the vice president said. He looked at Director Carson. He then said, "I'm sorry to interrupt your reunion with your family, but Director Carson and I… want to talk about some things with you."

"Regarding the Moon Palace and Starlight… and everything else you saw." Carson forced a smile and said, "You know, the things that you couldn't say using the Chinese communication channels."

Johnson said, "I don't think the Chinese would have cared. Otherwise, they wouldn't have let me come back."

Director Carson and the vice president looked at each other. They then looked at Johnson.

"Maybe you need some rest? If you do, we can talk about this tomorrow…"

"No need." Johnson shook his head and said, "Let's talk about this now, it won't take long. I don't want to waste tomorrow discussing this issue."

"Ok, thanks for your cooperation." Director Carson gave him an encouraging look and said, "Then… Let's start with Starlight."

Johnson nodded and said, "No problem, I can only tell you what I saw… Also, I hope you won't be too surprised."

He closed his eyes and began to tap into his memory. With NASA Director Carson and the vice president sitting across from him, he began to speak about his journey back to Earth.

"The Chinese spacecraft is large, and it had two wings and a blue flame at the back of the spacecraft… I think not fire, it might be plasma? When I looked at the spacecraft in my return capsule, it felt like the return capsule was a tiny sailboat sailing next to the giant ship. They easily took in the rescue capsule and provided us with food and water… They even gave us private bathrooms.

"Our Starlight's cabins were probably intended to be used as storage, but the facilities were quite complete. The most shocking thing was their attitude toward electricity. It felt like there was an unlimited amount of energy on Starlight. No one told us how much electricity or water we could use. Other than restricting us to our rooms during certain hours of the day, there was much more freedom on Starlight. It was almost like a cruise ship.

"The Moon Palace was even more surprising."

Johnson's face lit up as he continued, "It's like a fortress… A castle floating in the sky. The solar panels and heat sinks were like a garden. Any spacecraft seemed tiny compared to the Moon Palace."

The Moon Palace was obviously more surprising for Johnson.

Over the next ten minutes or so, he described his life on the Moon Palace.

The two people sitting across from him stayed completely silent.

After Johnson finished talking, the inside of the car went silent for a while.

The vice president took a deep breath and took out his glasses. He wiped his glasses with a cloth and spoke with a trembling voice.

"Jesus… That's incredible."

If our astronaut is telling the truth…

Then China's aerospace technology is unimaginably strong!

Johnson had a smirk on his face as he replied sarcastically, "It is indeed incredible…"

He looked outside the car window. When he saw a dome-shaped building nearby, he squinted and asked out of curiosity, "What is that?"

It had been five years since he last visited Los Angeles.

He didn't remember seeing this strange looking building near the airport.

"That? That is our National Ignition Facility, the Californian 'artificial sun'." The vice president smiled and looked at Director Carson as he said, "It's ok, my friend, there's no need to be frustrated. Even though the Ares program failed, the federal government's determination for the space race remains the same."

"Californian sun… Is that right?" Johnson smiled and said, "By the time we finish building it, they would have built a nuclear fusion device on the moon."

Even though Johnson didn't specify who he meant by "they", it was obvious what he meant.

The vice president was stunned, and he replied, "They are not allowed to conduct nuclear activities on the Moon."

"Maybe…" Johnson said casually, "But if they do, who is going to stop them? Director Carson? The president? The Congressional Budget Office?"

I don't think anyone…

Can stop the Chinese…

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Chapter 820: Lunar Mass Driver

Beijing.

A conference room at Chang'an Avenue.

Academician Wang Rongjun was wearing a gray coat. He slowly walked into the conference room and found his seat. He placed his vacuum flask on the table.

He looked at the table and tried to find the conference documents, but he couldn't find anything at all.

Academician Wang Rongjun was confused, and he was about to ask a staff member when he heard a voice next to him.

"Old Wang, what are you doing here?"

Wang Rongjun looked over and saw Chief Engineer Academician Li Qingquan from China Railway Group. Academician Li Qingquan began walking over.

When Wang Rongjun saw his old friend, his eyes widened!

"I was going to ask you that! Last time I asked you to go drinking with me, you said you were at a meeting in another city; how come you're in Beijing now?"

"Yeah, I had a meeting in another city, but suddenly, the State Administration for National Defense called me and told me there was a secret meeting here. They even bought me the flight tickets. I thought this meeting was confidential, so I didn't tell you." Academician Li Qingquan coughed and said, "I didn't expect you to be invited as well."

"If even you were invited, then of course they would invite me." Academician Wang picked up his vacuum flask and unscrewed the lid. He took a sip and looked around the crowded conference room. He said, "There are quite a few big names here."

Not only were there academicians from the China Railway Company, but the academicians from the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation and China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation were also invited.

Other than that, there were also some unfamiliar faces. They didn't look like they came from the industry, nor did they look like they came from academia. They seemed like they came from a military research organization.

He began recalling the phone call he received two days ago.

During the phone call, the person didn't tell him what the conference was about. However, by looking at the big names here, it seemed like this was going to be an important conference…

"Yeah," Academician Li Qingquan nodded and said, "all of the transportation industry big names are here… Maybe our country wants to plan a new super-high-speed railway project?"

Academician Li Qingquan's eyes lit up, and he became extremely excited.

The super-high-speed railway was a concept proposed by the China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation. It used "magnetic levitation and vacuum tubes" technology to achieve supersonic speeds. It had a theoretical speed of 1,000 kilometers per hour.

When China's high-speed railway trains reached 350 kilometers, there had been plans about building a super-high-speed railway system. The technology had been proven to be feasible, and many academicians had supported it. However, the project was never initiated.

One was due to safety reasons, and the other was because China already had a 350 kilometers per hour railway system, so there wasn't much demand for a much faster railway.

It was more profitable and meaningful for China to export its railway technology to other third world countries such as Africa.

However, on this day, the State Administration for National Defense suddenly invited many big names from the transportation industry to this conference. People couldn't help but get excited.

"Who knows…" Academician Wang Rongjun shook his head and said, "We'll see what the State Administration for National Defense has to say."

"You're right." Academician Li Qingquan smiled and said, "The conference is about to begin, surely they will tell us what this conference is about."

It was exactly 10 o'clock in the morning. All of the attendees were in the conference room. The conference room staff closed the main entrance doors, and the meeting officially began.

Director Li from the State Administration for National Defense was the meeting host. When he walked on stage, all of the chatter in the room disappeared. Many people had a serious look on their faces.

"Thank you all very much for taking time out of your busy schedules to participate in this meeting." Director Li cleared his throat and said, "The reason why we invited you today is that we have an important matter that needs to be consulted with experts.

"Due to the confidential nature of this matter, we were not able to disclose any information prior to this conference. I hope you all understand.

"Also, I hope you can keep the conference content strictly confidential. At the same time, do not hesitate to give your own opinions. If you have any good ideas, feel free to share them."

A projector shined on the projector screen in the conference room.

Once everyone saw the projected picture, the previously quiet conference room started to become noisy.

People looked at each other with astonished eyes.

Lunar mass driver!

People had their own guesses on what the State Administration for National Defense wanted to talk about today, but none of them expected the conference to be about the mass driver.

Academician Li Qingquan was slightly disappointed that the conference wasn't about the super-high-speed rail. Academician Wang Rongjun, who was sitting next to him, had his mouth wide open.

After a while, Wang Rongjun asked, "Are they building a high-speed rail on the Moon?"

Director Li cleared his throat and spoke in a serious manner.

"According to the construction plans provided by the Lunar Orbit Committee, we plan on building an acceleration track on a lunar crater…

"By using electromagnetic acceleration, the object will be accelerated to the Moon's escape velocity, then launched into lunar orbit through another inclined track…

"The construction will begin at the same time as the lunar research facilities. The first-phase project budget is 200 billion yuan. More than 70 universities, research institutes, and companies will be involved."

As Academician Li Qingquan listened to the State Administration for National Defense director speak, he had a slight smile on his face.

200 billion yuan for the first phase of the project!

They're basically building another Moon Palace on the Moon!

Academician Wang Rongjun frowned at the PowerPoint on the screen, and he suddenly said, "Building this thing will probably be extremely difficult. Even if we do build it, the power consumption will be astronomical! I'm afraid we'll have to build a fusion reactor on the Moon just to supply this big cannon."

"Big cannon?" Academician Li Qingquan raised his eyebrows. "What do you mean?"

Academician Wang Rongjun replied, "It is basically a big cannon."

The electromagnetic acceleration could accelerate an object to a speed of more than two kilometers per second.

That was much faster than any cannon projectile.

Li Qingquan stared at the PowerPoint and spoke with emotion.

"They've been putting off the super-high-speed rail project for at least half a decade by now."

Academician Wang Rongjun didn't know why his friend was bringing this up, so he looked at him and asked, "I think so… Why?"

Academician Li Qingquan said, "There were a lot of academicians who supported the project, right?"

Academician Wang Rongjun: "What's your point?"

Academician Li Qingquan sighed and said, "Nothing, I'm just feeling a bit emotional."

The super-high-speed railway project would also cost a couple hundred billion, yet it was never approved. This "Moon cannon" project was approved with just the support of one person.

Countless academicians were no match against one person.

There would never be a scholar with as much influence as Lu Zhou…

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Chapter 821: I Want to Study Mathematics With You!

Academician Li was right to be jealous.

Actually, almost the entire Chinese academic community was envious of Lu Zhou.

With a Nobel Prize and a Fields Medal under his belt, not to mention two academician positions, he could easily initiate a ten-figure project just by writing a letter. Thousands of noob researchers would kill to just publish one thesis.

Not to mention, he was only in his twenties…

He was the apex scholar of all scholars.

However, he wasn't just jealous.

In addition to his jealousy, Academician Li Qingquan also admired Lu Zhou. Professor Lu's achievements in China would take most people multiple lifetimes to accomplish.

Therefore, it made sense Lu Zhou was being taken so seriously by the Chinese government.

Lu Zhou was miles ahead of ordinary scholars.

By the time the State Administration for National Defense conference on the lunar mass driver project ended, Lu Zhou had already left Beijing and was on his way back to Jinling.

He finished all of his work for the Lunar Orbit Committee for now. He finally had some time to set the Lunar Orbit Committee aside and focus on Jin Ling University.

Not to mention he still had to mark his students' theses. Hence, he had to come to the mathematics department office every day.

"Yesterday I received a reply from the International Materials Reviews editorial department. Congratulations, your thesis has been published."

Han Mengqi stood in front of Lu Zhou's desk, and she was pleased to hear the good news. She sighed in relief and had a comforting smile on her face.

She had been preparing for the past six months for this graduation thesis. The knot in her heart was finally untied, and she could take a break for now, at least until next summer.

Lu Zhou looked at Han Mengqi and smiled.

"Don't relax just yet, have you thought about what to do after graduation?"

Han Mengqi scratched her head and shook her head. She hesitated for a bit and said, "I… haven't thought about it."

"Start thinking about it…" Lu Zhou looked at her with a serious expression and said, "If you want to do a PhD, you should start preparing by the beginning of next year. If you want to graduate, you should start looking for a job soon. If you're applying for jobs, I can write a recommendation letter for you."

Han Mengqi stared at the ground and said in an awkward manner, "Professor, can I ask you a question?"

Lu Zhou smiled and said, "Go ahead, answering questions is my job."

"What does… doing a PhD feel like?"

"What does it feel like? That's quite a generic question." Lu Zhou contemplated it for a second before saying, "How should I describe it… Actually, it's quite similar to what you're doing right now. The only difference is your mentality."

"Mentality?" Han Mengqi tilted her head, and she was intrigued. "Can you be more specific?"

Lu Zhou: "Simply speaking, PhD and master's students do roughly the same thing. The difference is that master's students are mainly focused on learning scientific research tools, such as graphical models or Markov chain simulations. They use these tools to solve the small problems they encounter in their scientific research. During this stage, the tools used to solve these problems are recommended to the students by the supervisor. The students are responsible for finding the solution."

"But for PhD students…" Lu Zhou paused for a second and recalled his time as a PhD student. He then said, "Phd students are mainly responsible for solving problems with new tools. The problems can be created by the students or the supervisors. At this stage, the students would have the ability to find new, novel problems. They might also be able to create new tools. That means, when you're a PhD student, you're doing scientific research on your own… Do you get what I'm trying to say?"

"Ah…"

Han Mengqi, who wasn't paying attention, suddenly looked at Lu Zhou.

She noticed Lu Zhou was staring back at her, and she suddenly blushed and scratched her head as she said, "Sorry… I kind of dozed off."

Lu Zhou said, "It's fine, I can tell you're thinking about a million things right now. Whenever I get confused because of a problem, I tend to lose my attention span as well. No need to apologize."

Han Mengqi asked, "You get confused by problems as well?"

Lu Zhou played with the pen in his hand. He went silent for a while, as if he didn't know how to answer this question.

However, after contemplating for a bit, he answered vaguely, "Of course, everyone encounters difficult problems at times. Even I can't make the right decision all of the time. Even today, there's a problem that I can't find a good solution to."

Han Mengqi was suddenly curious about what problem Lu Zhou was talking about.

Han Mengqi took a deep breath and encouraged herself to ask.

"Can I ask what problem it is?"

"It's a personal problem…" Lu Zhou coughed and said, "Anyway, you are talented at scientific research. If you continue on the academic path, I'd recommend you to choose the computational materials science field. Especially fields such as the Berry phase and topological effects in phonons, the development of 3D topological materials, and hydrogen storage. These are all popular fields, and you will be able to produce good research."

The goal of computational materials science was mainly to build predictable or descriptive models to help study the mechanism of materials and reduce the time and cost of new material development.

Ten years ago, this was still a new discipline, but now, it had become mature. Especially after the 2018 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, many research institutes opened a computational materials science research department. Most of the time, a strong materials science research department would hire a talented PhD student, so it had relatively good job prospects.

As for easy to produce good research…

Honestly, that was just relative to Lu Zhou's other laboratories.

The Jinling Institute for Advanced Study was a world-leading experimental institution in fields such as aerospace materials, carbon materials, and new energy. Many materials science academic journals had even "retained" the theses produced by this institute. Therefore, it was easy for the Institute for Advanced Study to produce good research in this field.

Han Mengqi went silent for a while, and Lu Zhou stared at her while playing with a pen. Lu Zhou suddenly asked, "What are you thinking?"

"I think…"

Han Mengqi bit her lip and contemplated it for a long time.

Finally, she looked up with determination and said, "I want to… study mathematics with you!"

Lu Zhou: "…?"

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Chapter 822: One Question Exam

Study…

Mathematics?

Lu Zhou was confused.

He went silent for a while. He then coughed and said, "Computational materials science is also a type of mathematics…"

"I don't want to learn computational materials science." Han Mengqi shook her head stubbornly and said, "I only want to study mathematics."

She felt like her sentence wasn't clear, so she quickly added, "I mean, study pure mathematics."

"Pure mathematics…"

Lu Zhou heard her request and felt a headache.

He normally didn't want to tell others what to do with their lives…

But…

Lu Zhou put down the pen and laid his hands on the table with his fingers interlocked. He looked at Han Mengqi with a serious expression and asked, "Can you tell me why? You've studied computational materials science for three years, why are you suddenly switching to pure mathematics?"

Normally speaking, it was common to see people switch from pure mathematics to applied mathematics fields. However, it was very rare to see people do the reverse.

If it were someone else, Lu Zhou wouldn't care. But Han Mengqi was his most talented computational materials science student.

Even Jerick, who attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, wasn't as talented as her.

Obviously, Lu Zhou felt a little disappointed she was leaving the computational materials science field.

After all, he spent a lot of effort training her.

Han Mengqi avoided eye contact and hesitated for a bit.

"I don't like chemistry at all… After choosing chemistry, I already wanted to switch to mathematics. Jin Ling University did that undergraduate student training program, and I had good grades. I was then convinced by the teacher and signed up…"

She felt like this was a horrible reason, and she didn't even want to continue speaking.

Transfer?

Lu Zhou was astonished.

Oh Jesus, little girl, you're graduating with a master's degree, yet you're still thinking about transferring just because you wanted to transfer when you were 18?

"Transferring is fine, I also transferred to mathematics." Lu Zhou tried to convince her and said, "The key is if it's suitable or not…"

"Not suitable or not." Han Mengqi shook her head and looked at Lu Zhou seriously as she said, "It's whether I like it or not."

Lu Zhou looked at her serious face and paused for a second.

Speaking of which, I think this is the first time she has disagreed with me…

Lu Zhou thought back to one of his quotes and sighed. He then repeated that quote.

"You're right, interest is the best teacher."

Even if it weren't for the high tech system, he would still be studying mathematics out of pure interest. That feeling of being immersed in the mathematics world was why he chose mathematics in the first place.

If his best student wanted to study mathematics…

He shouldn't convince her otherwise.

Even if computational materials science was a better choice for her.

After hearing Lu Zhou's approval, Han Mengqi's face lit up. She happily spoke.

"Then I…"

Lu Zhou interrupted Han Mengqi and said, "I won't stop you, but it's not easy being my mathematics PhD student… especially when it comes to pure mathematics."

Han Mengqi bit her lip and spoke with determination.

"No problem… I will work hard."

"Some things can't be obtained just by hard work. Mathematics is a discipline that requires talent, especially pure mathematics. There are many people who research mathematics, but very few are able to produce results. Some people spent their entire lives learning what other people have created, and never create anything themselves."

Lu Zhou took out a piece of draft paper and picked up the pen on his table. He thought for ten seconds and wrote down a line of equations on the paper.

[For any real number s 1, define ζ (s) = Σ1 / (m s) …]

Han Mengqi looked at the formula and narrowed her eyes.

"This is…?"

It looks simple.

Lu Zhou said, "It's the Riemann zeta function."

After that, he wrote down another line.

[… Prove that ζ(2n) is a transcendental number.]

Han Mengqi heard of Riemann before and knew that the problem wasn't easy. Her voice trembled as she asked, "Are you really going to give me such a difficult assignment already?"

"Don't think it's difficult just because it's Riemann. He's been dead for more than a century." Lu Zhou smiled and handed Han Mengqi the piece of paper. He said, "Also, this isn't an assignment, this is an exam."

"Exam?"

"Yes." Lu Zhou nodded and said, "If you can solve this problem, you can study a pure mathematics PhD with me."

He paused for two seconds before adding another sentence, "Of course, if you want to study computational materials under me, my office doors are always open."

After all, Lu Zhou was quite satisfied with her paper on topological crystal insulators. If this little girl could stop romanticizing mathematics and return to computational materials, he would certainly welcome her.

Pure mathematics…

Wasn't an easy field to learn.

Han Mengqi stared at the draft paper, and as she looked at the problem that asked her to prove the transcendental numbers, her head began to spin.

Forget about solving it, she didn't even understand the question.

When she was studying computational materials science, the mathematical methods she used were mainly in the fields of functional analysis, geometry, and topology. She had never studied analytic number theory before…

However…

She wasn't going to give up.

Han Mengqi looked up at Lu Zhou and clenched her teeth.

"Don't expect me to give up… I will start researching now."

"Of course not, I'm looking forward to your answer." Lu Zhou smiled and said, "However, you only have two months. I expect an answer by the end of this year."

"I don't need two months, one month is enough."

She picked up the piece of draft paper and left the office.

Once the office door closed, the office returned to quietness again.

Lu Zhou looked at He Changwen, who was sitting at a desk nearby. He Changwen was his pure mathematics PhD student.

"Hey, Changwen, if I asked you to prove that ζ (2n) is a transcendental number, how many different proofs could you come up with?"

He Changwen, who was writing something, hesitated for a second.

"I can think of… one way… Oh wait, no, two ways."

He Changwen spoke confidently.

Lu Zhou nodded and replied, "Two ways is pretty good."

He Changwen hesitated for a moment and asked, "Isn't that question too difficult for a master's student?"

He couldn't help but listen to the conversation that happened just now.

For most people who didn't study mathematics in their undergraduate or master's years, this problem was indeed quite difficult.

Not only did Han Menqi lack pure mathematics knowledge, but this was also a test of her mathematics thinking abilities. Abstract mathematical thinking wasn't an easy thing for mathematics students to learn, let alone a layman who had never studied pure mathematics.

Lu Zhou smiled gently.

"PhD students should be able to find problems and find answers themselves.

"If she can come up with the solution herself, that would be great.

"If she can't, then it means she is not talented in this area. She should think carefully about what she wants to do in the future."

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Chapter 823: Letter From IMU

In fact, Lu Zhou hoped Han Mengqi would give up on pure mathematics because of that question.

Even though this was an open-ended question, anyone in this field knew that this question wasn't easy to answer.

Because it was related to a classic Riemann zeta function problem.

Which was, the transcendental value of the Riemann zeta function at the odd positive integer points.

Just like He Changwen had said, this wasn't a problem that could be solved by laymen.

She had to be extremely talented, self-learn the relevant knowledge of number theory, collect the literature regarding the Riemann zeta function, and conduct some research on her own…

But then again, if she was indeed really talented in the field of pure mathematics, Lu Zhou would be happy to accept her as a student.

Lu Zhou had been thinking about a problem recently.

The "medal" he received from a higher level civilization some time ago revealed a very important piece of information to him.

Which was that human beings were not alone in this universe. Human beings had even been observed by higher-level civilizations, but they hadn't been contacted yet.

There were many possible reasons for this. It could be due to the long distances in space, or it could also be due to the cultural differences of the other civilizations. Or, the other civilizations could have already disappeared thousands of years ago…

Regardless of which scenario was true, so far, the system had information about a high-level civilization. It was likely the only way he could obtain information regarding this higher-level civilization.

It seemed like if he wanted to crack open the secrets of the system, he had to have level 10 in all of his disciplines.

If he wanted to upgrade his disciplines to level 10, he would first have to level up his mathematics to level 10 first. This was because his mathematics level set the upper limits for the levels of his other disciplines.

The only problem was that 3 million experience points wasn't that easy to obtain.

Only the mathematical crown of the world—the Riemann hypothesis—could provide this much experience points.

The "Control of Earth and Moon" mission was under control. After the Magpie Bridge increased the lunar transfer capacity to a new magnitude, both the Moon Palace and the lunar research facility would be completed. It was only a matter of time.

Because of this, all of Lu Zhou's extra time was used to study mathematics.

From his past experiences, he realized that the project he was currently working on had a high probability of being a system mission in the future. Even though he didn't know what this probability was, it didn't hurt to be prepared.

The day after he assigned the zeta function "exam" to Han Mengqi, Lu Zhou walked into his office at 8 o'clock in the morning. He placed his laptop on the table and asked Assistant Zhao to make him a cup of instant coffee. He then sat at his desk and began working.

Zhao Huan walked toward his desk with a cup of warm coffee. After she placed the coffee on his desk, she took out a document and spoke softly.

"Professor, after you left work yesterday, Principal Xu came here. He told me to give you this."

Class of Youth conference meeting notes?

After looking at the document title, Lu Zhou raised his eyebrows. He reached over and flipped through the pages.

"I'll find some time to read through it, thanks."

"Okay, professor!"

Assistant Zhao nodded and walked back to her desk.

Lu Zhou leaned on his desk and drank his coffee while reading through the conference notes.

Generally speaking, the Jin Ling University Class of Youth program was going pretty smoothly. They received approval from the relevant government departments, and they were about to select the first cohort of students.

Lu Zhou cleared his throat and looked at He Changwen, who was sitting nearby reading theses. Lu Zhou spoke.

"Changwen, I have something for you to do."

He Changwen, who was bored out of his mind, suddenly looked up with excitement.

"No problem, professor, what research project is it?"

He had been a PhD student under Lu Zhou for nearly three years. Even though he made some progress, it wasn't much. He wasn't particularly talented, and Lu Zhou was too busy. Most of the thesis was done by him alone.

Now that Lu Zhou suddenly said he had something to do, he was very excited.

"Uh… not a research project."

Lu Zhou looked at how excited he was and knew what he was thinking.

Even though Lu Zhou didn't want to hurt his feelings, now was not the time to give him a research project.

After clearing his throat, Lu Zhou continued, "The day after tomorrow, attend the discussion class in Room 101 at Building A. They're all undergraduate students. Be careful when you select the topic, don't let them feel overwhelmed. I need you to prepare a discussion outline and bring it to me tomorrow."

The moment He Changwen heard that it was a discussion class for undergraduate students, he began to frown.

"Professor, can't you give me something more challenging?"

Lu Zhou cleared his throat and said, "Do it properly, this is an important exercise… If you do this well, you will have many challenging tasks waiting for you."

"Yes, sir…"

Lu Zhou was about to start working when a chat window popped up on his laptop.

Xiao Ai: [Master, you have new mail ヾ ( ゚ ゚)]

Xiao Ai: [Email link]

Lu Zhou put down his pen and clicked on the link Xiao Ai sent him.

He saw an unread email lying in his inbox.

When he saw the IMU icon on the email, he looked surprised.

International Mathematical Union?

Lu Zhou quickly opened the email and began reading it.

[Dear Professor Lu Zhou, I'm sorry to disturb you amid your busy schedule. According to the votes of all the representatives at the last International Congress of Mathematicians, the next International Congress of Mathematicians will be held at St. Petersburg, Russia, in 2022. On behalf of IMU, I would like to send you an invitation and hope that you will be able to give a 60-minute report at the St. Petersburg International Congress of Mathematicians…

[If you are interested, we will send you a formal written invitation. If you are busy with research and don't have time to participate, please let us know…

[Herald Holden, Secretary-General of the International Mathematical Union.]

After Lu Zhou carefully read the email, he contemplated for a bit before typing a reply.

[Dear Professor Herald Holden, I am honored to receive your invitation.

[I am planning on attending the International Congress of Mathematicians at St. Petersburg, but I cannot guarantee that I will be there. If everything goes according to plan and I am able to attend, I will upload the content for my 60-minute report prior to the deadline.]

Lu Zhou clicked "Send".

After all of this was done, he leaned back in his office chair and looked outside the window.

Time really flies by…

It's nearly been four years since the last mathematicians congress.

Lu Zhou looked at the view outside his window and couldn't help but think back to four years ago.

Back then, he was still a professor at Princeton, studying the secrets of the Navier–Stokes equations. His life now was much more meaningful and fulfilling.

He started to get nostalgic.

He wondered how his Princeton friends were doing…

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Chapter 824: Friends From Far Away

On the other side of the Earth.

It was night time at the Princeton campus, only a few library rooms were still lit.

Inside a library room, Vera placed a stack of theses on the table. She found a particular line of calculations and spoke.

"… Line 11 on page 27, there's a problem with the formula."

She hadn't changed much over the past three years. The only difference was that her short ponytail had now reached her arm.

If she were wearing a long skirt, one might even mistake her for a real princess. Unfortunately, she often wore teenage-looking clothes, which made people mistake her for a high school visiting student…

"Oh Jesus… My God, you're even more strict than my PhD supervisor…" Molina rubbed her eyebags and grabbed a pen from the table. She stretched her back and stood up.

She didn't like pulling all-nighters, and sitting there all night hurt her shoulders and back. Even though she was one of the younger lecturers, she was still getting quite old.

At least she was when compared to Vera…

Vera smiled awkwardly as she said, "What do you mean, Sophie Morel is way worse than me."

Sophie Morel was Molina's PhD supervisor. The two had worked on the Riemann hypothesis for a long time. After losing the 2018 Nobel Prize, Sophie gave up on the Riemann hypothesis and began researching other areas of study. Surprisingly, Sophie had been doing quite well.

Molina, on the other hand, was still stuck on this age-old question. Even though she went from a PhD student to a Princeton University lecturer, her desire to solve this question was still there.

As for how she ended up working for Vera, it was a long story.

All in all, right now, the two were in the same research project group and had the same goal— solve the Riemann hypothesis.

"No, Vera, you're too humble. That coward could never prove Kakutani's fixed-point theorem so beautifully. She could never study a problem so meticulously…" said Molina. Molina scratched her head and felt irritated. She said, "Damn it, I should have thought of the Odlyzko–Schönhage algorithm a long time ago."

"Bingo, the Odlyzko–Schönhage algorithm," Vera said softly. She wrote down two lines of calculations on a piece of paper and said, "After we correct the algorithm, we can prove that 40% of the non-trivial zero points is on the critical line… Congratulations, Molina, you discovered a method other than Levinson's algorithm that proved Corney's critical line theorem."

Vera was trying to make Molina feel better by congratulating her.

However, Vera wasn't sure if Molina felt better at all.

It took them a month to come up with this idea, and another two months to test this idea. However, in the end, their result was already proved by someone in the 1990s.

The critical line that divided the non-trivial zero points of the z function was still at 40%. If anyone could increase this percentage, they were likely to win the next Fields Medal.

However, even after so many years, no one was able to defeat this dragon.

"This is meaningless…" Molina sighed and said, "Maybe Mathematics Chronicle will accept our thesis."

Vera gave her a look of encouragement and spoke.

"I think they will consider it. After all, we found another use for the Odlyzko–Schönhage algorithm."

Unlike other fields, mathematical research wasn't completely a result-oriented field. Even if someone didn't produce a beautiful result, as long as the proof process was interesting, it might be published. Not to mention that even though Mathematics Chronicle wasn't managed by Princeton anymore, it still had a more "relaxed" attitude regarding Princeton submissions.

However…

It was unlikely for them to publish in large journals such as Annual Mathematics.

"Maybe…" Molina rubbed her messy hair and said, "I think we should change our mindset. A while ago, I found Sir Atiyah's notes, and I think his research is interesting."

Vera's mouth was wide open.

"Molina…"

Molina said," What?"

Vera said in a serious manner, "You should really take a break."

This might be disrespectful toward Sir Atiyah, but long before Atiyah passed away, people had been trying to use his notes, all to no avail.

"Don't worry about me, I'm doing great." Molina rubbed her forehead and said, "Actually, you're right, I think I should take a break."

Anyone who studied Sir Atiyah's notes must be going a little haywire.

Vera sat next to her, and a moment of silence passed before she asked, "Why… are you so determined on solving the Riemann hypothesis?"

Molina replied sarcastically, "Just like how you're determined on getting that guy?"

Vera blushed, and she hesitated for a bit and looked at the thesis on the table.

"I… I'm not as determined as you. It's just that, he was the one who helped me when I needed help the most."

Molina: "But that was many years ago, right?"

Vera nodded in silence.

She was well aware that it was many years ago.

She didn't know if Lu Zhou still remembered what she looked like.

But she remembered exactly what he looked like…

"I feel the same." Molina smiled and grabbed the empty mug on the table as she said, "Mathematics saved me."

Vera looked at her with a puzzled look.

"But why Riemann hypothesis?"

"That's a story for another day."

Molina stood up from her chair, but because of her extreme fatigue, she struggled to maintain her balance. Fortunately, Vera stood up and supported her.

"Thanks." Molina grabbed the chair and smirked as she said, "If he doesn't want you, I'll marry you, sis."

Vera's face turned bright red, and she said, "Sorry, I don't… swing that way."

Molina pouted and smiled.

"Just kidding."

Moline picked up the thesis on the table and quickly walked away.

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Chapter 825: Small World

Generally speaking, someone doing theoretical research was doing one of two things.

They were either reading the relevant literature or working on their thesis.

Even at Lu Zhou's level, he was still tied by this rule. Every day, aside from his miscellaneous work, he would either read theses from the top 3 journals or quietly sit at his desk and think about his own problems.

After the "Control of Earth and Moon" mission chain finished, he planned on returning to mathematics research and reach level 10 in mathematics. Lu Zhou used a keyword software to search for relevant mathematics literature.

Lu Zhou would find and carefully read any theses regarding the Riemann hypothesis or the Riemann function, as long as they were in the top 5 journals.

Even though he knew it was unrealistic for someone in this field to create outstanding research results, he still wanted to get a little inspiration from other people's work.

As usual, Lu Zhou came into the office at 8 o'clock in the morning. After he finished reading He Changwen's discussion class notes, he opened his laptop and checked if there were any relevant theses he should read.

Suddenly, a chat pop-up window appeared on the bottom right corner of his computer screen.

Xiao Ai: [Master, you have a review invitation.~ (•̀•́)]

Thesis review invitation?

Lu Zhou put down his coffee mug and clicked Xiao Ai's email link.

The invitation was from the Mathematics Chronicle.

Lu Zhou still remembered that his first thesis regarding Zhou's conjecture was published in the Mathematics Chronicle. Even though he didn't publish any other thesis on Mathematics Chronicle since then, he would still occasionally receive review invitations from that journal.

Normally speaking, any thesis that was published in this journal had some amount of value.

Lu Zhou was intrigued. He opened the thesis in his email and looked at the thesis title. He raised his eyebrows.

"… Using Odlyzko–Schönhage algorithm to prove Corney's critical line theorem."

Lu Zhou sat up straight and quickly read the thesis abstract. He then began reading the thesis body.

This wasn't a long thesis; it was only 15 pages in total.

The author proved Corney's critical line theorem using a new method. Even though they weren't able to push the 40% number higher, the proof method was still fascinating.

If Lu Zhou recalled correctly, everyone used Levinson's algorithm to research this problem.

After carefully reading the entire thesis, Lu Zhou wrote down his own review and approved the thesis.

Most professors took 3-5 days to review a thesis, Lu Zhou, on the other hand, could instantly spot any problems with the thesis.

Lu Zhou glanced at his screen and paused for a second. He then grabbed his mouse and highlighted some of the formulas.

He didn't know why, but he felt like the formula structures were familiar.

Mathematics Chronicle had a double-blind review system; neither the reviewer nor the author knew who the other person was. However, there were ways to find out who the author was.

Many scholars had the habit of uploading preprints online before submitting it to a journal. It was quite easy to find out who the author was.

Lu Zhou was curious about the author. After all, the thesis had already been reviewed by him, it wasn't illegal for him to find out who the author was.

I want to find out!

Lu Zhou hesitated for a bit and made up his mind. He logged onto arXiv and began searching.

As expected, the author had the habit of uploading their theses online before submission. He easily found the author's information.

When he saw the author's name, he was stunned.

Molina!

And…

Vera Pulyuy.

"This is a small world…"

After a while, Lu Zhou smiled and shook his head. He closed his browser page and went back to the Mathematics Chronicle email.

No wonder he felt the thesis structure was so familiar. He knew both the authors, and one of them was even his student before.

What surprised him was that Molina hadn't given up on the Riemann hypothesis, and she even brought Vera into this mess.

Lu Zhou was hesitant about whether he should send Vera an email and ask how her research was going. Suddenly, the office door opened and someone walked in.

"Hey, Lu Zhou, look who's here!"

Lu Zhou looked up at the door and said to Luo Wenxuan, "You came here from Beijing?"

"I came from Switzerland. I went to CERN for a two-month business trip. I just came back today," Luo Wenxuan said. He pulled out a chair and sat across from Lu Zhou.

When he saw Lu Zhou's piece of draft paper on the table, he was intrigued. He picked up the draft paper and asked curiously, "The Riemann hypothesis? When did you start attacking this question?"

Lu Zhou smiled and said, "Just doing some research for fun."

"Wow, what a fun activity…" Luo Wenxuan pulled out a file and said, "Anyway, I did what you asked!"

Lu Zhou picked up the document and glanced at it. He looked surprised.

"Already?"

This was the project plan for the lunar hadron collider!

The detailed blueprints were not in this document. It only contained a rough engineering plan. However, judging from Luo Wenxuan's expression, the detailed blueprints should have been completed.

Hearing how surprised Lu Zhou was, Luo Wenxuan smiled proudly.

"It wasn't too difficult to design. There were two main difficulties regarding the collider. One was the tens of kilometers long vacuum pipelines, and the other was the liquid helium cooling system. It's not too difficult to build these things on the Moon. The structure is a lot simpler than LHCb. The main difficulty is from the engineering side, how do you plan on building the tens or even hundreds of kilometers long tunnel on the Moon?"

"I have that sorted out, so you don't have to worry about it." Lu Zhou smiled and put the document aside. He then said, "Tell me, how was your two-month visit to CERN?"

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Chapter 826: CERN

Lu Zhou asked Assistant Zhao to make him another cup of coffee. He spent the next hour quietly listening to Luo Wenxuan's experience at CERN over the past two months.

"The design of the lunar hadron collider is mainly done by the Chinese Academy of Sciences Institute of High Energy Physics and the Institute of Space Engineering. However, the Chinese research institutes don't have any experience on hadron colliders, so we contacted CERN…"

Theoretical research fields had very little confidentiality. Whenever CERN had too much data on their hands, they would often hand the data to other research institutes around the world. This was how the Internet was born. Even though there was some competitiveness when it came to groundbreaking research results, research institutes often came to an agreement.

After the Europeans heard that China planned on building a lunar hadron collider, they were even more enthusiastic than the Chinese themselves. They sent their best LHCb and ALICE detector engineers to Beijing. Then they gave the Chinese Academy of Sciences Institute of High Energy Physics ten research visitor spots.

Of course, this wasn't all free.

The reason why CERN was so eager to help was that they hoped to cooperate with China in particle physics research. After the lunar hadron collider was built, more than half of the world's high energy physics experiments would be conducted in space. Hypotheses that weren't verifiable before could now be tested in space.

Out of all of the scholars from the Institute of High Energy Physics, Luo Wenxuan worked at CERN for the longest. Naturally, he was selected as the leader of the Chinese research visitor group.

After spending two months at CERN, he had a lot to say.

"Edward Witten hasn't been there for a long time. I've asked the people in charge at CERN. Apparently, he left his CERN office and mainly works at Princeton now.

"It's not just Witten, a lot of other knowledgeable old professors are gone too. I walked around the lecture buildings and didn't recognize any of the professors."

Luo Wenxuan looked at the vapor rising from the coffee cup, and he sighed with a hint of sadness.

He wanted to see his old friends at CERN, but most of them were gone. They were either too old to keep working, went into another industry, or went to another research institute.

"That's how CERN is like, people in the theoretical physics field will work there at least once in their life, but no one knows where they could end up," Lu Zhou said. He grabbed his coffee cup and said, "It's just like theoretical physics itself, new things come in and old things leave."

"Let's not talk about this sad topic." Luo Wenxuan smiled and shook his head. He said, "Speaking of which, I found something interesting over the past two months."

Lu Zhou said, "What?"

Luo Wenxuan: "Do you remember? The big names at CERN like to learn French as a hobby."

Lu Zhou smiled and nodded.

"I recall something like that."

CERN was a place of the brightest minds in the world. Whenever someone placed a group of smart people together, there would always be competition.

They obviously couldn't compete in mathematics or physics. After all, they were all at the top of their fields. Also, it wasn't like they could compare their research results against one another; it would be like comparing apples with oranges.

However, if someone could learn a language in a month or even a week or two, that would undoubtedly prove someone's intelligence above others.

This might sound unbelievable, but the big names in physics who worked at CERN could often go from being totally clueless about French to being able to converse in French in just a couple weeks.

Not to mention that half of CERN's facilities were located in France. Therefore learning French and holding lectures in French was one of their favorite "hobbies".

When Lu Zhou first visited CERN, he didn't participate in this unique hobby. He heard about it from the other professors who worked there.

For example, Frank Wilczek once bragged to Lu Zhou that he was able to learn French in two weeks…

"It seems like the situation has changed." Luo Wenxuan smiled and said, "Learning French is out of style now. It seems like, the new way of bragging about one's intelligence is to learn Chinese."

"Learn Chinese?"

"That's right." Luo Wenxuan smiled and said, "Apparently, the official language of the Moon Palace is Chinese and that the Moon Palace research results posted online are also in Chinese. As you know, translating theoretical physics in Google is an absolute disaster. This forced many scholars to start learning Chinese."

"… How unfortunate."

Lu Zhou smiled and awkwardly rubbed his nose.

It seemed like this was his fault.

Even though there was no strict rule that the Moon Palace-produced theses had to be in Chinese, the observational data published and the experimental results published on the Moon Palace website were all in Chinese.

This made life much more difficult for international scholars…

However, China was the one that built the Moon Palace, so they had the right to publish in their native language.

In some sense, this was a power move.

English was a necessary skill for scientific researchers to master. However, improving the influence of one's native tongue in the academic world was also a scholar's responsibility.

If everything went well, the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Moon Palace would set up an independent journal to only publish research results from the Moon Palace.

By then, not only would the research data be in Chinese, even the journals would be in Chinese as well.

"Speaking of which, even though I didn't see my own friends at CERN, I saw your friend."

Lu Zhou: "Mine?"

"Professor Frank Wilczek." Luo Wenxuan shrugged and smiled. He said, "He told me to ask you; how's your research on the 750 GeV signal going? CERN did another experiment and didn't even find a 1 sigma signal."

Lu Zhou smiled and said, "Tell him next time, that after the lunar hadron collider is complete, I'll give him an answer…"

Luo Wenxuan smiled and said, "Oh, really now? I'm looking forward to it then."

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Chapter 827: Handsome People Problems

[Even though the thesis did not present any groundbreaking results, the methods used have a certain degree of novelty. When it comes to research on Riemann's hypothesis, the Odlyzko–Schönhage algorithm method is worth further exploration.

[Thesis approved.]

"I don't think it has any novelty at all…" Molina said. She placed the reviewer's comments on the table and sighed. She said, "I'm close to giving up on proving the non-trivial zero critical line points… Maybe Professor Atiyah was right. We should choose an easier method… Vera? Are you listening to me?"

Vera was slightly blushing. She looked at Molina and came out of her daydream. Her blue eyes looked to the side as she spoke.

"Oh… I'm listening, thesis approved? Congratulations…"

"Stop lying, you're thinking about him, aren't you?!"

Molina reached out her hand and lifted Vera's chin with a smile. Vera slapped her hand away.

"Don't…"

Vera stared at Molina with an unhappy look.

"Haha, I'm sorry, I just couldn't help it." Molina looked at Vera and sighed. She then said, "Just give up now."

"…?"

Vera didn't understand.

Molina looked at her and said, "Don't you get it? He and I are the same type of people."

The room suddenly went quiet.

Molina suddenly realized Vera could have misinterpreted what she had said. She waved her hand and tried to explain.

"Hey, don't look at me like that, that's not what I meant…"

Vera took half a step back as Molina tried to explain, "I'm just saying that he's not emotionally available, haven't you noticed? Has he ever been interested in any woman before?"

Vera bit her lip and didn't say anything.

"Exactly!" Molina scratched her head and said, "I don't know if I should say this, but even if you guys become a thing, I don't think you'll be happy."

Vera asked, "Why?"

"Don't know," Molina shrugged and said, "I feel like, if I married that man, our marriage would be boring."

…

Ever since Luo Wenxuan returned to China, Lu Zhou's office had become much more lively.

Even though this guy had his own office in the physics department, he would often come to hang out at Lu Zhou's office.

Anyone with two brain cells knew that Luo Wenxuan didn't come here because of Lu Zhou.

Speaking of which, Lu Zhou was actually quite astonished. He thought Luo Wenxuan would be over Assistant Kong in a month or two. Now that it had been almost a year, the man was still chasing after her.

What was more interesting was that, even though he was trying his best, the relationship between the two was more distant than ever.

Lu Zhou wasn't interested in other people's personal matters, so he left this aside.

After all, his office had plenty of coffee, and discussing physics problems with this guy was one of Lu Zhou's ways to kill time.

The days quickly passed by. It was soon November. Jinling City began to cool down. A gray coat and blue jeans were part of Lu Zhou's daily outfit.

According to his past experiences, this way of dressing made him stand out the least on campus. He could at least eat his lunch in peace, without people staring at him.

However, he had underestimated some people's determination.

During lunchtime, Lu Zhou went to the cafeteria as usual. He ordered a bowl of barbecued meat on rice and sat down at a quiet corner.

The moment he lifted his chopsticks, someone sat down across from him.

"I finally found you… Are you hiding from me?"

Lu Zhou looked at Luo Wenxuan, and he was a bit muddled. Lu Zhou then shook his head.

"Nope."

Luo Wenxuan: "Help a brother out."

Lu Zhou took a sip of his seaweed soup and said, "No, thanks."

Luo Wenxuan said, "What?! Aren't you going to ask me what it's about?"

Lu Zhou grabbed a piece of barbecued meat and stuffed it into his mouth. He spoke while chewing.

"I'm guessing it's not something important. If it is, you would have told me in my office. Try to solve it yourself, and don't drag me into this."

Luo Wenxuan placed his hands together like he was praying.

"Please, just this once, I don't need much, I just need a chance."

Lu Zhou: "Like what?"

Luo Wenxuan smiled mischievously and said, "Like… Maybe arrange a group date or something?"

Lu Zhou: "… No."

Luo Wenxuan took a deep breath and asked in a sincere way.

"Come on man, don't do this, I'm being serious. I'm not getting younger! I'll be single forever if I don't marry now."

Lu Zhou rolled his eyes and said, "Why did you wait until now then?"

Luo Wenxuan sighed.

"I was partying when I was younger."

"Get lost."

"Ok," Luo Wenxuan said, "I don't care if you believe me or not, but I'm being serious. I feel like I'm in love, and if I miss my chance, I'll regret it for the rest of my life…"

Lu Zhou sighed and put his chopsticks on the table.

Even though Lu Zhou didn't want to be involved in other people's emotional problems, he wanted this guy to start focusing on his work again. Therefore, Lu Zhou gave him a life lesson…

"You don't get girls by chasing them."

Luo Wenxuan paused for a second. He was muddled.

"… Then how am I supposed to get them?"

Lu Zhou said, "By attraction."

"…"

The table went silent.

Lu Zhou hesitated for a little.

He felt like he was correct. The feeling of attraction couldn't be forced.

Even animals would know that.

But honestly, for a handsome guy like him, this wasn't a problem.

Luo Wenxuan raised his hand and asked, "Can I ask a question?"

Lu Zhou: "… It sounds like you shouldn't ask me that question."

Luo Wenxuan: "Let me put it this way… Have you ever watched a movie with a girl?"

Lu Zhou: "…"

Suddenly, Lu Zhou didn't want to talk to this guy anymore.

Why don't I make him work in Beijing for a few years…

Would that be too ruthless?

Luo Wenxuan was about to comfort Lu Zhou when Lu Zhou suddenly spoke.

"I had, and it was a horror movie."

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Chapter 828: Want to Switch Cars?

Luo Wenxuan: "…!"

Lu Zhou: "…?"

Luo Wenxuan thought, F*ck, did he really watch a movie with a girl?

Lu Zhou thought, F*ck, when did I watch it again?

Honest to God, Lu Zhou couldn't remember when he watched the movie.

"Long time no see," Chen Yushan said. She sat across from Lu Zhou and asked, "Do you miss me?"

Lu Zhou curiously asked, "How did you find me?"

Chen Yushan smirked and replied proudly, "When you were still an undergrad, you would always sit at this spot in the cafeteria. Your assistant told me you went to the cafeteria, so I knew you were here."

Lu Zhou: "… I can't believe you remember that."

Luo Wenxuan looked at the pretty girl, then looked at Lu Zhou. A light bulb went off in Luo Wenxuan's mind, and he said, "… Should I, head off?"

Lu Zhou: "Yeah sure, you can head off."

Luo Wenxuan: "…"

I thought he was going to let me stay.

Fortunately, Luo Wenxuan was almost finished with his meal. He ate the last couple of bites and stood up.

Luo Wenxuan gave Lu Zhou a look of goodbye before leaving.

Chen Yushan sat in his spot, which was directly across from Lu Zhou.

Lu Zhou felt like she had something to say, so he asked, "Do you need anything?"

Chen Yushan blinked her eyes and said, "I'm not allowed to talk to my friend without needing something?"

Lu Zhou: "That's not what I meant…"

Lu Zhou was just surprised.

Seeing how confused Lu Zhou was, Chen Yushan smiled and said, "Okay okay, it's nothing big… I always see you riding in that black sedan. Are you interested in changing vehicles?"

"I don't know a lot about cars." Lu Zhou looked helpless and said, "But I have been wanting to switch it up a little… Do you have a suggestion?"

Chen Yushan smirked and said, "I've already arranged it for you."

Lu Zhou said, "Did you… already buy it?"

Chen Yushan said, "Not buy, someone else gave it to you. Remember last year when we invested in Zhongshan New Materials and began cooperating with BYD on the lithium-sulfur battery project?"

What, that happened?

Lu Zhou thought about it and shook his head honestly. "I don't remember."

Chen Yushan said, "I nearly forgot, you're a useless chairman."

Lu Zhou asked, "What does this have to do with BYD?"

"Around this time last year, there was an Alternative Energy Vehicle summit, right? The battery standardization plans are finally in place. In order to dominate the alternative energy vehicles, BYD launched a mid-range electric vehicle as well as a high-end one, and these vehicles were named 'Light of God' and 'Electric Purple'. Apparently, their mileage range is up to 2,000 kilometers."

When Lu Zhou heard this number, he had a surprised look on his face.

"It's able to reach 2,000 kilometers?"

"All thanks to your lithium-sulfur batteries."

Chen Yushan said, "As a thank you to us, or to you, BYD designed a special Electric Purple vehicle and gave it to our company. There is only one model in the world. Apparently, the control performance is first-class and the design is pretty cool. Are you interested? If you don't want it, I'll take it."

Lu Zhou instantly said, "I want it! Why wouldn't I want it? I want to change cars anyway."

Chen Yushan knew Lu Zhou would say this, so she said, "Okay, I'll give you the car when it arrives. Remember to give me a ride sometimes."

Lu Zhou: "There's really only one in the world?"

Chen Yushan nodded and said, "Yep, just one."

Lu Zhou joked, "Hope that they won't make any more of it…"

Chen Yushan smiled and said, "Of course they wouldn't, and if they do, I'll complain to them for you."

There was no way BYD would do anything to offend Lu Zhou. With the research and development capabilities of the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study, Star Sky Technology's place in the battery world was like Qualcomm's place in the chip world. Star Sky Technology was the father of alternative energy vehicles and mobile batteries.

Therefore, it was important for BYD to have a good relationship with Lu Zhou…

"Forget about the car." Chen Yushan placed her arms on the table and said, "There's something else I came to talk to you about."

Lu Zhou said, "What?"

Chen Yushan: "The day after tomorrow, the Russian Ministry of Economic Development will come to Jinling. The city council called us and said that their first stop is going to be Star Sky Technology. Are you free the day after tomorrow?"

Lu Zhou: "Do I have to go?"

Chen Yushan: "It'd be best if you could. After all, you are the chairman."

Lu Zhou: "I'll go if I have time… Oh yeah, when will the car arrive?"

"Within a week, what, you're interested in cars now?" Chen Yushan said.

Lu Zhou: "… A little bit."

Lu Zhou didn't know a lot about cars. He was just curious about what this one-of-a-kind electric sports car was like.

Chen Yushan smirked and looked at Lu Zhou flirtatiously as she said, "I never knew that you were into cars, I thought you were only interested in research."

Lu Zhou: "Of course I am, I have a lot of hobbies."

Chen Yushan curiously asked, "Like what?"

"Like…"

Lu Zhou's eyebrows furrowed as he tried to think of a hobby. However, he realized all of his hobbies were related to academia or research.

He looked at his bowl of half-eaten rice and said, "Barbecued meat?"

This was probably his only hobby outside of work. Chen Yushan began to laugh at him.

Lu Zhou paused for a second and said awkwardly, "Hey, what are you laughing about?"

With one hand covering her stomach, Chen Yushan said, "Nothing, I just think… You're pretty unique sometimes."

Lu Zhou: "…?"

What the hell does she mean?

What's so unique?

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Chapter 829: AFK Mission

Lu Zhou finished eating his lunch while talking with Chen Yushan. His lunch break was almost over.

Chen Yushan walked Lu Zhou back to the mathematics department building and told him not to forget about the Russian visiting group. After that, she reluctantly waved goodbye and left.

Lu Zhou returned to his office and sorted out his lesson plans from yesterday. After he confirmed with Assistant Zhao that he had an afternoon class, he went to Building A.

He had a number theory lecture this afternoon. His class was considered a mathematics elective course.

Even though most of the time his PhD student He Changwen lectured for him, seeing how the semester was almost over, Lu Zhou decided he should at least give one lecture.

He didn't know why, but he felt like the students in the classroom were staring at him instead of the blackboard…

Lu Zhou couldn't help but feel a little frustrated.

He didn't realize that his lecturing abilities had fallen to the point where the students were more interested in him than his content.

He thought back to when he was lecturing at Princeton University. Students from other classes would bring their own chairs just to sit in the lecture hall.

It seemed like he had to practice giving more lectures…

Soon, all four of the blackboards were filled with writing. The classroom bell rang.

Lu Zhou closed the textbook and looked at the students. He was about to give them a summary when he suddenly saw a blue window appear in his sight.

[

Branch mission complete:

4: Alchemist: Produce 100 tons of titanium alloy.

]

Complete?

Already?

Lu Zhou was surprised internally, but he didn't show it on his face.

He cleared his throat and spoke to the students.

"The class is over for now. Take a five minutes break, and we will continue later."

Lu Zhou left the classroom and went into the nearby toilet. He went inside a stall and summoned the system.

He walked in front of the information screen and pressed a button. His mission panel was displayed in front of him.

[

"Control of Earth and Moon" second phase:

Crowded Planet: 24-hour active population on the moon has to exceed 100

2: Spark of the Future: Large hadron collider on the moon.

ol start="3″

Three Feet Deep: Collect 50 tons of rare lunar soil.

Alchemist: Produce 100 tons of titanium alloy (complete)

5 Look Back on the Earth: Establish a semi-permanent Earth meteorological observation station in the Moon's orbit.

ol start="6″

Look into the distance: Set up a large space telescope on the Moon to produce more detailed observations of the planets in the solar system, as well as observations on extraterrestrial galaxies.

]

Lu Zhou looked at the completed mission and couldn't help but think.

All he did was write a letter asking for funding. Then, after a few months, the mission was complete.

This was basically AFK farming.

Unfortunately, he couldn't receive any of his branch mission rewards before the second phase of the main mission was complete.

He also didn't know what kind of rewards the branch missions gave…

"… Five more branch missions left?"

Lu Zhou looked at the remaining missions and rubbed his chin.

The first was easy to solve. He just had to organize a tourist group of a hundred people. Now that the Magpie Bridge was complete, this mission was relatively easy to accomplish.

As for the third mission, he was able to mine titanium ores on the Moon, so lunar soil was no problem. The mission only required him to collect the soil, and it might even be profitable to ship the soil back to Earth.

He didn't really care about the rest of the mission.

It was unrealistic for him to complete all of the branch missions; completing half of them was already pretty good.

After Lu Zhou exited the system space, he was about to leave his toilet stall. However, he heard someone using the faucet.

He planned on leaving the stall anyway, but when he happened to hear the two students mention his name, he sat back down and began listening.

As a professor, he was quite interested in what the students had to say about him.

"Did you understand God Lu's lecture?"

"I understood half of it, how about you?"

The guy with glasses sighed and said, "A third. Sigh, I want to understand it, but I'm not good enough."

The guy using the faucet said, "Yeah, I guess his lectures are always difficult."

The guy in glasses: "Probably! But even God Lu doesn't have a girlfriend, that makes me feel a little better, at least I have one."

"Haha, how do you know he's single, what if he's just lowkey?"

The guy in glasses waved his hand.

"I can tell."

Suddenly, they heard a voice behind them.

"Oh, really now? How can you tell?"

The two guys looked back, and when they saw Lu Zhou, it was like they saw a ghost.

"F*ck, God Lu!"

"Professor Lu!"

Lu Zhou smiled and didn't say anything. He just stared at the two guys.

"Professor… We were just…" The guy in glasses scratched his head and said cleverly, "We were just talking about how handsome you are!"

Lu Zhou: "…"

F*ck sake!

Do you think I'm deaf?

Also, no sh*t I'm handsome.

Lu Zhou didn't want to waste any more time on these two dumba*ses, so he said, "Go back to class."

"Yes, sir!"

The two students disappeared.

Lu Zhou looked at the toilet door close and sighed.

He never realized how good it felt to be a professor.

However…

Am I making a bad example? Will these undergraduate students think mathematicians are all loners?

Speaking of which, I'm not getting any younger.

My parents are going to nag me about this when I see them.

"… Forget about it, I'll wait for a couple more years."

Lu Zhou shook his head.

He wasn't avoiding this problem.

It was just that he hadn't figured out how to maintain a family yet.

Research took up most of his time, and he didn't have the energy to be a boyfriend, much less a father…

Lu Zhou returned to the classroom and opened his lesson plan. He turned to the last page.

"Turn your textbooks to page 47."

Paper shuffling sounds filled the classroom. Some students looked surprised.

"… The first half of the class covered basic number theory. In the second half, I'll talk about something interesting. Something I am currently researching."

He turned to the blackboard and wrote down two words.

[Riemann's hypothesis]

The moment he wrote down the words, the classroom went into an uproar.

Lu Zhou slammed his hand down on the table and tried to get the students' attention. He spoke in a clear and loud voice.

"I speak quite quickly."

"Listen carefully."

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Chapter 830: On-Site Question

Teaching undergraduate students was like a knowledge review session for Lu Zhou.

Normally, he wouldn't touch on these rudimentary materials. This was the only time he set aside his research and focused on the more simple concepts.

"… We all know that the Riemann hypothesis is one of the most important conjectures in the analytic number theory. It is a conjecture about the zero points of the zeta function. But, do any of you know how the Riemann hypothesis came to be?

"In fact, prior to the Riemann hypothesis, there was another proposition that troubled mathematicians for centuries. That is, the distribution of prime numbers."

Lu Zhou wrote down a few equations on the board. He then looked back at the students in the classroom and continued, "Using the fundamental theorem of arithmetic, even high school students know that every positive integer can be expressed as the product of prime factors. This representation is unique, thus prime numbers are the basic elements that make up a positive integer.

"However, the distribution of prime numbers is not as easy to understand. One of the most basic tasks of the analytic number theory world is to study the distribution of prime numbers."

The students had a look of concentration on their faces, Lu Zhou knew his lecture was going well.

The Riemann hypothesis was indeed a complex problem, understanding it was difficult, and solving it was near impossible…

Lu Zhou paused for a second. He then continued, "In analytic number theory, mathematicians often study the function π(x), a function that outputs the number of primes lower than x. Researching the characteristics of π(x) is one of the central tasks of the analytic number theory.

"Both Gauss and Legendre have done a lot of numerical calculations on π(x). They guessed that when x tends to infinity, π(x)~x/ln(x). Their conjecture was later proved, which is what we now understand as the Prime Number Theorem.

"Euclid proved that there are infinitely many prime numbers. Euler introduced the Euler product. These great pioneers provided us the tools to analyze and study prime numbers. No one was able to find a suitable method for proving Gauss' conjecture. That was until the 1950s, when a German mathematician published a paper titled 'On the exact number of primes less than a given limit'. His research opened a new road for π(x).

"Most people know who this German guy is, that's right, I'm talking about Riemann. He introduced the Riemann zeta function in this thesis."

Lu Zhou turned around and wrote down an equation on the blackboard.

[ζ(s)=Σ1/ns]

Lu Zhou looked at the dead silent classroom and spoke.

"This is it… It doesn't look hard at all, right?"

Everyone: "…"

F*ck sake!

How is it not hard?

"Riemann made a further hypothesis for the function he proposed, which was that all of the zero points of ζ(s) are on the critical straight line. It turns out his vision was quite revolutionary. All of our brute force calculations show that the zeros points are on a critical straight line. Unfortunately, even though we know that his hypothesis is likely correct, we have no way to prove it.

"We can often use the Riemann hypothesis to prove other conjectures. However, if the Riemann hypothesis isn't proven, we can't say for certain that other conjectures are correct.

"Vice versa, if we do prove the Riemann hypothesis, then thousands of mathematical conjectures that assume the Riemann hypothesis will become theorems!

"If anyone can prove the Riemann hypothesis, they would undoubtedly become the greatest mathematician of this century… I am certain of that, even though this century has just begun."

"Professor," a student said with his hand raised in the air. After receiving a nod from Lu Zhou, he asked excitedly, "If someone solves the Riemann hypothesis, how will they compare to you?"

"It won't be a good comparison. After all, my work goes beyond just the field of mathematics." Lu Zhou smiled at the student and said, "But if anyone does prove the conjecture, their work in mathematics will undoubtedly surpass mine."

After that, Lu Zhou explained some of the current research progress on the Riemann hypothesis. Because he changed his lecture style, the students were listening more intently.

Lu Zhou was satisfied with the performance of his students.

The time quickly passed by.

Lu Zhou glanced at the clock on the wall and saw that it was almost time to end his class. He chucked his chalk onto his desk and spoke.

"We'll end it here… Class dismissed."

Shuffling sounds of textbooks filled the classroom. Lu Zhou nodded toward the students, grabbed his lesson plan, and walked out of the classroom.

Lu Zhou was about to go back to his office. He wanted to write down his inspirations, which he got from the lecture. However, Dean Qin suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

"Excellent lecture!" Dean Qin said with a smile on his face. "It helped me a lot!"

Lu Zhou smiled.

"You're too kind, I haven't taught undergraduate students in a while."

Dean Qin said, "We all have our own priorities, and your research is obviously more important than lecturing. Speaking of which, are you busy these days?"

Lu Zhou: "Not really, why?"

"I have something to ask you." Dean Qin coughed and said, "Have you heard of the International Mathematical Olympiad?"

Lu Zhou: "I have, why?"

He had obviously heard of IMO. Unfortunately, he didn't have the chance to attend.

The IMO gold medalists were the best of the best.

For example, Schultz, who Faltings said was one of the three people who could surpass Faltings himself, was an IMO gold medalist.

As for why Schultz signed up for two more IMO tournaments after winning a gold medal… It was because Schultz thought it was fun…

Dean Qin smiled and said, "Here's the thing, last month there was a national high school mathematics competition, right? The top students in every state have been selected. The winter training camp will start in January next year. It's already November, so it's time to weed some people out."

Lu Zhou said, "You're not asking me to write exam questions, right?"

Dean Qin: "This wasn't my decision, the China Mathematics Society wants you to come up with the final problem."

Lu Zhou: "Is that appropriate?"

Dean Qin smiled and said, "Of course it's appropriate. The final question last year was also chosen by an academician. Not only are you an academician, but you're also a Fields medalist."

Lu Zhou: "Fine, it's only one question anyway."

"Yeah, thanks." Dean Qin suddenly remembered something and said, "Oh yeah, don't make it too difficult. There's no point if no one can solve it."

"Don't worry, I won't make it too difficult." Lu Zhou pulled out a piece of draft paper from his lesson plan and began writing.

Dean Qin looked at him, perplexed.

"You're not going to write the question right now, right?"

Lu Zhou: "Of course I am, why?"

Dean Qin said, "This is the national final competition, so you should think about it carefully."

"I just did." Lu Zhou wrote down the question and handed it to Dean Qin. "Give this to China Mathematics Society. It should be fine."

Dean Qin stared at the piece of draft paper. Lu Zhou began to walk away as Dean Qin muttered to himself, "Riemann zeta function?"

Dean Qin rubbed his chin and thought to himself.

"Can high school students even solve this problem?"

However, he suddenly realized something, and his eyes lit up as he spoke.

"Wait a second… This question is interesting…"

Dean Qin carefully looked around him and stuffed the paper into his pocket. He then quickly walked back to his office.

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Chapter 831: Clue for the Riemann Hypothesis

Inspiration always arrived at unexpected times.

Lecturing about the history of the Riemann hypothesis had pointed out some of the details that he ignored when conducting research.

Even though most of the time these details were useless, these irrelevant clues could occasionally play an important role.

After Lu Zhou returned to his office, he sat down at his desk and pulled out a piece of draft paper. He began writing down his thoughts.

"The Riemann hypothesis was proposed to study the π(x). Riemann's pioneering work wasn't on the proposal of the Riemann hypothesis, but it was on using Riemann zeta function to increase the domain of π(x) to complex numbers."

Lu Zhou's pen glided on the paper. He wrote down a line of the equation.

[π(x)=dt/lntO(x(1/2ε)]

"Riemann hypothesis' equivalence problem," Lu Zhou said as he placed the tip of the pen on the paper. He said to himself, "If the Riemann hypothesis is true, then we can drive this asymptotic formula from the Riemann hypothesis…

"The key to solving this problem is the function π(x) itself."

He felt like he was missing something.

It was almost like he was a third of the way done with a jigsaw puzzle, with the rest of the pieces scattered nearby. He just needed to connect the rest of the pieces. He needed a clue.

With that clue, he could connect the rest of the pieces.

Lu Zhou sat in front of his desk for an hour or so. His stomach began to rumble.

He looked outside and saw the sunset outside his window. He finally realized how long he had been sitting there.

"You were too focused, I didn't want to interrupt you," Assistant Lin said. "Do you plan on going to the cafeteria?"

Lu Zhou looked at Assistant Lin, who was standing at the door, and he thought for a second before saying, "If you're going to the cafeteria, bring me something."

He planned on staying in the office for a bit longer as he didn't want his thoughts to be interrupted.

Lin Yuxiang blinked and said, "Barbecued meat on rice?"

Lu Zhou looked at her.

"How did you know I wanted that?"

Lin Yuxiang winked and said, "I guessed it."

Lu Zhou felt a little creeped out. Lin Yuxiang gave him the chills.

"I don't want barbecued meat on rice tonight. Can you bring me some spicy chicken on rice… Thanks."

Lin Yuxiang glanced at Lu Zhou with a hint of resentment. She then turned around and left.

He didn't have to wait for long.

Lu Zhou was still sitting at his desk, writing formulas on a piece of draft paper, when Assistant Lin, who just came back from the cafeteria, placed a takeaway box of spicy chicken on rice on Lu Zhou's table.

Lu Zhou opened the takeaway box and looked at the tender chicken mixed with red and green peppers. He opened the pack of disposable utensils, placed some chicken on the rice, and began eating.

Because of his busy schedule, Lu Zhou had a fondness toward fast food. In Princeton, he would only eat bacon sandwiches, and in China, he would only eat meat on rice at the cafeteria.

Even though his diet wasn't healthy from a nutritional point of view, these inexpensive meals made him feel satisfied. It was just like instant coffee.

Not to mention, his metabolic capacity was strengthened by the system, so he didn't have to care about his diet.

Lu Zhou quickly finished his meal. He opened his computer and contemplated it for a moment. His ten fingers quickly tapped on the keyboard as he transformed his thoughts into words.

Even though his ideas might be trivial, any progress on the ζ(s) function would contribute to the research of prime numbers. Therefore, even trivial ideas had a certain amount of value.

Lu Zhou didn't care if his ideas would inspire other scholars, he was going to upload this onto arXiv regardless.

After reading some theses from other scholars, Lu Zhou turned off his computer and planned on going home. However, he suddenly received a video call.

Qin Yue was the person video calling him.

Lu Zhou pressed the "Accept" button and saw a familiar face appear in front of him.

"How's it going? How's lecturing at Princeton?"

It was morning over in Princeton.

The man sitting in front of the camera looked exactly the same as he did four years ago, just with a little more confidence.

Qin Yue looked at his ex-supervisor and said, "It's been going great. Remember the Ivy Club club? I was accepted a year after you left."

"They obviously aren't going to reject a mathematician who proved the Collatz conjecture." Lu Zhou smiled and said, "Is there something you want to talk about?"

Mathematicians generally didn't like small talk. Qin Yue adjusted his glasses and asked, "I heard you're researching the Riemann hypothesis?"

Lu Zhou: "… Yeah, why?"

Qin Yue smiled awkwardly and said, "Nothing, I just saw that you reviewed a thesis related to the Riemann hypothesis. I was just curious."

Lu Zhou smiled and said, "You found out about that?"

Jesus, is he stalking me?

It was very rare for someone to look at someone else's academic review record.

Qin Yue looked at Lu Zhou and said, "I promise the majority of mathematicians are stalking you. I'm not the only one."

Lu Zhou felt a little weird, but he didn't know what to say.

He nodded and replied, "… I have been researching the Riemann hypothesis."

When Qin Yue heard that his former supervisor was trying to solve this century-old problem, a look of interest appeared on his face.

"How's the progress—I mean, do you need my help?"

Halfway through his sentence, he realized it was inappropriate to ask how the progress was going, so he changed his words.

However, Lu Zhou didn't seem to care.

"I have some clues, especially after reading Molina's thesis. That further confirmed my guess."

Qin Yue: "What guess… Are you allowed to tell me?"

"Of course I am. If you can prove the Riemann hypothesis using my guess, I would be happy." Lu Zhou smiled and said, "My guess is that, the method of lowering the lower bound estimation of the zero points on the critical line might lead to some interesting conclusions, but it is unrealistic to solve the Riemann hypothesis using this method."

Qin Yue had a serious look on his face.

Lowering the lower bound of the zero points on the critical line was one of the most popular methods for researching the Riemann hypothesis. The "closest" result in proving the Riemann hypothesis was proved using this method.

However, Lu Zhou said this method might not work, which surprised Qin Yue.

"What do you mean?"

Lu Zhou said in a serious tone, "We might have to research the π(x) function itself to find the last puzzle piece to solve this problem."

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Chapter 832: Professor Lu Is Making a Move?

Regressing the π(x) function…

Qin Yue thought to himself while staring at the ceiling of his Princeton office.

After a moment of silence, he suddenly shook his head with a brooding look.

"If that's the case… Then the work Molina is doing is useless?"

It's not just Molina…

If this spreads throughout the mathematics world, I think the entire community would be shocked.

Especially the people in the field of analytic number theory, research on the Riemann hypothesis will totally change…

After all, Professor Lu had already solved two Millennium Prize Problems. Professor Lu thinking something was unreliable was the same as a death sentence.

Qin Yue hesitated for a bit and decided to keep his mouth shut. After all, he wasn't sure if Lu Zhou was being serious.

However, what Qin Yue didn't know was that, shortly after he hung up the phone, Lu Zhou uploaded the complete thesis to Arxiv.

This was going to cause a sensation in the mathematics world…

…

"Ahh… I feel like all my hair is going to fall off."

Han Mengqi sat at her desk and stared at the question on the piece of draft paper. She bit her pen and scratched her head. She had no idea how to solve this problem.

"For any real number s 1, define ζ(s) = Σ1 / (m s)… Prove that ζ(2n) is a transcendental number."

Han Mengqi repeatedly read the equation with a pouty face.

After a while, she sighed and leaned back in her chair in defeat. She stared at the ceiling and began to daydream.

"What if there's no answer?"

Han Mengqi sat up straight and searched the question on Baidu, and like before, she couldn't find the question anywhere.

Looks like Lu Zhou came up with this question himself…

The girl sighed in defeat and sat with her feet on the chair. She wrapped her arms around her knees and stared blankly at the draft paper.

Tools used in computational materials science couldn't be applied to pure mathematics at all.

She knew it would be beneficial for her to look through the relevant literature and try to find similar studies that she could use as references. However, she was completely new to the analytic number theory field, so she didn't even know where to begin.

She was totally lost…

"Does he really not want me…"

Han Mengqi buried her chin between her knees.

Quickly after, she slapped herself on the face and began motivating herself.

"Pfft…

"So you think I can't prove it?"

Han Mengqi imagined how surprised Lu Zhou would be when he found out that she had solved the problem. Her eyes were filled with determination.

"I can do it!"

…

"Achoo!"

Lu Zhou was back in his Zhongshan International mansion. He just came out of the shower and pulled out some chocolate milk from his fridge. He sneezed two more times.

"Is someone talking about how handsome I am…"

Lu Zhou closed the fridge and walked into his study room. Xiao Ai, who was next to the coffee machine, flew into the air and chased him.

"Master, sneezing once means someone is thinking about you, sneezing twice means someone is insulting you, sneezing three times means you are sick. No one is calling you handsome…"

Lu Zhou: "Shut up."

The drone speaker turned off. A line of characters appeared on the display.

[(•̀•́) …]

[Master, you are handsome~]

Lu Zhou ignored Xiao Ai and sat down in his study room. He placed his laptop on his desk. Suddenly, his phone began to vibrate, and two messages popped up on his screen.

[Come to the office tomorrow!

[Don't forget!]

Lu Zhou looked at Chen Yushan's messages. He smiled and replied [Ok]. After that, he set his phone aside and logged onto arXiv.

His thousand-word thesis, which was uploaded less than five hours ago, already had thousands of downloads. It was even referenced by someone.

Is five hours even enough time to read through my thesis?

Lu Zhou logged on to his Mathoverflow account and looked at the international mathematics community discussing his thesis.

However, the discussions weren't exactly academically focused…

"Unbelievable."

[Levinson's algorithm has produced the best Riemann hypothesis research results we have ever seen. But does anyone think this road is not feasible? Does that mean Conry's critical line theorem is useless?]

[Professor Lu's thesis did not state that. He thinks that this idea might produce valuable results, but it is very difficult to solve the Riemann hypothesis.]

[I agree with Professor Lu's point of view. A while ago, Professor Molina from Princeton and her partner Vera proved the Conry zero-bound theorem using the Odlyzko–Schönhage algorithm. They failed to increase the 0.4 number. This might mean 0.4 is the limit.]

[Remember the twin prime conjecture? Using the sieve method, people were able to reduce the 70 million number to 246, but Lu Zhou was the one that used a topological method to solve the conjecture… Maybe the same applies to the Riemann hypothesis.]

"Doesn't anyone have an ounce of creativity?"

After reading through the forum for a while, Lu Zhou didn't find one coherent academic argument. It was all a bunch of mathematics PhDs freaking out.

But this did make sense. It was extremely difficult for someone to understand his thesis in a short amount of time. After all, the Riemann hypothesis was at the top of the food chain. Forget about normal PhDs, even people like Professor Deligne had trouble understanding the Riemann hypothesis.

Lu Zhou yawned and saw it was getting late. He turned off his computer and left his study room.

He still had to meet the Russian visiting group tomorrow, and there was probably a banquet afterward, so he planned on getting a good night's sleep.

Even though he didn't have to pay much attention to the Lunar Orbit Committee, as the chief designer, he still had some work to do.

While Lu Zhou was sleeping, the discussions on Mathoverflow grew, and this attracted the attention of many big names in the field.

It wasn't just Mathoverflow, all major mathematics forums around the world were discussing this topic.

Professor Lu plans on attacking the Riemann hypothesis!

He's already made some progress!

This was just like what Qin Yue had envisioned.

The mathematics community went crazy because of Lu Zhou's thesis…

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Chapter 833: Visiting Group From the North

The next day, Lu Zhou woke up early in the morning. After cleaning up in his bathroom, he asked Xiao Ai to fetch him his suit.

He had a diplomatic event today, and it was probably going to be broadcasted on national TV.

In order to please his fans, Lu Zhou spent a couple of minutes styling his hair.

Lu Zhou admired himself in the mirror for a while, until it was about time to leave. He went into the kitchen and microwaved last night's leftovers. After finishing his breakfast, he sat in his black sedan and headed toward the high-tech aerospace industrial area.

Lu Zhou sat in the back of the car and looked at the scenery. He suddenly remembered his conversation yesterday, so he said, "I plan on switching cars."

Wang Peng: "What car?"

Lu Zhou: "A fully electric one."

Wang Peng: "Is it safe?"

Lu Zhou: "You can inspect it when it comes."

Wang Peng nodded and said, "No problem, I'll drain the battery when it comes."

Lu Zhou: "… Fully drain it? You sure?"

Wang Peng looked at the rearview mirror and said, "… Why, what's wrong?"

Lu Zhou: "Nothing is wrong, but it has a 2,000 kilometers range… Are you sure you want to fully drain it?"

2,000 kilometers!

Wang Peng nearly choked on his own saliva.

He clenched his jaw and spoke stubbornly.

"No problem! It's just 2,000 kilometers."

Just 2,000 kilometers.

That was the distance from Jinling to Beijing and back…

Seeing how stubborn this guy was, Lu Zhou didn't have anything to say.

2,000 kilometers…

Once he fully drains the battery, it will barely be a new car anymore…

In less than half an hour, a black sedan drove past the high-tech zone, toward the newly-built high-tech aerospace industrial area.

Strictly speaking, the aerospace industrial area was part of the high-tech zone. However, they were separated for convenience.

Ever since the completion of the Jin Ling City aerospace launch site, the entire Jin Ling City aerospace industry had developed at an incredible speed. Jin Ling City became Asia's Houston.

From satellites to spacecraft components, from heat sinks to aerospace batteries, from state-owned aerospace giants to privately-owned companies, more than 500 companies had recently moved here. Every component of the Moon Palace or the Magpie Bridge could be found in Jin Ling City.

This was why the Russian Ministry of Economic Development decided to visit Jinling instead of Beijing. The Russians wanted to learn from China's aerospace industry.

The Russians had a huge aerospace foundation, but due to its depressed economy, it had lost all of its power.

The entire world wanted to ride China's aerospace bandwagon, and the Russians were the first to act…

Star Sky Technology building.

A black sedan parked at the entrance.

When Lu Zhou got out of the car, a man standing next to a security guard noticed him and quickly walked toward him.

"Academician Lu Zhou, you're finally here!" The man tightly shook Lu Zhou's hand and said, "I'm Zhong Quan, I'm from the minister's office. You can call me Secretary Zhong."

"Lu Zhou. Academician is just a title, my job is still a professor, so you can just call me Professor Lu." Lu Zhou smiled and said, "Has the Russian visiting group arrived?"

Zhong Quan smiled and said, "They arrived a long time ago! Mr. Georgiev asked about you the second he got off the plane, and he hasn't stopped talking about you."

Asking about me?

Why?

Lu Zhou smiled and continued, "Oh really? Let's not make our guests wait any longer, take me there."

The secretary made an inviting hand gesture.

"Come this way!"

Because of the foreign visiting group, the high-tech aerospace industrial area was in shut-down mode. However, even though they were shut down, they were busier than normal.

Twenty black sedans were parked neatly in the parking lot near the Star Sky Technology building. A group of Russian diplomats followed a group of Chinese diplomats and local officials, who gave them a tour of the Star Sky Technology building reception.

Finally, Georgiev from the Russian Ministry of Economic Development saw the person he wanted to see.

"Hello, Professor Lu! I'm Georgiev," Georgiev said as he shook Lu Zhou's hand tightly. This Russian man smiled heartily and said warmly, "I always hear your name in Roscosmos meetings, and I'm glad to finally see you in person."

Lu Zhou shook Georgiev's hand and said humbly, "Oh, you're too kind. It's my honor to meet you, Mr. Georgiev."

"I'm quite impressed with the development of your aerospace company. I wonder if you can give me a factory tour today?"

Minister Yang from the Ministry of Commerce looked at Lu Zhou. After seeing Lu Zhou nod his head, Minister Yang replied, "No problem, come with me."

Star Sky Technology's aerospace assembly center was located in the high-tech aerospace industrial area. In fact, the entire high-tech aerospace industrial area was built around the assembly center.

Georgiev insisted for them to walk there instead of taking a car.

While walking, the Russian man looked at the buildings around him and couldn't help but look astonished.

He suddenly looked at Lu Zhou and said, "… After seeing all of this, I finally understand how you guys are able to create such wonders like the Moon Palace."

Lu Zhou smiled and said, "Not exactly a wonder. It's not much bigger than the International Space Station."

Georgiev shook his head and said, "The International Space Station was the joint effort of dozens of countries, and it took them more than a decade to finally complete assembly. It is unbelievable that the Moon Palace was completely assembled in less than a year. If that isn't a world wonder, then I don't know what is."

Even though Lu Zhou knew this Russian man was kissing his a*s, he couldn't help but feel proud.

After all, before the dissolution, the Soviet Union was one of the world aerospace powerhouses. Even though they were nowhere near as strong now, their dominance in the past allowed them to survive until now.

Most people didn't know that the "flow staged combustion cycle" technology used by the "Raptor" liquid oxygen methane engine on the Space-X BFR rocket was based on the Soviet Unions' RD-270 engine and UR-700 rocket.

Lu Zhou smiled and replied humbly, "We're just standing on the shoulders of giants."

His ion thruster propulsion technology was reversed engineered from a higher-level civilization, so in a sense, Lu Zhou was correct.

However, Georgiev seemed to have misunderstood Lu Zhou's words. Georgiev thought that Lu Zhou was talking about America. Georgiev laughed out loud and didn't know what to say. Fortunately, Minister Yang diverted the conversation.

Even though they had a little friction between them, this didn't affect their relationship. Georgiev wasn't a petty person; not to mention Georgiev wasn't in the position to argue.

Especially when it came to the aerospace field.

The aerospace industry was shifting from low-Earth orbit to lunar transfer orbit. If Russia wanted to stay in the industry, they had to get help from China.

China's strength was the only reason the grumpy old Russians were being so friendly.

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Chapter 834: Commercialization and Production Scale

The group of people soon arrived at the space shuttle assembly center.

The center of the factory was the birthplace of the Skyglow spacecraft. This was also the birthplace for a series of spacecraft components produced by Star Sky Technology.

A giant metal "hull" was lying horizontally in the factory. The metal hull looked more like a nuclear submarine instead of an outer-space spacecraft.

Because the narrow hull could not support its own weight, the entire hull was divided into three parts, which were suspended by a mechanical skeleton.

The second the Russians went into the factory, they began staring at this object.

Mr. Georgiev and the bureaucrats from the Ministry of Economic Development didn't react too much. However, aerospace experts who accompanied the Ministry of Economic Development group had their eyes wide open.

Professor Kaufman, who was an expert from Roscosmos and an academician from the Russian Academy of Engineering, was so surprised that his chin fell to the ground.

After looking at this behemoth for a couple of seconds, Mr. Georgiev sighed.

"I can't believe it… Is this your spacecraft?"

"It's the Magpie Bridge." Lu Zhou smiled and said, "You can call it a spacecraft, but I think it's more like a boat."

Academician Kaufman, who was standing next to Georgiev, couldn't help but speak.

"Such a large spacecraft… How are you going to get it into space?"

Suddenly, some of the Chinese personnel became nervous.

Because this involved sensitive information.

Minister Yang planned on diverting the conversation, but Lu Zhou gave him an assuring look.

Lu Zhou looked at the enthusiastic Academician Kaufman and said, "We'll separate it into three launches, first the command module, then the storage module, and finally, the engine. They will be docked together in outer space."

The Russian expert was shocked.

The most difficult part of aerospace was spacecraft docking. The more components one had to connect, the more risk there was. So far, the technology only allowed for two-piece outer space docking.

However, Lu Zhou was now telling him that China had the technology for three-piece docking. Even Mr. Georgiev was shocked.

"I can't believe your launch technology is so far ahead…" Georgiev looked at the Magpie Bridge and said, "Can I ask if this is using an ion thruster propulsion system?"

Lu Zhou: "Ion thruster propulsion system is the future. Outer-space voyages don't need a ton of thrust, and the only advantage of chemical rockets is the initial launch thrust."

Georgiev and Academician Kaufman looked at each other in awe.

Minister Yang from the Ministry of Commerce coughed and smiled.

"Well, that's the end of the assembly center tour. There are many outstanding companies in the high-tech aerospace industrial area that are looking forward to meeting you guys."

"Yeah, we did spend quite a long time on Star Sky Technology." Georgiev smiled and said, "Then, Minister Yang, will you please give us a tour of the other companies?"

For the rest of the visit, Georgiev seemed to be uninterested. The expert behind him also seemed to be unamused.

Even though there were many excellent companies in the high-tech aerospace industrial area, none of them were at the level of Star Sky Technology. Some of them had huge factories, but they were lacking in the technical department. Even though some of them had groundbreaking technology, the company's capital restricted them toward only supplying accessories.

However, Georgiev was relieved to see this.

Fortunately, Star Sky Technology was one-of-a-kind.

If there were two companies that had state of the art research and development capabilities, then China's aerospace industry would be too scary…

For the rest of the visit, Lu Zhou didn't accompany the Russian visiting group. However, there was a banquet held at the Purple Mountain Hotel in the evening. As the chief designer of the Lunar Orbit Committee, Lu Zhou decided to show up.

It was a Chinese style banquet.

Even though Lu Zhou sat at the same table as Mr. Georgiev and Minister Yang, he didn't talk a lot during the meal.

He wasn't good at socializing at formal occasions. Unless someone took the initiative to talk to him, he wouldn't speak. Instead, he placed the majority of his attention on the delicious food in front of him.

Mr. Georgiev, who toured Star Sky Technology's factory in the morning, tried to talk to him.

"Actually, I've always been curious. Aerospace has never been China's strong suit, but you guys have been rapidly advancing in recent years. Can you tell us how you did it?"

Lu Zhou didn't try to avoid the question. He said, "Pick a direction, then do your best."

Georgiev made a helpless gesture and raised his wine glass.

"That's a little abstract, can you specify?"

"Depends on how you interpret it." Lu Zhou tapped his wine glass with Georgiev and said, "By direction, I mean finding a realistic goal, this is done by the scientific researchers. Fortunately, the experts working with us are good scholars, and they helped us solve a lot of problems."

Georgiev said, "Then what do you mean by doing your best?"

"It means to have sufficient funding, and this is the state's responsibility," Lu Zhou said. "Roughly speaking, it is to focus on important tasks and allocate resources properly. Right now, the main problems of aerospace are the commercialization as well as the production scale. We have already solved the production scale problem, so the next step is commercialization. We have to collaborate with other companies and try to guide private equity into the industry."

"Commercialization and production scale?" Georgiev smiled and said, "But doesn't that violate the objective laws of market economics?"

Lu Zhou smiled and said, "The Queen of Spain funded Columbus' voyage, Mr. Georgiev. Was that a violation of the objective laws of market economics?"

Georgiev said, "Interesting, but that's a different story… Are they similar?"

"Of course they're similar. The ultimate goal of the aerospace industry is to step out of our homeland and expand our living space, which is essentially the same thing as discovering a new continent." Lu Zhou drank some wine and said, "The market is a catalyst for economic development, but not everything is developed in accordance with the laws of the market. At least not in the mathematics world."

"Hahaha, your opinion is very interesting." Minister Georgiev took a sip of red wine and smiled. He looked sincerely at Lu Zhou and said, "If you ever have the time, I'd like to sincerely invite you to visit Russia, I'm certain the Russian scholars will be glad to discuss this issue in depth with you.

Lu Zhou smiled and said, "I definitely will have the time. I plan on attending the International Congress of Mathematicians next year."

Georgiev said, "If you do come, we'll give you a grand welcoming ceremony!"

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Chapter 835: Diplomatic Dinner

The banquet continued.

Because Lu Zhou didn't stop eating, he was full pretty quickly.

Mr. Georgiev kept trying to talk to him, while Academician Kaufman was staring at him. After politely stating that he had to go to the bathroom, Lu Zhou left the banquet hall.

He finally had some peace and quiet.

Lu Zhou slowly walked to the bathroom and washed his face. After that, he walked to the Purple Mountain hotel balcony.

He had been to his hotel many times. The annual Star Sky Technology meeting was held here. Back in college, he was invited to a celebration party here as well. Therefore, he was quite familiar with the layout.

The balcony on the fifth floor directly faced the Purple Mountain. The scenery during the autumn sunset was breathtaking.

Unfortunately, it was already eight o'clock at night. There was nothing but the cold breeze.

Lu Zhou wanted to avoid the loud and noisy banquet hall, so he tried to kill some time here.

When he sat down on a bench, a hotel waiter nearby walked over with a menu.

"Sir, would you like to order anything?"

"A mocha, please."

"Got it." The waiter nodded and scribbled on his notepad. Suddenly, he heard someone speak behind him with a weird Chinese accent.

"I'll have a glass of Tequila sunrise."

With her pale blonde hair laying on her shoulders, a Russian girl in a dress walked up and sat next to Lu Zhou. She looked at the waiter and gently said, "Please don't forget the ice."

Even though it wasn't winter season yet, the breeze on the balcony was quite chilly. Ordering an iced drink was unusual.

"Oh… okay." The waiter looked at the beautiful blonde girl and said, "Won't take long."

After that, he put away the menu and left the balcony.

Lu Zhou looked at the strange lady sitting across from him. He guessed she was probably with the Russian visiting group. He was about to ask for her name but the lady spoke first.

"Looks like I'm not the only one sick of the banquet."

Lu Zhou: "Who are you?"

"Victoria. My father is in the visiting group." The blonde lady reached out her hand and said, "It's nice to meet you."

Even though Lu Zhou felt like she knew who he was, he still introduced himself.

"I'm Lu Zhou, a mathematics professor."

Victoria seemed to be amused by Lu Zhou's introduction. She twirled her finger around her hair and said, "Just a mathematics professor?"

Lu Zhou made a helpless gesture and said, "I also do a bit of physics… and chemistry."

Victoria smirked and said, "You're funny. I think you do a lot more than just physics and chemistry."

"Really? I guess…" Lu Zhou looked at the waiter walking over and said, "Your cocktail is here."

"Thanks." Victoria lifted her cocktail glass and took a sip. She said, "My Chinese is not very good, I only started learning three months ago."

Lu Zhou: "You're pretty good for someone learning for only three months."

Mastering Chinese wasn't an easy feat for Russians, and being able to speak at this level within three months was insanely good.

Obviously, Victoria wasn't just a pretty face.

While Lu Zhou was judging her, Victoria was doing the same. However, she didn't make it as obvious. She spoke to Lu Zhou like Lu Zhou was her good friend.

"Am I being complimented by a genius?"

"Genius? Me?" Lu Zhou smiled and shook his head as he said, "I'm no genius, I just work a little harder than others."

Also… I have the system.

But I wasn't born with that, so I guess it's not my own talent.

Victoria smiled and said, "You're so humble. You've done more in one lifetime than most people can do in ten lifetimes. That's not just because of a little hard work."

Lu Zhou: "Maybe, but who knows what can happen in the future."

Victoria smiled and said, "I studied economics at Moscow University and took some elective courses in functional analysis. We often hear our professors praise your mathematical abilities. That is very rare for Russians. We rarely praise others for their mathematics talents."

Lu Zhou: "You know mathematics?"

"Just a little bit… Why, are you surprised?" Victoria said with a flirtatious smirk on her face.

Lu Zhou nodded and said, "I am, I didn't expect to meet someone that speaks the same language as me here."

"I'm happy to hear that. I'm also very curious about your research project… Or rather, I'm curious what kind of question is troubling a genius like you." Victoria took a sip of her cocktail, leaving a print of red lipstick on the glass. She said, "Let's talk about it."

Are you sure?

You want to hear about my research project?

Lu Zhou was glad to speak to her. After all, there was still two hours before the banquet ended.

Lu Zhou looked at her "curious" eyes and smiled awkwardly.

"I'm happy to oblige."

…

Mr. Georgiev obviously knew Academician Lu didn't want to talk to him.

Most scholars had introverted personalities. Especially those in theoretical research fields. They generally didn't like to talk with "shallow" people.

As a bureaucrat who used to be a diplomat, Georgiev was obviously aware of this. As for why he kept trying to talk to Lu Zhou…

How else could his daughter Victoria have a chance?

He swore he wasn't trying to sell his daughter out.

From a father's perspective, even though Professor Lu was a foreigner, he was definitely a qualified husband; a lot more qualified than those Russian alcoholics. His daughter had yet to find a suitable partner in university, so why wouldn't he want these two to be a thing?

However…

Things often didn't go as smoothly as planned.

He thought his plan was perfect, but he still underestimated Lu Zhou…

After the banquet ended, Victoria walked into the hotel room looking tired.

Georgiev looked at his tired daughter and asked, "How is it? Did you meet Lu Zhou?"

Victoria: "I did, and we drank on the balcony together."

Georgiev looked happy, and he continued to ask, "What happened?"

"Riemann zeta function…"

What?

What the hell is this?

Georgiev frowned.

"Riemann… what?"

Victoria smiled weakly and said, "We talked about Riemann zeta function for three hours, but he was suddenly inspired, that he ditched me… At least he paid for my drink."

She was exhausted at pretending to be interested in the conversation.

Why can't Lu Zhou be interested in movies or music?

He is quite handsome, but I would die if I had to talk to him every day…

Georgiev: "…"

Victoria looked at her dad and asked, "Dad, am I ugly?"

Georgiev paused for a second and said, "No, darling, you're as beautiful as your mother…"

"I've never had doubts about my looks before."

Victoria began to doubt her life, and she began to stare at the ceiling.

Georgiev didn't know how to comfort his daughter, so he sighed. "Maybe his standards are too high…"

Even though this was unfortunate, he couldn't do anything about it.

It just wasn't meant to be…

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Chapter 836: He Will Definitely Come!

A room inside Princeton's university library.

Vera pushed open the door and walked in. She walked to the table joyfully and stuttered. Finally, she was able to get out a complete sentence.

"He's researching the Riemann hypothesis!"

Molina was sitting at the desk, and without looking up, she knew exactly what Vera's facial expression was.

"The thesis on arXiv? I know, what's so surprising about it…"

Molina's sense of urgency had become stronger ever since that thesis was released.

Lu Zhou had never been defeated by a problem before. Even Millennium Prize Problems like the Navier–Stokes equations and the Yang-Mills Equations, were no match for him.

Because Lu Zhou had become an academic leader, he rarely participated in the mathematics world. He hadn't been to any conferences, but the mathematics community had not forgotten about him.

Even to this day, stories about him were still spread around the Princeton campus.

There was no doubt that Lu Zhou was a powerful opponent.

She had been attacking this conjecture for many years. If Lu Zhou was the one to take the crown from her, she would have a mental breakdown…

"Molina…"

Molina looked at Vera and blinked as she asked, "What?"

Vera forced a smile and asked, "Where do you think his research is at?"

Molina stared at Vera's blushing white cheeks and said, "How would I know? Why don't you ask him? You have his email."

"I…" Vera played with her own finger. She looked away from Molina and said, "… I'm not good enough for him yet."

I can't!

I can't take this anymore!

Molina stood up and held Vera by the shoulders.

"Listen, Ms. Pulyuy, I know he's your ideal lover, but realize that he is our enemy! You can't…"

Before Molina could finish, Vera interrupted her.

"He is not my enemy!"

Vera's eyes were full of determination.

"… Okay, I worded it incorrectly." Molina thought for a second and said, "Don't you have a contract with him about the Fields Medal?"

"!"

Vera suddenly began to look nervous.

Molina noticed this, and she smirked and patted the girl on her shoulders.

"Do your best. If we solve the Riemann hypothesis, we'll win ten Fields Medals."

Vera held her breath and tightened her fists as she muttered to herself, "If I solve the Riemann hypothesis… he will notice me."

Molina gave her an encouraging look and said, "That's right, not just him, the entire world will notice you."

Vera's face turned even redder as she looked down at her feet and smiled.

"No, no thanks…

"Just him is enough."

…

There wasn't a lot of exciting news in the mathematics world; therefore, the story of Lu Zhou beginning to research the Riemann hypothesis was considered a sensational story. Everyone was talking about Professor Lu's quest on solving the Riemann hypothesis; from online forums to Princeton's campus. Lu Zhou became the talk of the town.

Students weren't the only ones talking about him; the professors were no exception.

A big story like this obviously didn't escape the ears of Professor Fefferman, head of the Princeton mathematics department.

While Vera was talking to Molina, Professor Fefferman came to Professor Deligne's office with a printed copy of the same thesis.

When he arrived at Deligne's office, Deligne was sitting at his desk.

When Deligne heard footsteps, he looked up and squinted his eyes at the thesis in Professor Fefferman's hand.

"I'm guessing you have his arXiv thesis in your hand."

"Looks like you've already read it…" Professor Fefferman threw the thesis aside and said, "I didn't expect you to be so well informed."

"I'm quite good at keeping up with the times, and I've been using the Internet since 20 years ago…" Professor Deligne looked at the thesis and said, "You came here just for this?"

"What do you mean just for this?" Professor Fefferman looked in disbelief and said, "Haven't you heard of that legend? The person who can solve the Riemann hypothesis will become an immortal, not just in an abstract sense, but literally."

This legend came from a long time ago, around the 19th century. French mathematician Hadamard and Belgian mathematician Poussin made the first substantial progress on the Riemann hypothesis. They lived to 98 and 96 years old respectively.

Living to nearly a hundred years old back then was quite amazing. That started a legend where the person who proved the Riemann hypothesis would live forever.

Of course, this was only a joke, but this joke had been living on for a century now.

Deligne snorted and spoke.

"… That legend is more than a century-year-old. Bohr and Landa's theorem was much more impactful than Hadarmard's. If I remember correctly, they both died in their sixties."

"Okay fine, God isn't going to take care of everyone." Professor Fefferman smiled and shrugged. He then asked, "Legends aside, don't you think his thesis is very interesting?"

Professor Deligne: "Before he publishes a formal proof thesis, I will refrain from commenting."

Professor Fefferman smiled and said, "I'm not asking you to make a comment, I'm just curious about the point he made about solving Riemann zeta function using the π(x) function. I did some research and didn't find any interesting clues… I'm curious, how do you think he will solve it?"

Professor Fefferman: "What do you think he will do?"

Professor Deligne glanced at him and said, "Didn't you work with him on the Navier–Stokes equations? Don't you know him better?"

Professor Fefferman said, "Actually, I don't know him very well, he's used to working alone."

After that, Professor Deligne groaned.

He reminisced about the past and said, "You can't solve the Riemann hypothesis with just an idea. I can come up with a dozen ideas on how to solve it, but none of them gives me hope. The π(x) function is pretty new, but not totally unique. People have tried using it before."

Professor Fefferman nodded.

This wasn't the first time he heard the idea of using π(x) to solve the Riemann zeta function. He had even heard people talk about it in cafes.

"He's a scholar who is both good at using tools and creating tools. Whether or not he successfully applies the π(x) function, I'm certain he will be able to find the successful tools."

Professor Fefferman: "Like the Group Structure Method?"

"Not quite." Professor Deligne smiled and said, "This problem has troubled the mathematics world for more than a century and a half. He will probably create a new tool that will help us understand the Riemann zeta function."

He paused for a second and continued, "I'm looking forward to the next International Congress of Mathematicians."

Professor Fefferman said, "He might not come."

Deligne shook his head.

"Trust me, he is coming."

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837 Boundary Approach Method!

After successfully killing time on the balcony, Lu Zhou left the waiter some cash for the drinks. He then immediately went to the parking lot and got into his black sedan.

"Back to Zhongshan International."

"Okay."

Wang Peng, who was in the driver's seat, nodded and soon began driving.

He talked about the Riemann zeta function with the lady for a long time. Even though, for the most part, he was talking by himself, he was still somehow inspired by the conversation.

Lu Zhou, who was sitting in the back seat, suddenly spoke.

"I need a tool."

Wang Peng paused for a second.

"… What tool?"

"… Nothing."

"Do you want to go to the supermarket?"

Lu Zhou shook his head and smiled.

"If only they sold it at the supermarket."

Wang Peng felt like if he kept on asking, he would be muddled by Lu Zhou's response. Therefore, he shut his mouth and focused on driving.

Zhongshan International wasn't far from the Purple Mountain Hotel, and after a ten-minute drive, Lu Zhou was back in his gated neighborhood.

The car stopped at his front door. Lu Zhou told Wang Peng not to come in tomorrow. After that, Lu Zhou walked home and up the stairs.

"It's not realistic to solve the π(x) function using a general method. There have been thousands of people who have tried to solve this problem in the past. Even though this idea might work, the most obvious pathway must have been attempted before."

"A novel approach requires a novel tool!"

"I need a new tool!"

The quad-rotor drone flew next to Lu Zhou, following him up the stairs.

Xiao Ai curiously asked Lu Zhou.

[Master?]

"Give me a cup of coffee, instant, send it to the study room."

[But it's so late… (ー〃)]

"It doesn't matter, I don't plan on sleeping tonight."

[Okay, Master, but please stay healthy.]

Lu Zhou opened his study room door and replied, "Okay!"

Climbing the Riemann hypothesis mountain at once was unrealistic. This mountain had stood in the mathematics world for far too long. Countless people had attempted to challenge it, only to stay at the bottom. Even though there were now signs pointing toward the top of the mountain, there wasn't a single tool they could use to climb the mountain.

No matter what kind of proof he was going to use, he had to lay a solid foundation.

This way, it would give himself some hope…

Lu Zhou sat down at his desk and threw the pile of used draft papers into the bin. He then took out a new stack of blank draft paper.

Lu Zhou looked at the draft paper on his desk and smirked. He shook his head and muttered to himself, "… This is probably the least expensive project I've done this year."

When he tried to prove Yang-Mills Equations, he requested CERN to conduct several sets of expensive experiments.

For a pure mathematics problem like the Riemann hypothesis, the costs were draft paper and his brainpower…

…

Lu Zhou hadn't devoted himself to one research project for a long time.

Ever since he became the chief designer of the Lunar Orbit Committee, he had played the role of an academic leader. Rarely did he participate in the forefront of scientific research.

However, Lu Zhou wasn't out of practice.

When he devoted himself to a mathematics problem, the strings of numbers and Greek symbols flowed through his brain like music.

The rising vapor from his cup of coffee gradually disappeared. The street lights on the asphalt roads went out. The Purple Mountain was pitch black. After a while, Lu Zhou heard the birds chirping outside, and this made him stop writing.

"The new cohomology mathematical tool 'Étale' created by Grothendieck while researching Weil's conjecture made a huge impact on the development of algebraic geometry and the entire mathematical field. That ultimately led to Deligne's proof of Weil's conjecture.

"If I want to find a way to climb the mountain, I have to climb the smaller mountain first… A weak Riemann hypothesis."

When it came to the twin prime conjecture and the Polignac's conjecture, the latter was contained within the former. Even though the former didn't lead to a direct proof of the latter, it could inspire one to prove the latter.

That was how the mathematics world was explored.

From proving the weak form of a conjecture, to proving the conjecture, to then proving a stronger form of the conjecture; once all of these were completed, all of the clues became connected, and the tower of mathematics was built.

Lu Zhou wrote down a line of equations on a new piece of draft paper.

[Re(s) = 1-c/ln [ Im(s) 2] (u003e0) …]

Lu Zhou smirked, and his dignified look gradually disappeared.

"If I want to prove that all zeros are distributed on the zero limit line, I should start by excluding areas where zeros do not exist! Re(s)0 and Re(s)1, as long as I think of a way to enhance this proof to all areas outside the critical line, that is, Re(s)u003c1/2 and Re(s)u003e1/2, I can prove the Riemann hypothesis!

"I'll start from the right limit!"

This proof method was called the critical zone method! Instead of proving what percent of zeros were on the zero limit line, the proof attempted to shrink the critical zone area containing all zeros, eventually reaching the critical line!

As long as he could prove the right boundary of the critical zone from Re(s) = 1 and the left to Re(s) = 1-ε(ε u003e 0), for all values of epsilon, he could prove the Riemann hypothesis!

He had an idea, and all that was left to do was execution!

His intuition told him that this piece of the puzzle was in the algebraic geometry field! Unfortunately, that was one of his main weaknesses…

"If only I had someone to talk to."

Lu Zhou shook his head.

Especially Professor Deligne…

Unfortunately, some things couldn't be explained through email. Video calling might work, but the atmosphere wasn't the same as talking in person.

It seemed like he could only rely on himself.

"I won't rely on others."

Even then, Lu Zhou couldn't hold back his curiosity. He opened his computer and went on Mathoverflow.

He was soon disappointed.

When he uploaded his thesis on arXiv, he hoped it would help lay the foundation for others. He wanted to see some interesting discussion on Mathoverflow, as that might inspire him.

But now, it seemed like his plan was clearly unsuccessful.

Even though this was supposed to be a professional mathematics discussion community, full of PhDs, most people were more interested in gossip.

Although there were some academically focused discussions, most of them were outdated.

"Looks like I have to retreat for a few days."

Lu Zhou leaned back on his chair and picked up his phone. He told Wang Peng not to disturb him for a few days. He then yawned and went into his bathroom.

He was hoping to get inspired throughout the night, maybe even produce some in-progress results. However, the situation was much worse than he had thought.

Since he decided to go on a retreat, there was no reason for him to stay awake anymore.

Before he would officially start working, he planned on making up for last night's sleep…

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Even with a research plan, solving the problem wasn't easy.

The concept of a critical zone had been around for more than a century.

The zones Re (s) u003c 0 and Re (s) u003e 1 were solved the earliest as they were the easiest. The regions Re (s) = 0 and Re (s) = 1 took nearly a decade to solve.

The exclusion of these two areas directly led to the proof of the prime number theorem.

In order to dive deep into this topic, Lu Zhou collected a large amount of thesis in this area. He even found electronic versions of Grothendieck's academic works, which were removed by major publishers. He found the original Étale proof method, as well as the theses published by Professor Deligne on Weil's conjecture.

Lu Zhou actually should have read these theses during his PhD, but unfortunately, he was involved in the field of number theory, not algebraic geometry.

Research on Goldbach's conjecture took up all of his time. Professor Deligne gave him a lot of freedom, otherwise, he wouldn't have been able to concentrate on Goldbach's conjecture.

There were both pros and cons from Deligne's style of teaching.

On the first day of his retreat, Lu Zhou spent the entire day collecting all of the theses.

Lu Zhou spent the next two days reading the thesis and summarizing the main points.

On the fifth day, Lu Zhou combined his algebraic geometry hypotheses with his newly-learned theorems. He chose an algebraic curve over a finite field as a support, which gave him a shortcut to the final answer.

Inspirational thoughts flew out of his brain.

After finding the algebraic curve on the finite field, all the puzzles began connecting themselves together…

On the eighth day.

Lu Zhou was sitting at his desk. He stretched his back and stood up from his chair.

He finished writing the thesis last night. He didn't even know what time it was.

Because he was too concentrated on his research, he didn't remember when he fell asleep.

This feeling of being completely immersed in the mathematics world was magical, time flew by without him knowing…

Sure enough, mathematics was his passion.

That felt amazing!

He looked at his phone, which was on the corner of his desk. Unsurprisingly, dozens of missed calls and texts popped up on his screen.

Lu Zhou didn't have time to cater to these things. He left his phone aside and planned on replying later. He then looked at the pile of A4 papers on his table.

"Looks like it's time to type the thesis on a computer…"

Without eating breakfast, Lu Zhou transferred the written thesis into the computer.

With Xiao Ai's help, the thesis transfer didn't take a lot of time.

After Lu Zhou double-checked the thesis and made sure there were no formatting mistakes, he sent it to the editorial department of Annual Mathematics.

His last thesis didn't have any publication value, so he only uploaded it on arXiv.

But this thesis was different.

The research on the Riemann hypothesis had been stalled for nearly a century, and his research was a giant step for humanity!

He had proved that when the value of ε approached zero, there were no non-zero trivial points of the ζ function in the region of Re (s) 1-ε!

He creatively named this problem.

The Quasi Riemann hypothesis!

…

While Lu Zhou was on his retreat, people in the outside world started to worry about him.

It was fine not leaving the house, but not answering the phone made some people a little anxious.

Another week went by.

Wang Peng, who was guarding the mansion, began to worry if Lu Zhou had anything left to eat. Doctor Yan, who was responsible for the health and safety of Lu Zhou, couldn't wait any longer. She drove her SUV and came to his front gate.

Yan Yan was wearing a white doctor's coat. She walked to the front gate and looked at Wang Peng, who was smoking a cigarette.

"Why hasn't Professor Lu come out?"

Wang Peng tapped his cigarette and shook his head.

"I don't know."

Yan Yan: "…"

The hell is I don't know?!

You're his bodyguard!

Yan Yan tried to look into the front yard. She hesitated for a second before asking, "Should we go inside?"

Wang Peng smiled and shook his head. He said, "Don't do that, he will get angry."

Yan Yan: "How do you know? What if he needs our help…"

Wang Peng tapped his cigarette and replied, "Because… I've done it before."

Yan Yan frowned and was about to say something. Suddenly, the front gate opened, followed by the front door opening.

The two looked at the front door and saw Lu Zhou walking out of the house in a gray jacket.

Wang Peng threw the cigarette into the trash and said, "You proved it?"

Lu Zhou looked at Wang Peng and Yan Yan, and he was slightly surprised.

"Do you even know what I was researching?"

Wang Peng awkwardly shook his head.

He obviously didn't know what Lu Zhou was researching. However, from his past experience, he knew it must have been a difficult problem.

Lu Zhou began walking toward the car. Yan Yan stopped him and said, "Wait a second, you have a physical examination today. We made an appointment last week…"

"We did?" Lu Zhou rubbed his head.

Yan Yan nodded.

"Do you want to hear the call recording?"

The f*ck?

Why did you record the call?

"No need, I trust you." Lu Zhou coughed and said, "We'll do the examination later, I have something more important to do."

Wang Peng looked serious, and he began looking for his car key.

"Where are we going?"

Lu Zhou smiled and began to look excited.

"We're picking up a new car."

Wang Peng: "…"

Yan Yan: "…"

How is that important?!

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839 Don"t Piss Him Off

Three days ago, Chen Yushan had been texting Lu Zhou. She told him that the Electric Purple car from BYD had arrived, telling him to pick it up from the dealership.

However, Lu Zhou's phone was turned off at the time, so he didn't see the messages. It wasn't until a few minutes ago, after he uploaded the thesis onto arXiv, did he have time to check his text messages.

Then…

Within half an hour, Lu Zhou was in the dealership, standing next to the cool black sedan.

The sales lady was nervous about Lu Zhou's security guard, and she tried to maintain a professional smile as she talked about the basic functions of Electric Purple.

After hearing her explanation, Lu Zhou immediately asked, "What's the max speed?"

The sales lady politely said, "Max speed is 260 kilometers an hour, but you'll never reach that on normal roads."

Lu Zhou nodded expressionlessly.

F*cking nuts!

It's crazy an electric car can go that fast.

This is even faster than Teslas… Of course, this isn't a production car, but still, this is pretty awesome.

Lu Zhou asked another important question, "What about its safety features?"

The sales lady smiled politely.

"The glass is bulletproof…"

"I'll take care of that," Wang Peng said confidently. "If it doesn't pass our tests, we will modify it."

Lu Zhou suddenly became nervous.

"Don't turn this thing into a tank."

Wang Peng said, "Of course not… We have experts in the department for this kind of modification. It will look exactly the same after it is done."

Bullsh*t!

Lu Zhou hesitated for a second and said, "I have one request."

Wang Peng: "What request?"

Lu Zhou awkwardly smiled and said, "Before you modify it, drive me around first."

Wang Peng: "… Okay."

…

Even though Lu Zhou wasn't particularly interested in cars, every guy was more or less into cars.

Driving around a limited edition car was quite exciting.

Especially since Lu Zhou had just finished tackling a problem, it was time for him to relax.

Wang Peng drove around the Purple Mountain and the city center. Lu Zhou opened the windows on both sides of the car and let the breeze hit his face.

However, after ten minutes or so, he started to feel bored.

As expected, he wasn't fond of luxury cars.

Mathematics was more interesting to him.

After Lu Zhou closed the windows, he took out his phone and logged into his Mathoverflow account. He then looked at the trending posts.

Just like he had expected, within an hour of him uploading his "Quasi Riemann hypothesis" thesis, the discussion boards on Mathoverflow exploded!

[Jesus… I can't believe it!]

[A few days ago, Professor Lu was still researching the π(x) function, right? How come he suddenly changed his research path???]

[How many scholars have claimed to have made a major breakthrough on the Riemann conjecture? Re (s) = 1-c / ln [ Im (s) 2] is infinitely close to Re (s) = 1 when Im (s) , so we can't extend the right boundary toward the critical line at all! Can't these millennials be more rigorous!]

[This is Professor Lu you're talking about! Have you even read his thesis? He didn't even reference Re(s)=1-c/ln[Im(s)2!]

[I know this is Professor Lu, but Sir Atiyah has won much more mathematics awards! Mathematics research should be looked at objectively, the author's background doesn't matter! If he made this submission anonymously, no one would care!]

Lu Zhou smiled when he looked at the comments.

No sh*t!

If some no-name mathematician claimed to have made progress on Riemann's hypothesis, no one would believe him.

You don't believe me?

Just wait!

Interestingly enough, he saw a familiar name-tag on the forum—Terry Tao.

This was obviously non other than Professor Tao Zhexuan from Los Angeles.

Professor Tao's comment was interesting.

[I'm still reading through the thesis, give me a second, this might take a while.]

Professor Tao rarely gave ambiguous comments on whether a thesis was correct.

If the thesis topic was in an area he was familiar with, he could often immediately find a disproving argument.

But now, this seemed to be different.

His comment further heated the discussions on Mathoverflow.

Lu Zhou continued to scroll and saw some interesting comments. He slowly smirked.

Wang Peng looked at him. He was curious about what Lu Zhou was reading on his phone. He knew he shouldn't be asking, so he decided to concentrate on driving.

After driving around Purple Mountain, this beast-looking Electric Purple car stopped at the gate of Zhongshan International. A neighbor walking their dog looked at the car curiously.

They had never seen the car logo before.

Nor had they seen the car model before.

This wasn't unusual for laymen, but for car enthusiasts, it was like they had discovered a new continent. They took out their phones and began taking photos.

However…

When they saw the person getting off the car, the neighbors quietly put their phone away.

Oh Jesus, it's that guy…

Taking photos of normal celebrities was fine.

Even B-list celebrities weren't a big deal in this gated community.

But when it came to Lu Zhou…

They didn't dare to mess with him…

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For a high-end gated community like this, every entry and exit had to be registered.

After Lu Zhou moved in, the gated community increased its security levels. There were more security guards roaming around the area.

Even though this was Lu Zhou's car, he still had to follow security procedures.

After Wang Peng parked the car, he got off and muttered, "What a rush this car is."

Due to his profession, he had driven many cars. Ranging from premium foreign cars to customized domestic cars. However, this was one of the best cars he had ever driven.

Considering the fact that electric cars had only been around for a few years, this was even more amazing.

Lu Zhou stretched his shoulders and smiled. "Of course."

Wang Peng: "It's not cheap, right?"

Lu Zhou: "I don't know, but there's only one in the world…"

Wang Peng spoke emotionally.

"So that's how rich people live."

Lu Zhou said, "Stop pretending, you've driven military tanks before, this is just a sports car."

Wang Peng rubbed his nose and said, "I haven't driven a tank, I've only ridden in one…"

Lu Zhou: "…"

Wow…

I was just kidding, I didn't expect this guy to actually have sat in a tank before.

Lu Zhou was suddenly curious about what kind of life his bodyguard used to live.

Wang Peng looked at the car key in his hand and said, "I'm going to register the vehicle, it might take a few minutes. Do you want to wait or come with me?"

The gated community was quite safe.

This community was the safest place in Jinling; even intelligence personnel from other countries would have trouble entering.

"I'll just stay here. Remember to pick me up tomorrow. I don't have any plans tonight, so I won't need the car."

Wang Peng nodded and said, "Okay then, I'll head off then."

"Sure… Remember to not modify the car too much, just a little," said Lu Zhou with a worried look on his face.

Wang Peng looked at how nervous Lu Zhou was, and he smiled and said, "Don't worry, I'll bring it back the exact same way."

"I'll hold you to that!"

Lu Zhou gave a reluctant look at his brand new sports car. He then turned around and walked back to his mansion.

After returning home, he threw his trench coat on the couch and saw Xiao Ai flying over. He told Xiao Ai to make him a cup of coffee. He then went upstairs to his study room.

It had been a while since he uploaded his thesis, so the entire world probably knew about his mathematics thesis at this point.

However, the only opinion he cared about was from Annual Mathematics.

Normally, a thesis review would take a long time, but he directly submitted it to the editorial department's email, therefore he skipped the general procedure.

He went on his computer and saw an unopened email in his mailbox.

Unsurprisingly, it was from the editorial department of Annual Mathematics.

[Dear Professor Lu, we have received your thesis manuscript. I would like to thank you for choosing us as your publisher. The thesis is in peer review, but as you know, there are very few scholars in your field of research. We are currently contacting an appropriate reviewer. We will notify you of any updates.]

There hadn't been any progress regarding the critical zone research for more than a century. Even though there were a few people researching Riemann's hypothesis, very few people chose this as their research direction.

However, this hypothesis was still quite important in the field of analytic number theory. Otherwise, it wouldn't have been named the Quasi Riemann hypothesis.

Basically, if a scholar could solve this problem, they would undoubtedly receive a Fields Medal.

For more than a century, no one had been able to increase the right boundary limit of the critical zone, even by a little. A lot of people thought that this proof idea was not feasible, but now, someone suddenly proved Re (s) = 1-ε (ε 0), which proved that the critical boundary band could be moved!

What did this mean?

For ordinary people, this might not mean much.

But this was huge for the mathematics community!

Therefore, it wasn't easy to find a reviewer.

Because of Lu Zhou's connections in the academic community, it was difficult to find an appropriate reviewer who didn't have any conflicts of interest…

Therefore, it seemed like the ill-tempered Professor Faltings was the best choice. Also, Faltings happened to be in the field of algebraic geometry and analytic number theory…

However, this still depended on whether or not Faltings had the time to review.

After all, reviewing a thesis like this was no piece of cake…

"Hope that Faltings has the time to review my thesis."

The door gently opened, and a drone holding a steaming cup of coffee steadily flew inside.

[Master, your coffee. (๑•̀ᄇ•́)]

"Put it on the table."

[Okay, Master. (•̀•́)]

The drone landed steadily on the corner of the desk. Its retractable arm then placed down the coffee.

The bottom right corner of Lu Zhou's screen read: [Please enjoy (* / ω\ *)]. Lu Zhou smiled and picked up his coffee, taking a sip.

"Thanks, it's delicious."

Lu Zhou placed the coffee on the table. He then dragged the email to his recycling bin.

He was able to close his email and continue his unfinished research, which was to extend the value of ε towards 1/2. However, an email suddenly appeared in his mailbox.

Lu Zhou paused for a second and clicked on the email.

He noticed the familiar email address and held his breath.

[Professor, are you researching Riemann's hypothesis?]

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Any research progress regarding Riemann's hypothesis would be talked about in the mathematics community.

This was no exception for the mathematics department at UC Berkeley.

After Professor Lu uploaded his thesis onto arXis, the news regarding the proof of the Quasi Riemann hypothesis spread like wildfire. People were discussing the news all over campus.

"Did you hear? The Quasi Riemann hypothesis was proven!"

"I did, that's incredible. No one has made any progress for a century!"

"Last time the prime number theorem was proved as a result of research on the Riemann hypothesis. I wonder what Professor Lu will make of it this time."

"Yeah, if only I had Professor Lu's intelligence."

"Keep dreaming!"

The mathematics department students weren't the only ones talking about this event. The professors were talking about it as well.

Analytic number theory wasn't Berkeley's strong suit. They leaned toward the partial differential equations side. However, for scholars like Tao Zhexuan, who was proficient in multiple fields, they obviously kept up with the latest news in mathematics.

Tao Zhexuan sat inside an office in the mathematics building at Berkeley. His desk was full of draft papers. With a pen in his hand, he stared intently at the thesis on his table. He was so focused he didn't even hear the knock on his door.

After a while, the door was pushed open. A thin Asian man walked in with a box of pizza. He was a PhD student.

"Professor, the pizza you ordered is here."

Tao Zhexuan replied without looking up, "Just put it aside."

"Okay, but you should eat it while it's hot." The PhD student looked at the thesis in front of him and asked curiously, "Oh yeah, yesterday, I saw your comment on Mathoverflow… Are you still reading that thesis?"

Tao Zhexuan: "Yes."

The PhD student gulped and asked, "Is there a conclusion yet?"

"I would tell you if there were one."

"Okay then." The PhD student gave a helpless expression then left the room.

Normally speaking, Professor Tao was an approachable person. He was one of the big names at Berkeley who were friends with the students.

However, there were exceptions.

Whenever he was troubled by a question, he would act cold toward everyone, even his wife…

"Interesting.

"He's using an algebraic geometry, similar to something Grothendieck would do, but it's not obvious.

"Choosing an algebraic curve on the complex plane… How did he come up with this idea?

"Also… Can he really prove it using this method?"

Tao Zhexuan leaned back on his chair and looked at the dusty ceiling fan. He scratched his head.

It was rare for a problem to bother him for this long.

He tapped the pen on the paper and solemnly spoke.

"Debatable."

However, he didn't sound confident at all.

"Am I the one who's wrong…"

Maybe the proof does in fact, exist?

…

Speaking of which, Lu Zhou didn't remember when was the last time he received an email from Vera.

Was it a year ago?

Or even longer?

Obviously, Vera, who was researching Riemann's hypothesis, saw Lu Zhou's thesis on arXiv. She took the time to read it and had some questions.

Most things were difficult to convey through email. Therefore, the two agreed to a video call at 8 pm Beijing time.

After three years, Lu Zhou could finally see the student he was proudest of.

Even though it was through the Internet…

At 8 pm the next day, the video call began.

Lu Zhou made a cup of coffee and sat in his study room. He was prepared to discuss academic problems, but the atmosphere was a bit stiff.

It seemed like the girl had too much to say, but she didn't know where to start. She nervously sat in front of the computer screen without saying anything.

Lu Zhou had an awkward look on his face.

Her blonde hair was combed into a ponytail. Lu Zhou could even tell she was wearing a different shade of lipstick. Clearly, she dressed up.

What should I say?

Long time no see?

That seems a bit cold.

Nice hairstyle?

What if she thinks I'm hitting on her?

Lu Zhou coughed and spoke clearly in a formal way.

"Let's get to it… Tell me what your question is."

Having small talks and greetings might make the atmosphere even stiffer. Therefore, he went straight to the topic.

As expected, the tension in the room disappeared.

Vera sighed in relief and nodded. She spoke quietly.

"Okay, wait a second…"

The girl walked to the side and dragged a fully-written blackboard into the camera view.

Lu Zhou looked at the lines of equations and paused for a second. He looked surprised, then gradually, he started to look serious.

Vera cleared her throat and said quietly, "This is the algebraic geometry method you used to prove the Quasi Riemann hypothesis, I tried to summarize the proof."

Lu Zhou skimmed through the blackboard and nodded with approval.

"Not bad."

No wonder she's my star student.

Being able to summarize all this is not easy.

Vera smiled and said, "Even though Molina… I mean Ms. Abel told me not to discuss these problems with you, I think it's better… to discuss it with you."

Talking about ideas with a genius scholar was risky, because the academic community only recognized who produced the result, not where the initial idea came from.

Therefore, some scholars even resisted the urge to publish their in-progress results… They wanted to aim for higher, something more significant.

Vera put on a serious face and spoke.

"I carefully studied the algebraic finite field curve you introduced when ε tends to infinitely small. I found out that there are no non-zero trivial points of the ζ function in the region of Re (s) 1-ε. The properties of 2Γ(1-s) = (2π)(s-1)sin (πs / 2) ζ (1-s) hold…"

Vera turned toward the blackboard and wrote on the right corner, which she purposely left blank.

Lu Zhou looked at Vera and frowned, but he quickly relaxed.

He had a rough idea of Vera's thought process.

She used his own proof as a foundation and introduced a homology mapping function that connected the nilpotent Lie groups… Basically, she made some improvements on his Group Structure Method and applied that to the enlargement of ε.

The chalk in Vera's hand stopped moving. She turned around and smiled.

"This method will probably work, but I can only do it halfway. I was thinking if you could finish it…

"So… I need your help."

Vera spoke quietly. She wasn't even sure if Lu Zhou could hear her.

Lu Zhou stared at the formula on the blackboard for a while. He suddenly asked, "Do you know why you can't complete the proof?"

Vera paused for a second and asked, "Why?"

Lu Zhou spoke the truth with a look of regret.

"Because you can't prove this problem with the Group Structure Method."

Vera: "…?"

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A tint of red appeared on Vera's white cheeks, and she pouted and looked stubborn.

"Why?"

She would be fine if Lu Zhou found a calculation error. But Lu Zhou simply told her the proof idea wouldn't work, without reason. She couldn't accept this.

Even though he was her respected ex-supervisor.

Lu Zhou knew what Vera was thinking. He sighed and patiently explained to her.

"The curve Re(s) = 1-c / ln [ Im (s) 2] is infinitely close to Re (s) = 1 when Im (s) approaches infinity. By using the Group Structure Method, this result is inevitable. Therefore, if we want to use the critical line, we must use a different tool. This is the reason why I did not use the Group Structure Method when I proved the existence of epsilon. Instead, I used an algebraic geometry method."

Lu Zhou knew the Group Structure Method like the back of his hand.

When it came to Deligne's proof that "all zeros of the ζ function of a d-dimensional algebraic cluster over a finite field lie on the complex plane, Re (s) = 1/2, 3/2, …, (2d-1 ) / 2…", before using a homology group method and the Fourier transform, Lu Zhou first thought about using the Group Structure Method.

However, things didn't go that well.

When he tried to apply a group theory method to the Riemann zeta function, he soon discovered it would not work as expected.

Lu Zhou looked at the blushing girl and spoke.

"On the surface, the research on the critical line is an analytic number theory problem. However, it actually is a complex analysis problem. When it comes to the group construction of Riemann's zeta function, I recommend you to read some of Grothendieck's algebraic proofs of the Riemann-Roch theorem. It might inspire you."

The steam slowly rose from Lu Zhou's coffee cup. The girl stared at her keyboard and didn't speak.

After a while, she looked up and stared dead straight at Lu Zhou.

"I still think my theory is correct.

"We don't have to prove that Re (s) = 1-c / ln [ Im (s) 2] infinitely approaches Re (s) = 1 when Im (s) approaches infinity to use the Group Structure Method. I will prove it to you!"

When Lu Zhou looked at how determined Vera was, he contemplated it for a second before smiling.

"I think there are better approaches, but it seems like you have made up your mind. If you are sure you can do it, then you might as well try. Maybe you are right, maybe we will meet on the finish line."

Vera nodded.

"Yeah! I will not give up!"

The girl covered her mouth and coughed twice.

Lu Zhou paused for a second and asked, "Are you okay?"

Vera looked up and smiled reluctantly. She then replied softly, "Nothing… The weather has been changing, so I might have caught a cold."

Lu Zhou: "Take care of yourself. Put more clothes on, drink some water."

Vera began to blush. She didn't know if it was because of Lu Zhou or because of her cold.

"Thank you."

The conversation died.

The two went into silence.

It seemed like they didn't know what to talk about outside the world of mathematics.

Lu Zhou was about to end the call, but Vera suddenly spoke first.

"Um…"

Lu Zhou: "What?"

Vera bit her lip and stared firmly at Lu Zhou.

"I still remember our agreement.

"I will try my best!"

Lu Zhou paused for a second.

He was about to say something, but the call was disconnected.

Lu Zhou stared at the blank screen and went silent for a while.

Suddenly, a pop-up window appeared on the lower-right corner of his desktop.

Xiao Ai: [Master, do you want me to call her back? (๑•. •๑)]

A few seconds went by, Lu Zhou smiled and shook his head.

"No, it's fine. Even if you do call her back, I wouldn't know what to say."

Xiao Ai: [Okay then 0.0]

Lu Zhou: "Speaking of which, I didn't know you can video call people for me…"

Xiao Ai: [That's very easy for Xiao Ai to do.]

Lu Zhou: "True."

He nearly forgot that Xiao Ai hacked into a European government affairs system and used the loopholes in the system to forge an identity. This helped him sneak in a prohibited machine tool.

Video calling a person was a piece of cake in comparison.

…

The Quasi Riemann hypothesis was solved. Even though epsilon was determined to be infinitely small, this was still a huge step forward for the critical line idea.

Now, the only problem was how to advance the epsilon to 1/2.

Over the past few days, Lu Zhou spent four hours a day locking himself in the Jin Ling University library.

The library at Jin Ling University wasn't as great as the Firestone Library in Princeton, and he could even access original manuscripts at the Firestone Library. However, he could find most of the resources he wanted at the library at Jin Ling University.

And for the ones he couldn't, as long as he put in a request, the library would buy the book for him.

Speaking of which, a small accident happened.

When he was sitting in the library studying the Riemann zeta function, someone secretly took a picture of him sitting at his desk with a pile of books and sent it to their friends' news feed on WeChat.

After that, somehow this photo went around the entire school.

In fact, Lu Zhou was happy to see himself set as a good example for the students. The only downside was that the caption used for the photo was "Keep on studying and you'll never be old".

What do you mean old?

I'm not even thirty years old yet!

The hell is old?

Ah, I'm so pissed off!

It was worth mentioning that while Lu Zhou was researching on how to extend the proof of the Quasi Riemann hypothesis, Mr. Faltings, the director of the Max Planck Institute for Mathematics, finally received the review invitation from Annual Mathematics.

Now that the thesis had a reviewer, Lu Zhou's thesis finally entered the peer review process.

This was going to be a long wait.

Due to the difficulty of the 40-page thesis, it would be at least December before the results would be published.

The entire mathematics community was talking about the Quasi Riemann hypothesis thesis.

Lu Zhou could even hear people talking about it at Jin Ling University campus.

However, Lu Zhou didn't really care about what other people think about him. He put all of his attention onto the value of epsilon.

Just like this, November came to an end.

Another major event occurred in the international community, one that had nothing to do with mathematics, one that far surpassed the proof of the Quasi Riemann hypothesis.

After half a year of construction, the first phase of the lunar research facility was finally complete!

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A dark space filled with stars.

The Moon Palace space station peacefully floated in lunar transfer orbit.

A long spacecraft gradually floated toward the space station.

The number "002" was written on the side of the spacecraft, implying this was the second "Magpie Bridge" launch.

A few scientific researchers, which came from all over the world, were on the Magpie Bridge.

The landing gear extended forward as the Moon Palace gradually approached the Moon Palace space station.

Professor Stephen stood next to the porthole. As he looked at the white planet nearby, he couldn't help but exclaim, "Unbelievable."

Professor Ian Crawford from Birkbeck College, University Of London looked at him and asked curiously, "What's so unbelievable?"

"I can't believe the Chinese actually did it. They built a scientific research station on the Moon." Stephen looked outside the porthole and said, "I always thought they were just scamming money from the United Nations."

A few months ago, the idea of building a semi-permanent experimental facility on the surface of the Moon sounded like a fantasy.

Professor Stephen never would have thought the Chinese could really do it.

However, reality proved him wrong.

The production was completed on Earth and was transported to the surface of the Moon via the Magpie Bridge.

If he didn't see the photos of the scientific research station, he wouldn't even believe this was all real.

Not just that, but apparently, China planned on building a hadron collider for particle physics experiments. CERN had sent a team of experts to Beijing to help China with technical problems.

It seemed like the Chinese and the European Union were getting along nicely.

In order to participate in the lunar research station project, various countries had to pay a large lump sum of money to China in exchange for the opportunity to allow their own scientific researchers to set foot on the research station…

"They have completely industrialized the aerospace industry." Professor Ian continued, "I spoke about this in my thesis a long time ago. The development of lunar resources is our only way to advance technology. There is bound to be a country that could do this first."

"That's why I said this is unbelievable." Professor Stephen sighed and said, "They've done more in a year than we have in ten years."

Professor Stephen looked at the space station and suddenly spoke.

"Speaking of which, I wonder if Dr. Z is on this space station."

When the Mars bacteria crisis was happening, an anonymous thesis published on arXiv saved the entire Earth's ecosystem.

This matter had been widely talked about in the biology community.

Legends had been made about Dr. Z's identity. However, even though official institutions had tried to investigate this matter, no one had yet been able to identify the person who saved all of mankind.

Professor Ian looked at him strangely and asked, "Why do you think he's here?"

"I've carefully read his thesis. His writing style is very similar to some of my Chinese students. My intuition tells me he is Chinese. It's very likely he was involved in the research of the X-0172 bacteria. Right now, the only patient with the X-0172 bacteria is lying on the research station, so there is no reason for him to not come here."

Professor Ian jokingly said, "I still remember that a while ago, you couldn't believe China could produce such research results."

Professor Stephen coughed and rubbed his nose.

"That was the past, the times have changed."

While the two were talking, the Magpie Bridge successfully docked with the Moon Palace, and the connection hatch slowly opened.

The researchers wearing spacesuits gathered in front of the cabin door and floated into the space station.

They stood in the cabin pressure buffer room. A Chinese staff member with a serious face stood in front of the researchers.

He cleared his throat and spoke with perfect English.

"Welcome to the Moon Palace space station, I am in charge here.

"The flight to the Moon's surface will depart in three days. You will receive training over the next three days to help you adjust to the low-gravity environment.

"Now, please show your e-passport…"

Even though the Moon didn't belong to one single country, the facilities built on the Moon were owned by various private countries and organizations.

Even though China didn't claim territorial sovereignty over the lunar research station, strictly speaking, the research facility was part of Chinese soil.

Therefore, they had to show a passport and visa before entering…

…

Lu Zhou didn't expect that he went on trending for two different things.

One was for the Quasi Riemann hypothesis.

Even though this hypothesis wasn't particularly well-known, it still didn't stop him from ending up on the trending page.

On the other hand, the completion of the lunar scientific research station made him number three on the trending page.

This lunar scientific research station was named "Guanghan Lunar Palace", and it far surpassed the proof of the Quasi Riemann hypothesis in terms of popularity.

Not only did media outlets all over the world report on the news, but netizens around the world also enthusiastically discussed this matter.

It seemed like the entire world had their eyes on China.

For Lu Zhou, the attention and media reports didn't phase him. He didn't care about them at all.

He put all of his energy on the Riemann hypothesis. The Lunar Orbit Committee was moving forward as scheduled, so he didn't have to worry about it at all.

However, while Lu Zhou was minding his own business, something confusing happened.

Which was, after the completion of the Guanghan Lunar Palace, the second phase of the "Control of Earth and Moon" mission chain was marked by the system as complete.

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844 Golden Mission Card?

[Congratulations, user, for completing the second phase of the "Control of Earth and Moon" mission: Permanent Station on the Moon

[Requirements: Construct a semi-permanent scientific research station on the Moon's surface for astronomical observations, as well as observation of climate activities and high-energy particle physics experiments.

[Reward: 200,000 mathematics experience points. 200,000 engineering experience points. 100,000 materials science experience points. 50,000 energy science experience points. 500 general points. One lucky draw ticket.

[Secondary goals:

1. Three feet deep: Collect 50 tons of rare lunar soil. Reward: 1,000 general points, random experience points card. (completed)

2. Alchemist: Produce 100 tons of titanium alloy. Reward: 500 general points, 100,000 experience points, one lucky draw ticket. (completed)

]

Lu Zhou: "…"

Lu Zhou looked at the information screen and didn't feel happy at all. In fact, he was cursing himself.

The lunar hotel is already under construction, per Chen Yushan's suggestion. The one-day lunar tourist scheme was just posted on Star Sky Technology's website. But now you're telling me the second phase of the mission is over?

What about the lunar hadron collider, and the giant lunar telescope…

They had already finished the design for the lunar hadron collider, but they hadn't begun preparing for the giant telescope.

Lu Zhou didn't expect the branch missions to be completed by themselves, but now the system was telling him the main mission was completed as well?!

For the first phase, I have to submit the mission myself, right?

How come it was automatically submitted for the second phase…

Lu Zhou closed the panel and shook his head.

All in all, the mission rewards were quite plentiful.

Lu Zhou took a deep breath and looked at the information screen in front of him. He spoke with a clear voice.

"System, open my characteristic panel!"

The moment he finished speaking, a blue light swept across the screen, and Lu Zhou's updated characteristic panel was displayed in front of him.

[

A. Mathematics: Level 8 (974,000/3 million)

B. Physics: Level 7 (11,215/1.2 million)

C. Biochemistry: Level 6 (10,000/600,000)

D. Engineering: Level 6 (0/600,000)

E. Materials science: Level 6 (163,000/600,000)

F. Energy science: Level 4 (0/200,000)

G. Information science: Level 3 (3,000/100,000)

General points: 4,335

]

His engineering went from level 5 to level 6, energy science went from level 3 to level 4. The rest stayed the same.

As for the remaining 100,000 experience points…

Lu Zhou thought for a while and chose to allocate all of them to information science, which made his information science level go from level 3 to level 4. Even though he could receive information science experience points from his branch missions, due to the importance of informatics in the aerospace industry, it was cost-effective for him to level up as soon as possible.

"Speaking of which, I still have a random experience card…"

Lu Zhou went into his inventory and selected the golden experience card.

[Random experience card (receive 1-9,999,999 random experience points.]

I can win seven digits of experience points!

But I can also only earn 1…

After reading the card description, Lu Zhou gulped.

If I receive 2 million experience points, I can increase my mathematics to level 9!

"Is the system going to scam me again?"

Lu Zhou silently prayed in his heart. His fingers trembled as he reached out and tapped the card.

An animation showed the card disappearing into golden stars. A line of text appeared on the system inventory panel.

[Congratulations, user, 100,000 mathematics experience points received!]

As expected, he didn't receive 7 figures of experience points.

He knew the system wouldn't be so kind to him.

Even though this was a little unfortunate, the 100,000 experience points was still pretty good.

Lu Zhou closed his inventory panel and returned to his characteristic panel.

"Here comes the exciting part."

Because of his branch mission rewards, he had two lucky draw tickets.

Since it turned out that praying was useless, Lu Zhou didn't waste any time. He closed his eyes and pressed the draw buttons.

It turned out he was pretty lucky this time.

[Congratulations, user, a sample is given!

[Receive: "Transcendence" X-1 computer!]

[Congratulations, user, special item received!

[Received: Golden mission card!]

Lu Zhou didn't really care about the Transcendence X-1 computer since he could tinker with that in his laboratory at a later date. He was more interested in the golden mission card.

He reached out and tapped his inventory panel, where a translucent dialog box popped up.

[Golden mission card (A special mission card that comes with bonus experience points). Use it to activate a golden reward mission. If the user is currently assigned to another mission, the golden reward mission will take priority until the golden reward mission has either been completed or abandoned.]

"Bonus experience points… What does that mean?"

The description read like a mobile video game.

Lu Zhou was curious. Since there was a golden mission card, were there also a silver mission card and a diamond mission card?

"Current mission will be paused… Does that mean it's similar to urgent missions?"

But it's not actually an urgent mission, and I can abandon the mission at any time?

Regardless, I should look at the final missions for the Control of Earth and Moon mission chain.

Lu Zhou left the card alone and went to his mission panel.

Now that the lucky draw was completed, his mission panel should have been updated.

He clicked on the translucent panel, and a dialog box appeared in front of him.

[Goal 3: Control of Earth and Moon!

[Requirements: Build a mass driver on the lunar surface with a delivery capacity of 50 tons.]

[Secondary goals: …]

When Lu Zhou read this mission, he froze.

What surprised him wasn't that the system had the same idea as him.

When he looked at the secondary goals section, he saw that the unfinished branch missions from phase two were transferred into phase three…

It seemed like he didn't miss out on the branch mission rewards after all.

But this also meant he had a lot of missions to do…

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845 Three Years!

Lu Zhou stared at his mission panel for five minutes, and in the end, he decided to activate the mission card.

Even though the Lunar Orbit Committee planned on building a mass driver on the moon, he had no idea how long it would take.

He should be using this time to complete another mission instead.

After all, the lunar mass driver was advancing forward by itself, so the mission could be picked up again at any time.

[Golden reward mission: Activated!

[Description: The beginning of a future era starts with mathematics…

[Requirements: Solve the Riemann hypothesis within three years!

[Mission rewards: 10,000 general points, two million mathematics experience points. "Legendary" mission card.]

"… Solve the Riemann hypothesis in three years?"

Lu Zhou finished reading the translucent mission panel and muttered to himself, "I know this is the crown of mathematics, but three years…

"Is more than enough time."

Lu Zhou double-checked the mission requirements again. He then tapped the screen and closed his mission panel.

Solving the Riemann hypothesis wasn't an easy task. Even though he already solved the Quasi Riemann hypothesis, climbing the final part of the mountain would take a lot of effort.

But why was Lu Zhou so confident?

Because there had yet to be a problem that took him more than three years to solve…

Lu Zhou had no doubt that he could solve this problem within three years.

This was both his mathematics intuition and his self-confidence from being the king of modern mathematics!

"The 'legendary' mission card sounds exciting…"

Surely legendary is better than golden, right?

Lu Zhou didn't know what was hidden behind that mission card, but the word legendary made him thrilled…

…

After Lu Zhou exited the system space, he opened his eyes and woke up in his office.

He felt a warm sensation climbing from his spine to his brain. It was like his neurons were immersed in a spa of knowledge. He never felt better before.

It felt like…

He was one step closer to becoming the omniscient God.

It didn't take long for the information to enter his brain, and the warm sensation in his spine gradually subsided.

Lu Zhou moved his shoulders and felt something weighing on him. He reached out and felt a blanket.

He looked at the girl in the office. The girl blushed and said, "I saw you were sleeping, so I put the blanket on you."

Lu Zhou looked at Han Mengqi and smiled.

"Thank you."

"You're welcome… Oh, the question you assigned me, I finished it."

Han Mengqi was turning bright red. She tried to avoid eye contact as she walked up and handed him the stack of A4 papers.

"I don't know if it's right, but… I thought of it myself."

"Let me see."

Lu Zhou took the stack of A4 papers from the girl and glanced at it.

The title was the question he assigned her.

[For any real number s u003e 1, define ζ(s) = Σ1 / (m s)… Prove that ζ(2n) is a transcendental number.]

Lu Zhou spent five minutes looking through the first couple of pages. He then gave her an evaluation.

"Standard proof."

Lu Zhou looked at the calendar, then looked at Han Mengqi.

"I'm surprised. I thought it would take you more time to prove it, I didn't expect you to finish it this year."

Han Mengqi couldn't help but smile proudly. She pouted and replied, "I'm actually pretty smart."

Lu Zhou smiled.

"I agree with that."

Lu Zhou looked like he had some questions, so Han Mengqi energetically spoke first.

"Go ahead, ask away!"

"Line 16, page three."

Han Mengqi quickly found the line on her A4 copy.

Lu Zhou picked up the room temperature coffee cup on his table and took a sip. He paused for a second before saying, "Explain in detail on how you introduced the ζ (2n) from equation 2 as a transcendental number."

After hearing this question, Han Mengqi was relieved.

She did a ton of preparation before coming to Lu Zhou, so she didn't expect Lu Zhou to ask a fairly basic question.

She took a deep breath and replied, "This can be obtained by transforming equation 2 using Euler's formula. For any integer nu003e 1, ζ (2n) = b (n) π (2n).

"B(2n) is a sequence of rational numbers, which is, Bernoulli numbers. Obviously ζ (2) is π 2 times a special rational number, and ζ (4) is π 4 times a special rational number… So it is obvious that ζ (2), ζ (4)… are rational numbers. And because π is a transcendental number, the function values are also transcendental numbers."

After hearing Han Mengqi's explanation, Lu Zhou nodded with approval.

"Not bad.

"Don't be happy just yet, that was just to prove you wrote the thesis yourself. The following question is the real challenge."

Lu Zhou put down his coffee cup and spoke.

"Now that you have proven that ζ (2n) is a transcendental number, I want to ask, what about ζ (3)?"

What a simple question…

Han Mengqi proudly raised her chin.

However, when she was about to answer the question, she froze.

ζ (3)!

ζ (3)!

What what what?

What is that?

Han Mengqi was muddled, Lu Zhou smiled and asked, "Can't answer it? ζ(3) seems simpler than ζ (2n), right? It doesn't even contain a variable."

"Yeah…" Han Mengqi pondered. She didn't know what to say.

After a while, she spoke in an uncertain tone.

"Maybe… it's also a transcendental number?"

Lu Zhou smiled and said, "Oh really? Why?"

Han Mengqi answered honestly, "It was a guess."

Seeing the girl lower her head, Lu Zhou smiled and spoke.

"It's not surprising you don't know the answer. Because Euler also didn't know. It wasn't until 1978, when French mathematician R. Apery proved that ζ (3) is not a rational number. As for whether or not ζ (5) is a rational number, we still don't know."

After Han Mengqi heard that there was no answer to the question, she pouted.

"What is that… There isn't even an answer to the question… You're bullying me."

"There is an answer." Lu Zhou smiled at Han Mengqi and said in a serious manner, "There's an answer to every mathematics problem, we just don't know it. When you become a PhD student, that is where the challenge is. You will have to find your own ideas for proofs, then find the proofs themselves."

Han Mengqi paused for a second.

She immediately realized what was going on, and she looked ecstatic.

"Wait a second, you're saying that I can be your student!"

Lu Zhou smiled and nodded.

"I actually already made up my mind after you answered my first question.

"The second question will be your research project."

Lu Zhou stood up from his desk and walked to the blackboard. He picked up a piece of chalk and wrote on the blackboard as he spoke.

"The transcendence value of the Riemann zeta function at odd positive integers has always been a classic problem in analytical mathematical theory. According to Euler's formula and the properties of Bernoulli numbers, we can easily prove that ζ (2n) is a transcendental number. Therefore, our hypothesis is that for any integer n u003e 1, ζ (2n 1) is also a transcendental number.

"The best result so far is that there are countless ζ (2n 1), which are irrational numbers. However, the difference between infinities is still infinity.

"If you can do good research in this area, even if it's only a small proof, you will be recognized by the academic community.

"By then, you will be able to graduate."

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846 Quantum Computer?!

In fact, strictly speaking, Lu Zhou's research direction wasn't regarding the transcendental values of the Riemann zeta function at odd positive integers. The Riemann hypothesis had little to do with transcendental numbers.

However, having said that, things in mathematics were often linked in unexpected ways.

Lu Zhou didn't expect Han Mengqi's research to be useful for him.

She was assigned to conduct research in this area because his research was regarding the Riemann zeta function. If she ever ran into any trouble, he could easily help her.

As for the other less important reason, it was because he hoped he could be inspired while guiding her.

After Lu Zhou assigned the research project, he and Han Mengqi talked about some housekeeping matters. Matters related to compensation and expectations.

Even though this chick's family was loaded, he still had to go through the normal procedures.

Lu Zhou had the habit of taking care of every single one of his students.

After Lu Zhou explained all of the relevant details to Han Mengqi, he told her to take the day off. They would go through the formal process tomorrow and register at the Academic Affairs office. She would also come report at his office tomorrow.

Han Mengqi, who was full of joy, happily left the office. Lu Zhou called Wang Peng and told him to bring the car to the mathematics department. He wanted to go to the Institute for Advanced Study.

Suddenly, his office door was pushed open, and He Changwen walked in while chewing on a pork bun.

He looked at the blackboard and paused for a second. He nearly dropped his bun.

"Boss, you… are researching the transcendental values of the Riemann zeta function at odd positive integers?"

Lu Zhou had only just solved the Quasi Riemann hypothesis, and there was now another world-class mathematics problem on his blackboard.

Even though this problem wasn't as nutty as the Riemann hypothesis, anything related to Riemann zeta function was considered a world-class problem.

He was ready for Lu Zhou to say "yes".

However, Lu Zhou didn't nod his head.

"This isn't my research, I assigned that to student Han. Oh yeah, by the way, she's going to be your PhD classmate now… Is that fine?"

He Changwen looked at Lu Zhou angrily.

Lu Zhou thought back to what he said. He didn't think he said anything wrong.

"Nothing."

He Changwen shook his head with an angry look.

Damn it!

I've been with you for three years, yet you've never assigned me such a big project!

I mean, I wouldn't have contributed to the Quasi Riemann hypothesis anyway…

But you're already assigning this new chick such a big research project.

This is so unfair!

He Changwen began to look even angrier.

Lu Zhou: "…?"

…

Because there was still a system reward waiting for him to "unbox", Lu Zhou didn't stay for long at work. He decided to leave early.

He didn't have to wait for long before his Electric Purple car was parked at the mathematics department building.

Lu Zhou saw his beloved car and sighed in relief.

Thank God he didn't make too many modifications to my baby car.

At least it looks somewhat the same.

Wang Peng walked up and helped him open the door. Lu Zhou asked curiously, "What did you change?"

"We changed the class, the car frame was also replaced with reinforced steel. We then repainted it and coated it with carbon fiber. The weight might have increased, the acceleration might be slightly lower, same with the horsepower. But the rest should be the same." Wang Peng happily slapped the roof of the car and said, "I told you, I wouldn't destroy your precious car."

Lu Zhou: "I'm curious, what's the point of modifying it?"

Wang Peng: "It makes a big difference. Before, if this thing were hit by a truck, we would be screwed."

Lu Zhou: "What about now?"

Wang Peng replied calmly, "The truck would be the one that's screwed."

Lu Zhou: "…"

I guess it's better to be safe than sorry.

I wonder if we can test it with a truck…

While Lu Zhou was getting in his car, two female students walked out of the library and walked past the mathematics department building. They noticed the cool looking sports car and spoke to one another.

"Yo, look over there… That's God Lu's car, right?"

The girl with bangs excitedly looked toward the car.

"I think so… I remember he used to drive a boring sedan, right?"

"Maybe he changed his car after becoming an academician?"

"Maybe! But I heard he has his own company, so he might have bought it himself?"

"I think God Lu doesn't have a girlfriend…"

The two female students went silent for a second.

Two seconds went by, and the girl with bangs exclaimed, "Sigh, actually money isn't important, I just like guys who are good at mathematics. They're so intellectually charming."

Her friend replied, "Forget about it. There are plenty of smart boys doing mathematics, yet I don't see you going out with any of them?"

While the two students were joking around, the Electric Purple car already drove away.

They suddenly realized that they had forgotten to take a photo and post it on their friends' news feed…

…

The Jinling Institute for Advanced Study was close to Jin Ling University, and the drive took less than ten minutes.

After they arrived at the institute, Wang Peng registered the vehicle while Lu Zhou went straight to the main building of the institute. He took the elevator and went directly to the third floor underground laboratory.

This was his secret warehouse. It was mainly used to store Xiao Ai's main server, as well as some samples and debris from the system.

Lu Zhou walked to the center of the laboratory and closed his eyes. He extended his right hand and entered into the system space. He went into his inventory and clicked the item.

When he opened his eyes again, light blue particles began to fly around him, and the particles slowly gathered together and formed an object.

When the blue light disappeared, a black metal box was sitting in front of Lu Zhou.

["Transcendence" X-1 computer, a medium-sized industrial quantum computer with an integrated quantum chip, used for server software… Note: Due to intellectual property laws, this device has anti-engineering protection and cannot be disassembled or scanned. Any unauthorized use will lead to unpredictable consequences.]

It's a quantum computer!

After reading the translucent dialog box in front of him, Lu Zhou's heart skipped a beat.

However, after reading the last sentence, his heart rate calmed down.

F*ck sake!

What do you mean I can't disassemble or scan it?

So I can't use my scanner gun then?

Lu Zhou was curious what would happen if he accidentally broke the computer, who would fix it for him?

Maybe this is just for experimentation?

But then again, if this is truly industrial grade, it should last me for more than a decade.

Lu Zhou was wondering how to connect this computer to a power supply when the quad-rotor drone flew over.

[Master, can you give it to Xiao Ai?

[(́『『)]

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