Chapter 70 Xia Weiliang stayed up for three consecutive nights; the blueprints shocked the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Yanjing, 3:30 AM.

In the residential compound of the Institute of Microelectronics at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the night was as thick as ink that would not dissolve.

"Ring, ring, ring—"

The red secure telephone on the nightstand started ringing frantically, like a summons for one's life.

Chen Guoan yanked off his quilt, his gray hair messy as a bird's nest from sleep.

He grabbed the receiver, his temper flaring.

"Which bastard is calling my private line in the middle of the night! Don't you know I have a heart condition!"

"Old man, it's me."

From the other end of the line came Xia Weiliang's weak and hoarse voice.

It was interspersed with a few suppressed coughs.

Upon hearing this voice, Chen Guoan's anger surged straight to the top of his head.

"You ungrateful little bastard!"

He slapped the bed frame, spittle flying everywhere.

"The Chinese Academy of Sciences couldn't keep you, so you ran off to a private factory to screw in bolts! Now that you can't make it, you know to come begging your master for help?"

On the other end, Xia Weiliang breathed heavily and let out a soft laugh.

"Who's begging for help? Stop talking nonsense and go to the study to turn on the fax machine."

She licked her chapped lips, her tone laced with a hint of madness.

"I'm going to show you something good that can break the Yankees' necks. Catch it."

"Do you think the Yankees are made of clay? Breaking their necks, indeed!"

Chen Guoan laughed in return.

"I'd like to see what kind of trouble your crappy assembly factory can stir up!"

He slammed down the receiver, threw on an old military overcoat, and shuffled into the study in his cotton slippers.

He pressed the receive button on the fax machine.

The machine whirred and creaked to life, slowly spitting out an A4 sheet of paper.

Chen Guoan pushed his reading glasses up the bridge of his nose, looking entirely disdainful.

He had intended to glance at it and then use it as a coaster for his ashtray.

But the moment he tore off the still-warm fax paper and his eyes fell upon it.

The old man was frozen solid on the floor.

"This... this optical path layout?"

Chen Guoan's breathing instantly became chaotic, his chest heaving like a bellows.

Drawn on the paper was a "Partial Design of Ultraviolet Interference Optical Path."

With trembling hands, he brought the paper under the desk lamp.

His eyes were almost glued to the ink.

"Utilizing a multiple diffraction compensation algorithm? Bypassing the physical refraction of the ultraviolet light source?"

A "boom" went off in Chen Guoan's head, as if ten thousand cows were stampeding inside.

He slammed his hand onto the desk, knocking over the enamel tea mug sitting on it.

Goji berry water spilled everywhere, but he did not even spare it a glance.

If this blueprint were real, it would be the equivalent of chiseling a door right through an airtight iron wall!

It perfectly bypassed the lithography machine patents monopolized by the West!

Chen Guoan had lost his mind.

He grabbed the phone on the desk, his fingers frantically dialing the compound's duty number.

"Sound the highest-level alarm! Immediately!"

He roared into the receiver, making the ears of the guard on the other end tingle.

"Get all those old geezers from the Semiconductor Research Institute out of their warm beds!"

The guard was startled and asked, stammering.

"Elder Chen, what's the big emergency? Are there spies?"

"The lifeblood of China is at stake!"

Chen Guoan kicked open the study door and strode out.

"If they aren't in Conference Room No. 1 within five minutes, I'll cut off all their research funding tomorrow!"

Ten minutes later.

Conference Room No. 1 was thick with smoke, choking enough to make one unable to open their eyes.

Seven or eight national treasure-level academicians in their seventies and eighties were there, wearing pajamas and cotton slippers, their hair all messy.

They crowded tightly around the conference table, with that fax paper placed right in the center.

"This formula simply won't work! The light source refractive index will cause severe optical distortion at such a micro scale!"

A fat old man with age spots all over his face slammed the table, spittle flying everywhere.

"This is sheer nonsense! It violates basic optical laws!"

"Bullshit! Look closely at this constant node in the bottom right corner!"

Chen Guoan smacked the fat old man on the shoulder, pointing to a line of small text on the edge of the partial drawing.

His eyes were as red as a rabbit's, and his voice was louder than anyone else's.

"With this algorithmic compensation, the lithography machine doesn't need those top-tier ultraviolet lenses from the Americans at all!"

"Even using our old machines, which are two generations behind, we can still etch nanometer-scale wafer trenches!"

The fat old man looked where he was pointing.

His Adam's apple bobbed violently, and his expression changed instantly.

He collapsed into his chair, his trembling hands reaching into his pocket for his emergency heart medication.

He shoved the pill into his mouth and swallowed it dry without water.

"Incredible... what kind of genius came up with this architecture?"

The fat old man clutched his chest, tears streaming down his face.

"If this blueprint can be implemented, the Americans' twenty-year technology blockade against us will be nothing but a huge joke!"

The old men in the conference room all fell silent.

Only heavy breathing could be heard, rising and falling.

They had worked in semiconductors their whole lives and spent their whole lives being shut out by foreigners; they knew exactly how valuable this piece of paper was.

"Bang!"

The conference room door was burst open.

Dean Liu of the Institute of Microelectronics rushed in, wearing a black wool coat, his forehead covered in sweat.

"Old Chen! I heard you got a blueprint that can bypass the lithography machine barrier?"

He strode forward, his eyes shining with excitement.

Chen Guoan, his eyes rimmed with red, guarded the A4 paper tightly with both hands, afraid someone might snatch it away.

"Dean, it was sent by that good-for-nothing, rebellious disciple of mine."

He gritted his teeth, his voice extremely hoarse.

"She is at Xinghai Technology in Donghai City, currently stripping a set of brand-new chip mask layouts."

Chen Guoan swallowed dryly, his eyes revealing a mix of deep despair and fanaticism.

"The girl doesn't have enough computing power and is stuck on the final optical algorithm. If she keeps pushing herself, she'll lose her life!"

Dean Liu gasped, his scalp tingling.

Xinghai Technology? That private factory that sells mobile phones?

They were actually hand-crafting chips? And they had produced such an epoch-making, national treasure-level blueprint?

"These lunatics are risking their lives!"

Dean Liu did not hesitate for a second; he turned and pulled a red secure telephone from his inner pocket.

This kind of secure phone could only be used in the most critical of moments.

He dialed the number, his voice crisp and decisive, carrying the determination of someone burning their bridges.

"Is this the Yanjing Military Region? I'm Old Liu from the Institute of Microelectronics!"

"Apply for a special flight path for me immediately! I need the fastest military transport plane!"

The person on the other end seemed to hesitate.

Dean Liu's eyes widened, and he roared into the receiver.

"Don't talk to me about regulations! This is a critical asset that concerns the destiny of our nation!"

"If you delay by even one second, you will all be sinners in the eyes of the Chinese scientific community!"

The sky was just beginning to brighten.

On the distant horizon of Yanjing, a cold, fish-belly white hue appeared.

On the runway of the military airport, the engines of a gray military transport plane roared.

The massive gust of air kicked up the fallen leaves on the ground.

The plane accelerated violently, its nose lifting as it pierced into the thick clouds like a sharp sword.

The noise inside the cabin was deafening.

The several national treasure-level bigwigs sat in two rows, fastened by seatbelts, huddled close together.

They had not even bothered to wash their faces, still wearing the clothes they had put on in the middle of the night.

But in everyone's eyes, there was an excitement like that of a twenty-year-old youth.

Any one of them, if plucked out, would be a pillar of the domestic semiconductor field.

Chen Guoan sat by the window.

He clutched the wrinkled fax paper tightly in his hand, his fingernails digging deep into the flesh of his palms.

Recalling Xia Weiliang's weak "Help me, old man" from the phone call last night.

This titan, who usually had a fiery temper, could no longer hold back his tears.

Cloudy tears streamed down the deep wrinkles of his old face, falling rapidly.

They dripped onto his gray military overcoat, blooming into dark water stains.

Decades of bitterness and frustration were released the moment he saw this partial blueprint.

The technological breakthrough this group of old bones had spent their entire lives hoping for had actually shown a glimmer of light in a run-down private factory.

"The backbone of China's semiconductor industry is finally going to stand tall."

He wiped away his old tears and turned to look at the rolling sea of clouds outside the window.

Chen Guoan pressed the blueprint tightly against his chest, his voice trembling yet resonant as a bell.

He roared at the top of his lungs toward the cockpit.

"Faster! Tell the pilot to fly faster! Full speed to Xinghai!"

The old man, his eyes red-rimmed, shouted out loud.

"This is the national treasure that will turn the tide for China's semiconductor industry!"