Chapter 77 Father of Rare Earth

In October, the autumn colors in the Imperial Capital were at their peak.

The wind swirled withered yellow sycamore leaves, tirelessly slapping them against the red brick walls of the old Soviet-style buildings at Imperial Capital University, making a rustling sound.

No. 5 Yiheyuan Road, South Chemistry Building, third floor.

Before even stepping over the threshold, a suffocating smell of kerosene, mixed with the unique pungent sting of acid mist, rushed straight to the head as if it had eyes.

This place looked dilapidated, yet it was the heart of the entire China's rare earth separation technology—

The Rare Earth Chemistry Research Lab.

In front of an experimental bench, a white-haired old man with a hunched back held a dropper. His eyes were almost pressed against the beaker, staring intently at the infinitesimal changes in the solution's layering.

Elder Xu.

China's "Father of Rare Earths" and the founder of the cascade extraction theory.

"Teacher, this data is impossible to process!"

With a "thud," a notebook was slammed heavily onto the table.

Zhao Qing, a female graduate student with a ponytail, had eyes rimmed with red:

"Our chromatograph is still that five-year-old antique; the resolution is simply not enough!"

"The praseodymium-neodymium separation data just now was all noise. This entire week of experiments has been wasted again!"

The more Zhao Qing spoke, the more aggrieved she felt, her voice trembling:

"The Physics Department next door has already switched to equipment imported from the Lighthouse Country."

"And us? We're still using these primitive methods for blind testing!"

"Isn't this like taking a fire poker to fight against someone's machine gun?"

In the laboratory, several other researchers stopped their work, keeping their heads down in silence.

One cannot make bricks without straw; this was a thorn in everyone's heart.

Elder Xu straightened his back, gently set down the dropper, took off his glasses, and rubbed his brow. His voice was hoarse yet gentle:

"Xiao Zhao, pull yourself together and dry your tears."

"The country is tight on foreign exchange right now. Every penny must be split in two, and we even have to save half for emergencies."

"We in the rare earth field are here to 'create blood' for the country's impoverished industry, not to suck its blood."

"If the equipment is poor, we'll just run more sets of data and pull a few more all-nighters."

"Weren't the mushroom clouds back then calculated using abacuses?"

Zhao Qing bit her lip, forcing back the complaints that were on the tip of her tongue.

She wiped her face hard with her sleeve and turned to wash the beakers, her stubbornness evoking pity.

Just then, there was a knock on the wooden door of the laboratory.

"Knock, knock, knock."

Elder Xu turned around, somewhat surprised:

"Old Zhang? What wind blew a busy man like you here?"

Standing at the door was indeed Zhang Zhengguo, followed by an excessively young man.

The young man wore a slim-fit jacket, rare in these times. His eyes were clear and bright, and he was observing this laboratory filled with the "smell of heavy industry" with great interest.

Zhang Zhengguo strode into the room. He didn't mind the pungent smell; instead, he took a deep breath and smiled:

"Elder Xu, I wouldn't come to your temple without a reason."

"Today, I've brought you some 'timely rain'."

As he spoke, he stepped aside to reveal Lin Xi:

"Let me introduce you. This is Comrade Lin Xi."

"The Deputy Manager of the Red Star Labor Service Agency at our Northwest Launch Base, and also a..."

"Technical 'eccentric genius'."

Elder Xu froze for a moment, instinctively reaching out to shake Lin Xi's hand, a trace of confusion flashing in his eyes:

"Service Agency? Is that... for logistics support?"

Before Lin Xi could speak, Zhao Qing, who was already fuming, exploded first.

She was already frustrated by the failed experiment. Seeing a top leader from the Seventh Ministry of Machine Building Industry bring someone from a "Service Agency" to a national-level secret laboratory made her snap.

"Director Zhang, we deal with rare earth separation and atomic chemistry here, not repairing boilers or patching tires."

Zhao Qing shot Lin Xi a sideways glance, her tone as sharp as a knife:

"If you're here to sell shampoo or labor insurance gloves, turn left out the door; the logistics department is over there."

The livestream chat instantly flooded the screen.

[Hahaha, young lady, you're narrowing your path! This is the future God of Wealth!]

[Lin Xi: I don't fix boilers; I only fix your brains.]

[You can't blame her. In this era, service agencies really do just do odd jobs. Who would've thought the Streamer is a cheater?]

[Elder Xu looks so haggard; it's heartbreaking. This generation of scientists is truly sacrificing their lives to fill the gaps.]

Lin Xi wasn't angry; even the smile on his face didn't change.

He looked at Zhao Qing with an expression like one would use for a child throwing a tantrum.

"This student is right, I am from the Service Agency."

Lin Xi's tone was calm, exuding a sense of composure.

"However, our Red Star Service Cooperative doesn't just patch pots; occasionally, we also patch the shortcomings of the national industry."

"Hmph," Zhao Qing snorted softly, turning her head away, too bothered to pay him any mind.

Elder Xu felt a bit embarrassed. He glared at Zhao Qing and then turned to Zhang Zhengguo:

"Old Zhang, don't take it to heart. I've spoiled this child; she's just blunt."

"But... why have you come this time, exactly?"

Zhang Zhengguo found a stool and sat down, pointing at Lin Xi:

"Xiao Lin has some unique ideas regarding rare earth extraction and wanted to 'compare notes' with you."

"Additionally, we'd like to discuss a collaboration with your laboratory."

"Unique ideas?" Zhao Qing couldn't help but interject while washing beakers, her sarcasm at full blast:

"A deputy manager of a service agency—does he even know what a trivalent ion is?"

"Does he know what a complex compound is?"

Lin Xi ignored her provocation and took a neatly folded document from his coat, handing it to Elder Xu with both hands.

The gesture was as solemn as presenting a diplomatic credential.

On the cover, a line of text was written neatly in fountain pen:

"Proposals on Optimizing 100-Stage Cascade Extraction Dynamic Equilibrium and Fuzzy Logic Control Using Computer Matrix Operations"

Elder Xu took the document.

But when he saw the words "matrix operations" and "dynamic equilibrium" in the title, his pupils constricted sharply.

One can tell a master by their first move.

Currently, rare earth separation relied on the experience of "shaking funnels" or simple linear equation calculations.

Once the stages exceeded fifty, the variables would explode exponentially. The human brain? An abacus? That was like an ant trying to shake a tree.

Elder Xu flipped to the first page.

After reading just three lines, the politeness on his face vanished.

It was replaced by gravity.

Following that was the shock of a pupillary earthquake.

Finally, his entire being seemed to be sucked into those few thin sheets of paper, as if the surrounding people and events had instantly vanished.

A dead silence fell over the laboratory, with only the "tick-tock" of the wall clock.

Five minutes.

Ten minutes.

Twenty minutes.

Elder Xu remained in the same position, like a statue. The only thing moving was his slightly trembling hand; his knuckles were white from the intensity of his grip.

Lin Xi was in no hurry. He pulled up a chair and sat down, even picking up a test tube on the table to examine it with interest.

Zhang Zhengguo sat there composedly, drinking the tea he had brought with him.

Looking at Zhao Qing's increasingly bewildered and uncertain expression, he felt a secret thrill: That's what you get for looking down on us aerospace people!

Finally, Elder Xu let out a long breath of turbid air.

He suddenly looked up, his eyes frighteningly burning as he stared fixedly at Lin Xi:

"The 'Non-linear Feedback Compensation Algorithm' in here..."

"How did you come up with it?!"

"Current computer processing power is nowhere near enough to handle such complex simulations!"

"How did you simplify this model to such an extent?"

"This is simply... a stroke of genius!"

Lin Xi smiled slightly and leaned forward:

"Elder Xu, actually, there's no need to calculate every single molecular movement clearly."

"We just need to introduce 'Queuing Theory'. Treat each extraction tank as a service window and the rare earth ions as customers in a queue..."

The next twenty minutes became a two-man show between Lin Xi and Elder Xu.

Zhao Qing was completely dumbfounded.

Because the terms popping out of their mouths—"centrifugal extractor," "PLC automatic control," "online mass spectrometry feedback"—were things she had never even heard of, yet she instinctively felt they were mind-blowingly impressive.

The more Elder Xu listened, the more excited he became. He grabbed a fountain pen and scribbled notes rapidly on paper, as if he had suddenly aged backward by ten years, the light in his eyes astonishingly bright.

"Brilliant! Simply brilliant!"

Elder Xu slapped his thigh, not even noticing the pain:

"If we use centrifuges instead of settling tanks, the residence time can be shortened by dozens of times!"

"The purity we want... 99.9999% is actually possible!"