123: Chapter 123 Damn, what a show-off!

Li Qiang swallowed hard, a flash of excitement in his eyes.

"If we follow this line of thought, perhaps... a crack really will be pried open in the door to the twin prime conjecture!"

"Quick! Print it out! I need to find Director Zhang!"

That day, the peace of the Huaxia Institute of Mathematics was shattered by a paper from an undergraduate at Forestry University.

Meanwhile, Zhao Yang was sitting in the warm cafeteria, eating his favorite braised pork while listening to Li Tianqi complain about the frustration of final exam review.

Li Tianqi and Wang Mian were the types who studied hard in high school but started indulging themselves wildly after entering university.

The next month was finals; there was about half a month for review before the final exam weeks for various schools would arrive one after another.

"I told you two to put some effort into your studies during the semester!"

Zhao Yang said irritably as he looked at the two grumbling roommates.

"All you two do is play games every day. I don't know how you got into Beijing Forestry University; it's a Project 211 university, after all!"

"Hehe."

Wang Mian and Li Tianqi looked at each other and grinned.

"Brother Yang, it's not easy getting into university! Back in high school, we never had the chance to play games!!"

"Yeah! Brother Yang, it's only the first half of freshman year. We need to rest; don't be so driven!"

Hearing their words, Zhao Yang rolled his eyes.

"Look at you two, then look at Sun Xu! I'm really fed up with you guys!"

"That's different. Ah Xu's family situation is relatively poor."

Li Tianqi shrugged.

"I don't have any special ambitions; I just want to graduate smoothly. After graduation, I can work at my uncle's company!"

"My uncle told me! He'll give me fifteen thousand a month!"

Hearing Li Tianqi's words, Zhao Yang was instantly speechless.

Damn, those cursed second-generation brats!

While Zhao Yang was shooting the breeze with his two roommates,

on the other side, the Huaxia Institute of Mathematics, located in the heart of the Electronics Market Area, was an unremarkable-looking but heavily secured small gray building.

It gathered the top mathematical minds in the country and was the pinnacle of the national basic science research pyramid.

Director Zhang Ping put down the printout, took off his glasses, and rubbed the bridge of his nose. As an authority in the field of Analytic Number Theory, it had been a long time since he had read a paper that truly impressed him.

In recent years, a trend of impetuousness had risen in the domestic mathematical community, with many low-quality filler articles, but those who could truly tackle the hard problems were few and far between.

But this paper in front of him, only twelve pages long, had kept him reading for a full three hours.

"Old Li."

Zhang Ping put his glasses back on and looked at the associate researcher sitting across from him, Li Qiang.

"Are you sure this was written by a freshman from Beijing Forestry University?"

Li Qiang nodded with a complex expression. "Director, I've already had someone verify it with the Beijing Forestry University Academic Affairs Office."

"Zhao Yang, male, 18 years old, a 2008 undergraduate from the School of Life Sciences. He was also the one behind that sensational TIP article earlier. His record is clean; no gold medals in math competitions, and though his math grades were good in high school, they weren't outstanding."

"That's strange."

Zhang Ping pointed to the fourth page of the paper, where there was a set of complex integral formulas.

"When handling the error term of the GPY Sieve Method, the Smooth weighting function he introduced is exquisitely constructed."

"This isn't just a matter of skillful technique; it requires a profound insight into sieve theory. This kind of insight is usually only found in old-timers who have spent decades immersed in number theory, or in peerless geniuses like Terence Tao."

"More importantly..."

Zhang Ping's voice deepened.

"Although he didn't directly prove the twin prime conjecture, this paper of his takes a solid step forward in estimating the distribution of prime numbers in short intervals."

"If we follow this line of thought, as long as we can prove that the distance between prime numbers is less than some finite constant, the door to the twin prime conjecture will be pried open."

Li Qiang swallowed. "Do you mean he might still have more research up his sleeve?"

"I don't know. But this paper alone is enough for him to receive an offer as an associate researcher at our institute."

Zhang Ping stood up, walked to the window, and looked at the night scene outside.

"An 18-year-old boy showing top-tier talent in Biology, computer science, and mathematics simultaneously, yet stuck in a Forestry University..."

"This is a massive waste of talent and a certain failure of our education system."

Zhang Ping turned around, his tone becoming decisive. "Tomorrow, help me contact the administration of Beijing Forestry University... No, contact Zhao Yang himself directly. I want to see him, personally."

"Director, you're going in person?"

Li Qiang was somewhat surprised; given Zhang Ping's status, people usually lined up to visit him.

"I pray the Lord of Heaven to rouse his spirit and send down talents of every kind."

Zhang Ping smiled and looked at Li Qiang.

"It's been a long time since I've encountered a genius like Zhao Yang! Naturally, I must meet him in person!"

Zhao Yang, who was shooting the breeze with his two roommates, received a call from an unknown number.

Zhao Yang's brow furrowed slightly, and he gestured to his two roommates.

Li Tianqi and Wang Mian, who were chatting, both stopped.

Zhao Yang answered the phone.

Soon, a look of surprise appeared in Zhao Yang's eyes.

"Okay, I understand. I'll definitely be there tomorrow."

After hanging up, Li Tianqi and Wang Mian, who were beside him, looked at Zhao Yang impatiently and asked curiously.

"What is it, Brother Yang? Who was it?"

"Yeah, Brother Yang, what's going on?"

Zhao Yang looked at his two roommates.

"It was a call from Researcher Li Qiang of the Huaxia Institute of Mathematics. He said Director Zhang Ping of the Huaxia Institute of Mathematics wants to see me."

"Huh?"

"Holy crap???"

Hearing Zhao Yang's words, Li Tianqi and Wang Mian were instantly dumbfounded.

They hadn't expected something like this to happen!

That's the Director of the Huaxia Institute of Mathematics!

Was Brother Yang already starting to associate with big shots of this level?

Wait... that's not right! Why the School of Mathematics? Why isn't it the Director of the Institute of Computer Science?

"Brother Yang, why is the Director of the School of Mathematics looking for you? Why isn't it the Director of the Institute of Computing Technology at the Chinese Academy of Sciences?"

Li Tianqi and Wang Mian both looked at Zhao Yang with curiosity.

"Oh, that. I wrote a paper on number theory a while back. It was somewhat interesting, so it must have caught the Director's attention."

Zhao Yang said nonchalantly.

Li Tianqi: "..."

Wang Mian: "..."

Damn! The King of Posturing!

The next day, at a quiet teahouse outside the south gate of Yanlin University.

Zhao Yang wasn't particularly surprised by today's scene; from the moment he uploaded the paper to arXiv, he had anticipated this situation.

But what he hadn't expected was that the Director of the Huaxia Institute of Mathematics would come in person and specifically arrange to meet him. He had thought that at most, the university president would call him in for questioning.

He just hadn't expected to meet the Director of the Huaxia Institute of Mathematics in such a private setting.