300: Chapter 300 After all, I'm a mad scientist!

"It's a villa."

Zhao Yang smiled and said to Li Xin and the others.

"I expanded and renovated the villa's basement, so it counts as my private laboratory. I use precision robotic arms and automated programming to conduct repetitive experimental research."

Zhao Yang naturally couldn't expose the existence of Shin-chan. As for the topics he was researching, these were things that absolutely could not be exposed.

Therefore, robotic arms and automated programming were the best ways to cover up Shin-chan's existence; after all, he was considered an expert in the fields of image recognition and computer science himself.

No one would suspect anything.

Beside him, Zhou Ting asked curiously: "God Zhao, why do you have to put your laboratory in the place where you live? Don't you have a company? Putting a laboratory in your own home is a bit too..."

Zhou Ting actually wanted to say that it felt a bit like a mad scientist, but she was a little embarrassed to say it.

"Having the laboratory where I live gives me more freedom with my time. If I think of something in the middle of the night, I can just go downstairs and take a look."

Zhao Yang said this very casually. He smiled and looked at Zhou Ting, teasing her.

"Besides, for this kind of private laboratory, confidentiality is naturally more important. After all, I am a mad scientist!"

Hearing Zhao Yang's words, Zhou Ting's face flushed slightly. Zhao Yang had understood her implication.

"Doing experiments on your own is different from being in a school laboratory. At school, there are research groups to supervise each other, and safety is guaranteed. When you do it alone, it's easy to overlook some details."

Professor Gu Ming looked at Zhao Yang, his tone a bit more serious than usual.

"The placement of your laboratory benches and reagent cabinets must comply with fire safety regulations. Volatile reagents must be kept in dedicated ventilated storage cabinets, and the disposal of Biology waste must also follow standard procedures; you cannot just throw them away to save trouble. If a problem arises, no one will be able to cover for you.

"Besides, this is where you live. If something goes wrong, it will be troublesome! So, you must be careful, careful, and careful again."

"Rest assured, Teacher Gu, I have done all of this according to requirements. The fume hood is industrial-grade, the reagent cabinets have fireproof coatings and spill trays, and Biology waste is autoclaved before being disposed of collectively."

Zhao Yang looked at Professor Gu Ming and said with a smile.

Professor Gu Ming looked at him for a few seconds, nodded, and didn't say anything more. He had known Zhao Yang for a long time; although this student often didn't play by the rules in academics, he was never sloppy in his work. Especially regarding safety and regulations, he had never skipped any steps just to save trouble.

"As long as you know what you are doing," Professor Gu Ming said.

Zhao Yang smiled and agreed, then stepped aside from the doorway and beckoned to everyone, signaling for them to come in.

After entering, Gu Qing kept holding Zhao Yang's arm. She had specially put on makeup before coming and was wearing a knitted spring jacket. Zhao Yang took them to the first-floor dining room to have a cup of tea.

Li Xin stood in the middle of the living room holding a teacup, looked up at the crystal chandelier, then looked down at the solid wood flooring under his feet, and then turned to Zhao Yang and said: "God Zhao, is this floor solid wood? My parents wanted to install this when they were renovating last year, but my dad's budget vetoed it."

"It's solid wood. The previous owner installed it, I didn't touch it," Zhao Yang said.

"The previous owner had good taste," Zhou Ting added from the side. Her gaze swept from the sofa to the TV background wall, then paused for two seconds on the decorative painting next to the fireplace. "How much did it cost to renovate this house?"

"It was already renovated when I bought it, I'm not sure about the specific renovation costs," Zhao Yang said.

Li Xin put down his teacup, leaned against the sofa armrest, and asked a question he had been holding back for a while: "God Zhao, you've been talking for a long time, but where is the laboratory? Didn't you say you were bringing us to see the laboratory?"

Zhao Yang looked at everyone. Everyone's face carried different degrees of anticipation. Zhao Yang stood up and walked towards the corner hallway.

"This way."

Everyone followed him through the hallway and turned into an elevator hidden behind the stairs. This elevator could hold about eight people, and a floor plan of the underground functional areas was posted on the stainless steel inner wall. The elevator slid down silently for a short distance, and when the doors opened again, the scene before them stunned everyone.

The elevator entrance faced a corridor. On both sides of the corridor were floor-to-ceiling glass curtain walls. Through the glass, one could see rows of stainless steel laboratory benches and precision instruments with flashing status lights inside. At the end of the corridor was a heavy airtight door, with fingerprint recognition and iris scanning panels next to it.

The entire basement was brightly lit; the cold white LED light illuminated every corner clearly, and even the anti-static coating on the floor reflected a faint light. The outermost automatic door of the corridor was made of industrial-grade high-density alloy. Once closed, it cut off all physical contact between the underground and the outside world. The low-frequency hum of the air conditioning system came through the alloy seals, and the metallic scent unique to dry, clean air was pushed into the corridor along the air ducts.

Li Xin was the first to step out of the elevator. He stood in the middle of the corridor, turning his head left and right, looking at the automated equipment row by row: robotic arms, centrifuges, fully automatic nucleic acid extractors, benchtop sequencers, and high-precision mass spectrometers. All the instruments had their running status lights on, green and blue, flickering in the clean white light.

"This is truly amazing."

"Damn, this makes me feel like I'm seeing a sci-fi world. It's too powerful."

Zhou Ting stood in amazement in front of a robotic arm that was operating automatically, watching its end effector precisely transfer from one sample rack to another, its movements so fluid it didn't seem like a machine.

"God Zhao, how much did this set of equipment cost?" Li Xin asked.

"It's alright," Zhao Yang didn't give a specific number.

"What does 'alright' mean?"

"Enough for you to spend a lifetime."

Li Xin didn't ask any further. He was used to it by now; whenever it came to Zhao Yang, and whenever it involved money, don't ask—asking was just inviting humiliation.

"Your laboratory is very impressive."

Professor Gu Ming stood in front of a high-precision mass spectrometer in the central area, looked inside through the observation window for a few seconds, then turned and exclaimed to Zhao Yang. He didn't ask about the source of the equipment, nor did he ask where the funding came from. He had known Zhao Yang for a long time and knew that after this student received the profits from Spark Technology, his personal assets were already at a magnitude that an ordinary professor couldn't imagine.

"It's alright," Zhao Yang said with a smile.

After the tour, Zhao Yang treated everyone to a meal outside. They ate at a nice Sichuan restaurant nearby, and a whole table of dishes was ordered. Li Xin couldn't stop once he started drinking. At first, he was just bickering with Zhou Ting, but later, as the alcohol went to his head, he grabbed Zhao Yang's shoulder, his eyes slightly red, and said that God Zhao must never forget the brothers who ran gels together.

When he said this, he was still holding half a glass of unfinished white liquor, and his other hand patted Zhao Yang's shoulder several times. Zhou Ting pulled him from the side and said, "Aren't you embarrassed?" Li Xin looked back at her and said, "Whether it's embarrassing or not doesn't matter; God Zhao's promise is worth more than anything."