Chapter 125 The Investigation Team Arrives

Sunlight pierced through the clouds, casting large shadows across the Gobi Desert.

Lin Mo stood at the entrance of the Prefabricated Building, watching the three off-road vehicles approaching in the distance, feeling surprisingly calm. He had slept for a full four hours, the longest sleep he had had in three days. Chen Xueming was right—with the data in hand and the truth in his heart, what was there to fear?

"Director Lin," Li Xiao trotted over, holding a thick stack of folders. "All the materials are ready. The First Wall Material simulation data, Tritium Extraction experiment records, digital twin system development logs, daily work briefings—it's all here."

Lin Mo took the folders, flipped through them casually, and nodded. "Thanks for your hard work."

"Also," Li Xiao lowered her voice, "Brother Zhao asked me to tell you that security is normal. He'll cooperate with the investigation team as long as they don't enter the core laboratory. If anyone tries to barge in..."

"Don't do anything rash." Lin Mo glanced at her. "Tell Brother Zhao to cooperate normally and don't make a scene. We have nothing to hide."

Li Xiao acknowledged and trotted away again.

The convoy stopped in front of the Prefabricated Building. The car doors opened, and the first to step out was Deputy Director Liu. He nodded to Lin Mo without speaking, then turned to open the back seat door.

A foot wearing an old-fashioned cloth shoe stepped out first, followed by washed-out blue cloth trousers, a gray jacket, graying hair, and thick-rimmed glasses—an old man in his sixties, carrying a military green canvas bag with the faded red words "Awarded to Advanced Worker" on it, the year no longer legible.

Lin Mo was stunned.

"What, don't recognize me?" The old man took off his glasses, wiped them, put them back on, and squinted at Lin Mo. "Xiao Linzi, it's been three years, have you gotten too big for your boots?"

"Academician... Academician Zhou?!" Lin Mo practically rushed over. "Why are you here?!"

Academician Zhou, an Academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences' Division of Technological Sciences, seventy years old, was a leading authority in the field of domestic Nuclear Fusion. Fifteen years ago, he had presided over the construction of China's first tokamak device, the "eastern star." Although it ultimately failed to achieve ignition due to technical limitations, it had trained an entire generation of Nuclear Fusion talent. Even Wang Zhenguo had to call him "Senior Brother" upon meeting him.

Three years ago, at an academic conference, Lin Mo had asked him for advice on First Wall Material, and the old gentleman had pulled him into the corridor of the venue to chat for two full hours.

"The Ministry invited me to be a consultant, so I stopped by to take a look." Academician Zhou patted Lin Mo's shoulder with a smile. "I heard you've been working with great enthusiasm here, so this old guy is shamelessly here to sponge some experience. Are you welcoming me or not?"

"Welcome! Of course, you're welcome!" Lin Mo's eyes felt a little hot, and he immediately turned to Deputy Director Liu. "Director Liu, this is..."

Deputy Director Liu explained with a smile, "Academician Zhou is the technical consultant we invited. For an investigation, you can't just look at materials and listen to reports; you need people who really know the field to see it for themselves. Academician Zhou volunteered to come, saying he wanted to see the progress of the tokamak-3 with his own eyes."

A weight lifted from Lin Mo's heart. He wasn't afraid of the investigation, but he was afraid of investigators who didn't understand the technology, who would ask layman questions that were not only exhausting to explain but also prone to causing misunderstandings. With Academician Zhou here, at least the technical side would be understood.

"Let's go, take me to see it." Academician Zhou slung his canvas bag over his shoulder. "Don't bother with the formalities. Let's look directly at the data, the laboratory, and the problems you've encountered and how you've solved them."

The investigation team consisted of five people: Academician Zhou (technical consultant), Deputy Director Liu (team leader), two young officers (responsible for materials and interviews), and a recorder.

Lin Mo led them to the temporary conference room—which was actually just a large Prefabricated Building with several tables pushed together in the middle and drawings and progress charts plastered all over the walls. Li Xiao had already organized the materials by category, with labels on each stack: First Wall Material, Tritium Extraction, digital twin, Magnet System, vacuum chamber...

Academician Zhou walked over, ignoring the organized folders, and instead stared at the drawings on the wall for a long time.

"Did you draw this yourselves?" He pointed to the overall structure diagram of the tokamak-3, which was densely packed with various parameters and technical points.

"The system... our team drew it together." Lin Mo almost let it slip. "Everyone was responsible for their own part, and we stitched it together at the end."

Academician Zhou leaned in closer, his finger slowly tracing the lines of the Magnet System. "This magnetic field configuration design is quite different from the 'eastern star'. Whose idea was it?"

"I proposed the preliminary plan, and Chen Xueming optimized it." Lin Mo answered honestly. "Our simulations found that the traditional configuration still had room for improvement in plasma confinement, and this new design can increase energy confinement time by about 15%."

Academician Zhou nodded without speaking and went to look at another drawing.

Deputy Director Liu stood to the side, unable to interject, so he had to smile at Lin Mo. "That's Academician Zhou's style; he can't walk away once he sees technology. You two talk; we'll go and understand the situation with the other comrades."

He took the two officers to find Chen Xueming and Li Xiao, leaving Academician Zhou and Lin Mo in the conference room.

For the entire morning, Academician Zhou looked at the drawings on the wall one by one, asking questions from time to time. Some questions were very detailed, so detailed that even Lin Mo had to think for a moment before answering; some questions were broad, so broad that Lin Mo needed to explain the principles and ideas for half an hour.

At lunch, Academician Zhou sat down opposite Lin Mo with his tray and suddenly said, "Xiao Linzi, your design is much more mature than the one I had back then."

Lin Mo was taken aback. "Academician Zhou, you are being modest. Without the foundation laid by the 'eastern star', where would we get the experience?"

"It's not modesty." Academician Zhou took a bite of food and chewed slowly. "Back then, a lot of my work was based on guesswork, based on 'I think it should be like this.' Your work has data support, simulation verification, and alternative plans for every step. This is what science is."

He put down his chopsticks and looked at Lin Mo. "I heard you had a conflict with that Director Zhang?"

Lin Mo gave a bitter smile. "It's not really a conflict, it's just... he demanded to speed up the progress, and I said no, some problems must be solved before we can move forward."

"He asked you to skip verification and ignite directly?"

"...Yes."

Academician Zhou snorted. "Laymen leading experts, it's fatal." He paused. "Do you know why the 'eastern star' didn't ignite back then?"

Lin Mo shook his head.

"It wasn't because the technology wasn't good enough." Academician Zhou's eyes seemed distant. "It was because the schedule was pushed too tight, and we forced it through before some tests were finished. And the result? Once the plasma went in, the First Wall Material had problems, the whole project stopped for two years, and later the funding ran out, so there was no follow-up."

Lin Mo was silent.

"If I had stood my ground back then and insisted on finishing the tests, maybe..." Academician Zhou didn't finish his sentence and waved his hand. "Let's not talk about it. You did the right thing. Some hurdles, if you can't cross them, you just can't; it's not something that can be solved just because someone guarantees it."

In the afternoon, Academician Zhou proposed to go see the laboratory.

Lin Mo accompanied him, from the First Wall Material laboratory to the Tritium Extraction Pilot-scale production device, and then to Li Xiao's digital twin system machine room. Everywhere they went, Academician Zhou looked very carefully and asked deep questions.

In the Tritium Extraction laboratory, Chen Xueming was debugging a new piece of equipment. Seeing Academician Zhou enter, he was stunned for a moment, then quickly stepped forward to greet him. "Academician Zhou! Why are you here?"

"Xiao Chen, I heard you returned to the country. You've done well." Academician Zhou shook his hand. "99.3% Tritium Extraction, I've seen this data, it's two points higher than the best international level. How did you do it?"

Chen Xueming looked at Lin Mo, and Lin Mo nodded. Only then did he start to speak, explaining the technical principles, innovation points, the difficulties encountered, and the solutions from beginning to end.

After listening, Academician Zhou was silent for a long time, then suddenly sighed. "Old, I'm really getting old. You young people are extraordinary."

A week is neither long nor short.

The investigation team went out early and returned late every day, reviewing materials, conducting interviews, entering the laboratory, and holding symposiums. Lin Mo cooperated throughout, answering every question and providing whatever was needed. The slight anxiety in his heart had dissipated for the most part after meeting Academician Zhou on the first day—with this old expert here, at least he wouldn't be wronged technically.

But there were also moments of anxiety.

For example, on the second night, the two young officers talked to Zhao Gang, asking many questions about "base personnel management," "entry and exit approval procedures," and "whether there are any violations." After Zhao Gang came back, he had a dark face and cursed all night about "these people don't know a damn thing."

For example, on the fourth afternoon, Director Zhang suddenly appeared at the base and talked behind closed doors with Deputy Director Liu and Academician Zhou for two hours. Li Xiao secretly went to find out the news, only to hear Director Zhang slamming the table inside and saying, "The problems I reported are all facts," and then Academician Zhou replied unhurriedly, "Whether it's a fact or not depends on the data."

For example, on the sixth day, Deputy Director Liu talked to Lin Mo alone, asking many questions about "team management," "decision-making mechanisms," and "communication with administrative leadership," and finally said meaningfully, "Xiao Lin, people in scientific research sometimes need to pay attention to methods and approaches."

Lin Mo didn't understand the meaning of this sentence at the time, and pondered it for a long time afterward.

On the seventh afternoon, the investigation team held a summary meeting.

The conference room was full of people: core members of Lin Mo's team, Zhao Gang and several security backbones, Fang Lin, Director Zhang, and several administrative staff from the base.

Deputy Director Liu presided over the meeting, first asking the two young officers to report on the situation of reviewing materials and interviews. They listed a lot of data and facts—project progress, technical difficulties, the tackling process, team status—and the conclusion was very clear: the project was progressing normally, there was no "passive work," and the so-called "delay in progress" was because technical problems were encountered and were being actively solved.

Director Zhang's face became uglier and uglier.

Then it was Academician Zhou's turn to speak.

The old gentleman stood up, looked at the people present, and finally cast his gaze on Director Zhang.

"Director Zhang, I have read your report."

Director Zhang opened his mouth, wanting to say something, but Academician Zhou waved his hand and continued:

"The problems you reported, we have checked them one by one. You say Lin Mo is 'passively working'—what I have seen these seven days is that he works more than sixteen hours a day, staying up late to tackle problems. Is this called passive work? You say 'delaying progress'—the First Wall Material fatigue problem, the optimization of Tritium Extraction efficiency, which one of these is not a hard nut to crack? Whoever comes will have to chew on it. Is this called delaying progress?"

Director Zhang's face flushed red. "Academician Zhou, I..."

"I know, you don't understand technology." Academician Zhou's tone softened a little. "It doesn't matter if you don't understand, you can learn, you can ask. But you must respect scientific laws. Lin Mo not letting you skip verification and ignite directly is correct. If someone had stopped me like this back then, the 'eastern star' wouldn't have..."

He paused and took a deep breath. "Alright, I've finished my opinion. For this project, the technology is fine, the team is fine, and the person in charge is even more fine. Anyone who has a different opinion can bring data to speak."

The conference room was so quiet that the sound of the wind outside could be heard.

Director Zhang hung his head and said nothing.

Deputy Director Liu cleared his throat. "Thank you for Academician Zhou's professional opinion. According to our investigation team's one-week field investigation and comprehensive situation, our conclusion is—the problems reported by Director Zhang are inconsistent with the facts. The investigation report will be truthfully reported to the Ministry. This matter ends here."

He looked at Lin Mo. "Xiao Lin, you have been wronged. If you have any difficulties in the future, you can report directly to the Ministry. Principles that should be upheld must be upheld."

Lin Mo stood up and bowed deeply. "Thank you, Director Liu, thank you, Academician Zhou, thank you to everyone on the investigation team."

His voice was a little choked, but his back was straight.

In the evening, Academician Zhou was leaving.

Lin Mo sent him to the car, and the old gentleman held his hand and said the last sentence:

"Xiao Linzi, keep up the good work. The day the tokamak-3 ignites, I will come to applaud for you."

Lin Mo nodded vigorously.

The off-road vehicle disappeared into the night, and Lin Mo stood in the sandstorm for a long time without moving.

In the distance, the lights of the base were like scattered sparks on the Gobi Desert.