Chen Zhuo looked at Zhang Qiang, his tone calm yet filled with an undeniable certainty.
"Old Zhao told you to find your ’holistic intuition.’ If your brain can’t wrap around it and you can’t find it, then just stop looking."
Zhang Qiang was stunned, wondering what trick Chen Zhuo had up his sleeve.
Chen Zhuo took the pencil from Zhang Qiang’s hand and pointed the tip at the complex geometry problem.
"From now on, when you do junior high geometry problems, don’t think about what concept it’s trying to test you on, and don’t worry about what it’s asking you to find."
Chen Zhuo looked at Zhang Qiang.
"Just treat it like you’re playing The King of Fighters. Memorize the move list."
"Move list?"
Zhang Qiang was a little confused.
"Right."
Chen Zhuo used the pencil tip to draw a line under the first sentence of the problem description.
"Look here. The problem mentions the phrase ’tangent AB of circle O’."
Chen Zhuo turned his head to look at Zhang Qiang.
"That’s your opponent jumping."
Zhang Qiang blinked. It seemed to be sinking in.
"Don’t worry about what the whole problem is asking, and don’t worry about how messy the diagram is. What’s your muscle memory?"
Without waiting for Zhang Qiang to answer, Chen Zhuo used the pencil to connect the center of the circle, O, to the point of tangency, then drew a small right-angle symbol.
"When you see the word ’tangent,’ your hand should automatically connect the center to the point of tangency and mark the right angle. That’s your heavy punch anti-air. You don’t need to think. You see the word, you execute the move."
Chen Zhuo’s pencil tip moved down the problem description, stopping at the second sentence.
"Look here again. ’Isosceles triangle CDE’."
Chen Zhuo tapped the test paper.
"Isosceles triangle. Without a second thought, what’s your muscle memory?"
Chen Zhuo shoved the pencil back into Zhang Qiang’s hand and pointed at the triangle in the diagram.
"Draw an altitude from the vertex down to the base. That’s like you’re doing a Dark Sweep—down, forward, punch. You don’t need to think about why. Just draw it as a reflex. Go on, draw."
Zhang Qiang held the pencil and swallowed hard.
He didn’t think about what the problem was asking for. He just mechanically followed Chen Zhuo’s instructions. Seeing the isosceles triangle, he drew an altitude perpendicular to the base and marked the two equal base angles.
"Very good."
Chen Zhuo nodded in satisfaction.
"Keep scanning down. The problem also mentions an angle bisector. When you see an angle bisector, what move do you use?"
"...Draw perpendiculars to the two sides?"
Zhang Qiang asked tentatively. It was one of the rules from the notes Chen Zhuo had given him.
"Correct. Draw them."
Zhang Qiang gripped his pencil, his wrist moving across the diagram as he drew the two perpendicular lines.
Throughout the entire process, he didn’t think about the problem’s logical chain at all. He was like a machine executing code, or a gamer touch-typing on a keyboard. He saw a specific term in the problem description and added the corresponding auxiliary line to the diagram.
"Alright, combo’s finished."
Chen Zhuo leaned back in his chair and pointed at the test paper, which Zhang Qiang had now covered with several auxiliary lines.
"Now, take another look at this diagram."
Zhang Qiang lowered his head and looked at the diagram he had just finished drawing on.
The geometry diagram, which had once been a chaotic mess that looked to him like a pot of congee, was suddenly transformed by the three auxiliary lines he had drawn without even thinking.
The radius connecting to the point of tangency and the altitude of the isosceles triangle happened to form a clear right-angled triangle inside the circle. Meanwhile, the two perpendiculars drawn from the angle bisector clearly outlined a pair of congruent triangles.
In that moment, all the hidden conditions were revealed, as if they’d been uncloaked and exposed in broad daylight.
The problem had been completely dismantled.
The answer was laid bare on the paper, practically jumping off the page.
Zhang Qiang sucked in a sharp breath.
The pencil in his hand fell onto the desk with a TAP.
He stared at the paper, dumbfounded, then looked up at Chen Zhuo, his mouth slightly agape. He was speechless for a long moment.
"This... It’s solved?"
Zhang Qiang felt like his entire worldview had been shattered.
Before, when he did geometry problems, he always tried to construct the entire proof in his head. But because he didn’t have enough ’memory,’ his brain would ’crash’ every time.
But now, he had just acted like an unfeeling connect-the-dots machine, not thinking about the ’why,’ only seeing keywords and triggering actions.
And as a result, the problem solved itself!
’This is like using a cheat code that doesn’t even require you to think!’
"Holy shit..."
Zhang Qiang couldn’t help but curse, his eyes shining with excitement.
For the first time ever, doing a math problem gave him the same rush as mashing buttons to pull off a super move in an arcade game!
"Brother Zhuo, you’re amazing!"
Zhang Qiang was so excited he grabbed Chen Zhuo’s arm.
"With this move list, why the hell would I be scared of Old Zhao! Come on, come on, where’s the next problem? Let me try another one!"
Zhang Qiang frantically flipped through his workbook and found an even more complex comprehensive problem involving circles.
He muttered to himself.
"See a diameter... draw a right angle. See a midpoint... draw a median. Heavy punch anti-air, Dark Sweep..."
His pencil flew across the paper with a SWISH SWISH, and in less than a minute, a complete logical chain clearly materialized in the diagram.
Watching Zhang Qiang, who was as excited as if he’d been shot up with adrenaline, Chen Zhuo just sat quietly to the side, observing him scribble on the test paper.
Chen Zhuo didn’t think this method was particularly advanced.
In reality, it was just a form of basic algorithmic logic.
It was about breaking down a huge, complex systems engineering project into individual sub-modules that could be executed mechanically.
He had used the same line of thinking a few days ago when he was teaching Chu Ge how to handle high-concurrency database issues over the phone.
The only difference was that with Chu Ge, he had used discrete algebra matrices.

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