Naturally, Li Dong, who was in the waiting area, was completely unaware of what was happening in the judges’ lounge.
At the moment, he was holding a cup of warm water, taking a sip from time to time. He couldn’t be more at ease.
In contrast, Elder Chen, who was beside him, was a nervous wreck, muttering nonstop.
It couldn’t be helped. This was the closest Jiangcheng Sixth Middle School had ever come to the level of a top-tier super school.
"Li Dong, let me go over it with you one more time..." Elder Chen said, holding a printout of the PowerPoint slides for "Spontaneous Symmetry Breaking Induced by Rotation."
"During the presentation later, don’t talk too fast! Especially when you get to the Lagrangian dissipation equation, you have to give the judges time to think and digest it."
"Also, if that Professor Anderson asks you about differential manifolds, don’t get dragged into a deep discussion with him!"
"Just drag the topic back to classical mechanics and the isomorphism of phase transitions at all costs! Don’t let him lead you into the trap of pure mathematics. This is the physics division, understand?"
Li Dong looked at the nervous Elder Chen and sighed helplessly.
"Teacher Chen, don’t worry."
"I built this entire model from scratch, from the nuts and bolts to the differential equations. I could recite it all with my eyes closed."
To alleviate the old man’s anxiety, Li Dong decided to create a distraction.
He pointed toward the entrance of the waiting area.
"Hey, Teacher Chen, what school is that team from? Their... style is... quite unique, huh?"
Hearing this, Elder Chen subconsciously looked in the direction Li Dong was pointing.
A three-person team, consisting of two young men and one young woman, was walking confidently toward the sign-in room.
Evidently, it was almost their turn to go in for their presentation.
The hairstyles of the two young men on the team were, well...
The hair on the sides of their heads was plastered flat against their scalps, as if they had just been born.
Elder Chen was taken aback when he got a clear look, and he lowered his head to flip through the list of finalists in his hand.
"It’s the team from the Korea Science Academy (KSA)."
"That’s strange," Elder Chen muttered.
"The Qiu Prize Asian Region competition has been running for so many years, and the strong overseas teams are usually from Singapore’s Raffles College or a few well-known international schools in Indonesia."
"The South Korean teams usually prefer competing in the United States. What are they doing here?"
Curious, Elder Chen glanced at the physics topic this South Korean team had submitted.
"This... What the hell is this crap they wrote?"
Li Dong leaned in, also curious.
"Simulation of Room-Temperature Superconducting Phase Transition Based on Non-Hermitian Quantum Systems and Macroscopic Desktop Verification of Topological Boundary States"
HISS—
After reading the title, Li Dong sucked in a sharp breath of room-temperature superconductor.
Holy cow!
’Non-Hermitian systems? Room-temperature superconducting phase transition? And they even managed a macroscopic desktop verification?!’
’Any single one of those terms would be enough to have the Nobel Prize committee showing up at your door overnight with a medal!’
’And now you’ve not only thrown them all together, but you’re also claiming to have achieved a "macroscopic desktop verification"?’
’Did you guys secretly master the Three-Body Star People’s sophon technology, or did you crack Doraemon’s Fourth-Dimensional Pocket?’
Li Dong watched the three South Korean students walk confidently toward the presentation room and couldn’t help but give them a mental thumbs-up.
’As expected of the universal powerhouse. The sheer audacity of this topic... We really can’t mess with them. Hmm... can’t mess with them for now, anyway.’
Still, Li Dong was a little puzzled. How did a topic that sounded so unreliable make it through the semifinals and all the way to the global finals?
Seeing Li Dong’s expression, Elder Chen naturally knew what he was thinking. He had seen this kind of trick before, so he explained.
"Wondering how they made it to the finals?"
"For a topic like this, the theoretical part most likely uses an unpublished, underlying mathematical model from a university lab in their country."
"The semifinal judges focus on the completeness of the theoretical derivation."
"As long as these students make their DFT simulation charts look pretty, and add in those topological algebra formulas from the university lab, they have a good chance of bluffing the semifinal judges, provided the math is self-consistent."
"But to bring it to the global finals... heh heh..."
Who were the judges for the global finals? Was this some kind of joke?
Just as Li Dong and Elder Chen were mercilessly roasting the South Korean team’s topic, a voice filled with excitement suddenly called out from behind them.
"Senior Li Dong!"
Li Dong turned around.
A short but clear-eyed young man was standing behind him.
"Huh? Oh, it’s you..." Li Dong paused for a moment. After maxing out his 0.3-rated memory... he finally recalled, "From Rongcheng Seventh Middle School... Junior Qiao Fan, right?"
Qiao Fan nodded, his eyes, fixed on Li Dong, sparkling with the fire of what could only be called a "fated showdown"!
He still remembered how he had been defeated by this senior at the Huaxuan Cup finals just a few months ago.
He also remembered his senior’s completely unfazed, scholarly demeanor when faced with the massive one-million-yuan prize.
From that day on, Qiao Fan had sworn to surpass Li Dong, fair and square!
And today, he had come here with his project: "A Study on Droplet Bouncing and Pilot-Wave Nonlinear Dynamics Based on Faraday Waves."
He had absolute confidence in his topic!
This was a macroscopic simulation experiment that touched upon the fundamental interpretations of quantum mechanics!
"Senior, this time, I will give it my all!" Qiao Fan declared, his tone as resolute as a Spartan warrior heading into battle.
Li Dong looked at this passionate kid, and the corner of his mouth twitched slightly.
’Dude, my little bro, you’re all fired up? But I’m really just here to go through the motions today.’
Just then, Qiao Fan’s female coach stepped out from behind him.
"Elder Chen, long time no see."
Su Wan first greeted Elder Chen, then looked at Li Dong with a complicated expression.
Unlike the passionate Qiao Fan, who was completely absorbed in his own world, Su Wan paid close attention to developments in the academic world, both at home and abroad!
’This university freshman standing before her had, just a short while ago, dropped a "nuclear bomb" on the international computational mathematics community, one with enough yield to destroy the old system of algorithms!’
’First author in *Math. Comp.*! Personally endorsed by the editor-in-chief, Su Qiwang! The man who took the computing power records of global supercomputing centers and ground them into the dust!’
Su Wan looked at her own foolish student, who was still naively thinking he could have a clash of titans with Li Dong, and sighed inwardly.
’Qiao Fan, oh, Qiao Fan... the guy is just here for fun.’
’High school students don’t read top-tier Q1 journals, so they don’t know how cruel the world is, but she did!’
However, Su Wan couldn’t possibly crush Qiao Fan’s resolve at this critical juncture.
Besides, she held on to a sliver of hope. This was the physics division, after all. Li Dong’s achievements were in mathematics; perhaps his talent for physics wasn’t as great?
So, after exchanging a few pleasantries with Elder Chen, she made an excuse about needing to prepare for the presentation and pulled Qiao Fan aside for a pep talk.
At that moment, the door to the presentation room was suddenly pushed open from the inside.
The previously confident South Korean team with their plastered-down hair walked out, their faces ashen.
The female student’s eyes were red-rimmed; she had clearly been crying inside.
The leading male student, meanwhile, was walking out quickly, complaining loudly in Korean to their supervising teacher.
Li Dong didn’t understand Korean, but...
"Shibal..."
Li Dong heard that particular curse loud and clear.
Watching the South Korean team’s retreating backs, a nearby volunteer who understood Korean couldn’t help but let out a snicker and whisper a translation to their companion.
"Those South Korean students are cursing out the judges."
"They’re saying Mr. Qiu Chengtong and the other foreign professors are too rigid and conservative, that they only focused on experimental errors and couldn’t appreciate their perfect ’mathematical model and theoretical innovation’! They also said they’ll never come back to this kind of backward competition that lacks any groundbreaking spirit..."
After the South Korean team left, it was Qiao Fan’s turn.
"Next group, Rongcheng Seventh Middle School, Qiao Fan."
Qiao Fan glanced back at Li Dong, his look seeming to say, ’Senior, watch me!’ Then he strode into the presentation room.
Watching Qiao Fan’s back as he entered, Elder Chen’s nerves tensed up again.
He turned to Li Dong, a hint of worry in his voice.
"Li Dong, Teacher Xiaosu just gave me the rundown. Qiao Fan’s Faraday wave project is incredibly solid. Both his fluid dynamics model and the quantum mechanics analogy are impeccable."
"That kid is aiming for the global gold medal! His project puts a lot of pressure on your chances of winning!"
"How confident are you, really, in our hysteresis loop model?"
Hearing this, Li Dong slowly let the amused, spectating smile fade from his face.
He looked at the anxious Elder Chen and replied helplessly.
"Teacher Chen..."
"I’m not that confident. His topic is much deeper than mine..."
This made Elder Chen even more worried. Just as he was about to sigh, he heard Li Dong continue.
"I’m only about ninety-something percent confident..."

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