Professor Wang froze when he heard what Liu Ruochuan said.
’Wait a minute?’
They were in the first tier worldwide right now.
’Wouldn’t that just be giving away their time for free?’
"Dean Liu."
Professor Wang’s tone changed in an instant.
"What do you mean by that?"
He even started to wonder.
’Does Liu Ruochuan know some people who are also working in this area?’
’Is he trying to buy them time?’
’If that’s true, that would be pretty underhanded.’
Seeing the cold expression on his face, Liu Ruochuan quickly waved his hands.
"Hey, Old Wang, don’t get me wrong."
"It’s not like that."
Liu Ruochuan hurriedly explained.
"It’s that kid, Li Dong."
"He already submitted to the *Mathematical Annals*."
Professor Wang was taken aback for a moment.
"Submitted what?"
He didn’t quite register it at first.
It was no longer a rare occurrence for Li Dong to publish in a top journal.
’What does his submission have to do with our GL2 to GL3 work?’
But then, it dawned on him...
"You mean..."
"The thing he said last time at Sunshine Hall?"
Professor Wang had also been at that seminar in Sunshine Hall.
He clearly remembered Li Dong standing on the stage, facing Jiang Yubai, and casually tossing out that one sentence.
*I’m going to take it from GL2 to GL(n).*
At the time, everyone in the audience thought the kid was just bragging.
That was GL(n), after all.
One of the ultimate forms on the main line of the Langlands Program.
Everyone present felt that even if the kid was serious about doing it, it would be a matter of years, not now.
Professor Wang swallowed hard.
"Dean Liu."
"You’re... not kidding me, are you?"
Liu Ruochuan sighed.
"I’m not, Old Wang."
"That’s why I told you to pause for a bit."
"The kid is very confident."
Professor Wang leaned back against his chair.
He gave a bitter smile.
’I’m really getting old.’
Although their research group wasn’t the absolute best, it was definitely in the first tier.
That day in Sunshine Hall, Li Dong and Yang Shengguo had laid out the entire basic framework for extending GL2 to GL3.
Their research group just had to follow that line of reasoning, and they could complete the full proof in less than half a year.
Half a year.
For a project of this magnitude, that was already absurdly fast.
But now, Liu Ruochuan was telling him...
...that Li Dong had already submitted the even more incredible one to the *Mathematical Annals*.
How long had it been?
Just over a month since that day in Sunshine Hall.
The kid had leaped all the way from GL3 to GL(n).
Professor Wang sat in his chair for a long time without saying a word.
Liu Ruochuan didn’t disturb him.
He understood this feeling all too well.
Many years ago, the first time he saw Mr. Qiu work through a theorem on the blackboard that he himself couldn’t solve, the expression on his face must have been quite similar to Professor Wang’s right now.
After a good while, Professor Wang snapped out of it.
He waved his hand dismissively.
"Forget it, forget it."
"I’ll just wait for news from the *Mathematical Annals*."
He stood up.
He walked to the door, then stopped and turned back.
"Dean Liu."
"Hm?"
"If this paper really gets published..."
Professor Wang paused.
"...it won’t be appropriate for him to continue as an undergraduate at Yuanpei, will it?"
Liu Ruochuan was silent for a moment.
Then he nodded.
"Yes."
"It won’t be appropriate."
Professor Wang gave another bitter smile.
He shook his head and left.
Liu Ruochuan sat in his chair for a long time.
’Professor Wang was right.’
If this paper really got published in the *Mathematical Annals*...
...Li Dong’s reputation in the world of mathematics might truly reach the same level as people like Terence Tao.
A first-year student.
If he continued his undergraduate studies at Yuanpei, every professor would just go to class and stare blankly at him...
How could they even teach the class?
Not to mention what outsiders would think.
"Yan University Suppresses Li Dong," "Genius Forced to Remain an Undergrad"...
As soon as the *Mathematical Annals* published it, a dozen articles like that would pop up the same day.
’I have to think about what arrangements to make for this kid.’
Liu Ruochuan took out his phone.
He sent a WeChat message to Tian Gang.
[Teacher Tian, are you free to grab a meal sometime?]
[I’ve been thinking about the Li Dong situation. I need to discuss it with you.]
Meanwhile, Li Dong was sitting in the Yan University Library.
A pile of books was spread out on the table in front of him.
They were the ones Professor Zhang Lufang had told him about.
Books like *Coordination Chemistry*, *Introduction to Emerging Fields of Inorganic Chemistry*...
Now that he had the Memory Palace,
his reading speed had become absurdly fast.
A specialized book of three or four hundred pages,
he could get through it from the first page to the last in just over ten minutes.
Of course, those ten-odd minutes only took care of the "memorizing" part.
Understanding would have to come slowly later.
But even so, it was terrifyingly effective.
He spent the entire morning loading this whole pile of books into his Memory Palace.
As he closed the last book, *Introduction to Scanning Probe Microscopy*,
Li Dong stretched.
For the past couple of nights,
he had actually been lurking in the group chat.
And he noticed that the more he understood, the deeper the discussions between Madam Curie and Mendeleev in the group became.
He opened the group chat.
[Marie Skłodowska Curie]: Mr. Mendeleev, I will say this one last time.
[Madam Curie]: If we accept that a radium atom can spontaneously transform into a radon atom at any given moment, releasing an alpha particle, then the notion that elements are immutable can no longer stand.
[Madam Curie]: I have performed experiments for over thirty years. I’ve measured so many half-lives I couldn’t count them all a hundred times over.
[Dmitry Ivanovich Mendeleev]: Madam!
[Mendeleev]: The experimental data you give me is always in units of grams! Or even milligrams!
[Mendeleev]: Have you ever calculated how many atoms are in a single milligram of radium salt?
[Mendeleev]: You cannot even absolutely guarantee that it is a pure phase!
[Mendeleev]: You say that within that milligram, "radium became radon," but perhaps what you observed was merely a small amount of radon impurity that was already present escaping!
[Mendeleev]: You are unable to point to a single, individual atom and tell me: "This is the atom that transformed from radium into radon right before my eyes."
Seeing this, Li Dong paused.
’They can send data to each other??’
’And Mendeleev’s point is spot-on.’
’When you extract 0.1 grams of radium chloride from tons of ore, how can you prove that "every single atom in that sample is radium"?’
’You can only say, on a macroscopic level, "This batch of material, as a whole, appears to be radium."’
Madam Curie was pinned down by this very statement.
[Madam Curie]: ...
She was silent for several minutes before replying.
[Madam Curie]: I admit, with my current methods, I cannot point to a single atom and say what it is.
[Madam Curie]: But one day, there will be a way.
Mendeleev paused for a moment before another message appeared.
[Mendeleev]: Madam, I respect your work.
[Mendeleev]: But until that day comes, I will still maintain that elemental transmutation is a misinterpretation.
[Mendeleev]: You yourself have said that the intensity of radium’s radioactivity is directly proportional to the quantity of radium and is independent of its chemical environment.
[Mendeleev]: This proves, in fact, that the process occurs outside the atom, not within it.
[Mendeleev]: External excitation by the Ether is another possible explanation, one you have not ruled out.
Li Dong read their messages.
He realized that to resolve their argument, what was needed wasn’t new chemistry.
It was an instrument.
An instrument that could "weld" the elemental fingerprint of X-rays and the single-atom spatial resolution of an STM onto a single probe tip.
You precisely position the probe tip over a single atom.
You hit it with X-rays from a synchrotron.
You measure its absorption edge at a characteristic energy.
That’s the "ID card" for this one atom.
Not for a gram of radium, not for a milligram of radium.
But for this single atom.
Then you wait.
Wait for it to decay.
Wait for it to spit out an alpha particle.
And you do it again.
The probe tip is still there.
The atom is still the same one.
But its "ID card" has changed.
From the L-edge of radium to the M-edge of radon.
Mendeleev’s statement, "You are unable to point to a single, individual atom and tell me,"
would no longer hold up in the face of such an instrument.

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