Rong Yu tapped her fingers on the tabletop.
She had indeed only started to stand out half a year ago, so it was understandable that she was being questioned by a group of the country's most outstanding students.
She raised her eyes and said calmly, "Apart from Su Ronghua, there must be others who think I shouldn't be the captain of the Huaxia Team, right?"
"I don't think so!" Sheng Ciyuan said loudly. "Forgive me for being blunt, but out of everyone sitting here, whether in terms of talent or ability, no one can compare to Rong Yu!"
The whole room fell silent.
Song Huai's face was full of disbelief.
He knew Rong Yu was very impressive, but... why did Sheng Ciyuan think so too?
A member of the Sheng family in the capital, a chosen one, with a top-tier family background and top-tier personal talent. Someone like him was actually kissing Rong Yu's ass?
For some reason, the image of Ji Zhouye popped into his mind.
What was the difference between Sheng Ciyuan's current appearance and Rong Yu's little follower, Ji Zhouye?
Su Ronghua laughed out of anger. "An 'elderly' eighteen-year-old repeating student, with no achievements and no papers. Besides a gold medal from the domestic physics competition, what else do you have to show for yourself?"
Rong Yu: "..."
An "elderly" eighteen-year-old.
It was clearly the prime of youth, but she was being called elderly. She refused to accept it.
But on second thought, Su Ronghua was a high school sophomore, probably only sixteen years old. Eighteen was indeed a bit older to him.
Moreover, questioning only her age and not her gender was pretty good already.
She looked at the leading teacher. "Since everyone has doubts about my ability, why don't we verify it on the spot? Teacher Huang, please give us a question."
Teacher Huang also became interested.
These proud geniuses all thought they were the best, so it was completely normal for them to be unconvinced by someone else being the captain. Giving them a question at this time to let them compete and recognize each other's abilities would be a great thing for enhancing team cohesion.
There was a whiteboard in the meeting room. Teacher Huang picked up a marker, walked over, and started writing the question: "Calculate under the background of curved spacetime..."
The meeting room was dead silent.
Song Huai's fingers stiffened. This question was a bit too difficult, somewhat beyond the scope of their usual training.
It required handling the metric of general relativity, calculating the matrix algebra of quantum field theory, as well as the connection coefficients of differential geometry... Not only did it test physics, but it also required profound professional knowledge in mathematics.
Su Ronghua thought intently for a few minutes, immediately opened the laptop he carried with him, and began to calculate.
Sheng Ciyuan was about to start solving the problem when he saw Rong Yu empty-handed without any auxiliary tools. He immediately pushed his laptop over. "You use it."
This warm-up competition was to make the team members wholeheartedly submit to the captain; he didn't necessarily have to participate.
Rong Yu twirled her gel pen and shook her head. "No need."
As a person from the 1970s, she hadn't yet developed the habit of carrying a laptop when going out. For her, as long as she had a pen and a piece of paper, she could construct a massive mathematical and physical world, not to mention she also possessed an excessively young brain.
The question Teacher Huang came up with on the spot didn't have too many complicated components; it could be completely calculated by the human brain.
Sheng Ciyuan met her confident eyes, nodded, and began to calculate diligently.
Su Ronghua's fingers flew across the keyboard extremely fast. He pressed the enter key for the last time. Next, he only needed to wait for the computer to run for about five minutes to get the final result.
He looked up at his teammates beside him.
Song Huai's brows were tightly knit; evidently, he was still stuck at a critical point.
Sheng Ciyuan was progressing smoothly, but he was too slow—a step behind him.
Ding Zhe was still frantically calculating...
His gaze finally landed on Rong Yu, and he immediately let out an unceremonious laugh.
Rong Yu surprisingly didn't even have a computer. In front of her were only a pen and a piece of scratch paper, and the paper was completely blank except for a few numbers and symbols.
Was she unable to even keep up the act anymore?
Could someone like this still be the captain?
In his view, Rong Yu wasn't even fit to be a team member. If this kind of person went onto the battlefield, wouldn't it be a disgrace to the great nation of Huaxia?
He looked at Teacher Huang, conveying the meaning: Look, this is the captain you chose, nothing more than this.
Before long, Su Ronghua's computer program finished, and a string of characters appeared. He strode forward and wrote it on the whiteboard.
Just as he finished writing, Sheng Ciyuan's result also came out. He spoke up, "My result is the same as Su Ronghua's. Rong Yu, what is your final result?"
Su Ronghua smiled and looked at Rong Yu.
He wanted to see how she would talk her way out of this.
Rong Yu's face was extremely calm, as if she were just having an ordinary chat. She pushed the scratch paper on the table over. "The same."
"Wh-what?"
Su Ronghua was completely stunned.
He dashed forward in a single stride and stared intently at the scratch paper. Indeed, it was exactly the same as what he had calculated.
But!
Rong Yu hadn't used a computer, and the scratch paper was practically blank. She hadn't even calculated it; how could she have arrived at this result?
"You copied my answer."
Su Ronghua didn't say it as a question; his tone was absolutely certain.
Teacher Huang said calmly, "Fifteen minutes ago, Rong Yu had already written this value on her scratch paper. And at that time, you were still building your model. Of course, if you don't believe me, you can check the surveillance footage."
Su Ronghua was rendered speechless. He mumbled, "Relying purely on the brain, how could it be possible to calculate it?"
"Because the human brain is more flexible than a computer and holds more possibilities." Rong Yu raised her hand. "If the human brain and computer are combined, perhaps it would be faster. Bring your model over for me to see."
Su Ronghua didn't know what she wanted to do, but he pushed his laptop over.
However, there was still some distance from the middle of the oversized office desk to Rong Yu. She would need to stand up and lean over to reach it.
Sheng Ciyuan immediately stood up, picked up the laptop with both hands, and carefully placed it in front of Rong Yu.
Song Huai frowned.
The Second Young Master of the Sheng family was actually fawning over Rong Yu like this?
Was he pursuing her?
Rong Yu scrolled the mouse and quickly scanned through the model. This model was very mature, which was quite rare for someone of Su Ronghua's age. No wonder he could stand out among the physics geniuses nationwide while only being a high school sophomore.
She slightly modified a few coefficients. "You made the computer run an extra loop, so it needed five minutes. Changing it here can reduce the time to about two minutes."
Su Ronghua's expression froze.
Since stepping into the math and physics competition circle, he had basically never met a rival. Sheng Ciyuan was the first, but later Sheng Ciyuan's focus shifted, and he easily surpassed Sheng Ciyuan, becoming one of the top academic gods among the younger generation in Huaxia...
Now, meeting Rong Yu... being easily surpassed by someone else, to be honest, didn't feel very wonderful.
"It seems everyone should have recognized the captain's ability." Teacher Huang clapped his hands. "I hope that under Rong Yu's leadership, our Huaxia Team will achieve excellent results in this competition. Meeting adjourned."
