Chapter 97 - 96: Terrifying Deductive Skills! Not Playing by the Book
Chapter 97: Chapter 96: Terrifying Deductive Skills! Not Playing by the Book
Shi Changying was very satisfied with such a smart chat system; it saved her the time of typing out replies herself. She had already learned Pinyin, but she wasn’t fluent in typing yet, and handwriting was far too slow.
DING! The phone vibrated twice.
[HS]: [Image]
[HS]: You have three minutes to give me the answer.
[Only I am the first]: ?
The other party had sent a picture of a math problem. Shi Changying stared at the screen in silence.
A few of the formulas looked familiar. She had seen them in the mathematics section of the *Taichu Holy Scripture*. She had also listened to Hua Shao animatedly explaining her latest advancements. Although the lectures always put her to sleep, she would give them enough positive feedback. After all, whenever her ministers looked at her with expectant eyes and asked, "Your Majesty, what do you think?" she simply couldn’t bear to let them down. So, she would either say, "We find it quite excellent," or, "It suits Our wishes perfectly."
But whenever it touched upon her intellectual blind spots, she genuinely didn’t understand a single thing. Therefore, Empress Taichu truly had no idea what these formulas meant or how to use them.
"Yingying?" Lu Mi asked in confusion when she saw her freeze. "What’s wrong? Are you in some sort of trouble?"
Shi Changying decided to seek help from the person she was going to replace. As the ancients said: lower his guard, approach him, learn from him, become him, surpass him, and then eliminate him when he slacks off. She handed the phone to Shaoyuan and asked, "How do you solve this problem?"
Shaoyuan glanced at it and raised an eyebrow. "Higher-order arithmetic progression."
Shi Changying hadn’t encountered this concept yet, so she shook her head.
Shaoyuan kept it brief and to the point. "It’s taught as an elective in college and barely touched upon in high school. Don’t worry about it for now."
Shi Changying considered her current math proficiency. It was probably around a sixth-grade level. She was quite satisfied to have reached this level in less than a month. Although math and physics only got harder the further you went, Empress Taichu was confident she could conquer these two anti-human subjects and seize the throne of being ranked first in her grade.
However, if she didn’t know something, she didn’t know it. She wouldn’t pretend to understand. Shi Changying typed with a clear conscience.
[Only I am the first]: I don’t know how. I’m a primary school student.
[HS]: ?
Looking at this reply, Hua Shao felt like she was being provoked.
This was a new account with a Jianghuai IP address. She had only tracked it down because she saw a certain "cake" suddenly follow it. Having researched math and physics for two lifetimes, Hua Shao was acutely sensitive to the smallest of details. Her logical reasoning skills were also incredibly formidable. While others were still pondering the purpose of a matter, she could see the result at a single glance. This resulted in her colleagues and students being unable to keep up with her train of thought.
After all, a normal person’s thought process went from A to B to C, and so on. But Hua Shao could jump straight from A to Z, entirely omitting all the intermediate steps. Therefore, Hua Shao instantly deduced that this new account must be the liaison between Lu Qingyuan and a certain "cake." Anyone capable of getting a certain "cake" to take action was surely no simple character. Thus, she had decided to test the waters with an ordinary math problem. But the result...
Hua Shao stared at the six words, "I’m a primary school student," and smiled faintly. Did they think they could fool her like this? Did they know the consequences of deceiving her? Very well. She was going to use her ultimate move.
Shi Changying suddenly realized her phone had frozen. The screen was stuck on the chat interface with HS, and she couldn’t exit no matter what she tried. What was going on?
Just as she was about to smash the phone against the wall in an attempt to physically restore it to normal, her hand was caught. Long, jade-like fingers with distinct knuckles rested over the back of her hand, bringing a trace of warmth. These hands looked beautiful whether they were holding a pen or a book. But the owner of the hand was perfectly well-mannered, releasing her immediately after stopping her from smashing the phone.
"What’s wrong?" Shaoyuan asked.
Shi Changying turned her head. "My phone went on strike."
Shaoyuan grunted in acknowledgment. "Let me see."
She handed the phone to him.
Shaoyuan narrowed his eyes slightly. Someone was launching a remote attack on this phone. He powered off the device, easily neutralizing the opponent’s attack using the most primitive method.
"It caught a virus," Shaoyuan said flatly. "Go eat first. I’ll handle this."
Lu Mi came over and linked arms with Shi Changying. "Let’s go, Yingying. Leave it to the young master, he’s very reliable. Today’s meat dish is sweet and sour meatballs!"
Accurately catching the name of the dish in that sentence, Shi Changying finally followed Lu Mi out of the room.
Shaoyuan tapped his fingers lightly against the tabletop a few times while casually typing with his other hand.
[Shaoyuan]: Find out who launched the attack.
A moment later, a reply arrived.
[God of Delicious Cake]: I knew this HS had to be a psychopath. Why else would they launch a remote attack on my client’s phone? If they have a problem, they should come at me! This is going too far!
[Shaoyuan]: It seems the opponent’s skills are on par with yours.
[God of Delicious Cake]: No, I won’t allow that. Let me emphasize once again: I am the number one expert in cutting-edge tech and equipment! Do you know what number one means?
[God of Delicious Cake]: Fine, even if HS is neck-and-neck with me in computer skills, could they possibly bake a better cake than me? Impossible.
Losing his patience for this conversation, Shaoyuan exited the chat and began pondering HS’s true identity. If it was someone from Beidou... As one of Jiuzhou’s intelligence agencies, it was impossible for Beidou to act so brazenly; it would be too easy to expose their identity.
Meanwhile, Hua Shao also noticed that her attack had been blocked.
The next second, a chat box popped up directly on her phone.
[God of Delicious Cake]: What’s the meaning of this? It’s one thing to attack me, but how could you bully a child?
Hua Shao frowned. Was it really a primary school student?
[HS]: Excuse me, is your daughter a loyal fan of Lu Qingyuan?
[God of Delicious Cake]: I’m in the prime of my youth! Where would I get a daughter from? You’re a pig, you hear me?!
[HS]: I don’t speak to non-humans.
[God of Delicious Cake]: What do you mean? Explain yourself clearly! I’m dedicating the best years of my life to science; where would I get a daughter? Are you just jealous that my academic prowess is stronger than yours?
Hua Shao set her phone aside and massaged her temples, her thoughts churning slowly. She was aware that Qingyuan’s massive fanbase inevitably contained hidden talents. Once, due to severe weather, Qingyuan had been trapped on a mountain while filming, and a fan had actually called in a helicopter. That incident trended online and sparked widespread discussion. The media joked that Qingyuan’s fans were spread across every field imaginable, and if anything went wrong, they could leverage a massive network of connections. Could she really be overthinking this?
The phone chimed with a DING. It was a system notification.
[You have a new message from a followed user.]
Hua Shao narrowed her eyes. Realizing that the account "Only I am the first" had made a post, she immediately clicked on it.