Chapter 97 - 78: Team Competition
Even at five in the evening, the summer heat still lingered in the north.
There was no wind. The hot air was trapped by the corridor’s vents.
Students pouring out of the various exam halls gathered in the stairwell.
No one was running.
Most of them walked slowly.
Chen Zhuo didn’t linger. He followed the flow of people to the first-floor lobby and pushed open the glass door.
Outside, sunlight slanted across the steps.
He walked to a patch of shade in front of the second cafeteria.
This was the meeting point they had decided on at lunch.
Zhou Kai was already there.
Instead of standing, he was squatting on the curb, his hands resting casually on his knees as he stared at the ground.
A moment later, He Gui came over from the other end of the main path.
His feet shuffled as he walked. Reaching the shade, he sat down directly on a decorative rock next to Zhou Kai and let out a long sigh.
Miao Shian adjusted the gold-rimmed glasses on his nose. As he approached, he instinctively tried to force a smile, but his mouth only twitched before he gave up.
Wang Huashao held a square folded from a scrap of paper he’d torn from somewhere, unconsciously fiddling with it.
Upon reaching the group, he opened his mouth as if to say something, but after a glance at everyone’s mood, he shut it again, simply running his hands through his hair in frustration.
Lin Yi was the last to arrive.
She walked under the tree, stood next to He Gui, and pulled a mint from her pocket. She unwrapped it, popped it into her mouth, and her cheek puffed out slightly.
All six of them were now gathered.
Teams from other provinces constantly passed by. Some were fiercely debating the parameters of the final major question, while others complained that the tolerances for the component assembly were too large.
But the six members of the Su Province Team stood together, and not a single one of them brought up the exam they had just finished.
There was no comparing answers, no complaining about the questions.
A white bus turned the corner at the intersection ahead and pulled over to the side of the road.
Its doors hissed open.
Chen Zhuo, at the front of the group, stepped onto the bus.
The six of them found empty seats and sat down.
The doors closed, the engine restarted, and the bus smoothly merged into the evening rush hour traffic.
The bus didn’t head straight back to the hotel.
After about half an hour, it stopped on an old street lined with locust trees.
Professor Wang was waiting for them there.
The old man stood at the entrance of a restaurant with a somewhat dated storefront. Seeing the bus come to a stop, he waved at them.
It was a local copper hot pot restaurant.
Pushing open the heavy glass door revealed an interior filled with the rich, greasy aroma of lamb and billowing steam.
The first-floor dining hall was packed with people, and the noise was deafening.
Professor Wang led them directly to a private room on the second floor.
In the middle of the room was a large round table, with a traditional charcoal-fired copper hot pot already set up in the center.
The charcoal underneath glowed red-hot. The clear broth in the pot was boiling, with a few pieces of green onion and ginger floating on the surface.
On a cart nearby were a dozen plates of paper-thin sliced lamb, along with several plates of frozen tofu, cabbage, and glass noodles.
In front of each person was a bowl of prepared sesame sauce, sprinkled with chopped scallions and cilantro.
"Sit down and eat."
Professor Wang pulled out a chair and sat down, not asking a single question about the exam.
The six students took their seats one by one.
Professor Wang picked up two plates of lamb from the cart and used his chopsticks to slide all the meat into the boiling pot.
The red and white slices of meat changed color instantly in the roiling water, curling up.
No one needed to be told what to do.
Zhou Kai picked up a strainer ladle, scooped up a spoonful of the just-cooked lamb, and dumped it into his bowl. He swirled it in the sesame sauce and shoved it directly into his mouth.
The searing heat and the savory, umami flavor of the lamb and dipping sauce spread through his mouth.
He chewed voraciously, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallowed it all down.
Then he went back for a second scoop.
No one in the private room spoke.
There was only the GURGLE of the boiling water in the copper pot, the crisp CLINK of chopsticks against porcelain bowls, and the sound of swallowing.
Food piled up in their stomachs, bringing a reassuring sense of fullness.
They ate for over an hour.
The empty plates on the table were stacked high.
The broth in the pot slowly boiled away, and the charcoal fire dimmed.
After settling the bill, they walked out of the restaurant.
The sky was completely dark. The streetlights were on, casting a dim, yellow glow on the asphalt.
The evening breeze dispersed the day’s oppressive heat, bringing with it a hint of coolness.
The bus took them back to the hotel.
The carpet in the hallway was thick, muffling their footsteps completely.
They reached their rooms.
They each had their own room, all six in a row.
Chen Zhuo stopped and looked at the others.
"Everyone, go back, take a shower, get some sleep. We’ll meet tomorrow morning at seven-thirty in the first-floor restaurant, same as before."
A few of them nodded and took out their key cards.
A series of electronic BEEP BEEP sounds followed.
Locks clicked open, they went inside, and pulled the doors shut behind them.
The hallway fell silent once more.
Chen Zhuo entered his room.
He inserted the key card, and the entryway light turned on.
He took a change of clothes from the wardrobe and went into the bathroom.
Ten minutes later, Chen Zhuo walked out of the bathroom, drying his hair with a towel.
He went to the bed, pulled back the covers, and lay down.
He turned off the bedside lamp.
The room plunged into darkness, save for a sliver of streetlight filtering through a gap in the curtains.
「The next day.」
At 6:30 in the morning, Chen Zhuo opened his eyes right on time.
He got out of bed and washed up.
By 7:30 AM, the other five had also arrived one by one at the first-floor buffet restaurant.
Zhou Kai’s walking pace had returned to its usual rhythm.
Wang Huashao was at the buffet line picking up steamed buns with half a fried dough stick already in his mouth, while He Gui had gotten a cup of soy milk and two hard-boiled eggs.
No one mentioned yesterday.
They quickly finished their breakfast and put down their utensils.
At 8:00 AM sharp, the bus was waiting at the hotel entrance. The team assembled and boarded.
Today’s route was different from yesterday’s.
After entering the university campus, the bus didn’t stop in the main academic area up front.
Instead, it continued down a wide asphalt road, heading deeper into the campus.
The trees on both sides of the road grew sparse, and the old red-brick buildings were left behind.
An area with a heavy industrial feel came into view.
There were large, gray, steel-framed factory buildings with thick ventilation ducts running along their exteriors.
The air smelled of a mixture of machine oil and anti-rust paint.
The bus stopped in front of a massive complex.
Above the main entrance was a row of large, iron-gray metal characters, unpainted, retaining their original metallic color.
National Engineering Comprehensive Training Center.
The teams from every province got off here.
Today, there was no need to find their individual exam rooms; all the teams were gathered in this one large venue.
Each team consisted of six people standing together.
Someone at the front pushed open two heavy, red iron doors.
The space inside was vast.
Rows of large lights hung from the ceiling, illuminating the entire hall brightly.
The floor was clean and flat, marked with yellow paint to delineate different zones.
There were no single-person desks or plastic chairs like the ones used in regular exams.
In the very center of the hall, dozens of workbenches were arranged in neat rows.
Dozens of teams followed the signs to their designated workbenches, each marked with the name of their province.
The Su Province Team’s station was in the front right section of the hall.
Chen Zhuo led the other five to their workbench.
The six of them stood around the rectangular table.
In the very center of the workbench sat a black metal box.
It was about a meter long, half a meter wide, and about forty centimeters high.
Two heavy-duty latches on the front were fastened securely.
There were no markings or text on it whatsoever.
It wasn’t just their table.
A quick scan of the hall revealed that an identical black metal box sat in the center of every single workbench.
At 9:00 AM, at the very front of the training center, an electronic screen that took up half the wall lit up.
After a moment of black, black text appeared on a white background.
National Junior High School Physics Competition Finals—Comprehensive Team Challenge.
Then, the main text appeared line by line below the title.
The font was large enough for even those in the back row to see clearly.
Topic: Collection and Conversion of Weak Ambient Energy.
Task: Using the standard component library on your workbench, independently design and build an energy harvesting system.
Objective: Without using any chemical batteries or mains power, light up the 2.5V high-brightness red light-emitting diode provided by the organizing committee in a sealed bag, and maintain a stable light for no less than 10 seconds.
Time Limit: 4 hours.
Rules: Borrowing components from other teams is prohibited. Destructive disassembly of fixed facilities within the training center is prohibited.
After the text finished displaying, a red digital clock appeared at the very bottom of the screen.
04:00:00.
A short electronic whistle blared over the hall’s PA system.
The countdown began to tick.
03:59:59.