This whole interaction, seen by the others, left them not only shocked but utterly speechless.
Professor Xie did pull the girl into his arms first, right?
His arm was clearly around her waist. She was practically nestled in his chest. And their eyes were locked like glue—no mistaking that.
Old Jin: “Something’s up.”
“Iron tree, did you finally bloom?”
“I think the iceberg’s sprouting.”
Xie Dingyuan cast a cool glance in their direction, and everyone immediately shut up.
Jiang Fuyue changed out of her lab coat, her neck feeling a bit stiff. She rotated it a couple of times to relieve the tension.
Xie Dingyuan, now changed as well, stood waiting in the hallway, fingers unconsciously rubbing together as if recalling the sensation of something.
“All done,” she said.
He turned around, face calm. “Let’s go.”
The two headed to the cafeteria together. Along the way, they continued discussing the model and the data—neither mentioned the earlier embrace even once.
Jiang Fuyue chalked it up to an accident and didn’t give it further thought.
As for what he might be thinking… only he would know.
After lunch, they returned to the lab.
Xie Dingyuan: “You can nap in the break room if you’re tired.”
Jiang Fuyue waved it off. “No need, I’m not sleepy.”
She wanted to input the results from this morning’s analysis back into the simulation model for verification.
“I’ll help,” he said, taking a seat at another computer and beginning to input the data using her method.
The model was something she had developed herself. To keep it simple, many of the function keys were marked with single letters—for example, the delete function was just “D.”
As long as she understood it, that was enough. What others made of it wasn’t her concern.
But Xie Dingyuan had only watched her use it once and already grasped the whole thing. Now he was operating it with ease. Jiang Fuyue gained a whole new level of respect for his learning ability.
As for Xie Dingyuan—
Watching the twenty-minute re-verification process shrink to a few seconds through her model was mind-blowing, to say the least.
At this point, their dynamic had become: sparring on the surface, mutual admiration underneath.
Jiang Fuyue thought to herself, Okay, his arrogance might be somewhat justified.
Xie Dingyuan, on the other hand, was thinking, My past bias made me look like a complete idiot.
…
In the afternoon, Old Bai returned, looking refreshed after his nap. The dark circles under his eyes were gone.
He went back to his workstation—only to find that the two hundred-plus data sets that hadn’t been processed were now down to just over thirty.
“Holy cr*p!” he blurted, thinking he was still dreaming.
Old Jin: “You’re not seeing things. It’s real.”
Old Bai: “What the heck happened to the data?!”
“Professor Xie and Jiang Fuyue tag-teamed it this morning—he cranked out the data, she ran the model. Tug-of-war style. Over a hundred sets done. You’re off the hook now!”
“A-a hundred sets?!” Old Bai gulped hard. “No way…”
“See for yourself!”
“Look—Jiang Fuyue even finished the analysis reports. She double-verified the results too.”
Old Bai: “…D*mn! These two aren’t even human!”
“And where are they now?”
Old Jin pointed further inside.
“In the lab.”
Old Bai went quiet.
Being allowed in the lab at all was already a recognition of one’s research capability.
He hadn’t expected Jiang Fuyue to be granted access so quickly. It had been less than a week since she arrived. The fastest among them back in the day didn’t get into the lab until six months in.
Truly, comparison is the thief of joy.
No one suspected Professor Xie of playing favorites. Jiang Fuyue’s skills were obvious to everyone.
Old Jin smirked: “Still think it’s unfair?”
Old Bai ground his teeth. “It’s not unfair… but that doesn’t mean I have to like it.”
A high school girl, not even graduated, and already miles ahead of them all. What kind of legend would she become?
Yeah… hard to swallow.
…
Jiang Fuyue followed Xie Dingyuan through five interlocked security doors and finally entered the core lab area.
Both were dressed in full protective suits and passed through two rounds of decontamination showers.
The core zone housed a biosafety cabinet, ultra-low temperature freezer, centrifuge, incubator, microscope, lab benches, and even a small animal research room.
On top of the biosafety cabinet was a thick pipe about half a meter in diameter, connected directly to the roof. It maintained negative pressure, and most operations were performed inside the cabinet.
Jiang Fuyue didn’t approach—just observed from a distance.
“BSL-4?” she asked.
BSL stands for Biosafety Level. The higher the number, the stricter the protection.
Four was the highest.
Xie Dingyuan shook his head. “Strictly speaking, this barely qualifies as Level 3.”
She raised an eyebrow. “Looks like it protects way beyond a 3.”
“Better safe than sorry.”
True that.
They stayed inside for nearly two hours. It was well past working hours when Xie Dingyuan finally insisted she leave.
According to protocol, they needed to go through decontamination before entering the buffer zone, where they could then remove their outer protective suits.
However, while passing through one of the interlock doors, Jiang Fuyue’s suit was snagged and torn.
She hadn’t been disinfected yet, meaning she could be carrying potentially dangerous biological material from the core zone.
Xie Dingyuan’s face darkened.
Jiang Fuyue took a deep breath but stayed calm, not moving an inch.
Xie Dingyuan said, “I’ll take you into the spray-down decontamination unit now. But your suit’s torn. You can’t keep the clothes underneath either…”
Jiang Fuyue immediately understood. There was no time to be shy or modest.
Without hesitation, she said,
“Then I’ll need your help taking everything off.”
Not just the outer layer.
Everything.
