Concentric Circles

Song He's train of thought, which had been waiting for a long time, pounced on the flashing numbers in an instant, like a Sniper firing a thunderous shot at a target that had just shown its head!

Hit!

A large area of numbers in his mind lit up, and a wild and unparalleled lightning bolt pierced through everything. In an instant, a massive Concentric Circles abruptly took shape!

Nearly ten thousand numbers rapidly formed six layers of Concentric Circles, each layer connected by different calculation rules. No wonder he couldn't discern any pattern by directly looking at the file. The numbers in the file didn't form any graphic at all, but were arranged harmlessly in rows, more orderly than corpses.

Now, all the numbers had finally come back to life, actively arranged in a large circle, rotating mightily!

Song He, drenched in sweat, launched his final sprint, performing the Concentric Circles calculation!

Six layers of Concentric Circles, adjacent numbers merged, each layer undergoing pairwise merging. The large circle formed by the merging repeated the process, eliminating numbers time and time again, until finally, an eight-digit number remained.

Song He's head throbbed violently. The scale of the calculation was unbelievably vast. Some branches constantly went to zero and disappeared, but hundreds and thousands of branches continued to advance.

Every step had to be correct. One wrong number, and the whole game would be lost!

The giant circle formed by numbers shrank step by step, the scene was spectacular, like the process of a star collapsing. Song He's skull ached so much that he almost cried out, and sweat poured out like a flood!

"One minute left!" Li Kui suddenly shouted, this time his shout was weak.

"88631002!" Song He suddenly stood up and roared.

The whole place was silent, everyone was stunned, Li Kui looked at him in disbelief.

"88631002!!" Song He roared again.

After roaring, his brain was completely oxygen-deprived, his vision went black and he fell back into his chair, barely managing not to faint, but his eyes were blurred, and many stars were spinning above his head.

Li Kui pulled out the walkie-talkie with a whoosh, and repeated the numbers loudly, "Eight eight six three me cave cave two!"

On the big screen, the countdown clock had reached zero!

Song He's brain was a bit stuck. Hearing Li Kui's shout, he was shocked, thinking that the last four digits were wrong.

It took him a few seconds to realize that some numbers were pronounced differently in the army. In the early years, when the artillery was operating, it was often necessary to report numerical coordinates. The soldiers came from all over the country, with different dialects and accents, and individual numbers were easy to mishear, so the pronunciation was uniformly changed.

The room was silent, everyone looked at Song He, their eyes curious and awed.

"Is it correct?" Song He looked at Li Kui.

"We don't know the news yet, we'll let you know when we do." Li Kui looked worried. "Did you calculate it?"

"Yes, but I didn't verify it, there wasn't enough time." Song He nodded.

The next morning, breakfast.

At the table, Song He and Lao Zhao were sitting at a table eating, steamed buns, fried dough sticks, and tofu brains.

"Sweet tofu brains aren't disgusting?" Song He said, "Salty ones are better!"

"What do you know!" Lao Zhao snorted.

Both of them had good appetites, eating heartily. Although there was a sweet and salty disagreement, they tacitly put aside the dispute. After all, Song He was leaving after this meal. He didn't have any serious business here, just came to see Lao Zhao by the way.

"How was it yesterday when you were called to help?" Lao Zhao remembered this.

"Don't mention it." Song He's face fell. "I was almost exhausted to the point of fainting! They gave me nearly ten thousand numbers, and didn't say the rules, and asked us to find an eight-digit number. Who the hell knows how to find it? And there was a countdown, starting at 24 hours, then suddenly shrinking to 12 hours, and finally shrinking to only one hour!"

"So you failed? Didn't solve it?" Lao Zhao asked.

"No, although I was exhausted, I still solved it."

"Solved it?" Lao Zhao was stunned, looking at him with his fake eyeball. "How did you solve it?"

"I memorized it from beginning to end, looked for the pattern, found that the pattern was to construct Concentric Circles, and then calculated it tens of thousands of times to get the result." Song He said.

Lao Zhao laughed, "At least make up something that sounds plausible."

"It's true! How could it be made up?" Song He said, with a fried dough stick in his mouth, unclearly.

"How long did it take you?"

"The countdown kept changing, I'm not sure, no more than two hours, I guess."

"Two hours to memorize and mentally calculate a hundred thousand numbers?" Lao Zhao laughed. "If you really had that ability, you'd be attaining immortality! Still eating breakfast? Just go on a grain-free diet directly!"

"Memorizing and calculating a hundred thousand numbers by brute force is certainly difficult, but it's not hard if you categorize them according to patterns. There are tricks to memory and rapid calculation; it's the bread and butter of us mathematicians," Song He explained calmly.

"Was the final result correct?"

"Don't know, haven't been notified yet."

"I feel... it's a long shot. If it's really as you say, calculating a hundred thousand numbers in two hours, how could it be accurate?" Lao Zhao's attitude was pessimistic.

"It's best to pray that I calculated correctly. The soldier who called me over said that if the final answer is wrong, someone might die," Song He's expression turned serious.

"Is that so?" Lao Zhao also became serious. "Then pray you calculated correctly!"

Song He silently munched on his fried dough stick, his mind racing. After reporting the answer yesterday, he had asked Li Kui for details, wanting to know whose life or death his calculated answer would determine, but was rejected on the grounds of confidentiality.

Actually, it's better not to know. If he knew who it was, and if he really calculated wrong, perhaps the guilt would be immense. Knowing nothing, the guilt would be less.

Song He didn't re-verify the calculation. Firstly, calculating it once was truly exhausting; he hadn't recovered even after a night's sleep. Secondly, he didn't dare to calculate again, fearing that the result would be different. What would be the point? There was no way to remedy it anyway.

Buzz, buzz! The phone on the table vibrated.

Lao Zhao picked up the phone, put it to his ear, listened for a couple of sentences, and nodded repeatedly. "Good! That's good!"

He hung up the phone and breathed a sigh of relief. "Little Song, you've done a great service!"

"They notified me?" Song He's eyes widened.

"The result you calculated is correct. None of our own people died, and we also obtained some very valuable things," Lao Zhao said. "The internal affairs will record your contribution, but the credit will not be made public for the time being, for fear that someone will target you because of it. In addition to the honor, there is also a bonus of six hundred thousand, which will be transferred to you within two working days."

Song He nodded and picked up a steamed bun to eat.

"You're quite calm," Lao Zhao laughed.

"Where's the calm? I almost couldn't sleep last night," Song He said. "It's just that there's no need to jump up and cheer. I'm actually very happy."

"Do you like working here?" Lao Zhao asked.

"I don't like it. The pressure is too great. My heart almost exploded yesterday!" Song He shook his head wildly, then stopped when he remembered that Lao Zhao couldn't see him. "I'm okay with doing some slow-paced research and development, but this kind of ticking time bomb mission is really torturous!"

Lao Zhao chuckled, like an old veteran mocking a new recruit. As he laughed, he remembered something, and his expression became complicated.

"Finished eating." Song He threw the disposable chopsticks into the trash can. "Lao Zhao, just wait patiently for the surgery. Let's get together again when your sight is restored!"

"Okay." Lao Zhao nodded. "Where are you going next? Do you need me to help arrange it?"

"No need, going back to my hometown! The National College Entrance Examination results will be out in a few days. Going back to see my old friends check their scores," Song He smiled.