Classmate, Wake Up

Shen Qi finished his spicy strips and continued drawing regular polygons within the concentric circles he had just created.

A perfect geometric pattern unfolded under Shen Qi's 2B pencil.

He inscribed regular polygons within the circle, employing the "Method of Exhaustion." By successively drawing regular polygons inside the circle, he "exhausted" the circle's area.

The Greeks were the first to propose this geometric drawing method, which the British later improved and named the "Method of Exhaustion."

This ancient mathematical method was still relevant today in the 21st century. Seventeen-year-old Chinese high school student Shen Qi skillfully used it to find the diameter of the circle.

The square root of 3 over 2.

Shen Qi wrote down the answer, a very simple number. To arrive at this number, Shen Qi had broken a 2B pencil, and the proof filled the entire exam paper.

After checking it twice with no issues, Shen Qi submitted his paper.

Three hours had passed since the 9 AM start time, making it exactly 12 PM.

"Young man, student Shen Qi, this is the National Final. You're submitting your paper an hour and a half early. Don't you want to check it again?" the invigilator asked, taking Shen Qi's paper and quickly scanning it.

"I've already checked it twice. There are no problems. I want to eat lunch, a proper meal." Shen Qi was hungry again, probably because he was going through puberty and growing rapidly, making him particularly prone to hunger.

"Once you submit your paper and leave this classroom, there's no turning back," the invigilator gave a final reminder.

"I'll just submit it as is, let nature take its course." Shen Qi glanced at the work ID badge hanging on the invigilator's chest. His surname was Liu, and he was a staff member of the Chinese Mathematical Society.

Shen Qi politely said, "Thank you for the reminder, Mr. Liu, but I'm hungry."

"Alright, you can go. Good luck, student Shen Qi." Mr. Liu put Shen Qi's National Final paper into the envelope and sealed it.

"Mathematics never relies on luck, only on strength." Shen Qi suddenly remembered this sentence, given to him by his homeroom teacher, Zhang Wanbang.

Mr. Liu's face darkened. "You can leave now, student Shen Qi. Weren't you hungry?"

Inside the classroom, the remaining nine contestants were extremely tense.

"Damn it, submitting an hour and a half early. What a show-off." The contestant from the Ebei Province Math Olympiad team bit his pencil, his brows furrowed into a deep frown. He had also gotten a perfect score in the National Preliminary, but he was stuck on the second analytic geometry problem in the first half of the National Final.

"Where did this monster come from? Can he not show off?" The contestant from the Capital Math Olympiad team particularly detested these unknown, attention-seeking jerks. He was also stuck on the second problem.

"Heh, maybe he just left it blank. Heh, playing mind games, huh? I won't be affected by you." The contestant from the Xiangnan Province Math Olympiad team was more optimistic, with strong mental fortitude. Three hours had passed, and he hadn't solved a single problem.

"Cra... Crap... I... I... F*** you..." The contestant from the Zhedong Province Math Olympiad team suddenly felt dizzy, his vision went black, and he collapsed onto his desk.

"Hey!"

"Student, wake up!"

All the invigilators panicked. They immediately administered first aid to the Zhedong Province contestant, pinching his philtrum and massaging his temples.

"Mr. Liu, National Final contestant number 52 has fainted!"

"He might have been too nervous and didn't replenish his fluids and food. He fainted from hunger!" the invigilators reported the situation to the person in charge of the classroom.

Mr. Liu made a decisive judgment. "Carry him out and call medical personnel immediately!"

Chaos erupted in the examination hall as National Final contestant number 52 was carried out.

"Is this student alright?" Shen Qi asked from the classroom doorway, showing genuine concern.

"Shen Qi, I order you to leave the examination hall immediately! Go as far as you can, or your National Final score will be invalidated!" Mr. Liu was also flustered. He blamed himself for chatting with Shen Qi, which had apparently caused the other contestants to faint.

"You're blaming me?" Shen Qi shrugged, then left the examination hall, looking very innocent.

The difficulty of the National Final exam was streets ahead of the National Preliminary, with the second problem being the most challenging.

So far, Shen Qi was the only one in the entire hall to have solved the second problem, a complex elliptical equation. The problem was so difficult that it had even caused one contestant to faint.

Shen Qi walked out of the Second Teaching Building. The air outside was so fresh. The Capital was bathed in bright sunshine today, a rare occurrence without smog.

Looking around, "Heh, I seem to be the first to finish the first half of the National Final. None of those guys from the Ebei team, who play blind chess, have come out yet. And a guy from the Zhedong team even fainted. Poor guy."

Shen Qi sent a text message to their team leader, Teacher Tian: "Done. Going to eat."

Teacher Tian replied instantly: "Solve your own lunch. Your teammates are still fighting."

Shen Qi: "So bored."

Teacher Tian: "Turn left outside the school gate, there's a steamed bun shop."

Shen Qi: "Teacher Tian, I want to drink the 'Zhuangyuan Jidi' porridge, but I don't know my way around the Capital. Where can I buy it?"

Teacher Tian no longer replied to the text messages.

"So bored!" Shen Qi had a simple meal at the campus cafeteria and then returned to his dorm to read and sleep.

Shen Qi's Math Level had been raised to Level 5. His deductive reasoning, insight, and judgment in mathematics had further improved.

This didn't mean he could stop studying just because his academic level had increased. The system was responsible for enhancing Shen Qi's thinking abilities, while he himself had to accumulate knowledge through daily learning, as the more, the better.

Over the past few months, Shen Qi had read through all the undergraduate textbooks in the mathematics department, at least once. For some branches, he had read them several times.

In the face of the giant that was mathematics, Shen Qi was still an infant. There were many branches of mathematics that he had only touched upon lightly or not at all.

"The more I read, the more I realize how ignorant I am." Shen Qi flipped through a copy of the "Mathematical Herald." This journal was published by the Chinese Mathematical Society, and it was one of Shen Qi's subscriptions.

A paper in this issue of the "Mathematical Herald" was well-written by a mathematics Ph.D. from Yanjing University. He had proposed new insights into Functional Analysis and applied them to quantum research in multidimensional spaces.

When he reached the part about quantum mechanics, Shen Qi couldn't understand it anymore. Although mathematics was the vehicle for describing quantum mechanics, one at least needed to understand what quantum mechanics was and what it studied.

Physics is the discipline that intersects most frequently with mathematics. It's hard to clearly define the branch of Mathematical Physics as belonging to mathematics or physics, even though it's listed in the mathematics department's curriculum.

Mathematical Physics was Shen Qi's weak area. He certainly had weak areas, even within the field of mathematics.

"Old bro, you're clueless? If you're clueless, then we're all mentally retarded." Someone entered the dorm; it was Qi Jianhong.

Shen Qi closed the Mathematical Herald and asked, "Jianhong, you're back. How was the exam?"

"The first question was damn tricky. I don't play Go, I don't even know the rules, so I left it blank. The second question, Analytic Geometry, seemed ordinary at first glance, but upon closer inspection, it was terrifyingly difficult. I left it blank too. For the third question, Plane Geometry, I used the Method of Exhaustion to find the diameter, root-3 over 2. I don't know if I got it right." Qi Jianhong only completed one of the three questions, but he didn't seem dejected; he had given his best effort.