The Passion of a Thirty-Something Man

"Did I disturb Dean Lu's enjoyment?" Shen Qi asked. Look how refined and interesting Old Lu is; this amateur calligraphy enthusiast has produced works of professional quality.

Old Lu recently joined the Capital Calligraphy Association. He paused his study of calligraphy and asked, "What brings you here?"

"I've written something, could you take a look?" Shen Qi handed the manuscript to Lao Lu.

Old Lu took the manuscript and looked at it. "What is this thing?"

"A newly defined automorphic L-function."

"I know, what I mean is, why define this thing?"

"Could you please point out any flaws in my proof of its analytical continuum? Is there anything wrong with how I'm demonstrating it?"

Although Lu Guozhen was deeply engrossed in calligraphy, he was also highly skilled in analysis; otherwise, he would not have been able to become the vice dean of the Vice Dean of Mathematical Sciences.

Lu Guozhen calmed down and carefully studied Shen Qi's manuscript.

Shen Qi took care of himself, leisurely pouring himself a cup of tea and admiring Lao Lu's calligraphy.

Shen Qi's manuscript looked messy, and people who weren't good at math wouldn't be able to understand what he had written.

Lu Guozhen immediately noticed that Shen Qi had written about a new automorphic L-function. After studying it again, Lu Guozhen fell into deep thought, "You have proven the analytic extension of this automorphic L-function, which has a clear arithmetic meaning, but it is isolated. My feeling is that you have justified a theory, but I don't quite understand what the purpose of this theory is."

Shen Qi, sipping tea and discussing philosophy, explained in detail, "There are several types of L-functions. One is the prephase L-function, which is a generalization of the Artin L-function and is defined by purely arithmetic form. The second is the automorphic L-function, which is defined by a priori information. There is also a special case, namely the generalized Hecke L-function, whose functional equation and analytic extension can be directly proven."

"Mathematicians are used to categorizing things, and even a single L-function has been divided into so many types. When I defined this automorphic L-function, I took into account its arithmetic form, and as you just mentioned, it has arithmetic meaning. So my attempt seems to have succeeded. The first and second types of L-functions can be integrated to form a new form with broad applicability. However, the third type, the Hecke L-function, has its own special characteristics, and I haven't found a particularly good way to unify them yet." Shen Qi sipped his tea and casually picked up some of Lao Lu's tea snacks to enjoy. The mathematics department was his home; he felt relaxed and at ease here.

"Is this part of the Mathematical Grand Unification?" Lu Guozhen suddenly realized. As people in the mathematics circle, Lu had already known that Shen Qi's center had launched the Mathematical Grand Unification project, Ou Ye from their School of Mathematics was also a member of the project team. This was a cross-departmental collaborative project.

Shen Qi nodded and said, "That's how I planned it, which is why I came to you for advice first."

"Who dares to instruct you now? Who can instruct you?" Lu Guozhen said with a smile.

Old Lu picked up the seal, breathed on it, and stamped it on the scroll of paper inscribed with "Shui Diao Ge Tou - Swimming": "This piece of calligraphy is the pinnacle of my career; I'm giving it to you."

"Oh my, this is a great gift, thank you." Shen Qi accepted the artwork produced and sold by Lao Lu, feeling a little embarrassed. "The calligraphy works you've given me over the years are almost enough to complete Chairman Mao's entire collection of poems, but I've never reciprocated with an artwork of equal value. Please don't take offense, it's not that I'm stingy, but my artistic skills are indeed limited."

"Take the words, but keep your manuscript." Old Lu took Shen Qi's manuscript for himself and said, "Your concept of Mathematical Grand Unification is quite unique; I'll study it further."

"To change your handwriting, we need to use a mathematical manuscript?" Shen Qi asked.

"You can't bear to part with it?"

"What's there to be reluctant about? Why didn't you say so earlier? I wrote a whole box of manuscripts in America and gave them all to my American students."

Shen Qi left Lu Guozhen's office with his calligraphy works. The academic exchange with Lao Lu was still meaningful; at least Lao Lu could understand what Shen Qi was saying.

Shen Qi also felt a bit sentimental; Lao Lu's mathematical skills remained stable, and his calligraphy side business was thriving.

Honestly, Shen Qi had almost no outstanding side hustles or special skills.

Shen Qi used to have some hobbies, like running and stargazing, some for physical fitness and others for a sophisticated touch. But due to work and family reasons, he had to give up these hobbies halfway through.

Now that Shen Qi has passed the math exam and given birth, he has decided to return to his side hustle, continuing to improve his health and cultivate sophisticated hobbies.

"System, the reference template for Sports Level 15 is... never mind, I'll look it up myself. You never answer me anyway."

Upon investigation, the system's reference template for Level 15 Sports is a track and field athlete named Usain Bolt.

The 15-level reference templates for the ten subjects only feature Bolt as a living contemporary figure; the rest are historical figures.

"I admit, Bolt is indeed an invincible figure." Shen Qi didn't intend to train to Bolt's invincible level in sprinting; it was just for physical fitness, not to become an Olympic champion.

The study of stars is systematically classified under the field of physics.

The system-defined Physics Level 15 reference template is Einstein.

Einstein studied the mysteries of the universe, but he was not a proper astronomer.

The system does not answer the question of who the level 15 astronomer is.

The reference template for the 2015 Chinese language exam was Li Bai.

"Chinese Language and Literature" is an abbreviation for language, literature, and culture. Setting Li Bai as the invincible template for Chinese Language and Literature is not wrong.

"I still have over 60,000 points left in the top student ranking system. What am I going to do with them? I'll use them up."

Shen Qi hasn't been doing much physical exercise lately. He used to run and jump a lot, accumulating a lot of sports experience.

The current status of the sports stats is: Level 5 (24288/50000)

Upgrading from level 5 to level 6 requires 50,000 academic points or experience points. Shen Qi added 50,000 points and upgraded his physical education level to 6.

Shen Qi has written several books, totaling over 1.5 million words.

Although it is an academic work, at the very least, the author should be qualified in terms of writing fluency, grammar should be correct, there should be no typos, sentences should be fluent, and word choice and sentence structure should be appropriate.

Writing books has accumulated a lot of Chinese language experience points for Shen Qi, and his current Chinese language level is: Level 5 (29012/50000).

Shen Qi added 50,000 points and upgraded his Chinese language skills to level 6.

Compared to his Chinese and physical education scores, Shen Qi's political attributes were indeed far too strong. His political level accumulated over time and automatically rose to level 8.

Lao Lu, the vice Vice Dean of Mathematical Sciences, has reached a professional level in calligraphy and has been recognized by his colleagues in the capital's calligraphy circle.

Shen Qi set a small goal: to develop a professional-level hobby in a field outside of scientific research.

In the system's settings, level 5 is the entry-level professional level.

In other words, Shen Qi's physical education and Chinese language skills, according to the system settings, have already exceeded the entry-level professional level, but they have not been recognized in real society.

Shen Qi resumed physical exercise; a Level 6 in physical education is really impressive.

Theoretically speaking, a level 6 athlete's athletic ability is no less than that of a national first-class athlete.

With the Yenching University Sports Meet just around the corner, each college and department needs to send representatives to participate.

"Everyone who can run and jump, sign up!" Shen Qi encouraged the participants at the center; he was a strong supporter of sports.

"I'll sign up for the 10,000 meters." Xiao Junlong was originally on a business trip at Ship Research Institute in another city, but Shen Qi summoned him back because of this sports meet.

Shen Qi: "Old Xiao, when you came all the way from your hometown to Yenching University to enroll, you only applied for one subject?"

Xiao Junlong: "I'm already 30 years old, I can't deny getting old. Director Shen, how many individual events did you sign up for?"

Shen Qi: "I signed up for the 100-meter dash and the long jump."

"Director Shen, weren't you specializing in endurance sports? Why did you switch to speed and strength sports?"

"Speed and strength-based challenges, that's exciting! I signed up for the student group, so I'll leave the leadership of the center's faculty and staff group to you, Lao Xiao."

"Really?" Xiao Junlong was very surprised. Director Shen actually dared to confront a young student? Old Shen, you're almost 30 years old, do you have to be so fierce?