Heading North to Ice City

After several hours of flight, Huang Xiuyuan and his group of over a dozen people landed at Taiping International Airport in Bingcheng.

Exiting the airport, they headed straight for the main campus of Harbin Institute of Technology. Suiren Company had already set up a temporary office near the university.

The June sun in Bingcheng was bright, and the Harbin Institute of Technology campus was lush with greenery. Several members of the school's management and six or seven student union cadres stood at the main gate.

They had hung a banner at the entrance with welcome slogans, and a Bingcheng News interview van was parked nearby, with the cameraman busy adjusting his equipment.

Soon, sharp-eyed individuals spotted four taxis arriving in succession, and a young man stepped out of one of the vehicles.

An elderly man from the school's management recognized the young man instantly with his sharp eyes. He walked over quickly, patted Huang Xiuyuan on the shoulder, and laughed heartily: "Xiuyuan, you kid are doing well."

"Uncle Liu, long time no see." Huang Xiuyuan was also all smiles.

After some pleasantries, the group went to the auditorium, where he gave an impromptu speech lasting over ten minutes, donated 50 million to Harbin Institute of Technology, and immediately followed up with an interview for Bingcheng News.

Time passed quickly, and the sun was already setting outside.

After having dinner in the school cafeteria.

Huang Xiuyuan sent the others away and met with the old man who had greeted him that afternoon in his office.

Inside the office, the old man asked happily: "How is your father? I heard he even went to the disaster area?"

Huang Xiuyuan, who was brewing tea, smiled and replied: "He's doing fine. It was an engineering support team organized by my company, and my dad just went to help keep an eye on things."

"He's always had a stubborn temper. When you go back, tell him he must come to Bingcheng this year, no matter what."

"Definitely, definitely."

This old man was Liu Zhenting. He and his father, Huang Fuqiang, had served in the same military unit back in the day; Liu Zhenting was the regiment commander, and his father was a guard.

Their unit had participated in the counterattack in '79, and as one of the few survivors, the old man had worked at Harbin Institute of Technology in Bingcheng ever since he officially retired in the nineties.

His father, meanwhile, had spent a few years in government offices before choosing to resign and start his own business.

Huang Xiuyuan had only come to Harbin Institute of Technology back then because his father had chased him with a whip; after all, moving from Lingnan to Bingcheng for school was a huge test, if only for the weather.

Looking back on the past, it all felt somewhat surreal.

The old man and the young man chatted about family matters for over two hours before Huang Xiuyuan finally brought up the reason for his visit.

"Your company developed a high-energy material? The power is about 17 times that of TNT? You aren't joking?" Liu Zhenting's expression turned serious.

Huang Xiuyuan was equally solemn: "Naturally, I wouldn't joke about this. That is why I made a special trip here, hoping the school could help with testing and discuss how to handle it."

"Where is the sample? Is it over in Lingnan?"

Huang Xiuyuan explained: "The laboratory in Lingnan only has a few kilograms of samples. I have already transported the production equipment to Bingcheng. As long as it is reassembled and supplied with the necessary raw materials, we can resume production at any time."

Liu Zhenting hadn't expected him to move so quickly, with the equipment already in Bingcheng. He asked hurriedly: "What raw materials are needed?"

Tearing a page from his notebook, Huang Xiuyuan wrote down high-purity nitrogen, calcium carbonate powder, and sodium chloride powder.

Glancing at the materials, Liu Zhenting saw they were all common substances. He chose to trust Huang Xiuyuan and, despite the late hour, notified a number of people throughout the night.

Early the next morning, before the sky had even brightened.

Over a dozen green trucks and a group of fully armed soldiers surrounded the temporary warehouse, and before anyone noticed, they quickly transferred the equipment inside.

At eight o'clock in the morning, after breakfast, Huang Xiuyuan, accompanied by three engineers and Liu Zhenting, headed toward a range of hills in the suburbs.

Among those accompanying them were six engineers and teachers from Harbin Institute of Technology, all of whom specialized in high-energy fuels and high-energy explosives.

Their minibus wound through the roads until noon before reaching their destination: a testing site, or rather, a firing range.

After eating lunch at the base.

The group finally received the batch of parts, and the three Suiren Company engineers assembled them with practiced ease.

Finally, Huang Xiuyuan took the parameter chip and the Hexagonal Silicon Oxide-Graphene Film from his briefcase, completing the most critical assembly.

Then he started the equipment and ran a test for over ten minutes, after which one of the engineers said to him: "Mr. Huang, we are ready for production."

Huang Xiuyuan immediately ordered: "Then begin production."

"Understood."

The group of Harbin Institute of Technology engineers and teachers waited in anticipation; after all, 17 times the power of TNT sounded a bit unbelievable.

The Nitrogen-20 production machine and the passivation machine began to operate. Compounding 15 layers of Hexagonal Silicon Oxide film under specific voltage and vacuum negative pressure, combined with a large amount of electrical energy, they rapidly generated Nitrogen-20 powder.

Over two hours later, they had produced over a hundred kilograms of passivated Nitrogen-20, which was pressed into blocks of varying sizes.

It was then sent to the testing site for detonation testing.

Inside a bunker, everyone held binoculars.

Several Harbin Institute of Technology engineers whispered to each other.

"How much for the first test?"

"0.1 kilograms," replied Li Feng, a researcher lost in thought.

"Old Li, what do you think?"

"Theoretically speaking, all-nitrogen ionic salts can indeed reach this power, perhaps even exceeding it, but..." He hadn't finished his sentence.

Suddenly, an explosion sounded in the distance. The sensors in the sealed test chamber fed back a set of data, and when everyone focused their eyes on it, they were immediately unsettled.

"Holy crap!"

"17.36 times the power of TNT."

"This thing is incredible."

Li Feng also felt deeply shocked. As far as he knew, there were indeed research projects on all-nitrogen ion salts in the country, with institutes in Nanjing working on them.

In fact, high-energy materials are being researched both domestically and abroad; for instance, metallic hydrogen, which has been a hot topic in recent years, is a major area of focus.

Similarly, all-nitrogen ion salts are also a popular direction.

Just as everyone's thoughts were drifting, dozens of kilograms of Passivated Nitrogen-20 were detonated one after another in the test field.

In the preliminary tests, depending on the environment and quantity, the measured power was around 16.87 to 17.62 times that of TNT, which was basically consistent with the data provided by Huang Xiuyuan.

As a scholar in the field of high-energy materials, Li Feng knew the terrifying potential of this material.

Passivated Nitrogen-20 is powerful, can be mass-produced, and uses cheap raw materials, making it both affordable and effective.

He had seen that piece of equipment, and that film should be one of the key technologies; the chip contains the process parameters, and the overall process should not be difficult.

He had exchanged ideas with Huang Xiuyuan in the morning, and the storage conditions for this material were not overly demanding. Combined with the fact that the detonation method is identical to TNT, these advantages taken together make the replacement of TNT by Nitrogen-20 a basically foreseeable result.

Over the next half month.

Nitrogen-20 continued to be produced, and related experiments and tests were conducted intensively.

Quite a few people arrived at the base one after another, many of whom were big shots.

During these two weeks, Huang Xiuyuan, representing Suiren Company and with the help of Harbin Institute of Technology as a bridge, signed a memorandum of comprehensive strategic partnership with Norinco, as well as patent licensing agreements regarding Nitrogen-20 and the Nitrogen-20 passivation process.

Norinco will pay Suiren Company 60 million in patent fees annually to obtain the relevant patent authorizations for Nitrogen-20.

At the same time, they will purchase Hexagonal Silicon Oxide-Graphene Film from Suiren Company at a unit price of 200,000, with the first contract for 1,000 pieces, totaling 200 million.

These collaborations are all confidential.

At the same time, they also jointly established a high-energy fuel research project with Harbin Institute of Technology to develop the application of Nitrogen-20 in rocket engine fuel.

These are just the visible gains; there are also many invisible gains among them.