Likely a Weakling

Chapter 42: Likely a Weakling

After the meeting ended, almost everyone was jubilant and burning with impatience.

Professor Lu quickly provided several broad directions, and everyone chose what they preferred to work on to avoid overlapping ideas within the same school.

If this series of papers were published successfully, they could practically fill a special issue; it was a golden opportunity for the School of Mechanical Engineering to break into the national top ten!

"With a higher ranking, graduates won't have to worry about finding jobs... and we'll be able to attract all sorts of high-end manufacturing enterprises."

Thinking about how all their metrics would improve to some degree, Professor Lu became happier the more he spoke, eventually bursting into hearty laughter.

The happiness had come so quickly that it was almost overwhelming.

"Right, Zhang Yuan's paper needs to be published as soon as possible. All of our work is based on its foundation. If it isn't published, all of our papers will just have to sit on the shelf."

Professor Lu Junzhe suddenly remembered this matter. "It would be best to get it published in Modern Science as soon as possible."

Modern Science was arguably the domestic journal with the highest impact factor, a top-tier Q1 journal.

"I'll help him revise it myself!" Lin Wenda said.

"No." Lu Junzhe shook his head. "He isn't your student, so it's better not to mess with it. If you don't revise it well, you'll just invite gossip. Just give him a few pointers and let him handle it himself."

"Actually, they're all just trivial details, not that important. Let's get it passed quickly so we can publish our own articles..."

"You're right."

Formal journal reviews generally follow a three-tier system: initial editorial review, peer review, and final review by the editor-in-chief. With review times ranging from one or two months to as long as half a year, such a long wait made Lu Junzhe very anxious.

He was in a rush, truly in a rush.

Because as long as Zhang Yuan's paper remained unpublished, they couldn't cite their research findings.

Publishing an article without citations is called plagiarism, and that would be a disaster!

"Sigh, send him the editor's expedited email address as well; let's get it published quickly."

As for whether it would pass?

Lu Junzhe and Lin Wenda naturally never considered such a question.

If this paper couldn't pass, then Modern Science might as well go out of business.

Half an hour later, Wang Zhong discovered a new email in his inbox.

"A highly innovative, high-value paper; we suggest submitting it directly to Modern Science..."

"The revision suggestions are as follows..."

Wang Zhong felt his heart bloom with joy upon seeing his grand-student being praised; if the paper weren't good, they wouldn't have suggested submitting it to Modern Science.

He then forwarded the email to Zhang Yuan.

Zhang Yuan received the email shortly after, and upon reading it, he felt a jolt of surprise.

"They actually want me to submit to Modern Science!"

Zhang Yuan pondered it for a while and let out a long sigh.

He had originally intended to find just any journal to submit to, but Professor Wang had even included the submission email address.

It seemed that the "inspirations" his father had left him were likely the cream of the crop, carefully selected and preserved, far more excellent than he had imagined.

If Zhang Yuan hadn't taken the time to study these "inspirations," he would never have discovered the treasures hidden within them.

"Thanks, Dad."

Only now did he vaguely understand his father's painstaking efforts.

Since the revision suggestions asked him to submit as soon as possible, he might as well just make some casual edits—for instance, changing some sentence structures; or if some parts were too wordy, he could just trim them down...

Hmm, in his eyes, those were just meaningless things.

Although he was diligent, he never wasted his diligence on meaningless tasks.

"That'll do."

After spending three hours making minor revisions, Zhang Yuan felt it would be embarrassing to bother the big shots to look over the paper again, so he submitted it directly to the editor's email address...

"Let's go out and have some fun!"

Just then, a girl's voice came from outside the door.

Opening the door, he saw Han Ziyue had come uninvited, looking at him with a smile from outside the dormitory.

He had no idea how she had managed to bypass the dormitory warden's gaze and make it to the men's dormitory building.

Zhang Yuan had just submitted his paper, so he was in a pretty good mood. "Don't you have intensive training? The summer camp is for studying, not for playing. Besides, a girl running into a men's dormitory, that's... you know..."

"Know what?"

Zhang Yuan looked at the ceiling. "It's... not safe."

Han Ziyue walked into the room quite boldly, looking around. "Why are you like my dad? What era do you think this is? You're so uptight!"

"What? You can't let go?"

Han Ziyue said playfully, "It's Saturday today, you don't have to study, study, study all day long. As for safety... do you really dare to do anything to me? You used to be such an honest person, didn't you?"

Zhang Yuan blushed, "I certainly wouldn't."

This small room wasn't messy; on the contrary, it was very tidy, lacking the typical odor found in most boys' dormitories.

"You've cleaned up very well, you're quite good at housework..."

Zhang Yuan recalled his own slovenly father; if he didn't do the chores, who would?

He could even cook, prepare meals, and scrub toilets...

He said, "I'm someone who is going to board a starship. If I don't pay attention to personal hygiene, wouldn't I end up stinking out the entire ship? If I receive too many complaints, I'll be stripped of my right to remain awake and forced into cryosleep."

Han Ziyue sat curiously on another stool, resting her chin in one hand, "Haha, bad hygiene habits lead to forced cryosleep?"

"Of course. Not only that, but if you break the law, you'll also be forced into cryosleep. Either way, you stay in cryosleep until a new civilization is established before you're allowed to wake up and face trial according to the law." Zhang Yuan shrugged and closed some of the open books on the table.

"That's too miserable, right? Waking up from cryosleep just to go to jail?"

Zhang Yuan nodded, "So, yeah... but generally, people wouldn't intentionally break the law anyway. What did you come to see me for?"

Han Ziyue extended an invitation, "Actually, there's nothing specific. Let's go to the water park together, how about it?"

"Not going, I need to study!"

Recalling the solemn vow he made last night, Zhang Yuan pulled up a stool and sat earnestly in front of the computer, "putting on a show" as he began to revise a paper he had already submitted.

But the "study to distract yourself" method wasn't a cure-all. With a girl staring at him from behind, Zhang Yuan couldn't help but feel distracted.

"Ah, I remember now, you really are a top student. Back in high school, you loved doing homework. When you were dating my sister, you often helped her with her homework, and you even helped me with mine..."

Han Ziyue found it hilarious as she brought up the past.

"When did I ever like doing homework? Wasn't I forced to?" Zhang Yuan thought back to the time about five or six years ago.

Back then, Han Ziyue always loved being a third wheel. Zhang Yuan even had to get her permission just to kiss his girlfriend; she was truly annoying.

In the blink of an eye, she had grown up so much.

Time really is like flowing water.

Han Ziyue looked at Zhang Yuan's computer screen with a hint of admiration, "Is this a paper you wrote? Can I see it? Are you trying to get it published? Writing a paper must be harder than winning a competition, right?"

"...I don't know which is harder myself, I've never won any awards in competitions. Actually, they each have their own difficulties."

Zhang Yuan doubted from the bottom of his heart whether this airheaded Miss Han could even understand any five consecutive words in it.

Judging by the aura of a weakling she exuded... there was a high probability she was a total dunce.

After all, she never liked doing homework in the past and was never a top student growing up.

Besides, she was a sophomore in college, and it wasn't that he looked down on her... she just really didn't have the level for it.