This was not what Lu Zhou had expected.
As members of the discipline that placed the greatest emphasis on academic purity, he had expected his teammates to mind at least a little, or to show some similar reaction. Yet after he confessed everything, they forgave him with surprising ease.
"Actually... you really don't need to apologize." Scholze opened his mouth, considered his wording, then said, "You contributed at least fifty percent... or sixty percent to solving this conjecture. I think Professor Perelman and Professor Mochizuki would agree with me on that."
Although his face was still a picture of bewilderment, he had at least snapped out of his stupor compared with a minute earlier.
At that moment, after hearing Scholze's remarks, Shinichi Mochizuki nodded along, even though he still had some way to go before digesting that enormous amount of information.
"...On that point alone, I agree with Professor Scholze. Using a refinement of Baker's Theorem as the starting point was simply brilliant, as was the mathematical language you constructed."
Standing beside the two of them, the ever-inexpressive Perelman also nodded and said succinctly,
"I don't really mind, but it would have been better to tell us beforehand."
Hearing that, Lu Zhou gave a helpless look.
"I wanted to, too, but until now, this was classified as top secret. Even now, they've probably only disclosed part of the story. I've been researching the ABC Conjecture all this time, so I haven't been following any of this."
"Come to think of it, I'm still a little lost." Looking as though he had no idea what expression to make, Scholze spoke with a complicated mix of disbelief. "Extraterrestrial civilizations... God, I've only ever seen this stuff in Hollywood movies. Does something like that really exist? Are you sure this isn't an April