Going out,
eating,
taking a ride,
watching girls,
being secretly sized up by girls and aunties,
getting off,
strolling to school,
entering the classroom.
Lin Fangxin saw Yan Xiao and said immediately, "The things you ordered have all arrived. Shall we modify them right now?"
"Don't rush, let me catch my breath first. The journey was exhausting..." Yan Xiao slumped into a chair, looking remarkably like someone who had just returned from a business trip abroad.
In reality, he was hit by spring fatigue...
After resting for twenty minutes or so, Yan Xiao finally followed Lin Fangxin to the laboratory under her urging.
The laboratory was an empty room on the second floor near the window, not very large, around forty square meters.
Inside, aside from two sets of tables and chairs, there was only the stuff Yan Xiao had ordered.
Lin Fangxin had specially requested this from the school for her experiments. After all, the two of them needed to design and assemble experimental items, and it wouldn't be appropriate to keep them anywhere else.
As soon as Yan Xiao entered the room, he immediately unpacked a portable mousetrap.
He carefully studied the manual without rushing to install the equipment.
Instead, he walked over to the table, picked up a pen, and began to draw a diagram.
Lin Fangxin leaned in close to Yan Xiao to watch.
What Yan Xiao drew was a cage-like diagram.
After finishing the drawing, Yan Xiao said, "Let's build something like this. We'll use insulating materials for the top and bottom to form a box, put the experimental lamps inside, and then use the mousetrap's main unit to connect the stainless steel wire mesh panels on all sides."
"From what you've drawn, the conductors on all sides are separate strips. How many mousetraps will this need?" Lin Fangxin looked somewhat puzzled.
Yan Xiao explained, "Not many. We'll connect a piece of iron wire to the bottom of each piece of wire mesh, and finally twist the wires together. That way, we just need to hook up a single mousetrap main unit."
Lin Fangxin suddenly understood.
Yan Xiao, however, fell into deep thought once more.
After a long while, Lin Fangxin couldn't help asking, "What are you thinking about?"
"I'm calculating mentally what materials to use..."
Lin Fangxin: "..."
In the end, after some discussion, they decided to use plastic insulating boards for the top and bottom.
"I'll go buy them then." As soon as Lin Fangxin finished speaking, her phone rang.
She took out her phone, saw that it was Wan Jingwei, and answered immediately, "Hello, Uncle Wan."
"Little Lin, hello, hello. I've brought the things over for you, but the security guards downstairs won't let us in. Could you have a word with them?"
"Alright, I'll come right down."
With that, Lin Fangxin hung up the phone and went downstairs with Yan Xiao.
From afar, Wan Jingwei caught sight of Lin Fangxin and Yan Xiao, thinking to himself, They truly are a match made in heaven, a handsome man and a beautiful woman.
He waved his hand and called out a greeting.
Lin Fangxin jogged a couple of steps and explained the situation to the security guard first.
Then she turned around and discovered that behind Wan Jingwei stood several workers, carrying an oversized box-
about the size of a double-door refrigerator laid on its side.
"What is this???" Lin Fangxin asked out loud, while thinking to herself, Is the Black Light this huge???
"This is the newest model produced at our facility, not yet on the market, this year's flagship model exclusively for large beauty salons," Wan Jingwei introduced proudly.
"Uncle Wan, I only need a Black Light bulb..."
"Just a bulb?" Wan Jingwei was dumbfounded as well.
"Shall I go back and get you a few bulbs then?" he asked tentatively.
Lin Fangxin nodded immediately.
"Are you in a hurry? How about I dismantle a few bulbs for you right here?" Wan Jingwei asked again.
"Then many thanks to you." This time it was Yan Xiao who spoke.
A group of workers unpacked the equipment, removed five sets of bulbs from it, and handed them to Yan Xiao through Wan Jingwei.
"Many thanks, you've been a huge help."
"Don't mention it. After all, it's Academician Lin's business, which makes it our top priority." Wan Jingwei was polite.
After exchanging some flattery, Wan Jingwei took his leave.
Yan Xiao and Lin Fangxin went together to the wholesale market for a massive shopping spree.
Aside from purchasing plastic boards, the two also bought several plastic desk lamps.
By the time they finished buying everything, it was already the evening rush hour.
Guided by the philosophy of orderly work and a healthy lifestyle, Yan Xiao decided that today's work would end here.
They put the things back in the laboratory and each went home.
Another night of tutoring,
and the next day Yan Xiao still didn't arrive at school until the afternoon.
He went to the classroom first and found that Lin Fangxin wasn't there.
Then he went to the laboratory.
Upon arrival, he found six completed, assembled simple insect-trapping devices lined up side by side in the room.
"You made these by yourself?" Yan Xiao asked in surprise.
Lin Fangxin shook her head and said, "I asked some classmates from our class to help me make them this morning. You know, since they major in physics, sometimes they can double as half-carpenters..."
Yan Xiao agreed deeply.
"Can we do the experiment as soon as possible? Where do you think is suitable to choose?" Lin Fangxin asked.
"Farmland is best, and ideally several farmlands separated by a sufficient distance from one another," Yan Xiao answered without hesitation.
"How about we go to the Agricultural University's experimental fields?" Lin Fangxin offered an idea.
Yan Xiao refused. How many bugs could you possibly find in a place like that?
"Then where should we go?"
"Real farmland is best."
"Then, the suburbs?"
"The suburbs are best. Look into it, or ask your dad if he can recommend anywhere."
Lin Fangxin didn't hesitate at all and immediately called her father, Lin Wushu.
After hanging up, Lin Fangxin said, "My dad says he'll drive us to Changping District tonight. There are some fields with severe pest infestations over there."
"Your dad is going too?"
"Mhm."
"Then can I not go?"
"What do you think?"
In the end, Yan Xiao compromised...
It just felt a bit strange. In his two lives, he had never met a female classmate's parent alone.
Time quickly reached 5:30 in the evening.
Yan Xiao and Lin Fangxin had a meal, and at 6:20, Lin Wushu arrived.
"Hello, Uncle Lin." Yan Xiao greeted him, looking completely harmless.
"Hello," Lin Wushu replied, eyeing Yan Xiao up and down as well.
His evaluation of Yan Xiao was that he was a man of fine talent and indeed the type girls liked.
But!
Once that girl was his own daughter, Lin Wushu wasn't quite so happy anymore.
"I heard your thesis topic this time is going to be about 'phototaxis in insects'?" Lin Wushu asked.
"Yes, this was an accidental discovery from my childhood," Yan Xiao answered cautiously.
"Tell me about your experimental process design."
Yan Xiao nodded and explained step by step, with great coherence, how he planned to conduct the experiment.
Lin Wushu praised inwardly, This kid's logic is really strong.
Yet, out loud, he said, "There are a few points you haven't considered."
"Oh?" Yan Xiao was somewhat surprised.
"Have you ever thought about the fact that all these light source designs you've made currently have light sources?"
"Is there a problem with that?" Yan Xiao didn't understand.
"Of course there is. If you consider the most rigorous experimental procedure, you need to include experimental equipment without a light source.
That way, if the pest-killing rate of the equipment without a light source is low, you can prove the conclusion of 'insect phototaxis' through comparison."
So that was it...
Ginger really is sharper the older it gets...
Though Yan Xiao didn't want to admit it, he had to concede that Lin Wushu made sense.
"Anything else?" Yan Xiao asked.
Anything else? I racked my brains just to come up with this one, don't push your luck... Lin Wushu raged inwardly while nodding expressionlessly. "Strictly speaking, it's best to do this experiment in batches and at different time periods for greater value, and ideally have some kind of analysis of insect species at the end."
"There's no time for that now, let's just make do with this for the present." Yan Xiao faked a helpless sigh.
Thinking to himself, As long as I can earn the prize money, who cares about rigor.
"You two stop chatting, it'll be dark if you keep talking," Lin Fangxin said, looking at the two solemn and deliberately stern men.
Lin Wushu smiled helplessly, took out his phone, and called the driver.
In less than two minutes, three men looking to be around twenty-seven or twenty-eight arrived in the laboratory.
These three were all Lin Wushu's students.
One studied physics, one studied chemistry, and another studied mathematics.
Supervising doctoral students across multiple disciplines-Lin Wushu was truly the only existence of his kind in this world.
"Professor Lin, do we just need to move these things onto the truck?" asked one of the men with dark skin and a flat top.
Lin Wushu turned around and said, "Ask my daughter and them."
"All of these are needed." Lin Fangxin directed the three men to move the items onto the truck.
Of course, Yan Xiao wasn't idle either; he was responsible for the cleanup, wrapping up, and counting work.
The things were loaded.
Lin Wushu's three students drove off in the truck, while Yan Xiao and Lin Fangxin got into Lin Wushu's large Mercedes.
Plagued by severe traffic jams all the way,
by the time they reached their destination, it was already pitch dark outside.
"Dad, where on earth did you find such a large piece of land? Are there really a lot of bugs here?" Lin Fangxin stood at the edge of the field and couldn't help asking.
"Of course. This is the land allocated to our institute. Originally, it was meant for everyone to plant crops and relax when they had free time.
However..."
"However what?"
"However, we're actually all quite busy and don't have time to tend to it. Every year we just come over in early spring to sow some seeds, and the rest is just waiting for what we planted to feed the bugs..."
"No wonder."
Lin Wushu thought to himself, As for the actual situation, I still have thousands of ways to turn this place into a wasteland.
But asking me to waste time applying pesticides, catching bugs, and tending crops? Forget about it...
After getting out of the car, Yan Xiao walked straight into the fields.
He quickly demarcated several areas.
To prevent the lights from interfering with one another, he deliberately placed the lamps far enough apart.
To everyone's surprise, that most important Black Light wasn't placed right in the middle of the field by Yan Xiao, but rather right near the roadside.
"Will placing it here be okay? Don't you think it would be better to put it closer to the central area?" Lin Fangxin asked.
"There's no problem here. Putting it here is the only way to demonstrate the value of the Black Light and make our experimental data more persuasive," Yan Xiao said with a straight face.
It wasn't that he insisted on making things difficult for himself.
Rather, many books in the system mentioned that placing a Black Light near the roadside yielded much better results.
He looked up at the sky; not even a shadow of the moon was visible.
This made Yan Xiao even happier.
Without the influence of high beams, the efficiency of the Black Light would undoubtedly be extraordinary.
Connecting the equipment,
debugging,
turning on the power,
activating the equipment.
After finishing all of this, the group returned to the car.
After all, it was already spring.
Especially in the suburbs during spring, mosquitoes were already beginning to stir restlessly.
Yan Xiao desperately wanted to suggest heading back now and coming back tomorrow during the day.
But since even Lin Fangxin didn't speak up, he didn't have the nerve to say anything.
Just as Yan Xiao wanted to find some topic to break the silence, he looked up and found that father and daughter Lin Wushu and Lin Fangxin were staring blankly out the window.
"What's going on?" Yan Xiao spoke up.
"See for yourself." Lin Fangxin kept her eyes fixed ahead.
Yan Xiao followed Lin Fangxin's gaze and froze too.
This...
The Black Light beside the road was like a lit firework, crackling and spitting sparks.
"Is it on fire?" Yan Xiao blurted out instinctively, then immediately realized it wasn't burning. Countless flying insects were playing a clicking game with their slender bodies...
Does it really have to work this well??? Yan Xiao thought.
"Yan Xiao," Lin Wushu said.
"What is it, Uncle Lin?"
"This research of yours is good! Good! Good!" Lin Wushu repeated the word three times.
His heart was anything but calm.
He didn't have to wait for the experiment to end to know that Yan Xiao had succeeded.
And this success offered another innovative method beyond conventional pesticides, manual pest removal, and bait-based pest control.
The key was that this method was both effective and environmentally friendly.
Even more remarkably, its economic benefits were obvious too.
Take pesticides, for example. Once the insects were dead, that was it.
They couldn't be fed to poultry.
In fact, because the dead insects carried pesticide residue, they could also contaminate the soil.
Yan Xiao's method was different. Left alone, the insect carcasses would return nutrients to the soil.
Collected, they could be used as livestock feed-for chickens, pigs, or fish.
The sparks crackled nonstop all night.
During that time, Lin Wushu's apprentices replaced the Black Light's battery several times.
By the time the last battery gave up the ghost, dawn had arrived.
"Wake up!" Lin Fangxin shook Yan Xiao awake after his long, sound sleep.
Yan Xiao opened his eyes groggily and saw Lin Fangxin looking at him with open admiration.
Instinctively, he wanted to lift his head and kiss her, but the moment he moved his neck, he felt an icy gaze from the side.
Then he remembered that Lin Fangxin's father was still there.
I nearly died without even a place to be buried...
That was close. Way too close...
Yan Xiao stiffly pretended he had only been turning his head and asked, "What time is it?"
"Six twenty."
"Did the experiment keep going well?"
"It couldn't have gone better. Once our paper comes out, we're practically guaranteed to win an award," Lin Fangxin said happily.
"Great! If there's prize money, all our work won't have been for nothing!" Yan Xiao perked up immediately.
Lin Fangxin giggled, though she couldn't shake the feeling that something about what Yan Xiao had said was a little off.
"You two had better register a utility patent as soon as possible," Lin Wushu said.
At his reminder, Yan Xiao also realized that this device could be patented.
He really hadn't thought of that.
He had overlooked it.
After all, Black Light insect traps were so common on Earth.
So common that they appeared in countless books.
Although there were quite a few patents for Black Lights, most concerned their external design.
Their actual value wasn't all that high.
But this was Azure!
Yan Xiao decided he would register it as soon as he got back. He wouldn't even go back to sleep!
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