An unexpected reward!

The next day, during mathematical analysis class.

The tiered lecture hall was packed with students.

When Old Wang, their math teacher, arrived, he did not rush to open the textbook.

Old Wang swept his gaze around the room and cleared his throat. "Before we officially start class, there's something I need to tell you."

"The announcement for this year's China Undergraduate Mathematical Contest in Modeling is out."

"This time, international teams will be taking part. Teams from several universities in South Korea and Singapore will be coming, so it's a much bigger event than in previous years. The university considers it important and hopes students in our department will actively form teams and sign up."

As soon as he finished, the students began murmuring among themselves.

"Damn, international teams? Wouldn't we just be there to make up the numbers?"

"Exactly. Shouldn't we leave competitions like this to Tsinghua and Peking Universities and Zhejiang University? If people from our school go, we'll probably just be stepping stones for the others."

"I think our school only had one team win second prize in last year's provincial competition. We didn't even come close to first prize. Winning something at the national competition? Dream on!"

"Our school's way behind the others. Going would just be a waste of time."

"All I want is to get through this semester without failing a class. Who cares about some modeling competition?"

"We're only freshmen. We don't have to take part, right?"

Scattered laughter spread through the room. Just about everyone had decided not to bother.

Old Wang stood at the podium, his expression unchanged. He had clearly expected this reaction.

He waited for the laughter to die down before speaking. "Do you have a point?"

"Of course you do. Our school really doesn't offer the same platform as Tsinghua and Peking Universities, and our resources fall short too. That's a fact."

The classroom fell silent.

"But I've been teaching for more than ten years, and I've seen plenty of students."

"Some people start out ahead and end up no different from anyone else. Others don't start out so well, but go further than anyone. In modeling, what matters isn't your school's name, but your ability to solve real-world problems."

"Of course, I won't force anyone. You're only freshmen, after all. All I can say is that I encourage everyone to give it a try. If you're interested, just sign up with me before the end of next month."

With that, Old Wang turned, opened the textbook, and began the day's lesson.

Qi Hao's eyes flickered.

Mathematical modeling...

He unconsciously twirled his pen in his right hand. He was indeed tempted.

He now had a Soviet System, and his mathematical foundations were improving at a visible pace. If he took part...

Qi Hao quickly dismissed the idea.

The modeling competition required a team, time to learn to work together, and a great deal of time spent learning programming and writing papers. If he diverted his time to those things, his progress through the problem book would slow down.

Qi Hao made a decision.

No rush.

There was a modeling competition every year. If he wanted to take part later, he would have plenty of chances.

Rather than spend time on a competition where he most likely wouldn't place very high, he would be better off diligently strengthening his fundamentals first.

Once his abilities had truly reached the next level, it wouldn't be too late to compete.

Having thought it through, Qi Hao put the matter aside and returned his attention to Old Wang's writing on the blackboard.

Interestingly, today's lesson happened to cover the same section he had worked through in Demidovich the night before.

Old Wang worked through the derivations on the blackboard, the chalk squeaking as he filled it from edge to edge. Most of the students looked pained, but the formulas felt unusually familiar to Qi Hao. Every step of the derivations was just as he expected.

Qi Hao was delighted throughout the entire math class.

He had two major courses in the afternoon and no classes that evening.

Qi Hao wolfed down a few bites at the cafeteria, then headed straight to the library to get to work.

After a whole afternoon of intensive practice the day before, he was noticeably faster at solving problems than on the first day.

Equivalent infinitesimal substitution had been etched into his muscle memory, and he no longer had to hesitate over what order to use for a Taylor expansion.

Tests for series convergence, integrals with parameters, derivatives of multivariable implicit functions...

He took them apart one after another, crushed them, and stuffed them into his brain.

Over the next few days, whenever he had no classes in the afternoon or evening, Qi Hao was either at the library or on his way there.

When he neatly wrote the answer to the hundredth problem on his scratch paper, Qi Hao glanced at the system panel.

[Remaining talent time: 00 hours 00 minutes 00 seconds.]

[48-hour problem-solving task: completed.]

[Calculating task results...]

[Rating: A]

[Total problems completed: 100. Accuracy: 100%. Average problem-solving speed: increased by 217% from the initial value.]

[Issuing rewards...]

[1. Mathematics experience points +160]

[2. Purple-quality treasure chest ×1]

[3. Points +200]

The instant the Reverse Analysis talent state ended completely, a powerful wave of exhaustion swept over Qi Hao's body.

His aching neck, the stiffness in the web between his right thumb and index finger, and even his slightly dry eyes from concentrating intensely for so long were all protesting the unusual way he had lived these past few days.

But in stark contrast to his physical fatigue, his brain was so excited it was almost on fire!

Qi Hao leaned back in his library chair and studied the results panel the system had given him, his eyes growing brighter.

His average problem-solving speed had increased by 217%!

He knew all too well how significant that number was.

On the first day, he had spent a full twelve minutes just finding the right approach to the first problem. Later on, the moment he saw a problem, his brain skipped the most grueling stage of trial and error and gave him the right direction. That was exactly why his problem-solving speed had improved so quickly.

His mathematics experience points had been 115 before. With the 160 he had just gained, they were now at 275.

It looked like the work he had put in over the past few days had brought him much further than all his previous diligent studying!

The points went without saying. They could be exchanged for science and technology, and Qi Hao decided to leave them alone for now and use them when he needed them.

Of course, none of those appetizers compared to the final main course.

Qi Hao sat up straight and fixed his gaze on the purple treasure chest on the panel.

"Big Brother, don't let me down."

"May the luck of the chosen be with me!"

Qi Hao silently repeated the wish, then, without any hesitation, selected "open" in his mind!

[Purple-quality treasure chest opened successfully!]

[Congratulations, you have obtained:

1. Unpublished high-quality paper, "Absolute Pruning Inequalities and the Asymptotic Convergence Theorem for Finite-State Game Trees." Author: Alexander Kronrod. (A paper on the underlying derivations of heuristic search, constructed through pure mathematical logic during AI development to compensate for the severe lack of computing power in early transistor computers.)]

2. Memory fragment ×1 (Kronrod Automated Reasoning Laboratory)]

Qi Hao froze.

The paper seemed to be about applications of mathematics in the field of artificial intelligence.

That took him by surprise.

The reward did not delight Qi Hao. He even felt like laughing a little.

Alexander Kronrod was undoubtedly a Soviet, which meant this paper was based on Soviet AI technology?

Was this some kind of joke?

Qi Hao wasn't a computer science major, but he still had some basic knowledge.

Ever since the Dartmouth Conference in the 1950s, the field of artificial intelligence had been dominated by people from the United States.

From the Turing Test, perceptrons, and expert systems to deep learning later on, almost every technological wave had originated in the United States.

As for the Soviet Union...

He tried to recall his high school history textbook and the popular science videos he usually came across.

In the early 1950s, the Soviet Union had outright labeled control theory and cybernetics bourgeois pseudoscience.

Although the ban was lifted under Khrushchev, the Soviet Union's focus at the time was entirely on the space race and nuclear weapons, leaving little funding for computer science research.

By the Brezhnev era, the Soviet Union's planned economy was inherently unfriendly to information technology. Administrative and interdepartmental wrangling had made a complete mess of the computer industry. Its hardware copied IBM mainframes, and its software had almost no decent ecosystem.

So in the public's understanding, the Soviet Union was essentially a nobody in AI. The United States had Dartmouth, the Stanford AI Laboratory, and MIT. What did the Soviet Union have?

What kind of AI could the Soviet Union have come up with during the Cold War? Qi Hao wondered. And a high-quality paper, at that. The system can't be messing with me, can it?

Then Qi Hao reconsidered. The system hadn't tricked him so far. Its previous rewards had produced real results, and he had benefited from them.

All right, forget about the paper for now. I can't really understand it anyway.

He turned his attention to the second item.

A memory fragment.

From the name alone, he could tell it was the kind of item that let him experience someone else's memories, a classic premise in games and movies.

Qi Hao curiously selected it.