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"Yu, I'm sorry, you know what's going on with the kid now, right?" Li Jiangao rubbed his hands outside the room, apologizing.
"This kid..." After thinking for quite a while, Yu Chenggong couldn't find the right adjective to describe Qiao Ze. He ended up saying simply, "Isn't he just too stubborn?"
"It's true that he doesn't know how to communicate normally, but his mathematical talent and attainment are also real. Many geniuses are like this, unconsciously offending others, possibly alienating many, and being misunderstood, leading to their talents being buried. But if you just give them a chance to shine, they can be dazzling like the sun. Just like the historical Ramanujan."
Li Jiangao was racking his brain to speak well of Qiao Ze. Although his understanding of the boy was still not broad, he genuinely had high hopes for him. Moreover, with the help of Yu Chenggong, a highly experienced admissions teacher in the school, there was a much higher chance of successfully getting the peculiar child Qiao Ze into the school.
Of course, he also truly hoped to make Qiao Ze as normal as possible.
Even though this was not within his job scope, it could still allow Qiao Ze to shine more easily and avoid some detours.
What was even rarer was that at this moment, Li Jiangao had very little self-interest in doing these things and was motivated purely by his love for mathematics, and he couldn't bear to see a special child like Qiao Ze wasted.
"Professor Li, you really don't have to tell me all this. But don't think I'm overstepping our acquaintanceship by saying some words. Recruiting such a child is generally risky, and if anything happens to him at school, it would be troublesome, especially since he comes from a single-parent family.
But if you really have high hopes for him and need me to help write a report or something, just let me know," Yu Chenggong said with a smile.
"Then, thank you very much, Teacher Yu!"
"Haha, Professor Li, don't mention it. Call me if you need anything! I must be off now, there's a student's parent coming for a consultation shortly."
"Alright, Teacher Yu, go ahead and be busy."
In Li Jiangao's view, Qiao Ze was a potential stock.
In Yu Chenggong's view, Li Jiangao was equally a potential stock.
Those who understand know just how impressive it is to get hired in a 985 top university's 3+3 program and to smoothly stay on.
Not to mention someone like Yu Chenggong, who had been mixing in the university circle for twenty years, and had witnessed how the criteria for hiring teachers became increasingly demanding each year to the point of being almost perverse.
Qiao Ze fell silent for a moment and then argued, "A name and 'mom' are both pronouns, symbols. I don't think they necessarily represent respect or lack thereof. And I will repay her."
Li Jiangao simply sat in front of Qiao Ze and said frankly, "Oh? Then tell me, how do you plan to repay her? You are not even willing to seriously consider college, you're not good at socializing, and you want her to worry about your future. Is that your way of repaying her?"
"I have a way to make money! Enough for her to spend!" Qiao Ze emphasized.
Li Jiangao took a deep breath and said, "Okay, I'll give you ten minutes. If you can convince me that you truly have a way to make money, I won't force this issue upon you anymore."
Qiao Ze pursed his lips and then said earnestly, "I've been thinking about a problem, and I'm close to having an answer. This problem is worth a million US dollars. Once I solve it and get the prize money, I'll give it all to her, enough for us to live on."
A problem worth a million dollars?
This specific amount made Li Jiangao think of a special series of mathematical problems subconsciously before he gasped in shock, feeling a chill run down his spine.
In the year 2000, the Clay Mathematics Institute offered a global prize for seven mathematical problems.
Each problem had a prize amount of one million US dollars.
Anyone who solved any of these problems and got the mainstream mathematical community's recognition could take away the prize money of one million US dollars from the foundation.
And it's a tax-free million US dollars at that.
Li Jiangao's mouth hung open as he asked in a low voice, "Okay, which one of the seven problems are you talking about? Since you're looking at those problems, you should know that the Four Color Theorem and Poincaré Conjecture have already been solved by others, right?"
Qiao Ze gave a small, somewhat proud smile and said, "Of course it's not those two problems. The problem I'm going to solve is the Mass Gap hypothesis. It won't be long before I can prove that in a simple, connected Lie group, there is a mass gap solution for the four-dimensional Euclidean space quantum Yang-Mills Equations."
After hearing Qiao Ze's words, Li Jiangao suddenly felt an urge to call Yang, who was still alive.
Really, if this problem was truly solved by the child in front of him, quantum physicists all over the world would owe this kid a debt of gratitude.
Even Li Jiangao wouldn't mind immediately kneeling before this child.
At least up to this point, no one in the world had been able to truly solve the Yang-Mills Equations, and it's rather sad that the primary framework used by quantum physicists to describe the laws of nature couldn't yet be handled mathematically.