You've only been playing for half a year, and you've already reached the finals?

Chapter 298 Chinese Mathematics is Blessed

This was Ming Jing's second time participating in the national training team, so he should have been quite familiar with the process.

However, because the event was held at Peking University, the participants felt a sense of novelty.

"This is the School of Mathematical Sciences at Peking University, located in Building No. 1 on the Yanyuan Campus."

The staff responsible for guiding the group were still introducing everyone, their tone full of pride: "Many of you must have signed contracts with Peking University, right? If you choose mathematics as your major, this will be where you study from now on."

"Of course, if you sign with Tsinghua University, you will also have the opportunity to come here, because the National Mathematical Society and the International Center for Mathematical Research are also located here. This is the most advanced place for mathematics in the country, without exception."

Upon hearing this, the surrounding students chuckled.

As expected of Peking University, they didn't forget to take a jab at Tsinghua University even at this moment.

Fortunately, most of them signed contracts with Peking University, after all, they were candidates for the mathematics competition.

Mingjing looked around with great interest, but there were hardly any people on the road. Even when people walked by, they were wearing thick masks and walking briskly.

A figure carrying a large white steamed bun and holding a bottle of Nongfu Spring water caught Ming Jing's attention.

Is this Wei Dongyi, who was all the rage online a while ago?
Ming Jing had heard of this person's strength, after all, Wei Dongyi had also taken the CMO and IMO exams, just like Ming Jing.

The difference is that Wei Dongyi started participating in the competition in his second year of high school. In the following two years, he got full marks in all his exams. Although he has not yet made any great achievements in the field, he is indeed promising for the future.

“Normally there are a lot of people here. But,” the person in charge of guiding people explained, “the situation is special recently, as you should understand.”

As we entered 2022, the virus showed signs of resurgence, and in order to cooperate with prevention and control, LPL even had plans to return to online matches.

Even the main reason why everyone came to Peking University to study this time was for this reason.

According to the normal plan, the national training team's training should have been held at Wuhan No. 3 Middle School, so Ming Jing wouldn't have had to travel so far.

"Anyway, you'll have to make do a little for this study session and try to stay in the classroom and dormitory as much as possible. Don't wander around. Trust me, this trip to Peking University will definitely be worthwhile for you."

The students responded and then followed them into a classroom, where they each found a seat.

Song Xuan and Wang Hao remained seated on either side of Ming Jing, and the three of them continued to whisper among themselves as they watched the professor enter the classroom.

"Wow, Old Jiang!"

It can only be said that Peking University's School of Mathematical Sciences is no ordinary institution; they've brought in a super-powerful figure that any math competition student would definitely recognize.

The professor was a man of few words and decisive action. He simply welcomed the students and then, as in previous years, handed out an A4 sheet of paper to each student with a question printed on it.

The art style of this question is slightly different from the previous ones.

For example, last year, they simply spent an afternoon with a single question, and then provided a detailed explanation the next morning.

But this time.
"Your task is to solve this problem during the two phases of your studies in the National Assembly."

With a smile, Mr. Jiang said, "As long as you can solve this problem, I guarantee you a spot in the IMO."

That's quite frightening to hear.

Even though the group of sixty students present were the best in high school mathematics and were likely to become the future pillars of Chinese mathematics, Professor Jiang intended to use this problem to stump them for two weeks!

Upon hearing this, Ming Jing immediately became interested and looked down at the question in front of him.

Upon seeing the question, Ming Jing's brows furrowed slightly.

The problem is simply stated, involving only sets, intersections, and counting, but its solution touches on the deep structure of combinatorics.

If a graduate student majoring in mathematics has studied enough, they might be able to solve this problem.

But since everyone here is just a middle school student, the difficulty level is clearly beyond the curriculum.

This is clearly not a problem that can be solved within the knowledge domain of high school math competitions!
Mingjing only thought about it for a moment before realizing that he definitely couldn't solve it at this stage.

No wonder this problem is worth an IMO spot.

If a high school student can solve this kind of problem independently, then he has already far exceeded the level of the IMO. This is an even higher honor than an IMO gold medal.

But he wasn't flustered.

He could understand the logic behind Professor Jiang's questions.

For questions where the knowledge points haven't been fully grasped, the purpose isn't to filter, but rather to enlighten and hone skills.

Seeing that everyone had slowly lowered their heads to think, Old Jiang was not in a hurry. He simply opened his thermos, took a sip, and then lowered his head to start studying his own project.

Time flies, and before you know it, an afternoon has passed.

Mingjing wrote many deductions on his draft paper, but he has not made any progress in solving the problem so far.

On the other hand, Song Xuan made some progress, filling his draft paper with dense formulas, clearly indicating that he had a plan.

But besides that, there are also perverts.

"It's written down."

A voice rang out in the classroom.

Everyone was startled and turned around in the direction of the sound, only to see Deng Leyan holding two pieces of paper and walking up to Old Jiang.

Old Jiang was clearly surprised at this moment, but he still took the draft paper and looked at it. Then, a smile appeared on his face!
"You must be Deng Leyan, right?" Old Jiang laughed. "Very good, you got it right. The solution is very advanced."

Upon hearing this, the audience erupted in another uproar.

What happened to the two-week timeframe?
How did you manage to finish it in just one afternoon?
At this moment, Ming Jing could only sigh in disbelief.

As the saying goes, some people get 100 points because they are capable, while others get 100 points because the test only has 100 points.

This statement applies even to the national training team.

Deng Leyan, a prodigy who won a perfect score gold medal in the International Mathematical Olympiad in his first year of high school, has now reached a level in his second year of high school where his mathematical abilities are beyond comprehension.

This feeling is similar to Ming Jing, who completed the Golden Road and won the FMVP Grand Slam in his second year in the industry, and his dominance is now in a completely unique class.

Ming Jing glanced at Deng Leyan one last time, then lowered his head and continued solving the problem.

The next morning, Mingjing returned to the classroom according to the training schedule.

Through the special teaching materials provided by the National Assembly and the explanations of a young teacher, Mingjing gradually began to clearly understand the definitions of "intersecting families" and "bi-intersecting families." He also gradually came to understand the Erds–Ko–Rado theorem.

But I'm still confused about the solution process.

On the contrary, Song Xuan achieved enlightenment during today's lecture, seemingly having figured out some key point. He submitted three densely filled draft papers and won the second IMO spot.

"Similar to Deng Leyan's solution, but with a slightly more circuitous approach." Old Jiang nodded as well, "But it's still passable."

Song Xuan returned to his seat excitedly, a smug smile on his face.

"Would you like me to give you some pointers?" the girl giggled.

Although Mr. Jiang clearly stated that he could not reveal the answers to other contestants, he could still provide guidance on key points.

"No!" Ming Jing refused outright.

It would be pointless to teach this kind of question; he must learn it himself.

Moreover, he truly had that confidence.

On the third and fourth days, the same new teacher began teaching "Linear Algebra Methods in Combinatorial Mathematics".

Unexpectedly, the method the teacher described wasn't particularly profound, nor was it as advanced as Mingjing had imagined, but its elegance was truly beyond his expectations. Listening to the teacher's explanation, Mingjing began to realize that his thinking seemed to have gone astray.

This question doesn't test knowledge beyond the syllabus, but rather creativity.

Mingjing discussed his thoughts with Song Xuan, which surprised Song Xuan.

"It actually seems like it could work!" Song Xuan exclaimed in surprise. "Then keep it up and finish writing it quickly!"

"Hmm? Why don't you give it a try?"

"I won't try it. This is your idea. I'll look at yours after you've written it out."

"Row."

Wang Hao, listening to their conversation, scratched his head.

What's going on? Mingjing has made progress too?
Then why can't he do anything?
The fifth and sixth days are the exam days.

Although Professor Jiang offered the method of advancing by solving problems, there will still be regular exams for selection.

The scope of this exam closely matches the lectures of the previous three days. As long as you followed the lectures of the previous three days, you should be able to answer the questions.

Song Xuanming said nothing more, and Wang Hao also performed steadily, successfully advancing to the second stage.

"Yay!" Wang Hao exclaimed excitedly, clenching his fist as he looked at his still tenth place ranking. "I've advanced!"

Ming Jing, still ranked third, glanced at Wang Hao sideways and said, "Look at your ambition, do you think you can even go to the International Olympiad if you're tenth?"

"If you can't get in, you can't get in," Wang Hao said frankly. "Getting into the second stage is a success, understand?"

"walk slowly."

After entering the second stage, 75% of the students in the class were eliminated, leaving only 15 people to continue learning.

The teacher's explanations became increasingly in-depth.

Three days of study have passed in the blink of an eye.

If Mingjing is unable to submit his paper, he will have to obtain a spot through an exam.

Although Mingjing is currently more than 80% confident of passing the exam, there's no point in not taking the test since it's already been put out.

But thankfully
With Mingjing writing the final proof, his mission was gloriously completed.

Song Xuan sat at Ming Jing's table, watching Ming Jing write the last line, his eyes filled with admiration.

"Impressive!" Song Xuan's tone was filled with genuine admiration. "You must be the only one who could come up with this idea."

"This is a clumsy method; those of you who are really good at it would never have thought of it," Ming Jing said cheerfully, before handing in his answer.

Ming Jing's answer was longer than Deng Leyan's and Song Xuan's, filling four whole pages.

But when Old Jiang saw Ming Jing's answer, he smiled even more happily than the previous two times.

"The logical chain from the inner product property to the linear independence lemma, and then to the analysis of the actual dimension of the vector space is very clear."

Old Jiang smiled and said, "To be honest, only your answer is what I want."

Ming Jing smiled and nodded, understanding what Elder Jiang meant.

Although Deng Leyan and Song Xuan answered quickly and correctly, they actually used knowledge points that were impossible to master at this stage.

It's like mastering L'Hôpital's rule and then going back to high school to do some limit problems; the difficulty is naturally greatly reduced, and you can easily solve them.

However, if you write L'Hôpital's rule directly in the solution process in the college entrance examination mathematics, you will lose points!

Mingjing, on the other hand, uses known basic concepts to make logical connections and combinations, just like using techniques from high school textbooks to push limits, which naturally leads to a perfect score.

"Not bad." Old Jiang's voice was full of approval. "If I remember correctly, your name should be Ming Jing?"

"Huh?" Ming Jing was somewhat surprised. "You still recognize me?"

"Who doesn't know you?" Old Jiang laughed. "One of my students even wanted your autograph."

This left Ming Jing momentarily speechless.

Anyway, it's a good thing that the solution has been found.

Ming Jing was the third and last person to solve the problem, which justifies his third-place ranking nationwide.

The night passed, and the second phase of the exam finally began.

Besides the three who have already advanced, the remaining twelve will need to compete for the final three spots through an exam.

Wang Hao stared at the three questions on the test paper, racking his brains, and slowly but steadily worked through them.

Wang Hao's abilities are sufficient to solve three problems. But his biggest opponent is time.

He has difficulty completing the questions within the allotted time.

Mingjing is doing well. The problem-solving over the past week has brought about a transformation in him. Now, when he goes back to tackle the major problems in the National Assembly, he feels a sense of ease.

The same applies to the exam on the second day.

The two-day exams ended quickly, and the results were officially released at the closing ceremony.

Deng Leyan: 126 points, 100% success rate, ranked first.

Song Xuan: 126 points, 100% success rate, ranked first.

Ming Jing: 126 points, 100% success rate, ranked first.

Mingjing also made another step forward, entering the ranks of those who scored full marks.

Following closely behind were a large group of students who scored near perfect marks but could only be ranked from fourth place onwards.

Wang Hao scored 117 points this time, with a scoring rate of 92.8%, but only ranked eighth, unfortunately stopping once again.

"Wow." Wang Hao was a little confused. "This year is just too crazy!"

Wang Hao knew that this exam would be extremely difficult, no less so than in previous years.

However, a perfect score, which is rare in previous years, has actually been achieved by three people this year!

Is this what they call the Golden Age?
It can only be said that Chinese mathematics is fortunate.

Wang Hao, who was forced out of the top six because of three perfect scores, was not in a hurry, mainly because he understood the situation.

Without Ming Jing and Song Xuan leading the way, he wouldn't have been able to keep improving, and might not have even made it into the top eight.

It can only be said that it was a matter of timing and fate; he didn't have that extraordinary talent, so it was destined that he wouldn't be able to qualify.

As Showmaker said, failure is a constant in a normal person's life.

Many opportunities are real opportunities for geniuses, but for ordinary people they are just illusions.

"Keep up the good work, whether it's math or games," Wang Hao said with a smile.

"Keep it up, you too." Ming Jing patted Wang Hao on the shoulder. "I'll treat you to a meal when we get back to Wuhan."

(End of this chapter)