They're already in university, and the primary school system is only just starting out?

Looking at the last message Shen Yan sent, Chen Lin felt completely overwhelmed.

Go to a hotel near the school and wait for me?

Are you discussing a problem, or are you setting up a honey trap?

Although he was somewhat aware of how attractive his face was, it shouldn't have led a top student and school beauty he had only known for less than a day to go to such lengths, right?

Could it be the added charm of being a "little Casanova"?

I don't think so. The reward description I read said it was supposed to take effect in person.

Chen Lin rubbed his temples.

However, it's understandable that Shen Yan is anxious.

That mathematical modeling competition seems to end in 30 hours.

Oh well, let's just consider it an added-value service for food delivery customers.

With that in mind, he no longer hesitated, decisively opened WeChat, and found the contact person whose contact name was "Backstreet Bar - Brother Wang".

Chen Lin: [Brother Wang, I'm sorry, I have something urgent to attend to tonight and can't make it. Could you find someone else to cover for me?]

Brother Wang: [What's wrong, Xiao Chen? Did something happen at home?]

Chen Lin: [No, something came up at school, and my advisor contacted me at the last minute.]

Brother Wang: [Okay, you go ahead and get busy. I'll check with Xiao Fei to see if he's free.]

After settling things at the bar, Chen Lin reopened his chat with Shen Yan, picked up the large bag of snacks, and turned to head towards the school.

Chen Lin: [I've canceled my plans for tonight. I'm going back to school now. See you in the same study room.]

Less than a minute after I sent the message, Shen Yan replied.

Shen Yan: [Okay, I'll wait for you in the study room.]

……

Ten minutes later, in the brightly lit study room of the Mathematics Department building.

When Chen Lin pushed open the door, Shen Yan was the only person in the large room.

She seemed to have been waiting here for a while; the laptop in front of her was lit up, and the small blackboard was covered with dense calculation symbols.

Hearing the door open, Shen Yan looked up sharply, her eyes lighting up instantly.

"You're here!" There was a hint of excitement in her voice.

"Hmm." Chen Lin responded, casually slamming the large box of snacks onto the corner of the empty table with a "bang".

Shen Yan's gaze fell on the box, and she paused for two seconds.

Her face flushed red instantly, and she quickly lowered her head.

"Chen... this is too much trouble, you even brought me food."

Her voice was so soft it was like a mosquito's hum, a complete contrast to the charismatic academic genius she was during the day.

Chen Lin almost choked on his own saliva.

Did I bring this for you?

What are you thinking? This is money I earned through hard work!

Why are you blushing like a teapot?

Oh, I have the "Little Casanova" aura, then it's alright.

Chen Lin was internally cursing, but his face remained as calm as a rock: "Ahem, we're going the same way. Let's get down to business, what's the problem? We're in a hurry."

"Okay!" Shen Yan switched back to work mode in a second. She spun the laptop around and tapped the messy graphs on the screen with her fingertips. "Following your previous approach, we corrected the algorithm for the implicit propagation coefficient, and the model's fit to historical data did improve significantly. However... when making stress predictions for the next 30 days, three new abnormal peaks appeared, which are completely illogical."

Chen Lin leaned closer.

Several colorful threads are twisted into a ball of yarn, and the red line representing the number of infections suddenly stands up with three steep points at a certain point.

With his "Little Mathematician" ability activated, he read through the PDF Shen Yan had given him, including their team's... well, I mean, their underlying optimization solutions.

"Never mind those three peaks," Chen Lin waved his hand, "It's a minor issue."

"A minor problem?!" Shen Yan's eyes nearly popped out of their sockets. This was a fatal flaw that they had spent a long time discovering.

"Yes." Chen Lin confirmed confidently, "Your model optimization plan initially went astray. It's like a leaky bucket; if you plug one hole, the water will immediately leak out from another. Once this problem is solved, new ones will immediately emerge."

His voice wasn't loud, but every word struck Shen Yan's heart like a heavy hammer.

She froze, staring intently at the screen.

Did they go astray from the very beginning?

So all those days and nights they spent were for nothing?

If anyone else had dared to say that, Shen Yan would have slammed her hand on the table and started arguing with them.

But it was Chen Lin who said those words.

He was a literature student who solved their problem with just a glance.

For some reason, deep down, she felt absolutely no doubt.

"What should we do?" Shen Yan's voice was a little hoarse, and her eyes were filled with confusion and pleading.

Chen Lin looked at her and offered a choice: "Two options. First, I'll help you solve the current problem, and you can hurry up and polish the report. With the current results, winning a national award shouldn't be a problem. Second, I'll overturn your existing optimization plan and give you a completely new one that not only perfectly solves all the problems, but theoretically, this model can be used directly as a finished product. But the risk is that there are only about 30 hours left until the competition deadline, and you might not be able to finish it."

After saying that, he leaned back in his chair leisurely, waiting for Shen Yan's decision.

Shen Yan did not hesitate at all.

Almost instinctively, she raised her head, staring intently at Chen Lin, and said decisively, "I choose the second option!"

For a true academic fanatic, a perfect truth is far more appealing than a decent award.

"Okay." Chen Lin was not surprised by her answer.

He pulled up a chair, sat down, picked up a pen, and began to explain the new plan to Shen Yan from the beginning on a clean sheet of draft paper.

"The traditional SEIR model is linear, but virus transmission is non-linear, especially in modern society, where transportation, social networks, quarantine policies... each variable is an independent chaotic system. Therefore, we cannot use addition, but multiplication. We introduce a multidimensional coupled dynamic Bayesian network..."

Chen Lin's voice echoed in the quiet study room.

Just like during the day, he simply blurted out whatever came to mind.

He was quite confident in his abilities as a "little mathematician," believing that the solution he had proposed was the optimal one.

On the contrary, he was afraid that Shen Yan wouldn't be able to keep up with him, so he would slow down his speech from time to time to give her time to think and digest.

Time passed by, second by second.

Shen Yan was completely absorbed in the story. Sometimes she would furrow her brows, and sometimes she would have a sudden realization. The light in her eyes grew brighter and brighter.

Although she couldn't fully understand, she could clearly sense that Chen Lin's proposed solution was much better than the original one.

Simple and elegant!

After an unknown amount of time, when Chen Lin drew the last symbol and put down his pen, he realized that it was already pitch black outside the window.

He glanced at his phone; it was 9:30 PM.

"...That's about it. With your abilities, you should be able to fill in the rest of the details yourself." Chen Lin stood up and stretched his stiff neck.

"I"

Shen Yan opened her mouth, wanting to say many things, but in the end, it all boiled down to the simplest sentence:

"Thank you."

"It's okay, I wish you all the best in the competition." Chen Lin waved his hand, all he wanted to do now was go back to his dorm and sleep.

After saying that, he picked up the snacks and turned to walk towards the door, quick and decisive, without any hesitation.

Shen Yan stared blankly as his figure disappeared through the doorway, then looked down at the draft paper covered with formulas.

She pursed her lips, turned around and returned to her seat, and began modeling and programming based on the new plan provided by Chen Lin.