Chapter 38: The Simplest Subject

After collecting the test papers and exiting the examination hall, Xu Ming noticed Chen Lu standing in the hallway by the entrance and walked over to greet her.

"Are you waiting for me?"

Chen Lu, whose examination hall was in the adjacent classroom, turned around abruptly upon hearing his voice. After confirming it was Xu Ming, she nodded and said with a serious expression, "I promised to treat you to a meal the day before yesterday."

Xu Ming felt a flash of surprise. He had mentioned it casually and hadn't given it much thought, never expecting her to remember it so clearly—especially on the day of the college entrance exam, appearing so urgent. It was just like the class's top female student to be so decisive and unhesitating in her actions.

Since she had brought it up, there was no reason for Xu Ming to refuse. He shrugged and asked, "Where shall we eat?"

"Anywhere is fine; I brought money today." Chen Lu pulled a pink wallet from her pocket and declared with a grand gesture.

Xu Ming glanced at it and replied, "Let's go to the cafeteria. I'm not used to eating food from outside." With that, he headed toward the school cafeteria. Chen Lu stood there for a moment in a daze before hurriedly following after him.

...

In the past, Xu Ming had always been the one buying food for Zhang Yinxin. When Chen Lu stood before him, holding two portions of shredded pork lo mein and seaweed egg drop soup, he couldn't help but feel a momentary sense of disorientation.

After a few seconds, he spoke, "Let's go eat in the general building. The school gave me the key to the first-floor office."

"Okay," Chen Lu agreed quietly.

Soon, the two arrived at the room and sat facing each other to eat. Neither of them spoke, and an awkward atmosphere permeated the room; they simply focused on finishing their meal and the seaweed soup.

It wasn't until they were almost finished that Xu Ming finally broke the silence. "You can take a nap here at noon so you won't feel sleepy during the math exam this afternoon."

Chen Lu looked flustered upon hearing this. She felt both embarrassed and afraid of wasting Xu Ming's kindness, as the summer heat truly made one prone to drowsiness, which could affect her performance. Most of her dorm mates were at other exam sites, and the remaining ones had had their families arrange for housing nearby, so she wouldn't be going back to the dormitory. She wouldn't have dared to nap there alone.

Her hand, still holding her chopsticks, paused in mid-air for a moment before she softly asked, "What about you?"

"I don't have the habit of sleeping during the day," Xu Ming replied, looking up. He wasn't lying; with his long periods of deep sleep, he didn't need much rest at night. If he were to take a nap during the day, it would truly be a waste of time. As for letting Chen Lu rest here, he hadn't thought much of it—it was merely an act of concern born of camaraderie.

Besides, he had just eaten a meal she paid for.

In the end, Chen Lu chose not to leave, deciding to take a short nap to recharge her energy for the math exam. Usually, she could fall asleep just by resting her head on her desk in class, so she certainly wouldn't mind it here.

Xu Ming, however, took out a math draft notebook and continued to try and optimize the new inequality for the weighted Gram matrix he had proven, looking for areas of improvement. Additionally, he had already asked the principal to help him obtain textbooks and problem sets related to university-level mathematics; he wouldn't be idle during the summer break after the college entrance exam.

Some time passed, and Chen Lu woke up naturally. As she opened her eyes, she saw Xu Ming studying math. She was momentarily stunned. She had never seen anyone so focused, as if nothing in the outside world could affect him.

But the next second, Xu Ming’s gaze shifted toward her. As their eyes met, Chen Lu scrambled in a panic, her cheeks heating up as if her secret thoughts had been exposed.

"You're awake. There's still time before the exam starts; you can go wash your face first."

"O-okay."

Xu Ming watched Chen Lu hurry out and shook his head, refocusing his attention on the formula before him without letting it distract him further.

2:30 PM.

The vast majority of candidates were already waiting outside the examination hall, many with visible anxiety on their faces. Even though Chen Lu knew that, for Xu Ming, math was undoubtedly the easiest of all the exams, she still made an encouraging gesture as she headed to her own hall.

"Good luck."

Seeing this, a smile touched the corners of Xu Ming's mouth as he replied, "You too."

3:00 PM sharp. The math exam officially began.

Inside the hall, Xu Ming received his paper, checked it, and began answering. As for the scratch paper provided, he ignored it entirely.

"Is the first question about sets?"

As he silently read the problem, his brain had already calculated the answer. He finished the dozen or so multiple-choice and fill-in-the-blank questions in less than twenty minutes. For the remaining six long-form problems, he quickly determined the solution methods and began writing out the proof steps and formulas directly on the answer sheet.

However, when he reached the final, most difficult problem, he slowed his pace and read the conditions a few extra times. Of course, this wasn't because he was stumped, but because he felt it was too simple.

"Given the sum of the first n terms of the sequence {a_n} is S_n = 4/3a_n - 1/3 * 2^(n+1)..."

"n = 1, 2, 3, ..."

"Find the general term a_n for the first term a_1;"

"...The final big problem this year is actually a sequence problem."

According to the experience of previous college entrance exams, the final problems were usually about derivative functions, involving many points of knowledge and large amounts of calculation. He didn't know how many people that had brought to tears in the past. Now that it had been replaced by a sequence, it would likely lower the pressure for everyone.

Thinking this, Xu Ming didn't delay. After confirming that he could solve it using the recursive method and the method of differences, his pen moved rapidly across the answer sheet, quickly writing out the complete proof steps and formulas.

When he finished the entire paper, the clock on the wall showed it was not yet four o'clock. He looked up, saw it was still early to hand in the paper, thought for a moment, and decided not to leave early to wait.

"Forget it."

He muttered to himself and began to mentally review his ideas from noon for optimizing the new inequality of the weighted Gram matrix, continuing to calculate and derive the formulas.

Meanwhile, the other candidates around him were mostly frowning, their palms sweating as they gripped their pens, dampening their scratch paper. It was clear they were not having a smooth time with the exam.

The invigilator on the podium sighed silently, feeling a pang of anxiety for this year's batch of candidates.

"Is this year's math paper really that hard?"

His eyes swept over the faces of the students, and when he saw Xu Ming staring blankly, his face filled with regret.

"He's already planning to give up so soon? Even if you don't know how to do it, you should at least fill out the answer sheet. Didn't the teachers lecture about this before the exam?"

Later, when he walked around the hall to inspect, he saw that the scratch paper on the side of Xu Ming's desk didn't even have a single mathematical symbol on it, and he shook his head with increasing disappointment. However, as an invigilator, he couldn't offer any advice or reprimand, so he could only watch the time slip away.

Finally, with only fifteen minutes remaining, he seized the opportunity to call out:

"There are fifteen minutes left until the math exam ends. Please hurry and finish your work; do not give up easily."

This sentence completely pushed the sense of urgency in the hall to its peak. Some students who hadn't finished their problems were even shaking, forming a stark contrast to the completely relaxed Xu Ming.