Chapter 242

Translator: Dreamscribe

"Quack-quack! Washing machine reservation complete!"

The playful notification sound of Quack-Quack 3.0 rang from her phone. Yun Chae-a opened just one eye beneath her blanket and checked the screen.

[Washing Machine No. 3, Start 07 : 40, Estimated Finish 08 : 32]

"I'll remind you again 10 minutes before it finishes. Quack-quack!"

In the corner of the screen, a yellow duck waddled along carrying a laundry basket. When Chae-a had first enrolled, she had struggled to get used to this ridiculous mascot.

'Why a duck of all things?'

It was an essential Gifted High School app that allowed students to conveniently access every facility on campus. Aside from breathing, almost everything that could be done at school was packed inside this yellow duck.

'They made an app just to reserve a washing machine?'

Apparently, it had started as a simple laundry room reservation app.

Back when the dormitory washing machines were always occupied and disputes were constant, a freshman had whipped it up over a weekend and uploaded it to the school server.

That sunbae had been Yu Seo-ha.

Chae-a got out of bed and opened the app.

[Laundry Room, Student Cafeteria, Space Reservations, Library, Shuttle, Packages, Lost and Found, Suggestion Box]

Tapping the student cafeteria showed the real-time crowd level and today's menu, along with statistics on how much food had been left over the previous day. There was even a rumor that the nutritionist checked which dishes were popular through the app when planning future menus.

The words at the very bottom of the screen caught her eye.

[Quack-Quack 3.0 - Built on Seo-ha's code]

A sunbae who had served as president of the computer club Bit Forge several years ago was said to have explained it like this.

"At first, I opened the code because I wanted to tweak the washing machine function a little. But something was strange. The entire laundry section had been built as a separate module. Almost like it was saying you could plug something else in here."

Apparently, the comments Seo-ha sunbae had left throughout the code were still there. Whenever Bit Forge members discovered one, they posted it on the intranet as though they had found treasure.

The most famous one was said to be a single line written at the very top of the laundry room module.

'Cutting in line is mathematically inefficient. So let's stand in line.'

With each new cohort, Bit Forge and the student council added another function to Quack-Quack.

The original 1.0 became 1.5, then 2.0 with the addition of the library, and finally 3.0, which covered the entire campus.

It was a tower built up by generation after generation of graduates. Since it was such an unusual case, it had even been featured in the media several times.

And now, it had become a source of pride for the current students.

Bzzt-

"Quack-quack!"

[Cafeteria Crowd Level : Low, Today's Breakfast : Beef and Radish Soup, Stir-Fried Mushrooms, Rolled Omelet, Roasted Nuts]

After checking the notification, Chae-a finished her shower and put on her uniform.

It was still before morning classes began. But there was one thing she never missed each week.

***

At the far end of the third floor of the Engineering Building.

There was a seminar room at the dead end of the corridor.

Chae-a glanced at the clock.

She had heard that it had once been kept locked before the preservation work was completed, but it was now open.

Rattle.

She slowly opened the door and stepped inside.

Yu Seo-ha's handwritten proof.

No matter how many times she saw it, the sight was overwhelming. These were the traces of the first mark he had left on the history of mathematics when he was a thirteen-year-old student at this school. Unfathomable numbers and symbols densely covered three walls of the classroom, twisting across them like coiled snakes.

In the passionate strokes of the handwriting, she could almost see the grueling solitude and exhilaration the boy must have felt at the time.

Chae-a took another step toward the glass wall.

'I still can't follow it from here.'

Even at this school, where the brightest students in the country gathered, not a single student could fully understand the proof covering those three walls. The principal had said during the entrance ceremony,

"If you can understand the meaning of even a single line before you graduate, that alone will be a success."

That was surely no exaggeration.

And yet, Chae-a found it difficult to look away from the proof. Even among the strings of symbols she could not understand, she was overwhelmed by the visual beauty of the strangely ordered structure they formed.

Swish.

At the sudden sound, she turned around.

Chae-a's eyes widened.

'Yu Seo-eun?'

She was currently the most talked-about student in the entire school.

They were in different classes, so Chae-a had only ever seen her from afar, but now she was standing right there. Chae-a unconsciously held her breath.

'They said she's two years younger than me, right?'

She had skipped one grade in the United States, then another year in middle school.

A mischievous smile hung on her face, which still retained an unmistakably youthful look. At the same time, perhaps it was simply the halo effect, but she seemed to possess a mysterious aura whose depth was impossible to gauge.

'She's pretty.'

A small face.

Her long, slender limbs extending beneath her uniform skirt gave her the fresh vitality unique to a girl still in the midst of growing.

"Oh! Someone was already here? Sorry. I didn't mean to disturb you."

Seo-eun smiled awkwardly and stuck out her tongue a little.

"N-no! I was just looking around too."

Chae-a hurriedly waved her hands and answered. Seo-eun smiled and walked over beside Chae-a, then looked at the glass wall. Watching Seo-eun stare seriously up at the equations, Chae-a felt her heart begin to pound.

After hesitating briefly, she spoke to Seo-eun.

"Um...."

"Yes?"

"Why did you come here?"

Seo-eun's eyes widened at the unexpected question.

Chae-a was curious.

She surely saw her own brother every week. If there was something she wanted to know, wouldn't it be easier to simply ask him directly instead of coming here?

After hearing the explanation, Seo-eun pouted.

"Oppa is kind, but there are some things he absolutely refuses to teach me."

"Huh?"

Chae-a blinked.

Seo-eun remembered something that had happened a few weeks earlier. There had been a part of the Life Matrix she was curious about, so she had taken the paper to her brother. He had merely glanced at it and smiled.

Even when she pestered him to explain it, he had only said,

"Isn't the view from the summit beautiful because the climb up was difficult?"

"I don't know! You don't even go hiking, oppa!"

After that, Seo-eun spent the next several weeks buried in the Life Matrix.

Molecular biology and immunology, converting numbers into symbols, then converting those symbols back into protein binding and metabolic pathways. It was a daunting struggle. Then, at dawn yesterday, Seo-eun had finally deciphered the last key to the Life Matrix.

It was the moment when the rules her brother had hidden within the numbers and symbols came together into one enormous three-dimensional matrix.

"...Ah!"

A cry of wonder escaped Seo-eun's lips.

An overwhelming thrill surged through her. At the same time, she was so deeply moved that tears sprang to her eyes.

Suddenly, she remembered the preface of the Yu-Riemann Geometry textbook she had read before.

「The most beautiful moment in mathematics is not when the answer is being written down. It is the moment when someone who has been stuck against a wall for a long time suddenly understands, with their entire being, why it has to be that way. And that moment belongs to that person alone. No one else can interfere with it.」

"Mine alone."

Seo-eun murmured softly.

Only now did she understand. Her brother had not wanted to take that moment away from her.

Chae-a stared blankly after hearing the explanation.

She was about to say something when an announcement came over the speakers.

Ding-dong-ding.

-Attention, students. Starting at 11 a.m. today, a special lecture and discussion session with Yu Seo-ha sunbae will be held in the auditorium. All current students are requested to attend without exception.

"...Oppa?"

"You didn't know either?"

The two looked at each other, then hurried toward the auditorium.

***

"Let's go."

"Yes, Minister."

Minister Lee Hyun-seok leaned back in the rear seat of the official car. His eyelids were heavy after a restless night, but his mind remained clear.

Yu Seo-ha, whom he had met again after a long time, looked considerably more grown-up than before. As planned, Hyun-seok had candidly laid out the government's position to him.

"I never imagined my discharge would become a problem."

"...I'm sorry."

After listening to the explanation, Seo-ha rose from his seat and paced around the office for quite some time.

"To be honest, I haven't once thought about making money since high school."

"Huh?"

It was an open secret that his fortune was enormous. Hyun-seok decided to hear him out.

"The research I happened to find interesting simply connected with the real world, and value emerged from that. So even if you ask me about the country's future growth industries, I'm not sure how much help I can really be...."

"I see...."

Hyun-seok took it as an indirect refusal.

It was understandable. Seo-ha had already done more than enough for his country, and now, with his discharge approaching, the government was asking something else of him yet again.

"Then, if you truly want to support the scientific community, how about supporting students?"

"What sort of support do you mean?"

Seeing Hyun-seok's puzzled expression, Seo-ha smiled brightly and said,

"I want to give opportunities to the people who will lead Korea in the future. We're planning a Team Apex internship program for students...."

"Ah!"

Team Apex was an organization shrouded in mystery.

It was the world's greatest gathering of geniuses, rewriting the history of science at an astonishing pace. Even brilliant students from the world's most prestigious universities waited indefinitely for a chance to get in. And now, the leader himself was offering to open its doors.

"But we'll decide the selection criteria ourselves."

His voice was filled with affection for those coming after him. Hyun-seok soon burst into a hearty laugh and nodded repeatedly.

"Thank you! Truly, thank you."

It might not be the immediate result the government had hoped for.

But they could establish a pipeline to Seo-ha while simultaneously nurturing future talent. In the long run, there could hardly be a greater benefit.

Seo-ha also looked satisfied.

This had been Daisy's suggestion.

[Master, Team Apex's insular organizational culture may become a risk in the future.]

Seo-ha had actually been concerned about the same thing.

It was becoming increasingly difficult to recruit talent who met his standards.

"Ah! Then we can just train them ourselves?"

[Correct, Master.]

Of course, that was not all.

Team Apex was already an organization admired by everyone. But because its doors were firmly shut, that admiration could never become anything more than a vague dream.

'Simply opening up an opportunity like this.'

Geniuses all over the world would start dreaming of joining Team Apex from the age of ten.

The most efficient way Daisy could think of to stand against power.

It was to use immense capital and technology to make the other side economically dependent. Shake the stock prices of hostile forces, cut off their supply of technology, and replace their leadership.

'But Master would never use that method.'

Then there was only one answer.

'Build influence.'

If all the talented people of the future grew up looking toward the same place, that organization would become untouchable, a sanctuary that no one could wield as they pleased. A home for geniuses, an institution that would make the entire world turn its back on anyone who dared to touch it.

Daisy's vision stretched far into the future.

Minister Lee Hyun-seok watched Seo-ha's reaction before cautiously bringing something up.

"A..and if possible, could I ask you to give a lecture? We've been getting a lot of requests at the ministry...."

Hyun-seok smiled awkwardly as he continued.

"You're so difficult to meet in person that universities and research institutes all over the country keep sending requests. They say their greatest wish is to hear a lecture from Director Yu Seo-ha just once."

Seo-ha thought for a moment, then nodded.

"All right."

"Really? Then I suppose Seoul National University or KAIST would be the most appropriate venues. The students and professors there have been especially persistent too. Where should we arrange it?

Seo-ha smiled and answered.

"I'll do it at my alma mater."

Needless to say, the principal was grinning from ear to ear.

*****

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