Chapter 8: Math Prodigy

Early the next morning, Ye Dali carried Ye Qinghe out of bed, settled him into his wheelchair, and pushed him out of the courtyard.

The heavy rain had stopped sometime after one in the morning. There were still signs of flooding from the night before — puddles lingered in many spots, and drifts of debris and fallen leaves had piled up in places.

The streets were in better shape, likely because sanitation workers had already swept through at the crack of dawn.

They didn't take a taxi. Ye Dali took Ye Qinghe by bus first, then transferred to the subway, spending over an hour making their way to 301 Hospital.

Faced with Ye Qinghe's improvement, the specialist first had Ye Qinghe wiggle his fingers. Once he confirmed it wasn't just Ye Dali's imagination, he had Ye Qinghe taken through a series of examinations.

"This is certainly a positive sign, though some of the results may not come back today — we'll need to wait and review them once they do.

In the meantime, I need you to think carefully about what you've been feeding him lately, and what kind of rehabilitation you've been doing. We also need to understand what's behind such a noticeable improvement.

It would help us in studying his condition."

The money Ye Dali had brought was quickly converted into a thick stack of examination orders. The specialist had always found Ye Qinghe's case memorable, and was genuinely curious about the signs of recovery.

"I'm aware of your situation — as I mentioned before, if you're willing to cooperate with us on some research into this condition, I can arrange a stipend for you under the research program, and a significant portion of the examination and treatment costs could be waived."

The moment the specialist finished speaking, Ye Qinghe shook his head.

"We appreciate your kindness, but — no, thank you."

Ye Qinghe knew exactly how he was recovering. Even if these specialists dissected him piece by piece, they'd likely find nothing useful. Besides, he had no intention of being anyone's lab rat.

So this proposal was absolutely out of the question.

"Qinghe!"

Ye Dali, on the other hand, was tempted. The specialist had brought this up before, and other doctors had too, but Ye Qinghe had always refused.

Back then, the specialists had no leverage. Now that there was actual improvement, Ye Dali hoped Ye Qinghe would cooperate — maybe it would even speed up his recovery.

"Dad, I want to go home."

Ye Qinghe gave Ye Dali no chance to persuade him, and stated it plainly.

"Doctor, let me have a word with him. I'll come back tomorrow when the results are in."

Ye Dali glanced at Ye Qinghe's resolute expression, offered the specialist an apologetic word, and wheeled Ye Qinghe out.

On the way back, Ye Dali kept trying to talk Ye Qinghe around, but Ye Qinghe didn't respond to a single word — which drove Ye Dali up the wall.

The improvement was good news, but the money had drained away fast. Even so, once they were home, Ye Dali got Ye Qinghe settled and sorted before rushing back out on his electric scooter.

"Lottery Draw!"

After Ye Dali left, Ye Qinghe looked at the accumulated Lottery Draw chances and didn't hesitate.

The distance from their rental room to the hospital was well over five kilometres.

Ye Qinghe hadn't expected the System to count the bus and subway rides toward the five-kilometre total. The only disappointment was that the round trip had been over thirty kilometres, yet the System only granted one Lottery Draw — not one per five kilometres.

Otherwise, he'd have had six draws today.

The pointer spun rapidly, sweeping past option after option.

This time's options were different from yesterday's. There was only one body-recovery option — restoring one-third of the function in his left little toe — which left Ye Qinghe a little deflated.

The pointer slowed bit by bit, and finally came to rest on an option Ye Qinghe had never imagined winning.

[Math Prodigy]

Ye Qinghe stared at it and shook his head in disappointment.

What use was Math Prodigy to someone who was completely paralysed?

Math Prodigy: When faced with any mathematical problem, you will always receive an intuitive hint toward the next solution step.

Reading the description, Ye Qinghe felt it was pretty much useless.

What a waste of a draw.

He checked the time — half past one in the afternoon. He had Xiao Ai turn on the computer and went back to drilling Stand Till the End questions.

This was tied to whether he could land a 200,000-yuan annual salary job in the short term. He had to take it seriously.

At half past two, Ye Dali came home.

"How are you feeling? Did you notice any recovery anywhere in your body today?"

The moment he walked in, Ye Dali looked at Ye Qinghe with eager anticipation.

"Dad, if it really came back that fast, I'd be up and running in a few days."

Ye Qinghe replied, exasperated.

"Ha, ha, ha — you're right, I'm getting ahead of myself. It's just that we finally have a little hope, you know? Slow and steady, slow and steady — as long as things keep improving bit by bit, that's all that matters!"

Ye Dali scratched the back of his head and laughed. He really had been too impatient.

Clean up, wipe down, change into fresh clothes, massage, then eat.

After the meal, Ye Dali hopped straight back on his electric scooter and headed out again.

Now that Ye Qinghe had a chance at recovery, Ye Dali was brimming with energy and drive.

After an hour of studying — and with a full stomach — Ye Qinghe wasn't quite in the mood to keep grinding through questions. He started browsing around online instead.

"Help needed! Is there any math expert out there who can explain this problem for me?"

A help-request post caught Ye Qinghe's eye and he clicked on it.

A math problem?

Could his new Math Prodigy skill actually come in handy here?

But when he opened it and saw the question, he realised immediately this was no elementary school problem — it was a wall of notation he couldn't make heads or tails of.

What on earth was this?

Yet strangely, as his eyes swept over the problem, a clear sense of the next solution step naturally surfaced in his mind.

The person asking for help clearly had some level of ability — the first few steps were all correct and matched the solution path forming in Ye Qinghe's head.

But at the fourth step, something had gone wrong.

"The issue arises when handling eigenvalue clustering and matrix problems — numerical instability appears here..."

"For your generalised eigenvalue problem, you need to construct an effective preconditioner M to improve the spectral properties of the coefficient matrix..."

Since he had nothing better to do, Ye Qinghe posted his answer in the thread.

The post had a lot of traffic, but most of the replies were things like: "I'm reading this like it's written in a foreign language," "I can't even understand the question, let alone answer it," and "Kneeling in awe, waiting for someone smart to explain."

The moment Ye Qinghe's reply appeared, someone immediately responded: "I can't understand any of it, but you wrote a lot, so I'll just assume you're right."

Ye Qinghe chuckled, closed the post, and continued wandering around online.

"Someone actually replied?"

A second-year student in the mathematics department at Qingmu University in Jingcheng noticed the notification on his phone. He frowned and tapped open his help-request post.