Ye Wenjie, watch my moves closely.

Chapter 45

Just after the Mid-Autumn Festival, Zhang Zhi'ao returned to the capital first, as he still had to report back to the North Sea Fleet.

A few days later, Li Youyu returned with Ye Wenjie and Yang Weining, and the couple rested at home.

Li Youyu hadn't even settled into his seat when the old man called him away.

"You, you." The old man's spirits were much better than they were half a year ago. He waved his hand, signaling the housekeeper to bring over a chair and a teacup, and sat down opposite Li Youyu.

His every gesture was as kind as if he were teaching his grandchildren.

"I've heard about it all. This trip was extremely dangerous for you, Xiao Yang and Xiao Ye, especially Xiao Ye. What courage and boldness you have!"

Cheng Lihua's appearance was an unexpected surprise to everyone.

Without Ye Wenjie's almost self-sacrificing act of stepping forward, Evans would probably have escaped with the coordinates of the Trisolarans.

From someone who wanted to take revenge on the world, Ye Wenjie's transformation has surprised the old man.

"I actually hope she and Lao Yang suffer less." Li Youyu sighed. "This is all my fault. I was too confident. Looking back now, I realize that everything I did was wrong. Without your help, I'm afraid I would have wasted my time."

"You're still young, you still have the chance to try and fail."

The old man waved his hand, seemingly unconcerned. "We couldn't have predicted that letter. In fact, even now, the National Security Department still hasn't found out who wrote it... It's as if the letter appeared out of thin air."

The letter is now in the criminal investigation department, and several departments are working together to screen the sender.

Thinking of that letter, Li Youyu felt a kind of unspeakable frustration on his lips, so he simply changed the subject and said, "Actually, whether Evans exists or not, ETO is destined to appear. More than 20 years later, when the sophons descend on Earth, the Trisolarans will definitely use the sophons to select their followers and use the power within humanity to hinder social development."

"So what if we can't build a particle collider? Staying alive is the most important thing. Even with a technological gap of several hundred years, we can research for another 20 years; surely we can break the sophon barrier, right?"

The old man listened to Li Youyu's complaints with a smile. In his opinion, only a truly responsible person would be dissatisfied with the status quo.

So, when this kid said on Radar Peak that he didn't care about humanity, he was just being stubborn.

The old man handed him the documents he had prepared long ago and said, "What truly promotes scientific progress are just one or two key technologies. Most of the time, scientists are like blind men touching an elephant, constantly exploring."

Since you know there's an elephant ahead, we can definitely draw it many times faster than others.

Li Youyu opened the document; it contained very little formal language, just a few paragraphs, more like a message from an elder to a younger person:

[The money is limited, and the country is still weak; we apologize for the hardship you've endured.]

It wasn't much, but most of the money Evans took was invested in the project to build a particle accelerator.

With this money...

Li Youyu finally had the confidence to stand up straight.

"Don't be too happy yet," the old man chuckled, taking a sip of tea. "You left a little loose end to your scheme against Evans, leaving a bunch of uncles and grandpas to clean it up. Well, I'll leave you a little loose end too. I've gathered all the old brothers from the Institute of High Energy Physics, and they'll be waiting for you at the Chinese Academy of Sciences this afternoon. Whether they'll listen to your advice depends entirely on your silver tongue."

"Kid, don't look at me like that. I'm not going to back you up."

Don't worry.

Li Youyu drank the tea in his cup in one gulp.

In his view, as long as funding is secured, the senior members of the Institute of Physics are very easy to talk to.

But when he confidently pushed open the door of the Institute of High Energy Physics and saw the seniors inside, he was dumbfounded.

Sitting here are not only senior figures from the Institute of High Energy Physics, but also almost all the big names in China whose names can be called, represented by Qian Xuesen, Qian Zhongshu, and Qian Hewen. Their research areas encompass nuclear physics, aerospace, fluid mechanics, optics...

"Young man, you'd better think carefully before you speak," someone said. "Even though you've secured funding for the particle accelerator, we old folks aren't so easily fooled."

These giants who upheld the physics of the Republic were all waiting for Li Youyu, waiting for the young man who was clamoring for a merger to give his reasons.

Under the gaze of the crowd, Li Youyu walked to the front of the stage. He flipped through the manuscript he had written, hummed twice, and suddenly felt very pale.

So, under the watchful eyes of everyone, he crumpled the manuscript into a ball and, in the simplest of words, recounted to his predecessors the story of the sophon that would completely kill physics more than 20 years later.

Despite their doubts, the seniors in the audience listened attentively to the entire story.

Because they knew that the Big Brother wouldn't put someone who talks nonsense in such a situation.

"Young comrade," someone in the crowd raised a hand. Li Youyu looked over and saw a very familiar face. "As far as I know, cutting-edge theoretical physics internationally doesn't really touch on the concept of dimensions. Humanity's understanding of dimensions is basically at the stage of abstract philosophy. According to you, the Trisolaran civilization unfolds sophons in eleven dimensions. This level of technology is indeed quite challenging. It's difficult to develop the technology to manufacture sophons in 20 years. Since you want our help, why don't you tell us your thoughts?"

"We don't need to create sophons," Li Youyu said. "We just need to shield them and create a sealed chamber with an extremely strong and uniform electric field. By utilizing the positively charged property of sophons and the principle of like charges repelling each other, we can effectively prevent sophons from entering."

"That's a good method." The scholar who asked the question nodded. "Since you've already come up with it, what else do you need us old folks to do?"

Li Youyu said, "The limitations of this technology are too great. Everyone has to wear high-voltage resistant insulating suits to catch their breath in this uniform electric field. I would like to ask the seniors to improve the concept of this shielded room and enclose the particle collider inside, so that this particle collider can become a secret weapon to kill alien civilizations."

"interesting."

Someone laughed, joining the joke from the person next to them, "This is a war, a war between two civilizations, a war between physicists. Sounds pretty grand and imposing, doesn't it?"

The technological gap between humanity and the Trisolarans is greater than the technological gap between the United States and China during the Korean War.

But the more this happens, the more it stirs up the indomitable spirit in everyone's bones.

"The younger generation has its own things to do," said a woman nearing sixty. "After living in anonymity for most of our lives, in these last few decades, we can have a spectacular showdown with extraterrestrial scientists. I think it's quite interesting. What do you say, old friends? Let's fight one more time?"

The older generation didn't have the habit of giving grand speeches; they simply expressed their attitude with applause and smiles.

Li Youyu stood on the stage and bowed to these senior scientists, their temples gray and their lives solitary.

It is thanks to countless selfless individuals like these that the Republic has been able to emerge unscathed from its numerous encirclements and reach where it is today.

They all have a common name.

The backbone of the Republic.