Forbidden Zone of the Human Race - Chapter 132 Inappropriate
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Chapter 132 Inappropriate

Xiang Ning internally struggled, wondering if he should intervene and nudge the calculations along to complete this project when an alarm sounded. He froze. The numbers on the screen had suddenly turned chaotic. There must have been some deviations in certain data sets. 

Alia quickly led him to the control room below the screen. Tens of researchers in white were furiously typing on their keyboards at almost three hundred characters per second. All he saw were afterimages of their hands. 

When they appeared in the room, the researchers stopped. Alia asked, “Old Jin, how’s everything?” 

The elderly man she called Old Jin wiped the sweat from his forehead with a smile. “I’ve found the error. As long as I enter the figure from my calculation, I’m thirty percent sure it’ll stabilize.” 

It was then that the rest of the crowd noticed their arrival. 

“Team leader, we still have enough time. How about you do the calculations once, too?” Old Jin suggested in an agreeable tone. Xiang Ning guessed that Alia held a high position in this lab. 

Alia thought for a moment, then shook her head. “It’s alright, I’ll just arrive at a similar solution to what’s already there. We’ve failed a few hundred times already, let’s just record this wrong method and use another calculation route next time.” 

Old Jin nodded with a smile. It had been the same since the dawn of time, every invention came from failure. But just as he was about to key in his data, Xiang Ning spoke up. “Uh… if there’s enough time… uh… you know… uh… I’d like to make a suggestion.” 

Xiang Ning suddenly realized there must be something wrong with him, because he felt extremely uncomfortable seeing Old Jin’s calculations. All he needed to do was round up the last two numbers, but it was easily overlooked. It shouldn’t be a problem to make a suggestion. 

Everyone turned to Xiang Ning, their eyes judging him. He awkwardly scratched his head. 

“Who’re you?” They realized this awkward kid had been brought in by Alia. 

“Uh... I’m Xiang Ning, a student from Qiling Academy. I’m very interested in scientific inventions, so I have some basic understanding of it… uh, that’s all I have to say.” Xiang Ning felt like his introduction was solid, though the researchers didn’t trust him the moment he said he was a high school student. 

“Hmmph, do you know who Old Jin is? He’s a scholar that’s only second to the Twelve Prodigies, the top academician within the space field! A quarter of the numbers you see on the screen were calculated by him!” A handsome young researcher walked out from the side, though his condescending glare was irritating. 

“Plus, do you know what space-folding, space-induction, and the universal gravitational constant are?” 

“No.” 

No? So why are you talking then? 

“Alright, alright. Wang, please don’t scare Xiang Ning.” 

“No, Old Jin, he’s a kid who doesn’t know anything. How could he question you during such a serious occasion? What right does he have? He doesn’t know the consequences of his own actions.” 

Xiang Ning’s mouth twitched. He only wanted to give a small suggestion, was such a huge reaction necessary? 

The youth grew more and more excited, telling everyone about the great deeds of Old Jin. 

Seeing as he was still talking, Alia cut him off. “Everyone, this is Mr. Dong’s disciple, he’ll be one of us in the future.” 

Everyone’s eyes widened in disbelief. Wang Jiayan, who was still chattering away, suddenly shut his mouth like he had just seen a ghost. This kid who knew nothing was Mr. Dong’s disciple? Why? Wang Jiayan was the one who published his thesis before he turned thirty on the academic websites, the one who received praise from many great masters saying they saw great potential in him. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be here in this team that averaged forty-three years old. He was proud of himself for it too. Before coming here, he, too, had heard of the great Dong Qianyi and felt he was good enough to have Dong Qianyi as a mentor. 

It went without saying that everyone knew what came of that. 

“Oh! Mr. Dong’s disciple! You’re so young! Tell me your suggestion then, let’s discuss it,” said Old Jin with a smile. 

“Old Jin.…” Wang Jiayan couldn't believe it. What did Old Jin say? ‘Let’s discuss it’! It seemed he saw Xiang Ning as an equal? 

“Alright, alright. Young people are creative and much bolder, we may get inspired by it, too. Researchers like us must be bold with our ideas. It doesn’t matter if we’re right or wrong, or how else will we progress?” Old Jin was calm and kind as ever. 

Xiang Ning had a great impression of him. However, he must still keep a low profile, since he only knew about the relationship between objects and space. He didn’t know anything beyond that. 

“Uh, Old Jin, I think the numbers look fine other than the last two numbers, they look off to me. I was thinking if we could round the number up so the last three numbers become 666 it’ll smooth the data out, don’t you think?” 

The crowd was speechless. 

Wang Jiayan’s eye twitched. “That’s your suggestion? You don’t like the two last numbers? So you’re changing them to numbers you like better? Are you sure you aren’t here to cause trouble?” 

“No, no, I have no other intentions. It’s fine if you don’t want to take my suggestion, forget I even said it.” Xiang Ning also felt awkward, and Wang Jiayan was right, this was a proper institution and he should have used proper jargon instead of his layman terms. 

To their surprise, Old Jin clapped. “Impressive! It’s true, if we round the last two numbers up, the data looks much smoother!” 

Wang Jiayan and Xiang Ning were both dumbstruck. 

“Let me try.” Old Jin turned to test Xiang Ning’s theory, but Wang Jiayan stopped him in a hurry. “Old Jin, are you really going to take the kid’s suggestion? It makes no sense!” 

“Yeah, Old Jin, it doesn’t sound like he can be trusted.” 

The crowd thought Xiang Ning must have inherited Dong Qianyi’s great knowledge, as he was his disciple, but it looked like he was just there to cause trouble. But here, they couldn’t overrule Old Jin’s stubbornness as he was the oldest and most experienced researcher there. Thus, they begrudgingly agreed upon his insistence. 

When they keyed in the modified numbers, the screen returned to its initial smooth flow of numbers and Old Jin let out a hearty laugh, “It worked.” 

Everyone who was suspicious of Xiang Ning was stunned. They felt like their years of experience in research had gone down the drain. That wasn’t right at all! 

new grandpa dropped! thank you for reading! - doge