Sensing Li Jiangao's gaze, Su Mucheng turned her head and smiled.
Really, it's much better to have Su around in situations like a private chat. At least she could help smooth things over for Qiao Ze.
Qiao Ze is a good kid in every aspect; it's just that most of the time, he's still too proud.
He understands everything; he just disdains expressing himself, and he even disdains lying.
It could only be said that Li Jiangao understood Qiao Ze well; the communication among the three in the lounge was indeed quite difficult.
Besides Academician Yao, Zhang Hongcai from the Yanbei University International Mathematics Research Center was also present.
Although the students of the two schools would make various jokes at the expense of the school across the street on various occasions, and even the recruitment staff often had various conflicts, the relationship between the two schools wasn't as bad as the outside world imagined, but rather quite tightly knit.
For instance, the academic affairs offices of both schools opened up their respective strengths as elective courses for students from the other school to register for.
In Peking University, it was common to see individuals carrying Huaqing backpacks; likewise, Huaqing's campus often had students clad in Peking University attire.
Plus, with Huaqing being renowned for engineering, there were more males than females; Yanbei balanced more towards liberal arts and sciences, with a higher ratio of female students. So cross-school romances were actually quite normal.
As everyone knows, the better the school, the higher the success rate of campus romances.
Thus, competition along with cooperation was the main theme of interaction between the two schools.
As for the resentments of the recruitment staff during the annual admissions season, those could probably only be considered a seasoning of life.
However, on someone else's turf, Zhang Hongcai still behaved extremely humbly; at the very least, he couldn't steal the spotlight from the hosts.
So the initial concern mainly came from Academician Yao.
"Qiao Ze, are you feeling better? I wanted to invite you to visit our school yesterday, but Teacher Yu said you had a cold and needed to rest, which really gave me a scare."
"I didn't have a cold. I asked Teacher Yu to make up an excuse to decline."
Qiao Ze answered truthfully. After finding out about this prospective academician online, Qiao Ze held him in high regard, so he explained a bit more clearly.
His respect had nothing to do with other honors; mainly because the academician before him had laid the foundation for distributed quantum algorithms and the security of quantum communication protocols.
"Hmm..." Qiao Ze's honesty caught Academician Yao off guard. What was he about to say again?
"Haha, Qiao Ze, you're still as humorous as ever, aren't you? Academician Yao, do you know what he said to me the first time we met? He suggested that my Chinese grades might not be very good... It really depressed me, so I went back to our liberal arts college and got a set of papers to try... Turns out my score really wasn't great."
Zhang Hongcai chimed in to lighten the mood. With just the three of them, he didn't mind self-deprecating a bit.
Qiao Ze said nothing, while Academician Yao Qizhi laughed and glanced at Zhang Hongcai, joking, "It seems like Qiao Ze doesn't like visiting Huaqing's campus, huh? How about we visit Yanbei's campus today?"
Qiao Ze shook his head and said, "No thanks."
"Oh, why not? Don't want to take a look on your first visit to the Capital?" Zhang Hongcai couldn't help but ask.
"I've seen it already." Qiao Ze said and added after a pause, "Online."
"Online?" Both bigwigs were taken aback again.
Qiao Ze thought for a moment and said, "My mom hopes I go to Yanbei or Huaqing, so I checked out the campuses online."
The bigwigs exchanged glances, and Zhang Hongcai couldn't help but follow up, "Since your mom hopes you come to Yanbei or Huaqing, why not consider it? What's wrong? Don't you like the campuses?"
Qiao Ze glanced at Zhang Hongcai and provided a very down-to-earth answer: "Can't get in."
Well, that rendered the bigwigs of the two top-tier institutions speechless once again.
"Ah... a problem with uneven subjects, perhaps?" Zhang Hongcai managed to squeeze out a question.
"Yes, my Chinese grades aren't good, and the exam questions for college entrance exams are too simple," said Qiao Ze, nodding as he summarized.
That pretty much ended the conversation.
Academician Yao Qizhi glanced at the time; there were ten minutes left until the report would start, so he directly said, "What about now? You've proven yourself. If you're willing to come, I'll make the arrangements."
Qiao Ze shook his head and said, "No thanks."
"Why not? Wouldn't this fulfill your mother's wish perfectly?"
"Xilin is quite good; she's gotten used to it."
"But the academic environment at Xilin is ultimately not as good as here. If you're planning to study abroad, the resources you could get at Huaqing or Yanbei would be far greater than staying at Xilin. Simply for the sake of mathematical theoretical research, Yanbei is after all number one in the nation," Academician Yao stated very candidly.
Qiao Ze shook his head and said, "What suits me best is the best."
"Yes, number one in the nation was in the past," Qiao Ze thought for a moment and then earnestly said.
Academician Yao looked at Zhang Hongcai, who received it with an unchanging expression and didn't speak out to refute.
Because he thought of the words Qiao Ze had said to Professor Xu from his institution.
This guy had already begun to undermine the foundations of Yanbei University.
Obviously, he wouldn't take the reputation of the Yanbei Mathematics Institute too seriously.
"Ahem, alright, let's get ready to head over. By the way, Qiao Ze, this is your first time giving a report, right?" Academician Yao, unsure of what more to say, finally chose to give up.
"Yes." Qiao Ze nodded.
"Nervous?" Academician Yao asked.
Qiao Ze gave Academician Yao a glance and asked, "Is there anyone in the audience today who has a deeper understanding of the problem than I do?"
Academician Yao was momentarily stunned, and then shook his head, "That... There shouldn't be."
Qiao Ze nodded and casually replied, "Oh."
"Haha... let's go, let's go..." Zhang Hongcai was the first to stand up.
The moment was genuinely awkward.
He had thought that Qiao Ze's temper might have changed a bit under the influence of the school over these past few months, but it seemed that the kid was still the same—innocent!