"What are you talking about, winning her over?" Chu Yang gave the group a helpless look. "I've known her since high school. When I heard you guys say she was outside just now, I went out to say hello. I didn't expect her to be drunk, so I just happened to carry her back to her dorm."
"Can you look at your conscience when you say that?" Zhu Pengfei shot Chu Yang a sideways glance. "Third, don't assume we're all blind. If you're just ordinary friends, do you have to carry her back to her dorm bridal-style? Are her roommates just furniture? Besides, I saw it clearly—Campus Belle Lin threw herself into your arms!"
Wang Lei's eyes lit up. "Third, you wouldn't happen to be that dead ex-boyfriend of three years Campus Belle Lin keeps talking about, would you? Did you two break up three years ago, and then you broke her heart so badly that love turned into hate, which is why she goes around telling everyone you're dead?"
Zhang Mingyang channeled his inner know-it-all and gave his thigh a hard slap. "Third, I get it now! That's not fair of you. Did you love and leave her, abandoning our Campus Belle Lin, and that's why she started saying you were dead?"
Wang Lei was already fully invested. "Damn, if that's the case, then for the next half-month of military training, Campus Belle Lin is going to make things difficult for us as our assistant counselor! You've got to fix this, Third!"
Chu Yang was utterly exasperated. "Stop letting your imaginations run wild. I didn't do anything to wrong her, and we were never a couple either. As far as I know, she never dated anyone in high school."
"Then I know," Zhang Mingyang laughed. "So that dead ex-boyfriend of three years was just made up by Campus Belle Lin to use as a shield? Looking at it that way, does that mean I have a chance?"
"Get out of here!" Zhu Pengfei shot Zhang Mingyang a look. "Stop daydreaming. I swear on my sharp sixth sense that there is definitely some untold story between Third and our Campus Belle Lin."
Swish!
In a flash, the three of them snapped their gazes back to Chu Yang.
*Big brother, big brother, spill the tea!*
Chu Yang sighed helplessly. "We were never together, and I didn't love and leave her. We're just normal classmates."
"Then you don't have any feelings about her at all?"
"..." Chu Yang was silent for a moment. "I do!"
If he didn't care, why would he abandon his proper life as a professor and academician just to come to Peking University as an undergraduate?
The three of them burst into instant laughter.
"Third, you should have just said so earlier! You're just after her body, how shameless, hahaha! But a junior who doesn't want to sleep with a senior isn't a good junior. Third, I support you!"
"Totally support you!"
"Go for it, Third! If you bag the campus belle, our whole Dormitory 319 shares the glory!"
Chu Yang's mouth twitched.
His roommates were quite the characters.
Who would ever dare say that people who got into prestigious universities were just bookworms?
***
Meanwhile.
At a large aerospace engine research base in Mobei.
Inside the conference room.
A middle-aged man who looked barely forty but had entirely white hair, dressed in a laboratory white coat, stared at stack after stack of top-secret design blueprints, his head fit to burst.
This was Professor Lu, who had spoken with Chu Yang on the phone earlier.
Lu Yong, the vice dean of Peking University's School of Electronic Information!
Chu Yang's previous photolithography machine project had drawn upon top professors and experts from all over the country in various fields.
However, they had only been responsible for specific parts of the project.
Once their tasks were completed, most of them had immediately returned to other research projects.
Lu Yong was one of them.
For the photolithography machine project, he had stayed at the research base for a month, completing the manufacturing of the module components assigned to his area, before leaving.
It was precisely because of this achievement that, at not yet fifty years of age, he had become the vice dean of Peking University's School of Electronic Information!
However, just three months ago, he had been urgently reassigned to an ultra-secret research base—the research base for fifth-generation aerospace combat engines!
This research project had been underway for nearly ten years.
As the "heart" of an aircraft, aerospace engines had always been hailed as the "modern crown jewel of advanced manufacturing."
A nation's aviation strength was reflected entirely in its ability to independently manufacture ultra-high-performance aerospace engines.
Yet Huaxia's research into aerospace engines had started far too late—a full thirty years behind other top nations.
Although following along behind others in subsequent research projects had saved Huaxia's researchers from making many detours, detours inevitably brought the accumulation of technology and experience.
What Huaxia lacked was precisely that experience.
They were simply incapable of independently completing the research for high-performance aerospace combat engines.
This had resulted in Huaxia's current top combat aircraft engines all relying on imported high-end vector-turbofan propulsion engines from abroad, preventing domestically developed top-tier fighter jets from entering mass production.
It was the equivalent of having their throats held in a foreign chokehold!
Consequently, ten years ago, research on fifth-generation aerospace engines had officially commenced.
His reassignment had been specifically to tackle and resolve minor issues regarding the engine's operating circuit integration design.
Over the past three months, he and a host of other scientific experts had collaborated to complete the circuit design and the overall engine assembly, finally bringing the very first prototype of this entirely Huaxia-developed fifth-generation aerospace combat engine into existence!
Just this morning, taking advantage of the fine weather, their fifth-generation engine had finally entered the test-flight stage.
Yet, due to a combination of issues, the test flight had failed!
In an instant, everyone at the research base was thrown into panic and flurry.
***
At that moment, an elderly man nearing sixty stood at the front of the conference room, gazing gravely at the researchers below. "Everyone, regarding today's test flight failure, do you have any thoughts? Has the problem been identified?"
One of the researchers immediately spoke up. "The test results are out. There were issues in several areas. First is still the turbine blades—the precision of the turbine blades still has a slight deviation. And then there is..."
The crowd listened quietly until the report concluded.
The old man at the front of the conference room let out a cold snort. "Let's set aside the other aspects for a moment. How many times has the precision of the turbine blades been tested, and it still fails to meet the standard? What on earth do those material-supplying conglomerate companies mean? Do they expect us to change our design blueprints?"
Other research bases that had launched projects concurrently with theirs had already produced engines for fifth-generation transport aircraft, as well as various models of drones and missiles.
Yet their research into aerospace combat engines had consumed a full ten years, only to yield this kind of result during a test flight!
At that moment, Lu Yong raised his head from the crowd, looked at the old man, and spoke up. "Chief Engineer Ye, I know someone who might be able to help us solve this problem."
The person he was referring to was Chu Yang!
Back during the research on the photolithography machine, the research base had encountered numerous problems.
Yet those same problems, once they reached Chu Yang's hands, were quickly resolved with ease.
To some extent, in the minds of the researchers who had participated in the photolithography machine project, Chu Yang's status had reached an almost mythical level.
Furthermore, he had previously discussed the design of aerospace combat engines with Chu Yang, and Chu Yang had many unique insights of his own in this area.
He believed that if Chu Yang came, he would definitely be able to solve this problem!