sinovels Chapter 138: First Battle a Success, Round 2 Begins
Chapter 138: First Battle a Success, Round 2 Begins
Chapter 138: First Battle a Success, Second Round Begins
Grilled fish restaurant.
The owner recognized them and greeted them as soon as they entered: "You're here? Your usual spot?"
"Yes!" Li Hu interjected, "The usual spot, let's share a table!"
Two tables were pushed together, and seven people sat down.
Li Hu grabbed the menu and started ordering, while Zhou Lin directed from the side, "Order plenty of fish; it'll be good for your brains. You've all worked hard today."
"I know, I know." Li Hu didn't look up, scribbling on the menu, "Two grilled fish, one slightly spicy and one not spicy. Also, beef, shrimp, lotus root slices, enoki mushrooms, tofu skin, potatoes..."
"1
Chen Long interrupted him, "Are you sure you can finish all this?"
"We can finish it all! I'm happy today!" Li Hu said confidently, adding a few more dishes before handing the menu to the waiter.
When the dishes were served, the aroma filled the entire room.
Lin Dong picked up a piece of fish and put it in his mouth.
The grilled fish tasted good, with just the right amount of spiciness. The fish melted on his tongue, carrying the smoky aroma of being grilled over charcoal. He chewed a couple of times and looked up.
Li Hu was putting fish into Zhou Lin's bowl, his eyes crinkling with laughter.
This guy is quite proactive in pursuing her.
He looked away and continued eating.
A pair of chopsticks reached over, and a piece of fish landed in his bowl. He looked up and saw Chen Lu putting away her chopsticks, eating her own fish with her head down, her ponytail hanging down her shoulder, and the tips of her ears slightly red.
Lin Dong looked at her for two seconds, and the corners of his mouth curved slightly.
Should I put it back in her pocket?
He thought for a moment, then didn't touch his chopsticks.
Zhou Lin winked at Zhao Yu from across the table, and Zhao Yu smiled with her lips pursed.
Lin Dong didn't look at them, and lowered his head to eat the piece of fish.
Li Hu's voice rang out again: "When do you guys think the second round will be held?"
Chen Long said half a month later. Li Hu chewed on the fish and muttered, "So what are we going to do during this time?"
Lin Dong didn't respond.
Half a month. Just enough time for the company to complete one round of optimization.
Chen Long said he was going to review his lessons, and Li Hu wailed, "I still have to take the exam!" Everyone laughed.
Zhao Yu asked Chen Long softly about the exam, and Chen Long pushed up his glasses and said it was alright.
Li Hu chimed in from the side, "He'll definitely be fine. This guy reads more diligently than anyone else."
Chen Long glanced at him and said, "You should also read some books."
1
Li Hu shrank back guiltily: "We'll talk about it later."
Lin Dong's lips twitched slightly.
Zhou Lin suddenly asked, "Who came up with your team name, 'The Four Heavenly Kings'?"
Li Hu immediately pointed at him: "Fourth Brother!"
Lin Dong didn't look up.
"I just picked it up randomly," he said.
Zhou Lin didn't believe it, saying the name sounded quite imposing. Li Hu patted his chest smugly: "The four of us are indeed imposing."
Chen Long, standing to the side, said calmly, "You talk too much."
Everyone laughed.
By the time we finished eating, it was already dark.
Several people stood in front of the grilled fish restaurant, the streetlights casting long shadows.
Zhou Lin yawned: "I'm sleepy, I'm going back to sleep."
Li Hu said, "I'll take you."
Zhou Lin glanced at him and smiled, "Okay, you deliver it."
Zhao Yu glanced at Chen Long and said softly, "Then I'll be going now."
Chen Long nodded: "Mm."
Zhao Yu followed Zhou Lin forward, taking a couple of steps before turning back to look at him again. Chen Long was still standing there, adjusting his glasses. She smiled and turned back.
Chen Lu walked at the back, pausing briefly as she passed Lin Dong.
"I'm leaving," she said.
Lin Dong nodded: "Mm."
Chen Lu glanced at him, wanting to say something, but then felt there was nothing to say. She smiled, turned, and left.
Her ponytail swayed under the streetlights.
Li Hu chased after her, calling out, "Senior Zhou Lin, wait for me!"
The three people walked away.
Chen Long stood there, watching Zhao Yu's figure disappear at the intersection, before turning his gaze away.
"Let's go," he said.
The three of them walked towards the dormitory.
The street was quiet, the streetlights illuminating the road surface in a white glow. Li Hu wasn't there; no one spoke, only the sound of footsteps could be heard.
As they reached the dormitory building, Xu Zang said, "The second round should be more difficult than the first."
Chen Long glanced at him and said, "Hmm."
Xu Zang didn't say anything more and went inside.
Chen Long followed behind. Lin Dong walked at the back, glancing up at the dormitory building lights.
The light is on in room 501 on the fifth floor.
His lips twitched slightly, and he followed.
Li Hu hadn't returned to the dormitory yet.
Chen Long sat at his desk, opening a book. Xu Zang leaned against the headboard, holding the book he'd been reading all day. Lin Dong lay on the bed, staring at the ceiling.
After a moment of silence, Chen Long suddenly spoke up: "Xu Zang, your solution to the third question today was very interesting."
"
Xu Zang turned a page of the book: "Not bad."
"I've never seen that kind of thinking before," Chen Long said. "Where did you learn it from?"
Xu Zang thought for a moment: "I haven't learned it. I just feel that's how it should be done."
Chen Long paused for a moment. "Haven't you studied it? You just think that's how it should be done?" He adjusted his glasses and didn't ask any further questions.
Lin Dong lay on the bed, listening to their conversation, and the corner of his mouth twitched slightly.
He understood Xu Zang's explanation, of course.
That kind of overarching, framework-based thinking. A way of thinking Chen Long had never seen before, though he had seen it in the very distant future.
The dormitory quieted down, with only the sound of turning pages.
About half an hour later, the door was pushed open.
Li Hu walked in, his face flushed and a smile on his lips.
Chen Long glanced at him: "Did you send it back?"
"It's been sent back." Li Hu plopped down on the bed, lay back, stared at the ceiling, and grinned like a fool.
Chen Long glanced at him: "What are you laughing at?"
"It's nothing," Li Hu said, but he couldn't suppress the smile on his face.
Chen Long ignored him and continued reading.
Li Hu lay down for a while, then suddenly sat up: "Fourth Brother."
Lin Dong looked at him and asked, "Hmm?"
Li Hu opened his mouth as if to say something, but then swallowed it back.
After a few seconds of hesitation, he said, "Thank you for today."
Lin Dong was taken aback: "Thank me for what?"
"Thanks for standing up for me," Li Hu said. "And one last thing, tell Zhang Yang when you get back that he shouldn't forget the bet—Shuai."
Lin Dong looked at him, and the corner of his mouth twitched slightly: "Stop being so dramatic."
Li Hu chuckled and lay back down.
After a while, he spoke again: "Fourth brother."
"Um."
"Do you think we can win the second round?"
Lin Dong thought for a moment and said, "Yes."
Li Hu smiled: "That's fine then."
After the first round of competition, time slowed down.
Lin Dong started going to class on time.
Song Yao's notebook was a great help. He flipped through it and figured out the outline of the missed lessons, so he didn't have much trouble listening to the lectures.
Li Hu is different. This guy struggles to get out of bed every morning, even after the alarm clock rings three times.
Chen Long was usually the first to leave. Before leaving, he would knock on Li Hu's bed frame, say "I'm leaving," and then close the door. Li Hu would grunt twice and continue sleeping. By the time he finally got up, there were usually only twenty minutes left before class.
"Why didn't you call me!" One day he was late again, and when he came back he yelled at Chen Long.
Chen Long didn't even raise his head: "I called."
"What you called 'squeak'? You just tapped it once!"
"You heard me."
Li Hu opened his mouth, realized he had indeed heard it, and had no choice but to admit defeat.
Xu Zang was the most stable one in the dormitory.
Every morning at seven o'clock sharp, he would get up, wash up silently, and leave the house quietly. Sometimes Lin Dong would wake up early and see Xu Zang sitting on the edge of the bed putting on his shoes, moving very quietly, as if afraid of waking someone.
He always carried the book with him—to class, to the cafeteria, and back to the dorm. Once, Li Hu curiously flipped through it, read two pages, and then returned it, saying, "I don't understand it."
Xu Zang didn't say anything and put the book away.
Days passed by like this.
Classes, break time, cafeteria, dormitory.
Occasionally, I would run into Chen Lu and her friends on campus, exchange greetings, and chat for a few minutes.
Every time Zhou Lin saw Li Hu, she would tease him a couple of times. Li Hu would blush every time, but he would still go up to her every time.
Zhao Yu and Chen Long still didn't communicate much, but when they walked together, they were a little closer than before.
Lin Dong saw it all.
He took some time to go back to the company.
Zhang Mingyuan has lost weight, but his eyes are still bright.
After running for a few weeks, the motherboard has become much more stable, and the power consumption has dropped from 450 to 430.
Zhou Chengyu's touch algorithm is still being optimized, reducing the latency from 14.9 milliseconds to 13.7. Cheng Chuan's antenna signal was adjusted twice, recovering by 1 out of 3 dB. Cheng Yu's heat dissipation solution was revised, reducing heat generation by 1 degree Celsius.
"The progress is acceptable," Zhang Mingyuan said, "but we are still far from our goal."
Lin Dong glanced at the data and nodded: "No rush, take your time."
He spent the day at the company, checked everyone's progress, and discussed the upcoming plans with them. Uncle Cai talked to him for half an hour about the accounts; the 37 million was still there, and all procurement was proceeding according to plan.
Lin Dong agreed.
When Li Hu returned to the dormitory that evening, he was hunched over his desk doing his homework, scratching his head in frustration.
"Fourth brother, how do I do this problem?" He pushed the notebook over.
Lin Dong glanced at it; it was a basic data structure question about binary tree traversal.
"Recursion," he said.
"I know about recursion, but my code doesn't work."
Lin Dong took his pen and wrote a few lines on the paper.
It's not the optimal solution, but it works.
Li Hu glanced at it, then slapped his forehead: "Oh, I'm missing a condition." He took it back, revised it, and got it working, letting out a sigh of relief.
The news of the second round of the competition was announced a week later.
A crowd had gathered in front of the bulletin board. Li Hu squeezed in and then out again, holding a sheet of printed paper in his hand.
"The second round, December 18th, is still a team relay, but the format has changed." He handed the paper to Chen Long.
Chen Long took it and glanced at it: "Modular programming relay".
"What do you mean?" Li Hu asked.
Chen Long adjusted his glasses: "Each team will receive a project, which will be broken down into four modules. The four people will write them in order. Team 1 will write the basic module, team 2 will write the core algorithm, team 3 will write the peripheral functions, and team 4 will handle the integration and debugging."
The modules have interface dependencies and can only be written in sequence. There's a two-hour time limit; anything that fails to run will be eliminated.
After listening, Li Hu scratched his head: "Then doesn't that mean Number 1 is very important? If the basic modules are poorly written, the whole thing will crash."
"That's right," Chen Long said. "So number 1 should write the safest option."
Li Hu glanced at him and smiled: "Isn't that you?"
Chen Long didn't speak, but the corner of his mouth twitched slightly.
Xu Zang stood to the side, never looking at the paper, but Lin Dong noticed that his eyes narrowed slightly after he heard the rules.
"Is there a problem?" Lin Dong asked.
Xu Zang shook his head: "No."
The following week, the four of them began preparing for the competition.
While it's called preparation for the competition, there's really not much to prepare. We don't know the questions or the events; the only thing we can do is familiarize ourselves with the rules and practice teamwork.
Chen Long remains the same every day: attending classes, reading books, and writing code.
But he began to consciously control his pace, writing the most conventional solution for each problem, without adding a single line of unnecessary code. He wrote a little slower, not genuinely slower, but intentionally slower. Code that was too fast would be easily exposed, and he didn't want that.
Li Hu became serious. Every night he would sit at his desk writing code, and after finishing, he would show it to Chen Long. Chen Long would point out the problems, he would fix them, and then show them to Chen Long again.
"Can you name your variables more correctly?" Chen Long once said, pointing at the screen.
"What's wrong?"
"A, B, C, D, can you even understand what you've written?"
Li Hu scratched his head: "I can understand it."
Chen Long took a deep breath and remained silent. Xu Zang peeked out from the bed, glanced at the screen, and said, "The boundary condition of the third loop is wrong."
Li Hu was stunned for a moment, looked down for a long time, and then slapped his forehead: "Damn, it really is."
After he finished revising and got it working, he breathed a sigh of relief.
Xu Zang had already gone back to bed.
Lin Dong sat on his bed, watching the three of them. Chen Long was explaining coding standards to Li Hu, while Xu Zang had his eyes closed as if he were asleep, but he was definitely not. He was wondering just how capable these three really were.
Xu Zang. This person never takes the conventional approach when solving problems, but every step he takes is crucial.
Chen Long's code is as stable as a textbook, but textbooks won't tell you why he can write it so stably.
Li Hu may seem the most rough around the edges, but his "minor mistakes" are handled with remarkable finesse.
Lin Dong's lips twitched slightly.
interesting.
December 18th is fast approaching.
The second round of matches was held in the same stadium, in the same venue and the same booths. But the rules had changed, new match instructions were displayed on the big screen, and the stands were packed with people.
Zhou Lin, Zhao Yu, and Chen Lu sat in their usual seats.
"Can they still get first place this time?" Zhou Lin asked.
Zhao Yu thought for a moment: "I don't know. The rules have changed this time, so teamwork will be even more crucial."
Chen Lu didn't speak, but her eyes remained fixed on the entrance to Area A.
Chen Hao and Zhao Yu arrived again in the waiting area.
The two men stood in the corner, not coming over to cause trouble, but their eyes kept glancing towards the Four Heavenly Kings. Chen Hao's expression was slightly better than last time, but not by much.
Zhao Yu kept his head down.
Li Hu glanced at them and whispered, "Old Eight and Old Three are behaving themselves today."
Chen Long said, "Ignore them."
Zhang Yang is not in Zone A; he is in Group D.
But everyone knows that today's focus isn't on who's first in Group A, but on whether the "Four Heavenly Kings" can maintain their speed and catch up with Zhang Yang's team's performance. The rankings on the big screen show the entire event, with data from both Group A and Group D scrolling simultaneously.
Lin Dong leaned against the wall with his eyes closed.
Li Hu paced back and forth, asking, "Why haven't you started yet?"
Chen Long said, "What's the rush?"
"I'm just in a hurry."
Xu Zang stood at the very edge, holding no book, but his eyes were closed, as if he was thinking about something, or as if he wasn't thinking about anything at all.
The loudspeaker came on.
"Please welcome the third batch of teams from Area A: the Four Heavenly Kings Team, the BugKiller Team, and the HelloWorld Team."
Li Hu immediately stood up straight: "It's our turn."
The four people walked towards the entrance.
Chen Long walked at the very front, in position number 1. He stopped at the entrance, glanced back, and nodded without saying a word.
Li Huchong gave him an OK sign.
Xu Zang did not turn around.
Lin Dong stood at the back, watching Chen Long's figure disappear into the cubicle.
He took a deep breath.
The second round has begun.