Cosmic Love Affair

Chapter 18 Sagittarius I

After Cheng Guang got off work, Xie Li stayed alone in the office.

Frustration and dejection enveloped him.

He lay on his desk, looking at the reply Tan Ke had given him.

He rubbed his eyes and sent a message to Tan Ke: I might still not be able to make it. If only I didn't have those accents.

He wouldn't have experienced mockery and contempt.

Xie Li put down his phone and finally began to understand what Shen Zhichuan meant by “ovarian lottery.”

His phone rang.

Xie Li was stunned as messages kept pouring in.

Tan Ke: If the bubble universe and Guth model hold true, considering that we have already observed gravitational waves, this theory has a considerable space for verification. That means there might be countless universes, countless Earths, and countless yous outside our universe.**

Tan Ke: Among countless yous, there would be countless destinies, and the probability of the you with an accent existing would be a very small number.

Tan Ke: If we regard the event of you having an unpleasant accent as a random variable, and assume that the probability of producing a specific accent follows a monotonic function, and add other events that are not related but not necessarily independent with a non-zero correlation coefficient, from the day you met that English teacher to this very moment, the probability of producing such a you in this time interval is infinitely small, so small that the combined computing power of all the computers in the world cannot calculate it.

Tan Ke: It's not good, but it's precious because it's inseparable from you.

Xie Li held his phone and stared at it for a long time. He recalled things from his junior high school days.

He had always been good at math since he was young.

But there were too many problematic children in the orphanage. A healthy and quiet little boy wouldn't get much attention. It wasn't until Xie Li's math teacher came to the orphanage and recommended him to participate in the Olympiad training that things changed.

However, the orphanage had its own concerns.

The Olympiad training was not free; it required a large sum of money. The orphanage itself relied on government funding and was already struggling financially.

Moreover, the training location was very far from the orphanage. If Xie Li had an accident on the way there and back, the staff of the orphanage would also be held responsible.

But who had the time to take him to and from the Olympiad class every day?

After all, everyone had their own lives. The work at the orphanage was just a means to make a living.

After the orphanage rejected the proposal, the math teacher, though disappointed, still didn't give up and recommended that Xie Li skip a grade.

He used his spare time to tutor Xie Li for free. Not only did he tutor Xie Li himself, but he also gathered other teachers to help tutor him. In the end, Xie Li successfully passed the exam, skipped from the second year of junior high to the third year, and directly participated in the high school entrance examination.

Before the high school entrance examination, the math teacher specially brought gifts and all the mock exams that Xie Li had done, and went alone to find his classmate who was a teacher at a key high school in the city. With the guidance of his classmate, he registered Xie Li for the selection exam of outstanding students from districts and counties at the key high school.

On the day of the exam, it was a sunny day. The math teacher waited outside the exam site for three hours, too stingy to buy water for himself, but he bought a box of ice cream for Xie Li.

Xie Li suddenly felt ashamed.

How could he still complain about not having an “ovarian lottery” after receiving so much kindness?

Clearly, he was already holding the best one.

He wiped away his tears, replied to Tan Ke with an emoji, put down his phone, and picked up the manuscript that he had thrown to the ground in a huff just now.

He had already come this far.

Everyone was pushing him forward. He had no reason to lie on the ground forever just because he had fallen.

The next morning, when Cheng Guang came to work, he pushed the door open and saw his junior with messy hair and dark circles under his eyes. He was shocked and said, “Li, did you stay up all night here?”

Xie Li was reading his manuscript. As soon as he heard Cheng Guang coming in, he suddenly had trouble speaking.

He stood up, closed the door, took out an eye mask and earplugs, and said to Cheng Guang, “Senior, can I recite the manuscript to you?”

Cheng Guang didn't understand why he was doing this, but he still nodded in agreement without hesitation.

At first, it was still hard to speak. Cheng Guang's presence was too strong.

Although his sight and hearing were blocked, he could still sense the breath of a person.

Xie Li clenched his palm and silently counted, trying to calm himself down.

But Cheng Guang was still waiting, and maybe he would speak in the next second - “Li, are you ready? Senior has something to do.”

The stronger this thought became, the more he couldn't speak.

Suddenly, someone tousled his hair.

Xie Li lifted his eye mask.

Cheng Guang stood in front of him, holding a piece of paper. On the paper, it was written: Senior won't rush you. Take your time. We'll do it slowly.

Cheng Guang was the most ordinary guy from a science college. He wore black-rimmed glasses, a crew cut, sports shoes, a plaid shirt, and carried a black bag of an unknown brand all year round. In winter, he would wear a tricolor down jacket. He was not good at speaking and a bit slow. The first time he gave his wife flowers, he wanted to be creative, but ended up buying a bouquet of carnations with daisies. When he tried to buy his wife lipstick like others, he bought three identical deadly Barbie pinks.

Cheng Guang got married early. His wife was an English teacher, and their child was only one year old. There were many things to deal with at home. But he never made excuses to push things onto Xie Li. On the contrary, after learning about Xie Li's background, he often took care of his junior in a subtle way.

Xie Li held back his tears and nodded hard.

With such a great senior and so many people who cared about him, how could he not get up?

Xie Li put the eye mask back on.

His heart was pounding in his chest.

His body was still tense, but his senior's silent wait gave him a bit of courage to fight against his own body in the darkness.

The first sentence came out of his throat dryly.

His own voice, transmitted through the bones into the brain, sounded vague and strange.

Cheng Guang gently patted his shoulder.

For the second sentence, he hesitated for a long time before speaking.

He tried hard to open his mouth wide, making his voice clear and loud. He painstakingly distinguished between long and short vowels, bit his tongue hard between his upper and lower teeth, and tried his best to produce a standard dental sound.

Xie Li recited slowly and heavily. It didn't sound like an article praising achievements, but more like an eulogy at someone's funeral.

When he took off the eye mask, he was sweating.

Cheng Guang handed him a piece of paper: “Wipe your sweat quickly.”

Xie Li took it uneasily: “Senior, do you think it's okay?”

Cheng Guang hesitated for a second, and then said very affirmatively: “It's okay. I think it's definitely fine.”

On Thursday evening, Xie Li sent a message to Professor Fang, saying that he was a bit busy this week and would visit her next week.

Professor Fang replied quickly, telling him to study with peace of mind and not to worry about the manuscript. She said he could come to visit whenever he had time.

He spent all his spare time reciting that speech. During the day, Cheng Guang acted as his listener in the office. At night, when he went home to sleep, he dreamed of respectable leaders and teachers, and the department head's half-bald forehead after his recent hair transplant.

Three days before the scholarship retest selection, Xie Li received a new notice.

The retest location was changed to the top-floor meeting room of Changjing Capital.

The form of the retest also changed. The candidates would record their speeches and answers anonymously. The judges would evaluate the anonymous recordings, and no one would know the identity of the recording submitter before the evaluation results were made public.

That is to say, the public speech was canceled, and the face-to-face Q&A was also canceled.

Xie Li was so happy that he almost jumped up, grabbing Cheng Guang and shouting: “Senior, I'm saved!”

That night in his dormitory, Xie Li suddenly realized something.

How could the review, the venue, and everything suddenly change, and even be changed to the top-floor meeting room of Changjing Capital?

Xie Li vaguely suspected that it might be Tan Ke's doing, and it might have something to do with himself, but it was too self-centered to think so.

He wrapped himself in the quilt and covered his head, for fear that this bit of self-centeredness would be discovered by others.

On the morning of the retest day, Shen Zhichuan even came over and offered to drive him there.

How dare Xie Li trouble his master? He took the subway by himself.

Xie Li didn't arrive very early. There were already many people sitting in the reception hall. He had just sat down when the receptionist he had met last time came to invite him.

The receptionist took him to the eighth floor.

Changjing Capital was not very large in scale. Most of its employees were concentrated in the AM* department, with more than four hundred people in total. There was also a small part working on quantification* under Fang Xian's hand.

Xie Li had been to this floor before. He thought the receptionist would still take him to the guest meeting room, but he was directly led into Tan Ke's office.

The receptionist opened the door for him and left.

Xie Li had no choice but to go in by himself.

Tan Ke's office was not very big, and it was full of display screens. There were three on the wall and four on the desk, blocking him tightly behind.

Xie Li walked over and only then saw that he was wearing headphones and talking on the phone.

Hearing the sound, Tan Ke frowned and looked up. Seeing it was Xie Li, his expression eased a bit. He waved to Xie Li, signaling him to come over.

Xie Li heard him speaking English, with a heavy and stern tone, so he couldn't help but walk lightly and slowly approached.

He stood beside the desk for a while before Tan Ke ended the call, took off the headphones and threw them on the table, looking a bit tired.

Xie Li always felt a strong sense of distance when Tan Ke was in a suit. He became awkward for a moment and greeted randomly: “Mr. Tan, hello!”

Tan Ke was both amused and helpless, looking up at him: “Are you ready?”

Xie Li nodded: “I've recited it many times and even rehearsed with others. It should be fine.” He hesitated for a moment, “And we were notified that the review rules have changed. We don't need to give a public speech anymore. I think I'm fine.”

He spoke earnestly and confidently.

A hint of a smile appeared on Tan Ke's face: “You'll be the last one. There won't be anyone after you. Don't be nervous when you go in, just take your time and speak slowly.”

He pondered for a moment and added: “Inside is a self-service recording device. It's sound-sensitive and no one is monitoring. The staff outside won't be able to hear it either. After you come out, someone will take you to listen to your recording. If you're not satisfied with it, I'll ask them to strike your name off the list, and your recording won't be submitted. No one will hear this speech of yours; everyone will just think that you withdrew voluntarily.”

He looked at Xie Li: “Don't be nervous, okay?”

Xie Li suddenly felt a bit dazed, as if he had been stunned by a gold brick falling from the sky.

Many questions and words popped up in his mind, and he wanted to get them clear.

But he held back.

He smiled at Tan Ke, his eyes shining as if there was a little flame burning inside.

He nodded: “Okay.”

The author has something to say: *Bubble universe: a kind of multiverse theory. It is believed that there exist countless open universes, each with different cosmic constants, which fits quite well with the cosmic inflation theory (the universe expanded rapidly in an extremely short time after the Big Bang, and then the speed decreased).

*Guth model: that is, the inflation theory model. The discovery of gravitational waves has provided strong supporting evidence for the inflation model.

*AM: Asset Management, the asset management department.

*Quantitative: an investment and trading model that uses mathematical models to replace human judgment and to mine probabilistic patterns from historical events and data.