Theanine and Lies
Linda's confirmation message, like the final piece of a puzzle, firmly bound "Mingyan Capital," Shen Huaiming, and Shen Zhiyan together. Jiang Mo, holding her phone, stood before the floor-to-ceiling window of her apartment, feeling as if the city beneath her feet was a giant, intricate trap. Shen Zhiyan's words, "I suggest you refuse," still echoed in her ears, but now they sounded like the only clear signpost in the fog.
He wasn't lying. He refused to cooperate with his father's capital, and he advised her to refuse as well. But this didn't completely dispel the chill in Jiang Mo's heart. To what extent did he truly understand his father's actions? In this game, was he a helpless pawn, or a detached observer?
She needs to be more careful.
The second day of recording focused on the theme of "The Application of Artificial Intelligence in Cultural Heritage Protection." Several precious bronze replicas were added to the lab for 3D modeling and data acquisition. Jiang Mo wore a turtleneck sweater to conceal her somewhat tired expression. She deliberately remained more silent than usual, focusing on her work and avoiding any unnecessary eye contact with Shen Zhiyan.
However, she encountered a problem when trying to scan a complex bronze jue (a type of ancient Chinese wine vessel). The layout of the jue's three legs and its spout and tail meant that no matter the angle, a part of the structure would always be obscured by itself, making it impossible to obtain complete point cloud data in one go.
She was frowning at a missing shadow on the screen when Shen Zhiyan's voice sounded from behind her, still in his emotionless professional tone: "We can try multi-view scanning and then use point cloud registration algorithms to fuse them."
Jiang Mo's body stiffened almost imperceptibly. Without turning around, she just stared at the screen: "I've tried it, but there are always gaps at the connection point. The precision isn't enough."
“It’s your choice of initial coordinate system that amplified the registration error.” He took two steps closer, maintaining a safe distance, and pointed at her screen. “Try establishing a spherical coordinate system with the object’s center of gravity as the origin, instead of the conventional rectangular coordinate system. It can better handle complex curved surfaces with unclear central symmetry.”
His suggestion hit the nail on the head. Jiang Mo followed his instructions, and sure enough, the fused data resulted in a complete and smooth model. She whispered, "Thank you."
"Hmm," Shen Zhiyan responded, but didn't leave immediately. He stood silently behind her, the laboratory lights casting long shadows at his feet that barely overlapped with hers. Jiang Mo could feel his presence, like an invisible pressure, or a silent interrogation.
After a long silence, he spoke in a low voice, only the two of them could hear: "Green tea... are you finished?"
Jiang Mo was taken aback, remembering the cup of tea he had handed her yesterday. She had left it in her apartment without touching it.
"Not yet," she replied, trying to keep her tone as calm as possible.
"Theanine has a limited half-life." After saying this seemingly random sentence, he turned and left.
During lunch break, Jiang Mo remained in the rest area reviewing documents. Researcher Zhou approached with a tray, his face beaming with excitement: "Ms. Jiang, that idea about spherical coordinates this morning was absolutely brilliant! Professor Shen is a genius in this area, though sometimes he doesn't like to explain things; you have to figure it out yourself."
Jiang Mo smiled but didn't reply.
Xiao Chen, sitting next to him, added in a low voice, "Professor Shen is a bit demanding when it comes to the perfection of data. Last time, I had a registration error that was 0.5%, and he sent it back to be redone three times." He paused, secretly glancing at the seat that Shen Zhiyan usually sat in, which was now empty, and lowered his voice even further, "However, he never makes demands on us because of personal matters. One thing at a time."
Jiang Mo's heart skipped a beat. Xiao Chen's words seemed to unintentionally offer some kind of defense for the taciturn man.
In the afternoon, the program team arranged a small seminar for the guests to exchange ideas with several cultural relics experts. When an elderly expert recounted the history of a bronze artifact's journey overseas, he became somewhat emotional, mentioning "the shortsightedness of capital and the loss of culture."
Jiang Mo noticed that when Shen Zhiyan, who was sitting opposite her, heard the word "capital," his fingers on his notebook tightened slightly, his gaze lowered, and he stared at a spot on the table for a long time without moving. It was an unconscious avoidance, an instinctive reaction to having a sensitive area touched.
After the seminar ended, everyone dispersed. Jiang Mo deliberately slowed her pace and "bumped into" Shen Zhiyan in the corridor.
“Professor Shen,” she said, holding the documents, her tone casual as if chatting, “what that old gentleman said just now was quite thought-provoking. Sometimes I feel that the power of capital is truly all-pervasive, as if it decides everything, good or bad.”
Shen Zhiyan slowed his pace and walked alongside her, his gaze fixed on the empty corridor ahead, his voice somewhat low: "Capital is a tool. Tools themselves are neither good nor evil; they depend on the intentions of their users."
“But if this tool becomes too powerful, won’t it turn around and hijack the user’s intentions?” Jiang Mo pressed, her gaze falling on his profile.
Shen Zhiyan remained silent for a moment, and only the clear sound of their footsteps remained in the corridor.
"Yes." He finally spoke, his voice tinged with a barely perceptible ache. "So rules are needed, boundaries are needed."
“What if the person who wields the tools doesn’t want to follow the rules and ignores the boundaries?” Jiang Mo stopped, turned around, and looked him straight in the eye.
Shen Zhiyan stopped and looked back at her. His eyes were complex, as if countless data were flowing beneath the surface, yet he couldn't come up with a simple answer. The light from the corridor ceiling lamp cast shadows on his face, blurring his usually sharp features.
“Then we’ll need a stronger defense,” he finally said, his tone regaining its usual calm, yet as if stating a heavy truth. “Or, we’ll have to pay an even greater price to fix it.”
Is he referring to capital, or... his father?
The day passed in a tacit understanding and silence. When she finished work, Jiang Mo received a message from Linda saying that a public service advertisement collaboration they had discussed earlier had been basically finalized, and the other party appreciated her recent image of "combining rationality and humanity."
This was a small piece of good news, like a glimmer of light shining through the gloom. She needed this kind of real work to solidify her position.
She returned to her apartment alone, without turning on the lights, and stood in the darkness of the entryway for a while. Her gaze swept over the island bar, where she saw the bottle of nutritional supplement that Shen Zhiyan had given her, supposedly developed internally by the center to help relieve mental stress, and next to it was the glass of green tea that he hadn't touched yesterday, now completely cold.
She walked over, picked up the bottle of supplements; the label had a complicated ingredient list and instructions for use. Then, she picked up the glass of cold tea, went to the sink, and poured it out without hesitation. The brown tea disappeared silently into the drain.
She couldn't be sure if, besides theanine, this cup of tea contained any other "ingredients" she couldn't detect—such as probing, or a kind of silent pressure from his father's world that he passed through his hands.
Just as she was about to wash the empty cup, her phone screen suddenly lit up in the darkness—a text message from an unknown number. The message contained only one line, yet it instantly chilled her to the bone:
"Miss Jiang, you wouldn't want your father, Mr. Jiang Weiguo, to have that old case from twenty years ago brought up again, would you?"
Her father's name, like a long-buried scar, was suddenly and unexpectedly revealed.
The other party was no longer targeting her alone, but instead turned their attention to her family members back in her hometown, whom she was trying so hard to protect.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com