Chongming senior is the best!
"Chongming senior is the best!"
67.
Chongming couldn't remember exactly when he started to unconsciously pay attention to this junior sister from Beiluan.
The two first met when Xue Xiang messaged him, saying that the sandwich cookie from Beiluan that their professor had received had arrived. The Nuclear Research Institute jokingly refers to students who are co-supervised by two professors as "sandwich cookies." The term "sandwich cookie" implies the difficult position a student in is when the two professors disagree.
However, Meng Lanjian's situation was different from the past. Her big boss was Zhong Suo, and her little boss was Zhong Suo's eldest apprentice. The big boss only provided money, and the little boss was responsible for providing the work. It was also difficult for the apprentice to challenge his highly respected master. Therefore, Lanjian was a lucky cookie in the middle.
Such a disordered teacher-student relationship is rare in the Nuclear Research Institute, and Chongming was very curious about the person his teacher had taken on as a student from Beiluan.
The first thought that flashed through his mind when he saw Lan Jian was, "What a beautiful... sandwich cookie."
Chongming has been living a secluded life for the past six months since returning from abroad to work as a postdoctoral fellow with Xue Xiang. It has been a long time since I have seen such a vibrant, beautiful, and refreshing face at the Institute of Nuclear Energy and even Nanjing University.
Walking through the bookish campus of Nanjing University, one can attract attention mostly through clothing and appearance. Moreover, students often travel in groups, so even those with outstanding looks cannot be easily spotted by Chongming, who walks with his eyes fixed straight ahead.
But once you meet Meng Lanjian's gaze, it's hard to look away for even a moment. Her beautiful peach blossom eyes shine, and her deep-set eyes accentuate her sculpted features. Beneath her straight nose, her lips have a healthy, pale red hue. When she speaks, the corners of her mouth turn up slightly, carrying a bright smile that instantly brings joy to anyone who sees her.
So when he took her to the station, she asked him whether it was more convenient to sit in the front passenger seat or the back seat, and Chongming subconsciously answered the back seat.
He had only just agreed to be Zheng Xuerou's fake boyfriend at that time, and he didn't have the idea that he needed to leave the passenger seat for his nominal girlfriend. He let Lan Jian sit in the back simply because, apart from Mama and Meimei, he wasn't used to having a woman sit next to him.
Moreover, this new junior sister from Beiluan had only spent a short time alone with him, walking from the twelfth floor to the parking lot, and he had already lost his composure and said several wrong things.
For example, she asked, "Senior, will you be working at the nuclear research institute or in the new lab on the 12th floor?" He answered "institute" but then immediately changed his answer to "laboratory".
For example, she asked, "Senior, have you ever been to our University of Washington? You can come visit me sometime!" He replied, "Sure, I haven't been yet," and immediately remembered that the Particle Physics Society competition was held at the University of Washington last year, and he even won an award...
Throughout the journey, Chongming kept turning the volume up to ease the awkwardness, then immediately turning it down again to hear her better. He even accidentally activated the car's smart system. Whether his junior sister noticed his nervousness or not, he let out a long sigh of relief after seeing her off.
In the six months before Lan Jian graduated with her master's degree, he was so busy with experiments that he rarely thought of this junior sister who hadn't even enrolled yet, but he did visit Hua University once.
The Particle Physics Society holds a major competition every three years. The next competition will be hosted by Nanlu University, and the unlucky organizer is Xue Xiang. Professor Sang, the organizer from Huazhong University of Science and Technology, wants to hand over the society's affairs to him and also asks him to help install software on the lab's new system. While he's fiddling with the computer, he overhears Professor Sang's students whispering among themselves:
"Have you tried the flower tea that Lan Jian brought back from Europe?"
"I drank it. Professor Sang even left the chocolates she gave me here. She went all the way to the top of Europe to buy Lindor, but Professor Jing teased her, saying that you can buy them at the supermarket in Nanlu. She got so angry that she sent them all to our lab, hahaha!"
"She had such a great spring break! Every day I saw her posts—feeding horses, hiking, picking wild fruit—it made me want to go to Europe for my graduation trip!"
"Wait until you can finish your master's thesis ahead of schedule, like some people who can do it for five years straight, before you start thinking about this!"
Chongming chuckled silently to himself, then heard the person making the flower tea exclaim "Wow!" while holding their phone, and another person leaned over and clicked their tongue in amazement, "Our pillar of strength, Xiaolanjian, only got second place? Who was first place?"
"Nanjing University! I heard they research biomaterials, that sounds amazing..."
As soon as he finished speaking, the person who spoke remembered the laboratory.
A big shot from Nanjing University was sitting there, and he immediately fell silent.
At noon, Professor Sang and Chongming had lunch at the school's vegetarian restaurant, and the topic of Lanjian, who was about to pursue his doctorate at the Nuclear Research Institute of Nanlu University, came up.
“I heard from the kids in the lab that Lan Jian is the darling of our department. I thought that word meant mascot!” Professor Sang said with a smile when she mentioned Lan Jian. “They said it’s because all of us teachers favor her, and the students are even more so. We’re afraid of leaving her behind in everything we do, so people will think that we Hua University students are ostracizing Bei Luan University students. We spoil her a lot… Actually, Lan Jian is really outstanding, but because of her special status, many good things don’t go to her. That’s why we teachers take extra care of her.”
Chongming was puzzled. "Is Teacher Sang referring to scholarships and medical insurance?"
Teacher Sang shook her head. "It's not just that. I heard from Jingyou that she came in second place in the FallingWallsLab three-minute speech competition. Although the first place went to your Nanjing University, to be fair, it wasn't a fair win."
The reason why Lan Jian did not win the first place to represent the Nanlu region in an international competition is obvious – how could the Nanlu government allow a student from Beiluan to represent Nanlu in the competition?
After returning home that day, Chongming watched all the videos of the top three speakers and silently gave a thumbs up to the second speaker in the official video, who was bright, beautiful and poised.
When summer vacation arrived, the heavy particle laboratory moved to the twelfth floor.
Ma Yuehe was often at the hospital or the Nuclear Science Department IV to conduct experiments, so he didn't come to the 12th floor very often. Meng Lanjian came to the lab at the end of August. Senior Sister Hui was also there that day, and after a pleasant conversation, Senior Sister Hui took her to pay her respects to Guan Shaoxiao, the Flower Butterfly, on the 12th floor. Because the semester hadn't officially started yet, Lanjian didn't show up again for the next few days.
Chongming and Lanjian first met up close when Xue Xiang was arranging a computer for Lanjian. At that time, the laboratory was in dire need of reconstruction, and computer components were placed on the long table in the middle. Many of them were "orphans" from the Zhong Institute era, covered in dust. Chongming was sorting through the parts, preparing to assemble a new computer for Lanjian, when Lanjian skipped in from outside and called him "senior."
"Your clothes are dusty!" Lan Jian pulled a wet wipe from her bag and handed it to him. "Go wipe them clean!"
Chongming was plugging in the motherboard, a delicate task that required careful handling. Without turning his head, he said it was nothing. Lanjian, however, reached out and gently wiped his back a few times. She didn't touch him directly, but instead used a tissue to wipe his back.
"Since you can't reach it anyway, I'll do it for you! You're welcome, senior!"
Even when she spoke playfully, she would still address him respectfully as "senior."
After setting up the computer, Chongming discussed with her that there weren't many seats available in the lab yet, and Lan Jian would have to share a desk with him. After hearing this, she smiled broadly at Chongming and said, "It's okay, senior. My computer is here at the long table, so I'll just sit here. It's spacious enough! You don't need to bother setting up a separate desk for me."
Later, because the school's power supply was frequently interrupted for maintenance before the start of the semester, Lan Jian's relay system at the long table had poor contact, so she officially moved to the seat next to Chongming.
During her first year at Nanjing University, she left early and returned late, attending classes every day and having little time to do research in the lab. As a result, Chongming and she didn't become very close.
The day after New Year's Day, on the way to buy ingredients for a lab dinner, Lan Jian remarked that Zheng Xue Rou was going abroad to pursue her doctorate. Suddenly, Chong Ming wondered how she would react if she knew that Zheng Xue Rou was his "girlfriend".
Seeing her stunned expression, he began to panic—even if she would eventually find out about this from someone else, how could he, how could he be so cruel as to tell her in this way?
He saw her eyes dim instantly, and only then did he realize that her vague, scattered, yet overflowing feelings for him had long been obvious to him.
His probing was a rejection of her without a second thought.
He thought Lan Jian would retreat, so that he could focus on being her senior brother without any distractions.
The two truly began to get to know each other during Lan Jian's first winter break after starting her doctoral studies. Lan Jian began to truly immerse herself in the laboratory, learning professional skills related to her research field. It was only then that she gradually came to understand the differences between Nanjing University and Huaqiao University.
The academic atmosphere at the University of Washington emphasizes individuality; each student is carefully selected.
The competition among future elites is fierce, with most professors and past presidents having studied in Europe; while Nanjing University emphasizes teamwork, with laboratories frequently collaborating and sharing resources, resulting in a high percentage of graduates pursuing further studies in the United States. Chongming and Zheng Xuerou are prime examples.
Teamwork, in essence, means seeking help promptly when encountering obstacles, letting others know the progress and where the problem lies, and then working together to solve it. However, Meng Lanjian had developed a bad habit during her university years: she would work on her own without saying anything. A week later, Xue Xiang discovered that she had been reading papers in the wrong direction and called Chongming over for a good scolding.
Chongming then realized that teaching his junior sister Lanjian had become his responsibility.
He taught Lan Jian research methods from the basics, assigned her homework, and occasionally took her to the Fourth Nuclear Science Department to observe how others conducted experiments. She was going back to Beiluan for the Chinese New Year, and Chongming was worried that she would have trouble getting a taxi as the year was approaching, so he got up at five in the morning to pick her up from her school dormitory and take her to the airport.
Before he saw her through security, she kept turning back to look at him standing there. For some reason, Chongming felt that she was reluctant to part, yet trying hard to hide it, her innocent gaze, seemingly devoid of any romantic feelings, much like a child saying goodbye to their friends after winter camp. When he got back to his car, he suddenly received a message from Lan Jian. She reminded him that there were still sandwiches he had bought yesterday in the lab refrigerator, expiring before noon today, and that if he didn't eat them, he should remember to throw them away before the Lunar New Year.
At that moment, he really wanted to expose his playful, carefree, and thoughtful junior sister—he didn't want her thoughtfulness, and he wasn't her winter camp study partner—he was her senior brother, and she couldn't look at him like that.
It would make him want to commit a crime.
They would break their vows, just like monks and Buddhas who cannot drink alcohol or eat meat.
Chongming had read the message, but before he could reply, the car behind him honked, urging him to leave. Later, when he received Lanjian's "Happy New Year" message, he realized that he had eaten the sandwich long before it expired, and he had forgotten to tell her.
However, that's not important.
After the winter break, Lan Jian returned to the lab looking a bit preoccupied. At that time, Chong Ming didn't know that Lan Jian hadn't gone home to celebrate the New Year with her parents. He secretly gave Lan Jian the red envelope he had received at Zhong Suo's house, saying that it was a New Year's red envelope left for her by her teacher.
Lan Jian was surprised and delighted to receive the red envelope, and in the following days she returned to her lively and energetic self from before the Lunar New Year.
As time went by, the two, who spent every day together, grew closer and closer, and began to feel like fellow disciples. Lan Jian gradually stopped calling him "senior" and started calling him "Chongming, Chongming" like everyone else.
Sometimes, Chongming would also experience the same joy he felt back at Huada University when he heard that Professor Jing liked to tease Lanjian.
She liked the red tissue box, but he preferred the blue one, and he always put the blue one on the table, getting in her way. She tolerated it a few times, then asked him, "Are there many blue tissue boxes left in that box?"
"There's not much left. We'll have to replenish it once the blue ones run out."
"Aren't there still a lot of red ones that haven't been used yet?"
"Red is unlucky, we don't use it in our lab. Haven't you noticed that the font always turns red when the program throws an error?"
"Huh? Is there such a rule in the lab?" Lan Jian naively believed it and stopped worrying about the color of the tissue box. A couple of days later, probably because Ma Yue and he couldn't match up, she immediately took a box of red tissues from the storage room and returned to her seat, confronting him fiercely, "Chongming, you scared me again!"
Chongming chuckled inwardly, but maintained a composed facade, pretending not to understand. "How did I scare you?"
“You told me that the lab has a tradition of not using red tissue boxes to avoid bugs, but Ma Bao said he didn’t know that!”
"Of course he wouldn't know. He's not the one who goes to the logistics department to get more tissues whenever the lab runs out," Chongming said, feigning mystery. "It's a secret of the Nuclear Research Institute; only the most capable people would know!"
"Who would know that? How do you know? Tell me!"
"Well, of course only the people who go to restock will know that."
"Then who will restock in our lab?"
Chongming was a little speechless at her slowness. "Me?"
"Then take me with you next time you go restocking! I need to ask the logistics department if it's true."
?
Chongming was amused by her seriousness and deliberately mistyped the code, pointing to the red area on the screen that suddenly started displaying errors, saying, "See? The consequences of using red."
Startled, Meng Lanjian immediately threw the red cardboard box onto Ma Yuehe's table.
The more easily Meng Lanjian was teased, the more Chongming enjoyed teasing her.
Sometimes, she would be in the middle of a conversation with someone, and suddenly turn to Chongming and ask, "Hey, we're having a team building event in the lab next week. Have you already discussed where to go with the boss?"
Chongming deliberately raised his eyebrows, putting on airs and saying, "I'm not called 'Hey'."
"Senior~" Lan Jian would ask him in a softer voice at this time, "Senior Sister Hui and I want to go to Meijiao Ridge to feed the deer, what do you think?"
"Do you want to go, or does Senior Sister Hui want to go?"
We all want to go!
"It's not impossible."
"Yay! Senior Chongming is the best!"
Sugar-coated bullets.
She always showered him with sweet words and compliments.
She would say similar things from time to time.
"Senior, if you can teach me this problem, you'll definitely be promoted to full professor within five years!"
"Chongming, could you help me eat the cabbage? Wow, you even swapped it with my favorite tomatoes! Thank you so much! You're the best!"
"Chongming, can you take me to buy red bean cakes today?"
For a single red bean cake, she would pester him from the night before until the next afternoon when he borrowed Ma Bao's electric scooter.
That time, it started raining halfway through the journey. She refused to wear a raincoat, but Chongming insisted on putting a raincoat on her and even helped her put on a helmet. He shielded her from the rain in front of him. The rain was so heavy that raindrops the size of soybeans hit his arms, and even his thick skin hurt. He took her back to his home; it was the first time she had come to his home alone since the lab team-building event.
When she took off her raincoat and gave it to him, she suddenly thanked him very earnestly. Chongming chuckled and asked her what was so special about thanking him for. She explained, "Last time, when I went to get pizza with Ma Yuehe, it also rained. He saw that I was wearing a waterproof windbreaker and politely asked me what was wrong. After I said it was okay, he still gave him and the pizza the only raincoat he had."
Chongming knew that she didn't mean to complain about Ma Yuehe when she said that, because her last words before running off to play the game were—
"So Chongming, you're the best! You're the only one who really wants to give me the only raincoat."
Later, Chongming realized that he had been gradually won over by her sweet words.
That's why when showing the photo to her grandmother, she didn't deny that her grandmother had pointed out the wrong person, and even said, "She's as soft-hearted as a puppy."
But it was clearly because he saw her that his heart softened, and he felt a flutter in his heart, like he had seen the butterfly on the tip of a puppy's nose, fluttering its wings and flying into his heart.
Grandma said he "finally met someone he likes."
He did not refute it at the time.
My grandmother had been seriously ill for a long time, and her passing wasn't sudden. However, the news that my father was about to take over as the commander-in-chief of the Southern Army spread like wildfire. At the funeral, people coming and going stared at him. They finally learned what Major General Lu's son, the successor of the Valiant Battalion, looked like. They surrounded him with ill intentions, and after one group was driven away, another group would set their sights on him.
Those few days were exceptionally difficult for him. He had lost his grandmother, who had doted on him since childhood, and now he had to shoulder the responsibility of being the eldest grandson of the Lu family, dealing with a multitude of trivial matters. Just when he was at his wit's end, Meng Lanjian suddenly arrived.
That day was the Mid-Autumn Festival, and normally people would avoid such occasions, so very few guests came to pay their respects. When he received the call, he knew that according to etiquette he should not act recklessly at this time, but he couldn't restrain himself. Like a traveler who had been parched for a long time and then received rain, he hurried towards the direction where she was at the entrance of the mountain.
That day, Meng Lanjian wore a dark brown sleeveless dress, with a black bow in her hair. The mourning hall was set up on a high platform with long, dense steps. Chongming thought Lanjian would leave after signing the documents for him, but unexpectedly, she looked up in the direction of the mourning hall, lifted her skirt, and slowly climbed the steps.
He remained silent the whole way, but Lan Jian glanced at him several times out of the corner of his eye, and he saw it every time.
In fact, the moment Lan Jian appeared, his heart, which had been heavy with illness for several days, inexplicably stirred with a sense of unease.
Aura. It's the vitality that comes from being pulled from the seabed after sinking into the ocean, the brightness that returns after being bathed in sunlight.
As the two walked through the long corridor filled with wreaths and elegiac couplets and entered the mourning hall, Lan Jian saw the name on the elegiac couplet beside her—Lu Dingyue.
That was Chongming's real name, which was unknown to others within the nuclear research institute.
At that moment, an overwhelming sense of panic and helplessness washed over him, veiling Chongming's hard-won joy under a glass dome. In truth, that dome had always been there, but he had always deliberately forgotten to open it, even forgetting its existence. But the butterfly within him couldn't fly out, hovering and struggling beneath the dome. He didn't know whether he wanted the butterfly to fly out alive, or to die as a specimen.
Humans are such strange creatures.
Chongming had been the center of attention since childhood, and he was used to being flattered and genuinely liked. He had seen so much of this that he could easily tell the difference. At first, Meng Lanjian's feelings for him were well hidden, but he still managed to touch upon those feelings. He couldn't accept them, so he wanted to use his nominal status as Zheng Xuerou's boyfriend to make her give up on him.
Ironically, he allowed his growing and persistent affection to spread wildly in a corner where no one paid attention. He thought he could hide his true intentions from everyone.
It wasn't until he and Lan Jian were walking through the golden forests of Wuyue Mountain that Meng Lan Jian, with a butterfly hair clip tucked behind her ear, asked him if he would still send Zheng Xue Rou abroad.
He was shocked to discover that she was even smarter and braver than he had imagined.
The moment he was struck by Meng Lanjian's gaze, his heart was struck hard by a luminous object that had gone astray. The Schrödinger's butterfly, as if it were about to commit martyrdom, crashed to its death against the glass.
His hidden, unseen emotions and soft-heartedness were also suffocated inside the glass enclosure.
He could no longer let her continue her fearless courage—when his father asked him to appear at his grandmother's funeral, he knew that his marriage was no longer his own decision.
He cruelly pushed her away, repeatedly thinking about what his grandmother had said, his heart filled with only regret.
Grandma, Chongming has finally met someone she likes. It's a pity you didn't get to see her.
Grandma, she bowed three times before your funeral, you could see that, right? She was someone I really wanted to be with, but I knew there was no future for us. So, does starting in that direction mean an inevitable, cruel hurt?
Grandma, I told her to go and have a real relationship. But what does love feel like? I don't even know myself. I only know that if she moves on sooner than me, I'll be better off.
So Chongming killed the butterfly.
I preserved it as a specimen, covered it with the pages of a diary, and let it remain in the past.
In the days leading up to his grandmother's funeral and before his business trip to Europe, he sensed that Lan Jian was acting differently. She seemed to have something to say to him. Finally, on the afternoon of the farewell dinner for him and Xue Xiang, only he and Lan Jian remained in the lab, still discussing a problem. He drove them to the restaurant alone. She familiarly went to the back seat, and as he passed her, he smelled the fragrance of her hair. They sat together every day, and he could smell the faint scent of her hair every day, but that day her hair smelled different—a particularly strong, herbal fragrance. He couldn't resist asking her after getting in the car, "Why does your shampoo smell so special today?"
Lan Jian was very interested in this topic. "I have a college classmate who is currently conducting research on 'NoPoo,' which is short for noshampoo. She is abroad and some plants are hard to find, so she asked me to help test the effectiveness of soapberry shampoo among the three major plant alternatives to commercial shampoos: tea seed, soapberry, and soapberry. I used it for the first time yesterday and felt that I used a bit too much; my hair became very dry."
"Then where did you find soapberries?"
"I ordered it from a traditional Chinese medicine shop in the suburbs."
Chongming casually retorted, "Did Guan Shaoxiao drive you all this way?"
"It wasn't him, it was my boyfriend who took me."
Chongming braked suddenly, causing Lan Jian to lurch forward. She grabbed the back of his chair, her forehead nearly hitting it.
"Are you alright?!" Chongming pulled over and turned on his lights.
He hurriedly got out of the back seat to check on her. "Take your hand away, let me see. Did you hurt yourself?"
"No, I used the back of my hand to cushion it so it didn't hurt." Lan Jian removed her hand, her eyes sparkling as she looked at Chongming. She laughed carefree, "How did you know I have a boyfriend? You're reacting so strongly?"
Chongming stared at her without saying a word.
"Are you so happy because I was the first to tell you this?"
"I'll go back now if you're alright."
Chongming closed the car door for her, then returned to the driver's seat without looking back and started the car. Lanjian did all the talking the rest of the way, telling him how she and Han Li got together and how happy she was in love these past few days.
Chongming stared irritably at the red light, which was just as incessantly blaring as Meng Lanjian's. He didn't want to look in the rearview mirror at her beaming expression.
There were so many red lights along the way that Chongming didn't want to listen to a word Meng Lanjian said. During the meal, she asked him for a drink, but he wouldn't let her have a single drop.
Why should she drink to celebrate? His heart was churning with bitterness, and he drank every single drink Meng Lanjian wanted.
That night, he got completely drunk. Zheng Xuerou sent him a message telling him she wanted to break up.
He seemed to have finally been freed, and passed out drunk.
On the red-eye flight to Europe the next day, Xue Xiang chatted with him about gossip, asking him how he knew that Lan Jian and the Huang family's boy were dating.
Chongming abruptly covered his face with the magazine to hide his furrowed brows, and replied uncooperatively that he was drunk and talking nonsense and didn't know anything.
But he knew in his heart that he knew everything.
Even Zheng Xuerou could tell that he liked Meng Lanjian.
The two met in the United States. Zheng Xuerou learned that he had traveled from the United States to Country X to discuss a joint doctoral program between the two universities with his professor because of Meng Lanjian. She smiled and said, "You like her so much, but you have to watch her go abroad. Doesn't that hurt?"
Chongming stubbornly denied it, saying, "Don't talk nonsense. I'm the senior, I should think more about the juniors."
"The Nuclear Research Institute only accepted Meng Lanjian as their last doctoral student. Which junior students are you going to think about?" Zheng Xuerou exposed him incisively. "I originally thought that you were willing to help me and act with me to deceive my mother because you had a little bit of affection for me beyond that of fellow students. But after seeing the photos of the dinner party in the group, I realized that you are not ignorant of love between men and women. You just hide it too well, and ordinary people are not favored by you."
Chongming was speechless, as if she had struck a nerve.
"Chongming, you can look at the photos of yourself when you have time. Your thoughtfulness and indulgence towards Meng Lanjian is not how a senior should treat a junior. Whether you admit it or not, I have said all I have to say."
That night, Meng Lanjian's sudden "SOS" sent Chongming, who was already in a state of turmoil, completely lost his composure. He decisively changed his flight and returned to Nanlu earlier. When he was packing his luggage, he saw the VR headset that took up almost half of his suitcase and felt like he had gone mad.
He clearly gets motion sickness from VR, and she clearly already has a boyfriend and will never go to his house again.
But he still bought it.
It was all because she casually remarked at the technology expo, "If anyone has something this fun at home, I'll immediately come over and beg to take it in."
Upon arriving at the airport, with plenty of time before boarding, he aimlessly browsed the duty-free shop when he suddenly overheard someone say, "This GODIVA is so unique; I've never seen it in Nanlu before!"
He recalled hearing from two years ago at the University of Washington that she had gone to the Roof of Europe to buy chocolates that could be bought at the South Slope Supermarket. By the time he came to his senses and boarded the plane, he was already carrying three boxes of chocolates.
These three boxes of chocolates later became his and Meng Lanjian's wedding candy.
@Someone who always refers to themselves as "Author" but suddenly feels a little awkward leaving a message:
0. Another really long chapter—I couldn't stop writing about all the little details. Don't mind how long and tedious it is TT
1. Professor Sang is the vegetarian professor who appeared in the previous article when Chongming secretly switched the cabbage bento!
2. Chongming Island is really awkward.
3. Finally, we've filled in so many hidden plot points!
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