[—Vera Pulyuy]
[2020.6.8.]
When Lu Zhou’s line of sight fell on the second row, his heartbeat suddenly calmed down.
“Was it written when she was still teaching at Princeton?”
She didn’t mention this to me.
But thinking about it carefully, it seems that only she would write such a thing.
Although they were academic acquaintances, during his stay in Princeton, the closest contact he had was probably the little apprentice that he liked the most.
And if he remembered correctly, Hardy wasn’t able to join the Ivy Club. But he wrote a recommendation letter for Vera, introducing her to the club.
With a hint of curiosity, Lu Zhou, who wanted to know what Vera had to say, turned to the next page, skipped the table of contents, and looked directly at the prologue.
The content written in the prologue was an academic lecture given by Professor Helfgott at the University of California, Berkeley.
If he remembered correctly, that was from 2015.
Lu Zhou remembered clearly that, at that time, he had just won the honor of the Cole Number Theory Prize, and he had just made Goldbach’s conjecture the next goal of his research.
In that lecture, Professor Helfgott showed him the “Hardy-Littlewood circle method”, an important mathematical tool, and the progress he made on Goldbach’s conjecture using this tool.
The specific details were blurred in Lu Zhou’s mind.
However, the author who wrote this biography was particularly impressed by the academic lecture, and she even remembered the color of the clothes he was wearing at the time.
With delicate brushwork, she wrote on the first page of the prologue.
[Some people say that everyone is an apple that God took a bite from, but because some apples are particularly delicious, God took an extra bite.
[And he is undoubtedly an apple beloved by God.
[I still remembered the academic lecture on the application of the circle method given by Professor Helfgott. It was also my first encounter with him.
[At that time, he was not a professor at Princeton, nor was he the protagonist of this lecture. As part of an audience, he sat in the crowd like me, quietly thinking about Professor Helfgott’s theory and writing in his notebook at the same time.
[I still remembered that it was December, but like always, the weather in Los Angeles was perfect. Sunny with clear skies. At that time, he was wearing a white button-up shirt and blue jeans. When he walked past me, I realized that my heart skipped a beat.
[Of course, what impressed me was not his clothes, but the brilliance of his reasoning and the kindness in his heart.
[Because of the perplexity of Professor Helfgott’s theory, I was in a nervous mood and asked him some of the puzzles in the lecture that confused me.
[However, even for a nobody like me, he still patiently answered the confusions in my heart.
[I listened very carefully because his voice was pleasant. Although it was only a few sentences, it seemed to have a reassuring affinity and a powerful but non-aggressive persuasiveness. No matter how complicated the mathematical problem was, under his explanation, it became simple and easy to understand.
[At that time, I imagined that, if one day, I could sit in the classroom and listen to his lectures, it would be amazing. I didn’t expect that this wish would come true many years later.
[However, as I said before, God gave him a mind that was close to the pinnacle of mankind, but God also took something from him…
[Something special.
[I once prayed that God would return it to him.]
The lines of printed text flowed like a trickle on the slightly yellowed paper.
This didn’t sound like a biography; it was more like something else…
After reading the entire text, Lu Zhou gulped.
Although he opened this biography with curiosity, he felt that it was the wrong decision.
He felt like he was riding a tiger.
To be honest, he had never experienced similar timidity when facing the threats of The Spirit of The Universe Foundation…
Well, not really timidity.
More like fear.
He then looked at the librarian who was standing behind the front desk. After remaining silent for a while, he asked, “Can I take away this… biography about me?”
After hearing Lu Zhou’s words, the elderly librarian hesitated and said in a compromising tone, “Of course… This biography is written in your name. If there is false content in it and it arouses your disgust, of course you have the right to remove it from the shelf.”
Lu Zhou: “Not disgust… and there is nothing wrong with it.”
At most, it just made him feel a little embarrassed.
Even a person like him, who wouldn’t get emotional in these situations, could see that this was not a biography at all. Instead, it was a million-word love letter.
As if seeing the embarrassment on Lu Zhou’s face, the librarian smiled and joked, “I know; who didn’t do a few stupid things when they were young? There is nothing to be embarrassed about.”
“Although I don’t know what you are thinking about, I can swear that it’s not what you think.”
“Whether it is or not, it is not easy to write a million words. There should be some deep thoughts and feeling inside. I understand very well that everything seems heavy in the face of time, but can you really bear to tear the pages from the heart of a little girl? Even after 100 years.”
Lu Zhou was silent for a while. He finally put down the biography.
Although he didn’t want the future generations to have some strange misunderstandings about him, if this biography really carried so much meaning, he really shouldn’t take it away.
Looking at Lu Zhou, the librarian showed him a warm smile and took the book from his hands.
“Thank you. You have given future generations a chance to dig out treasures from history, and you have also preserved the youth of a young girl… I feel the joy of my grandfather.”
Lu Zhou squinted his eyes at him and said, “Your grandfather was not a person who was interested in gossip.”
“I know that the old man always talked about ‘civilized wealth’, but you can’t deny that this biography is not civilized wealth?”
The funny old man winked at Lu Zhou.
“After all, the biggest difference between humans and machines is that humans have emotions!”
