Chapter 144: The Lunar Gold Metal Has Arrived

Half an hour later, the bus arrived at the south gate of North China United University, and Zhang Mingyang and Bai Muqing stepped off the vehicle.

"Wow! Is this your university?"

Bai Muqing looked at the massive quartz school gate and marveled at its scale. "Even your school gate is this huge?"

"That's for sure!" Zhang Mingyang replied with a proud look. "You haven't seen the east gate yet. That's the main entrance, and it's twice as big as this one."

"If I'd known, I would have come back to my home country for college." Bai Muqing felt a deep sense of envy; the main entrance of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology was not even half the size of this place.

"It's past nine, let's head in quickly." Zhang Mingyang glanced at his watch, realizing it was almost time to meet his senior fellow apprentice.

At the security checkpoint of the school gate, Zhang Mingyang went through facial recognition first so he could process a temporary visitor pass for Bai Muqing.

Inside the guard booth, Zhang Mingyang explained the purpose of their visit to the security personnel and obtained a temporary pass valid for one day.

After finishing the paperwork, Zhang Mingyang hurried back to the security gate and motioned for Bai Muqing to scan her face for recognition.

"Temporary pass accepted. Entry granted."

The prompt sounded, the turnstile unlocked, and Bai Muqing quickly walked through.

Once inside the campus, Zhang Mingyang spotted an empty shuttle bus and dashed toward it. Unaware of the rush, Bai Muqing strolled leisurely behind him, admiring the surrounding scenery.

"Hurry up!"

Looking back and seeing that Bai Muqing had not kept up, Zhang Mingyang anxiously urged her on. "Get over here quickly! If we miss the shuttle, we're going to have to walk a long way on foot."

"What did you say?" Separated by quite a distance, Bai Muqing didn't catch what he was saying.

"Crap!"

Seeing the last two shuttle buses start their engines, Zhang Mingyang quickly ran over to flag them down. "Run! The buses are about to leave."

He shouted again, but Bai Muqing still didn't understand. "What did you say?"

"Are you hard of hearing?" Zhang Mingyang yelled before sprinting back toward her.

"What were you shouting about just now?" Bai Muqing asked as he ran up to her.

"Just follow me, or we'll miss the ride!" Without waiting for a response, he grabbed her delicate hand and pulled her toward the shuttle bus, ignoring her expression of surprise.

"Wait!"

They stopped the bus and climbed aboard. Zhang Mingyang found two empty seats and sat down, though he was still holding Bai Muqing's small hand.

"I really shouldn't have brought you out." Zhang Mingyang complained that she was too slow and almost made them miss the bus.

"Hey! What kind of look is that?" Zhang Mingyang glanced at the person beside him. Bai Muqing was looking at him with a shy, endearing expression.

"My hand!"

"What did you say?" Bai Muqing spoke in such a soft voice that he didn't catch it.

"I said, your hand!" Bai Muqing raised the hand he was still holding up for him to see.

"Oh...!"

Zhang Mingyang quickly let go. He had been in such a rush earlier that he grabbed it without thinking, and since he used his right hand, he hadn't felt any tactile sensation.

"Um... I didn't notice. I'm sorry." Zhang Mingyang stared out the bus window, feeling utterly embarrassed.

"It's fine. Actually, you can keep holding it if you want!"

"Huh?"

Zhang Mingyang hadn't expected her to say that, and he waved his hands hurriedly. "No need! No need!"

With that, he quickly punched their destination into the fare machine before they missed their stop.

After the little episode, the two of them looked out in opposite directions, neither speaking another word.

"The Energy Department stop has arrived. Students getting off here, please use the rear door."

Hearing the announcement, Zhang Mingyang nudged Bai Muqing beside him. "Hey, this is our stop."

"Oh!"

She hurriedly stood up and walked toward the exit.

Off the bus, Zhang Mingyang led her toward the direction of the laboratory.

"Where are we going?" Bai Muqing asked, looking at the surrounding architecture.

"To our research group's lab." He pointed toward a small hill ahead. "There's a collider inside, much like the one at the base, though it's much smaller in volume and length."

"Your school has something like that?" Bai Muqing was extremely surprised. She had heard of particle colliders; even MIT didn't possess such equipment, which was typically restricted to national-level research institutes. She hadn't expected to encounter one at a university today.

"What's so special about that?" Zhang Mingyang said with great complacency. "Our campus also has a large wind tunnel, a miniature rocket launch tower, and a ten-thousand-meter deep-sea submersible. We have all kinds of cutting-edge facilities."

"Your school is simply amazing!" Bai Muqing suddenly found herself envying the students here. With access to top-tier equipment and such beautiful scenery, who wouldn't want to study in a place like this?

"Here we are." Zhang Mingyang pointed at the massive iron gates ahead.

"Huh? Why are there several cars parked outside the iron gate?" Zhang Mingyang quickly led Bai Muqing forward at a run.

As he drew closer, he realized several people were unloading cargo from the vehicles, and his senior fellow apprentice seemed to be among them.

"Oh! Could the materials have arrived?" He quickened his pace and trotted over.

"Senior!"

Lin Su, who was on the truck, heard someone calling him and looked over. "Mingyang! You're here? And who is this?" Seeing a beautiful woman accompanying Zhang Mingyang, he stared at Bai Muqing and asked.

"Hello, I am Zhang Mingyang's girlfriend, Bai Muqing."

"Huh?"

Lin Su was dumbfounded. Not only him, but Zhang Mingyang was also stunned. He looked at Bai Muqing beside him and whispered, "Didn't you promise me you wouldn't say that?"

Bai Muqing blinked at him adorably and replied, "I forgot."

"You...!"

Lin Su stared at the stunning beauty before him for a moment before snapping back to reality. He leaped down from the truck and stepped forward to shake hands with Bai Muqing.

"Hello, I am Lin Su, Zhang Mingyang's senior."

"Hello." Bai Muqing's smile was exceptionally charming, leaving Lin Su completely captivated.

"Ahem!" Zhang Mingyang coughed twice and pried his senior's hand away. "Senior, have the materials arrived?"

"Huh? Oh, yes!" Lin Su collected himself. "They just got here. I was just helping the crew unload the truck."

Zhang Mingyang walked over to the truck bed and pulled out a slab of moon-gold metal. This was the exact material he had been waiting for; with the addition of moon-gold, this experiment would have at least a twenty percent higher chance of success.

"Senior, these metal plates are extremely precious. We must make sure no one else gets their hands on them!"

"Don't worry," Lin Su said with absolute confidence. "All the unloaded metal plates have been stored in the underground laboratory. No one can enter without our access pass."

"Good!"

Seeing the workers continuing to unload the cargo, Zhang Mingyang pulled Lin Su aside and asked in a low voice, "Senior, has the underground construction started yet?"

Lin Su glanced around and whispered back, "Rest assured. The people I hired are completely trustworthy. All the construction workers have been compensated well, so they won't go around blabbing."

"Good!" Zhang Mingyang finally felt relieved.

"Hey?" Lin Su nudged Zhang Mingyang, gesturing toward Bai Muqing. "When did you get yourself a girlfriend, kid? And such a gorgeous one at that?"

Hearing his senior's question, Zhang Mingyang initially intended to explain, but then he remembered that his senior was also single. In the end, he decided against clarifying. "She's been pestering me for months. At first, I kept turning her down because I thought she was too ugly, but she badgered me so relentlessly that I finally agreed last week to give her a one-month trial."