Genius Playground

Chapter 5 Electricity

Yesterday, Jiang Ran speculated that the unexpected time travel of text messages was likely related to electricity, electric fields, and electromagnetic fields.

Isn't a text message essentially just a string of radio signals?
The transmission of a text message is actually the transmission of a radio wave.

If phone A wants to send a text message to phone B, the radio signal is first sent from phone A, then captured by the nearest base station tower, and finally sent to phone B by the base station tower.

This process is inevitable.

Even if phone A and phone B are placed side by side, text messages must first be transmitted to the cell tower, and then the cell tower will forward them to phone B.

Therefore, it is obvious that if text messages were to travel through time and return to the past, there are only two ways to achieve this—

1. The radio signal of the text message travels back to the past before reaching the signal tower.

2. The moment the signal tower receives the radio waves of the text message, it travels back in time.

No matter how you look at it... crossing a 100-meter-high steel signal tower is terrifying.

Moreover, the signal tower processes massive amounts of information every moment. If it were to travel through time, hundreds or even thousands of people at Tunghai University would receive a "time-travel message."

However, it is clear that time-space text messaging is not a common phenomenon, and there has never been any news about it.

therefore.

Jiang Ran put forward a bold hypothesis:
The radio waves from the text message he sent somehow traveled back in time to three days prior.

[Then this radio wave was picked up by a cell tower that had been monitoring it for three days, and subsequently relayed to Cheng Mengxue's phone three days prior.]

Radio waves are one of the few things in the universe that can travel at the speed of light.

To this day, the first radio broadcast sent by mankind in 1906 is still traveling at the speed of light in the universe.

The speed of light is always romantic and ambiguous.

Therefore, from this perspective... the above assumptions may not be entirely unreasonable.

"I have a feeling that we're getting closer and closer to the answer."

In class, Jiang Ran clicked away with her pen, looking out the window.

……

In the afternoon.

The trio reunited and headed to the Film Club on the first floor of the club activity building.

"Senior Yan Rui just received a disciplinary action..."

Cheng Mengxue whispered a reminder:
"Won't he get angry if we go to him at this time and ask him about the details of high-powered appliances?"

"Don't worry, I've already inquired."

Jiang Ran peered through the crack in the door into the film studio:
"Everyone says that Senior Yan Rui has a great personality and is easy to talk to. Moreover, this kind of warning is not recorded in the student's file, so it doesn't really have any impact on the graduate."

Inside the film club, old items were scattered everywhere, and a bespectacled senior was tidying up the items at a table.

That must be Yan Rui.

cough cough.

Jiang Ran cleared her throat and pushed open the door.

squeak...

The old wooden door groaned, its hoarse sound as aged as the time inside the house.

Yan Rui turned around and looked at the three of them:

"You are……"

"Hello, Senior Yan Rui."

Jiang Ran stepped forward and introduced herself:

"We are sophomores. My name is Jiang Ran, and I am in the School of Computer Science. These two are from the School of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering and the School of Fine Arts."

"Oh, hello everyone."

Yan Rui pushed up his glasses, looked around, and wanted to invite the three of them to sit down, but found that the activity room was full of clutter and dust... so he gave up.

"What's wrong with you?"

"I'm sorry, senior, I hope you don't mind. We came here because we saw the disciplinary notice outside."

Jiang Ran pointed to the door:

“We all felt that the punishment was too harsh and unfair. It was just the use of a high-powered appliance... Many students secretly use hair dryers and induction cookers in their dorm rooms, and no one gets punished.”

"Hehe, they're different."

Yan Rui shook his head and smiled:

"Thank you for your concern. But I'm graduating soon, and this kind of disciplinary action that won't be recorded in my file won't affect me at all."

"Besides, I completely understand why I was punished. This is not a simple short circuit and tripping... I burned the main circuit and meter box on the first floor, and the school didn't make me pay for it. They've already been very lenient with me."

"what?"

Jiang Ran pretended to be very surprised:
"What kind of high-powered appliance is so powerful? Is it a photo developing machine?"

"no no……"

Yan Rui shook his head:
"It's the [Positron Cannon]."

The three of them were so scared they turned into hedgehogs.

"Haha, you guys don't need to be so nervous, it's just a name."

"Have you seen the anime Evangelion? The person who made this device was just making a joke."

Yan Rui laughed heartily and pointed to the old cardboard box on the ground:

"I found it by accident while tidying up yesterday. I don't know which class of seniors made it."

"I found the name on the label interesting, so I was curious and took it out to try it out. But who would have thought... it blew up the electrical wiring as soon as I turned it on."

Jiang Ran squatted down and started rummaging through the old cardboard box.

It's empty inside now, covered in dust, and there are fallen robot animation stickers, from the anime "Neon Genesis Evangelion".

"Although it's called a positron cannon, the device is actually a modified CRT monitor's picture tube. You've all seen those old-fashioned, slicked-back monitors, right?"

Yan Rui continued to explain to the three of them:
"And the old-fashioned televisions used to work by accelerating an electron beam to near the speed of light and then bombarding the phosphor on the screen, which then displayed the image."

"The label on this positron cannon says that they modified the CRT picture tube to make it emit a beam of positrons outward, hence the name positron cannon."

"This is impossible."

Qin Feng, the top science and engineering student, is now online:

"Electrons are all negatively charged, so there are no positrons. The principle of a cathode ray tube is to accelerate electrons at the anode and emit them from the cathode... It's impossible to modify it to create a positron beam."

"Moreover, electron beams can only be emitted in a vacuum. The air is full of gas molecules and dust, and an electron beam cannot travel even one centimeter."

"you're right."

Yan Rui shrugged:
"So, it exploded, didn't it?"

"..." "..." "..."

The three of them were silent.

Well-reasoned and supported by evidence, leaving no room for rebuttal.

"I'm a science student too, so of course I know how ridiculous this kind of device that emits positron beams is."

Yan Rui turned around and continued tidying the windowsill:
"In the end, it's just a poorly made product cobbled together, or simply a ridiculous toy."

……

Qin Feng and Yan Rui reached a consensus that the so-called "positron cannon" was complete nonsense.

but.

Jiang Ran narrowed his eyes, catching the key words.

Electron beam.

Another thing related to electricity.

Could it be...

"Senior."

He stepped forward and asked:

"When you activated the positron cannon... that funny toy, yesterday afternoon, was it on this table?"

"Correct."

Yan Rui gestured with both hands:

"It's placed right here, with the so-called cannon barrel facing the window."

Jiang Ran looked out the window...

It seemed like a fateful encounter, a reunion with an old friend—that enormous, buzzing transformer distribution box.

"That is to say."

Jiang Ran placed his palm on the table:
"If, assuming the [Positron Cannon] can really fire a positron beam... then once that device is activated, the high-energy electron beam, accelerated to the speed of light, will hit the transformer distribution box outside the window."

"Probably." Yan Rui showed no interest in this.

"Can I ask you one last question, senior?"

Jiang Ran straightened up, unable to stop her heart rate from accelerating.

"Could you tell us... approximately what time it was when you activated the positron cannon that day?"

Yan Rui stopped tidying up.

Turn around slowly.

He looked at Jiang Ran and smiled helplessly:
"You're quite an interesting person."

"But I do remember the exact time, because the power went out instantly, and I specifically checked the time on my phone."

Sunlight streamed through the prism at the corner of the window, creating a rainbow that draped over Yan Rui.

"So I remember it very clearly."

He pushed up his glasses and looked up:
"The positron cannon was activated on the evening of March 17th..."

"6:05."

(End of this chapter)