After breaking up with my boyfriend, I made a fortune and rose rapidly in my career.

"Fang Zhifang?"

Chen Ping leaned back in his seat, holding his phone. Li Mingyuan paused for a moment on the other end of the line.

"The Provincial Commission for Discipline Inspection didn't say much about the specifics. But the timing is too coincidental. Fang Zhiyuan just suffered a setback at the Provincial Party Committee meeting this morning, and his sister was placed under investigation this afternoon. It's definitely not a coincidence."

Chen Ping moved his thumb on his knee.

"Mayor Li, I am not involved in Fang Zhifang's matter, nor do I wish to comment on it. I have already resolved the equipment issues at the Chipfire Phase II project, and Han Zhengke will be released this afternoon."

"Okay, you handled it quickly. We'll talk again when you get back."

After hanging up the phone, Jiang Fan glanced at himself in the rearview mirror. Chen Ping didn't say anything, tossed his phone onto the seat next to him, and closed his eyes.

After the car passed the Jiacheng toll station, Chen Ping opened his eyes and dialed another number.

The phone rang six times before it was answered.

"Yuanzhou, have you arrived in Nanzhou yet?"

It was noisy on the other end of the phone; I could hear announcements from the waiting hall.

"I just got off the high-speed train and I'm at the exit."

Lin Yuanzhou's voice was very hoarse.

"Take the train to the right after you exit the station. There's a budget hotel across the street. Stay there for the night. I'll have someone pick you up at eight o'clock tomorrow morning."

After hanging up the phone, Chen Ping found the email that Lin Yuanzhou had sent him three days ago.

The email subject was "Optimization Scheme for Silicon Carbide Crystal Growth Process Parameters (Seventh Edition)".

The attachments contain all the experimental data and crystal growth models.

Although Chen Pingfang couldn't understand it, the chief engineer of the Chipfire Center commented that it was at the top level in China after reading it.

Lin Yuanzhou was Chen Pingfang's college classmate and a PhD student in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at Tsinghua and Peking Universities.

After graduation, I worked at the Institute of Semiconductors, Chinese Academy of Sciences for eight years, published more than 20 SCI papers, and received the National Natural Science Foundation of China grant twice.

Three months ago, he was ostracized and forced to leave the research group due to conflicts, and even his access card to the laboratory was taken away.

When Chen Ping found Lin Yuanzhou, he was staying in a rented room in his hometown.

The room was in a bad state. There was a half-eaten instant noodle on the table, and a very old laptop with a broken fan.

The next morning, around eight o'clock, Jiang Fan drove to the entrance of the budget hotel.

Lin Yuanzhou was already waiting by the roadside, carrying an old suitcase.

He was wearing black-rimmed glasses, a plaid shirt, and his trousers were a little dirty.

He was only thirty-four years old, but he looked much older, like someone in their forties.

Chen Ping rolled down the car window and said to him, "Get in."

Lin Yuanzhou opened the back door and got in.

He put his suitcase in the trunk.

"You've lost weight," Chen Ping said, looking at him.

Lin Yuanzhou replied, "Because I do a lot of experiments, I eat less."

He pushed up his glasses, his expression unchanged, but he looked very tired.

The car drove directly into the High-tech Zone.

The first floor of the management committee building is an open office area with more than 30 workstations. By 8:30 a.m., most people had already arrived.

As soon as Chen Pingfang led Lin Yuanzhou in through the main entrance, everyone in the office turned to look at them.

Someone noticed a stranger standing next to Chen Pingfang and whispered among themselves to their colleagues. Although the voices were low, Chen Pingfang still caught a few words: old classmate, parachuted in, nepotism.

Without stopping, he walked directly to the projection screen in the middle of the office area.

"Xiao Jiang, project Lin Yuanzhou's technical solution onto the screen."

Jiang Fan took out a USB drive and plugged it into the projector.

The curtain lit up. The first page was a temperature field simulation model of a silicon carbide crystal growth furnace, with color gradients accurate to 0.1 degrees Celsius. The second page was a comparison table of crystal defect densities, showing that Lin Yuanzhou's solution could reduce the microtube defect density from 15 per square centimeter to 0.8. The third page directly provided a yield prediction: a yield of 91% in the pilot stage and over 95% after mass production.

The office area suddenly became quiet.

Chen Ping turned around and looked at everyone.

"This is Dr. Lin Yuanzhou, a graduate of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at Tsinghua University, who worked at the Institute of Semiconductors, Chinese Academy of Sciences for eight years. His silicon carbide crystal growth process plan was reviewed three times by the Chipfire Center Technical Committee and received the highest overall score."

Chen Ping's finger tapped the set of defect density data on the screen.

"The microtube defect density is 0.8. The highest publicly available record in China is 1.2, which was achieved by Tiankehe Semiconductor last year. Lin Yuanzhou's solution is one-third lower than their data."

Chen Ping paused for a moment.

"If anyone has objections to this candidate, they can present their own technical solution and compare it with this data."

No one speaks.

The young clerk who had been whispering about nepotism earlier had his head almost buried in the computer screen.

Chen Ping turned off the projector and patted Lin Yuanzhou on the shoulder.

"Come on, I'll show you the lab."

The two left the office area and went to Building B of the Corefire Center. They took the elevator to the third floor and arrived at room 304 at the end of the corridor.

A sheet of A4 paper was pasted on the door, which read "Silicon Carbide Pilot Laboratory (Under Construction)".

Chen Ping swiped his card and opened the door.

The lab is about 60 square meters, not very big. On the left wall are two pieces of equipment covered with dust cloths, on the right are empty shelves and a lab bench, and there is some packaging waste on the floor.

"The equipment hasn't all arrived yet. The crystal growth furnace from Han Zhengke's place won't be delivered until the 15th of next month. These two are old testing machines left behind by Sun Zhaohui. See if they're still usable."

Lin Yuanzhou squatted down and lifted the dust cover on the first piece of equipment.

The first was a very old X-ray diffractometer; the label was yellowed. The second was a high-temperature microscope, with its power cord haphazardly tucked behind the base.

"It'll do for now." Lin Yuanzhou touched the sample stage of the diffractometer, his fingers covered in a layer of dust. "I'll use it for some preliminary work, and then replace it with the new equipment when it arrives."

Chen Ping leaned against the door frame, watching Lin Yuanzhou wander around the two old pieces of equipment, already planning in his mind how to set up the laboratory.

"Let's go to the talent apartment and book a place to stay first. The lab won't miss this one day."

The talent apartment is located on the east side of the High-tech Zone, just a ten-minute walk away. The apartment has two bedrooms and a living room, is fully furnished, and has south-facing windows.

Lin Yuanzhou dragged his suitcase into the bedroom, then drew back the curtains in the living room. Sunlight streamed in, brightening half the living room.

Lin Yuanzhou stood by the window, his hands in his pockets, his tense shoulders relaxing.

Chen Ping took two bottles of water from the refrigerator and tossed one to Lin Yuanzhou.

"Alright, stop thinking about useless things. Get the pilot production line up and running."

Lin Yuanzhou took the water, unscrewed the cap, and drank most of the bottle.

"Lie it flat, consider this a debt I owe you."

"What are you lacking? Getting a 95% yield rate is more valuable than anything else."

Chen Ping sat for about ten minutes, explaining everything about the property and the cafeteria, and then got up and left.

At four o'clock in the afternoon, Lin Yuanzhou returned to Laboratory 304.

He prepared to start cleaning up the two old pieces of equipment.

He first went to work on the high-temperature microscope and found that several screws on the base were rusted and could not be turned.

Lin Yuanzhou found a wrench and struggled to unscrew the screw.

When he removed the base, he saw that there was something underneath, a very old cushioning pad that looked quite brittle.

Lin Yuanzhou wanted to take the cushioning pad out and throw it away, but when he took it out, he noticed something underneath it.

It was a kraft paper envelope, and the envelope was not sealed.

Lin Yuanzhou opened the envelope and took out three sheets of A4 paper.

The paper has yellowed, and the words on it are a bit hard to read, but the title is still legible.

The document reads "Details of the Disbursement of the Industrial Guidance Fund of Nanzhou High-tech Zone (2022 - Internal)".

The second column of the paper listed the payee, and he saw the name Dingsheng Venture Capital appear many times.

Lin Yuanzhou did not recognize the company Dingsheng Venture Capital.

However, when he saw the words "guidance fund" and "internal", he felt that this thing might be very important and he was a little nervous.

He stared at the contents, completely stunned.

He looked down and saw a signature in the bottom right corner of the last sheet of paper; it was Sun Zhaohui's name.