From child prodigy to chief scientist

"Xiaoxiao, after dinner, let's go to Teacher Zhao's house together..."

It was only through Xu Lang and Yu Guilan that Xu Xiao learned that they wanted him to take the entrance exam for the Yucai Children's Class.

Xu Xiao seemed indifferent to this. For him, no matter where he went to study next, he would mainly rely on self-study.

However, after thinking about it again, Xu Xiao felt that going to the children's class was indeed a better choice.

Although in principle, one can freely register for the college entrance examination, in practice it is not so easy and may require a very complicated procedure.

However, if you can get into the Yucai Children's Class, you can enjoy better educational resources and have a much greater chance of entering university earlier.

With that in mind, Xu Xiao quickly agreed.

After finishing their meal, Xu Lang and Yu Guilan took Xu Xiao to their homeroom teacher Zhao Mingyuan's house.

On the way, Yu Guilan also made a special effort to buy some high-end fruits.

Since we need their help, it's not appropriate to go empty-handed.

"Teacher Zhao, I'm sorry to bother you."

"Hey, you're here already, why did you bring anything? No need to take off your shoes, just come in."

Xu Xiao and the other two were naturally embarrassed to dirty Zhao Mingyuan's floor, so they took the initiative to change into slippers.

After inviting Xu Xiao and her family to sit down, Zhao Mingyuan shifted the topic to Xu Xiao.

"Xu Xiaoping usually performs well at school, and her grades have consistently ranked among the top five in her class."

"However, it is indeed very difficult to get into the Yucai Junior Class. Every year, thousands of people apply, but only a few dozen are actually admitted..."

Zhao Mingyuan subtly expressed his opinion: given Xu Xiao's previous performance, the chances of her getting into Yucai Children's Class were indeed too slim.

Xu Lang and Yu Guilan roughly understood what Zhao Mingyuan meant, and their expressions became somewhat serious.

"Teacher Zhao, isn't it a bit unrealistic to suggest that Xu Xiao take the entrance exam for the gifted youth program?" Xu Lang asked.

"It's not that absolute. It's worth a try, but it's best to be mentally prepared. It's perfectly normal not to pass the exam."

Looking back over the years, the number of students who have been able to enter the Yucai Junior Class from Gangdu Primary School can be counted on one hand.

After a moment of silence, Yu Guilan seemed to have made a decision.

"Teacher Zhao, didn't you print out the exam questions for the Yucai Junior Class for Xu Xiao? Why don't you let Xu Xiao do them first and see how well he can answer them?"

"That's what I think too. If Xu Xiao does answer well, I would also support him to sign up and give it a try."

As he spoke, Zhao Mingyuan found a set of test papers and handed them to Xu Xiao.

"This is last year's exam paper for Yucai Children's Class. It is divided into several parts: mathematics, Chinese, English, and general knowledge. The normal full score is 200 points, and the exam time is only 120 minutes."

"Just go back and finish the math section first; that's worth 120 points. It's okay if you take your time; just bring it over for me to grade tomorrow."

Zhao Mingyuan was well aware of the difficulty of this set of questions. When he had other top students from Gangcheng Elementary School do this set of questions before, none of them were able to get more than half the marks.

If Xu Xiao were to stay here to do practice problems at night, he probably wouldn't be able to solve more than a few in one night.

After receiving the exam paper, Xu Xiao glanced at the questions.

"I thought it would be a really difficult question, but it's not that hard after all."

It's clear that these questions are indeed much more difficult than normal elementary school questions, but they're not far from being extremely difficult.

With Xu Xiao's abilities, as long as he is even slightly serious, there is absolutely no way he could lose points on this.

"Teacher Zhao, you don't need to go home to do it. Lend me a pen, and I can finish it in a little while."

Xu Xiao seemed to be asking Zhao Mingyuan to "serve him a pen and ink," which surprised Zhao Mingyuan for a moment before he handed over a pen.

"Okay! Then we'll proceed according to the normal exam standards. You'll have a maximum of one and a half hours. We'll start grading your papers after that."

Zhao Mingyuan was also somewhat displeased by Xu Xiao's arrogant attitude.

Since Xu Xiao was so stubborn, Zhao Mingyuan didn't intend to show him any more leniency.

"Xu Xiao, why don't we just go home and do it? Let's not waste Teacher Zhao's time here," Xu Lang advised.

Xu Lang had just glanced at the test paper and knew that the questions were indeed not easy.

However, Xu Xiao did not respond to this, but instead picked up a pen and started working.

Seeing this, Xu Lang and Yu Guilan said nothing more and just watched Xu Xiao answer the questions silently.

They realized just from the first question how difficult the set of questions was.

In a typical elementary school curriculum, the first question is usually a simple decimal or fraction calculation problem.

But even adults like them find it difficult to give an answer to this question right away.

How many different ways are there to divide 2016 candies into several equal groups, with each group containing between 10 and 40 candies?

According to their approach, they need to calculate every integer between 10 and 40 to see if it is divisible by 2016.

However, such calculations are extremely complex and may not be completed in five minutes, and there is a high risk of omissions.

But before they could think of a better method, Xu Xiao had already completed his answer—

Nine types.

Seeing Xu Xiao's work on the draft paper, Xu Lang finally realized what was going on.

"So it turns out that you first factorize the numbers into prime factors, which makes the calculation much faster."

Although I understood Xu Xiao's line of thought, it was indeed not an easy thing to calculate the correct answer so quickly.

Seeing Xu Xiao demonstrate such abilities, Xu Lang and Yu Guilan felt much more confident.

Within minutes, Xu Xiao had finished several questions, some of which he hadn't even used any scratch paper for.

As adults, Xu Lang and Yu Guilan should be able to solve most of these problems if they take them seriously.

However, they could never answer questions as quickly as Xu Xiao; they would be lucky to finish half of the questions in an hour.

There are two types of benches in the meeting room: one with two seats and one with four seats. A number of students attend the meeting. Some students sit one on each of the two-seat benches, while the remaining students sit in groups of three on each of the four-seat benches. The average number of seats per student is 1.35. Since the total number of students is less than 70, what is the total number of students?

"This problem requires setting up an equation, and two unknowns... Wait, Xiaoxiao, you even know how to solve a two-variable equation?"

Seeing that Xu Xiao's thinking was basically the same as his, Xu Lang's eyes widened in surprise again.

According to Xu Lang's memory, this knowledge was taught at least in junior high school.

But considering that Xu Xiaolian can understand logarithmic functions, it's not surprising that he can solve bivariate equations.