Chapter 85: Seals and Compatibility

Six in the morning. The alarm had not yet rung, but Lin Chen was already awake. In the growing light, the water stain on the ceiling slowly came into focus, its edges jagged and irregular. He threw back the blanket and put on his shoes. Medical tape was wrapped around his left ankle; in the damp spring weather, the old injury gave off a faint, dull ache. He flexed his toes, confirming the joint still moved normally and would not affect his gait. He washed up. Splashed cold water on his face. Skin tightening. Mind clear. Awake.

Seven-ten. Corridor outside the Academic Affairs Office. The line already stretched to the stairwell. The air smelled of chalk dust, old paper, and damp, peeling plaster. Lin Chen stood at the end of the queue and pulled his independent admissions document pouch from his canvas bag. He checked it page by page. Personal statement. Transcript copies. Competition certificates. Recommendation letter. Edges aligned. No creases. He still needed Teacher Wang’s final official stamp. At exactly nine, the wooden office door opened. Teacher Wang, wearing reading glasses, checked the roster, his finger moving slowly across the form. Then the stamp came down. Smack. Red ink seeped into the paper fibers. Lin Chen stared at the circular seal. The edges were crisp. No bleeding. He accepted it with both hands. Thanked him. Turned away. The file was complete. The process loop was closed.

Late morning. The science composite and math scores were posted. A red ranking sheet had been pinned to the back wall of the classroom. Lin Chen walked over and scanned downward from the top. His own name was on the seventh line. Science composite: 241. Math: 138. The total score had not been posted yet, but his rank was within the top fifteen in the grade. Chen Hao’s name was on the third line. Math: 146. Science composite: 253. The gap was steady. No surprises. Around him, voices dropped into hushed discussion. Someone slapped a desk; someone else sighed. Lin Chen did not linger. He returned to his seat, opened his notebook of mistakes, and marked in red the point loss on the final electromagnetism problem in the science paper. He had skipped steps. Lost four points. The college entrance exam awarded points step by step. He filled in the missing derivation. His pen moved with a dry rustle. Outside the window, the shadow of camphor trees crawled slowly across the desk. He did not look up. His eyes stayed fixed on the page. Competition thinking pursued the optimal solution; gaokao thinking pursued reliable points. The underlying logic was different, but the execution path was the same: break down, verify, allow for error. He forced himself to switch channels, like flipping a relay in a circuit. Click. Connected.

Afternoon. The computer room was empty. Lin Chen dragged in that old canvas bag and set the secondhand laptop—taken out from under his bed—on the desk. Its shell had yellowed with age. The ports were loose. He plugged it in. The fan gave a low hum. The screen lit up. White text on blue. Windows 98. He needed to confirm the testing environment for the computer exam. He inserted the flash drive. Four gigabytes. The test room requirements: a C compiler, the basic Python libraries, and a text editor. He installed them one by one. TC 2.0. The Python installer. Notepad++. The progress bar crept upward. The hard drive churned heavily, like an old tractor climbing a hill. Installation complete. He opened TC 2.0. Created a new file. Typed: #include <stdio.h>. Compiled. Passed. Ran it. A black window popped up. Hello World. He closed it. Opened Python. print \"test\" Enter. Output normal. He wrote down the version numbers. The exam room would not provide internet access. Every dependency had to be packaged locally. He wrote the compiler path, environment variable settings, and commonly used header files onto a sheet of scratch paper. Folded it. Slipped it into the flash drive’s protective sleeve. Compatibility was a hard requirement. If it wasn’t compatible, everything went to zero.

Toward evening. At the edge of the athletic field, Lin Chen dialed a public telephone. Dropped in a coin. Fifty cents. The number was for the office of the teacher leading the competition team at Provincial University of Science and Technology. Busy signal. He dialed again. Connected.

“Hello?”

The voice was familiar, blurred by static on the line.

“Teacher Li, this is Lin Chen from Qinghe No. 1 High School. For the independent admissions computer test at Provincial Tech, the exam room requires us to bring our own computers. I wanted to ask whether the lab will be open this weekend. Or... whether it might be possible to stay one night in the guesthouse?”

There was a two-second silence on the other end. The sound of a keyboard tapping.

“Lin Chen, ah. The lab won’t be open on weekends. The guesthouse is possible, but you’ll need a letter of introduction. Did you bring proof from your school?”

“I did.”

“All right then. When you arrive, go straight to the security office at the south gate and register there. Give them my name. Beds are tight—only one night. The computer test is in Information Building 304. Bring your own power strip. The voltage in the exam room is unstable, so be careful with your equipment.”

“Thank you, Teacher.”

“Do your best. Don’t be nervous.”

The call ended. Lin Chen set down the receiver. The coin return rang out with a metallic clink. He walked back to the dormitory, spread open his account book, and calculated.

Hard-seat train ticket: 24. Guesthouse: 30 (secured). Meals: 30. Printing: 2.5. Emergency reserve: 5. Total: 91.5.

Cash on hand: 33.8. Shortfall: 57.7.

He crossed out “Emergency reserve: 5 yuan” and changed it to “Emergency: 3 yuan.” Shortfall: 55.7.

Countermeasure: cut food costs. Two days in the provincial capital—eat only steamed buns and drink boiled water. The cafeteria’s free soup was unlimited. That could save 15 yuan. Shortfall: 40.7.

For the rest, he would offset it by drawing in advance against his competition prize money. That would depend on the interview result. Risk: if he failed the preliminary screening, the prize money would not be issued.

He stared at the figures. Not anxious. Only calculating. Then he closed the account book and slid it into the drawer. Reality had no tolerance for error. Only priorities.

Evening self-study. The classroom was quiet. Lin Chen placed the document pouch, flash drive, laptop charger, power strip, ID card, admission slip, cash, bandages, and desiccant packets into the canvas bag one by one. The weight was evenly distributed. He adjusted the shoulder strap to the right length. He put the bag on and stood up. His center of gravity was steady. A slight pain throbbed in his left foot. Manageable. He walked to the window. Night over the county town was dense and heavy. In the distance, a train whistle sounded—long and low, like some kind of signal. He returned to his seat, opened his notebook of mistakes, turned to the final page, and wrote:

Chapter 85 Objectives Document file completed. Environment configured. Travel confirmed. Funding gap reduced to 40.7 yuan. Next step: depart at 7:15 a.m. on April 18.

He closed the notebook. Turned out the light. Lay down. In the darkness, he listened to his own breathing—steady, long, even. There were no fantasies in his mind. Only a checklist. Departure time. Transfer route. Exam room seat. Compiler version. Voltage fluctuation. Bandage replacement. Every variable had been entered. All that remained was execution.

The wind rose outside the window. Camphor leaves brushed against the glass with soft, scattered sounds. Lin Chen closed his eyes. His fingers tapped unconsciously against the bedsheet, the rhythm steady—like a heartbeat, like a countdown. Early tomorrow morning, he still had to go to the school clinic for a health certificate. In the afternoon, he had to verify the train timetable again. The weather forecast said there would be showers in the provincial capital. He needed to bring one more plastic bag. Waterproof. Moisture-proof. Accident-proof.

He thought no further. Sleep was the only way to restore his strength. He adjusted his breathing, slowed the rhythm, and let his consciousness gradually sink, like a piece of iron dropping to the bottom of the water. Quiet. Stable. Waiting to be pulled up again.