Chapter 185
Translator: Dreamscribe
The day of leaving boot camp.
Seo-ha snapped into a crisp posture, brought his right hand to the edge of his eyebrow, and saluted.
"Trainee Number 17, Yu Seo-ha, reporting the successful completion of training! Thank you for your guidance during this time. Sir!"
As Seo-ha left the parade ground, the drill instructors saw him off with tears in their eyes.
"Take care! And don't ever come back!"
Relief that it was finally over was plain on their faces.
For four weeks, Seo-ha had been both the idol of the training camp and, at the same time, a protected charge everyone had to watch over. Worried that a single bruise might form on the body of the nation's first Fields Medal winner, they had had to come out at dawn to clear the pebbles from the parade ground.
The day before discharge, Seo-ha, filled with gratitude, carefully signed an autograph for each of the drill instructors who shyly approached him, one by one.
"Trainee Yu. No, Mr. Seo-ha."
The company commander came over with moist eyes and gripped Seo-ha's hand tightly.
"You have no idea how glad I am that you're leaving in good health. Your mind is a national treasure, so please take care of yourself out there in the world... You can bring back a Nobel Prize too, right?"
'But there's no Nobel Prize in mathematics.'
He swallowed the words that had risen to the back of his throat.
It wasn't as though there had never been a precedent of a mathematician receiving one, so perhaps it might be possible someday. Seo-ha expressed his thanks to them once more and walked out past the guard post.
The military uniform he had worn for four weeks had grown fairly comfortable on his body.
He took the bus toward home. As he entered the mouth of the village, the scenery of his hometown, unchanged in the slightest from the past, came into view.
He got off the bus and trudged along the road. Passing the old shopping district and the familiar tree at the village entrance, he could see, far in the distance, the house he had so longed to return to. It was before he had even stepped into the yard.
Bang.
The gate flew open and someone shot out at the speed of an arrow.
"Oppaaaaa!"
It was Seo-eun, who now looked quite the young lady. But the momentum with which she ran toward Seo-ha hadn't changed in the slightest from when she was seven years old.
Suddenly, a wave of longing washed over him. Back in his Gifted High School days, when he only came home on weekends, Seo-eun had always been exactly like this.
Seo-ha set down the duffel bag slung over his shoulder and spread his arms. At that, Seo-eun leapt into his embrace like a child.
"Ugh, were you doing alright, Seo-eun?"
Startled by the sudden weight, Seo-ha took a step back and held Seo-eun tightly.
"Yeah!"
"Did you say hi to your friends too?"
"Yeah, we play together every day. But I hate it when they keep asking me to speak English."
Seo-eun giggled and pulled him into the house.
Through the open door, Mi-young came hurrying out. She cupped both of Seo-ha's cheeks, looked him over this way and that, and let out a sigh of relief.
"Come on in. Let's eat."
Seo-eun was clutching the sleeve of Seo-ha's uniform tightly.
A delicious smell wafted out from the kitchen. Doenjang stew, stir-fried pork, seasoned spinach. They were all foods Seo-ha loved. Only now did it truly sink in that he was home.
"Mom, I'll help!"
Excited, Seo-eun got up and carried over the side dishes. When Seo-ha tried to help, the mother and daughter fiercely stopped him.
"Oppa, just stay put."
"You've been through a lot, so sit down."
The two voices came at the same time. Seo-ha chuckled and took his seat.
The spoons, chopsticks, and side dishes were set down one by one. Seo-ha's gaze drifted to one side. The chopsticks Seo-eun had put down were slightly crooked.
Sweep.
Seo-ha quietly reached out and realigned them, straight and square once more.
The room he entered after the meal was over.
Seo-ha's hand glided smoothly across the bookshelf. The texture of the books touching his fingertips was familiar. His gaze came to rest on the biographies of mathematicians tucked into the corner of the shelf. Gauss, Euler, Newton, Ramanujan, and Pascal, who had been the rival in his heart since childhood.
Seo-ha pulled out the thick hardcover bearing the name Blaise Pascal.
"Have I finally caught up to you at nineteen?"
Curly brown hair, eyes that seemed to pierce through to the essence of things. He looked at Seo-ha with an expression that said he was nowhere close.
"I'm still not enough. I know that too. After all, you completed a theorem named after yourself at sixteen. At my age, you'd already have built a mechanical calculator. But Pascal's Law came at twenty-five. Just watch. Things will be different by then."
The twenties were the era in which many great mathematicians had left immortal achievements behind.
For Seo-ha, who wished to be remembered as one of them in the distant future, it was the age at which he absolutely had to accomplish something even greater than the Riemann Hypothesis.
His hand trembled slightly.
If he couldn't surpass Pascal, he wouldn't even be able to approach Newton, Euler, or Gauss.
Suddenly, a voice spoke up.
'What's this, you know it perfectly well yourself, don't you? And yet, knowing that, you went and shut me away?'
Seo-ha glared at the top of the desk.
A ridiculous duck mask was glaring back at him.
"Why are you out already? Are you that impatient?"
'Don't make me laugh. You're the one who called me out.'
"I did?"
Seo-ha was at a loss for words.
He had no choice but to admit it. The one who had summoned Ducky was himself. The thirst suppressed within him couldn't be quenched by solving just a single difficult problem.
Over the past four weeks, Seo-ha had tried his hardest not to think about mathematics. He had resolved to let go of everything while running across the dusty parade ground and to restore his body and mind. But that very thought had only provoked Ducky instead.
'Do you really have time to be taking it that easy? You want to surpass those giants, don't you?'
The duck doll on the desk seemed to be urging him to pick up a pen that very instant. Seo-ha let out a deep sigh and leaned back into his desk chair.
"Be quiet. I know it even without you telling me."
Seo-ha's eyes lingered for a long while on the cover of Newton's autobiography.
A portrait printed in black and white.
"Newton, I won't blame the era I was born into. There are still plenty of unsolved mysteries left in this world. And..."
He was about to say something, but pressed his lips firmly shut.
Like the Law of Universal Gravitation and the Theory of Relativity, he wanted to someday complete a logic that explained everything in the world as one.
The Theory of Everything.
Humanity's final dream, the one Einstein devoted the last thirty years of his life to but departed without ever achieving. Only by completing this, it seemed, would Seo-ha finally be able to stand tall with his shoulders squared before the giants of the past.
"Let's make a killer cipher first. It's true that we made RSA obsolete, after all. You help too, Ducky."
Rattle.
When he opened the drawer, out came a palm-sized military-green notebook.
[Military Notebook]
Inside, equations were scrawled in a messy, flowing hand.
The moment he picked up the pen, his restlessness vanished and a sense of peace finally returned to his heart.
* * *
The dream workplace, Apex Lab Korea.
The thoughts of the researchers who came here were all alike. They would do their best, produce results, and leave their names on the next-generation PQC. And then add to their résumés one shining line that read "Collaborated with Team Apex".
"Since there are only six of them, they'll need more team members too, right?"
Hye-ran, a college classmate, asked Hyung-joo as if seeking his agreement. It was a question missing its subject, but he understood it at once.
"Who knows. It'd be huge if it happened, though."
The greatest perk among them, needless to say, was the chance to become an official member of Team Apex.
"Everyone's so quiet."
The researchers around them sat in front of their monitors with coffee in hand. But on a closer look, it was obvious they weren't doing anything at all.
The people on the other side were the same. They had their hands resting on their keyboards while their minds were somewhere else.
Ahem!
Perhaps finding the mood awkward, someone cleared their throat.
Today was that very day.
"What time did they say?"
"Eight o'clock."
Hyung-joo glanced at the clock on the wall.
[07 : 55 AM]
Beyond the glass wall of the conference room, Theo was visible. He stood with his arms crossed, looking toward the entrance. Su-jeong stood beside him, busily checking over some materials.
Ben and Sri wore anxious expressions. Cecilia was already on her second cup of black tea.
Watching them, Hyung-joo realized something for the first time.
'So even those people get nervous.'
The past four weeks.
Team Apex had greedily absorbed the knowledge that the elite Korean and American researchers had spent their lives building up. Cryptography, famous for being difficult. Yet they never got stuck anywhere. On top of that, their ability to take what they understood and apply it to their own specialties was nothing short of astonishing.
And now those monsters were clearly nervous.
So it was only natural that everyone harbored the same question.
'Just what kind of person is Yu Seo-ha?'
[08 : 00 AM]
Ding-dong.
Right on time, the elevator doors opened.
Seo-ha walked in.
Familiar jeans and a checkered shirt. The Military Notebook was tucked into his front pocket. He came striding down the hallway.
His gaze turned toward the chalkboards and whiteboards mounted on the walls. Without breaking his stride, Seo-ha quickly skimmed over them with his eyes. As if reading the table of contents of a book.
Seo-ha didn't throw his authority around.
In fact, the people around him knew well that he had a gentle disposition. But true authority comes from skill and achievement.
The moment he stepped into the main hall, the air changed.
The man who had proved the Riemann Hypothesis, a being held in awe by scholars across the world. A halo seemed to shine behind him.
Without anyone taking the lead, the researchers rose from their seats one by one. No one had given the order, yet it happened naturally, like flowing water.
"Here."
Ben had approached at some point and held out a white lab coat. Seo-ha took it and slipped it on without a second thought.
He stopped walking and looked at the researchers.
"Please, have a seat."
At Seo-ha's bright smile, the mood in the lab softened gently.
It was their first meeting. The researchers each sized Seo-ha up by their own standards.
'Thank goodness. He's so much nicer than our professor.'
'He's amazing at math, but he's still young, so maybe he'll be easy to handle.'
He took his seat and began reading through the materials that had piled up over the past four weeks.
Gulp.
The development proposal for the next-generation post-quantum cryptography that Hyung-joo had also had a hand in.
Team Apex were exceptionally brilliant mathematicians, but when it came to cryptography, they were no different from beginners. That was why the Korean and American governments had dispatched all this personnel.
Flip.
The speed at which he turned the pages was constant. The researchers held their breath and watched.
And Seo-ha was confused.
'Huh?'
His face gradually hardened, then at a certain point twisted sharply. Seeing this, Theo chuckled as if he had expected it.
'This is a cipher?'
It wasn't the math he knew.
The beauty of mathematics that Seo-ha pursued lay in explaining the greatest possible world with the least possible order. But the cipher system these people had built was buried in nothing but the single-minded thought of keeping attackers from cracking the code.
"Aah."
Seo-ha let out a single cry of anguish.
It was like a collapsing wall propped up with tens of thousands of supports. They had needlessly raised the degree of the polynomials and injected random noise, inflating nothing but the complexity.
The LWE (Learning With Errors) method, the mainstream of modern next-generation cryptography. It mixes errors into the correct answer to confuse the attacker.
Being experts, they had sound reasons behind their design. But to Seo-ha's eyes, this looked like a giant castle of garbage. Ducky let out an anguished "quack quack". He was so dizzy that his stomach was practically churning.
When he raised his head, he saw faces looking at him with expectant eyes. Not knowing what to say, Seo-ha put on a troubled expression.
*****
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