「The next day.」
In the project team's conference room, the air was thick with a suffocating anxiety.
The ashtrays were already overflowing.
Empty coffee cups were stacked in layers.
The futility of an all-nighter was etched on every haggard face.
Zhao Yu's voice was hoarse.
His bloodshot eyes swept over every downcast face.
"Speak up."
"Even a wild idea will do."
No one answered.
The conference room was dead silent.
Every solution they could try had been declared a failure.
Every theory they could deduce had led to a dead end.
The fatal high-frequency resonance problem had become an insurmountable obstacle standing in everyone's way.
Chen Gang kept his head down, his fingers swiping aimlessly across the light screen.
On the screen, the "Helmholtz Resonance Trap" model he was once so proud of now seemed like a cruel joke.
Into this frozen despair, a calm voice rang out clearly.
"Engineer Zhao, I have an idea."
SWOOSH!
In an instant, every gaze in the room focused on a corner of the conference room.
Han Feng rose from his seat.
For the past half-month, he had been quiet in the project team.
He never participated in discussions.
He only ever spoke up after each failed simulation test, precisely pointing out the "lesion" that no one else could detect.
But now, everyone understood that just finding the lesion was meaningless.
What they needed was a cure.
A cure that could bring the dead back to life.
Zhao Yu looked up, a final flicker of hope igniting in his bloodshot eyes.
"Speak."
"Our approach may have been flawed from the very beginning."
Han Feng walked to the holographic projector in the center of the room but didn't call up any complex data models.
He simply extended a finger and drew a simple circle in the air.
It represented the engine's pressurization chamber.
"We've been reinforcing the blades or trying to divert the turbulence after it has already formed."
"It's like waiting for a flood to reach our doorstep before we scramble to pile up sandbags and dig drainage channels."
His voice was steady and unhurried, each word striking a chord with everyone present.
"Why don't we go upstream…"
"...and tame the current before it becomes a raging torrent?"
His words were simple and easy to understand, yet they left all the top-tier engineers in the room momentarily stunned.
Engineer Qian pushed up his greasy glasses, his brow deeply furrowed in thought.
"Han Feng, when you say 'upstream,' are you referring to the point before the Spiritual Power enters the pressurization chamber?"
"We tried installing a flow-stabilizing array, but it resulted in at least a seven percent loss in energy efficiency. The trade-off wasn't worth it."
"No."
Han Feng shook his head.
"I'm talking about the very source of the energy's transformation."
"In other words, the inner wall of the pressurization chamber."
Chen Gang, who had been looking down the whole time, snapped his head up!
He didn't voice any doubts. Instead, his mind raced at an unprecedented speed, madly extrapolating along Han Feng's line of thought.
"The inner wall of the pressurization chamber?"
"My solution was to carve micro-grooves on the inner wall, but as you all saw, that created new problems."
"Your solution was to 'block' it—a physical-level interference."
Han Feng looked at Chen Gang, his tone calm.
"My idea, on the other hand, is to 'comb' it."
He reached out and manipulated the holographic model, and the inner wall of the pressurization chamber instantly magnified to fill their entire view.
"I suggest we abandon all the complex structures."
"We only need to use a high-precision Spiritual Energy Carving Saber to inscribe three 'Qi-Guiding Patterns' on the inner wall."
As he finished speaking, he drew three simple, spiral-shaped patterns on the smooth model of the inner wall.
The three patterns were as simple as doodles, possessing no aesthetic or logical basis that could be explained by modern fluid dynamics.
"Qi-Guiding Patterns?"
A young engineer scratched his head, his face a mask of confusion.
"Aren't these just a few spiral lines?"
"Will that even work?"
Chen Gang frowned, staring intently at the three simple lines.
As a top-tier theoretician, his mind churned through an ocean of knowledge, trying to find even the slightest theoretical basis for it.
"From the perspective of traditional fluid dynamics, these three spiral lines are too simple to have any effective macroscopic impact on a high-speed Spiritual Energy Fluid."
Chen Gang began to speak, his voice unusually calm and filled with the pure tone of academic inquiry.
"Their structure isn't even complex enough to form an effective resonance-cancellation model."
"However…"
His tone shifted, and a look of astonishment mixed with an almost fanatical light flashed in his eyes!
"What if this isn't physical interference, but rather a form of guidance from some kind of Energy Field?"
"Like how a magnet guides iron filings!"
"Could it be that these three patterns form… an 'energy-guiding field' on the chamber wall's surface that our current instruments are completely unable to detect?!"
Chen Gang's words were like a clap of thunder, jolting every engineer in the room wide awake!
"That's right! Using an Energy Field to 'comb' the Energy Flow! That approach…"
"But what's the theoretical basis?"
"Why would these three lines generate a guiding field?"
"What are the calculation formulas?"
"How can we simulate and verify it?"
The questions seemed to have brought them back to square one.
Han Feng looked at the crowd and calmly explained.
"I don't have formulas or data."
"This is just an association I made while reading some ancient Array Maps."
"The purpose of these three Qi-Guiding Patterns isn't to block or guide the Spiritual Qi."
"Instead, through their very shape, they create a kind of 'resonance' with the high-speed flow of Spiritual Qi."
He used the word 'resonance'.
"It's like a comb."
"At the very moment the Spiritual Qi is compressed and about to turn turbulent, it preemptively combs it smooth."
"As long as the Energy Flow at the source is stable, then no matter how it impacts the turbine blades later on, it won't produce destructive high-frequency resonance."
Engineer Qian's brow furrowed even tighter.
"Han Feng, your explanation is too… vague."
"All of our designs must be based on quantifiable data."
"However, your line of thinking has indeed opened a new window for us."
"That's right."
Chen Gang nodded in agreement.
"Although it can't be proven theoretically, it provides a completely new direction for verification."
"We've been trapped by data. Maybe we should try this… unquantifiable method."
Zhao Yu, who had been silent all this time, let his gaze drift from the three simple spiral lines Han Feng had drawn to Chen Gang's incredibly complex micro-groove model beside it.
A moment later, he slammed his fist on the table!
"I don't care if this is mysticism or science!"
"At the very least, he's proposed a new direction we never even considered! And the cost is extremely low!"
Zhao Yu shot to his feet and issued a decisive command.
"Old Liu!"
"Get a new pressurization chamber ready immediately! Follow Han Feng's design and carve these three lines onto it!"
Chen Gang looked at Zhao Yu, then at Han Feng. His lips moved, and he finally said something that shocked everyone.
"Engineer Zhao, I suggest you have Han Feng supervise personally, or even… have him do it himself."
There was no jealousy in his voice, only a pure, ultimate reverence for the truth.
"Since this is his idea, his understanding of these three 'Qi-Guiding Patterns' must be the deepest."
"A hair's breadth of deviation could lead to a thousand miles of error."
「Half an hour later.」
In the machining workshop, a brand-new pressurization chamber was secured to a workbench, gleaming with the cold light unique to metal.
Han Feng personally put on a clean-suit and picked up the slender Spiritual Energy Carving Saber.
"I'll do it."
He declined the assistance of the First Level Technician standing beside him.
The moment he gripped the carving saber, his entire aura changed abruptly.
The surrounding noise, the hum of the instruments, the gazes of the onlookers…
He shut it all out.
In his Perception, the cold metal seemed to come alive.
He could clearly "see" the crystal lattice structure within the metal and the potential paths of Energy Flow.
He began to carve.