Originally, Herta returning to the Herta Space Station was a good thing.
When facing the two geniuses, he could use the excuse of working for Herta to cut off conversations.
Bai Luan originally thought this excuse could be used indefinitely, and in the period immediately after Herta returned, this excuse to end conversations was indeed very effective.
But recently, things started to go wrong.
Bai Luan could clearly feel that... the time the three geniuses spent together had increased.
Even when the three geniuses were all on the Herta Space Station, the actual time they spent together was only during the development of the simulated universe; the rest of the time, they each pursued their own research topics on the Space Station.
In this state, Bai Luan spent very little time facing all three geniuses simultaneously, so it wasn't as tiring to deal with them, and he could always use the reason of helping Herta to end conversations.
But recently... he wasn't sure if it was his imagination.
He just felt that the time the three geniuses spent together, communicating, had increased.
They no longer gathered only for the simulated universe project.
This was not good, very, very not good.
When three geniuses gathered, their thoughts diverged very quickly, making it very difficult to deal with them.
Moreover, even setting that aside, with three geniuses gathered, his foolproof excuse was rendered useless.
"I need to do something for Ms. Herta"... Ms. Herta herself was right here, so this excuse simply couldn't be used!
And why had the time the three geniuses spent together increased?
Ultimately, it was because of Bai Luan himself.
Originally, the fields involved by the three geniuses were different, and the only overlapping area was the simulated universe.
But with Bai Luan's arrival, it was different.
In order to keep up with the geniuses' thinking, he had gone to the Little Black Room for advanced studies in every field each genius was involved in.
Even now, every day when he faced the geniuses, he still had to go into the Little Black Room for advanced studies from time to time.
This led to Bai Luan being able to converse with any of the three geniuses.
For the three geniuses to gather, they needed to satisfy one condition: their interests had to have an intersection point.
That is to say, there had to be at least one thing that interested all three of them.
This intersection point used to be the simulated universe.
Now, there was another one.
Bai Luan himself had become the intersection point.
Now, wherever Bai Luan was, the three geniuses could gather there.
Bai Luan was not stupid; after the time the three geniuses spent together noticeably increased, he quickly realized something was wrong.
After some reasoning and verification, he discovered with a look of despair that he had become the geniuses' new intersection point of interest, besides the simulated universe.
Things had already become like this; he couldn't go back to the past and start over.
But he didn't understand!
He didn't understand how all of this had become like this!
During this time, he had clearly done nothing different from what he had done before when he gathered with the three geniuses.
But why did Ruan Mei and Screwllum's evaluation of him keep getting higher?
He was clearly performing the same as before!
The same operations, in the past, would result in an 8.0 score.
How come this season, when he looked at the settlement screen, his score had become 13.0?
"Are you all crazy? I'm clearly treading water, but you insist on pointing at me and saying I'm making rapid progress?"
What's more, he even deliberately gave a lot of wrong suggestions to lower the geniuses' impression of him.
And the suggestions he gave were ambiguous, appearing correct but requiring a certain amount of time to prove wrong, making them highly costly incorrect suggestions.
Logically speaking, the geniuses' evaluation of him shouldn't have changed.
It didn't make sense.
The more Bai Luan thought about it, the more confused he became, the more depressed he felt; he thought for a long time in the Little Black Room but couldn't figure out why.
Finally, a single sentence from Herta in the Little Black Room clarified it for Bai Luan.
That is, geniuses are completely different from ordinary people; ordinary people often need to make mistakes multiple times for them to turn into experience.
But for a genius, making a mistake is no different from making progress.
So, now the situation was very clear.
Given that, in the eyes of a genius, error = progress, Bai Luan provided two types of suggestions to the geniuses: correct suggestions and incorrect suggestions.
And these two types of suggestions would follow the following two processes.
Correct suggestion → adopted, project progresses → genius's evaluation of him rises.
Incorrect suggestion → adopted, error occurs → error summarized, experience gained → progress made → genius's evaluation of him rises.
After the two logical chains were sorted out, Bai Luan smiled with relief.
Haha, so that's how it is, no wonder their evaluation of me went up.
Hahaha.
So doing nothing at all is the best solution?
What have I been doing all this time?! (Painful mask)
After a period of frantic desperation in the Little Black Room, Bai Luan calmed down.
It's okay, it's not the most desperate moment yet, there must still be some way to salvage it... Hmm, if only I could start developing a time machine now, then travel through time back to the past and strangle the me who was frantically giving suggestions to the two geniuses, all problems would be solved.
When this ridiculous idea popped into Bai Luan's head, he knew he was out of options.
All strategies exhausted.
『That's so cool, I'm going to write this part of your raving into my thesis』
"What are you showing your mentor?!"
『Hmm, still able to retort, not crazy』
"I think I'm close."
『That's so cool, I'm going to write that into my thesis too』
"..."
A helpless, bitter smile appeared on Bai Luan's face.
He needed some time to accept reality.
They hadn't even started building the simulated universe DLC yet, and the workload was already like this; Bai Luan didn't dare to imagine what it would be like when it actually began.
Alas, life is not easy, Bai Luan sighed.
Herta walked over, first looking at the dejected Bai Luan with interest.
She rarely saw Bai Luan so troubled.
Most of the time, he was very optimistic.
"What's wrong with my assistant? I don't usually see you sighing like this."
"Don't worry about me, I'm just a little tired and need to rest."
"Oh? Is that so? Then I'll help you recharge."
Herta smiled and opened her arms to Bai Luan.
"Uh... this is?"
"Come, give this genius a hug."
Saying that, she moved her hands, continuing to invite Bai Luan.
"...Isn't facing me directly a bit too stimulating for me?"
"I know."
Herta took a step forward, pressing closer.
"This genius did it on purpose."
"Then... then alright."
Bai Luan opened his arms, somewhat hesitantly embracing Herta in front of him.
It was his first time being so close to someone of the opposite sex, so much so that he turned his face away, not daring to look at her face.
Aside from the unique shyness of a first face-to-face hug.
When he hugged her, his hands could feel Herta's hanging hair tickling him.
It was... warm, reassuring, and he could feel a sense of peace.
He had to admit, that hug indeed made him relax a lot.
But as expected, it was still too stimulating for him; after hugging for a while, Bai Luan was the first to give in, letting go.
"Thank you, Ms. Herta, with this hug, I think I'll be very quick..."
But Bai Luan let go, and Herta did not.
"Ms. Herta?"
When Herta heard Bai Luan's slightly questioning voice, she showed a mischievous smile.
Suddenly, she squeezed harder, hugging him very tightly, and the two, who had been slightly apart, pressed their faces together.
Herta's slightly teasing voice came from beside Bai Luan's ear:
"Your heart is beating very fast~"
Bai Luan temporarily lost his ability to form words.
Then he felt a series of soft touches on his face.
Herta rubbed her face against his.
"This time it's fine, next time, don't turn your face away."
Then, she released Bai Luan, and seeing his overwhelmed state, she laughed out loud.
Then Herta reached out a finger and poked Bai Luan's nose.
"You, you, you're only allowed to show this expression to this genius in your life, understand?"
Bai Luan's brain had frozen, but his underlying code was still running; hearing Herta's request, he subconsciously nodded...