The time on the operating table was two hours and twelve minutes, each step was completed successfully in one go, without any rework, hesitation, or any redundant "let’s take another look" operations.

Gao Yuan took off his surgical gown and gloves, flexing his fingers, which bore deep indentations from long hours of holding the instruments.

Robert also removed his surgical gown. The two stood side by side at the operating table, looking at the last freeze-frame on the screen. The reconstructed anterior and posterior cruciate ligaments were clearly visible in the joint cavity, two pink cord-like structures crossed at the center of the knee joint, full in form, accurate in position, and moderate in tension.

The door of the observation room opened.

The experts filed out with varied expressions, some still watching the video replay on their phones, some quickly jotting down notes, some shaking their heads as they walked—not in denial, but in a disbelief of amazement.

A middle-aged expert came over, shook Gao Yuan’s hand, and said, "I’ve been doing this for twenty years, I’ve never seen anyone navigate positioning so quickly without navigation equipment. How did you do it?"

Gao Yuan looked into his eyes and replied, "Experience and intuition!"

The expert was taken aback, perhaps expecting a more technical answer, like angles, references, or calculation methods. But Gao Yuan gave him the least "technical" answer.

Experience and intuition—this answer might sound like a cop-out, but in Gao Yuan’s gaze, the expert saw not a cop-out, but a realm he had never attained. In that realm, surgery was no longer a pile of techniques, but became an instinct, an intuition, something as natural as breathing.

An elderly professor with a head full of white hair came over, and Gao Yuan recognized him, the director of a well-established medical center on the East Coast, one of the pioneers in anterior cruciate ligament research, a figure written into textbooks. As the old man approached, the surrounding people automatically made way.

He stood before Gao Yuan, did not shake hands or exchange pleasantries. He merely looked at Gao Yuan.

"I’ve been doing anterior and posterior cruciate ligament reconstructions for forty years, thinking I’d seen it all. Today, I saw something in this surgery I’d never seen before. Your anterior and posterior cruciate ligament tibial tunnel positioning—I’ve not seen anyone describe this method in any literature. Is it your original creation?"

Gao Yuan shook his head: "It’s not mine, it’s my teacher, Professor Yang Ping."

The old professor nodded, so that’s it.

In the changing room, Gao Yuan sat on a bench, resting.

"In the afternoon," Robert said, his voice slightly hoarse, "they’ll have a lot of questions."

"Yes!" Gao Yuan said.

"Have you thought about how to answer them?"

"I’ll speak honestly," Gao Yuan said, "Just as Professor Yang taught me."

After resting for a while, they went to the hospital restaurant for lunch.

At two in the afternoon, the small meeting room was full.

It was not an official academic presentation, no podium, no nameplates, no agenda. Just an email sent by Robert—"Doctor Gao is here, you can come and ask questions." Then everyone came if they were free, even that old professor who had sat silently throughout in the observation room yesterday. The room didn’t have enough chairs, some were standing, some leaned against the wall, some simply sat on the floor.

Gao Yuan sat at the front, without notes, without a PowerPoint, only a bottle of mineral water. He was very casual, not looking like a surgeon who had just brought collective silence to the top sports medicine experts in America, but more like a neighbor dropping by.

Robert sat next to him, cross-legged, twirling a pen in his hand. He wouldn’t answer questions for Gao Yuan, but he would help translate those professional terms when needed. However, he was mentally prepared that Gao Yuan might not need his translation. Gao Yuan’s English was good enough, good enough to discuss any technical detail with anyone.

A young resident physician sitting in the corner raised a hand, and before Gao Yuan could point at him, he couldn’t wait to speak.

"Doctor Gao, during yesterday’s surgery, for the femoral tunnel positioning of the anterior cruciate ligament, you didn’t use any navigation equipment, how did you ensure the precision of the tunnel position? What anatomical landmarks did you use?"

Gao Yuan did not answer immediately. He stood up, walked to the whiteboard at the front of the meeting room, picked up a black marker, and drew a lateral outline of a knee joint. He spoke while drawing, his pace not fast, but each word was clear and powerful.

"The textbooks tell you that the femoral attachment point of the anterior cruciate ligament is located on the medial wall of the intercondylar notch, behind the intercondylar ridge. This statement isn’t wrong but it’s not precise enough. Because the intercondylar ridge is often worn flat in patients with chronic injuries, you can’t find it. Moreover, even if the intercondylar ridge is intact, it only provides a front-back reference, not an up-down reference."

He drew an arrow on the board, pointing at the medial surface of the lateral femoral condyle.

"I use the most ordinary ’resident ridge.’ It’s a bony protrusion located at the upper rear part of the medial wall of the intercondylar notch, proximal to the intercondylar ridge. This structure is more constant because it’s outside the joint capsule, unaffected by intra-articular diseases. No matter how damaged a patient’s joint is, this ridge remains. Find it, then move seven millimeters forward and two millimeters down—right at the center of the native footprint. Actually, my description isn’t very precise—I’m just describing it in a way everyone can understand. When I truly operate, I don’t use seven millimeters or two millimeters for positioning; rather, I rely on the tactile feel of the probe. The ligament’s footprint and non-footprint react differently under the probe, and its mechanical center differs as well."