The Soul Paper Scandal
The Scholar Society exchange meeting.
An invitation from Scholar had arrived. It was an invitation for a knowledge exchange. The timing was perfect. I decided to accept, both to report that I’d completed the 100 million dollar research project they’d taken from me before, and to casually toss them the soul research I’d uncovered while smashing apart World’s Enemies.
A few days later, just like always, a single black vehicle pulled up in front of the Evils Enterprise building. Leaving behind Vira—who was delighted about suddenly getting an unexpected vacation—I climbed into the car alone and headed for the society headquarters.
By now I was quite familiar with the all-black vehicle. The moment I arrived at Scholar, the members who had arrived first greeted me warmly.
“Dr. Eight.”
“President.”
“Haha—! You really shouldn’t call me that here. I’m just the third member, after all.”
Swallon, president of the Esper Research Academy and Scholar No. 3, scratched his cheek with an awkward smile. I shook his hand in friendly greeting, then turned my gaze to Dr. Kuroi, who was standing respectfully behind him.
When our eyes met, Dr. Kuroi’s face filled with an expression of utmost reverence, as if he were a believer beholding his god. He bowed his head carefully and offered a greeting.
“It is an honor to see you again, Dr. Eight.”
“Yes, it’s been a while, Dr. Kuroi. And how have you been, Lucia?”
“I have been well, my Creator.”
I quickly wrapped up the greetings with the two people who always gave me such difficult responses, then looked around and asked the president.
“—Dr. Swallon? Are we the only ones here today?”
“No. There’s one more person coming. I believe you already know them, Dr. Eight…”
“Someone I know?”
I tilted my head, wondering if there was anyone like that among the Scholar members. Just then, a bronze-skinned beauty slowly walked out from deeper inside the Scholar headquarters.
She had a healthy, vibrant appearance that didn’t quite match the typical image of a scientist. Her face was etched with a deep scowl, as if something had put her in a foul mood. Yet even with that frown, her skin showed remarkably few wrinkles—making it obvious she was either quite young or put serious effort into skincare.
In other words, she was second-rate as a scientist.
“—Was it you?”
“Pardon?”
“Did you send me that email?”
“Email… Ah, then you must be Dr. Siira?”
“Looks like it.”
The woman in front of me reached into the pocket of her lab coat and pulled out a research paper. It was the paper I had organized and sent to her—the one summarizing everything I’d learned about souls while researching elementals. I had forwarded it to Dr. Siira’s email address.
Since I had no proper academic credentials and had never even done foundational soul research, submitting it myself would have been laughed off as a joke. So I sent it to Dr. Siira, who was already known for researching souls. If it carried her name, people would at least give it a proper look.
It seemed she had been quite impressed by the paper. She even printed it out and brought it with her?
“You’re saying you wrote this?”
“Yes, that’s correct.”
“Why the hell did you send it to me of all people?”
“It’s not my main field of research, and since I don’t have any degrees, submitting it myself would obviously get ignored. So I sent it to you, Dr. Siira, as a fellow Scholar member.”
“…You want to borrow my name? You’re asking me to submit it as a joint paper?”
Hearing her words, I tilted my head in genuine confusion and asked back.
“Joint research? No, there’s no need for that. You can submit it as your solo paper.”
“Solo… paper—?”
“Yes. It’s not that big a deal. I can just write another one if I need to…”
Riiiiip—!
Before I could even finish speaking, Dr. Siira began tearing the paper in her hands to shreds. Her hands moved with pure rage.
After ripping it apart for a long while, she still wasn’t satisfied. Panting heavily, she started stomping violently on the scattered scraps littering the floor.
“You fucking—piece of—shit—!”
The paper was being thoroughly defiled. The sight triggered a slight trauma in me. What if that had been my graduation thesis, the one I’d stayed up all night for an entire month writing? Just thinking about it made my teeth clench.
Fortunately, the paper being torn in front of me wasn’t my graduation thesis, and I hadn’t stayed up all month writing it, so I managed to calm down.
“—You son of a bitch.”
“…Why are you suddenly swearing at me?”
“Are you really that good at research? Is the world full of geniuses like you while the rest of us look like complete idiots?!”
“Uh…”
Of course I didn’t think that. That would be like a modern graduate student who majored in mathematics going back in time and looking down on Newton, Gauss, or Pythagoras.
But Dr. Siira must have interpreted my hesitation differently. She flipped me the middle finger and shouted.
“Fuck off, you bastard.”
“…I really didn’t think that.”
“Just wait a little. I’ll bring something far superior to the crap you scribbled down. Got it?”
With those words, Dr. Siira turned and disappeared somewhere. As I watched her retreating back, Dr. Kuroi—who had been quietly watching our exchange—sidled up and whispered.
“My lord… It seems this time even the god has made a mistake…”
“Hey, can you stop with the whole ‘god’ thing already…”
Honestly, I didn’t think writing a free research paper was such a terrible thing. Back in my old world, there were plenty of professors who demanded far worse.
But seeing Dr. Kuroi’s reaction, I roughly understood. This time, it really was my fault.
“Haa…”
After leaving Scholar, Siira chain-smoked furiously inside the car heading back to her lab. The dark interior quickly filled with cigarette smoke, but neither she nor the driver seemed to care.
In fact, the driver kept asking worried questions about what was wrong.
“Are you alright, Dr. Siira?”
“…I’m fine. Just focus on driving.”
“Yes. My apologies.”
Arriving at her lab while still puffing away in silence, Siira threw off her smoke-stained clothes and headed straight for the bathroom.
The water that poured from the shower was so cold it made her jump even though she’d turned it on herself. Even as the freezing water cooled her heated skin, the irritation and rage dominating her mind refused to settle.
What? ‘I can write as many of those as I want’?
Just thinking about it again made her blood boil. If her patience had been even slightly lower, she might have punched the bathroom wall repeatedly. Of course, she had plenty of patience and wasn’t stupid enough to smash a solid wall with her bare fist, so that didn’t happen.
After finishing her shower and returning to the lab, Siira sat down in her personal chair and stared at the paper she had written. …Honestly, it was garbage.
This was after she had seen that paper. The curse of knowledge. Once you knew the correct answer, the problem looked absurdly easy. At the same time, you realized just how flawed your own solution had been.
…Fucking bastard.
She craved a cigarette. But with superhuman patience, Siira suppressed the urge and began revising her paper. She tried her hardest not to think about Eight’s paper.
After writing nonstop for hours and hours, she finally finished the revisions. It was a tremendous improvement compared to her original draft.
Yes. It looked exactly like the paper someone had casually emailed her.
“Ah, fuck…”
When she read it again, most of it was just patchwork from the paper Eight had sent. In other words, it was essentially plagiarism. But there was nothing she could do. When two people fought over the same topic with only one correct answer, if the other side had already found the right one first, anything this side did would inevitably look like copying.
This time she couldn’t hold back. Deleting the painstakingly written paper, Siira bit down on a new cigarette and instinctively began clicking her mouse. That clicking eventually led her to click on Eight’s paper sitting on her desktop.
That perfect, beautiful answer sheet washed through her mind.
Ah…
‘A Comprehensive Summary of the Soul.’ What an arrogantly grandiose title, she had thought. She even wondered if he was mocking her for being so obsessed with this field. But that wasn’t it.
There wasn’t the slightest exaggeration in the paper’s title. After reading just two sentences, she realized he had simply written the facts plainly.
It was like seeing a pioneer who had already reached the end of a path she had been stumbling through in complete darkness without a single light. She realized the entire direction of her research until now had been wrong.
“Fuck… ing hell…”
“With this, the proof of the soul is complete.”
The first time she read that sentence, goosebumps had erupted across her entire body. Even now, after reading it countless times, it was the same. This was the future—the completion—of the research topic she had devoted her entire life to, and would continue to devote herself to.
And it had been born from someone else’s hands. That alone made her furious, but the fact that the person himself didn’t even seem to care made her even angrier.
It felt like everything she had done until now was being treated as worthless.
“So this… is what a true genius looks like…”
Haa—. Exhaling a thick cloud of smoke, Siira let out a bitter laugh. She had climbed this far while being called a genius herself, but she never imagined she would hit a wall even here.
After staring at the paper for a long time, Siira carefully navigated to a paper submission site. She wanted to make things difficult for the person who created this.
What? ‘You can submit it as your solo paper’? ‘No one would believe me since I don’t have a degree’?
Siira submitted the paper with Eight’s name first and her own second—as a joint research paper. Perhaps thanks to her name value, the number of views began skyrocketing immediately.
News would probably start pouring out by the end of the day. And if it didn’t, she would make sure it did.
“From now on, you’re going to have to research this topic with me for the rest of your life.”
He had to take responsibility for stealing her entire life’s work. Siira muttered to herself and let out a soft, giggling laugh.
“Hmm?”
I was in the middle of cooking ramen in the lab when I heard my name on the TV news and perked up my ears. No matter how many times I looked, the name on the screen was definitely mine.
…Why is my name appearing there?
It was completely incomprehensible, but there was one thing I knew for certain.
“I’d better eat this quickly…”
Riiiiing—! Hearing the phone ring from the boss, I hurriedly worked my chopsticks. Every extra bite was a victory.