Why Are You Here?
Why Are You Here?
[You have comprehended the Top-grade Fire Magic "Chaser Flow."]
[The following changes have occurred to your thesis examination progress:]
[Fire Magic: 836 acquired → 837 acquired (out of 1048 total)]
"Ugh...."
I had pulled an all-nighter. My temples throbbed from spending half a day using nothing but my head. Yawns came one after another.
Still, it was more bearable than I thought. I had been accustomed to staying up all night ever since the old days.
Staying up through the night was a kind of habit I'd had long before I met Professor Haspelt. If I traced my memory back... yeah. It started when I was preparing for the high school entrance exams.
Even if I was exhausted, the work still had to be done. A slave was, by definition, such a creature. Shaking off my idle thoughts, I took out the broom I always used from the common storage room.
As always, that day began with the morning sweeping. Because not a single fallen leaf must be on the path when my lovely... whatever, professor arrived at work.
"Hyaaam."
I was sleepy. Sleepy as hell, like I might just die. My vision was so blurry it felt like I was wearing glasses with the wrong prescription.
Clutching the broom, I sat down on a nearby bench. I even pretended to sweep the surroundings from my seat. But. It wasn't working. My body was too heavy and wouldn't move the way I wanted it to.
"......!"
The sound of trudging footsteps jolted me fully awake. I launched myself off the bench on reflex.
My intuition wasn't wrong. Golden hair fluttered right before my eyes.
"......."
"It's a fine day, Professor."
"Were you dozing off?"
"Yes."
"...You're needlessly brazen."
Because if I tried to bullshit you, it wouldn't end with just losing a hand.
"Did you finish everything I told you to do yesterday?"
"Yes. Here you are."
A muscle twitched around Professor Haspelt's eyes as she took the thirty scrolls from me.
Her face looked more fatigued than usual. I didn't know if she hadn't slept or hadn't put on makeup, but her appearance was more haggard than normal. Seeing her eyelids occasionally twitch, she seemed to be lacking magnesium. Even her hair, normally like threads of gold, looked somewhat brittle.
"No... problem. You made them well."
Most of all, her voice was a tone lower than usual.
"Follow me right away today. You don't need to clean the lab."
"But I haven't finished cleaning up yet."
"This much is enough. Don't argue, just follow me."
"......."
I followed behind Professor Haspelt with a quick, mincing gait.
**
It was only after some time had passed that I realized it. The fact that Haspelt was strange that day.
The sun had already passed its zenith, but I hadn't heard a single nag. Normally, she would have thrown hysterics, asking if I couldn't even do this right, or why I was so clueless, but she hadn't shown a hint of irritation.
"Professor, we're short on enamel. Shall I go fetch some?"
"No. I'll borrow some from a colleague, so rest for a moment."
What the...? Had she eaten something bad the day before? A chill ran down my spine from some inexplicable sense of wrongness.
They say people's attitudes change when they're about to die. Or maybe she had grown grudgingly fond of me—I still couldn't tell. It was hard for me to read another woman's mind.
Even while I was constantly running circuits in my head to grasp her intention, my hands never stopped. I spent the time writing other scrolls or tidying up the desk.
Soon, Haspelt, who had gone outside, came back in, opening and closing the door. She had a bundle of copper wire in one hand and was holding a plate in the other.
Now what was that? Surely she wasn't planning to smash my head in with that plate?
"Come over here for a moment."
"What is this?"
"I received it from a colleague."
Well, there it was. It was just food. I supposed being tired had briefly made my thoughts a little extreme.
On a plate engraved with a hyacinth pattern sat a Mont Blanc and two slices of spinach quiche. The surface of the Mont Blanc was glossy, as if it had been glazed with honey, and the quiche had balsamic dressing on top. Was it normal to sprinkle balsamic on quiche...?
"You didn't eat lunch."
Haspelt pulled out a chair and pushed the plate toward me. It meant come here and sit down.
It felt like I'd been hit in the head with a staff instead of being offered a plate. In the span of a few seconds, several hypotheses surfaced in my brain, which had already calculated every possible scenario.
The most credible among them was the 'Last Supper' scenario. It was a vicious strategy to fatten me up with the best possible quality before selling me back to the slave market. Just like when the original homeowner completely guts and remodels the interior before selling a house, Haspelt intended to dump me at the peak price.
Of course, she would. She had spent over a thousand gold coins just to buy me. That price could even purchase a High Elf who was holed up deep in the Great Forest and never came out.
It was truly a pity for Haspelt, who paid that much for the sole reason that I was decent at math—or so I thought.......
"What are you doing? Just standing there blankly."
"...Pardon me."
"I already ate, so it's fine. Go ahead."
I sat in the chair with a reverent heart. I had somehow shaken off the drowsiness. Right then, I was more rational than ever. I decided to produce the most appropriate reply using the interpersonal skills I had cultivated so far.
"Professor."
"What is it?"
"I believe eating in the lab is inappropriate."
I looked around as I continued.
"Coated scrolls might be a different matter, but raw Magic Paper is like a wafer that holds a semiconductor and must not be contaminated by even the smallest foreign substance. Besides that, aren't there many sensitive experimental instruments here? As you once told me in the past, Professor, I consider eating in a place like this to be conduct unbecoming of a researcher's attitude and dignity."
I was a body that had slogged away in labs for over ten years, counting my time as an undergraduate intern. Basic rules that had to be followed in a lab were long since ingrained in me. That was precisely why Haspelt never scolded me when it came to research attitude alone.
I could deal with my hunger later. Most of all, the chocolate incident from the day before had put me off sugar.
Haspelt stared at me with a blank look. It was the most uncharacteristic expression I'd seen on her lately.
"...Right. You know well. Saved me the trouble of re-educating you."
She moved the plate to a cool spot. That didn't mean I couldn't eat that delicious-looking food, though. As soon as she told me I could go eat in the outside lounge after finishing the task, I bolted out like a dog.
I set the plate down on the table in the lounge. The yellowish texture of the Mont Blanc, the chewiness of the Gruyère cheese in the quiche.... Ah shit, why the hell did she add balsamic? It ruined the flavor.
No, that wasn't the important thing right then. I sank into thought as I ate my lunch-slash-snack.
Anyway, Haspelt's condition was strange. Normally, if I declined something like this, she wouldn't have insisted repeatedly.......
Sure enough. Professor Haspelt's eccentric behavior continued the next day.
Whenever materials ran low, she would go outside in my stead, or she would come to the hallway we always met in before me and tell me I no longer needed to sweep there.
It was as if she was trying to curry favor with me.
No, if you looked purely at the overall labor intensity, it had actually gotten worse.
The morning cleaning time was entirely converted to research time, and the dinner period was pushed back. The amount of time I spent stuck to Haspelt during the workday had increased.
When something was needed, Haspelt began going out herself instead of me. Whenever we ran out of Magic Stones or Magic-Circuit Components for circuits, she immediately obtained them from a nearby lab.
"You finished faster than I thought."
This was the background behind how I had finished writing scrolls that would normally take a week in just three days. How nice would it have been if it had been like this from the start?
"I'll go and deliver these, so rest for a moment."
Three hundred completed "Light Arrow" scrolls, and fifty "Chaser Flow" scrolls. An hour would be enough for her to deliver the goods to the knights' order and return.
That day's lunch was a chicken breast salad sprinkled with peppermint. The taste was stable when I chewed the asparagus and cherry tomatoes together.
On the other hand, being treated to expensive food for two days in a row made me feel somehow uneasy. The effect of gaslighting was no joke. Or maybe it was because my stomach had finally found peace after three years.
Clunk.
As I was chewing my chicken with vegetables in the lounge, Professor Haspelt thrust a shopping basket in front of me.
"Are you going to the market?"
"I received information that a Top-Grade Magic Stone has appeared. The afternoon will be a little busy."
It was a thing that happened occasionally. Using me as a pack mule.
Haspelt rarely went to the market, but when she did, she bought a lot of goods at once. Even the day she brought me here, she had bought a ton of things along the way, so from day one, I thought my arms were going to fall off.
"Are you ready?"
"Yes, Professor."
We each finished preparing to go out and then stepped out of the academy gates.
The academy had a place similar to the 'University Street' from my original world, just like a university. Beneath the well-paved main road, countless shopping districts were lined up, raking in the money of students and faculty.
It was an unfamiliar sight for someone like me. If there was something I wanted to buy, I used to order it via delivery, so I rarely ever went outside specifically to buy something. That was probably why the general stores lining both sides of the main street felt so foreign.
Of course, there was one other reason besides that.
"I greet the Duke!"
"What are you doing...! Move aside, quickly!"
The marketplace was bustling with crowds, but whenever Haspelt and I passed through, people cleared the way on their own. So there was a human ambulance right there.
Wasn't this a nuisance...?
Come to think of it, it was a strange thing. Normally, a person holding a ducal title would send a servant and wouldn't come out personally to buy things. Above all, this was a place mainly used by commoners or low-ranking nobles.
I didn't know about other things, but I could at least tell that apart from how harshly this person treated me, she didn't really care about the class system. At least she didn't say things like the evil nobles in novels, like 'You lowly slave wench!'
How long had I walked, lost in such idle thoughts? Items began to pile up in my hands one by one.
"That's five thousand sheets of Magic Paper and three hundred packs of Mana Cigarettes from the Great Forest, correct? Please sign here."
Ah. Dammit. My shoulders were going to be wrecked at that rate.
"This is the last place."
A smile spread across my lips.
The long, three-hour path of hardship was finally ending!
"Oh my! Isn't this Professor Haspelt? Thank you for always patronizing our shop!"
"I heard a Top-grade Magic Stone came in, so I'm here to check it out."
"Of course! It was obtained from slaying a Calamity-class Magic Beast in the Northern War. The price is quite steep."
"It doesn't matter."
"Kuh, as expected! Then I'll bring out the item right away."
After briefly setting my load down, I focused my interest on what the merchant would bring.
A rather large jewelry case was brought forth in his hands. It was a design that people who had studied electronic engineering would quite like.
Clack, went the box as it opened. Haspelt and I gazed inside with subdued eyes.
And in the next instant, my breath stopped.
"Huh...."
It was a rectangular black Magic Stone. Three long, thin metal pins were attached to its bottom.
"Though it is said to be Top-grade, it was only obtained by hunting a powerful Magic Beast. No one yet knows just how useful it will be."
"Is that so. It will be worth researching."
"According to the mage who autopsied it at the front, each of these metal pins corresponds to a letter of the Imperial Common Alphabet. In this case, let's see.... P, N, and P again, they said. What these mean, I don't quite know."
My heart pounded violently.
Was it because something that couldn't possibly exist in this era had appeared before my eyes?
"Assistant. Your race is originally from the northern mountain range, isn't it? Do you know what kind of Magic Stone this is?"
At Haspelt's question, I chose silence for a brief moment.
It wasn't because I didn't know what that was used for. On the contrary, I didn't doubt for a second that I knew its principles better than anyone else in this world.
After all, the inventor was a physicist. Could there possibly be a physics student in the world who hadn't learned how that Magic Stone operated?
"It's fine if you answer that you don't know."
"No, I know."
I met Professor Haspelt's eyes. And then, enunciating clearly, letter by letter, I pronounced five syllables.
Transistor.
"That's no ordinary Magic Stone."