Your Paper Is Dope (6)
Your Paper Is Dope (6)
The blazing golden temple shall be there.
Should anyone ask about the future of the Gold-Eye Tribe.
Lift your head and bid them behold Elankaya.
**
The library was packed. Proof that midterm season had begun.
Not a single seat looked likely to open up. At this rate, camping out in the reading room was out of the question. The best I could do was check out a few books and retreat to the dormitory.
Did that mean I was studying for exams? Not exactly.
It felt awkward to say it myself, but there was nothing left worth learning in the first year. I'd already pre-studied the material for three years; if there was still something I didn't know, that would be the real problem.
That was why I had time to spare despite exam season. During this period, the other students didn't even show their faces in the clubroom because they were busy studying. If I wanted to do research, I had to do it alone.
So I decided to finish the paper I'd been working on.
[■ Development Complete: Bethe-Feynman Equation]
Calculating the yield of Flare was completed in short order. Now that I'd reached this point, progress on developing a nuclear weapon would visibly accelerate.
That was, if only I had the materials.
Producing a thermonuclear bomb through classical methods required a material to serve as the initiator, but I hadn't seen uranium even once since arriving in this world.
Uranium was a radioactive element with a yellowish hue, much like the color of my eyes. It was the fellow the public knew as the raw material for atomic bombs.
The problem was that I couldn't locate a deposit rich in uranium at the moment, and even if I somehow found one, there was no suitable method for mining it.
Suppose I somehow managed to get that far. How would I handle refining and enrichment?
And what about converting uranium into plutonium to induce nuclear fission? To pull that off, I'd need to build at least a heavy-water reactor, and if I tried that, Frey might just run away.
Above all, handling uranium entailed safety issues. Unlike Flare, which operated solely on scrolls and optical instruments, uranium emitted radiation.
Of course, my goal wasn't to build an atomic bomb.
My objective was a hydrogen bomb. If I was going to take down the Demon King, I might as well pick the one with overwhelming destructive power, wouldn't I? In fact, in this world, building a thermonuclear bomb was easier than an atomic bomb, thanks to the assistance of Air Magic.
Moreover, if I used lasers, development was possible without even mining uranium.
And now, I had finally completed the first step.
[■ Development Complete: Flare]
"Son of a biiiitch... I finally finished...!!"
[(Complete) Top-Grade Fire Magic — Flare]
[# The sun, the fourth state, and the fifth path lie herein.]
[A top-grade magic art that emits high-temperature, high-heat fire elements in a coherent state. The threshold required for activation is high, but once used, it boasts a ferocious output capable of burning metal into a plasma state.]
[◆ Achievement Unlocked!]
[This magic art was developed by you.]
With a single ultra-high-output laser and a metal plate, plasma could be generated. If I confined that plasma inside a capsule with excellent reflectivity and thermal durability and simply maintained the temperature and pressure above certain thresholds, it should satisfy the conditions for nuclear fusion without issue.
To do that, I'd first need to acquire a substance like beryllium. I'd also need lithium, and since the neutrons produced by Flare alone wouldn't be enough, I needed a Water Magic specialist to draw neutrons from seawater.
"The to-do list was a mountain."
[Why are you trying to go off on a tangent? Aren't you going to submit your assignment?]
Ah, right. I had forgotten about that.
This was a problem I could mull over slowly once summer vacation arrived. I set down my quill and secured the dozens of pages with a binder clip.
"The paper's finished!"
And then I bolted out the door like Frey heading out to buy beer.
I rushed breathlessly into the building housing the Imperial Academic Society and flung my 57-page masterpiece into the paper submission tray. The person handling documents at the desk turned their eyes toward me.
"I'd like to request a review."
The desk clerk who saw me wore a complicated, subtle expression.
"Are you certain you're submitting to the Fire Magic field?"
"Yes."
"Really?"
Why were they asking me the same thing multiple times?
Only after being asked to confirm several more times did I manage to extract a promise that my paper would be placed in review-pending status. It pained me that I had to pay the receptionist one silver coin as the review fee.
The first author of the paper was, of course, me. However, I'd given co-author positions to Rote and Frey. This wasn't an achievement I'd accomplished alone, and also, this was the best reward I could give the two of them.
Rote was the daughter of Count Saliere, so she wasn't strapped for cash. Frey, despite buying and drinking alcohol day in and day out, never complained about being short on money. Neither seemed to have financial troubles. In the first place, it made no sense in this world that people with family names would go hungry.
If that was the case, I had to give them something other than labor fees to make it a fair trade.
Honor. For dealing with the upper class, nothing beat that.
If word got around that a first-year university student had published a paper in an SCI-level journal, and as a co-author at that, all hell would break loose. Some people would raise suspicions of corruption or plagiarism, and if it became clear that the achievement was genuine, that person would be the target of envy and jealousy.
I'd also expressed my thanks to Vermel, but my conscience prickled to leave it at that. So I decided to settle the deal by helping the three of them study for their exams.
This was true give-and-take. Wasn't "win-win" a phrase that could only be used in situations like this?
I was just about to turn away with a satisfied smile.
"Um, by the way... are you perhaps Miss Aether?"
"Huh? Yes. That's me."
The desk clerk who'd been flipping through the paper I'd submitted suddenly let out a low groan.
"You're the person who submitted the paper on the Maso-Energy Exchange Theorem last time, correct?"
"Yes, I am."
"The review result came in as of yesterday."
Oh.
The 'Maso-Energy Exchange Theorem' was a theorem I'd proven about two months ago.
I'd been wondering when it would come through, and to think the review result was already out so soon.
"How did it turn out?"
Hearing a paper review result always made my heart pound. There weren't many experiences that made anxiety and anticipation bloom at the same time. It was just like logging onto the admissions office homepage to check your final university acceptance.
A moment of silence. My heart pounded fiercely.
"Let me double-check, so please wait just a moment."
The silence didn't last long. A single sentence struck my ears like a thunderbolt.
"Congratulations! It's an accept."
Accept.
It was the moment my name entered the academic world.
**
Midterms began. While the students busily worked their writing instruments, the faculty could enjoy a brief respite.
'It's nearly finished.'
For Kleis, these days were like a welcome rain in a drought. She could concentrate entirely on researching Flare.
The long-cherished wish of House Haspelt, Flare.
Flare, whose development had been initiated under the orders of the previous Duke Haspelt after he first encountered an Extinction-class on the Northern Front, was now on the verge of completion.
Despite the gradual reduction in state support, the reason Kleis had been able to research Flare steadily was that her father had provided continuous backing. Having recognized her talent from a young age, Kleis's father had expected the ultimate Fire Magic to be completed within his lifetime.
Now it was time to repay that expectation.
To make a good impression on her parents, to honor the souls of the countless comrades who'd died on the front lines, and above all, to deliver a satisfying blow to the cowards who'd fled, claiming Fire Magic had a limit to its power.
Flare had to be completed. In the hands of House Haspelt, and no one else.
In fact, during the midterm period, Kleis had reached the final stages of writing her paper. She'd scraped together research funds by using the development grant provided by her family and the tax revenue she earned as duke. The results of experiments funded by that money were now gradually emerging.
To find a method of activating Flare, which required such a high amount of magical power, the method Kleis chose was simple.
She split the magic circle that composed Flare into individual components, then combined them later to amplify them across multiple stages.
The experimental results showed that the initial efficiency wasn't great.
Nevertheless, she had succeeded in shaving off the outer layer of a Calamity-class Magic Beast in her own way. With this level of power, it was a satisfactory outcome.
'In actual combat, I won't be firing just one shot anyway. If I pour multiple shots on them simultaneously, even an Extinction-class won't be able to move.'
She wanted to be praised by her family soon. Although her father had retired from active politics and she was now the head of the family... she still wanted to hear him say she had done well.
Kleis gathered the pages containing experimental data and the accompanying theory and was just on the verge of enclosing them. The time was May. The temperature in the academy was gradually rising, and summer was approaching.
It was around then that someone came to visit Kleis as she was about to begin the finalization work.
"Professor Haspelt, I have something I'd like to propose."
It was a face Kleis knew well. A researcher sent from the Imperial Academic Society.
The Imperial Academic Society was the institution that managed and reviewed all research papers in the empire.
A treasure trove of scholarship and the cradle of all mages. Kleis was also a member of that Imperial Academic Society.
In any case, a visit from the Imperial Academic Society was not a common occurrence. Usually, when they came to ask something of an authority in the academic world, they approached with a deferential attitude.
"A proposal?"
Kleis tilted her head and furrowed her brow.
Curiosity and irritation intersected. At the moment, Kleis had no time to spare for trivial interpersonal relationships, consumed as she was by the single-minded determination to complete her paper.
"Yes, about two weeks ago, someone submitted a paper on Fire Magic. It's content that you, Professor, would find interesting as well. I came to ask if you'd be kind enough to review it."
"Fire Magic?"
"Yes."
Her expression crumpled instinctively. To review someone else's paper when she herself was in the thick of writing one — and busier than ever.
She didn't want to.
'It's probably not any remarkable topic anyway.'
If her Flare research had been stalled, she might have tried reading it, but at the moment, things were going smoothly.
The experiments were perfect, and the calculations were flawless. If she focused solely on refining the discussion, she could easily have it ready to submit within a week.
"I'll decline the proposal."
"Pardon? It's a good opportunity. Are you really refusing?"
Kleis shook her head.
"I'm too busy with work to look at it right now. If it gets accepted for publication later, I'll check it then."
"Then it can't be helped. Excuse me."
Thud. The laboratory door closed. Perhaps due to the aftershock, one of the incandescent bulbs illuminating the room flickered briefly and then went out.
Looking at the bulb that had reached the end of its life, Kleis clicked her tongue.