Your Paper Is Dope (10)
Your Paper Is Dope (10)
"Well, of course it is."
The color in Kleis's face brightened in an instant. She whispered to Meri in a voice now brimming with smugness.
"Mine is far more lightweight than that thing."
At Kleis's sudden shift in attitude, Meri could only look puzzled.
"How are you supposed to drag equipment that huge all the way to the front lines and actually use it? You agree, don't you? Yes? Meri?"
Had she developed manic depression or something? Even if only for a moment, the thought crossed my mind—the gap between Kleis's line just now and the one before it was that severe.
"......."
For now, I decided to observe a little longer.
The eyes of the people who had come to audit the presentation mostly glinted with a red light. Considering that Flare belonged to Fire Magic, this was only to be expected.
That said, mages from other fields weren't entirely absent. Among them, those with black irises were the second-most numerous after red.
Eyes represented by black or dark gray—having such eyes meant you had been blessed by a spirit that governed Earth Magic. In other words, every mage with black eyes present knew how to wield the earth element.
It was not strange at all for those Earth Magic users to attend this particular presentation, rather than some other society meeting—the one where Flare would be demonstrated.
[A Study on the Construction and Ignition Method of the Flare Scroll Utilizing Earth Magic Equipment]
Of course. After all, the core equipment that enabled Flare to fire had been built by Earth Magic users.
It was a so-called collaboration between Fire Magic and Earth Magic. In technical terms, a field called Composite Magic.
Serious discussion of Composite Magic in academic circles had only begun a mere twenty years ago. Even then, most of it was basic theoretical research, and in an era when its importance hadn't been heavily spotlighted, outside support remained at a paltry level. Little money invested naturally meant meager research results. Composite Magic was a field that a few mages at Tillet Academy had been dabbling in on the side at best.
Yet an unexpected miracle had occurred in that barren environment. Fire Magic and Earth Magic had been applied simultaneously to develop Flare, which came as welcome news not only to House Haspelt, already conducting Flare research, but also to condensed-matter researchers who studied crystal fabrication and modification.
"Has everyone gathered?"
The golden-eyed girl who stepped up onto the podium rubbed the blackboard briskly with an eraser in one hand. Nothing was written on the board. It looked like idle hands acting out of habit.
To Kleis, the sight was deeply comical. A first-year, at best, play-acting as a professor. Watching Aether act like that actually brought her a sense of relief.
"Well... she's just an undergraduate, anyway. How well could she possibly have made it?"
Two other girls stood frozen beside the golden-eyed girl, their hands clasped in front of them. One of them wore a large hat that hid her face from view.
Both girls besides Aether had their shoulders locked stiff, as if it were their first time attending an academic conference like this. A sharp-eyed observer would have detected them subtly steadying their breathing.
In contrast, Aether was checking her presentation materials without any real change in expression. Composure leaked freely from that face. An attitude as if she had been through this countless times before.
"It seems everyone is here. Then...."
Having prowled across the podium in a two-four time step, Aether opened her mouth with a gentle smile.
"I'd say now would be a good time to begin."
**
The girl cleared her throat. It took her only three seconds to establish the thread of the conversation.
"Everyone here from Fire Magic will already know what Flare is. To keep the introduction brief, Flare is a top-grade Fire Magic technique. Yet it's also known to be a cut above other top-grade spells, and it is currently singled out as the only means capable of destroying extinction-class magic beasts."
None of that talk really mattered.
To Kleis, born the legitimate heir of the ducal house that had first devised and developed Flare, what Aether was saying was less captivating than a childhood fairy tale heard from her father.
Compared to this trivial preamble, what mattered was just how powerful a Flare Aether had created. Kleis hoped that this invention might turn out to be all pretense and no substance. If it wasn't, then the paper she herself had written being reduced to scrap paper was all but a certainty.
Though she knew it was a nasty little wish, Kleis prayed all the same.
That very intent was why Kleis had attended Aether's presentation in the first place. If she could find a gaping flaw here and call it out, it would be Kleis's victory. No matter what, she had to stop it here.
"......Well."
As if Aether had read that very thought, she directed a sharp glare toward Kleis.
"It's not just a saying that seeing once beats hearing a hundred times. Let me show you the experimental results directly."
Aether gave a crisp clap of her hands, and Rote and Frey scrambled into motion. Frey, who had been hauling a cart with a grunt, touched the silica mass and moved it. Bwoong—the materials flew through the air and clung to the magic beast's armor like rice flour being kneaded into dough.
"...Is this, Transmutation?"
"She modified a crystal this size without even a transmutation formation?"
Frey brought the remaining materials together and layered them one by one onto the armor, compressing it. The gauntlet, which had already looked impossibly sturdy, grew even more solid.
"The iron slab being prepared right now is the target that Flare will destroy. The raw material is the frontal armor of a magic beast called Gargantua."
"Gargantua? You mean the Calamity-class Gargantua?"
"Yes. Gargantua is recorded as the most durable magic beast humanity has ever destroyed. We plan to make it even tougher, and then shatter it in one shot."
Kleis gave a derisive snort.
"Shatter it in one shot? You'd have to be making sense. Flare or not, it would need to be hit two or three times in succession."
"We only started preparing today ourselves, so it seems it will take a little longer. I ask for your understanding on this point. While the experiment is being readied, I'd like to explain the theory... By any chance, are you familiar with the principle that mana particles and energy are mutually interchangeable?"
The reaction to her question came in two broad types. A nod of the head, or a shake.
Only Kleis flinched, shoulders jerking.
'The Maso-Energy Exchange Theorem.'
If Kleis remembered correctly, that theorem was from a paper she had reviewed not long ago and signed off on.
Without the inspiration she had drawn from that theorem, Kleis would never have managed to complete Flare. So she had been thinking that once she found out who the author was, she absolutely had to meet them and at least treat them to tea, but....
"Until now, people have only known that Flare is a spell with a powerful output. No one has been able to answer why."
Wait. Wait a moment.
A sense of wrongness crawled up Kleis's spine, making it prickle. A shudder ran through her entire body.
"The theoretical core that constitutes Flare is a single point. When the elements that make up Fire Magic interact with the elements of Earth Magic through a certain process, the repulsion causes a fixed quantity of mana particles to be converted into energy.... In that process, a wave of an unfathomable frequency is produced......."
No way.
It couldn't be, could it? It mustn't be.
"When those mana waves cohere, Flare is formed. I have defined this sequence of processes as the Maso Deficit."
"...By any chance, do you have the paper containing that theorem with you now?"
"Yes. I printed several copies in advance and brought them."
Several attendees raised their hands. Aether stepped down from the podium and handed each of them one copy of the paper she had brought. Her thoroughness was hard to reconcile with a mere first-year undergraduate.
Neither Kleis nor Meri—neither of the two raised a hand. Even so, Aether approached them both, gave them a copy of the paper, and walked away.
"It seems the experiment is nearly finished preparing."
What Aether produced was a large scroll inscribed with a magic circle in a straight-line form.
At the sight of that scroll, Kleis could not suppress her shock.
"A linear magic circle—are you joking right now?"
Every magic circle was fundamentally circular. It was the basics of the basics taught in Introduction to Scroll Theory. To ignore that was unthinkable.
"Meri, do you think that thing makes any sense...?"
"Hmm, who knows."
"There's no way it'll work properly."
Despite Kleis's small protest, Aether paid her no mind. No, she was so focused on the experiment that she didn't hear it.
"Flare is a spell that consumes a great deal of mana. But after several modifications, it can now be fired using only the mana equivalent to a single Mana Cigarette."
This, too, was hard for Kleis to accept. Even she, with her outstanding mana reserves, had to smoke over a dozen Mana Cigarettes just to force out a single shot—and it could fire on just one?
This was a clear flaw. The output would never come out properly.
Kleis's lips curled upward, convinced she'd found a weakness. Now all she had to do was wait for the Q and A session. Better yet if the experiment failed right then and there.
"Of course, Flare's efficiency is not high. It requires two more steps of processing before the output becomes usable. Explaining it all in words would be complicated, and it would make the presentation boring, wouldn't it? So I'll skip the details......."
Click.
The scroll was fitted to one end of a roughly 1.5-meter iron rail, and mana was channeled into it.
"It will take about thirty seconds to fire. There will be a very loud noise, so please cover your ears and wait until then."
Silence flowed along with the seconds. Everyone in the lecture hall was trying to capture the image of Flare's proper firing sequence with their own eyes. Some had already braced themselves in awe. Others were jotting down concerns or questions on memo pads.
Meri belonged to neither group. She was turning the pages of the theory paper Aether had handed out one by one, letting out wordless exclamations.
"Hey, this is the real deal."
"......Give it here."
Curiosity piqued, Kleis snatched the paper. A faint tremor passed through the paper as she gripped it.
[Title: Are Mana Particles and Magical Energy Mutually Interchangeable?]
There was no doubt. This was the very paper Kleis had reviewed and even stamped as 'Approved.'
This couldn't be happening.
Her heart rate gradually quickened. She tried to take a deep breath to calm the sensation of her insides seething, but it was useless. Everything in her sight besides the paper grew hazy.
At the very top of the first page, in small, seven-point cursive script, was an inscription. The field where the author's name was written. The field that had been blank—under the principle of anonymity—when Kleis reviewed it.
The name of the person she was now supposed to thank....
[First Author: Aether]
[No Coauthors.]
KWAANG─!!!
Flare was fired.
A single beam of light cut Gargantua's gauntlet cleanly into two chunks. It had happened in an instant.
A shrill 'peeeee─' of tinnitus rang in the ears. The thunderous roar reflected off the walls of the lecture hall and dragged on for a long time afterward.
While that roar continued, the sound of someone slamming their fist down hard against a desk reached my ears. Only one person noticed the existence of that sound—Professor Meriga Herlein—because it was small compared to the noise Flare had just produced.