Volume 20, Mortal Technica(2/3)
On the other hand, Nene hadn't only invented training machines for Military Artist use, but she had also tried deriving techniques to be used in other areas, so the scope of her activity was very broad. Moreover, Harley had also heard that she had gotten many actual results, and because of this it could be said that it was a natural outcome for her to possess her personal research lab.
Yes, she was very outstanding.
Why had she, who was like that, chosen himself?
Harley still thought about this.
"Because you're very cute."
"Huh?"
"You showed a look of doubt, so I said the reason. Is that not enough?"
"Th....that's not what I meant."
An embarrassed feeling of being seen through made Harley lower his head.
"Of course, if you were too poor of an Alchemy student, I wouldn't like you even if you were very cute."
"Uh...."
The word 'like' made his face become even hotter.
Th....The stimulation was too intense.
To a novice in love like Harley, just that word made his entire body unable to move.
Ahh, but, if he didn't think of a topic to talk about....
It had already been three days ago since her confession to him. After that, when the two of them met around school, Harley would always become shy like this and unable to properly speak to her.
Ahh, but, topic topic.... What should I talk about?
Harley didn't have anything in his mind that could serve as a topic. Up through now, he had always single-mindedly focused on Dite research, and until now he hadn't even felt interested in other things, like fashion, music, or movies.
On the other hand, Nene wore pretty clothes under her white Alchemy lab coat, and even Harley could see instantly that she was very fashionable. Even in this aspect, Nene still didn't have any faults.
Uuu.... nothing. He no longer had a choice.
"S....senpai, what research are you conducting now?"
She was also an Alchemy student, so she couldn't hate that kind of topic. Harley thought this as he spoke.
"Right now? I'm making new battle machines for training. Do you want to see?'
"Ah, okay."
Nene wasn't unhappy. Though Harley relaxed a bit, after he saw Nene walking to the covered object, he still went along with her curiously. Since the moment he had entered this room, he had been very interested in the object underneath the sheets.
Nene grabbed the sheets tightly, and pulled them off all at once.
"Uwah...."
What was there was a three-dimensional creature model with a height reaching about up to Harley's chest. Of course, it wasn't just a three-dimensional model.
It was probably a test work, because its outer layer was made quite roughly. Maybe it was made to move by extension, as there were many parts on its head area with such functions. It didn't even have an exoskeleton, and just directly showed the sensory machines inside, with wires hanging down lightly and vertically.
Harley had seen this creature before.
"A larva?"
"Right, used for actual battle training. After all, a mature phase is way too big, and it can fly in the air, so I think it's better to use a simulator to carry out that training. But that would become a large-scale group battle, and also leads to some problem in price of equipment, so because of this we can't use such a method as an answer to Military Artist group training. But, if it were a larva, we only need to make a certain number to let two or three platoons carry out cooperative battle training on the practice field? Moreover, it was also raised once in Military Artist reports that using a simulator doesn't let the Military Artists get used to pain as early as possible."
"I see...."
Nina would be ecstatic once she heard this, Harley thought.
"I plan to make the size of the finished produce even closer to the real creature. But with that, there will be problem with the materials. Though we can manage to make material for the shell from synthetic compression plates made from sand, we definitely need to choose softer materials for the moving systems. Considering how many we'll have to cobble together, how far we can reduce the cost is also a problem."
The eloquent remarks felt quite fresh to Harley. What to strengthen, and what to cut down - when creating a product, those questions were bound to spin around in one's head. However, Harley didn't often think about cost control. Even if he considered it, at it would just be research fees paid as a commission.
Even in Dite research, Harley preferred to adjust Dites made for personal use, so it could be said that he didn't need to go think about cost control. Even if only Layfon could use the Adamantium Dite, Harley thought that its specifications were just that way, so he couldn't do anything about it. Though the Shim Adamantium Dite was almost reaching perfection, Harley didn't change his way of thinking because of it. He thought that in the end he was a researcher, so it was fine to pass the problems of actually using those things to other people to resolve. In the end, applicability wasn't very important when chasing personal bests.
Maybe this was the correct thinking of a researcher.
But, if he really wanted to let his creations become reality, thinking about those parts of the product would definitely make it easier for them to be accepted. Not giving the question 'how can this thing be used?' to the user when things were completed, but giving the other party a direction to some extent, that would make it more comfortable for the other party.
This person couldn't only research.
Harley had originally respected this senpai greatly, and after learning of her ways of thinking, that thought became even more deeply rooted.
"Senpai's really amazing."
"That's not true. Also, your Dite adjustment techniques have won very high praise among the Military Artists."
"That couldn't be."
"....Hm, I want to let you see something."
"Huh?"
"Actually, I'm mostly already chosen the materials. But considering the cost, I can't use very good materials, so I've encountered a small bottleneck in calculated strength."
"Ahh, I see."
An actual larva.... Harley had never seen the actual moving creature with his own eyes, but he had participated in after-battle cleanup, and had actually touched their exoskeletons and felt their toughness. Moreover, after performing anatomies of many larvae and researching, he had obtained various data. It would definitely be very difficult to make such a thing move, even to just let it advance forward. No, it was enough to just make it move. But, if its movements easily stopped after a single blow from a Military Artist student, then it would be a waste. In that case, it needed some degree of strength. Though a compromise had to be made with the premise of mass production, if even its performance was compromised, then it would have no reason for existing.
"Can I ask for a bit of your opinion?"
"Of course that's no problem, leave it to me!"
Harley thumped his chest.
Compared to not knowing what to say, this was much better.
At the time, that was what Harley thought.
◇
"Can I bother you for a moment?"
After hearing those words, Kirik moved the hands placed on his wheelchair's wheels. After class, he prepared to go to the research lab where he normally stayed, and this was something that happened in the meantime. So, his wheelchair stopped. At first glance, it was just a normal hand-powered wheelchair without any special functions, but actually just by placing one's hands on the cover of the wheels and controlling it with subtle force, it could move by itself.
But changing directions was still really annoying - just as Kirik thought this, the other party moved in front of him.
Kirik remembered that he was in a high position and a second-year Alchemy student, but he didn't remember the other person's name. Had he heard it before? Kirik tried remembering, but even that action felt troublesome to him.
"What do you want?"
"....Hey you, I'm the Head."
"So what do you want?"
"........"
After Kirik asked again, the other person showed an expression as if his momentum had been stopped and swallowed the words in his mouth.
"....Are you in the same research lab as Harley Sutton?"
"Why?"
Kirik quietly gave off an impatient air. I'm the Head so you obviously have to show respect.... it wasn't that attitude that made Kirik impatient, but from the words in the beginning, he had faintly felt the dislike the other person had towards him.
That man showed a timid expression again. However, this time his face clearly showed the dislike he held for Kirik.
"He's being used."
"........"
Maybe he needed some time to be able to restore his mind's vigor, as his face constantly twitched. Kirik sat on his wheelchair, so the man's gaze was above him. Maybe the height of his vision made the man have a mistaken feeling of strength over the other person, and his face finally showed an atmosphere of complete contempt for Kirik.
"He's really pitiful. There are a lot of innocent guys in the Alchemy Department, and she's also a beautiful girl, so he was easily tricked, and doesn't know that he's just being used for the next assessment test."
"........"
The man already completely despised Kirik, and his words became more plentiful. Kirik quietly observed from the side.
"Because this year's research results were poor, her current position is very precarious. If the next battle assessment fails, she might be evicted from her research lab. She's using him for that purpose...."
"Have you spoken enough?"
"Nn? ........Ack!"
Kirik interrupted the man's words. Because the man had gotten carried away, he had unknowingly moved his gaze from Kirik's body at some point. After seeing Kirik's expression, his voice choked.
"Then please get out."
Kirik looked at the man with a face even more displeased than normal, and the man was completely cowed by that gaze. He hastily moved back from in front of the wheelchair.
"Since you're also a researcher, why don't you spend the time you use gossiping about other people on the things you want to create?"
"Ah, uwah, ah...."
"........"
Kirik looked at the man's shameful face without interest, and moved his wheelchair.
"Hey!"
After a while, a familiar voice caught up.
It was Taurus.
"Hey, was that talk for real just now? What should we do?"
"Nothing."
Taurus who had been hiding somewhere eavesdropping said this anxiously, but Kirik just frowned, muttering with his usual expression.
"Though that guy is stupid, he's not an idiot."
◇
This day had finally come.
The day of the battle assessment.
There wasn't anyone on the battlefield during the holiday. The morning air was clear and fresh, and the smell of oil gradually seeped into it.
Harley listened to the growl of the motor next to his ears while connecting the terminal to the battle training-usage mock filth monster - named 'A-1' - to check its condition.
Though there had been other workers helping when it had been moved here, it was only Harley and Nene who were responsible for inspecting A-1.
"How is it?"
The voice coming from behind him was filled with worry. The sound of footsteps came from the restless Nene, continuously passing through Harley's back.
"Don't worry, the movement systems are secure, and it operates very efficiently. The data seems completely the same compared to the tests that we performed earlier."
Harley ignored Nene's impatient mood, continuing to begin the inspection of the artificial intelligence. This part should have been done by Nene, but for some reason, she had given the inspection work to Harley after the frame had been assembled, doing other work herself.
It felt strange.
Harley liked doing things that weren't routine, because it could put him in a good mood and various ideas would spill forth from points of view that he had never thought about. The inspiration he had obtained by working together with Nene on A-1 was even more than his normal repair work on abandoned products. He had even written down some ideas, and planned on immediately starting them after this business ended.
Even so, this was still very strange.
"Nene-senpai, please do the final check."
From Harley's point of view, there were no problems with the artificial intelligence. The artificial intelligence that this machine used didn't have much of a difference with the ones used by cleaning machines. The different part was in acknowledging whether objects were enemies or trash, and the responses made were to attack or to pick up, those were the only dissimilarities.
"Nn, if Harley thinks there are no problems after seeing it, then that's enough."
Nene said this without even looking at the image on the terminal.
It really was very strange.
Though Harley thought this, right now he didn't have time to ask about it.
The minute hand of the clock indicated that the assessment would soon begin.
The communication machine in the preparation room gave off an electronic noise, and Nene pressed the button.
"Okay, Understood."
After she ended her response, Harley anxiously took off the machine attached on top of the A-1, checking whether the outer shell was indeed connected, and readying it to a state where it could activate at any time.
"Let's go."
"Alright."
Harley nodded his head, and gave the start button of the A-1 to her. She quietly gazed at the button for a bit, and then pressed it.
A-1 quietly moved, and then began advancing towards the practice field. In order to follow it, Harley and the others rode a small motorcycle.
A-1's sensory machines accurately locked on the specified standby location. It advanced towards there, and after checking the location, it stopped.
When the motorcycle stopped slightly behind it, the two of them began observing the situation.
Though Harley and Nene couldn't see, the battle training-usage mock filth monsters invented by other students should be positioned on the other side of the practice field.
This was a fight between battle training-usage mock filth monsters. Harley and the others had to win this fight, and they had to do more than just win against their opponent. They had to obtain victory comprehensively - like durability, lifetime, ease of repairs, cost efficiency for mass production - outside of battle as well.
This was very difficult.
If it were just for winning a fight, certain parts wouldn't require any expenditure of effort. However, if the important parts weren't improved because of other portions that had to be worked on, the creator would feel anxious, and that anxiety was related to the anxiety they felt after coming here.
Nene, who had been the creator, obviously had a solemn expression on her face.
"Don't worry, we'll win."
Harley blurted that out.
Nene showed a surprised expression and turned around, and then a wry smile emerged on her face.
"How can the researcher say that kind of wishful, cheap prediction."
The beep announcing the start of the competition sounded.
A-1 whose motor was quietly running began to move at this moment. A real larva would use countless legs to support and move its giant body. But replicating that kind of movement method would make the machinery become complex and errors would emerge, so the two of them had decided to use the treads that heavy-duty construction vehicles used as a movement system.
The tread movement system accurately dug into the damp soil of the practice field, and then began advancing. A-1 still wasn't at full speed, because it was using its sensing machines to locate the enemy's position.
Not long after, and maybe because its sensing machines had locked on to the enemy position, A-1 suddenly explosively raised its speed.
"Let's go back."
"Okay."
Even if they chased it they couldn't do anything. In order to return to the preparation room and observe the data from A-1, the two of them moved the motorcycle.
A-1 advanced.
The enemy's position was very clear, and the distance continued to shorten. The speed at which the two drew closer was even faster than the speed of A-1, indicating that the opponent had also noticed A-1's location. But it didn't change any fighting strategies according to this fact, just single-mindedly charging forward.
According to testimony of the Military Artists, this was exactly the same as the usual attack of larvae. If there wasn't any abnormality, the larva's movements would probably be derived from its survival instinct, but A-1's situation was because its designer had only allowed it to take the actions 'charge at the enemy and then destroy it'.
A-1 was a giant attacking weapon. It could be said that it single-mindedly charged it target, used its outer shell to collide, smashing the enemy, and that this was its only reason for existence.
A-1 advanced. It knocked over the manmade vegetation in the center of the practice field, trampling them while it advanced.
The locked target was at a distance that could be confirmed with the eyes.
A battle training-usage mock filth monster that had been given the same reason for existence charged at A-1. A-1 boldly rushed the enemy.
The outer shells of the two collided, but one side was knocked back, things that could be called sparks if not for their overly strong luminosity burst out, and a boom shook the ground.
The sudden sound even reached Harley and Nene.
"How's the damage?"
After Nene asked with a stiff voice, Harley began reading the information displayed on the screen.
"Some damage and cracking has appeared on the outer shell, and the internal machinery.... is alright!"
Harley cried out very happily. But, Nene didn't respond. Turning around, he could only see her arms tightly wrapped around her chest, and she seemed a bit dazed.
"We did it...."
"We did it!"
Nene's stiff body began to slowly soften. However, the test hadn't yet ended. Harley quickly moved his gaze back to the image on the terminal.
"The machinery is still suffering a massive load in several areas. The two sides are pushing each other right now. But there's no problem with movement power, and the increase in temperature is also in the predicted range."
By the displayed data, he could understand that the two sides were currently pushing each other at a slow speed, and the collision that had occurred just now hadn't sent any side flying, and they had entered a tug-of-war with the manner of pushing each other directly. When they had a Military Artist as an opponent, this kind of situation couldn't have much significance. However, since the moment Harley had heard of this assessment, he had constantly thought about this possibility. So Harley had put in quite a bit of work on the various load capacities of the machinery.
Harley was confident in its endurance.
Next was power, and that would be good if they could win in this battle of strength.
A tension that made his stomach clench assaulted Harley, and he also felt from behind his back that Nene who had temporarily gotten out of her rigid state was tensing up again. The tension of the two of them was even sent into the terminal, and maybe because of this, the many words on the image changed to make them feel abnormally anxious.
"....Ah!"
Harley gazed at the changing words. The load amounts on the machinery that sent power to the treads had begun quickly decreasing. That meant that the treads were digging into the ground normally and moving forward. That definitely wasn't because the fight with the opponent had already been resolved, and the evidence was that it was still enduring a load higher than during normal movement.
"We're pushing it back.... Yes, we're pushing it back!"
Harley clapped his hands.
"........"
"Yes! Go! Do it!"
Harley wasn't concerned about Nene's silence, but continued to jump with the data on the terminal image. The power going into the tread system continued to increase, and the tread system responded, pushing forward while biting into the ground. The load being endured by the front of the outer shell had changed. Though there had been damage accumulated at the surface and cracks that continued to spread, the interior was still unharmed.
A-1 smoothly pushed the opponent.
Just then, a communication machine suddenly beeped.
"....What?"
The test hadn't ended. According to the schedule, a communication shouldn't have come at this critical point.
Nene anxiously grabbed the communication machine.
"....Yes........Huh?"
That voice showed her anxiety to Harley. The data continued showing their side’s advantage, but Nene's face showed that some unfortunate situation had happened.
"I understand, I'll quickly take countermeasures.... as insurance, please prepare the shelters."
The voice filled with a sense of crisis made Harley stand up.
"Senpai, what's happened?"
"....The opponents seem to have already given out the stop signal."
"Huh?"
The surprised Harley quickly checked the terminal image. However, the data listed out from the sensing machines didn't indicate such a situation.
This was a training-usage machine, so its goal wasn't to give the opponent deadly wounds. Because of this, during training, the fighting outfits of Military Artists would be affixed with machines monitoring their vital signals. Once their livelihood was down to a certain value, that machine would broadcast the stop signal. The machine was installed with safety measures, and once it received that stop signal it would stop its attack, but....
"Are the safety measures not operating normally? Or is it the sensing machines? It couldn't be...."
Was it the collision at the beginning that had made the sensing machines go faulty? But no such signals had appeared. In that case, was the data shown on the terminal wrong?
Regardless of how he operated the terminal, Harley couldn't find out the reason.
"Senpai, I'm counting on you."
"Nn."
Harley was helpless. In this situation, he could really only rely on the creator to resolve things. After Harley left his position, the green-faced Nene quickly began operating the terminal. Her operation sequence was the same as Harley's, so it really could only give the same outcome.
"It couldn't be...."
After murmuring this, Nene closed the monitor data for the moment, and called up other programs.
It was the artificial intelligence program of A-1's movement.
"....An error has really appeared in the connection to the sensing machines."
"Huh?"
"The sensing machines should have received the stop signal. But, the sensing machines couldn't identify that signal, so they took it as noise and ignored it. With that, the stop signal obviously wouldn't appear in the monitoring data."
"How...."
historical
Harley shook for a moment, and then quickly stood up. He couldn't just spectate like this. A-1 was still advancing, and he feared that it was completely destroying the opponent machine.... In other words, if the opponent continued to send the enemy identification signal, A-1 wouldn't stop attacking. If this went on, A-1 would hit the wall of the practice field. Harley didn't think that the wall would be destroyed, but judging from A-1's direction of advance, it might hit directly into the other side's preparation room. And moreover, the two sides seemed to only have their machines advance in straight lines, so that possibility was quite high.
"Hurry up and send the emergency stop signal!"
"No good, it's an error with the sensing machines. It won't receive the signals that we send."
"Then what if we stop the other side's enemy identification signal?"
"If we could do it, it probably would have been done already. Since they can't do it, that means that problems might also have been produced in the opponent's because of that collision."
"How...."
Harley held his breath, but Nene in front of him hung her head.
"Ahh.... this is karma."
"....Huh?"
"I only ignored such an essential place because I planned on cheating."
"........"
"My results this year weren't very good. It was even bad to a level where this test would decide whether my research lab was taken back or not."
Facing Nene's sudden confession, Harley was speechless.
"I lost my self-confidence. Because I didn't want my current research lab to be taken away, I invented 'A-1' for this assessment, but I didn't think I could succeed by myself at all.... Just then, I heard that your results were very excellent, and that's why I wanted to see whether I could rely on you to turn the tables...."
"Uh, that kind of stuff doesn't matter right now."
Nene's sudden monologue surprised Harley.
It wasn't because he learned of her true thoughts.
Rather, because she was saying these kinds of things right now.
Right now wasn't a time to talk about those things.
"If senpai wants to say something, I'll listen properly after this, but right now let's first put our minds to what we can do."
"By 'what we can do', you mean...."
Nene also showed a surprised expression. Her confession just now clearly meant that her feelings towards Harley were fake.
However, Harley didn't care about that matter.
"Senpai, you can fix this error quickly, right?"
"Huh? Nn...."
"Then I'm counting on you."
"But, even if I fix the program on this side, it won't affect anything out there. Didn't I say? The sensing machines have errors...."
"In that case, we can only change the program directly."
"Directly, meaning...."
"I'll do it."
"........"
"Hurry!"
"O....Okay!"
Harley shouted, and Nene quickly and hurriedly operated the terminal to rewrite the program. Though Nene was panicked and unfocused, she was a technician in the end. She already had the necessary procedures in her brain, so her fingers moved correctly, and changed the program in the blink of an eye.
She put the program into a data chip.
During this process, Harley started up the engine of a small motorcycle.
"Just insert this into the third port on the back outer shell portion, and the program will be change-->>