[41] Another Genius (3)
What "see you later" meant became clear a little later when Etella grabbed his ear and dragged him down.
"Iruki! I told you one more time and you'd be disciplined!"
"Ow ow ow ow! I adjusted it so the device wouldn't break. You know what happens if I deliberately blow it up."
"You show no remorse! You're on strict probation for a week starting today! Don't come to class!"
"Ugh! That's too harsh!"
Iruki wailed, but he never admitted he'd done anything wrong. He even turned and grinned at Shirone and Nade.
"Ha. You really did it again. Shirone, sorry. I should go."
Nade left first. Shirone was seized by a strong impression and hardly noticed him go. Other students reacted the same, and a flurry of comments spread through the room.
"That guy's still crazy, isn't he? His detonation triggers are coming faster than before. The blast power's about the same, though."
"Well, savant syndrome—he must be calculating the reaction formulas insanely fast."
Shirone cut in.
"Reaction formula? You mean the equation that causes the explosion?"
"Yeah. I don't really know much about detonation magic either, but they say how you calculate the reaction formula changes the blast. It's kind of like Ignite is to flame magic."
"I see. With that kind of blast, you wouldn't even need to learn flame magic."
"No. The application's different from flame magic. Flame magic fires instantly. Even if Iruki's power grows, it'll still take time to reach detonation. Shortening that reaction time is the job of a detonation mage."
If Shirone's insight was specialized for teleportation, detonation magic suited Iruki's superhuman calculation skills perfectly.
Its advantage was that detonation magic could produce an explosion larger than a Spirit Zone. The magic itself only triggers the detonation; the explosion is a byproduct. That made it optimal for the displacement type, whose zone shrinks with distance.
'Mercodain Iruki…'
His first impression had indeed been as intense as an explosion.
* * *
They took their first month-end evaluation after entering Class Five.
Shirone's average score was forty-one. He was still in the lower ranks, but he'd raised every subject by ten points in a month.
When class ended, students stretched and packed their desks. Some headed to the campus canteen to fill empty stomachs, but most paired up and went to research clubs.
Shirone, who wasn't a member of any club, planned to stop by the library. He wasn't satisfied with an average in the forties, but he was pleased that lately he'd been adding substance to the spine of his knowledge at a faster pace.
"Hey, Shirone."
A female student approached. Her friends watched eagerly from the corner of the lecture room.
"Yeah. Do you need something?"
"We talked it over, and would you consider joining our club? We study matter-transfer magic. If you joined, our output would be much higher. It ties a lot into photonization theory, too."
He'd received offers from a few groups since making Class Five, but this was the first time his specific field had been explicitly needed.
'Hmm. Maybe I should try it.'
The academy evaluated students in three main categories: practical exams, theoretical exams, and performance evaluations.
Performance evaluations were assignments done over the break—you wrote a paper on any topic and submitted it. Most students substituted a club presentation and finished it during the term.
Shirone had once looked into club membership to save time, but in the end he'd declined.
They were offering because of his name now, he thought, but once activities started he wasn't sure he could keep up with their level.
"Well, what should I do? I'm working on something right now but haven't gotten results. I plan to focus on that for a while."
"Oh, I see. Then we can't force you."
"Sorry for offering if you're going to turn it down."
"Heh, no. What are you apologizing for? If you change your mind, tell me."
The girl smiled and returned to her friends, considerate rather than offended. In Class Five, few students acted purely on emotion. Iruki-type weirdos existed, of course, but they were exceptions.
Not long after they left, cheerful laughter drifted from the corridor.
'Lucky them. Looks like fun.'
A pang of loneliness sat in Shirone's chest. He had Rian and Amy as friends, but Rian worked in a different field and Amy was in her graduating year and busy.
Life was a lonely battleground, he supposed, but attending Class Five without comrades to share it with felt especially empty.
"Oh? Shirone, you heading out now? Come with me."
Nade slipped up behind him and wrapped an arm around his neck. He never failed to do this whenever Shirone was the last to leave class.
They chatted as they headed back to the dormitory. Most of the conversation covered topics Shirone liked.
"The library's fine, but the club rooms have a lot of specialty books too. By the way, why did you say no earlier? That club's pretty decent."
"I don't think I have the time."
"You really should raise your theory scores first. Still, I'm envious. I don't even have that kind of drive."
Shirone laughed.
"You've got tons of friends, though. You could join any club and be fine, right?"
"What are you talking about? Of course I already have a club. I'm the president, even."
"Huh? Really? I had no idea."
Shirone had assumed Nade disliked belonging to a specific group and hadn't asked. A president, though.
"What kind of club is it?"
"Ha! It's embarrassing to boast. There are only two people in it, me included."
"Huh? Then doesn't it fall below the minimum? Funding would've been cut."
The school required clubs to have at least three members. One is singular, two is plural, three begins to be a group.
"Last semester our seniors graduated. I inherited the presidency, so I've been worried about it."
"I see."
There were many clubs on campus, but few included seniors about to graduate—those were among the top students in the school.
"Mind if I take a look?"
"Really? I figured you weren't into clubs."
"I've always been interested. But if I join I might be a burden, so I want to be careful about signing up."
"Hahaha! What are you saying? Clubs are just kids studying and hanging out. No pressure at all."
"Is that so?"
"To be honest, you can be a bit hard to approach. People our age roughhouse and joke around—poke and mess with each other. There are rowdy kids in Class Five too, but most are friendly if you hang out. You should try to be a little more casual with people. Not asking you to let them touch your… you know. Hahaha!"
That was worth remembering. It had been the others who had reached out to Rian and Amy, come to think of it.
When Shirone started to get serious again, the watching Nade suddenly decided and exclaimed.
"All right! I feel it. This is really a special case—I'll show you our club. But you can't tease me later if it's lame, okay?"
"Really? I'd appreciate that."
"Stop with the thanks. We're friends. Come on, let's go!"
* * *
Shirone followed Nade into a remote area northwest of the Magic Academy central park. About a hundred huge tetrahedral blocks formed a complex colonnade. They were metallic, etched with magic sigils. Both the scale and the shape broke common sense.
"Where is this?"
"It's a storage depot for magical apparatus. Our club's inside one of the warehouses. Haha!"
Clubs weren't assigned fixed labs. When a club formed and reached a certain membership, the school handed over an empty space.
Still—a warehouse? It was hard to understand why the school would give such a secluded place on a sprawling campus.
"This place's been used as a hideout by seniors for generations. Our club's got a long history here. They said they fought hard to get this spot."
"But this is a little…"
"Haha! It's fine. There's nothing we can't make here if the warehouse has the parts. Don't tell anyone though. I'm trusting you because you're you."
"Really?"
Shirone hadn't expected ordinary students like Nade to be using warehouse materials illicitly. He followed into the building, stunned. The structure had many entrances, and nearly a hundred connected buildings made it maze-like.
"Hehe. Cool, right? But don't study the layout too closely. We change the building's configuration whenever we get a chance."
"You can change the building's layout? Is that even possible?"
"The formal name's Istas Magic Warehouse. The building itself is a magical device. It's much faster to move a section to the exit than to search and remove items. It's an engineering design balancing storage and transport. So when there's a practical day at school, the layout can change a lot. No one can find us no matter what."
Nade chuckled at the last line. A hideout no one could find—Shirone's heart thumped at the idea.
"There's a simple way to find the path. But you're not a member yet, so I won't teach you."
Nade walked the complex route without hesitation. After twenty buildings they arrived at a blue-painted area. Each building held about ten warehouses of varying sizes; Nade's club occupied the largest.
"Tada! We're here."
Shirone approached, nervous. What kind of research would hide in such a place?
A crooked sign sat on the iron door.
- Paranormal Psychical Science Research Club
"Pa—psychical science?"
Even among innumerable fields, psychical science hadn't crossed Shirone's mind.
"What do you think? Our club's awesome, right? We research supernatural phenomena. Ghosts, spirits, the afterlife, aliens, hell, gods—stuff like that."
Shirone's baffled expression slowly faded. The topic was oddly intriguing.
'The existence of gods, huh.'
Many had called on gods' names through history, but no god had ever appeared in person.
"This could be interesting. It might not be strictly magical, but it could be worth studying."
"Haha! Right? I knew you'd get it. Come on in. I'll show you around."
Nade grabbed Shirone's hand and pulled the door open. Instead of a neat space for philosophical thought, a cloud of dust greeted them.
Shirone frowned at the dust. The door had been opened once, and the lift of dust was excessive.
The warehouse was about fifteen pyeong. The desks had broken legs; the tables were covered with crumbs of bread and crumpled paper—so much for converting a warehouse into a lab. It looked like they'd put up nothing but the sign.
"Bit grubby, huh? You get used to it. Come in, come in."
Shirone couldn't understand why he had to adjust his eyes to the mess rather than the club cleaning it. But that thought vanished the moment he saw the chalkboard at the front.
Like the sign, the chalkboard hung crooked, covered wall-to-wall with dizzying formulas. A boy was still scribbling on it with a piece of chalk, moving quickly.
"Huh?"
Shirone flinched when the boy finished writing and turned around. It was Iruki, who'd been under discipline and had missed classes for several days.