Ch.114Your Student Was Awesome (6)

Virgo frowned and said.

[“You have a dirty body.”]

Zernya von und zu Trisha Adelbein frowned back.

“What?”

I’m dirty?

That’s absurd.

As the heir of Adelbein, I’ve always kept myself immaculately clean. I’ve never gone a day without washing. I’ve never done anything promiscuous.

[“That’s not what I mean. You, you have fake constellations implanted.”]

“……!”

[“Three of them, even.”]

Virgo pretended to retch while covering her mouth.

[“What a filthy procedure. What on earth happened to you? Were you tortured by someone?”]

Zernya tightened her scarf. The traces of artificial constellations that looked like barcodes. They were hideous, and she didn’t want to show them to others.

But this constellation noticed them immediately.

[“How could you get such a horrible tattoo on your neck.”]

“Shut up. I said shut up!”

[“Who did this to you? What garbage performed such a horrible procedure?”]

“I told you to keep your mouth shut because it’s none of your business!”

The implantation of artificial constellations was half voluntary. The other half was at her parents’ request.

“I became like this because of you all.”

The Zodiac 12 are finite. Despite Adelbein’s greatness, they weren’t chosen by them. There had never been such a case in history. The same was true for Zernya.

“My family has everything. And yet, no constellation came to us.”

[“That’s because you’re not good people. We have no power to lend to the wicked.”]

“Fine, think whatever you want.”

[“Anyway, you’re saying you created stars modeled after us because of that? That’s truly horrible.”]

“If you don’t want to contract with me, just get lost.”

Virgo clicked her tongue. Zernya anxiously looked around. Everyone must have heard. One of the Adelbein’s secrets had been exposed.

[“Look at that. Everyone’s looking at you strangely.”]

“That’s all because of you!”

[“We constellations always try to convey only the truth. Be grateful that I gave you this advice even though I’m not your backing constellation.”]

“You’re so annoying, seriously…!”

Zernya gritted her teeth.

[“Ah, right. At least your heart is clean.”]

“…?”

Her mind went blank for a moment at the unexpected compliment. Virgo pointed at Eidel and said.

[“Better than that boy. He’s completely black. So dark you can’t see inside. Compared to him, you’re a light gray? You could get worse, but you could also become cleaner.”]

Then Virgo whispered quietly enough that only Zernya could hear.

[“A piece of advice. Try living humbly.”]

It was something she’d heard somewhere before.

[“Sigh, I don’t see anyone I like. I’m going back to rest. I’ll wake up again if I see someone suitable as my master. Bring them here if you have someone to recommend. Everyone understand?”]

Swoosh.

Virgo returned to the crystal. Like a fairy entering a magic lamp.

But at that moment, Eidel was happily studying that very crystal.

“What the.”

His expression darkened rapidly as he analyzed the crystal.

The impurity concentration suddenly increased.

“No way, my research sample—!!”

Eidel screamed as he grasped the situation.

***

“We have a problem.”

The strategy meeting began. The participants included one professor, more than a dozen graduate students, two postdocs, and two undergraduates.

“The constellation won’t wake up even when we apply terahertz wave interference.”

“Could it be that the crystal has become unusable?”

“That’s impossible. Our paper!”

Everyone clutched their heads.

“Professor, isn’t there some way?”

“Well, I’m not sure either…”

He had studied constellation physics, but this was the first time encountering such a situation. The incarnation phenomenon of the Zodiac 12. That alone could produce hundreds of papers.

“Should we invite experts from other fields?”

“What if that crystal becomes a common topic in academia? The material we’ve finally obtained will be gone, and it’s obvious we won’t be able to write our paper.”

“Ugh.”

There was no way out.

“In the end, we need to find someone the constellation can possess.”

“How?”

“We’ll have to mobilize all our connections.”

“Before that, we need to specifically determine what kind of person this constellation likes.”

After much discussion, the graduate students seemed to reach a conclusion. Someone pure, innocent, and upright.

“Someone with noble integrity, I’d say. Rasella, the previous owner of Virgo, was frugal in everything and always thought of others.”

“Like a saint or a nun.”

“Yes, she even gave most of her specialty and salary to her subordinates. She said she only needed enough to feed herself. It was a famous story on the front lines.”

“What an incredible saint. Where can we find someone like that again?”

It was a difficult task. Most humans have greed. They don’t like to give what’s theirs to others.

“Mr. Rheinland? Do you have any good ideas?”

All eyes turned to Eidel. He was spacing out in the corner. He got up from his seat, muttering something like someone possessed.

“…Even if we find such a person, we’d be shifting responsibility to them.”

Virgo is one of the Zodiac 12. Anyone chosen by the 12 suddenly takes on a heavy duty. Moreover, they must live purely and cleanly for the rest of their life.

“We shouldn’t notify them unilaterally. It’s rude. What we’re doing is no different from foreign gods.”

“Then…”

“Scientists should fight with science.”

Zernya laughed in disbelief.

Just a freshman undergraduate, yet spouting such irresponsible words in front of graduate students and professors.

If it had been possible, they wouldn’t be racking their brains like this. Well, it wasn’t Zernya’s concern anyway.

It was just a day that put her in a bad mood. Just as Zernya was about to get up quietly.

“What, do you have a method?”

“Do you have a good idea?”

Graduate students, postdocs, even the professor. Everyone stood up in surprise and focused on Eidel. Zernya flinched at the movement.

“I just drafted an idea.”

Eidel held out a paper. He must have written something on it in the meantime.

“Let’s slightly modify the resonator. So it can trap not just foreign gods but constellations too. And to provide continuous heat transfer inside. Then it will go crazy and won’t be able to endure.”

A shift in perspective.

“Connect the cryogenic equipment and high-pressure device like this. There are electrons in the crystal too, right? If they’re in a low-temperature, high-pressure environment, they’ll form Cooper pairs. The superconducting effect.”

“Perhaps, that…”

“We’ll use Cooper pair spin as 1. And the theoretical spin of gravitons, which constellations hate, is 2.”

“So, you’re going to create pairs of Cooper pairs?”

“If that doesn’t work, we’ll try other methods. I’m also thinking about smashing it with an accelerator.”

The graduate students stood up cheering. Professor Stranov smiled grimly. The postdocs’ pupils grew so large they seemed to devour the whites of their eyes.

Zernya’s head went blank. What on earth was this situation? More importantly, why was she here?

Stranov slammed the desk, drawing everyone’s attention.

“Mr. Rheinland. You’re an excellent student. If I were your advisor, I’d let you graduate with a doctorate this year.”

“Thank you for saying so, Professor.”

“Anyway, let’s concretize this idea. Our goal isn’t the Zodiac 12. It’s enough if we can use the crystal without impurities. Lab manager!”

“Yes, Professor!”

“Contact the low-temperature physics lab. Since it’s come to this, we’re going for co-work!”

The lab began to bustle with activity. Even Eidel, a theorist, was running around on his feet. Setting up equipment, moving the crystal back to its original position, cutting some parts and placing them on specimens.

Zernya’s gaze followed Eidel’s movements.

“What on earth…”

She didn’t understand well, but something, something was happening.

Their preparations continued until dawn broke. As soon as they contacted external labs, equipment appeared like a swarm of bees.

“This is a cryogenic probe that can measure the coupling of gravity and electromagnetic force.”

“Huk, heok…!”

Eidel choked and stopped breathing.

“Hey, what are you doing! Breathe, breathe!”

Zernya patted his back hard.

“Kek, kek, heok.”

“Have you gone crazy after staying up all night?”

“What, what. Oh, it’s Zernya. Why didn’t you leave?”

“That’s…”

I was watching what you were doing and missed my chance to leave. She couldn’t bring herself to say that. It was somehow embarrassing.

“…None of your business.”

“Alright then.”

Eidel smiled while rubbing his eyes. It felt like her breath was caught. Her heart beat violently.

Zernya pressed down on her thin chest. It didn’t hurt, but it felt strangely uncomfortable.

New equipment kept coming in.

“And this is a spin adjuster. It can directly manipulate electrons or muons to create pseudo-bosons.”

“Wow, shit, heok!”

“I said breathe, you lunatic!”

At this rate, her only unique rival might die suddenly. If that happened, she would be lonely. Probably.

So she should stay close.

Because she’s a doctor.

***

The research team, which had been just over a dozen people, had grown considerably. Already its size reached 100.

As the research team grew, the speed of conducting experiments also increased.

Moreover, Professor Stranov spared no expense.

“We’ve contacted all engineers and technicians. About 2,000 of the best engineers in the Federation will solve most of the defects.”

“How much did you spend…?”

“I’m not sure.”

Stranov shrugged in response to the bewildered Eidel.

“It’s not that much expenditure for my lab.”

“Heok.”

“Anyway, including other authors, it’s about a hundred people. Mr. Rheinland, congratulations on leading such a research project.”

“Um, Professor? What do you mean…?”

“I told you before. Mr. Rheinland is the first author.”

Professor Stranov raised the corner of his eye. Eidel almost died from hyperventilation syndrome. If Zernya, who had been dozing, hadn’t immediately gotten up, he would have lost his breath.

“Idiot. What’s so great about this research.”

“It’s fun.”

“Fun? It looks hard, and it doesn’t seem to pay much.”

“Being a doctor seems just as hard.”

Eidel glanced at Zernya and smiled.

This is driving her crazy. Her pulse won’t calm down. Somehow, Eidel was the one moving around, but she was the one losing energy. Zernya pushed Eidel away and clicked her tongue.

“I’ve been living here for a week already.”

“You said you were going to have fun. If you don’t like it here, I’ll book tickets for you to go see a movie or something.”

“Movie my ass. This thing you guys are filming is the movie.”

Zernya looked up at the resonator. The crystal attached through ultra-fast processing sparkled brilliantly. A signal came from the optical research team.

“Mode synchronization starting.”

Click.

The test run began.

Waves are created, pass through the gain medium, and circulate like standing waves through the device. Then the temperature rises, it’s cooled again to low temperature, high pressure is applied… After all sorts of procedures.

[— ‘Fragment of Purity’ screams.]

A cosmic first.

Humanity succeeded in subduing a constellation.