Ch.81Tools

After examining the production facility, Meister takes another nap.

While she uses her ability to move around, the heroes of W City engage in awkward conversation in voices too quiet for the soldiers to hear.

“About Meister’s ability…”

“Don’t you think it’s not as impressive as we expected?”

“Yeah, I thought she was some incredible genius.”

When they heard Meister would be examining W City’s facilities, the heroes had been filled with anticipation for some amazing changes. But in reality, she just looked around absentmindedly before falling asleep.

What Meister said after waking up was even more disappointing.

“Not much has changed… Oh, meat consumption has increased significantly. Is the city market economy not being regulated? Maybe measures should be taken…”

“Thank you for your hard work, Meister!”

“Yaaawn… where to next…?”

“Server connection status check and Black Cat observation remain.”

After checking the servers, she simply said she would sleep more.

Meister briefly woke up, mentioned that nothing much had changed, and fell asleep again.

This time it was actual sleep, not the use of her ability.

While Meister slept, the heroes spent their guard duty time almost like a break in headquarters.

“Is that it? We just see Black Cat and then we’re done?”

“Feels kind of empty.”

“According to the records, she was supposed to bring about tremendous changes whenever she appeared.”

“She’s not really doing anything.”

“She’s not a genius, just a superhuman.”

Looking at it carefully, Meister only talked and slept without directly doing anything herself.

Even during surgeries, it was all “try this” or “try that,” and at other facilities, “fix this” or “pay attention to that.”

If that was all, did she really need to come all the way to W City?

They could have just watched recorded videos later.

“Meister’s ability is quite unique.”

“Oh, senior.”

Yu Anna approached the heroes who were having a quick meal of hot dogs and drinks.

“Just maintaining the facilities is impressive enough. Anyway… she’s quickly identifying if anything is wrong somewhere.”

“But can she really tell by just glancing like that? It seems like she’s just pretending to look.”

“Her ability allows her to know even by just glancing.”

Yu Anna looked around at the B-rank and C-rank heroes, briefly considering whether she should explain in detail about Meister.

Looking at the current situation, it seemed better to tell them.

“…Does anyone know about Meister’s ability, Dimensional Archive?”

“It’s restricted information for us. Not in detail.”

“I saw a bit before the information restriction was applied, so I roughly know… It’s a kind of future vision ability where a superhuman’s enhanced senses are maximized, right?”

“No, that’s wrong.”

Yu Anna sighed at the confident but incorrect answer, then got coffee from the machine and began explaining.

“Simply put, it’s something that answers questions. When she uses her ability and falls asleep, she contacts something unknown in her dreams that provides information humans don’t know.”

“Huh? Something unknown… like a god?”

“That interpretation exists, but according to Meister, it’s not a god.”

“How would she know… Oh.”

All the heroes in the conversation had the same thought.

She must have asked: “Are you a god?”

“So… even though it seems like she’s just casually looking at facilities, she’s actually asking ‘Is there a problem with this facility?’ and immediately identifying issues?”

“That’s right.”

“Wait, isn’t that an amazing ability?”

“It means she doesn’t need multiple people to inspect facilities.”

“So we just have Meister take a quick look and ask if there’s a problem…”

“No, she doesn’t even need to look, right? She could just ask ‘Are there any cities with problems recently?’ and that would be enough.”

“That’s where things get complicated… Meister’s ability has… many issues.”

Yu Anna began explaining the critical flaws in Meister’s ability with a bitter voice, noting that such an approach would make her check everything alone.

“I can’t explain in detail, but let’s see. Can anyone tell me about the coffee in my hand?”

“Um… it’s synthetic coffee made in W City’s production facility?”

“Slightly sour beans, warm, available from vending machines?”

“Yes, that’s sufficient. But this coffee is specifically in my hand, in W City, from a vending machine, right? If you don’t ask with all these specific details, the answers become overwhelming.”

“Huh?”

“For example, if you ask ‘What coffee do W City heroes drink?’, you’ll get information about all the coffee we drink in the city—the origin of the beans, why we drink it, its taste and composition, sales volume, just everything.”

“That’s… too much information, isn’t it?”

“That’s why for Meister to ask properly, she needs to see something directly and ask ‘Does this thing I’m looking at have this specific problem?'”

“So if she asks ‘Are there problems with W City’s production facilities?’, instead of just current issues, she’ll get information about inherent problems, past problems, and potential future problems?”

“The important thing is that Meister isn’t asking a god. If she doesn’t ask with new information, she only gets answers based on previous information.”

“I think I understand… wow, that’s really a headache-inducing ability.”

Without properly limiting the scope of questions, the answers become uselessly excessive.

Without seeing something directly, she can’t ask “Does this thing I’m looking at have this problem?”

If she needs a new answer but asks without seeing it again, she only gets answers based on past information.

“The biggest problem is that Meister isn’t really a genius…”

Meister is only a D-rank superhuman.

With low ability output, she can only ask questions a limited number of times.

This is also why Meister is almost addicted to the exhaustion that comes after excessive use of her ability.

“Meister can’t remember all the answers at once. She doesn’t understand everything the moment she sees the answer. She has to repeatedly view answers and ask additional questions to understand them.”

“Questions to understand the answers…”

“Plus, only Meister can see the answers. She writes down information bit by bit as soon as she wakes up, but for parts she doesn’t remember well, she has to use her ability again to ask and hear the answer.”

Meister’s ability provides answers but doesn’t force understanding.

Also, Meister isn’t skilled enough at manufacturing to create items based on the answers she receives.

When Meister wants to create something, she writes down detailed information about the item, its materials, and how to make those materials.

Then various companies use that information to realize… to manufacture what Meister has discovered.

Meister is both a human search engine and a human printer, though one that performs below expectations.

“If the answer to a question is too long, Meister can’t process it all… If she asks incorrectly, she risks overload.”

“Wait, does that mean Meister handles all the computational work of the ability?”

“It’s her ability, after all.”

The output and computation needed for a human to use an ability, and the computational power and energy consumed for answers, are automatically drawn from her heart and brain.

If she happens to ask a question that generates too many answers, she could die from her own ability.

With this realization, the heroes recalled the image of an extremely exhausted Meister.

“…Isn’t that ability quite ambiguous?”

“The more I hear, the less she sounds like humanity’s hero or the legendary genius Meister I imagined.”

“Right, Meister isn’t a genius, just a superhuman. And that ambiguous ability is what has kept humanity alive.”

Just then, Iron Might approached, eating a large sandwich.

“Shelters made of new materials that can withstand monsters, food production to maintain daily life, construction drones that quickly restore residential areas—all were created through Meister’s ability. Without Meister, ordinary people who aren’t superhumans would already be dead.”

“We know that.”

“But the ability is so ambiguous.”

“That’s not just ambiguous, it’s a garbage ability, you idiots.”

Then Electris, who had approached from behind Iron Might, tore off a piece of his sandwich.

The W City heroes all turned to look at Electris as she ate the part Iron Might had bitten into, which happened to be full of meat and cheese.

“What? I’m hungry too. Don’t you W City morons know that my energy emission and acceleration ability has poor fuel efficiency?”

“That’s not why we’re looking.”

“Then what? Because I joined your conversation? I’m just telling you because you idiots seem to have too many fantasies about Meister. I don’t like her either.”

When the W City heroes glanced at Iron Might, he expressionlessly changed the subject.

“Even if Meister’s ability is somewhat lacking and ambiguous, she is a true hero… She repeatedly asks questions that could kill her if done wrong, accumulating information that can help humanity. Everything we eat, this building, it’s all thanks to Meister. Especially in the early days of monster appearances, when no one knew how to deal with them, she was an enormous help…”

“Sure, and now she’s like chewed gum with no flavor left, or fruit peel after the fruit’s been eaten.”

Something you can keep chewing or brew tea with, but its primary usefulness is gone.

The W City heroes exchanged glances at Electris’s cold assessment of Meister.

“Is it okay to talk like that?”

“No matter what, she’s a hero who helped humanity survive the monster era.”

“Is this superhuman supremacy…?”

“And she came here to guard Meister too.”

Electris clicked her tongue at their reactions and took Iron Might’s drink.

“You think I wanted to come guard her? I came because if we didn’t, those government pigs would try something suspicious. I didn’t want to come to this city full of idiots again.”

Electris handed the drink back to Iron Might with irritation.

“She was helpful in the beginning, but now she causes more harm than good… just creating confusion and fattening up those government pigs.”

“Sigh.”

Meister brings confusion.

Yu Anna silently agreed, recalling an incident from long ago.

After long discussions between research departments of various cities and high-ranking government officials to overcome the monster era, they came up with a solution.

The Monster Weaponization Plan.

As S-rank heroes, the two of them had access to detailed records of the questions and Meister’s notes.

The questions that government officials had asked Meister at that time:

[Can monsters exist that don’t antagonize humans?]

[Can humans create such monsters?]

The answer was: It’s possible.

Led by this single word “possible,” humans tried to tame monsters.

Monsters that seemed tamed, or pretended to be tamed, through various drugs and machines.

When they went berserk, numerous heroes and citizens died.

The Monster Weaponization Plan that began this way failed like a nightmare.

The causes of failure were lack of information and time, and… the attempt itself.

Without hope, they wouldn’t have tried at all.

“Her biggest problem is that she answers nearly impossible problems as ‘possible.’ No…”

Those who still haven’t given up on the Monster Weaponization Plan.

Those who are proceeding with the Artificial Superhuman Plan.

Everyone who physically experienced that nightmare says the same thing.

If only Meister’s ability had been a little stronger back then.

If only she could have asked more questions.

Reaching the same conclusion, Meister pushed herself to discover more information.

Even when she was on the verge of death, coughing blood from her overclocked ability, suffering from malnutrition, she continued.

There is no time for Meister to grow as a superhuman.

“The problem is that she’s weak.”

A weak superhuman is merely a tool to be consumed for the government and humanity.