Ch.9191 – The Crime of Being Too Good

<91 – The Crime of Being Too Good>

The professor’s scheme was meticulous.

When I found the gambling coin by sound, she took away sound; when I found it by pattern, she took away sight.

And to top it all off, she processed everything in an instant with ‘acceleration’ without even being asked to do any of it!

Truly terrifying skill befitting the world’s greatest noble thief.

Honestly, I hit a wall.

“For your information, I plan to teach you the technique even if you don’t get the right answer.”

“Really?”

“The technique shown by the Oknodie freshman was interesting in many ways.”

“What about the coin?”

“If you don’t guess correctly, there’s obviously no reason to give it to you.”

“Hmph.”

“Acting pitiful won’t help. I’ve even taken toys from 3-year-old children before.”

Your identity as a noble thief seems to be in danger, Professor.

But who am I to worry about whom in this situation.

‘Annoyingly, even the patterns are identical.’

The larger cups covering the original cups had the same pattern as the existing cups.

That’s why I became suspicious.

Wait, is this not actually covering with larger cups, but <transforming> the existing cups?

When I layered mana over my eyes like contact lenses, I could see the mana composing everything in the world in detail.

“You even know how to use Search Eye?”

“It’s basic.”

Search Eye.

A technique that detects mana by overlaying mana on vision.

“That’s a method that damages your eyes if used for too long.”

I didn’t answer the professor’s comment.

More precisely, I didn’t have the luxury to answer.

As she said, this technique comes with a penalty.

It’s the result of insufficient proficiency.

There’s no technique an old-timer doesn’t know, but there’s a gap between frequently used techniques and those that aren’t.

Search Eye fell into the latter category.

Mana trap?

Mana creature?

When a 230cm muscle giant throws a “serious punch,” everything breaks anyway, so what’s the point of knowing?

With that concept play, I relatively had little interest in gameplay that involved cheap eye tricks.

I occasionally used Prognosis Eye, which precisely detects muscle movements to predict the opponent’s next move one step ahead.

If my proficiency with Prognosis Eye was 100, my proficiency with Search Eye wouldn’t even reach 10.

Even that was mostly theoretical knowledge.

‘But that’s enough.’

All three cups were indeed ‘transformed.’

As expected from a professor teaching <Eye Training>.

She set a trap to test my discernment.

Perhaps this is an extension of the previous lecture.

But I couldn’t find the real cup with this method.

‘It’s not just transformation.’

An ingenious mana barrier is spread out.

A thin layer of mana barrier surrounding each cup’s surface like a coating.

I can’t read the internal patterns of the cups.

In other words, the patterns visible on the cup surfaces now are fake patterns disguised by magic, not the original cup patterns.

Since cup 1’s pattern remains in position 1, cups 2 and 3 must have been mixed, and the coin should be in cup 1 which wasn’t mixed—but that turned out to be the trap.

It feels like she’s mocking me, standing right on top of my head, by perfectly recreating the pattern I had memorized.

‘Urgh. I don’t want to lose.’

I don’t want to lose, but…

As information increases, my mind gets complicated.

My head is overloading!

“Huh?”

Just then, I noticed something off at the corner of my vision.

Simultaneously, 3 seconds passed.

I immediately deactivated Search Eye.

3 seconds was the time limit to preserve my eyesight.

I stopped the operation right at the limit.

A smile appeared on the professor’s lips.

“You found something.”

“I did find something. The mark indicating ‘three challenges’ has appeared on the opposite side.”

This person not only performed all those processes in an instant but even rotated the desk 180 degrees.

How can he be so relaxed?

It’s frustrating, but Professor Bronze is strong.

She’s on a completely different level of swift action than me, beyond what I can comprehend in terms of speed.

“Can you find the cup hiding the coin with that?”

“Not at all.”

“Oh my. You couldn’t grasp the ‘pattern’?”

I couldn’t tell if she was mocking me or giving me a hint.

A statement I couldn’t quite figure out.

I erased from my mind words that would only confuse me if I thought about them.

One shouldn’t use uncertain information as judgment material.

Judgment is based on information collected firsthand.

Don’t use others’ records or plausible words as material.

Carrying through with only your own strength straightforwardly.

That’s the truth I know.

‘Let me think.’

If the disguised pattern on the cup is the same as the actual pattern, the coin is in cup 1.

However, the mana barrier has created ‘uncertainty.’

The possibility that the pattern on the transformed cup is a fake pattern on top of the barrier created instantaneously by ‘swiftness.’

In this case, all judgments based on patterns become false and deceptive.

Thus, cup 1 becomes the furthest from the correct answer.

‘The real one must be either cup 2 or 3. Psychologically, that was the only conclusion I could reach.’

That was until the mark indicating three challenges appeared on the opposite side.

That is not a mark forged with a “mana barrier.”

Silence.

Swiftness.

Transformation.

Barrier.

It’s ‘physical evidence’ indicating that another process, the ‘rotation’ of the table, was added to the four actions.

It’s reliable judgment material.

The table was flipped 180 degrees.

Naturally, the positions of the cups were also flipped 180 degrees.

I thought cup 1 was in its original position, but it might have been moved to position 3 and then returned to position 1 after the 180-degree rotation.

Whether she mixed the cups first or rotated the table first,

There’s a possibility that cups 1 and 3 were mixed.

Thus, cup 2 becomes closest to the correct answer.

‘The existence of the mana barrier makes all these assumptions mere possibilities.’

It’s the most difficult challenge.

A single layer of barrier.

All information and truth about the cups are lost in a maze due to a barrier thinner than a fingernail.

“May I ask one question as a hint?”

“Go ahead.”

“Can you remove the mana barrier?”

The professor didn’t answer.

“Professor?”

“What is it?”

“I just asked a question.”

“And I listened to it.”

“……”

Do you think this is some kind of counseling session?

You should give an answer.

‘Wait a minute.’

Perhaps the lack of a hint is actually a hint in itself.

From what I’ve observed so far, Professor Bronze has a personality that really hates losing.

She immediately blocked the technique I used in the next round, and in the end, she even countered psychologically by using my own technique against me to block the shell game with another shell game.

She returns what she receives.

She gives back as much as she gets.

‘An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.’ A personality like the Code of Hammurabi that follows the principle of lex talionis!

“The answer is cup 1.”

When I flipped the cup, sure enough, there was the coin inside.

The coin was in the cup furthest from the correct answer.

“How did you think the coin was there?”

“When the mark indicating three challenges appeared on the opposite side, the position of the text was flipped, but the order of the text wasn’t.”

In other words, if the text was written in the order 123, when the table rotated 180 degrees, the order should have changed to 321.

However, the numbers that appeared on the table remained in the same order, 123.

“There was no trace of a mana barrier. This means I wasn’t seeing things or mistaken… I could tell that the idea of the table being flipped 180 degrees was an ‘intended misconception.'”

“I don’t know what technique was used, but if the intention was to confuse, then following the opposite is the way to go.”

“With this, I could see through the intention to make cup 2 appear closest to the correct answer, so naturally cup 2 was excluded from the options.”

The professor rebutted.

“You don’t know what’s beyond the barrier. There’s no evidence to support your inference.”

“But I can tell the tendency.”

“Tendency?”

“A fencer confident in thrusting will frequently use thrusts, and a government official who wants to confirm their superiority will mainly deal with people who will highly regard their influence.”

The same applies to Professor Bronze.

“In this bet, you’ve consistently shown the principle of retaliation. I can be certain that in your third response, you would return my method exactly.”

“In academia, they call that confirmation bias. It’s a tendency to selectively take information you want and ignore what you don’t want. Doesn’t the Oknodie freshman just want to see such a trait in me?”

“Maybe so. But it worked, didn’t it?”

If it succeeded, that’s all that matters!

The professor had to acknowledge this invincible argument from someone who had been tricked.

“Why did you narrow it down to cup 1 between cups 1 and 3?”

“Because the existence of the ‘mana barrier’ made choosing cup 1 seem uncertain. I thought there might be a possibility in cup 1, which appeared most disadvantageous.”

“How strange. Though your body is so young, your wisdom hits the nail on the head like only a battle-hardened general or warrior would possess.”

“??”

“A single corner can bring down a mountain peak. It refers to the weakness of the tendency you mentioned.”

Using the opponent’s strengths, specialties, frequently used habits, and thought patterns against them to read their moves.

It’s an attack technique that old-timers naturally acquire after experiencing numerous rounds.

I didn’t know it could be called by such a fancy name!

“A promise is a promise. That commemorative coin is now yours.”

Yay, I won the bet!

But why?

Why do I feel like I’ve made a big mistake?

[You have shown exceptional talent in finding coins through shell games with ‘tendency exploitation,’ making Professor Bronze the happiest she’s been in the past year.]

[Psychology Prediction Experience +15]

[Behavior Prediction Experience +15]

[Search Experience +10]

[Thinking Ability Experience +10]

[Magic Detection Experience +10]

[Boldness Experience +5]

[Social Life Experience +5]

[Cuteness Experience +5]

“???”

What’s with this feast of experience points?

The growing sense of unease.

The professor’s increasingly friendly gaze.

Delivering the final blow, the professor said:

“Oknodie freshman. Would you consider receiving separate education under me? I’d like to teach you more personally outside of regular lectures.”

Now I understand.

What this uneasiness stemmed from.

It’s because it seems like the professor wants me to become a graduate student!