Web of light. Part 1-7. part 25

Part 25.

Chapter 118

Honestly, I expected a relatively large but provincial city from Polytech, a picture I knew from business trips "there" — small cozy buildings, everything is drowning in greenery, students are in no hurry (if not a session)... But it seemed — I got somewhere in the Moscow StanKin (Moscow Institute of Steel and Alloys)! Three twenty-storey academic buildings, hangars, a huge area for crowded Japanese cities for its own small park and sports area. There is a separate exhibition pavilion building — I shouldn't have gone to the exhibition with the guys in the spring. The buildings are gleaming with glass trim, and students are wandering around the park and the area between the buildings in couples and groups, sitting and hurrying. Someone is clearly learning something. Damn it! What is everything... dear!

"There" I really spent "half my life" in such places, if you count only my conscious age. First higher education, postgraduate studies. Work as a laboratory assistant. An unsuccessful PhD (or rather, an unsuccessful research assistant). The second highest, I've already taken over. New scientific work... which is why I got here. There was everything — I worked as a subordinate in the hospital, and adjusted experimental machines at the factory, I even had to become an employee of an LLC on a part-time basis with a free schedule, which makes and installs alarms with special functions (such as covering extended perimeters with laser emitters "at the intersection" or volume/weight sensors to organize an electronic analogue of the legendary "strip" from the loosened soil on the border). This particular job was especially informative in terms of communicating with people — from locksmiths and drunken electricians who put up two months of work before handing over the facility (and it still needs to be handed over in an hour!), to communicating with customers (as a technical consultant to determine how much it will cost), then in uniform, either in suits for my two annual salaries in the lab (and do it like a pond with ducks, since you're going to dig a hole anyway), or ordinary men whose garage cooperative is being robbed every day.

At second glance, the Japanese university differed from the Russian one somewhat more strongly — less noise, students sitting right on the floor, or even lying down (!), some — right on a specially dragged sleeping bag (!!!), but at the same time — more identical clothes, although there is no uniform. Many have T-shirts with the university or faculty logo. The shrine to the "spirits of reason", with smoking incense sticks, paper amulets and notes like "successful retake of the assembler test", which was also completely demolished right in the corridor of the department of computer science. о_О! By the way, judging by the notice on the door, the transfer is just underway. Rino-sensei, after rereading the inscription after Taizo and me, convulsively shrugged his shoulders, lit and stuck a new incense stick into the stand, prayerfully folding his hands. Wow, is this already a "holy place" for more than one generation? Yeah!

The Department of Precision Engineering was hiding at the far end of the corridor on the 12th floor, where we finally got after ten minutes of a confusing route. For some reason, all the buildings of educational institutions larger than schools seem to be an analogue of the Cretan labyrinth at first glance. Great. My seven-kilogram backpack has already weighed down my shoulders, not counting the laptop bag in my hands: again, I forgot about my not-so-old age... But he didn't dare to use magic. Even then, after the battle, when I saw that all the structures of the ferry had simply disappeared, I was pretty shocked... and I postponed finding out the reasons for later — there was no time for that. But then... It was a good thing it was a small storage device. It's good that I chose a place in the skin of the abdomen for its implementation, under which there is no fat layer... And it's good that I sleep on my back. The burn hurt a lot. However, Mizuchi brought him to me after all... with a loud hiss and comments about where I was thinking: after all, in order to overload the protection of my amulet, she had to fully unleash her aura and put her strength into a full-fledged combat blow that could cut an elephant. At the same time, the protection of the house was checked — Rinko was looking outside through glasses.

What it cost me to prepare everything in five days — it's better not to even think about it. Of course, it's not about protecting spirits from spirits, and it's not as stressful as taking a vassal oath, but everything had to be done "quickly to make it work." Suffice it to say that we completed the last details on Friday at school at ten o'clock in the evening. If it was still somehow familiar to me, then Taizo was just nervous. Well, yes, it's useful — it's better to start a "collision" with the "adult" world carefully in advance...

I liked the head of the department — a world-class man, with his own mind, of course, a stocky Japanese man with the figure of a sumo wrestler and the intelligence of a chess player. After talking with Rino-sensei for a while, he switched to us. He began to ask, unobtrusively pushing for revelations, who encouraged us to do such interesting things, are school teachers really? I had to come up with a trump card:

"Goro-san, nowadays almost any information, especially if you don't need to search for complete information, is easy to find online. The main thing is curiosity and the desire to do something, as Rino-sensei teaches us (a bow to sensei, who really blurted out something like that a year ago). May I demonstrate? Thanks! Taizo, help me!"

What is the good of the Rep-Rap project? It's really going to be "made of shit and sticks", all you need are metal guides, stepper motors, order a plastic melting head (you can do it yourself, but I didn't dare), buy a controller and download the software. If you have experience building one such device, it's really nothing complicated. And I've already assembled 3D printers. In just twenty minutes, we unscrewed the disassembled unit, connected it to a laptop and warmed it up. And then they set up a program for printing a sample that would be shown by Taizo at the avia department: a simple, even primitive glider... but by installing a light motor (with itself) and a battery (with itself) and planting the blades on the axle, we get a flying thing for quite a long time. Someone urgently had to master Autocad and an editor for a printer, and our homework, which was not done in a week, is still lying at home. At least almost all the teachers have "entered" our position...

Watching Goro and Rino's expressions, I tried harder to suppress the smile that was trying to creep onto my face. When I said that we would be demonstrating a working model of this ersatz fabricator, I forgot to mention that we would be printing a workable model of a motor glider "right here". Not all of it, of course, but only the nacelle and keels, because without any modification to the wing plates, they warped during "printing", and they turned out well if once out of five... that's why we made them in advance on Friday evening, choosing the best ones and literally finishing them with a file. Naturally, we said here that we would not print the entire model "to save time." A typical marketing ploy... but the "customer" was so impressed that he didn't even seem to notice anything. You know, when they showed me a 3D printer at work there, I was just as impressed!

About the degree of fu... surprise Goro-san's can be judged at least by the fact that he asked to leave the assembled printer at the department — with a refund later, of course, and compensation for the working time of the machine. No, the university has its own semi-industrial fabricator, of course, but he's the ONLY ONE and there's a queue for him for a month! And Taizo and I (already alone!) He invited me to attend the "open" lectures that the university holds for everyone, when he, Goro, leads them. And then he took us to the department of aircraft designers.: He wanted to see our glider in action. Fortunately, the success was complete, although one of the elevators still had to be replaced with a pre-made one. While Taizo was watching the operation of the wind tunnel with huge eyes (under the condescendingly flattered glances of two laboratory students), I heard the head of the department say to Rino-sensei:

"...And tell your esteemed director that an invitation for cooperation negotiations will follow within a month..."

Success, complete success! And he got the right to look "at the light", and Taizo dragged I, now who the hell is going to get me out of here — the playground for work is much better than the school Club, with all due respect to him. So I won't be me if I can't use the knowledge of a thoroughly familiar environment so as not to drag my teammates here too. And I'll have a real chance to figure out my ancestral abilities in terms of improving materials on a completely different level... and at least no one will stupidly count electricity for charging superconducting batteries here... So, I won't say "gop" yet. But! This is a victory! And it's purely mine — without any kekkegenkai and inherited spirits, without the glory of the clan, and even without a selfish goal. It's nice, kso, to get recognition like that, that I didn't work in vain, very much!..

...However, I still have to deal with the Committee. I need to call Hiroe and find out how it went...

Chapter 119.

"You couldn't be excused from visiting the Committee's office, I'm sorry. Everyone in the social control department was already ready to sign — I don't know what my mother gave them through my father, but she was terribly annoyed by our record. And she hadn't figured that out about the spell yet. In general, it was unpleasant — a fan of blue needles flying from the hand of this dyed bitch — and a part sticks into you. Brr, it's good that your defense held up. At the same time, this unfinished magician also managed to set fire to something in the office..."

"Rather," Shizuka added, "something reacted to her magic."

"Are you saying that there was a real magic item in this "magic club"? Actually, you would have noticed it, I think. Although if the amulet has no energy, then no. However, are you sure that Yu is not a magician?"

"Absolutely. No skills, no knowledge, you know."

"Okay, then we closed the topic. "Do you have any idea why the bosses of the Social Committee needed me?"

"Because of the last name," Hiroe snorted, "because in all other cases, you would have already witnessed an attack on your, sorry, OUR mutual friends."

"I support you," Mizuchi grimaced at the words Kaname.

Hiroe, of course, says what he says, no tact... It's just how she shows trust in the other person. The absence of a mask. And the girl's character is not easy... At least Shizuka understands this, I checked it out by specifically talking to her about this topic. And with Rinko too. The team began to "get lost", and immediately other people's flaws came out of all the cracks, which you notice only with close, relatively long communication. And it's good that girls are able to "talk through" these shortcomings, because in most men's groups, a universal "virtual penisomerism" championship would begin... and in women's too, only girls have not yet had time to learn to ignore the feelings of others, even Kaname. So you need to be prepared for lapping and smooth out, if possible, sharp corners as they appear... however, everything is clear here.

How should I behave in the Committee's office? It's clear that the charge against me now is "you live without custody, we have to send you to orphanage" they won't, otherwise they would have done it right away, at the age of nine. They probably won't. Damn, it makes me sick when I think that all my endeavors can be ruined with a light swipe of the pen on the sheet. Over the past two years, I have already managed to forget that I live in a house with bird rights... Maybe they'll try to put pressure on me... but for what? I didn't have time to show up with my "otherworldly" projects. And my social scientific endeavors should be encouraged in a good way. So what is it?

Rather, it's just an attempt by the head of the regional office to get to know me. What for? Apparently, to make sure that I understand my place correctly... under the broom. That's kso! After all, a couple of months after Tsuchi's departure, the conversation would have gone in a slightly different vein. Most importantly, it's all my fault with this rocket... On the other hand, it's an accident. Okay, it's too late now anyway. So, the plan of the conversation is to demonstrate sanity when talking to a psychologist. to demonstrate that I haven't forgotten everything when talking to the head of the regional office. Actually, that's all I can do.

I was scheduled to visit the Committee's office on Tuesday (again, having personally canceled school for me, the teachers will probably frown disapprovingly, they don't like absenteeism here — even on business). And I devoted half of Sunday to delving into the affairs of the Amakawa group, which had to be blamed on the girls. Well, what can I say — there has definitely been progress. All, absolutely all spirits have learned to express their thoughts very briefly and ... obscenely! No, they tried to restrain themselves in front of us, but a couple of new acquaintances were "caressed" in such a way that Rinko turned blue, and Hiroe made a tense face, memorizing. She was still too shy to take a notebook and write it down... or was she just doubting her ability to spell it accurately! As a result, the same Mizuchi turned out to be the spontaneous coordinator: she forced all yokai from both brigades to purchase inexpensive mobile phones for the first payment and record each other's phones. And put a call to her and me on the alarm button. At the same time, she taught me how to find and quickly press these buttons. Hiroe looked at the concluded contracts, there was nothing particularly complicated there, once she forced Kashi to charge a penalty from a not entirely honest customer who delayed the paver by as much as two hours. And the foremen, in the person of Porridge and Hawk-Nosed, were also driven to a men's clothing store and forced to buy a suit, and the rest were forced to buy any casual items such as T-shirts, sweaters, and sneakers in a simpler place. And she explained why in human society you need to change clothes, even if your outfit falls apart because of artifact protection.

Well, the yokai themselves were literally idolized... Rinko! Of the eight "ordinary" spirits, each brigade included, which is logical, four. Three men and one girl. And the girls, of course, got the role of housewives of the household unit: they took their clothes to the washing machines of the dormitory's common laundry room on time and pulled them out, dried, hung, bought and cooked food for everyone... That's where the plug came out. It wasn't that the workers' eateries had any particularly bad food, but it was still more expensive to eat there every day than cooking at home. Rinko, coming home from school with Mizuchi, became convinced that the yokai girls could not cook from the word "at all". And she fed one of the teams with her own cooking — it wasn't difficult for Kuzaki. As Hiroe blabbed to me, the spirits from the second brigade were literally on their knees begging for a master class with their cook. Rinko, who had recently found herself in the position of the second most powerful combat unit, was intensively mastering new possibilities, even with Shizuka she stopped cooking together, and then — this! They flattered my girlfriend, they flattered her... Moreover, the scene was seen by others, ordinary hard workers from the dorm, and now Kusaki were almost greeted with applause in the dormitory — a compassionate girl foolishly shared her generosity with other residents, as a "common boiler" (all the food is for me, then everyone takes the food).