Editing HEAVY OBJECT:MonicaSS (section)

===Part 6===

The fiber optic installation and maintenance pathways were accessed through manholes around campus. But unlike the ones leading to the general sewer, these had no hole for inserting an opener.

“You open them by attaching an electromagnet as a handhold and then rotating it twice to the right, three times to the left, and four times to the right.”

They followed the instructions to open one of the manholes and climbed down the flimsy ladder. Quenser took the lead with the girls following. Allen went last. Quenser descended the ladder with a thoughtful look on his face, made sure to get a good look up Monica’s super-mini dress as she followed him down, and got a heel to the face for his trouble. Elritta and Allen safely climbed down while that scum writhed around on the floor. Then they worked to secure a route like usual.

They found a narrow tunnel lit by a faint emergency exit sign. It was two meters tall and a meter wide at best. Cables encased in plastic were bundled together by the dozen and running along the walls and ceiling. That only applied further pressure.

Action movies often claimed blades were more powerful than projectiles in narrow spaces, but was that really true? Quenser felt no desire to trade his slingshot bow gun for Monica’s stun sabre.

“It’s like a labyrinth below the Academy. I bet I could film an entire movie down here.” Allen sounded annoyed. “But I don’t feel any safer. Aren’t we in trouble if we run into the enemy in here?”

“That depends on who you mean by ‘the enemy’. But check the wall here, Allen.”

“?”

“Some of the thick layer of dust has been scraped off. Someone must have passed through here.”

Quenser, Allen, and Monica exchanged a glance.

Then they turned toward Elritta.

“It couldn’t have been me. That mark is higher than my head.”

“Then did either the teachers or students found this place?”

“If so, a patrol would’ve found us and turned us to Swiss cheese. But that hasn’t happened. Besides, the marks on the walls and footprints on the floor don’t look like a large group is frequently moving through here. It looks more like a single person.”

“Then…wait, does that mean what I think it does?”

“I was thinking the same thing, Monica. No matter how good he is at manipulation, it still seemed odd that the Headmaster was staying out of harm’s way so well, but he must have known the same secret route as the Board Chairman.”

In that case, it seemed unlikely that Headmaster Cliff French-Connection would tell the students or teachers about the secret path. Send an angry mob in here and he would lose his safe route.

That said, they could not deny the possibility of the Headmaster leaving some “presents” using tripwires or infrared sensors. In the worst case, they could have been blown up by a grenade the instant they opened the manhole. They felt an even greater pressure in their stomachs as they cautiously walked down the narrow tunnel.

Fortunately, they never had to battle some colorful wires with a pair of pliers.

But they had not known that in advance. It wore at their nerves to slowly walk through the limited lighting while feeling enough tension to affect their breathing, but they finally arrived below the high school special classroom building.

“Assuming nothing has changed, the students control this building,” said Allen. “It’s become an armory thanks to the tools in the tech room and home ec room. And we’ll be seen as enemy soldiers since we have the Board Chairman with us. Once we poke this hornet’s nest, there is no going back.”

“It’s the same wherever we go. We won’t be welcomed by the students or the teachers.”

They opened the manhole while discussing it.

And they found themselves in a corner of a school hallway.

After being so cautious inside the underground passageway, night had truly fallen once they emerged, but they could not worry about the lack of light or the ghosts of the night.

They were much more bothered by the intensely hot wind that seemed to scorch their hair.

“Dwah!!”

“Don’t breathe in! This is bad!!”

They closed the manhole again, waited a bit, covered their mouths and noses with handkerchiefs, and opened it again.

Hell awaited them.

The improperly sealed wooden flooring had turned to charcoal and the windows had melted. The hallway wallpaper had burned and the linoleum floor had bubbled up and then solidified again.

Simply standing there sent a dull pain racing across their skin. Sweat immediately poured from their bodies. They felt no desire to carelessly touch the walls. They had likely absorbed all the heat like a furnace after the fire had been put out.

Quenser checked the tag of his blazer. Fortunately, it was made from natural materials. Wearing a track suit or other garment made from synthetic fibers would not be a good idea here. Having the clothing meant to protect you melt like cheese and cling to you was the stuff of nightmares.

“Wait, wait, wait. Did they blast the place with naphtha or something?”

“Doesn’t look like it,” said Allen while restlessly messing with his phone.

The heat may have been affecting it, but his number had yet to be removed from the students’ list.

“Apparently a teacher is driving around in a truck loaded with an experimental laser. It’s been firing on this building intermittently, so all the students have evacuated. Since it’s an armory, I imagine it’s a high priority target.”

“This is bad, but it’s also our chance.”

Quenser and Allen removed their jackets and placed them over Monica and Elritta. They were unsure how effective that would be, but they could not ignore the damage the heat would do to their skin.

“So where’s the Student Council Room?”

“On the east side of the second floor.”

Elritta tried to remove the coat because it was so hot, but Quenser and Allen stopped her because they were already feeling the pain of excessive sunbathing after just a few minutes. Quenser glanced down at his slingshot bow gun made from a tire tube. He was worried the heat would cause it to deteriorate. They had to consider Allen’s ''electric'' nail gun and Monica’s ''stun'' sabre as well. They both had electronics embedded in them to amplify their power, so they were weak to heat.

They were glad to see the students really had evacuated. They did not run across a bunch of students collapsed in the hallway.

They ran up the stairs toward the Student Council Room.

They gathered around the entrance to the adjacent storeroom.

It was locked, but unlike the Student Council Room, it was a simple design that combined the lock with the knob. It was the kind that locked by pressing a button on the inside. Quenser easily opened it by whacking the knob with his slingshot bow gun and causing the spring-loaded clasp to come undone with a pleasant noise.

But then they ran into a problem.

Thus spoke super-mini dress Monica:

“Servant, hurry up and open the door. Did I fail to properly beat a sense of ‘ladies first’ into you?”

“Shut the hell up, Lady Monica. …Oh, god that’s hot!!!???”

Quenser grumbled, but when he touched the metal knob, it produced a sizzling sound like from Chinese cooking. He immediately yanked his hand back and Elritta handed him the handkerchief that had been covering her mouth.

“You intentionally set him up for that, didn’t you?” she said. “It’s like an oven in here, so touching any kind of metal is suicide.”

“So what do we do? Kick it down?”

“There is no need to go that far. It shouldn’t be problem if you wrap a thick cloth around your hand first. It’s the same idea as a potholder.”

He tried again using his coat.

“Do you have any idea how valuable an engineer’s fingers are?” complained Quenser.

“Oh? Not as important as a lady’s delicate fingers,” replied Monica.

The space was about half the size of a classroom. Just like Elritta had said, it looked a lot like a dumping ground for old electronics. Dusty and yellowed fans, LCD monitors, air conditioners, refrigerators, and microwaves had been thrown inside, leaving little space to walk. There were piles of old junk here and there, but they wanted to stay away from the ones stacked higher than they were tall. Those could collapse at any moment.

There was no window.

They had to rely on the backlight of Allen’s smartphone, but that also helped keep the heat of the laser from getting inside.

They finally found relief.

“Servant.” Twintail Monica tossed Quenser the coat he had placed over her head. “You said we need to find an old printer, but will it even function in this environment? It’s probably already overheated and it might have already been fried.”

“It’s hard to say. This room is relatively protected, so we just have to pray it still works.”

“That’s it in the corner there. Let’s try plugging it in.”

Elritta pointed at the kind of large laser printer seen in offices and convenience stores. It came up to their waists, it had several buttons and joystick-like things, and it also had a long, narrow stand supporting an LCD screen the size of a car navigation system or a bath television.

“It’s a mess by the walls too. It’s too dark to see, but is this the power outlet? Okay, it’s plugged in, Quensette!”

“Servant.”

“Yes, yes. I’ll do it, I’ll do it. …Abyaha!?”

“Hey, be careful. The outlets in here are ungrounded. Get careless and you’re in for a shock.”

Quenser glared at the tomboy idol, but she whistled with a nonchalant look inspecting her carefully manicured nails.

Quenser nervously touched the device while wondering how exactly he was supposed to be careful with this. But…

“It works. The screen just lit up.”

They had been reliant on the phone backlight before, but a new light faintly but undeniably revealed the interior. The screen contained flashing messages asking for new paper and ink. They checked around the room and found a set of materials in one corner, presumably left there by the President and whoever else used it.

Elritta spoke while watching them open and fill the drawer-like slots.

“I believe it takes some special software to directly view the temporary memory. It would be faster to set it to print out the cache data.”

“Yeah, but don’t we have to see it to know which file is the one?”

“That is why we need to print them all out.”

Once they pressed the large “confirm” button, the motor rumbled and the work began.

They wanted the secret file the Student Council President had hidden there. That would be the proof needed to reveal the Headmaster’s financial malpractice, but that of course was not the very first thing printed out.

Most of it was completely worthless data.

But that did not mean it was also meaningless.

Board Chairman Elritta Champs-Élysées had said the various Presidents secretly tutored her afterschool. They had used their computers to create teaching materials and then printed them out here.

It was obvious at a glance.

This was different from someone showing off their knowledge with no real intention of explaining what it all meant. It was broken down with an obvious understanding of how to make it understandable and how to overcome common stumbling blocks and it included simple examples from real life.

Most of all, it was clear that they had not seen this as work.

They had enjoyed making these materials and you could almost imagine them eagerly typing it up with a smile on their face.

And there were a few notes in the margins that had nothing to do with academics.

“How to conquer spiciness!!”

“I can’t just have her eat spicy things right away.”

“Maybe combine it with other flavors?”

“Honey mustard chicken, tom yum, milk curry. The curry would probably be simplest.”

Elritta had said she knew she had to overcome it.

She might still have trouble with it and she might not have overcome it right away.

But the sentiment had reached her.

And yet…

“I know this isn’t like me.”

“What is it, Quensette?”

“The Headmaster…what was his name? I’m not going to bother remembering some dirty old man’s name, but that bastard attacked the person who wrote this. He tried to destroy everything contained here and all for his own personal greed.”

“…”

They said nothing more for a while.

The printer continued outputting the kindness of the past.

They had to refill the paper a few times, but then things changed.

“Here it is. This is the file.”

The total number of pages was listed as more than 200, so it would take a long time just to print. They grabbed each page as soon as it appeared in the tray and read through it.

Quenser honestly did not understand what all the detailed numbers meant. It was Board Chairman Elritta who grew excited upon reading it.

“This lists the entire flow of money, from the foreign bank accounts to the fictional shell companies. It’s not exactly a good thing that she discovered this much about the false funding project…but it’s still incredible. This is enough to track Cliff’s actions. This has more than 400 digital footprints. Even if he tried to erase it all now, the Black Uniforms would catch him first. In fact, it looks a lot like he wouldn’t even know all of the footprints he left behind.”

“Hold on, wait. Then what’s all this stuff still being printed out? If that was enough to ruin the Headmaster, why is the rest of this necessary? What more could there be?”

Something seemed off about all the additional pages the printer was still spitting out. They started to suspect the beautiful Student Council President had been given some false data.

“The Headmaster was trying to sell something?” Quenser frowned. “The deal was with the Information Alliance, the price was 20 million Legitimacy Kingdom euros, and the item was…what? A bunch of data???”

“Wait, is this a joke?” Elritta grimaced when she read the paper from the side. “The false funding project was joint government and civilian information warfare that made it look like 5 billion dollars was changing hands to trick the enemy into thinking a nonexistent Object was in development which would confuse their long-term military strategies.”

“Hm? What about it?”

“That requires more than just the money. It also has to be convincing and trustworthy. The enemy has to believe that location could build an Object given that sum of money. That was why our Academy was used. It is the Legitimacy Kingdom’s greatest technical school where we raise our greatest technical minds. It has enough of a reputation to start rumors of an Object construction facility existing below it. But what if that technical institute only existed as online data meant to make it convincing and trustworthy?”

They all exchanged a glance.

An unpleasant feeling filled the entire room.

“If they can fake both the 5 billion dollars and the technical institute, then the false funding project is no longer exclusive to the Legitimacy Kingdom. Any of the world powers could do the same.”

“Wait! What would Cliff gain from doing that!? He wasn’t just blinded by that one payment of cash, was he!?”

“He was already taking advantage of the Legitimacy Kingdom project in order to line his pockets with a portion of the public money, right?” Monica tapped the floor with her foil. “Then the more such projects are active, the more opportunities he has to make some of that money his. If he rattles the Legitimacy Kingdom by having the other world powers do the same thing, the Legitimacy Kingdom will have no choice but to begin even more bluffs. So he does profit from it in the long run, doesn’t he?”

“B-but the false funding project was top secret, right!? Sell the method to the other world powers and they’ll realize it’s all fake! If the bluff stops working, the project ends. Then he loses his source of income, right!?”

“Not necessarily,” cut in Board Chairman Elritta. “Basically, he just has to sell the method to the Information Alliance while hiding that the Legitimacy Kingdom is already using it. He tells them they can use the method to be the first in the world to use that unprecedented strategy. He tells them they can use it to fool the Capitalist Corporations, the Faith Organization…and most importantly, the Legitimacy Kingdom. From there, a false funding arms race will break out. Neither side is aware they are being shown an illusion as they accelerate their own false funding project with cold sweat dripping down their smiling faces.”

Once that happened, no one would know the total number of Objects in the world.

Those weapons could destroy the world and drive humanity to extinction several times over and no one would know how many each world power possessed. It would be an age of chaos.

The thought disgusted Quenser and he spoke his mind.

“I can see why the Headmaster is panicking.”

“Yes, so can I.”

“I mean, what crime would he even be charged with? The false funding project itself is top secret and has its roots in the military. Simply lining his pockets with public money is a pretty serious crime, but he’s also selling those secrets to another world power and creating the risk of an enemy information warfare campaign that could affect us for decades. That has to be embezzlement, leaking classified information, and either treason or instigation of foreign aggression. If this goes public, his prison sentence will be in the quadruple digits.”

“Why did he want money that badly? Bank robberies are not common, but not because people do not need money. It’s because the risk is too great and they will probably be caught before they can use the money.”

Twintail Monica sounded shocked, but they received an answer from an unexpected place.

After picking up the next printed page, Elritta read through it and froze.

“…”

“Is there more?”

“Read this. Although even I find it hard to believe.”

“?”

Quenser and Monica looked at the paper the tiny Board Chairman held.

It was apparently a list of the shell companies used in the digital transaction.

One was registered with its headquarters in the Capitalist Corporations.

However…

“An Object sharing fund? You mean that thing where everyone gathers enough money to sponsor a 5 billion dollar Object and profit from its use!?”

“I was wondering where he put all that money.” Elritta had to shrug at this point. “Cliff was trying to acquire his own Object. He wanted more than simple money; he wanted a much greater power!!”

It was hard to tell how much of this was a realistic conspiracy and how much was an overblown fantasy.

“Is this the unique greed of commoners?” asked Quenser with a cynical smile. “The worst part is I kind of sympathize with his goal here. His methods couldn’t be worse, though.”

The beautiful Student Council President must have been just as taken aback by the scope of the conspiracy she had unearthed. She must not have expected to find it went so deep. The secret file had some smaller notes jotted down in the margins.

“I’m scared.”

“I can’t ask for help here.”

“I would only be dragging them into this.”

She may have tried to stop several times along the way. She may have tried to obey the tremor running through her body and pretend she had never seen anything.

But she had not done that.

The secret file existed to the very last page as proof of what she had accomplished on her own.

She had to have considered the possibility of being attacked.

Why had she stuck with it so far?

The reason for her lonely fight was written there in the margins.

“But I can’t leave that girl all alone.”

“…”

It could not have been more obvious who “that girl” alluded to.

She was the leader of the Academy, but she was also a tutoring student.

And she was a 10-year-old girl.

The fear the President felt was all the more reason she could never shove it onto that girl’s shoulders. So she had continued through to the end and ultimately been attacked just as she had feared. Had she regretted her actions during her last moments of consciousness? Quenser felt certain she had smiled. Because she was glad it was her and not “that girl” who had been in harm’s way.

But that baton had not gone to waste.

No, whether or not it would go to waste was dependent on the actions of those who had received it.

“Hey, Allen.”

“What?”

“The President is a great girl, isn’t she?”

“Of course she is. You can belong to the Golden Lion Club and she’ll still be out of your league.”

And there was one rule the world had followed since ancient times.

The pieces of shit who hurt great girls were enemies of the entire human race.