Ryuuou no Oshigoto! - Volume 18 - Chapter 1.07

  The Girl Who Became a God

I step into the arena right behind Okito-sensei. For some reason, the sliding door is off its track and Ms. Noboryou is halfway into the hall and pale as a ghost.

Inside the arena―――is even more shocking.

“I-Ika?!”

I scream her name the second I see her sitting stiff as a board with blood spewing out of her eyes.

―――Now this is crazy!

There’s no way she can continue the match, zero.

Actually, she needs medical attention… now. There’s nothing normal about bleeding out your eyes.

―――She needs help! But ……

The match is still going.

Interfering now might void the match entirely. If she were an ordinary person, people would be rushing to her aid without a second thought. However, none of the adults here can so much as put a finger on her because of the situation.

Wins and losses are life and death to a Shogi player …… The results are more than sacred.

―――What do we do?! Appeal to the observer?!

Okito-sensei is standing right there, but I still can’t open my mouth. Ika is his biological daughter. That fact is making his decision even harder ……

“It’s about time you showed up. What kept you?”

Okito-sensei didn’t acknowledge Ai’s quip and turns to the match recorder instead.

“Remaining time?”

“Th-There is still over an hour. Th-Th-Though …… Sainokami-sensei has spent seventeen minutes on this turn so far ……”

“She won’t be playing a move,” Ai interjects matter-of-factly.

The little Challenger turns to the still-hesitant adults and starts issuing orders.

“Call an ambulance if you don’t want her to die.”

A two second pause.

Okito-sensei needed that time to take a breath.

“Under my authority as the observer, I hereby end this match due to a player be physically unable to continue.”

No one objects.

One look at this place, and it’s obvious the Empress can’t even lift a finger.

“I will consult with the organizers to determine the result of this match. At the very least, it will not be restarted today. The Empress will be taken to a hospital for evaluation.”

The adults take action like they were all shot out of cannons.

“C-Call an ambulance!”

“Quickly! Get the Empress into another room! Move!”

Ika gets carried out of the arena but she hasn’t made a sound. Is she even alive ……?

What in the world just happened?

How does someone sustain that much physical damage just by playing Shogi? Sure, Ai Hinatsuru once got a nosebleed in the middle of a match, but ……

I sit down behind the lower seat.

“Ai …… What happened ……?”

“Malnutrition. Of the brain, that is.”

“What?”

“Shouldn’t you be celebrating? She beat Ginko Sora by driving her into exhaustion, and I just gave her a taste of her own medicine. Your apprentice did that, don’t you understand? I should be getting a Well done! right about now.”

I take a deep breath.

“…… Could you be more specific? So that even I can understand.”

“Human brains are always in flux.”

“What do you mean …… flux?”

“They can’t continuously think about one specific thing out of necessity.”

Ai taps on her forehead between her eyebrows.

“We call that concentrating, but our brains aren’t built to delve deeper and deeper into one specific idea. Massive amounts of energy would be necessary if they get honed to work like a machine. That’s the same as suicide for any living thing. People can’t become machines and machines can’t become people.”

“…………”

Noboryou 3-dan and I make eye contact before realizing it.

Most of what Ai is saying makes sense.

Running Shogi software on a computer takes tons of electricity. That’s especially true for deep learning software. The amount of power those computers use is immense. I’ve heard that they can knock out the power to a house because the voltage went too high.

What would happen if you tried to do that with a human brain?

It would need enormous amounts of nutrients and oxygen.

More than the human body can provide ……

“This is what happens when the heart sends too much blood to the head trying to get more oxygen into the brain.”

“Blood vessels in her eyes must have ruptured ……,” says Ai between sips of tea like that horrifying truth was just dinnertime conversation. “So you see, I wasn’t afraid of Ika Sainokami’s approach from the start. It’s physically impossible to use.”

In her match against Big Sis, Ika had five hours of waiting time but only used eight minutes.

Now I realize that she didn’t only use eight minutes but that she could only use eight minutes. No matter how special her brain might be, it only had a regular teenage girl’s body to power it.

I can accept that if that’s all it was.

That Ika’s unique brain put her a step above the rest of humanity. Ai Yashajin used that against her.

Releasing Awaji’s match records might have been part of her plan to take down Ika all along.

It happens a lot in shonen manga. The enemy has the ability to absorb energy, so the hero purposefully gives them more energy than they can handle …… And they explode.

But …… there’s something I can’t just ignore.

“…………”

I look down at the blood-soaked board. Specifically, where all the pieces are.

Ika imploded before she could make another move, but Ai had turned the tables and claimed higher rating at this exact point in the match.

Basically, Ai Yashajin surpassed Awaji with the last move she made.

“May I …… ask you one more question?”

I waiver as the words come out of my mouth.

―――She won’t give me a straight answer, will she ……?

The question I’m about to pose has to deal with core elements of her research. There’s no way to know if she’ll speak openly when someone else is in the room.

So I decided to go with this instead.

“If you had a chance to play against the Shogi gods right now …… who do you think would win?”

“What would happen if I played against Shogi gods? Me?”

The girl who is undoubtedly the closest to divinity at this very moment smirks and says, “They wouldn’t play against me at all. It’d be a boring match.”