Vol 5. Chapter 22: Asahi on Stage (2)
“Up to this point, I’ve been explaining the absurdly fantastical phenomena we can currently observe!”
Asahi, at this point, took a pair of round glasses out of the pocket of her skirt and snap—put them on.
“Next, I will present the results of the experiments we carried out in Telek Port City!”
“Oh, that’s cute.”
“Thank you very much, Commander Sis-ter!! <Ringo> made them for me!”
And then she brought up the background that had led to the experiments.
“Now then, we have recorded magic warriors performing training exercises with this fireball magic several times.
As a result, we have confirmed that the phenomenon of this fireball changes depending on the person using it—whom we will refer to here as the caster.
Specifically, like this.
First, the fireball’s power. The difference in the amount of heat generated and the temperature.
Second, the fireball’s speed. The speed from the moment it appears at their hand until it hits the target.
Third, the way the fireball bursts. The area over which it bursts, the number of sparks that scatter, and their speed.
All of these differ from person to person, and we found no common elements.”
The number of subjects was five.
The number of trials, one hundred each.
For fireballs produced by the same individual, no significant differences were observed; the differences fell within the margin of error attributable to statistics and to influences such as ambient temperature and humidity.
However, when this became a comparison between individuals, no instances were observed that could be judged as identical.
“And so, the question arose of whether this fireball is even the same magic in the first place.
We merely call it a fireball, but is it actually some other magic?
Does magic, to begin with, ever produce the same phenomenon under the same name?”
“You mean you had them fire it a hundred times?”
“Commander Sis-ter, I did not force them! They said they train regularly anyway, so I simply asked to observe!”
“If that’s all it was, then fine...?”
“Yes! So then, we conducted interviews about from whom they had learned this fireball and how they had acquired it!”
“Is that the sort of thing they’ll just tell you if you ask...?”
“Yes! Everyone was happy to tell me!”
With a beaming smile, Asahi answered that.
<Ringo> shook her head.
“From <Paraiso>, I ordered them to disclose anything that is not related to matters of life and death.”
“You are forcing it out of them.”
“That is simply not possible!!”
Commander Eve let out a sigh at Asahi’s full confidence and urged her to continue.
“Yes!
So, as for the interview results!
Basically, they were taught the effects and power of the fireball by their magic teacher, as well as the image of it.
They were trained starting from using magic to light a fire, and then gradually taught the skills of sending it flying and making it burst!
After that, once they could do it, they would keep practicing on their own.
Making the flames form just as they imagine, flying just as they imagine, bursting just as they imagine.
They said they went through that sort of training.”
In other words, it was not that chanting some spell automatically produced a uniform effect, but rather that it could be acquired through steady, persistent training.
“As for how much individual aptitude is involved, I am sorry to say that at present this is unknown.
Even with the same amount of practice, sometimes someone improves quickly, and sometimes someone does not improve at all, so we do not even know whether this is due to having a sense for it or to external factors.
That said, we predict that the likelihood is high that things like individual sense and inborn aptitude have a large influence!
Children of magic users are more likely to become magic users themselves, and if they are familiar with it from childhood, they seem to learn faster and produce greater power.”
Since this was an interview-based survey, Asahi displayed its results.
In the end, those who had trained from childhood were superior, and it was apparently quite difficult to start from adulthood.
And, compared to self-taught training, it was also apparent that having a teacher gave them faster improvement and made it easier for a uniform phenomenon to occur.
“Therefore, I formulated the hypothesis that what magic requires is a clear and distinct image!”
Based on her own way of looking at magic, Asahi had predicted how magic phenomena were constructed.
The concept of internal magic power was something they had already confirmed. The number of fireballs they could fire in a day was almost constant, and that upper limit differed from person to person.
She predicted that only when the amount of internal magic power, the image of generating the fireball, and the will to generate the fireball all came together would magic manifest.
“We still do not have a way to measure magic power, but according to the magic warriors, their bodies start to feel sluggish when their magic power runs low.
If they feel sluggish, that means some kind of abnormal condition is arising inside the body, so we are continuing to verify whether we can capture some phenomenon with vital monitors!”
“You say you’re verifying it. What are you having them do?”
“Commander Ma’am. It appears that since several days ago, Asahi has been making them fire fireballs in training repeatedly until they can no longer fire them, while continuously monitoring their condition.”
Apparently, the five magic warriors had been made to stick with Asahi the whole time.
“...Fine. You are giving them some kind of compensation, right?”
“Yes! Of course, Commander Sis-ter! They receive the supreme smile of the strongest beautiful girl, Asahi Asahi—ow!!”
She must have gotten carried away too far, because <Ringo> smacked her.
“Since you do not do it yourself, I have been applying a premium to their daily wages and giving them priority allocations of food, alcohol, and other luxuries from my side. Relations are friendly for now, but please try not to push them too hard.”
“Asahi, keep within reasonable limits.”
“...Y-yes, Commander Sis-ter. It’s fine, we strictly observe an eight-hour workday!!”
“Making them do it for eight hours, you’re a demon!”
“Commander Ma’am, it is fine. They only spend about two of those hours accompanying Asahi; the rest is their regular daily duties. They are precious samples, so we have been monitoring to avoid wasting them. Please rest assured.”
“O-okay...”
After that humanitarian, heartwarming exchange.
Asahi brought up the results of a further experiment.
“So then, in order to verify magic construction by way of image, we divided them into Group A and Group B.
Group A continued the same training as before.
Group B, meanwhile, carried out practical training while receiving lectures on the image—via visual footage we prepared—and the underlying reasoning.
We continued these for about two weeks each.”
The result was—
“We were able to obtain a significant result in which the fireball magic used by Group B showed smaller differences between individuals!!”
In particular, regarding the phenomenon of the explosion after it hit the target, by having them review every day the same explosion footage—repeatedly and of what appeared to be an ideal explosion—they had become able to consistently produce the same result.
If magic construction was done by way of image, then certainly, providing slow-motion footage that allowed them to confirm the fine details would greatly contribute to building that image.
“Furthermore, we also observed a significant increase in the number of fireballs Group B could fire in a day.
If we suppose that firing a fireball causes internal magic power to decrease, then we can assume that the amount of magic power consumed per fireball has decreased!
We believe this is because clarifying the image has reduced the amount of magic power consumed!”
“Hm. Well, I can accept that. But it’s still a hypothesis, right?”
“Yes, Commander Sis-ter! It is only a hypothesis, and all we have confirmed is phenomena that seem explainable by that hypothesis! To be able to say the hypothesis is likely not wrong, we will need a much larger sample size!”
Sample size—in other words, magic users.
Telek Port City had secured five magic warriors as a fighting force. At present, Telek Port City was an extremely safe and stable town thanks to <Paraiso>’s efforts.
Because of that, they could get by with the minimum necessary forces for public order, and those five were able to accompany Asahi’s experiments. If anything, they were even pleased to have been given a role.
Because Asahi was a chatterbox, she had built reasonably good relationships with them as well.
They, in turn, seemed to be grateful for the existence of Asahi, who could accurately explain the phenomenon of the magic they themselves used.
“Speaking of samples, I wonder if we can make use of that super-strong knight, or the adventurers in Northend City, and so on.”
“Yes, Commander Sis-ter! I definitely want to observe magic other than fireball as well! Especially any that appears to enhance physical capabilities!
We are # Nоvеlight # analyzing the threat-creatures as far as we can too, but there is still so much we do not understand!”
Asahi was getting worked up over her explanation of the fireball, but it seemed she was also studying the threat-creatures in parallel.