"You two... weren't you by any chance looking for some profitable research?"
Elara's words caught Giuseppe's attention.
He spoke.
"For now, I won't take issue with you coming in unannounced."
"Yes."
"Your name?"
"It's Elara. Senior Giuseppe."
"Alright, Elara. What brings you all the way here?"
"It's because of this."
Elara spread a bundle of parchments on the desk. There was no room for me to intervene. Everything was proceeding under Giuseppe's control. ...
I just thought he was some old guy whose life got tangled up in his doctoral program. 'He's kind of cool.' I see you in a new light, Senior.
Giuseppe picked up the page from the bundle that seemed most important.
"Let's see."
Project for Normalization of the Imperial Capital Central Bell Tower. The name itself spelled trouble. I've never seen a project with the word 'normalization' in its name that turned out to be easy.
Ten to one, this was a job cleaning up a huge mess someone else left behind.
"..."
"..."
"..."
It seemed I wasn't the only one who felt the ominous vibe. Senior Giuseppe was also choosing his words carefully. A moment later, Giuseppe spoke.
"I've heard the name of this project. Weren't all the most formidable schools in the Magic Tower involved, only to throw in the towel?"
Elara nodded her head.
"Yes. That's correct."
"Then why are you passing a project like that to us? Are you looking down on our school just because Professor Doloren is away?"
"No, sir. If it felt disrespectful, I apologize. However."
"However...?"
"I saw a possibility."
Elara's gaze turned to me.
Wait... me?
All of a sudden?
"Hah."
Giuseppe let out a hollow laugh and continued.
"So she's already recognized your talent, is that it?"
"It's not that I recognized it. Isaac's talent was simply revealed."
"That's true." ...
What is this. What in the world is happening right now. I spoke to Elara.
"Could you please explain what's going on?"
"Liam, the headache, the mana lamp. Is that explanation enough?"
"..."
Damn it.
I warned that Liam kid to be careful, but it seems I was found out after all.
"What's this, junior Isaac... were you causing trouble outside without me?"
"Senior Giuseppe... that's not it."
"Excellent work. Thanks to you, you've brought us a job like this."
"... That's too much praise."
I wanted to scream at the top of my lungs that it wasn't like that. But the situation didn't permit it.
Elara spoke.
"Therefore, I would like to formally transfer this request to the School of Magical Surveying."
"Not bad."
Elara's face brightened. This is bad.
"Wait a moment. Rather than a job like this, I want to continue Senior Giuseppe's research."
At my words, Giuseppe's brow furrowed. He took a step closer to me and said.
"Junior. This is an opportunity."
"But it's not the research I want to do."
"You can do the research you want after you get your doctorate. For now, let's tackle a field that will get us the most attention." ...
I'm saying this because I don't want that. I studied Giuseppe's expression carefully. Is he serious?
Is there really not the slightest possibility of reversing this situation?
"..."
"..."
"..." ...
There isn't. Giuseppe looked like he had made up his mind to give me this job. ... Well, if he says jump, I jump. Isn't that what being a graduate student is all about?
And so, we arrived at the School of Magical Device Materials Processing to receive the detailed information. 'Is this like materials science and engineering back on Earth...?' I looked around.
Students in white coats were conducting experiments in small groups. 'Their lab is more than four times the size of ours. They probably have branches all over the Empire, not just here, right?'
The difference in our annual budgets might as well be measured on a logarithmic scale. I asked Giuseppe.
"Are all the labs in the Magic Tower this bustling?"
"The ones that make money are. Damn it. It's suffocating."
"I agree."
The rich scent of capitalism clogged my nose. It was poison for someone in a pure field of study that didn't make money. I followed Elara into a small storage room.
But Giuseppe didn't come. I asked Giuseppe.
"Huh? Senior, where are you going?"
"It would be better for you to handle the practical work. In the meantime, I'll go finalize the money talk."
"... I understand."
And just like that, I was alone with Elara. Once Giuseppe was gone, Elara's expression relaxed. ... Pointing that out would probably cause a big problem, right?
I decided to stay quiet for now.
"First, I'll give you an overview of the request."
"Yes."
"This request came from the Noble Council. It's to 'normalize' the sound of the Imperial Capital Central Bell Tower's bell."
"Normalize?"
Elara answered my question immediately.
"You just have to solve the problem of the bell sound being too quiet in certain areas, and loud enough to be considered noise in others."
"... What?"
All this for just the sound of a bell? Why would such a trivial matter flow all the way to a Magic Tower research lab? As if reading my thoughts from my expression, Elara began to add an explanation.
"... Junior Isaac. It might be different in the countryside, but things are different in the capital. The area around the bell tower is filled with nobles and high-ranking members of merchant guilds."
"Ah, so you can't ignore their complaints."
"Something like that." ...
To think that even this world has malicious complainers. Is it the same wherever people live?
"Of course, the Noble Council has offered a huge reward for solving this problem."
"How much?"
"100,000 gold."
"... Wow."
I take back what I said about malicious complainers. With that much money, I could live for the rest of my life by myself in the countryside. Even from the school's perspective, it must have seemed like a request that would bring in quite a large sum of money for the scale of the incident.
"So that's why everyone jumped at it."
"Right."
Elara let out a small smirk.
"This is the data we've collected on the other schools' failures. You're not allowed to take it out, so please review it only in here."
Let's see.
I read through the stories of the other schools' failures. It wasn't just one or two places that had failed. I asked her.
"Isn't the School of Sound Magic the expert in this kind of thing? Why didn't they go?"
"They already failed. Look at the next page."
"Ah."
Flip.
I turned the page. 'Work by the School of Sound Magic, who were researching sonic amplification magic circles, has failed. Windows within a 300m radius of the bell tower were shattered.'
Just hearing about it made my head throb. 'A graduate student probably had to clean up all those broken windows...'
"Our School of Magical Device Materials Processing also tried and is on the verge of failure. We can't delay the deadline any further or pass it on to another school."
"If that happens, you'll have to pay a huge penalty to the Noble Council. The school's prestige will be damaged, and its standing will be diminished."
"... You said you were a new student, but you seem to know how things work around here pretty well."
"..."
"..."
An awkward topic had come up. I vaguely changed the subject.
"So, what's in it for us if we succeed in this task?"
Elara shrugged.
"How would I know? That's not for people like us, who haven't even gotten our master's, to know."
"Ah."
Giuseppe had been treating me so well that I'd momentarily forgotten my place. My job was to do as I was told. At this point, I had to pray that Giuseppe didn't secure too large of a reward.
As long as we didn't receive more than half of the reward money, it seemed like we could get through this quietly.
Just then. Bang!
The storage room door burst open and Giuseppe walked in.
"I got it."
"What?"
"In exchange for transferring this project to us, we will receive the entire reward, plus an additional fifty percent of the penalty fee."
"..."
"..."
A silence fell over the storage room.
Elara muttered.
"No way... an additional fifty percent of the penalty...?"
She was dumbfounded by the fact that her school had been fleeced. Of course, I was too. 'I don't want things to get bigger...'
It was a little difficult to manage my expression. Giuseppe tilted his head.
"What's this? The reaction is worse than I expected. Should I have asked for more?"
"... No. Thank you, Senior. You've been a great help."
"Hahaha. It was nothing."
Giuseppe, oblivious to my inner turmoil, smiled brightly.
And so, having been ordered to 'do as I'm told,' I made my way to the Imperial Capital Central Bell Tower. Of course, I didn't just take the orders. Before heading to the bell tower, I made a proposal to Giuseppe.
Hearing my words, Giuseppe's eyes went wide.
"What? You want to borrow my name to solve this case? Why on earth? This request is a golden opportunity to make your name widely known!"
The truth was that I didn't want my name to become known... but I couldn't say that.
"Senior. Please think about it carefully. If a kid who just entered the graduate program steps up as the representative for a case involving this much money, will the client be able to trust us?"
"... That would be difficult."
"That's why I'm asking this of you."
"..."
Giuseppe's eyes wavered. Now's the time. Let's seal the deal.
"Senior. Please, lend me your name. I don't want to be a burden to our school."
"... Isaac."
"..."
"..."
"How... how could such a talent come to me..."
He was almost convinced. I desperately held back the smile that was about to break out.
"Very well. From now on, you will act as 'Giuseppe Guarneri' in public."
I will do as you command. And so, I began to operate as 'Giuseppe Guarneri'. I identified myself as Giuseppe Guarneri to the representative from the Noble Council and headed inside the bell tower.
The interior of the tower was in a serious state. The walls were covered in scorch marks and traces of some unidentifiable liquid that had dried, and pieces of broken mana stones were scattered across the floor.
"What in the world were they doing..."
The report didn't mention any of this nonsense. I tried to reverse-engineer what they had done from the traces left behind.
"They tried to amplify the sound..."
A foolish solution. The request wasn't simply to make the sound louder, but to 'selectively amplify the sound only in specific areas'.
"This is why the nearby windows shattered..."
To make matters worse, the areas where the sound was already loud were the nobles' residences. Expensive house windows must have been broken.
"The solution is simple, but they all took the long way around."
I brushed off the remnants of failed magic plastered on the wall with my hand.
"You just need to change the angle at which the sound reflects a little bit."
All it needed was a very minor repair, so that in the direction where the bell sounded too quiet, the waves would reinforce each other, and in the direction where people were suffering from the noise, the waves would cancel each other out. This is a 100,000 gold problem?
"A hammer for nails and a few wooden planks should do it. It won't even cost 1 gold."