Chapter 9 - Miscalcuation
As obnoxious as Nitori was, she had made a valid point. What exactly was I waiting for? Perhaps a latent fear of being offensive had suddenly emerged. Or maybe I was just thinking too much again. Whatever the reason for my hesitation, one thing was clear: I couldn’t keep grazing danmaku all day. I admit it wasn’t a difficult task to accomplish, seeing as blobs of water can only go so fast. Their speed, compared to other danmaku, was laughable. Even so, it would be unwise to let my guard down, just in case she had another trick up her sleeve.
It was time for a counter attack. “Formation 10C!”
I don’t mean to gloat, but I consider myself the master tactician. One inherent benefit to having an external medium – in other words, my dolls – fire my danmaku is that the barrage is not transfixed in one spot; this makes it harder for my opponents to react, since their peripheral vision cannot encompass the entire environment. To organize my tactics, I use notation to tell my dolls where to position themselves and what attack to prepare for.
In the case of 10C, it is a simple carousel formation. Eight dolls form a uniform circle around me. The circle’s circumference surrounds the entire arena, and they can move inward at my discretion. Two more dolls finish the formation, for a total of ten dolls. The first of the two replace my position in the center of the circle, while the second is directly above it. The second doll is an appreciable distance above, thus giving me a way to literally hang around while I watch the show.
Now that everything was in position, I pulled the string connected to the central doll. This caused the doll to explode, releasing the Seeker Wire, a blazing red laser. The dolls forming the circle act as nodes, which reflect the wire towards another doll. The dolls move inward and outward, as well as clockwise and counterclockwise, while they keep reflecting the seeker wire, until finally it hits something organic; in this case it would be Nitori.
“Pathetic, Alice.” The Kappa’s voice echoed. “You think a single laser will hit me? Do you know the probability of that?”
“Not likely,” I responded. “But set theory proposes that more trials will result in a higher probability.”
Since I was literally hanging on by a thread, it was hard to get in the right position, as I still had to graze her danmaku. Eventually, I managed to take out two more dolls; these were smaller than my regular ones. I threw them down so that they would hit the seeker wire, and as they did, the laser split into three parts.
“Think you can handle three?” I was confident that three lasers would be practically impossible to dodge over a prolonged period of time. However, the lasers continued to bounce off the dolls, indicating that they had not hit their target.
“Alice, I’ll admit that this laser show of yours is quite impressive.” A compliment from Nitori; how rare.
“Well, danmaku is all about beauty.” I replied with a bold voice.
“Unfortunately, that’s where you have it wrong.”
“Oh?”
“You can’t win with beauty. Danmaku is about intellect. You have to be able to outsmart your opponent in order to seize victory. That’s a simple case when dealing with you.”
Nitori’s camouflage had disappeared and I could finally see her in the water. No wonder the lasers never hit her; she was below ground level. I had completely forgotten about the environment change right at the beginning, and that would cost me the round.
“Alice, are you aware of the properties of water?” Nitori asked out of the blue.
“Of course I am. I need to be to pass my test tomorrow.”
“Well consider this an afterschool tutoring session. Water has a specific heat capacity of 4180 joules per Kelvin. This allow water to absorb a plethora of heat before changing state. Now watch what happens when my danmaku collide with your lasers.”
Nitori positioned her danmaku in front of my dolls, and as my lasers made contact with them, steam began to enshroud the arena, making it impossible to see. However, Nitori’s voice was still clear as crystal.
“Do you know how rainbows are formed?” Nitori asked me in the mist.
“Well-” Nitori continued without giving me a chance to answer.
“The sun’s light reflects on the droplets of moisture in the atmosphere. You could therefore consider water to be a simple prism, capable of diverging light.”
“So what?” I impatiently asked.
“So you lose this round!”
While distracted by Nitori’s lecturing, a laser had struck my back; it was my own. The force snapped my support thread and I fell to the ground. Even though danmaku was magical and did not hurt – to some extent at least – any physical damages were very real.
“Is that the best you’ve got Alice?” Nitori emerged as the steam had finally cleared. “If so, this wasn’t worth my time.”
“Maybe it is my best.” I struggled to get back on my feet after that collision, which was anything but pleasant. “However, even against a superior opponent, I will stand up and continue to fight.”
“Heh” It was an anomaly for Nitori to laugh, seeing as how serious she was all the time.
“What?”
“You’re stubborn Alice. I like that”
“What are you getting at?”
“You can learn a lot about someone through a danmaku battle, that’s all. I see now why Patchouli has an interest in you.”
“Does that mean you know where she is?”
“Perhaps. Shall we continue?”
I dusted off my dress and finished regaining my posture. “I believe the winner of the previous round picks their spell card first,” I finally said.
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