Perfect Girl and Chess Prodigy - Part 1

"So, how far away does she live?"

"I guess it'd be around a half an hour's walk from here."

"That's pretty far."

The two of us were walking along the sidewalk beside the busy road. The leisure centre was directly opposite a major shopping area, so traffic was usually pretty dense there. The sun had basically completely set already, so the entire area was being lit up only by street lights.

"Hey, Mizuhara."

"Yeah?"

"Have you heard of the Ideal Human Project?"

Huh.

[Illustration]

I guess it wasn't completely impossible that she'd know about it. There was a pretty long period of time where the Ideal Human Project was being reported by a few science magazines—although, for the most part, the entire operation was secret.

"Yeah, I think I remember seeing it in a magazine one time."

"Ah, so you've heard of it too?"

"I guess."

"I haven't told anyone this... but one of my old friends actually met a boy from the Ideal Human Project—it was many years ago."

"Really?"

"Yeah, apparently she met one in Osaka."

For a split second, I thought that it might've been the girl I met all those years ago, however, that girl wouldn't have known that I was from the Ideal Human Project.

Most likely, one of her friends met any one of the many Outcomes who were exploring Osaka during that 'holiday'. There were quite a few who were running around Osaka during that day.

"Ah, what were they like?"

"She said that he was really smart, apparently he knew lots of facts about the city."

Hm, I do remember an Outcome who sounded like that, although it could be true for many of them.

"Ah, that sounds cool."

We continued to walk down the street, it was interesting that Fujiharu had a friend who was in Osaka that day. There are probably very few people in the entire world who have ever met an Outcome before we were all discharged.

After the day we were discharged, many of the Outcomes, without constant training and education, became no different to normal people.

Now that I thought about it, I did make a promise to the girl I met all those years ago—I wonder if she still remembers it.

*

After around thirty minutes of walking, we made it to the apartment that Kanako stayed at.

"This is the place."

Fujiharu appeared very surprised.

"This place? It's so big!"

"I forgot to tell you that they're pretty rich."

I scanned my keycard to the apartment.

"You have a keycard to this place?"

"Yeah, they gave me one when they hired me."

"Wow, lying on your resume was really worth it in the end."

"It sure was."

We made our way into the elevator and I scanned my keycard again before pressing the button for floor 6. Our elevator eventually reached the destination and we made our way through the modern, well-kept hallway toward room 124.

I knocked on the door.

A few seconds later, Kanako opened the door.

She appeared to be taken by shock when she saw Fujiharu standing beside me.

"Who is this girl?" She asked.

"One of my friends."

"No, my question is why is she here?'

"I thought you might want a study partner."

"Are you not my study partner?"

I didn't want to go through this again.

"Ugh, well come in I guess," she eventually sighed.

Fujiharu whispered to me.

"Are you sure I'm welcome here...?"

"Don't worry, she's just like that."

The two of us made our way into the high-end apartment as Kanako walked towards her room. We followed inside and Kanako grabbed her workbook which was on the table.

"How did you go?" I asked.

"Um... I didn't really know how to do any of the science questions you set me..."

Ah.

"Science? That's my favourite subject!" Explained Fujiharu, "Excuse me for taking your job Mizuhara, but can I try to teach her?"

"Sure."

This was exactly what I wanted to happen.

I decided to watch for a little while as Fujiharu tried to explain the question to Kanako. Although, she tried her best for a few minutes to no avail.

"I still don't get it."

"Ah, maybe I'm not such a great teacher."

Well, this was bound to happen. Her father did hire very many tutors all to no effect, I wasn't exactly expecting Fujiharu to be able to upheave the precedent. I only brought her here to help Kanako study longer.

I walked over and looked at Kanako's work. It seemed that she lacked the base knowledge required to answer the questions in the first place. From the looks of it, whilst she struggled with every science, biology seemed to be the hardest for her.

"I think it's best if you try reading the textbook first."

I know that reading the textbook wasn't exactly the best method of intaking information but I wasn't going to just stand up and give a lecture all of a sudden like a real teacher.

"You should read it through and ask Fujiharu if there's anything you don't understand, she's pretty good at science from what I've heard."

"Alright then."

As the two of them began working, I decided to make my way into her living room and took a seat on the couch. I grabbed her English textbook before I left.

I would like to go back to the dormitory now but I might stay for a little longer just to make sure there aren't any issues.

The thing was, I didn't really expect her to suddenly learn science by reading the textbook, I'm sure many of her other tutors have tried the same thing and failed. I just wanted her to at least learn some of the base knowledge so it would be easier to teach her tomorrow.

I began circling some more questions in her English textbook. Since I've already pretty sufficiently taught her English and maths, it would be easier for her to consolidate those today with Fujiharu.

There was going to be a dorm room inspection today so everyone needed to be back before 9 pm. I still had plenty of time but it meant that I couldn't just stay here all night.

Suddenly, I heard some talking coming from the room.

"...so what's your relationship with Mizuhara?"

"...huh? We're good friends, we were just at the pool together before."

"...ehe, like a date?"

"...there were other people as well."

Well, that conversation seemed to be a little off-topic.