Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei - Volume 03 - Nine Schools Competition (I) by Sato Tsutomu Page B

of the Nine Schools Competition.
    Seeing as how the pre-competition preparations proceeded so smoothly both in materials and procedure, the continuously delayed selection process was a particularly glaring issue.
    Tatsuya sat before the maintenance device with Kirihara on the other side — but the two of them couldn't see one another. The members of the Student Council and various clubs leaders crowded around Kirihara.
    The first step involved activating the school device, a process where many malicious gazes were focused on Tatsuya's hand movements; but Tatsuya was long accustomed to working with much more complex devices than the school device, so this was a procedure he could have completed flawlessly in his sleep. He adeptly completed the preparations and adopted a poker face to ward off the abhorring gazes.
    "My task involves copying Kirihara-senpai's CAD schematics onto the competition-use CAD, making any necessary adjustments without changing the Activation Sequence, am I correct?"
    Tatsuya once again verified the test's contents.
    "Yes, sorry for bothering you."
    Tatsuya on seeing Mayumi nodding shook his head slightly. Not nodding, shaking.
    ". . . . . . What is it?"
    "I wouldn't advise directly copying the schematics onto a different model CAD. . . . . . But there's nothing for it, so let's put safety as the first priority."
    "?"
    Mayumi wasn't the only one dumbfounded. "Copying CAD schematics" was a simple task that occurs when users changed machines, so many people were also wondering why Tatsuya viewed this as a problem.
    However, the Technician Team centered around Azusa knew exactly why Tatsuya asked this question. The team members either nodded slightly in agreement or smirked as they prepared to enjoy Tatsuya's performance.
    Tatsuya didn't say anything else and plunged into the maintenance.
    First, he connected Kirihara's CAD to the maintenance device.
    The schematics replication process was semi-automatic, so there was no way to gauge the difference in skill here.
    However, Tatsuya didn't just dump the schematics replica directly into the calculation device of the competition-use CAD, but stored it into the processing area of the maintenance device, a move that caused quite a few people to raise their eyebrows.
    Next he measured Kirihara's personal psion oscillation nature.
    Following Tatsuya's instructions, Kirihara put the headset on his head, then placed both hands on the examination board.
    This was also normal procedure; if this was an automatic maintenance device, the steps required were to connect the CAD then read the psion waves and the process would automatically complete itself.
    Generally, students that used the school devices for personal maintenance would adopt that precise procedure.
    On the other hand, not relying on automatic maintenance and manually making minute adjustments to the CAD's OS showed an engineer's true strength.
    "Thank you senpai, you can take it off now."
    Tatsuya indicated that the measurements were concluded and Kirihara removed the headset.
    Ordinarily, the next step involved connecting the CAD that needed to be modified, then making any adjustments beyond the automatic recommendations. This required a preset CAD to be prepared in advance, then copying all the data onto the destination CAD.
    Just about everyone in the audience thought that Tatsuya messed up the procedure.
    As if to prove this point, Tatsuya stared at the monitor without moving a muscle.
    However, he didn't give off the air of someone who was hopelessly lost because of a misstep.
    His gaze was focused to a terrifying degree without giving a hint of that unsteady feeling.
    Unable to contain her curiosity, Azusa poked her head around Tatsuya's body to glance at the monitor.
    "Uh?"
    Her voice let out an awkward sound that was wholly incompatible with her youthful image.
    Tatsuya was completely unaffected by this interruption.
    Mayumi and Mari didn't dare to ask what was going on, so they both came to Azusa's