Section 14: Meet Me in the Last Lap

Our sauna score was a decidedly middle-of-the-road seventy points.

But, thanks to William Tell's advice, we finally had a real hint.

...Unrelated, but I find that given name thoroughly revolting.

Anyway, on this run, Tell was the last card we managed to find.

So we had to go into the final gift-giving trial without any outside help.

This time, we decided to narrow our focus to a single gift. In the end, we went with Kadoc's choice.

It was another plushie, like the kind we'd given her before. I think it was of an Elemental that belonged to a Grand Duchess or something.

For that, we got sixty-eight points.

Even though, from the outside, it didn't seem any different from the other mysterious creature plushies.

That has to be a hint in its own right. Our process of trial and error is definitely paying off.

From there, we set out once again for the goal space...

...and reached it without any trouble. Of course, you probably know what happened then, right?

This time, you got...three hundred and fifty-four!? That's even worse than you did on your first run!

Not in your wildest dreams will any of you become perfect fathers if you keep on like this! Don't you want to get out of here!?

...No, wait. Maybe you don't. Maybe you want to stay here and keep playing this game with me forever.

Well, if that's what you want, that's fine with me. Like I said, I'll stay with you for as many tries as it takes.

AIs never get bored of their reason for existing, after all.

All right then, let's get you ready for your fourth run!

Oh, and you'll probably only get one help card this time, so think carefully about how you'll use it!

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There's a very good chance we'll only see a single help card this run.

There's a possibility the cards regenerate the first time we hit zero available, but we have no guarantee there.

So we should treat this next card as the last one we'll get.

If we're going to launch a counterattack, this would be the time to do it. What do you think, Fujimaru?

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R-really?

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Well, we have gone through three rounds at this point. It's not that hard to see the trends in all of this.

I don't have any conclusive evidence, but I'm reasonably certain. Fairies have always been great at figuring out what dreaming children really want.

Otherwise, we'd never be able to lure them into the woods with promises of treats and candy.

That's right. Dreaming children.

That's what's really at the heart of all this.

And once you realize that her actions are being driven by a dreaming child somewhere deep inside her, you start looking at all sorts of things differently.

What do you mean by that?

According to her, this race was meant to make us the perfect fathers.

But what we didn't realize was that she didn't mean perfect fathers in the conventional sense.

She meant perfect fathers by HER standards.

That means we don't need to bother thinking about what most people would consider a perfect parent.

In the end, all these scores come down to one single thing: Is this what she's looking for in a father?

So, this whole thing has just been about her personal preferences!?

You know, I did think it was a little strange.

If she actually wanted to use this race to turn us into perfect fathers, she should have explained the scoring criteria right at the outset.

She can say it's important for us to arrive at the answers ourselves, but that's just too inefficient of an approach.

In general, you'd expect an AI to take a more sensible, efficient approach.

Exactly. That was one of the questions underlying this whole thing: Does she want to make you into perfect fathers, or not?

If she does, then she should just tell you what she wants. So why isn't she?

Because as much as she claims this race is about creating what society at large considers perfect fathers...

...it actually all comes down to determining whether or not it's producing fathers that suit her personal tastes...

...and she didn't want us to know that.

Explaining the scoring criteria or revealing answers would mean revealing that truth she's been trying to hide.

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Right. She said this scoring system operates automatically...

...so she probably can't change it at this point.

Hang on. Even if she wants to, you said? I wonder if she's realized this herself.

If the system really is completely autonomous, it could be subject to contradictions even she's not aware of.

Then again, it's more likely that she is aware, but she's too embarrassed to come clean.

At any rate.

Now that we understand what this race is really about, we should have a better idea of how to approach the tests.

All that's left now is to put together everything we've learned so far and do our best to arrive at the right answers.

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It'd be great to complete the game on this run. But if we don't, at least we can always try again.

Now, we're finally at the point where we can just keep repeating the same test until we get it right.

That's great. It means it's only a matter of time until we can get a hundred in everything.

Indeed! But I am getting quite exhausted, so I'd really like this next run to be our last!

Yeah. There's no point in spending more time here than we need.

From now on, we'll be playing a game where we use these tests to tease out what it is Kazuradrop is really looking for.

Oh, but try to do so as gently as you can.

You should never be too rough with the secret flowers that grow in the hidden places of someone's heart, after all.