Not Because Seorin Wrote the Reply

The reason Doyun didn't go when summoned to the director's office wasn't because Seorin wrote the reply for him.

Doyun wrote it himself. Three lines. I shared the proposal with my team. Three team members haven't decided yet. Once they decide, we'll answer together.

Two hours after he sent the reply, Team Two's negotiation request arrived.

Team Two's negotiation request wasn't a provocation.

Seorin knew that from the first line. A provocation opens with the other side's business. A negotiation opens with your own.

Reason for request: easing the risk grade restriction on ability use for three students on our team.

"What is this?" Mirae looked at the back of the request first.

"Read it." Seorin pushed the two sheets toward her.

Mirae read both pages. Her expression changed as she read.

"These people, three of their team members can't use their abilities."

"Why can't they?" Garam asked.

"Risk grade three and above needs a professor present." Mirae pointed to the clause. "Getting a professor takes ten days after you apply. Practicals happen every week."

"So they effectively can't use them."

"They can't. So in practicals, these people are in the same position as a team with no abilities at all."

"Same as us." Garam said.

"We choose not to use ours. They can't use theirs." Mirae distinguished. "Same result, different reason."

Seorin already knew that. Ha Taeyun had used a compressed leap in the duel because the duel required a professor present. In practicals, even he couldn't use it.

"So why come to us." Doyun asked.

"Because Team Seven created a provisional clause." Mirae said. "The reserved choice item. It's the first case of an academy form changing because of a student demand."

Seorin saw Team Two's leader's calculation in that. Her name was Mun Sea, third year, ranked eleventh in firepower.

Mun Sea wasn't trying to beat Team Seven for bonus points. She was trying to use the precedent Team Seven had made.

The negotiation took place that afternoon in the Academic Affairs conference room.

Before sitting down, Mun Sea laid out three copies of the documents, one for each member of Team Seven.

"There's one condition." Mun Sea spoke first. "We do it as consecutive rescue matches. Three rounds, three minutes each."

"Reason?" Mirae asked.

"To see whether Team Seven's approval procedure repeats every round." Mun Sea didn't hide it. "You can keep it once. If you keep it three times running, the procedure actually works."

It was an honest condition. And the condition most unfavorable to Team Seven.

"What if we can't keep it?" Garam asked.

"If you can't keep it, the procedure gets recorded as something for spare time only. That's unfavorable to our own proposal too."

"Why is that unfavorable?"

"Because we're not asking to ease the procedure either. We're asking for the procedure to be fit inside practical hours."

Seorin heard that sentence twice. She understood it the second time.

Team Two wasn't asking to use abilities freely. They were asking for the ten days of professor supervision to be replaced with team member approval.

That was the same direction as Team Seven's contract.

"Mun Sea." Seorin said. "What you're asking for right now is the same as our Article Twelve."

"It is."

"Then why a duel format. A joint application would work."

Mun Sea paused for the first time, briefly.

"A joint application was rejected. Twice."

"What was the reason."

"Collusion between student teams."

Mirae's pen stopped. "Collusion?"

"If two teams submit the same proposal, it's treated as collusion." Mun Sea showed the rejection notice. "So we have to make it a contest. If it goes up as a contest result, it isn't collusion."

Seorin saw the structure. Two teams wanted the same thing, and the system was built to keep them from demanding it together.

"I'll add one condition." Seorin said.

"Go ahead."

"The loser's proposal also goes up for review."

Mun Sea looked at him. "Then even if we win, we get less."

"You get less. But even if we win, the student teams' demand stays alive."

"Why do it that way."

Seorin answered exactly.

"The student teams' goal is legitimate. Not being able to use an ability because you have to wait ten days is a different problem from what our clause is trying to stop, but the academy tied the two together."

"How do you know they're different."

"Our clause says to get consent. The academy's clause says to have an adult watching." Seorin said. "Consent comes from the person involved. Supervision comes from a third party."

Mun Sea wrote that sentence in the margin of her own document. Seorin watched her hand. It was the same way Taeho wrote in the margins.

"May I use that sentence in the review."

"Use it. Just note the source."

"Why the source."

"If my name is on the student teams' proposal, it's harder to brand it as collusion." Seorin said. "A citation isn't collusion."

Mun Sea smiled for the first time. It was brief.

"Doesn't Team Seven want to beat us."

"We want to beat you." Seorin said. "Even if we beat you, we want the students' demand to survive. Both of those can happen together."

Mirae wrote the contract clause. The match conditions were five lines, and the last line read:

Regardless of win or loss, both teams' proposals will be submitted together for review by the Academic Affairs Committee.

Mun Sea signed it. After signing, she asked one more thing.

"Yu Seorin, you had the succession interview, didn't you."

"I did."

"This clause should be unfavorable to your side."

"It is."

"...I know. I did the same last year." Mun Sea gathered her papers. "I didn't do this back then."

"What didn't you do last year."

"One of my team members was risk grade four. She used it without supervision." Mun Sea's voice lowered. "I filed the incident report under that student's name. I didn't put mine on it."

"Where is that student now."

"She went on an exchange practicum. She won't be back for three semesters."

Mirae didn't write that conversation down. If she wrote it, this person seemed unlikely to say anything like it again.

Leaving the conference room, Doyun asked.

"Why did you add that clause?"

"Because they're in the right."

"Not that. The real reason."

Seorin stopped walking. This person had recently learned how to ask for the real reason.

"You wrote the appendix yesterday."

"Yeah."

"Writing those four lines, I found out something. Putting my own fault next to my own name wasn't as hard as I thought." Seorin said. "Putting someone else's goal next to their name was harder."

"Why?"

"I can decide my own fault. Someone else decides their own goal."

Team Two's round structure was announced the next day.

There were three rounds, and each round had a different trap layout. Mirae looked at the chart and said nothing for ten minutes.

"Something wrong?" Garam asked.

"The round layout targets our procedure time." Mirae pointed at the chart. "The first round gives us room. The second is tight. The third round's time shrinks depending on the first round's result."

"What does that mean." Doyun asked.

"If we keep the procedure fully in the first round, the third round's time limit drops to two minutes."

"Why set it up that way."

"To measure how much time the procedure actually needs." Mirae folded the chart. "If we keep it even at two minutes, it leaves data that the procedure only needs two minutes."

"And if we can't keep it?"

"It leaves data that two minutes isn't enough. That's data too."

Garam heard that and pressed his palm flat on the desk.

"I can't hold out for three rounds."

The three of them looked at him. It was different from yesterday. Yesterday he'd said it after the practical ended. Today he said it before it started.

"How many rounds can you hold out?" Mirae asked.

"One round for sure. The second, I don't know. The third, I don't think I can."

"Then we'll bring in a backup detection starting from the second round." Mirae wrote it down immediately. "Garam only makes the call, and Yu Seorin handles the detection."

"I can't do it with my hearing." Seorin said.

"Not with hearing. With the structure's load lines. You can see those."

Seorin reviewed the arrangement. The accuracy would drop, but it was possible.

"Garam. If you can't hold out in the second round, say so then too."

"I will." Garam attached no condition to that answer.

Mirae logged the promise in the ledger. One entry: team member advance notice of limit.

Yesterday, that item had been an after the fact statement. Today it was an advance item. Same person, same sentence, different column.

"So if we do the first round fast?"

"If we do it fast, it leaves a record that we skipped the procedure."

Seorin saw the design. Mun Sea wasn't testing Team Seven. She was measuring whether Team Seven's procedure could be compressed.

With that data, she could demand at the Academic Affairs Committee that the procedure be fit inside practical hours.

Team Two wanted Team Seven to win. They just wanted them to win the hard way.

Seorin told the team that fact. After he said it, Doyun laughed.

"So if we lose, they lose too."

"They lose."

"But they're aiming right at our weak spot."

"They are." Seorin said. "That's fair competition."

That evening, Seorin saw one more reply from the director's office.

It was a response to the three lines Doyun had sent. One line.

Does waiting for your team members' answer mean the student himself has no judgment of his own?

Doyun showed the reply to the team.

"What do I say to this?" He asked.

"You don't have to answer." Seorin said.

"If I don't, that sentence stays on record."

Mirae cut in at that point. "Let it stay. That's the director's office's document. It's not our record."

"Then what's our record."

"Yesterday's appendix. Four student judgments are written next to the student's name there."

Doyun took out the appendix again. There were three items on his line.

Attempted without approval. Interpreted silence as approval. Didn't disclose the physical cost.

As an answer to being told he had no judgment, it was a strange list. All three were judgments that had been wrong.

Still, he folded the list and put it in his pocket.

Seorin watched that motion. It was folded twice with a press each time, and today it didn't look like a gesture meant to hide anything.