To Sigma Inc., on its fourth day since founding, the coworking space in Gotanda was the whole world.
One section rented on a monthly membership. Three desks, one potted plant, one free coffee machine. Compared with Mio Himuro's previous workplace, Kotoba, the biggest social network in the country, the floor space and budget were orders of magnitude apart. Even so, Mio felt no dissatisfaction. As long as the laptop on the desk ran, the world opened up just as wide wherever she was.
"—So, Aya. Don't make me say it again."
That morning, when Mio came in to work, Ritsu Mikoshiba was making some case to a woman she didn't know, with unusual fervor. The man who was usually as composed and gapless as a prince was, only in front of this person, losing a little of his poise.
The woman was beautiful enough that Mio's processing speed dropped in spite of herself. Tall and slender, with fine, even features. And yet what she was wearing was a faded men's sweatshirt, with a can of energy drink in one hand. The parameters of the visual information contradicted each other, and for just a moment the classifier in Mio's head froze.
"That was a rational decision. It was the optimal consideration, from a business standpoint, and it doesn't mean anything more than—"
"Yeah, yeah."
The woman took a swig of her energy drink and cut Mikoshiba off, sounding as if she could not have cared less.
"Here we go, the Boss's 'business decision.' Such a handy phrase. How many times is that this week?"
"I'm only stating facts."
"I did take it seriously, and the result was 'a spineless boss who's nothing but a pretty face.' ...So. Enough with the 'business decision.' When is the spec for the next project going to be locked down? My hands are itching to draw some wireframes."
The ace salesman they had called "the Walking Closing Rate" at Kotoba was being brushed off perfectly, right in front of her. It was the first time Mio had ever seen that look on Mikoshiba's face.
"Oh, Mio!"
The woman noticed her, and her face lit right up. As though the cold shoulder she'd been giving Mikoshiba had never happened, her voice went about three degrees sweeter.
"Nice to meet you. I'm Aya Shinkai, and I'll be doing design for Sigma. I was at Kotoba too—on the design side, so our departments were far apart and we never got to meet. You're Mio, 'the Ice Bayes,' right? You were a legend at that company. Plus, ever since we got here, the Boss hasn't talked about anything but you. I finally get to meet you."
Her hands were seized firmly in both of Aya's, and Mio backed up slightly. The rate at which she closed distance was twice as fast as expected.
"...I'm Mio Himuro. Nice to meet you."
"Aww, even the cold shoulder is cute! My job is putting the code you write on screen in the most beautiful way in the world. Let's do this."
Aya Shinkai, Mio thought, and created a new entry in her memory folder. Designer. Acquaintance of Mikoshiba. And—the person that gapless man had been, unusually, losing his poise and pleading with, only to be brushed off without effort.
Most likely, it was this glamorous woman Mikoshiba had feelings for. All that talk of "business decisions" and "consideration" was the sort of thing people said to hide embarrassment. She made that guess, and decided that whether it was right or wrong lay outside her interest. Whoever Mikoshiba was smitten with had nothing to do with the problems she had to solve. Mio closed the entry without a second thought.
"By the way, Himuro. Care to join me for a bit?"
Just before noon, Mikoshiba set a flat wooden box down on the desk with a soft clack. When he opened the lid, there was green felt and round black-and-white discs. Othello.
"For a change of pace. You've been staring down paperwork for the incorporation this whole time. You said something before about blood flow to the brain, didn't you?"
"I did. Because it's a fact."
Mio pulled out her chair and faced Mikoshiba across the board.
"But this isn't aerobic exercise. It's training to sustain concentration. As a warm-up for the brain, it's reasonable enough."
The game was over almost before it began.
Early on, Mikoshiba's black spread out comfortably across the middle of the board, while white was pushed little by little toward the edges. Mikoshiba smiled slightly.
"Oh. Looks like I've got the upper hand."
"Just as I expected."
Mio deliberately let her white escape toward the edge of the board.
"In Othello, it isn't the side with more discs right now that wins. If anything, the side with too many early on is the one that gets flipped in the endgame."
Somewhere past the middle game, the tide turned.
The moment Mio's white took a corner square, a whole diagonal flipped over. Using that as a foothold, edges, then whole areas, avalanched over to white. The black that should have been dominating the board was whittled away before his eyes.
"...Huh. That's strange."
"It's not strange. It was a board that was always going to end up like this."
When she placed the last disc, the board was almost entirely white. A crushing defeat for Mikoshiba.
"You're strong. Like an Othello AI."
"Speaking of that AI,"
Mio stood one of the flipped discs on its edge with a fingertip.
"Strong AIs for Othello or Go learn, relentlessly, from an enormous number of past games—'the board position, and whether that game was won or lost.' From the current position, they read 'with this shape, what's the probability of winning in the end.' What they're looking at isn't the current number of discs—it isn't the absolute value."
"Not the absolute value?"
"No. Even if black has more right now, it means nothing. What matters is 'the features of the position' and 'the difference in the balance of the game.' Whether you hold the corners, the shape of the edges, how far the places your opponent can play have been narrowed down. They learn the differences you can't see just by counting. That's why you, ahead on disc count, get flipped over at the end."
Mikoshiba, despite having just lost, rested his chin on his hand, looking pleased. With a face that said he didn't intend to miss a single word of Mio's rapid-fire explanation.
"I see. Read the balance of the game, not the quantity you can see."
"You catch on quickly. As training to sustain concentration, you're not a bad opponent."
"Boss, did you lose again?"
Aya, who at some point had come to stand behind them, was smirking with an energy drink in hand. "Just so you know, trying to beat Mio at a board game is more reckless than touching the sun with your bare hands."
"I know."
Mikoshiba said it as he put the discs back in the box, sounding oddly satisfied. "I know, and it still makes me want to play again."
Mio had no idea at all what that expression meant. Being happy to lose was clearly a breakdown of the utility function. She watched it vaguely, as an example of irrational human recreational behavior.