The following afternoon.
As always, the sweet steam of soy milk hung in the workroom of Ohata Tofu Shop. Mio, coming off her all-nighter, opened her laptop on the desk in the back office and showed the screen to the owner, Ohata, and the white-haired veteran worker.
"I'll start with the conclusion."
There was no hesitation left in Mio's voice.
"The tofu you make is left over and gets thrown out, and yet on the same day you also run out—this isn't a mistake in the ledgers, or anyone slacking off. It's because Mr. Tadokoro, who passed away, looked at the sky every morning."
Ohata knitted his thick brows.
"The sky...?"
"Yes." Mio slowly traced the two line graphs on the screen. "Every morning, Mr. Tadokoro went outside and measured, with his skin, how much colder it had gotten since the day before, and the day's weather. 'It's gotten a good deal hotter than last night. Better make extra of the scooped'—that's how he adjusted the prep of the scooped tofu, a tiny bit at a time. Without teaching anyone, all in his own head."
Mio traced the places where the peaks of scooped-tofu sellouts overlapped with the peaks of days that had turned colder than the day before.
"That 'pinch here and there' vanished one day, just like that. Because Mr. Tadokoro was gone. Even if you prep by the day of the week, by the ledgers, there's no one left to make the crucial correction. So—only on days when the temperature swung sharply from the day before, the scooped tofu's waveform went haywire like an EKG. Days when people want chilled tofu, and days when they'd rather have simmered tofu. Mr. Tadokoro's body measured the line between them every morning."
The white-haired worker caught his breath sharply.
"The data was correct all along. The days of the week, the shipping numbers—not one of them was lying. What was missing was—that man's mornings, which never became data. Thirty-some years of Mr. Tadokoro's intuition, never once written in the ledgers."
Mio switched screens. A new forecast line graph, isolating only the scooped tofu.
"Silken and firm both paid no attention to the sky's moods. Tofu for stews and hot pots isn't swayed by heat or cold. The only one that was honest about the sky was the scooped tofu for chilled tofu. That's why trying to read everything together missed. What needed to be watched was different for each kind of tofu."
"...Then Tadokoro's feel for it," Ohata said in a hoarse voice. "What he did by feel for thirty years—you mean it's going to be replaced by a machine now?"
"No."
Mio denied it immediately. But what came after wouldn't form into words. She had always been bad at phrasing things where people's feelings were involved. Her eyes wandered slightly.
Into that gap, Mikoshiba stepped in without making waves. Softly, but precisely.
"Your feel for it, Mr. Ohata, and Mr. Tadokoro's too—that's exactly what we want to take good care of."
Mikoshiba went on as if making small talk.
"For thirty years, you've kept this shop from going under. That in itself is the best proof there is that the two of you had the real thing. What my colleague built isn't a machine to replace that feel. —It's just a system that takes over the 'sky reading' Mr. Tadokoro did every morning and reminds you of it. That's all. Every shop has its quirks. Every day has its own turns of luck. It's not something that can call everything exactly right. All the machine can give you is a rough 'guideline.' The craftsmen keep an eye on it and work with their hands—if we can help with that, that's all we want."
Mio took Mikoshiba's translation, and opened her mouth again. This time, directly.
"...It isn't to replace Mr. Tadokoro's intuition. We'll use the data to help it."
Mio met Ohata's eyes. She almost looked away, but even so, this time she didn't run.
"Every morning, the system will look at information like the temperature difference from the day before, the temperature, the day of the week, and the weather. Just the way Mr. Tadokoro did. 'It'll be hot today. Make about twenty percent more scooped than usual'—the screen will give a rough guideline like that. It won't go as far as telling you how many blocks to prep, like Mr. Tadokoro did. Having a machine calculate it down to the single block would be overkill, and the more you build in, the more work it takes. All it gives is the same 'pinch-here-and-there guideline' as Mr. Tadokoro's intuition. Deciding how many blocks to prep, in the end, is strictly up to the hands of you and your staff. The machine will just remind you, every day, of a man's mornings now that he's gone."
The white-haired worker wiped his eyes with the back of a gnarled hand.
"...What Tadokoro did every morning. So it'll stay, now."
"It'll stay," Mio answered briefly. "So that his thirty years don't stay gone."
Ohata was silent for a while. Then he snorted—but his eyes were bright red.
"...You found that man's mornings. Thank you. You folks are the real thing."
Some days later, Ohata Tofu Shop paid their first contract fee.
It was their first revenue since the founding. The amount was by no means large. But it was proof that the division of roles between the two of them—Mio solving, Mikoshiba selling and gathering the voices from the floor—had taken shape for the first time.
"That'll cover rent for now," Mikoshiba said with a laugh. "Next, at last, the real thing. We're going to launch Makoto for real."
That night, the office in Gotanda.
Mio, slumped over the desk, was gazing vacantly at the streetlights outside the window. Between the all-nighter and the site visit, she was worn down to the core.
Mikoshiba took small baked sweets out of a paper bag and lined them up by Mio's hand. A few golden-brown pastries that smelled of butter.
"Here. You were glued to that thing all night and didn't eat a thing, did you? Aya was furious, saying at this rate Mio was going to starve to death."
Mio sluggishly picked one up and brought it to her mouth. The sweetness seeped slowly into her empty brain.
"So. How did you get there?" Mikoshiba pulled a chair over and rested his chin on his hand. "You missed once with the days of the week and were stuck. How did you finally get to the sky?"
"...You."
"Me?"
"The words of Mr. Tadokoro's you brought back. That one remark, 'he was comparing it with the day before,'" Mio said, reaching for a second pastry. "The absolute value of the day's temperature couldn't explain it. What makes people want chilled tofu is how far it's swung from the day before—the temperature difference. Mr. Tadokoro measured that with his body every morning. It's the same as Othello. Not the current number of discs. What matters is the difference."
"I see," Mikoshiba nodded, impressed. "And only the scooped tofu was honest about the sky."
"Yes. What was missing was a single variable that Mr. Tadokoro measured by intuition. That's all."
Mikoshiba gave a little smile. And then—suddenly, he leaned in very close.
A distance not recommended for Mio's processing capacity.
"...Finally, the first step."
That was all that slipped out. It wasn't his usual cool-prince voice. It was his bare voice, the one that only broke down in front of Mio. There was not a single device in the room that could translate what had seeped into that low tone.
"...You're close, Mikoshiba. It's inefficient."
Mio drew back slightly. Mikoshiba being close simply meant that it ate up extra computing resources; within her, it held no value beyond that. The heat that had seeped into his voice went unreceived, melting soundlessly into the nighttime office.
"...No doubt," Mikoshiba said, and obediently drew back. As if rewinding the voice that had started to break back into his usual cool prince's. "Well, never mind. —Our company's first, memorable job. A splendid completion."
"Are there any more baked sweets?" Mio picked up another pastry. "They're good for replenishing sugar."
"...Pfft."
From the shadows of the kitchenette, a stifled laugh escaped.
Aya Shinkai, who was supposed to have gone home, had snuck back and was clutching her phone by the wall, peeking over at them with an expression at its absolute limit. Her laughter wasn't aimed at Mio. It was aimed at this pitiable prince, who had at long last seated the object of a years-long longing beside him, and still hadn't left a single character in the other party's detection log.
Aya pressed both hands over her mouth, desperately stifling her voice alone, and bowed deeply in her heart.
—Master Mikoshiba. On your memorable first job, a most splendid defeat indeed. All that remains in the recipient's log is a single line: "close / inefficient."
—This front-row seat, I have no intention of relinquishing for as long as I live.
Mikoshiba gave a wry smile toward the shadows. As always, Mio had no idea at all what Aya was so delighted about. Nor did she intend to try to understand.
Five days since she became unemployed. The company had its first revenue, and the problems to solve were still piled up like a mountain.
Not bad, Mio thought. —Though that was about the satisfaction of having finished the first job, not about the man beside her.
Mio picked up a third pastry. The first plate was long since empty; this was a box Mikoshiba had bought extra as a reserve, anticipating exactly this. Mio put it in her mouth as if it were only natural, and was already beginning to think about the next project. Never thinking of the fact that the stock had been replenished before her sugar ran out as anything more than an optimization of supply—and never even noticing that the man beside her was still gazing at her.
"...What's the next problem?"
Only Mikoshiba's one-sided love glowed quietly in the nighttime office, undetected by anyone.