It would mean confronting the Dreyfans after they become even bigger.
“What a nightmare... Wait, hang on. What if we think about it from a different approach?”
It’s been approximately forty years since the last foreign war. What used to be five chivalric orders were now three. They’d been downsized by forty percent. The prince who took command of the smallest one, the Third Chivalric Order, was the talk of the town at the time of his appointment.
Disarmament of the army is, in short, a reduction of the workforce. Moreover, members of the knights were fundamentally nobles. In which case, it had to happen gradually. As for the merchants who depended on nobles as their clientele, they were watching their shares drop at the same rate as the disarmament. And here we had the largest such company forcing their way into a new market. If they used the influence of the guild representative to do so...
“There’s a company shouldering the burden of the demands that come from military campaigns, right?” I asked.
“Yes. The Kendall Company, ranked third in the Culinary Guild. There are stories of President Kendall quarrelling with the Dreyfans in the past.”
“I see. So even if they’re still not on Dreyfan’s level, they’re way more of a big shot than we are...” And so we’d found Dreyfan’s enemy. Thinking about the timing of this incident... “I’m still not certain, but it’s worth keeping in mind. Even if the probability that this becomes useful is a mere ten percent, if we were to gather ten more leads with the same odds...”
“We’d have a 0.9¹⁰ percent chance of it not being useful. Inversely, that means there’s a 65 percent probability that it will be of use.”
Are you a human calculator or something? I guess this is only natural for someone with synesthesia. Numbers are as easily perceivable as colors to Mia, and she is capable of seeing numerical formulas by stereopsis, as if they had depth. I mean, that’s kind of why I scouted her in the first place. But...
“...”
“Am I mistaken?” Mia said as she cocked her head to the side.
“No, your calculations are spot on. However, in reality, there are times when those ten conditions aren’t always independent of each other.”
I recalled the greatest financial crisis back in the other world. The entire world suffered a massive economic slump as the result of one large bank, connected to a complex web of financial institutions, calculating the probability of bankruptcy upon going independent.
A punctured tire doesn’t occur very often. If we say the probability of puncturing a single tire is 0.01 percent, then the likelihood of puncturing two tires at the same time is abysmally low. That’s why carrying a single spare tire should suffice until you can get to a mechanic. However, that has nothing to do with splinters covering the road. And what if that happened on the highway where the distance between vehicles is practically nil?
At any rate, genius mathematicians brought about a financial crisis, and I’m not even worth comparing to them. In reality, complex economic analysis only possesses a limited amount of power.
“We’ve gone off track. Umm, everything just now was hypothetical, so...”
“Understood. I’ll gather information on the Dreyfans and the Second Chivalric Order... as well as the Kendalls.”
Even though Mia’s mathematical capabilities far surpassed mine, she also had a much greater social life than me. I mean, she at least had a network of commoners she associated with here at the Academy.
“Sorry for making you investigate a friend’s company.” Mia’s best friend was from one of the companies under the Kendall umbrella.
“It’s alright. Nothing they haven’t done to us. Also... what shall we do about the princess?”
“I still can’t get a read on what she wants. I feel like something should come up any time now, but the person in question never comes to school anyway...” I unintentionally let out a sigh. The one to bring about this situation was none other than that beautiful princess. Even if there was no effect on the market, I couldn’t just ignore her.
“I investigated her some, but haven’t really acquired any worthwhile information. The only thing I’ve found is that she’s busy with preparations for the Spring Festival.”
“The one her guard mentioned during the competition? The Oracle Princess holds a post at the cathedral, right? It’s probably just some honorary position though...”
“Lilka and the others were at the Spring Festival last year, so I’ll try asking them.”
“Thanks.”
“Think nothing of it. This sort of information gathering is my job. You just focus on your own job at hand, sir.” Mia glanced over to the end of the hallway, and we split ways to fulfill our own duties.
“In any case...”
Now that I was all alone, I gazed out the window in the direction of the gazebos in the courtyard. On the surface, many of the students were happily passing their time with each other. It even looked like a scene of afterschool activities from the other world.
However, in truth, this was a fight for their lives. There were two days of the week where the ban on high society meetings was lifted, and the conversations held in the gazebos at such times were implicitly known to be half-official.
Who invited whom? What did they talk about? These things held great meaning. It looked like a cheerful scene, but this was the battlefield of high society.
And the competition hosted by the princess happened right there, last week.
“She’s the fourth born, but still a bona-fide princess...”
It was honestly surprising how little influence she had.
“Well, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t thankful for that. Now then, it’s time to get to work.”