Ryuuou no Oshigoto! - Volume 17 - Chapter 3.2

  COMPUTERS AND SHOGI PUZZLES

I make a heart shape in front of my chest and look into the camera.

“M …… moe, moe kyun♡”

Ker-shak! Ker-shak, shak!

Flashes and clicks go off again and again in a room inside this cheap-looking building in Akihabara, Tokyo.

One beat later, the young woman behind the camera starts yelling at me.

“Your smile’s stiff as a board! Again!”

“Moe, moe squee.♡”

“The heart mark was twisted! Again!”

“Moe, moe squee!”

“Your voice fell flat! Retake!!”

“Wh-Why?! Voices don’t matter for pictures!!”

“Because I’m taking video as well, naturally. The times call for video! Sound is paramount! Even the mere clicks of Shogi pieces sell as ASMR! A female student’s hair and voice can turn a profit here in Akihabara!”

Special units of the local police would get sent here if they heard some of the things Machi Kugui-Yamashiro Ouka is yelling at me, and her strict demands keep coming.

Kugui-sensei is doing a field piece for a Shogi magazine today, and she asked me to help out.

…… So then why is it I’m in a maid outfit taking pictures with an omelet I made myself?

What does any of that have to do with Shogi ……?

Kugui-sensei looks down at the camera screen and thinks for a few long moments.

“Only the very first photo captured the fresh purity of an elementary school student. It’s settled! This picture it is.”

“…………”

Squeee ……

“I’m surprised you went out of your way to reserve a café just to take pictures, though …… It looks like a maid café that isn’t open to customers yet. How did you get to use this place?”

“Simple. I am a tenant in this building.”

“Whaaat?! K-Kugui-sensei …… you run a maid café in Akihabara?!”

“No, no. It’s a con-café that has maids, is all.”

“Con-…… café? Like a crime?”

“That’s short for concept café. A genre that maid cafés are part of, if you must be specific.”

“Uwhee ……?”

“The yagura is the most well-known of all Shogi strategies, but the yagura is only one of many Static Rook formations, no? That is the same relationship between maid cafés and con-cafés.”

Akihabara is complicated ……

“This one is due to open this fall as a Shogi con-café. Specifically the theme is using Shogi to fend off demons that have descended upon this maid café in the human realm. So the maids are the demons, in a sense. Customers have many treasure troves to choose from lately, thus much effort must be committed to the concept. Otherwise, the net will never catch wind of its existence, let alone go viral.”

“…………”

I take a closer look at the menu.

Moe moe omelet: 1500 yen.

Demon☆ Fuel Energy Drink: 2000 yen,

Pics: 500 yen each.

Mixed in there is Instructional Match: 3000 yen, which is the only price that kind of makes sense.

There are staff pictures on the wall, too. But the cast is wearing cat ear tiaras and two of them are labeled Machi and Ryou ……

“Huh? Two of those demon maids look a lot like Women’s Shogi Title Holders ……”

“That’s the demons playing tricks on you.”

Kugui-sensei then changes the topic, very bluntly.

“Ah, it is such a relief to have quality photographs on hand! I have big plans, something along the lines of Women’s Legend Ai Hinatsuru Exclusive! A Day in the Life of the Beautiful, Prodigious Women’s Title Holder! An 11-year-old’s summer only comes once! It needs a cover worthy of the title.”

“It’s a Shogi magazine, right?”

“That it is. Why ask the obvious?”

She starts lamenting strange things, like it would be perfect if only I played a more defensive, receptive style. Apparently, the key words Akiba, maid, and receive really strike a chord with Shogi people. I wonder why.

“I had been hoping for an interview with both sister apprentices. On the bright side, the leftover pages can be devoted to more of your photos. Put the whole set into the digital release, pair that with videos and ratchet up the price 10,000 yen a pop …… A steal, for sure!♡”

“Ten-chan refused to do an interview with me?”

“In a heartbeat, yes.”

Kugui-sensei’s eyes jump for a second and she rushes to explain.

“But not because she didn’t want to talk with you, Ai. She refuses all interactions with the media. Perhaps she developed a distaste for us journalists after what violating the rules cost her in the Queen Title Match against Ginko?”

“I know Ten-chan was upset when that happened, but ……”

She told me that she liked the article I wrote about that match, so I don’t think she has a grudge against media people.

I haven’t tried to contact her after I moved to Kanto.

If I had the chance to talk with her …… what would I say? There are so many questions I want to ask, but I’m afraid to hear her answers to any of them ……

Thinking about all this is making me sad, so I change the topic.

“Are you sure opening in Akihabara is the best choice? There’s no connection to Shogi here at all.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure.”

Kugui-sensei points one of her white fingers out the window at a building in front of the station.

“The owner of that building there, the Akihabara Radio Kaikan, was a famous Shogi puzzle creator.”

“Whaaat?! S-Shogi puzzles?!”

“His pockets ran deep. According to my Master, the scent of money would lure Shogi people to Akihabara to show off their own Shogi puzzles and collections they’d unearthed from the Edo period. Then again, Shogi puzzles were just an excuse to strike up conversations and ask to borrow money from him, as it were.”

“Debts ……”

Akihabara is sacred ground for otakus and technology.

Finding out it used to be the same for Shogi puzzles makes my heart race.

“For regular people, Shogi puzzles are just that: puzzles. Making the long, complicated 17-move checkmate ones takes time, and only a handful of pros will sit down to solve them. There’s so much more demand for the 3-move checkmate puzzles.”

As someone who learned how to play Shogi with Shogi puzzles, I’m not sure how to feel about that.

I know that no one can make a living just making Shogi puzzles anymore.

Professional players say they’re a waste of time because those sequences never happen in real matches.

Even Master told me he couldn’t recommend making Shogi puzzles during training, point blank.

But, I …………

“The cream of the crop creators got together to make a crown jewel of unreleased puzzles. The association was even on board to publish it and made a manuscript. They even set up the royalty payments. But the whole project fizzled when the Radio Kaikan owner passed away. The creators who sold their works for profit could very well have complained had the release been pushed through.”

“…… Where is it now?”

“Pardon?”

“The manuscript with the puzzles. I’m curious what they’re like ……”

“Filed away in the editor’s office, I believe. I’ll copy it for you should I happen across it. Think of it as my thanks for today.”

“Thank you so much!”

“But anyone coming to Akihabara in pursuit of Shogi material these days has their eyes set on a computer. Times sure have changed,” Sensei tells me as she puts her equipment away. “Well! Now that the photo session has concluded, why don’t we take care of your errand, Ai?”

“Y-Yes, please!”

I’m actually the one who asked Kugui-sensei if we could meet in Akihabara today because it would fit into my schedule.

Today———I’m here to choose a computer.