[Video]

[10billionpercent]

[Senku is the kind of person that people might've seen around, but he's a quiet guy who's often got a lot on his mind, and at the moment the mystery of the train appears to be going nowhere. He can't sit that idly by though, so he sets some of his brain power on a more personal mystery.]

I've scoured the library, such as it is, for a book on advanced or complex mathematics, so I figured I would ask if that's something someone has on hand and I just missed it.

[He doesn't have any points to request books as of yet.]

Specifically, I'm looking to refresh my knowledge of knot theory calculations. If you can help, let me know. I can certainly repay any favours in the future.

Comments

[nocawsforconcern]

Sounds easy enough! People are always easy to find. Just gotta find the treasure.

[10billionpercent]

[ He shouldn't rise to the bait, not really, but curiosity remaining unsated has never been his strong point. ]

What treasure?

[ Learning about other worlds would be fascinating and something to do on this boring, boring train ride. ]

[nocawsforconcern]

Any treasure. Where there's treasure, there's people, always! Or, there were people, recently. Shiny things, sparkling things, all of those attract people, and I can find them all!

[She puffs up a bit, clearly proud of herself.]

[10billionpercent]

Ah, unless you mean a skarn deposit, you're out of luck I'm afraid. There aren't any sparkly, shiny things any longer unless we make them.

[ That's not to say he couldn't though, in theory. ]

Really depends on what you think a treasure is.

[nocawsforconcern]

There's always shiny things. Gold or gems. People always want them.

Me, too! I want them, too. Treasure is calming. Treasure is anything that's sparkly and shiny! Except weapons, even if they're shiny, 'cause I'm really, really sick of weapons. Except my knives? But those are for ropes, not people, they just can do both if I have to. Like with pirates. I hate pirates.

[She's... just gonna keep going on and on like this for a while.]

[10billionpercent]

Not in my world. Anything like that that was manufactured at some point has completely broken down and vanished, and if it's not vanished, it's lying under the changed topography of the planet and I have no desire to go treasure hunting for things that are not useful to rebuilding civilization.

[ Well. They're not entirely useless, but a treasure hunt would take away from what they were doing. ]

It's an extremely primitive society. For now.

[nocawsforconcern]

They're not useless.

[She's pouting, now.]

And anyway, if I was there, it wouldn't matter where they were. Treasure comes to me.

[10billionpercent]

[ It's tempting to mount further argument, really, but he also knows that the sheer scope of what he's saying is hard to understand. Even for him, he gets these moments of crushing comprehension, so how can he expect strangers to get it? He can't. ]

Well then, you sound much luckier than me. Good luck.

[nocawsforconcern]

It's not luck. I dunno if I'm lucky or not... Caw, I'm good at cards, does that make me lucky?

But finding treasure is my power.

[10billionpercent]

That depends. Are you good at cards because you're lucky, or are you good at cards because you cheat?

[ He grins, rather amused at that, because he's a bit of a card shark, then again he counts cards. ]

[nocawsforconcern]

Rude! Caw. Don't be mean. I don't cheat.

[This is... not actually true. She extremely cheats at cards. The catch is, she's stupidly, ridiculously honest, but she also grew up in a tavern near a port. The sailors told her the cheating is actually part of the game. And she's gullible.

This is all completely pointless side-information, but at least she genuinely believes she's not cheating.]

[10billionpercent]

[ Senku is not the best human lie detector after all, so he'll take her words at face value. ]

Then, maybe you're lucky. I'm not lucky, but then again, the basic principles that I apply to card games isn't something I can help, but if I was actually trying to cheat, I could get creative.

[nocawsforconcern]

Don't do that. Cheating is bad.

[IMMEDIATE. yeah, that's what she's focusing on here.]

[10billionpercent]

The idea of keeping track what cards are in the deck is a stupid reason to be considered cheating.

The math is incredibly simple and there are only 52 options, so by process of elimination, it's not hard to make an appropriate guess as to what cards remain.

[ Really, that's only true for someone like Senku, but he does it so automatically, he couldn't play fair if he tried. ]

[nocawsforconcern]

[She squints a bit...]

That's not cheating, that's common sense. You're weird.

[10billionpercent]

[He shrugs.]

I agree with you, however in my world at the time that people were playing cards, they considered that to be a method of cheating. There were people famous for winning a lot of money that way, simply by counting the cards that were left in the deck.

[nocawsforconcern]

That's dumb. Cheating would be like punching the other guy.

[10billionpercent]

That's just violence. Cheating is usually much more subtle than that.

Also I'm not the kind of guy who goes around punching people.

[nocawsforconcern]

Caw. Why? Are you a pacifist? Or just weak?

[There's absolutely no judgment in her voice, it's... a genuine question... Not that she does a lot of punching either.]

[10billionpercent]

[It's pretty hard to offend Senku, honestly.]

I would say both. I'm not a pacifist in the way you'd think. I would rather avoid bloodshed if I can help it, but I'm not afraid to use what I have at my disposal for the greater good.

But, punching specifically? I'm weak as a kitten. [He laughs sardonically.]

[nocawsforconcern]

You should fix that. If you're too weak, then you can't avoid bloodshed sometimes.

[10billionpercent]

Fix what? My strength? That's already a foregone conclusion. I have other people handle things with their monstrous strength while I strategize.

[nocawsforconcern]

Nope. Come with me, you're gonna work out.

[She's.

She's trying to reach into the video screen.

She doesn't know how this stuff works yet, okay.]

[10billionpercent]

There's not one millimetre of chance I'm going to do that.

[She doesn't understand, his stamina's the worst and never seems to get better, despite the physicality.

But. She's reaching for the video.

Oh look at the time, Senku has to cut the feed. Please don't try to find him.]