Chương 386: 174.Paperwork Hell

After we left the Equipment Management Room, I didn't head straight back. Simple reason. If the Disciplinary Committee's job was preventing students from making things worse, and the Equipment Room's job was preventing the system from detonating itself, then the shooting-range desk's job was the last layer — the most practical, the least forgiving: Whether you can actually get a building full of self-confident cadets to stand in one place and shoot in the right order. Just thinking about it gave me a headache.

"Next stop, range desk," I said, tapping the folder.

"If they start crying too, we'll have officially assembled all Four Horsemen of the Representative Team Selection apocalypse." Hedwig walked beside me, voice even.

"Four Horsemen?"

"Disciplinary, Equipment, Venues, Shooting." I counted them off on my fingers.

"Add the Seitokai and you've got the deluxe five-piece dismemberment set."

"Are your metaphors always this... vivid?"

"Thank you. Very diplomatic phrasing." The deeper we went into the training block, the heavier the air got — dry metal, gun oil, the faint trace of spent propellant that never quite left. Both walls were lined with safety notices, venue-use regulations, emergency drill-stop procedures, and one enormous red-letter sign I always had to stop and stare at: NO ENTRY WITHOUT PRIOR CERTIFICATION Made sense. Very much in the school's style, too. It doesn't care whether you're learning joyfully.

It cares very much whether you're bleeding within regulation parameters. The range desk sat at the corner of the training block's main corridor, fronted by a full sheet of reinforced glass. Through it, you could see the segmented target bays and the simulated dynamic track. Not peak class hours yet, but there were already people inside running basic drills — distant commands, mechanical movement, and the flat, rhythmic sound of controlled fire. Behind the desk sat a woman.

Short hair, sharp eyes, a dark shooting vest over her uniform. A cup of coffee long gone cold sat at her elbow, next to a stack of annotated venue scheduling sheets. She didn't look like she was on duty. She looked like someone guarding an armory that might go off at any moment, who had preemptively given up on having expectations of collective human intelligence. She saw me. Her first move wasn't a greeting — she checked my ID badge, then my folder, then asked, point-blank:"Seitokai?" I nodded.

"Vice President. Here to deliver the bad news." She pushed the cold coffee aside without expression.

"If that's the Capital District Representative Team Selection, it's not bad news. It's a disaster forecast."... Good. I liked how people talked in this wing. Straight. No preamble. Saved me the psychological warm-up. I spread the summary page on the counter.

"They're actually going through with it this year." She scanned the header and let out a low exhale.

"Of course."

"Seems like that's the standard opening line today."

"Because every department's the same." She tapped the desk with her pen twice.

"Everyone knew it was coming back eventually. Nobody expected it to land now."

"What do you mean, now?" She looked at me.

"Year-end, when staffing is already scattered. New-term schedules not locked yet. The shared-subject curriculum adjustment for next year still stuck in committee." She delivered this like a death report.

"Running a selection tournament at this point isn't called enthusiasm. It's called asking for it." I almost slapped the desk.

"You just put my exact feelings into words." Hedwig, standing beside me, glanced quietly at the venue layout sheet on the desk and asked:"For the shooting events — is the bigger problem bay count, or calibration time?" The woman behind the desk actually looked at her properly for the first time.

"Both," she said, clean.

"But the first thing that'll actually blow up is people." I raised a brow.

"That's almost philosophical."

"Not philosophy. Experience." She pulled out an old scheduling sheet and laid it in front of us.

"See for yourself." It was a usage record from a previous large-scale marksmanship assessment — waiting zones, calibration areas, active bays, and fault-swap staging all color-coded. Just the density of it made you feel the day had probably looked like a legally-permitted smoke machine. She drew a line with her pen.

"Normal assessments, manageable. But the moment a selection tournament shows up, more people want to compete than usual, and every club and ad-hoc group will try to claim a time slot. Mix both Houses, and who goes first, who goes after, who has priority, who gets extra calibration time — all of it becomes a fight."

"Meaning," I finished for her, "if the schedule runs five minutes late, someone immediately starts implying the Council's running a black box."

"Yes."

"Ten minutes, and someone decides it's the Upper House suppressing the Lower, or the Lower dragging the Upper down."

"Also yes."

"Fifteen minutes—" She looked at me and cut in, flat: "Fifteen minutes, Disciplinary comes in and starts removing people." Perfect. That death-sequence walkthrough was more convincing than any event briefing I'd ever read. I wrote down the key points. Beside me, Hedwig opened her notebook and set a few lines down, pen steady. Her writing posture was almost too good — good enough that I briefly wondered if Imperial nobles were required to pass a calligraphy inspection before they were allowed to attend meetings.

The woman continued: "Also — dynamic targets and paired synchronized fire. Don't be optimistic about those two." I looked up.

"Why?"

"Because they're the flashiest, and the most likely to go wrong." She tilted her head toward one of the bays through the glass.

"Even in regular class, people always want to prove themselves on those setups. In a formal selection, it'll be worse. Especially the Upper House students who—" She caught herself, seemed to consider something, and chose a more civil phrasing.

"—who place a higher value on appearances." I nearly laughed. That was already being generous. In plain terms: the Upper House kids whose pride is thinner than the target paper. Hedwig didn't look offended. She said, calmly: "Lower House probably won't be quiet either."

"Of course not." The woman nodded, no hesitation.

"Lower House, once they think the rules are tilted, writes their frustration directly on their faces. Upper House is better at packaging their frustration as dignified language first, then working the process toward whatever benefits them. Both are trouble. Just different kinds." I could have applauded.

"You should publish that as a campus survival manual."

"Or," she said, "print it on the first page of the Seitokai's operating guidelines. Title: Don't assume everyone wants fairness. They want to win while looking fair."... That was vicious. Vicious enough that I filed it away immediately to deliver to Maki later. I flipped forward in my notes.

"So what's your recommendation to the Council?" She held up three fingers.

"First, extend calibration time. Stop imagining seamless back-to-back sessions. Second, stagger the popular events — don't let dynamic targets and paired synchronized fire land in the same window and explode. Third, write the fault-swap and late-arrival procedures into stone in advance. Otherwise someone will use my gun has a problem as a delay tactic on the day." I was nodding along when I stopped.

"Hold on."

"What."

"That last one — does that mean someone's actually done that?" She looked at me, expression completely undisturbed.

"How many years do you think students need to invent a stalling tactic?" I closed my mouth. Good question. Before this school produces officers, it apparently produces a very effective crop of people who know how to exploit the gaps in rules. Hedwig quietly reorganized the three points into a clean list, confirmed the wording, then asked: "If the Council puts the popular-event staggering plan and fault-swap conditions into the preliminary notice, can you review it before it goes out?"

The woman's eyes on her shifted — noticeably more attentive than when we'd walked in.

"Yes. Better than me being pressured into on-the-spot rulings on match day." She seemed to think of something, reached under the counter, and pulled out another small form.

"Also — for venue scheduling, don't just ask the instructors. Come to the desk too." I took it.

"What's the lesson behind that?"

"Not a lesson. A pattern," she said.

"Instructors handle training and events. The desk knows which time slots have the worst calibration-buffer bleed between sessions. If you build your schedule entirely off the instructor version without checking our side, you'll find it looks fine on paper and collapses in person." I looked at the sheet — calibration buffer / post-session clearance — and had to admire the precision of my own suffering.

"So the real nature of this entire selection tournament," I said, "is a war in which every department is working to prevent the ideal schedule from killing everyone."

"You catch on quickly," she said.

"Because I'm suffering in real time." Beside me, Hedwig laughed, very softly. Not loud. But in a place full of scheduling sheets and range regulations, it was somehow unusually clear. I glanced sideways and found her head still bent over her notebook, adding the last few points, the edge of a smile not quite pulled back.... Was she in a suspiciously good mood today? I thought of the nine-compartment breakfast. Then of her line outside the Disciplinary Committee — because you were explaining it.

And immediately felt my operating environment tilting in a direction I didn't fully trust. Dangerous. Not the time to deal with that. I collected the sheets, nodded at her.

"Good. That's enough for today. We'll send a first-draft schedule and staggering proposal — please feel free to tear it apart."

"Happy to," she said, without inflection.

"I knew your type loved rejecting other people's dreams."

"Better than watching you cry on match day." Can't argue with that. We were heading out when she stopped us.

"One more thing. You should be mentally prepared." I turned.

"For what?" This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it. She set her pen down, voice still level.

"Registration heat is this high for round one, which means certain names are going to surface early for the popular events. By the time it happens, the Council won't just be managing schedules. You'll be managing people who haven't even competed yet and are already deciding they don't like each other." There it was. We'd moved from system problems to people will cause problems. That was always where the real trouble lived. My eyes sharpened — not with pleasure, but with recognition.

"Any names?" She glanced at me.

"Isn't the Council usually good at finding those out?"

"Only because everyone loves to string us along first."

"Go ask the Lower House Marksmanship Club," she said finally, giving us something.

"And there's someone in the Upper House who's already putting out the word that they should get a reserved lane. Name's yours to dig up." Good. That was enough. Didn't need the full picture now. Just knowing the names were about to surface meant there was already something to work with. I waved.

"Thanks. I'm billing the emotional damage to the Council's psychological trauma account."

"Get out."

"So warm."

"Faster." We stepped out of the range desk, the door clicked shut, and the corridor air was immediately half a degree softer. I looked down at my notes, then at the folder. Disciplinary wants authority. Equipment wants reality. Range wants time, staggering, and no wishful thinking. What the Council was holding now wasn't an event notice anymore. It was a bomb, disassembled down to each layer of fuse. Hedwig fell into step beside me. After a few paces she said:"You asked very specifically in there."

"Because if I don't ask specifically, I'm the one who dies later."

"It's more than that." I turned to look at her. She looked back, tone even, but with something accurate running underneath it.

"You weren't just collecting information," she said.

"You were pre-emptively flagging the places people will use to cause trouble — on the President's behalf." I paused.... That was too right. Right enough that I didn't know whether to deflect or just accept being seen. In the end I shrugged.

"Can't help it," I said.

"My President is very good at taking things apart. Spend enough time next to her, you pick up some unfortunate skills." Hedwig looked at me, eyes quiet, and seemed to hold for a beat longer than usual.

"Not some skills," she said.

"Oh?"

"You're already quite good at it."... That line had no business being said that plainly. Especially not in that completely ordinary tone. It made it very hard to decide whether to argue back. I cleared my throat and pulled the folder against my chest.

"Thank you," I said.

"That's enough goodwill to get me through at least one more assignment meeting." She gave a small nod.

"Good." I looked at her face — composed, apparently entirely unaware of how much damage that sentence had just done — and thought: life keeps getting harder. Maki didn't assign her to me for a campus tour. This was a high-level occupational stress test. I looked back at the list, crossed off Range Desk, and exhaled.

"Alright," I said.

"Back to the Council." She glanced over.

"We're done for today?"

"For the circuit, yes." I shook the folder.

"Run any more and the information gets too scattered for Maki to rebuild from. What we have now is exactly enough — Disciplinary, Equipment, Range, three sets of conditions. Enough for her to officially declare the original plan dead on arrival." Hedwig was quiet for a moment, then said, lightly: "You know the President very well."

"Can't avoid it," I said, walking.

"I'm the one who gets buried under the schedule alongside her every time." She followed, didn't say anything more. But I knew that hadn't been a casual question. And I knew this wasn't the moment to think too carefully about it. Because back in the Council office, the President was waiting for us to bring all the collected fire-hazard information back to the table. And once we did, the Representative Team Selection would stop being an external tour and become internal operations.

By the time Hedwig and I got back to the Seitokai office, the sky outside had started its slow tilt toward evening. Winter light, once it starts dropping, turns the whole school into a specific kind of illusion — looks like it's almost over, but isn't, and might just be the second wave of disaster warming up. The coffee smell in the office was stronger than morning. Not fragrant. Dense.

Dense like someone had slow-cooked sleep, human decency, and civil service culture into a deep brown liquid and forced it into the room. I pushed the door open. The scene inside had barely changed. Maki was still behind the document mountain. Lan had the venue map spread out, ruler and color pens arranged with the precision of someone charting a front line for a war that hadn't exploded yet.

Roy was buried in budget frameworks and equipment requirement sheets, his face several shades worse than morning — the look of someone young who'd already been skinned twice by fiscal reality. And Jess. She was still there. And she was draped over her minute book, pen in one hand, other hand pressed to her temple, radiating the specific energy of someone who'd come to watch chaos and somehow gotten absorbed by the institution. She looked up the moment I walked in.

"You're back?" Her voice sounded like it had just been fished out of administrative quicksand.

"Is the world outside any better?"

"No." I dropped the folder on the desk.

"Just went from one hell to another hell and came back with the hell's receipts." She nodded, very solemnly.

"Right. That's the true culture of the United Interstellar Military Academy." Maki looked up at me and Hedwig.

"Back." Not a question. The kind of flat statement that means you'd better have brought something usable. I opened the folder and spread the three sets of notes across her desk, one at a time.

"Disciplinary wants direct on-site reporting and suspension authority. Pre-condition: we lock down the high-risk matchups, spectator zones, inter-House routing, and boundary restrictions in writing first." I pushed Nikaido's sheet over.

"She also specifically said — rules are rules, they apply to everyone. If anyone tries to freeze people out at the registration stage using status, she'll step in." Maki gave a short mm and pressed her fingers to the sheet. I kept going.

"Equipment says the range, Bladed Combat Training Hall, and Ground Operations Simulation Zone are the three most likely to blow. Don't trust any flow chart that says theoretically feasible — calibration buffers and replacement gear time will eat the paper version alive." Roy looked up immediately.

"I knew they'd say that."

"Your face right now," I said, "looks like a finance officer who just found a kindred spirit."

"That's because tech staff are the only ones still living in reality," he said, low. I set the last sheet in the center.

"Range desk was the most brutal. Popular events can't overlap time slots. Calibration windows need to be extended. Fault-swap and late-arrival procedures have to be written into stone before we start — otherwise people will use my gun has a problem as a delay tactic before the match even begins." Jess's eyes went wide.

"Wait, people actually do that?"

"Yes," Maki and I said at the same time. I caught myself a beat later. Maki glanced at me. Brief — like wind crossing a window. But I caught it. That kind of of course you already knew alignment. Irritating in how natural it was. Natural in how irritating it was.

Hedwig, standing beside me, waited for Maki to finish the first pass through the three sheets before she opened her notebook and added, evenly:"The range desk also mentioned — if the Council builds the schedule entirely off the instructor version without checking the desk's calibration-buffer windows, it'll look fine on paper and fall apart in person." Lan's pen stopped.

"Of course," she said. She looked down at her half-drawn venue map, and for the first time all day, her brow creased — just slightly. Roy flipped to the blank back of his budget sheet and started writing new notes.

"So it's not just a matter of adding more equipment budget. The entire scheduling order has to be rebuilt around this." Jess, listening, looked like she'd bitten into something sour.

"Wait — so the version we had this morning—""Dead," Maki said. Flat. Clean. The office went quiet for two seconds. I didn't speak. When she used that tone, it wasn't a discussion anymore. It was a verdict. Maki pulled out the original draft flow chart, spread it flat, looked at it for two seconds. Then she picked up the red pen and drew a clean, decisive X across the top row — the time allocation grid and the parallel shared-subject schedule. The sound of the pen dragging across paper was almost satisfying.

Like a formal death sentence for a plan that was never going to survive anyway.

"The flow gets changed once." She looked up and scanned the room.

"We change it now. After this, we only add data — no more overturning. Otherwise the Council drowns in its own revisions." I nearly stood up to applaud. Yes. Exactly that. Exactly that posture. The thing the Council fears most isn't too many problems. It's every problem getting a partial response, and everyone revising to show they're responsible, until the thing that kills you isn't the external pressure — it's the internal self-contradiction. She clearly knew that.

She set the condemned draft aside and pulled a blank sheet.

"Lan."

"Here."

"Redraw the venue map. Once. Shooting, Bladed Combat, Ground Operations — all three go to staggered flow. No more chasing synchronized spectacle. I want executable, not pretty." Lan nodded, no excess words.

"Got it. Popular events on offset timing, spectator zone separated."

"Also," Maki added, "Upper and Lower House routing split. Staging areas split too. Not because I'm worried about them meeting — because I'm worried about what happens when they meet with too much energy."

"Understood."

"Roy."

"Yeah."

"Budget is no longer based on all events running parallel. Shooting and Bladed Combat backup stock gets priority increases. Ground Operations replacement parts go on a separate line. And checkout sign-off is mandatory." Roy looked up.

"Meaning — no I'll sign later?"

"No," Maki said.

"Who checked out, who issued, who logged, who eats the damage — all written in advance." Roy, hearing this, looked somehow more settled than before. Interesting. Finance people sometimes don't fear more rules. They fear rules that aren't firm enough.

"That actually makes my life more livable," he said.

"Then don't die," I said. He looked at me.

"You first." Fair. The fact that he was firing back meant he was still functional. Maki turned to Hedwig.

"Hedwig."

"Yes."

"Rewrite the external version." Hedwig's gaze was steady.

"Put the restrictions in directly?"

"Yes," Maki said.

"But make them presentable. I want everyone to understand the rules clearly, without feeling like the school is threatening them on first read." I cut in.

"But we are threatening them." She didn't turn her head.

"Which is why we have a Secretary." Hedwig looked like she almost laughed, held it, and answered calmly: "Understood. Event descriptions, calibration rules, popular-event staggering, late-arrival and fault-swap conditions — all included."

"And the Disciplinary Committee's on-site reporting authority," Maki said.

"That one doesn't get hidden. It goes in plain language." Even Jess looked up at that.

"That blunt?"

"Exactly that blunt." Maki set the red pen down.

"If we don't spell it out, everyone will pretend they never saw it coming." Jess looked at her and murmured: "President, you sound like someone building a levee before the flood."

"No," I said, completing it for her.

"More like someone who knows the flood is coming, so she's assigned each of us to a different sandbag pile."

"That's pretty heartless, actually."

"But accurate," Lan said, from behind her map. Excellent. Crowd-sourced validation. I'd achieved another spiritual victory in a public setting. Maki finally looked at me. One glance, and I already knew. The loudest, most human-facing piece — still mine.

"Shimo."

"Here." She pulled the three reports I'd brought back into a single stack, then drew a blank record sheet from the bottom and slid it in front of me.

"You're not running the rest of the committee circuit." I raised a brow.

"Oh?"

"Run people instead." The office went quiet for half a beat. I looked at her. She looked at me, tone as level as if she were mentioning dinner might be late.

"From this point, the flow gets frozen once. I have enough external conditions. What we need now is — who's about to turn this selection into a battlefield." That sentence changed the air. Not paper-danger. Human-danger. Maki pressed her fingertip to the range desk note I'd brought back.

"The desk said it, didn't they? First-round registration is running this hot, which means names are going to surface early for the popular events. Upper House — someone's already putting out the word that they should have a reserved lane. Lower House — the Marksmanship Club and a few ad-hoc groups aren't going to sit quietly waiting for the announcement." I looked down at the note. Something familiar rose in my chest. Here we go. This was the real start. Not the forms. Not the staggering. Not the venue.

People — who hadn't officially entered yet and were already generating friction around the roster.

"Go find the names," Maki said.

"How deep?"

"Don't need everything," she said.

"Just pull out the highest-risk points first. Popular events, dominant clubs, groups with abnormally high registration, and—" She paused, then said the actually difficult part.

"That Upper House person who thinks they deserve a reserved lane. Find them first." I almost laughed. Not because it was funny. Because this type — the kind that hasn't shown their face yet but is already radiating I was always supposed to be first — was so perfectly in the school's style.

"So I've officially been promoted from Vice President to Campus Conflict Early Warning and Intelligence Retrieval Officer?"

"If you prefer, call yourself Spark Retrieval Officer," Maki said.

"Your naming conventions are getting worse."

"Are you going or not?"

"I'm going." I pulled the blank sheet over and tapped it.

"Otherwise I wait for them to grow legs and walk onto the desk themselves?" Maki gave a quiet mm. Not heavy. But certain. The kind that confirmed: she'd handed me the worst of it, and I'd catch it anyway.... Damn it. I hate how natural and correct that dynamic is, simultaneously. Hedwig spoke up: "If it would help, I can assist with organizing names and affiliated units." I turned to look at her. She was sitting straight, one hand still on the external announcement draft she'd been partway through revising.

Not a polite offer. Clearly she was already thinking two steps ahead. Maki glanced at her and nodded.

"Good. Pull the registration data for popular events — separate out the clubs and individuals. Hand them to Shimo."

"Understood." I looked at her, and had to fight down a laugh. She'd brought breakfast this morning, run the administrative circuit with me all afternoon, and was now, as evening came on, helping me disassemble names. The Secretary had adapted way too fast. Jess, halfway through a line of minutes, finally cracked.

"Hold on — why does this whole thing sound more and more like a campus intelligence operation?"

"Because it is," I said.

"No it isn't!"

"What do you think a representative selection is?" I said, patient.

"Everyone registers cheerfully, encourages each other, and at the end friendship and sweat decide the winner?" She opened her mouth. I supplied the answer.

"Wrong. That's the promotional video. Reality: the venue's already too small before anyone's signed up. The rules haven't been announced and the people who want to exploit them are already warming up. The roster isn't posted and the face-saving conflicts have already started." She muttered: "When you put it like that, youth feels kind of dirty."

"Welcome to military school." Maki didn't engage with any of that. She finished the last few lines of the new flow, capped the red pen. Click. Small sound. It landed like a declaration. She looked up at the redistributed materials on the desk.

"Done. The flow stands." No let's try this first. No we can adjust later. No if anything changes we'll revisit. Done. Once. Clean enough to feel like relief. I exhaled — actually exhaled. Because it meant the worst possible scenario wasn't going to happen: everyone bringing back a new report, the Council flipping the whole table again and again. What was on the desk now wasn't a puddle of self-replicating chaos.

It was something that was still heavy, still exhausting, still the kind of thing that made you want to skip school — but at least it could move forward. Roy folded the revised budget columns. Lan pressed the second-draft routing map to the corner. Hedwig rewrote the first line of the external announcement header.

And I picked up the blank name-collection sheet, knowing my trouble had officially upgraded from fighting the paperwork to finding the people who haven't stepped on stage yet and are already trying to claim it. Good. That was how it was supposed to feel. I leaned back, let out a long breath.

"President."

"Hm?"

"I'm starting to suspect you actually enjoy moments like this."

"Which moments?"

"When everyone's about to be crushed by things, and then you sort it all back into order. Like you're applying discipline to chaos." She looked at me. Eyes level, still as a frozen lake in a winter afternoon — but I knew it wasn't empty underneath, just that she didn't feel like letting anyone see. Finally: "I just don't like wasted effort." Very Maki. Also correct. Not that she liked control. That she hated waste. Hated work done for nothing. Hated energy spent for nothing.

Hated everyone already stretched too thin, dying alongside a version of the plan that was never going to survive. Which was why, when she drew that line, it had looked like an execution. I looked at her, and something close to a laugh came up.

"Alright." I stood, slid the blank sheet into my folder.

"I'll go dig up the first batch of people about to waste our time." She nodded.

"Bring back the popular-event roster before you come back."

"Yes, President." I answered, turned toward the door, and then stopped. Because I'd just realized something. This whole day — the first wave of Representative Team Selection hell — had only just started running properly. The morning meeting was the verdict. The afternoon circuit was the sampling. And now, with the flow finalized in one pass, the next step wasn't fighting paper anymore. It was fighting people. The kind who'd fight over slots, time windows, dignity, and who got to interpret the rules.

I glanced back at the office. Maki was already reading the next file. Hedwig sat beside her, working through the announcement draft, each line landing steady. Roy and Lan were back in their respective sectors. Jess was face-down on her minute book, a soul apparently held as collateral by the Council. Good. Everyone had returned to their layer of hell. And I was heading out to find the next name that would make the temperature rise. I pushed the door open. My mood was, somehow, slightly lighter than before.

Because the worst thing isn't a big problem. The worst thing is a big problem with no direction. Now there was direction. The blade had an edge. All that was left was seeing which unlucky name floated to the surface first. I looked down at the blank sheet in my folder and thought it looked interesting, being that white. Like names not yet written on it, with no idea they were about to have a very bad time.