Vol 1 Chapter 1.04 (2/2)

Professor’s eyes are as lively as the summer sun, and her voice is quite agitated too. Any time she talks about something concerning robots, Professor becomes extremely active. I like seeing Professor like this.

Even so, as our topic today is robot crime, my feelings just now are rather complicated.

“Oh…..?”

At this moment, Professor suddenly stops.

“What is it?”

“Iris, wait for me for a moment.”

After that, Professor walks to the other side of the road.

She is walking towards a robot lying on the ground. His right leg has been broken through, his body is broken down, curling up his body like a kitten, lying in front of a closed down store.

Professor ignored the fact that it would dirty her clothes and starts to carry the robot’s upper torso, leaning him on the steel door of the store. Then, she starts to do a whole body examination on the robot with a serious expression on her face.

“Hmm, the 007 model huh……” mutters Professor.

Professor then slowly takes out a spare battery from her pocket and stuffs it into the chest of the robot. After a few seconds, a ‘beep’ is heard, then the chest of the robot quivers violently for a while like an electric shock was used on him after his heartbeat stopped.

“Very good, his circuits are still functioning.”

After taking out the battery, Professor immediately takes out her phone to make a phone call.

“…… Ah, Ralph? It’s me. I’m near the fountain plaza right now.”

Professor briefly tells the person at the other side of the phone about the model and condition of the robot. The conversation ends after 30 seconds, then Professor starts looking at the cover of the gutters rolled aside nearby.

“This kid…… actually pa.s.sed through such a dark, narrow place……”

As Professor said, the robot seemed to have crawled out from the storm sewer, his body stained with moss. After imagining the silhouette of a robot crawling through a sewer pipe like a dark, narrow pa.s.sage, an inexplicable feeling wells up in me.

Professor sticks a sticker with ‘Oval University First Robotics Laboratory: Final Reclamation Information’ onto the chest of the robot, then says to me after turning around “Sorry for the wait.”

“Professor, you called the research centre just now?”

“Yeah. I made some arrangements for collecting this kid.”

I turn my head around to look at the robot just now.

“You can fix him?”

“Yeah, I won’t know if I don’t try.”

Professor often fixes robots that are lying on the roadside. If she got to know the ident.i.ty of the robot, she would contact the registered owner. Though there were some lucky robots who were taken away by their owners, most of them were kept in the storage room of the research centre.

If the robots are claimed by the Robot Management Department first, the robots would be converted into sc.r.a.p metal after dealing with the necessary procedures. From this perspective, the robots found by Professor are actually very lucky.

Walking forward hand in hand, I ask.

“Hey, Professor.”

“What is it?”

“Why do you keep helping and fixing the robots?”

“Hmm, yeah……”

Professor thinks for a moment, then stares at me.

“Because…maybe…it's the meaning of my existence?”

I feel that the smile that Professor gave me was gentle but contained a hint of sadness.

An expression like this sometimes appeared on Professor’s face.

♠

After dinner that day, Professor starts a long awaited ‘special talk’ for me. This is because Professor finished her work earlier than expected. I get this special talk and a date, too; what a special day this day is.

I move the table and chair into the research lab while beaming, arranging the small blackboard and duster, then I prepare some snacks and tea. Then the preparations are complete.

A special talk.

This is a private talk that Professor organizes for me time after time.

Professor organizes a lecture at Oval University each week. As she’s a young genius who’s at the forefront of robot engineering, the cla.s.sroom is always stuffed full of people, and quite a lot of people from other universities go to listen, too.

Professor’s lectures are very special and would start talks with philosophical topics like ‘Robots and Ethics,’ ‘Robots and Love’ and so on. Learning about these lectures a long time ago, I shouted “I want to join too!,” but in the end, I couldn’t go. I want to see with my own eyes, Professor standing on the stage with her white robe and holding a cane, teaching with a heroic posture and cold tone. As robots don’t have the right to go to school, attending sneakily would just affect Professor’s stand. As I was about to give up, Professor gave me a suggestion:

“Why don’t we just have the lecture at home?”

From that time on, Wendy von Umbrella started to organize special lectures for Iris Rain Umbrella alone.

I take out my thick notebook from my beloved folder. The notebook was jotted full of questions that I asked during the previous lectures.

For example,

“Do robots undergo psychological growth?”

“Do robots undergo p.u.b.erty and rebellious stages?”

“What are the differences between the emotions of robots and humans?”

“Can robots go to heaven too?”

“Might there be a day when humans marry robots?”

“How much does Professor love me?”

Though it was mixed with a few personal questions, these are still in a tolerable area. This is a personal talk, after all.

“Alright, please get back to your seat.”

Professor walks into the lab. Today, she is still wearing a white robe on top of her suit, her beautiful hair tied up behind her. On the other hand, I’m still wearing my usual maid outfit, so our combination is rather strange.

Professor place her hands on the old wooden lectern that she brought from the university, saying: “Starting roll call.”

“Iris Rain Umbrella.”

“Here! Here, here, here!”

I poke out my body from the table, raising my hand energetically like a kid who just started school.”

“Miss Iris.”

“What is it!”

“Saying ‘here’ once would be enough.”

“Understood!”

I am extremely happy at this moment. It would be nice if robots could go to school one day.

Professor coughs for a moment, then started the lecture with a ‘Well, please turn to page fifty two.’

I open the textbook that Professor uses in the university. As I read it quite a lot of times already, the book is quite tattered.

“The theme of the lecture today is ‘What is the meaning of the existence of a robot.’ Recently, this type of research is categorized as robot psychology. A thesis that I spoke of about eight years ago initiated a hot discussion……”

Professor says that rapidly. The blackboard is gradually covered with Professor’s beautiful writing.

I am recording Professor’s words onto the notebook. Of course, saving the contents on the blackboard in my mental circuit can be done, but it wouldn’t have the feel of a lecture if so. The most important thing is the atmosphere and our att.i.tudes.

After thirty minutes.

“…… Hmm, the above is the history of the ‘meaning of life’ and ‘mental hygiene’ from older models to newer models of robots. Though the arrangement is rather ugly from an academic view, but it might be able to help out students who are looking for a reference. …… Any questions?”

“Here!”

I raise my right hand and wave it with all my might. But there’s only one student here anyways.

“Miss Iris.”

“Your lecture is very interesting, thank you for that!”

The first thing is to be courteous.

“Then, about the ‘meaning of existence’ that professor mentioned just now, does it include ‘robots must serve their masters’?”

“Of course. Learning robots are prevalent among family robots; the direct meaning of their existence is to serve the robot user.”

“Then the meaning of my existence is to serve Professor, that’s for sure.”

“How did you get to that conclusion?”

“Because I love Professor.”

“Okay, okay.”

“Saying ‘okay’ once would be enough; Professor said that.”

“You are really so fussy.”

Professor heaves a sigh.

While jotting down the tables and explanations on the blackboard, I ponder today’s theme – the meaning of our existence. Lastly, after I hand in a simple report of my thoughts, the lecture would end.

“Alright, I’m done!”

“Wow, you’re quick.”

Like a detective who solved a hard case, I slap the report onto the lectern.

“Impression Report (Eighteenth time)” Theme……. Robots and Meaning of Existence.

The meaning of my existence is Professor. My beloved Professor. I love you, Professor. Marry me, Professor. End!

After reading my report, Professor’s expression becomes as awkward as an old police who had the limelight stolen by a detective.

“Erm, Miss Iris.”

“What is it!”

“Your report has only one row.”

“That row has everything!”

“How unmotivated are you.”

“I’m full of motivation!”

“Are you looking down on me?”

“I cannot deny the possibility!”

After heaving a sigh, Professor fishes out a circlet cigarette from her cigarette case.

She breaks the 8-shaped circlet cigarette into half, then pops one into her mouth.

“Professor, cigarettes……”

“It’s okay. This isn’t the university anyways.”

“No, not that…… No smoking in the lab.”

“Ah.”

As if she is throwing a tantrum, she declares while pouting: “Then that’s the end of the lecture today!”

She takes off her white robe, throws it onto the table, and leaves the cla.s.sroom speedily with purple smoke behind her. “Really.” The word faintly drifted over along with the smoke.

I pick up the report that I wrote. A large red word is written at the center— “REDO”

The prank today might be a little bit too much. As the special lectures are the only rare times when I can make fun of Professor, I couldn’t resist it.

I should send her some red tea and cake after this to improve her mood.

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