202
Machine translation is artificial stupidity.
02
One hour later.
Fyodor suddenly noticed that the sky outside the window had darkened, and realized that he had actually been talking to someone of unknown identity for more than an hour.
Before this, he had never imagined that he would chat with someone, especially someone he had just met, for so long.
It was less of a chat and more like the other person's monologue.
He only needs to respond to her rambling self-introduction with a few "soka"s or a nodding emoji, and then guide her to glean some personal information.
Oh... and various dictionary lookups.
Clearly, this cat had little experience interacting with foreigners or young children who couldn't read yet, as its messages contained a large number of Chinese characters. This was a good learning opportunity for it, as it had only recently started learning Japanese and its native language didn't use Chinese characters, but it was also somewhat daunting. It could only copy and paste them one by one into Google to view them.
It wasn't until more than an hour later that Fyodor noticed—
As a foreign language learning app, Jinjiang Foreign Language certainly can't automatically bring up a translation simply by long-pressing a chat bubble.
"..."
Okay.
Just consider it as memorizing a few more Chinese characters. After all, this is... his biggest headache.
Fyodor rubbed his temples and looked at the last words left by "Meow".
[Meow: Speaking of which, I've said so much already, why don't you tell us about yourself too?]
"..."
As cautious as Fedor is, it's certainly impossible for him to be as direct as the other side, almost to the point of registering his household registration.
This means he needs to create a persona for himself.
Fortunately, the hour or so wasn't wasted. While he didn't actually learn her name and address, Fyodor did gain some basic information about this "cat."
According to her, she is a high school girl studying in Tokyo, Japan, and has been active in the volleyball club since middle school. She is currently working hard for the summer tournament. Besides playing volleyball, she also enjoys watching movies.
Fyodor smiled.
Just from this one line, the image of someone you can have a good conversation with has already been established in your mind.
【I'm a high school student too.】 Considering that many girls her age are reluctant to chat with adult men, but boys much younger than themselves are easily labeled "immature," Fyodor decisively set a "new age" for himself—
[For high school seniors.]
I don't know much about volleyball or anything like that, because I can't do strenuous exercise due to health reasons. But like you, I enjoy watching movies. Also, I play the cello and plan to try applying to a music conservatory next year.
Because he was using a language he was learning, Fyodor typed rather slowly. However, the other person was clearly still online, and an exclamation mark was immediately sent.
[You like movies too! If you play music, do you like watching shows like "The Sound of Music" or "A Way Around the World"?]
The first movie she mentioned was a true classic, one Fyodor had certainly seen. But mentioning his love of movies wasn't just about finding a topic of conversation. Fortunately, her reaction unfolded as she expected; she chuckled lightly. Fyodor typed:
I'd watch music-related shows, but I probably prefer superpower-themed ones?
He needed to determine whether this "Meow" knew that there was actually a group of people with superpowers in the world.
Or, to put it another way, is the person possessing superpowers?
The other party replied almost instantly.
[Like "Superpowered Family" or something? The latest "Superpowered Family" movie just premiered in Japan recently, and I went to see it with high expectations, but the editor did something drastic—they killed off Iron Man! I'm so upset, waaaaaah!]
One crying emoji after another was sent over.
Fyodor: "..."
What he wanted to discuss was not simply whether the Iron Man was alive or dead.
Fortunately, everything is under control.
Imagining what a male high school student who genuinely loves this film series would react, Fyodor could only feign indignation and join in the rant, complaining about how the screenwriters were inhuman and whether they couldn't live without delivering heart-wrenching moments, before finally saying:
[On another note, have you ever imagined what it would be like to have superpowers like Iron Man or Spider-Man?]
【Isn't that a superpower?】Meow replied with a questioning emoji.
So he seems to be someone without any special abilities...
But the message that Miaozi sent next made Fyodor frown.
[Meow: Isn't it cool?]
[Meow: Besides, I've always felt that life would be so much easier if magic and superpowers really existed!]
[Meow: For example, if I oversleep in the morning, I don't need to rush to get to base safely. I can just hop on my magic broom and "whoosh—" I'm at school in a flash. Or if my room is dirty and messy, I can tidy it up in a second. Just thinking about it makes me happy!]
"..."
It was around 8 p.m. Moscow time.
Although it was completely dark, Fyodor didn't turn on the lights. Looking at the Russian text translated for him by the app, Fyodor couldn't help but click his tongue.
That's really true—
You are not a fish, how can you know the joy of fish?
On the other end of the phone, Kawakami Wakana: "...?"
What on earth is this fish?
…………
Kawakami Wakana realized that she seemed to have unknowingly angered this Lucia man who lived thousands of miles away.
Last night, after sending that message—something about fish or not, probably in Chinese, which she didn't understand—they never replied. The app clearly showed that the last message Kawakami Wakana sent, a question mark and the phrase "What does this mean?", was read.
Jinjiang does offer a translation function, but this long string of Chinese characters sent by the other party, when translated, results in…
Chinese characters were detected. Content:
Children are not fish; they can safely learn the music of fish.
"...?"
Sure enough, machine translation these days is basically just artificial stupidity!
Even on the second day at school, Kawakami Wakai spent the entire day wondering what it meant when the Russians suddenly started speaking Chinese.
So much so that...
Sleeping in math class, daydreaming in English class, sketching in art class, and getting hit first in dodgeball class during PE class.
Unfortunately, the lunchbox served was saury.
Kawakami Wakai: emmm...
During lunch, she asked Hinata Natsumi a very serious question: "What kind of music is the music of fish?"
Hinata Natsumi: Huh...?
"Your brother recommended I download Jinjiang yesterday and try chatting with foreigners in English, right?" Kawakami Wakana picked up a small piece of egg roll, swallowed it, and said, "I did that when I got back, and I was matched with a Russian."
"—Because the other person also likes watching anime movies, I started complaining about Tetsujin being killed off, and that's how this happened..." He showed the chat history to Hinata Natsumi.
Hinata Natsumi, upon seeing the last sentence: "..."
“That’s not music, that’s happiness.” After Googling for a while, she said with a dark face, “What this means is, you’re not a fish, how would you know if a fish is happy?”
"...?"
Kawakami Wakana couldn't help but reveal a wise look in her eyes.
It's not a fish...
I wonder if the fish are happy...
After a few seconds of silence, she clapped her hands: "I understand!"
"This guy from Lucia must still be really upset about Iron Man getting killed off! He might even be Iron Man's backer!"
"That's why he got upset when I suddenly started talking about how cool it is to have superpowers, and how convenient magic and superpowers are."
"After all, he got pushed because of this damn thing!"
Hinata Natsume: "..."
Although she didn't deny the possibility, she always felt...
Perhaps Meow-chan knows what this sentence means, but doesn't fully understand what it's trying to say.
Since you don't understand what the other person is thinking, don't make assumptions!
only……
Kawakami Wakana was clearly not one to overthink things. She immediately started typing away:
[I get it, it's actually Iron Man pushing, right!]
[You pushed it because it had superpowers, but I'm still here saying how cool superpowers are, so you're unhappy.]
I'm so sorry, I didn't mean that!
After sending all the messages, Ruoyi finished her lunchbox in a few bites and then climbed out of the classroom through the window.
"Xia-chan, I'm still not full. Let me go to the convenience store and buy another bread!"
Hinata Natsume: emmm...
That being said—
The classroom for Grade 11 Group 1 is on the second floor.
…………
After sending an apology message to the Lucia, Kawakami Wakana stopped looking at her phone.
After all, if you buy bread and milk from the convenience store in the queue area, and eat while chatting with Xia Jiang, your lunch break will be almost over.
After class, she had to go to participate in club activities.
The advisor also announced today that those who can attend the summer conference will be selected through an internal competition at the beginning of next month.
So, she mustered all her energy and not only participated in club activities with boundless enthusiasm, but also practiced independently with Hinata Natsume for a while after school. By the time she changed into her school uniform and went home, it was already past seven in the evening.
Xia had to go to tutoring class tonight, so after eating a little dinner, the two parted ways near the school.
As Ruoyi walked towards the subway station, her mind wandered to all sorts of random thoughts.
For example, what to eat for tomorrow's lunchbox, or whether to pick out some books to learn English over the weekend... and so on.
Then I recalled what the consultant had said about the selection of conference members.
Six people form a group for the competition...
Oh right! I forgot to tell Xia-chan before, it seems they'll be in the same group!
Thinking of this, and seeing that the light was green, Ruoyi quickened her pace, deciding to get on the tram as soon as possible, and then send a message to Xia, inviting her to team up.
"Beep beep—"
By the time they heard the car horn and saw the blinding light, it was too late…
[Author's Note]
He covered his head and ran away (bu)
The inspiration for this "tuo han zi" (a character from a Chinese comic series) comes from an episode where the character's handwriting is terrible and he even misspelled the katakana of his own name.
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