36. Sidebar 02: Passenger Spaceship ASUCA

In episode 32, the mass of the interstellar lifeform Zeno was stated as four million tons, but we are correcting the lower bound to two million tons. Our apologies.

The drone designed to read Biological Information was able to scan terrestrial areas of a certain size or larger—plants and animals—by narrowing the initial scan targets, allowing an average of thirty minutes per square kilometer on land. Japan alone has 380,000 square kilometers of land. Scanning it all with a single drone would take 760,000 hours. With a thousand drones, that comes to 760,000 hours—about a month.

Including the 4.47 million square kilometers of ocean surrounding Japan, the scan would take about four hundred days—but the sea might take five or six times longer than land, due to the need to scan across varying depths. Allocating resources solely to this task isn’t feasible, so for now, we’ll limit operations to a thousand drones. Future phases may target smaller organisms, though it’s uncertain when that will happen.

Ichijō seems to have developed a taste for inspection during the lunar survey—now she’s suddenly eager to take a solar system cruise aboard a spaceship. She keeps suggesting it. Whether she’ll actually conduct further inspections or not is another matter, but it does sound intriguing. There are passenger ships in the world exceeding two hundred thousand tons. Even at Yokohama Harbor, where super-sized vessels can’t dock due to bridge clearance, spaceships could still berth—no need to duck under bridges at all.

One of the world’s largest shipping companies, Nihon Sangyo, had partnered with Agirakana to jointly establish a new corporation, Solar Cruises—51 percent owned by Agirakana, 49 percent by Nihon Sangyo. Naturally, the name was Ichijō’s. Agirakana would supply passenger spacecraft; Solar Cruises would operate them as such. Since Agirakana, holding a 51 percent stake, was required to appoint executives to Solar Cruises, it was out of the question that I’d be one—there was no other Japanese Agirakana proponent besides Ichijō, so I shoved her into the role of vice president and board representative.

Because she was dispatched by Agirakana, which held a 51 percent stake, Ichijō technically held the power to dismiss any and all officers, including the president. Though, one could only hope the bizarre seal she’d affixed wouldn’t trigger any Japanese legal technicalities.

Ichijō initially declared she would return her entire executive bonus, second only to the president’s, but when told that returning it without cause would make other executives reluctant to accept their bonuses, she replied, “Well then, just take it,” and laughed — a dry, half-hearted chuckle, as if the whole matter were a minor domestic dispute.

"Then, since it'd be a shame to disappoint the other board members, I'll go ahead and take it."

was replied. Already, Ichijō was stationed in Hiratari, but also listed among the executives of ANL (All-Japan Airways), receiving a considerable executive salary.

When I asked what he was spending the money on,

"Purchasing Japanese stocks like this one would be a surefire way to make a fortune. If you're a novice like your senior, profits might be modest—but buying a Japanese stock index fund? That’s foolproof," they said.

Seems to be investing in stocks. Even if the stocks were to completely collapse, food and shelter are guaranteed at the Embassy—so one can afford to be complacent. Then there’s the matter of registering a newly coined trademark, ‘Officially Licensed by Agirakana,’ which appears to be generating a rather substantial income through licensing fees. If a regular civil servant did something like that, it would surely be a major scandal, warranting immediate disciplinary action. But Ichijō is a civil servant working at the Agirakana Embassy. Since I, her boss, don’t find such matters worth my attention, there’s no issue whatsoever. Only remarkable, really, is Ichijō’s knack for business.

Operating a passenger spacecraft requires only a few qualified captains and personnel for port-related duties—manageable enough. But for cruise ships, unlike lunar往返 shuttles, a substantial number of trained cabin attendants are necessary. Japan’s merchant fleet seems to lack surplus cabin staff; while senior-level attendants can be arranged somehow, it’s been said that assigning regular cabin crew is difficult.

Perhaps swayed by Ichijō’s insistence—“If we’re going this far, let’s go all the way”—the decision was made to establish a specialized school for training cabin attendants for space. A large faculty of professionals in hospitality will be assembled, followed by six months of ground-based education, then three months of practical training aboard an AMR vessel. Upon completion, candidates will be hired and assigned to either an AMR ship or Solar Cruiser, according to their own preferences.

The completed spacecraft was handed over to the Solar Cruiser, and interior construction—carried out at full speed as a continuous operation—was underway at the Ōkami Shipyard in Ōita Prefecture, with the goal of finishing before the graduation of the first cohort of the specialized school.

The name upon completion would be passenger spacecraft ASUCA (Asuka). Ichijō, having recently developed a peculiar fixation on anime, had chosen it. Apparently, the name for the next passenger vessel was already decided: SHIRLEY (Shārī). All members of the first cohort of the specialized school were scheduled to be assigned to the ASUCA.

For these reasons, the ASUCA was registered under the jurisdiction of Japan. Its gross tonnage stood at five hundred thousand tons—more than double that of the world’s largest current cruise ship. The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, and Transport had waived its usual tonnage measurement requirements.

A suka’s scheduled route.

Departing from an international port in Japan.

Depending on planetary positions, the order may shift, but the inner planets—Mercury (near the Sun), Venus, and Mars—will be visited first.

After traversing the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, the ship will circle the two outer planets, Jupiter and Saturn, in sequence.

Finally, it will make a port call at AMR before docking at a different international port in Japan than the one it departed from.

Catchphrase: "A luxurious interplanetary cruise—nine nights, ten days, exploring the solar sky."

Of course, ticket sales will be adjusted according to each country’s level of友好 (friendliness toward Japan).

Stealth-equipped vessels near Jupiter and hyperlane gates remain undetectable even in electromagnetic wavelengths, including visible light—rendering them invisible from orbiting passenger ships.

[Supplementary Explanation]

Stealth function

Labeled as "stealth function," though it offers no advantage against mass detection. Used for defense against beam weapons, vessels like those of Agirakana are equipped with it. It provides little resistance against Zeno's neutron radiation.

Measurement: The vessel's dimensions are measured directly, and its capacity is calculated to determine gross tonnage. Gross tonnage is required for vessel registration, according to the documentation. Details available via WEB.

The name of the first passenger vessel is an ancient alias of Asuka from the "Stowage Officer" series—completely unrelated to the luxury liner Asuka. The second vessel is also from the same series: Shirley, the "Stowage Officer."

Ichijō ascends the VIP staircase with surprising speed. One might reasonably speculate she could soon be among the hundred most influential people on Earth.

The Ōgami Shipyard in Ōita Prefecture has a certain old Navy arsenal vibe to it. We could’ve picked any location for the shipyard—just threw in Ōgami’s name for fun. Honestly, I’d have loved to see a real Super Yamato come to life.