One Week After the Match with Teikoku Gakuen, Raimon Strategy Room
Mika felt a breath on her shoulder as Serika leaned over in her seat to take a peek at what she was looking at on her phone. Blinking her eyes upwards in an attempt to look cute, Serika was disappointed when Mika pushed her face away with feigned disgust. Plopping back down in her seat, Serika decided to just ask with her words then
“What you looking at Mika?”
“I’m reviewing the Block D matchups from last week. It seems that Kidokawa Seishuu has some gained some new members”
“Really, let me see?!”
As Serika reached over to grab Mika’s phone, Kenji who was listening in front of them pushed up his glasses and decided to join in, having been surprised as well to see the change in Kidokawa’s lineup between the pre-season and Block D preliminaries.
“Yes, six new members to be exact”
Unable to hide his curiosity any longer, Galahad walked over to Serika who still had Mika’s phone.
“Get your hands off servant boy, I’m watching right now!”
“Come on Afuro-san!”
Observing the crowd that had begun to form around Mika’s phone, Kenji sighed and walked to the front of the room to hook up his laptop to the large monitor.
“Ohhhhhhhhh”
The Raimon members who saw the monitor turn on let out a resoundant exclamation of surprise and praise for Kenji who had neatly organized the data for Kidokawa Seishuu which had been organized into a 3-4-3 formation. Sitting down after gathering around Mika, the members let out cries of exclamation after double checking who the new No.10 was.
Falling out of his chair, Sadao asked in surprise from the floor
“Ganeko-senpai??”
Surprised to hear that Akuma had quit the team, Makoto also let out a loud shocked yell
“Ganeko-kun?”
Meanwhile, Nariko and Naoki began to giggle before Nariko tried to cover her mouth and with palpable scorn in her voice mocked
“Looks like the big baby got up and ran away to a little pond lol”
Seeing the familiar face, Galahad ground his molars recalling everything that Akuma and his gang had done the past year before checking on Mika to make sure she was okay. To his relief, she let out no sign of alarm but he still wanted to ask her if she was alright before he heard a loud snobbish voice from her right.
“Did that piece of garbage even win this match?”
Finally speaking up, Mika cooly answered Serika’s question with two words
“They lost”
“They lost, but they’ll still be moving on to the finals as Block D’s runner up team along with a new team I haven’t heard of before : Susanoo Gakuen”
“??”
Looking up at Kenji who had finished Mika’s train of thought, Galahad tilted his head in confusion. He had heard of most of the front runners in the Holy Road preliminaries but he had never heard of Susanoo Gakuen before…
Kenji switched from Kidokawa Seishuu to Susanoo’s data but unlike Kidokawa Seishuu’s, it was exceedingly sparse.
“It appears they’re a new school that just formed this year…However, almost everything about them is weird. There was no news of them before this year and it’s like they popped out of nowhere. I can’t even find anything about the 11 members other than the data from their 3 matches in Block D…It’s like they didn’t even exist before this year’s Holy Road…”
Looking at the screen closely, Mika couldn’t shake off the strange feeling she had. There wasn’t anything particular when she watched their matches themselves. They were skilled but it wasn’t anything extraordinary like Eisei Gakuen…
Perhaps she needed to have Edmund look into this…
Touching her lips apprehensively, Mika was awoken from her thoughts by a loud opening of the door followed by 3 girls who appeared to be friends of Ikue rushing over to where she was near the back.
“Ikue-chan!!”
“Ikue-chan!!”
Ikue looked up calmly at her giggling friends who appeared to be hysterically whispering amongst themselves.
“What’s up?”
….
Finally managing to calm down, the 3 girls looked around at the rest of the room that had gone silent and blushed in embarrassment looking at the 11 gazes that were directed towards them due to all the noise they had caused.
“Ikue, didn’t you say you guys were looking for new managers?”
“Yup, why? Do you guys want to apply? Finally, I’ve been telling you guys to do it with me for weeks now!”
“Well….”
Narrowing her eyes in suspicion, Ikue knew something else was going on here.
“And what’s that supposed to mean?”
However, before they could reply 2 boys dashed inside the room next and ran up to Sadao who was snacking on a biscuit Gabriel had baked earlier in the day.
“Daiguji-kun!”
“Daiguji-kun!”
“You didn’t tell us that Raimon was friends with the Four Guardians!”
“?!”
“But we’re not friends with them?”
“What are you talking about? Everyone already knows.”
“Know what?”
“They’re here!”
“You mean Eisei Gakuen??”
“Yeah! There’s a huge crowd forming outside. Everyone’s losing their minds!! Someone asked why they showed up and they said they’re looking for the Raimon Soccer Team”
Turning his head around to look at his senpais, Sadao took a glance at Serika who had been listening attentively to find out what the ruckus was all about.
“What should we do captain?”
After the events of their match against Teikoku, the members had begrudgingly decided to elect Serika as their captain to fill the hole left behind by Akuma much to the blonde girl’s delight. Hearing that Eisei Gakuen was here however, her nose twitched in annoyance recalling the stupid yellow eyes of that annoying cat girl. Well, she might as well go and wipe that stupid smirk off her face.
“Of course we’re going to go see them!”
Hearing Serika’s words, the other members got up; some reluctantly while others in anticipation to see why the other team had come to visit Raimon.
Raimon Outdoor Field
“What are you doing here Seiryuu?”
The Raimon members had finally managed to jostle, push and eventually make their way through the pack of students that had gathered around the four Eisei Gakuen members.
Looking upwards, Mika frowned as her gaze fell on the ultramarine-blue hair that she could see easily from afar due to it belonging to a stupidly tall boy with an arrogant grin on his face.
The four certainly were eye-striking, there was no doubt about that. The blue, black, white and red hair complemented the siblings nicely and just by standing they seemed to be exerting an aura of dominance that emanated across the field.
Hearing the harsh tone in Mika’s voice, Seiryuu put on a look of feigned hurt and asked pitifully
“What, I’m not allowed to come see you?”
As everyone processed the older boy’s words everyone gasped while some of the girls in the crowd who had come just to see Seiryuu’s famously good looks let out cries of disappointment and rage.
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
Meanwhile, Serika’s hair began to bristle listening to the blue-haired boy’s playful question. Wrapping her arms around Mika’s shoulders she gave a horrible hiss defensively while she gave a kick to Galahad who had a horrified look on his face. Brought back to his senses, he dashed in front of Mika and balled his hands into fists. He knew that he had always had a bad feeling about this guy….
Behind Seiryuu, Haruka tugged on Daigiichi’s sleeve to silently ask him “Did you know about this?” to which Daigiichi simply shrugged his shoulders indicating he had no idea why Seiryuu had insisted on coming to Raimon today. Suzaku, on the other hand, who had come dressed in a black shinigami robe today, excitedly put her hands up to cover her mouth and suppress a squeal. Seiryuu always did seem like a main character in an anime to her so it was exciting that the main heroine in the series was finally making an appearance.
Rolling her eyes as she watched her older sister squealing behind them, Haruka thought back to earlier in the afternoon.
Sun Garden, Afternoon
“Congrats on making it to the Holy Road Finals everyone!!”
“Hiroto!”
“Hitomiko-san!”
“Kira-sama”
Watching the other kids rush over to the man with red hair and green eyes alongside the woman with green-black hair and blue eyes, Seiryuu followed slowly behind them before bowing respectfully at the duo.
“I’ve told you before Seiryuu you don’t have to be so polite with me”
“......”
Seiryuu insisted on keeping his head bowed until Hiroto sighed and moved to the living room with the rest of the team following behind him.
“So how have you all been doing?”
Lounging around on one of the couches like a cat, Haruka was the first to answer
“Meh, the preliminaries were super boring”
Suzaku who was busy trying to stick a ninja headband onto Hiroto and Hitomikos’ heads complained
“The matches were so easy I didn't have any chance to make a dramatic entrance!! It was so annoying!”
Smiling eerily at Daigiichi, Hiroaki had an evil smile on her face as she bragged
“Oh, but at least the matches were very profitable if you follow me” before breaking out into an arrogant laugh that stabbed Daigiichi’s bank account in the heart.
“Hehehehehe”
Listening to her jubilant laugh of victory Daigiichi felt sorry for his pitiful remaining balance and promised to treat his savings better in the future.
Well…knowing Hiroaki, bank account-kun might have to suffer for a little more this season”
Watching the siblings argue and babble his ears off, Hiroto smiled warmly before reminding himself why the two of them had come in the first place. Though they usually visited every once in a while, they didn’t have another scheduled visit for another month or so.
Looking at the blue-haired boy who had already grown taller than himself, Hiroto nodded his head before clapping his hands to get the kids’ attention and tell them
“Your brother told me he felt like you guys needed a vacation, so I talked about it with Hitomiko and Coach Saginuma who both agreed, and had Midorikawa arrange a special trip for you guys!”
“WOW! Really?!”
The Eisei members turned around to look at Seiryuu who just had a nonchalant look on his face, as if this was normal, despite it being very far from normal for the teen. While they had gone on a trip to Australia last year after winning Holy Road, that had been an initiative by Saginuma and Hitomiko, and even then Seiryuu had insisted on training by himself the entire trip. To be honest, they weren’t even sure if ‘vacation’ was in Seiryuu’s vocabulary.
Muttering amongst themselves, they looked suspiciously at Seiryuu who innocently grinned as he felt the piercing gazes of the rest of his siblings.
“You guys have been working so hard, I thought you all deserved an extra special vacation, so I’m hurt that you all would treat your older brother like this”
Tearing up a bit at this, Daigiichi jumped upwards to stand in front of Seiryuu and began to yell at the rest of the Eisei members.
“I can’t believe you guys! Aniki worked so hard in order to treat us to a free trip and this is how we repay him! Aniki is the most generous, kind and awesome big brother in the world so we should be thanking him, not suspecting him!”
Unlike Daigiichi however, Haruka and Suzaku weren’t as touched.
Hearing the word ‘special’ come out from his mouth Haruka felt a shiver run down her spine, as she sensed pain in her near future while Suzaku, using her otaku senses, suspected the time she had set aside to paint her newest figurines and write her fanfics would be dropping significantly during this ‘vacation’.
Used to following along with what Seiryuu had planned, Hiroaki pushed up her glasses before raising her hand and interrupting
“So where exactly are we going to be going for this ‘trip’?”
Gaining control of the conversation again, Hiroto pulled out a map before pointing to…
“Hokkaido!”
“?!”
Haruka felt someone tug on her sleeve urgently and looked down at Hyosuke who whispered excitedly into her ear
“Are we actually going to Hokkaido?”
Sitting directly behind the duo, Sachi confidently declared
“Of course we are! When has Hiroto ever lied to us?”
Unlike Sachi and Hyosuke however, Doi wasn’t as positive-minded and with a hint of depression voiced his concerns to the three
“Isn’t Seiryuu-nii planning on making us do some sort of crazy training in the mountains, hike in the middle of a blizzard, or make us fight wild bears?”
Hearing the pessimistic thoughts of their youngest sibling, Sachi and Hyosuke were in sync covering Doi’s mouth with their hands before Seiryuu could get any ideas…
“Ouch!”
Feeling bonks on their heads, Sachi and Hyosuke quickly covered their heads but it was too late and their heads were already throbbing in pain.
“Don’t bully Doi-kun”
“They’re not wrong Noritaka-nii”
Haruka observed as Noritaka swooped in to protect Doi, who was the baby of their group, then rested his chin on his knee thoughtfully before admitting
“It is a little sus knowing Seiryuu…”
Hearing the five of them debate about what Seiryuu had in mind, Daigiichi entered the conversation next to continue his resolute defense of his aniki to which Haruka couldn’t help but roll her eyes and rebuke him.
“Don’t be a baka Daigiichi, knowing Seiryuu there’s a 100% chance we’ll be subjected to some sort of torture while we’re in Hokkaido”
Watching the children continue to squabble amicably as they kept coming up with one form of torture, trying to outdo each other and come up with the worst one possible, Hiroto sweatdropped before eyeing Seiryuu who had walked over from the back of the room.
“Did you handle the other thing I asked about?”
“Yeah, so don’t worry and have fun with your friends, okay Seiryuu?”
“Thank you Kira-sama”
“If you were really thankful you’d call me Hiroto like the other kids”
Avoiding his gaze, Seiryuu had a look of embarrassment as he awkwardly scratched his cheek with a finger.
Sighing, Hiroto patted the teen’s head before telling him
“I’m just teasing, you know you can call me however you like Seiryuu”
Looking at the teen in front of him, his image overlapped with the short, ragged and distrusting boy who he had first met 3 years ago. Seiryuu had really come a long way since then…
Unfortunately, there was no more time to waste on reminiscing so saying his goodbyes, Hiroto grabbed his coat and guided Hitomiko outside as they took the limo Midorikawa had arranged back to the company leaving the Eisei Eleven at the Sun Garden.
As the others kept waving to say goodbye on the road outside, Haruka watched as Seiryuu started to put on a light jacket and baseball cap.
“Are you going somewhere big bro?”
“Yeah, I’m going to Raimon”
“?!”
“Then…I’ll come to!”
Seeing Haruka dash inside and come out with her phone and purse while dragging along Suzaku, Daigiichi gave her a confused look and followed her finger where she was pointing to Seiryuu who was waiting by the front gate for Haruka.
Getting the message, Daigiichi quickly grabbed his own bag and followed behind as the 4 headed to the subway station.
Present, Raimon Outdoor Field
“What, I’m not allowed to come see you?”
Pushing aside Serika and Galahad who were blocking her way, unfazed, Mika answered his question literally
“There’s no law in place that says you are forbidden from searching for me no, but I see no reason for you to be looking for me either”
Unbothered by the icy answer, Seiryuu ignored the obvious tension in the air and replied leisurely
“You shouldn’t be so cold to someone who’s bringing you a gift Mika”
“I don’t remember asking to receive a gift from you Seiryuu”
“Well they say the best gifts are the ones you never asked for”
“Oh so is that why you always accept the gifts from those girls following you around? Or should I call them ‘fans’?”
“I didn’t know you were the jealous type Mika…I have to say, it’s a good look on you”
“I can assure you Mr.Seiryuu that jealousy is an emotion I have yet to experience—”
Not liking how riled up Mika was getting, Serika gave a fierce look of dissatisfaction at Seiryuu who had a broad smile on his face like he was enjoying himself.
Who was this guy anyway, it didn’t look like he and Mika had a simple relationship if he was able to make her this angry…
“Just spit it out already, what do you want!”
Looking at the blonde girl with pink eyes angrily interrupting their conversation, Seiryuu frowned a bit before deciding to stop messing around when he saw the warning look in Mika’s eyes to answer the question.
“Here”
Tossing a manila envelope over, Mika caught it quickly before giving him a wary look of suspicion and opening it.
However, seeing the cautious look on Mika’s face as she read the papers inside, Seiryuu knew what she was about to say and spoke up before she could say anything to turn him down.
“It’s still not enough”
“...?”
“Where you are right now, it’s not enough to play in the big leagues yet. Have you even looked at who made the Finals this year yet?”
“We were in the middle of looking at the Block D results before you interrupted us. Susanoo Gakuen was a bit…”
Finishing her sentence, Seiryuu confirmed her suspicions.
“Strange. Yeah, they’re obviously hiding their strength for the finals, and I’ve already looked into them. It seems they’re being backed by someone pretty powerful since they were able to block all of our investigations…But you’re going to have bigger problems if you think they’re the ones to watch out for”
Galahad pushed back the urge to kick Seiryuu’s face in with a soccer ball as he watched the older boy pause for dramatic effect as if he were enjoying seeing the look of confusion amongst the Raimon Eleven.
“Well, you’ll find out soon enough for yourselves right Mika? I know you won’t let me down again…so I’ll see you in a few days ‘kay?”
Content that he had finished saying everything he had intended to, Seiryuu led the other three with him as they made their way through the throngs of students who parted like the Red Sea to make way for the Four Guardians.
Watching them disappear, Serika and Galahad checked to make sure Mika was alright before asking her in unison
“What was that snake(Serika)/guy(Galahad) talking about Mika?”
“....Eisei Gakuen has invited us to participate in a training camp with them and Hakuren Jr.High starting Monday in Hokkaido.”
Hearing this, the Raimon team burst into a clamor
“What?” (Galahad)
“NO!” (Serika)
“Wow, really? Sounds fun!” (Makoto)
“This could be an interesting opportunity…” (Kenji)
“What about school?” (Sadao)
“Nariko?” (Naoki)
“It’ll be fun to twist the faces of some new people into agony Naoki, let’s go!” (Nariko)
“What’s the food like in Hokkaido?” (Gabriel)
“Sounds sortof scary….” (Akane)
“YES, YES, YES! MWAHAHAHAHA” (Hyun-Ki)
“......” (Aphrodi)
Struggling to balance her rationality and her distaste for Eisei Gakuen, Serika shut her mouth as she rapidly tried to come up with a logical reason to turn down their offer.
“This is just a strategy to obtain all of our information before the finals! We should think about this before accepting it so easily Mika!”
Intrigued by the offer and wanting to go himself, Kenji raised an objection quickly in response
“Why would they need to do that Afuro-san? Eisei Gakuen has already beaten us and even if we’ve powered up a little we still have less than a 1% chance of winning against them as we are now. In fact, this is our best opportunity to collect data on them while seeing what type of special training the reigning champions are doing.”
Looking at the faces of the members who were still on the fence and looking at him to see what he had to say on the matter, Aphrodi smiled until his eyes were almost shut and told them simply
“I’ll follow whatever you all decide”
“......”
“Ugh, this is the worst!”
Stamping her foot down in frustration, Serika closed her eyes tightly and tilted her head to look up at the sky and declare
“We’re going!”
“Thanks, Serika”
Blushing at Mika’s words, Serika opened her right eye carefully and looked at the other girl.
“Yes, well it’s only so we can beat them both later at Holy Road. Don’t even think about getting too chummy with them while we’re there okay?”
“I’ll get packing!!”
Overhearing the two girls come to a decision for the team, Makoto shouted excitedly before storming off the field at record pace to head home and get ready for the trip causing all of the other members to start animatedly talk about what they were going to bring and do in Hokkaido.
However, despite the laughter and anticipation flowing on the field Mika went silent as she felt like something or rather someone was missing…
“Sada-chan, do you know where Fukunaga-kun is? I haven’t seen him in a few days and it’d be a shame if he were to miss out on this training camp.”
“Oh Yuka? I called his house and his mother said he was feeling a bit sick so he probably won’t be able to come to school or practice for a while”
“I see…that’s certainly unfortunate timing. Would you mind telling him we’ll be gone for a week or so starting on Monday then?”
“Sure thing, Kuroha-senpai!”
Hokkaido,Susanoo, Eisei Gakuen, Yuka, Raimon… it seemed the number of things that would be on her mental list of things to think about before bed was getting longer and longer…
She might be needing Edmund to prepare for her hot milk before bed more often starting today…
Sigh
*****************************************************************************************************
Hakuren Jr.High, 3 Days Before the Training Camp with Eisei Gakuen and Raimon Jr.High
“Why the hell did you agree to a training camp with those losers Tsukishiro?”
“Awww, is my cutie still sad that we lost to Eisei Gakuen in the semi-finals last year?”
“WHAT! NO! And I’ve already told you not to call me that! I’m not cute!”
“Pretending to be all tough, isn’t that absolutely adorable??”
Gathered around their two co-captains, the rest of the Hakuren members let out a sigh of exasperation. On the side of the field near the benches after practice, a rather muscular boy with spiky, black hair and dark blood-red eyes, that had deep eye bags under them making the youth look like he was perpetually sleepy, was shouting at a much taller girl. Looking downwards while the boy was yapping like a mad dog, the girl had long arctic-white hair that was tied back in a ponytail with bangs that reached down to her eyebrows so they didn’t block her eyes, which were so tightly together due to her seemingly constantly maintained smile, even the colour of her pupils could not be seen.
Like usual, Ryoga and Tsukishiro were arguing while the rest of them were forced to listen, making the rest of the team internally facepalm. Despite being on a team together for 3 years now it wasn’t like Ryoga ever won against Tsukishiro so shouldn’t he have learned to give up yet?
Volunteering himself to be the one who interrupted the two for the day, a short boy with light brown hair that matched his hat spoke up
“Katata-senpai…it seems that Raimon has gotten a few new members this year so wouldn’t it be good to scout them out during the camp?”
“Eek!”
Flames seemed to be coming out of Ryoga’s mouth as he slowly turned his face without moving his neck in an eerie manner and asked
“You must be feeling brave today, Ikuma-kun. So you think just because Raimon has a few new members we’re going to lose??”
“No, no, no of course not!”
Pleh Pleh Pleh
“Bad Ryoga! Bad!”
“What the hell Tsukishiro!”
Shaking his head to get the water out of his eyes and hair, Ryoga violently whipped around to face Tsukishiro who was holding a spray bottle in her hands and had just sprayed him in the face with water.
“You’ll scare the other cuties if you talk like that Ryoga!”
“Ugh.”
Grabbing the towel that he had been handed silently by a rather short boy with long dark green hair that extended a little past his shoulders and had gloomy, dark orange eyes Ryoga grumpily muttered into the towel
“Fine, do whatever you want like you always do Tsuki. Just don’t expect to play all buddy-buddy with the rest of you”
“Thank youuuuuu Ryo-chan. I knew you were a good kid”
“!!”
Sending him hearts that she was making with her arms and hands, Ryoga shuddered with disgust and anger before running inside to make his escape while Tsukishiro laughed watching him run away[1]
“Oh, Ryo-chan. This is going to be a much more fun training camp than you think it will be… at least for me it will!”
Finished laughing to herself, Tsukishiro turned around and clapped her hands together
“Okay cuties, you can head home now too! Rest up over the weekend so you’re ready to greet our guests on Monday!”
Mwah Mwah Mwah
Giving hugs and kisses to the members as they left, Tsukishiro cheerfully saw everyone off as she always did before picking up the ball to amuse herself a little longer as she waited eagerly for the winds that Raimon and Eisei would bring to Hakuren.