Chapter 25

-Third Person POV-

“talking” – ‘thoughts’

“What happened to your hattrick?”

Rin stares down at Gento with narrowed eyes, however before he could respond the intercom comes to life, “The third stage’s 3 vs 3 ‘rivalry battle’ goes to Team Red! Score: 5-1!”.

Flicking his hair over his shoulder, Aryu walks towards his teammates who were still staring eachother down, “So, Rin, Gento, who should we steal?”. Hearing his teammate’s voice, Rin pushes Gento away from him, causing the shorter to fall down “ow-“, “Doesn’t matter. They’re all the same.” Rin begins to walk away, briefly glancing at the members of Team White.

Aryu lets out a sigh before turning back to Gento, who is getting back up, “What do you think Gen-” “Bachira.” Gento cuts him off, “What a coincidence, I want him as well.” Aryu turns to Team White and uses his finger to motion over, “Bachira Meguru, you will be assisting my glam goals.”.

‘Finally someone who doesn’t make me want to bash my head against the wall’ Gento thinks to himself as he shoots Bachira a smile, which the dribbler returns before he turns around to talk with his, now former, teammates.

“Ah, well. I wanted to stay with Isagi to the very end, but rules are rules. However, Isagi, I won’t be waiting. If you want me, come and steal me. I’ll follow the will of my inner demon.” He finishes, moving towards the door labeled ‘Winner’s gate’, where Gento is waiting with his arms crossed.

“Try not to get eliminated, Nagi, Isagi,” Gento taunts the two as they make their way towards the ‘Loser’s gate’. Turning to his left he puts his hand up to Bachira, “Good to have you back, weirdo.” Bachira high-fives Gento, sending the smaller boy a large smile, “If you wanted to play with me again you could have just lost, Gen-chan.”.

“Yeah, as if.” Gento laughs as he turns and begins walking to the locker room, with Bachira right beside him.

———Time Skip – 4th stage 4-Man Room———

“So this is where we’ll be staying?” Gento asks, standing next to his teammates, scanning the room in front of him ‘Compared to our last room, this almost feels like a downgrade.’. The room consists of the ‘trademark concrete walls’ that the entire compound seems to be built out of and four beds, one in each corner and a singular TV on one of the walls. ‘Probably so Ego can harass us some more.’

“So which beds to you guys wa-” “I don’t care.” Rin cuts off Bachira mid-question and starts walking back out of the room and away from his teammates. At this Bachira visibly deflates, “What’s his problem?” he turns to his right, where Gento was standing just seconds earlier, only to find the space to be empty.

“Huh? What did you say?” he hears Gento’s voice coming from a bed in the far corner, turning Bachira spots Gento, already nestled underneath his blanket and phone in hand. Seeing this, Bachira moves and flops onto the bed right next to Gento’s before rolling over and facing his teammate, who is looking back at him.

“Why is Rin-chan so mad?” Bachira asks Gento, who simply shrugs his shoulders before turning back to his phone, “Don’t know, don’t care.”. “What are you watching anyway?” “It.” “Like the one with the clown?” “Yeah, but the old one. It’s kinda trashy but I like it. “Ah, ok.” “Want to watch it?” “Yeah!”

———Time Skip – In the cafeteria———

“So it turns out, Bachira isn’t a fan of horror.” Gento says to Aryu who is sitting across from him, heavily judging the duo whilst eating his own food. Gento is calmly eating his own food, a smile draped over his face, whilst sitting right next to him is Bachira who is looking at his food, with a thousand-yard stare.

“Are the movies that scary?” Aryu asks, flipping his hair over his shoulder. “No not really, we watched the newer ones after and they have some good scares.” Gento responds, poking Bachira in his shoulder, “Don’t remind me…”.

“They can’t be that bad right?” Aryu questions the boy in front of him, who immediately perks up, “Oh no, I’ve got worse ones, wanna watch some?”. Aryu narrows his eyes at the boy, contemplating his optins however before he could respond Bachira intervenes, “DON’T!”

———Time Skip———

Gento, Bachira and the other two were sitting in the waiting room for the 4th stage, watching as teams were continuing to match up and head onto the pitch. At this point it had been a couple of days since Gento, Aryu and Rin had defeated Team Red and acquired Bachira and one thing had become incredibly obvious to the white haired striker, staring down his potential opponents, ‘They’re too scared to play against us. Is this what suffering from success feels like?’.

Letting out a large puff of air he stands up, stretches his back before turning to his three teammates who had obviously come to the same conclusion, “This isn’t going anywhere, wanto to train atleast?”.

Upon hearing his voice, the three perk up “Yeah sure, not like we have anything better to do.” Bachira responds, holding out his hand so that Gento could pull him up to his feet. “Better than letting my glam go to waste.” Follows Aryu, standing up putting his hand on his hip.

Rin stares at Gento, for a couple of seconds who stares right back at him “So, Ri-” “No.”, comes the short reply from the number one. “Are you still throwing a hissy-fit, because I stole your goal?”. Hearing this an irritated expression grows on Rin’s face, who decides not to answer Gento.

“Come on, are you that scared? Do something about it, loser.” Gento taunts the taller boy, who is still ignoring him. “Guess you’ll never beat your brother then.” At his continued taunts, Rin instantly shoots a harsh glare at Gento before standing up and staring down at the younger boy, “You’re on, you luke-warm trash.” he responds before stomping towards the training field.

“Are you sure that that was a smart choice, Gen-chan?” Bachira asks, side-eyeing the boy, who already moves to follow his, now enraged, teammate “Nah.”. Bachira and Aryu lock eyes for a second, before Bachira shrugs his shoulders, a large smile plastered over his face before moving to follow. Aryu just sighs to himself “Their personalities are so not glam.”.

———4th Stage Training Field———

“You’re not glam enough to score.” Gento hears Aryu’s voice from right beside, shortly before a large arm weaves over his chest and forces him back, away from the goal in front.

Sticking out his leg, Gento manages to barely pull the ball away from Aryu and creates some distance between them. Looking around he spots Bachira, who is closely marked by Rin. Briefly locking eyes with Bachira, Gento rushes straight at Aryu, whilst Bachira makes a run behind him, getting some distance from Rin, who calmly walks in front of the goal.

Taking a step to the left, Gento watches as Rin disappears behind Aryu causing the younger to gain a smile on his face, “Gotcha.” He plants his left foot back, pulling back his right, seeing this, Aryu moves to intercept his shooting angle, “I just told you, you won’t score.”.

“Nah, I will.” Gento says as the ball rolls past his left foot, before performing a rabona, using his right foot. The ball launches up into the air in a high arch, just barely scraping past the crossbar and landing right into the goal, tieing the game with a score of 1-1.

Team Black 1:1 Team White

0:1 Rin – Gento 1:1

“And now we’re even.” Gento says, wiping sweat off of his face, using his jersey. Turning he spots Bachira walking towards him, in a similar state of exhaustion wearing a big smile on his face, “Nice one, Gen-chan” he says, high-fiveing his friend.

With an annoyed expression on his face, Rin picks up the ball pitch before stomping away from his teammates, sending Gento and Bachira a harsh glare.

“That was a quite glam goal, Gento. I shouldn’t have underestimated you.” Aryu says, flicking his hair over his shoulder, looking down at his shorter teammate, who shoots him a tired smile.

“Yeah, you’re a pretty good defender. Have you thought about switching positions Glam-freak?” Gento asks, ruffling his own hair, flicking small beads of sweat onto the ground, which Aryu looks at with mild disgust. “I have not, and I will not.” Aryu responds before turning around and heading towards Rin.

“So, what now?” Gento asks, turning to his left, spotting Bachira who simply shrugs his shoulders. “Who knows, Rin-Rin is pretty good.” Bachira responds smiling before moving towards the middle of the pitch, standing across from Rin and Aryu.

Gento just sighs and moves to follow his friend, eyes flicking between the three players on the pitch besides himself, ‘This will be hard, both teams only need one goal and the emo’s deadly, whe he gets the chance to shoot.’

The four of them had moved to one of the free training fields, after talking it out for a bit they had decided on a simple 2 vs 2, best-of-three training exercise. With Bachira and Gento playing as ‘Team Black’, whilst Rin and Aryu kept their white jerseys from the match against Isagi and co. 

Gento chose the color black, assuming it would be Rin’s favorite, simply to piss off the taller boy.

He was wrong.

Rin couldn’t care less.

Rin had opened up the scoring rather quickly. Before Bachira and Gento could get close, Rin fired off a shot from distance, curling it around the two just barely scraping it in between Blue Lock Man’s outstretched hands and the goal post.

“What? To scared to actually play against us?” Gento teased the striker, aiming to piss him off yet again.

This time to immense success.

Rin is majorly pissed off and currently staring down Gento, who stares back at him with a deadpan.

This further infuriates Rin.

Aryu passes the ball to Rin, kicking off the game for a final time. Rin immediately sprints straight at both Bachira and Gento, continuing to stare down the latter as Bachira starts moving towards him.

With Bachira now within arms-reach, Rin performs a quick chop, sending the ball straight past Bachira and sprinting to follow it. “Ah, sorry, Gen-chan!” Bachira yells out at his friend, realizing that Rin had gotten past him with ease.

‘Damn…’ Gento thinks to himself with a small grimace, watching as Rin sprints straight at him, ‘I won’t beat him one-on-one.’ he smiles to himself, ‘Eh, who cares. Show me how you think, edgelord.’.

Gento moves towards Rin, who performs the same chop as he did against Bachira, aiming to get past Gento, who successfully reads this, forcing Rin to pull the ball back. Rin looks down at Gento with annoyance before sending the ball high over Gento, forcing his way past with a rough shove, causing the younger to fall on his ass “ow.”.

As the ball comes back down, Rin lets it bounce off of the floor once, before hitting a volley at full power, sending the ball rocketing straight at the goal. Blue Lock Man could only watch as the ball hits the back of the net at high speeds, ending the ball with a score of 2-1

Team Black 1:2 Team White

0:1 Rin – Gento 1:1 – 1:2 Rin

Rin simply stares down at Gento, who got back up without a care in the world. Gento looks back at the taller striker before a shit-eating grin spreads over his face, turning to Bachira, “Lookie lookie Bachira, Rin can only beat me with an obvious foul, kinda sad, no?”.

Bachira laughs at his friend’s comment, throwing an arm over his shoulders in the process. Seeing this Rin clenches his teeth, stomping past the two muttering something about “luke-warm trash” before heading straight into the adjacent locker room.

Watching their teammate stomp away, both Bachira and Gento begin laughing at the emo’s reaction before turning to Aryu, who is also observing the scene seeming rather disgruntled, “Your childish actions are not glam at all.” he says, flipping his hair over his shoulder, before also heading towards the locker room, “I will now take my leave, I need to keep up my glam appearance. It is high-maintenance after all.”

After a moment, Bachira and Gento stop laughing as Gento turns towards the schizo leaning on him at the moment, “So, what now? Wanna continue training?”.

Taking a second to compose himself, Bachira removes his arm from Gento’s shoulder, fluffing his own hair, “Nah, I think I’m done for today. I’ll just take a shower and head to our room for now.”.

Gento stretches his back, letting out a sigh in the process, “Alright, alright. I’ll go get something to eat and then I’ll join you guys, want me to get you something?”

After receiving the bumblebee’s order the two of them split up, after leaving the showers with Bachira heading back to their room and Gento heading straight to the cafeteria, one of the rare room’s to which he knows the way by heart.

Upon entering the cafeteria, Gento is hit by a wave of exhaustion, his vision zeroing in on the small amount of healthy snacks lined up by one of the further walls, ‘Jeez, let’s get some food and then off to bed.’ Grabbing himself an apple and a couple bottles of water, alongside Bachira’s protein chips, Gento starts waddling back towards the door.

He takes a bite of his apple, passing row after row of empty tables, upon opening the door Gento is hit face first by a larger muscled chest, causing him to drop his haul and just staring down at his dropped supplies.

“Eh, who the- you peasant again?” looking up Gento is met with Barou’s enraged face staring down at him, Gento simply moves his hand up grabbing the apple out of his move, chewing for a second before speaking up with a deadpan, “You made me drop my snacks, your majesty.”.

“Who are you talking to Barou- oh it’s you Gento.” hearing the new voice, Gento turns his head seeing Nagi, Chigiri and Isagi before him. Nagi, wearing a similiar expression of boredom mixed with exhaustion whilst the other two were looking at him with slightly surprised expressions.

“Oh, hey you three, looks like you didn’t lose Nagi, Isagi.” Gento says, with slightly widened eyes, before bending down and picking his stuff back up and taking the chance to kick Barou in the shin.

“What do you think you’re doing?!” Barou yells at the younger upon being kicked, Gento simply moves to hide behind the other three, using them as meat shields. “I’m surprised you’re still here, Gento.” Isagi speaks up, choosing to ignore the raging monarch behind him.

Hearing this, Gento lets out a long sigh before responding, “Yeah… If it were up to me and the others, we would be done already. Sadly the other quote-on-quote egoists are too scared to play against us.”

“What are your rankings anyways?” Chigiri asks, tilting his head at his former teammate, turning towards the pink-haired striker, Gento takes another bite of his apple before responding, “Oh, one, two, three and sixteen, Bachira’s the lowest rated by the way.”.

At this Barou momentarily stops his rampage, whilst Chigiri sweatdrops at the younger’s response, “How about you play us?” Isagi cuts in before the others could respond. At this Gento raises one of his eyebrows, judging the striker in front of him heavily before responding, “Are you sure? Remember how that turned out last time.”.

Isagi nods his head, determination burning behind his eyes, “Yeah, we’ll beat you this time, right guys?” He turns towards his teammate at the last part of his sentence, causing the three to nod their heads, staring straight at Gento with similar levels of determination.

Gento simply shrugs his shoulders moving past the four, heading towards his team’s room, “Alright, don’t come crying to me when you guys lose again. I’ll convince my team to play you lot.”

After walking for a bit, Gento enters the room finding his teammates on their respective beds. Rin sitting down on his seemingly meditating, Aryu combing his hair whilst staring into a mirror and Bachira smiling at Gento upon his arrival.

Gento throws the packet of chips alongside a bottle of water straight at Bachira, hitting him in the face, “Thanks, Gen-chan!”.

“I found our opponents for tomorrow.” Gento calmly says flopping down on his bed face-first. Hearing this Rin opens one of his eyes looking at the younger, Bachira simply grins at his friend, whilst Aryu’s hand stills in his hair before he turns to look at Gento.

“Effectively the same guys as last game, just with two more additions.” Gento continuis getting under the covers and turning to lay on his side. “And who are these new additions?” Aryu asks.

“Does it matter? We’ll win anyways.” Gento responds, looking at the ‘glam’ boy out of the corner of his eye, who nods his head in agreance. Looking at his other teammates Gento tilts his head with a cocky expression on his face.

“Let’s pass this.”

– End of chapter 22 –