3.5. Rival King

Noa took the field. Y/N followed dutifully behind him, the pair of them sweeping across the field towards the Bastard Munchen team. As Y/N watched, Kaiser grabbed the top of his shorter friend's hair, yanking it back so the boy's neck was exposed. He tapped the light skin, making the other boy cough horribly. Could you even call them friends?

"Sorry, Yoichi. I underestimated you." Kaiser grinned madly. Y/N frowned. "You're no shitty clown at all!"

He was about to go jump in, mouth opening, but Noa shot him a look. Y/N instantly fell still. Kaiser continued, not noticing either of them as they stood a small distance away. "Let's see... Rensuke Orange dude is the bandit leader out to steal my goals. You're Bandit A, who follows him around like a dog."

"Fine. I've got a role for you then." Isagi levelly met Kaiser's gaze. "How about the naked king who had everything stolen from him? Like that?"

Kaiser smirked. "Oh man. You're making me blush." His voice was completely free of venom, relaxed and sarcastic. "But I'm not done."

Y/N expected him to point at Bachira, or one of the other Bastard team members. He didn't expect Kaiser to whirl, eyes locking onto Y/N's surprised ones, smile spreading even wider. One slender finger pointed right at him. "And you. You can be the rival king, soon to be crushed under my foot like a fucking ant."

Y/N fumed. "You-"

As always, a screen far overhead lit up. A crackle sounded across the arena, and everyone from the foreign teams looked up with surprise. The Bluelock players didn't react, too used to the appearance of Ego in seemingly every single room.

The black-shirted man was reclining in a beach chair, holding a glass of dark purple liquid in a fancy cocktail glass. "Good job on your first match, Neo Egoists. I hope you enjoyed your first taste of the international leagues?"

Cringe name. Y/N kept his eyes on the screen without talking. Even though he really wanted to. He interrupted me... I wanted a chance to insult Kaiser.

"The world of pros is like a game of musical chairs." Y/N's eyebrows raised with disbelief. Ego is going senile if he's rambling like that. "To get into an existing team, you have to steal someone else's space. On top of that, every team has 'water' called philosophy. Logic, freedom, or rules - there's many ways to survive in that water. Some people die in water not suited to them."

Ego paused. He raised the cocktail glass up, light reflecting off it into the camera. "Or you may adapt, and live. Some may even dye the water their own colour. But for what it's worth... running away is also an option. Nobody's forcing you to be here."

"At any rate... the first match is over. Let's move on to the new Bluelock rankings."

Mouth opening into a silent 'o', Y/N stared upwards as on the screen, holograms sprang to life. A swarm of player names floated up, each with their own rapidly changing number. Some numbers stopped fast. Others kept rising, flickering as the noise of coins clinking echoed through the room.

He already knew about the biddings. The entire system had been explained to him beforehand, but apparently not to the Bluelock players. Isagi was staring up with wide eyes, watching his own number go up.

"These numbers are yearly salaries." Ego stated. His voice echoed. Nobody spoke. "Every game in this league is being watched by soccer club owners around the world. They watch all of your plays... bid on you... and the highest bid at the end represents your value!"

"Each bid gives the club rights to negotiate a contract with you, at that salary. Excluding overseas players, this is how we will determine the twenty-three players that will make up the U-20 World Cup team. For Bluelock players, this is a way to get stronger. For foreign players, it is a way to showcase yourself to the world."

The majority of the players were still at a value of 0. Comments about that started rising almost immediately, and Y/N winced at the shouts. Ego was undeterred. "Don't start complaining now. It's a miracle a country like Japan, with only a small presence on the international stage, managed to get all these teams here."

"This." Ego snapped his fingers. "Is how. Bluelock TV."

Don't mention that name again. Y/N internally complained. He'd already heard that so many times, sitting through endless photo shoots, briefings, and interviews.

"The monthly fee is 500 yen. We already have eighty million subscribers worldwide. This reality TV show is being streamed to the entire world, to all the soccer fans out there that want to see the birth of a new star. Bluelock is right now, without a doubt, the most important place in the world for soccer."

"Survive how you want. But if you can't get into games, your value will remain low, and you won't make the final 23. Steal someone else's spot. Aim for a striker position. It doesn't matter how, just prove your own worth."

Ego's image disappeared. What was left was the auction values, floating on screen. And Y/N... wasn't at the top?

Bachira Meguru - 32,000,000

Y/N L/N - 29,000,000

Kunigami Rensuke - 24,000,000

Isagi Yoichi - 17,000,000

Otoya - 9,000,000

Y/N immediately caught on. My goal was practically given to me by Noa. I just passed to him a few times. In Bachira's goal, he practically did it all himself. That's why he's so much higher than me.

One fist clenched at his side. Next time, I'm doing it all myself.

In any case, those five players were the only Bluelock players on the board. Out of the foreign players, there was a clear highest spot.

Michael Kaiser - 320,000,000

And at the bottom of the scoreboard, a bright message glowed, written in all caps.

NEXT UP, IN THREE DAYS. UBERS VS PXG.

🥕🥕🥕

I'm below Bachira.

Way below Kaiser.

Two thoughts that he couldn't get out of his head. They stuck in the back of his mind, and every time he tried to do anything, those two little things kept bothering him. It was pathetic, really. How he couldn't get the image of his bid out of his head.

He'd pretended like it meant nothing to him. And he knew he was going to make it, boost his value far above Kaiser's. But it still annoyed him. And on top of that, Noa's warning still gave him a strange feeling.

Was he worried?

"Nah." Y/N murmured to himself.

"Nah what?"

Y/N paused. After the game, he'd cleaned up and spent a good hour wandering around the Bluelock compound. He'd managed to stumble across a lounge area, tucked away in what he assumed was a secluded corner of the building.

It was a nice place. Literally carved into the side of a concrete hallway, dimly lit compared to the rest of Bluelock, it was one of the few comfortable areas in the entire building. Assorted armchairs and sofas formed a U shape around a fake fireplace embedded in the wall. A TV sat high on the wall. Y/N hadn't seen anybody around.

So when he turned to see who spoke, and found a zombie standing right behind his chair, his heart shot into his throat. "Holy shit!" Arms pushed out in front of him, he practically fell out of the chair while shouting.

The man just stood there, scratching at his temple with one long finger. He wore an amused smile on his face, golden teeth visible in between cracked lips. As Y/N slowly realised he wasn't going to be eaten alive, he groaned, picking himself off the floor.

"Who are you?"

Oily black hair moved as the man said something back in a different language. Not French... not Spanish... Italian? Y/N hesitated. He raised one finger, giving the man a sheepish smile as he drew some earphones from his pocket.

They were something created by Mikage Corporation, Ego had said. They translated all incoming speech into Japanese, whilst maintaining the other person's cadence and tone. The man's eyes brightened as Y/N slipped them on, setting the language to Japanese. He hadn't realised at first, but the zombie man was also wearing them.

"Hello?" Y/N tried. He waved a hand cautiously.

"Hey!" A bright smile spreading on his face, the man nodded. "Can you hear me?"

"Yeah."

"Cool, cool." Zombie dude strode past Y/N, flopping onto one of the armchairs. He splayed out over it, arms wide and body leaning back. If not for the bright look in his eyes, he would've looked like a perfect corpse. "What ya doing here?"

"I could ask you the same thing."

The zombie man's lips twisted into a funny shape. "Dude, this is my lounge."

"Huh? You have a lounge?"

"Not just mine, silly boy." The man gestured around. "This is the Ubers team lounge."

Instantly recognising the name, Y/N groaned again. Ubers were one of the five teams in the NEL. Their coach was Marc Snuffy, and they were known for... Y/N wracked his brain. Tactics and teamwork? Yeah, not my kind of place.

"Right..." Y/N gestured out of the room. "I'll just... head off."

"Oh, why?" The zombie man spread his hands, grinning. "Plenty of chairs here. And the rest of the lads will be joining us, you can meet them all."

"The entire team?"

"Most of them." He clarified. "We just finished training. Some of them are doing more training than others."

"Doesn't sound fair."

"Oh, it's an honour to do more training with the master." The zombie man sounded genuine. "You improve so fast, it's unbelievable. You gotta try it sometime."

"I'm... good, thanks. For now."

"Hm." The man's gold teeth shone as he grinned, producing a TV remote from gods know where. "You down for a rom-com?"

"Please, no."

"K-drama?"

"No."

"Game show?"

"Probably not."

"Horror?"

"Definitely not."

"The goddamn news?!"

Y/N paused. The zombie man raised an eyebrow. Sarcastically, Y/N nodded. "Sur-"

"Fuck that." He settled on a cooking show. Y/N shrugged, both of them sharing a grin as Y/N sat back down in an armchair. The thoughts of his auction value were momentarily shoved aside.

As they watched, Y/N realised just how dead the other man looked. His entire body was limp in the armchair, head angled upwards like he'd been shot in the forehead. And somehow, he was still watching the show, commenting cheerfully on any funny moments. His skin was pale, incredibly so, and on the back of his neck, Y/N could sort of make out a tattoo of a bite.

Eventually, noise from the hallway drew both their attention. The man's head flopped to the side, staring past Y/N at the corridor. Y/N twisted in his chair, locking eyes with the first of a group of players as they walked into the room.

Quite a lot of them, Y/N didn't recognise. Some looked Japanese, probably those from the U-20 team. Others looked very much foreign, likely from the original Ubers team. And some of them...

Barou came in, flanked by Niko on his left and Aiku on his right. Just behind them walked Sendou and Aryu. All of their eyes widened with surprise at seeing Y/N there, and he just raised a hand. "Sup?"

"Yeah. Sup?" Y/N rolled his eyes, hearing the zombie guy copy his words exactly.

"Lorenzo, what is he doing here?" One of the unfamiliar people pointed at Y/N, talking to the zombie guy.

"Wait, his name is Lorenzo?"

"Duh." The zombie man frowned. "Wait, who are you?"

"Y/N." He paused. "L/N."

"Oh, the money guy!"

"What?"

"Yeah, you're the money guy. Mercenary. I'm telling you, ya should've asked Ego to give you a little moolah for that special role. He's raking in views thanks to you."

"I didn't really have a choice."

"Welp." Lorenzo shrugged. "If you come play for Ubers, you can get some cash."

"Why don't you bid for me then?"

"How much do you want?"

"Three hundred and thirty mil."

"Gawdamn. Pricey considering your value right now." Lorenzo chuckled heartily.

They were broken apart by the foreign player, scowling. "Look, why don't you just go?"

"What?" As soon as he said that, Y/N completely forgot that he'd offered to leave a few minutes ago. He immediately chose to go against what the man had said, shaking his head. "We're watching how to make Tonkatsu cutlet."

"Sounds cool." Aiku interrupted. "Let the kid stay, he's not a bad guy."

Y/N held out a hand to Aiku. "Thank you-"

"He just needs to work on talking, listening, not overreacting, being nice, picking up social cues, and not having an IQ of fifty."

"Fuck you."

Though, Aiku's support of Y/N seemed to have swayed the rest of the team. They settled down in various chairs and sofas, some of them looking harshly at Y/N, others friendly-ish, and the rest just plain indifferent. Lorenzo grinned crazily across at Y/N.

As for the Japanese players, they had mixed responses to Y/N. Barou plonked himself down near to him, but very carefully didn't look at him. Aryu and Sendou sat with Barou. Aiku sat right next to Y/N, nudging him playfully with his shoulder. Niko hesitated, before slowly approaching and standing next to him.

"Can I sit here?"

Y/N smiled up at him, eyes lighting up. While he'd played a bunch with Niko online, it'd been a while since they'd last seen each other face to face. He immediately moved to the side, squishing against one side of the chair so the younger boy could take a seat. "Course. How have you been, by the way?"

"Great!" He enthusiastically replied. "Snuffy is a genius, Y/N. He knew more about how I play than I did myself! And he's teaching us so well..."

"I take it you don't need my help anymore?"

Niko hesitated. "I mean... it was nice... but I don't think so..."

Y/N grinned. "Neeks, it's fine. I'm glad you're doing well." He threw a casual arm around Niko's shoulder, relaxing into his side. "Do you know how to make that cutlet?"

"What?"

"The one on the TV."

"Oh." Niko frowned. "Never tried it before."

"NeVer?" Y/N's voice cracked with surprise, and Niko chuckled quietly. "Just wait. I'll annoy Ego until he puts it onto the cafeteria menu."

"I don't think he'll go for that."

"Niko, with all due respect." Y/N laughed. "You underestimate how annoying I can be."