RYENNE

[ 3.17 ] - Intermediate: I was caught.

Seeing as the ball had already bounced onto the ground, I caught it without another thought before looking up to find the whole right court watching me. Amongst those eyes, I could feel Ryun's confusion as he called for a timeout.

It didn't take long before he stood in front of me.

"What're you doing here, Ryn?" He asked, trying to keep his teammates from listening in. I just flashed a bright and obnoxious smile at him as I hand the ball over to him. Opening my bag, I quickly pull out a piece of paper before turning it so he could read it.

"What do you think? I decided to join as a new manager."

I watched as the color drained from his face, causing a laugh to escape as I tapped the small palm tree on his head.

"I should take a picture for Aunt Mara to see. She'd love it." I joked. Ryun's face continued to twist as he watched me speechlessly.

After a moment of silence, he finally regained his senses.

"Why are you joining? Didn't you just officially quit jiu jitsu?" As he spoke, he tried to sound as natural as possible, though I could hear the underlying annoyance in his voice.

I expected a better reaction from him...

Internally, I sighed as I answered him nonchalantly.

"Well, Leon convinced me to join." I paused for a moment before changing my answer. "Actually—he bribed me."

Ryun stared at me for a moment, tilting his head to the side as he narrowed his eyes.

"'Bribed'? You of all people was bribed? How? With what?" His voice became monotonous as he waited for me to elaborate. I just smiled mysteriously before shrugging my shoulders.

"For that answer...you should ask Litheon. Anyways, who should I turn this into?" I began to look around the room, but I didn't hear a response from Ryun. He just sighed before turning away. I didn't take it into offense as I never expected him to answer me. Instead, I decided that I'd look for the answer on my own. The most plausible person to look for is the current manager.

Turning away from the direction Ryun was in, I was surprised to find a girl approaching me with a bright smile. She was tall, probably as tall Litheon was currently, but what stood out the most was her vibrant, blue hair and her sparkling amber eyes. She looked as though she were a model.

"Hello! I am Carhee Hinora, the current manager of the Volleyball club." When I heard her introduction, I realized why I had thought what I did. As it turned out, she was from the Hinora family.

"Good evening, I am Ryenne Atstelli. I wanted to apply as a manager."

Almost immediately, her eyes lit up in surprise.

"Ryenne Atstelli? You're Ryun's little cousin?" She watched me intently for moment before nodding her head up and down. "Now that I look at you a little closer, I can definitely see the resemblance."

"Ah...yes. If you look at our hair colors, then it'd be hard to think we were related at all."

"I suppose that is true...Ah, right! Your application!" I handed the application form over as I waited for her to look over it. When she finished, she gave a satisfied nod before gesturing for me to follow her.

"You applied at the perfect time. I was short on hands so I was going to go around recruiting, but it seems that someone else has done the work for me!" She let out a hearty laugh, her hands resting on her waist as she continued to walk.

Somehow, she reminded me of an old man, much like Instructor Irold or Grandpa Mel, but instead she was a young girl with a beautiful face and a model-like physique. It was a fascinating combination.

As I distracted myself with my thoughts, we soon arrived at our destination. On the second floor of the gym was the club room for the Volleyball club along with many others that also share the gym.

Carhee opened the third door and gestured for me to enter before following behind me.

"This is our official club room, though we use it more as an office than anything else." She walked around to the main desk before taking a seat and pulling out a box of files. She then stuck my application form into a labeled file before closing it back up.

"The managers of the Volleyball Club have always been super organized. As you can see, the whole room is labeled so anyone can find what they need with ease. Over time, you'll get the hang of how things work around here." After her small explanation, Carhee clasped her hands together as she stood from her seat. "Now, shall we go back down to watch?"

I walked alongside the older girl as we made our way back down to the main floor when she suddenly turned to me.

"Oh! I think I should mention this since you'll be around now, but occasionally, there are girls that randomly stops by to bombard practice. Most often they are here to see Ryun, so don't be too alarmed."

I stopped walking for a moment as I stared at the back of Carhee, slightly tilting my head as I processed her words. She also stopped and turned back to face me, probably confused at my sudden stop.

Slowly, I opened my mouth as I stared up into her amber eyes.

"So...does this mean that before I introduced myself, you thought I was one of Ryun's admirers..?"

Carhee's eyes widened as her face began to turn red with embarrassment. Awkwardly scratching her head, she sheepishly nodded as she avoided my eye contact.

"Ah...I was caught."

I let out a light laugh as I caught up to her.

"I don't mind it. I think it's funny."

She just covered her cheeks in embarrassment as she lowered her head.

『 5 May x029 』

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Author's note:
Okay. Okay.
I know. I'm late. But, hey!
It's a longer chapter!
Anyways, I hope you enjoyed it. I had to write like 3 drafts until I became satisfied with it.
Anyways, I'll copy and paste this so you don't have to go all the way back to chapter 2.05:

1 - The Kingsley family monopolizes the top rated hotels of the country: Imperial.

2 - The Alpheus family reigns the Sports Industry and produces and trains top notch athletes: Alpha.

3 - The Careuss family is recognized as producing prodigious and successful musicians and owns the top record label, Osiris.

4 - The Zehille family owns one of the top two rated car companies of the country: VEX.

5 - The Grangier family, rival to the Zehilles, owns the other top rated car company: Linon.

6 - The Hinora family is founders of the successful fashion brand uWe and owns the top modeling agency We Fly.

7 - The Lucien family's planes and airports, Light Ways, is ranked number one in the country.

8 - The Atstelli family dominates the food industry in both culinary and patisserie: A'lette.

Also, school is starting up again and I saw my schedule before they even came out.
Students really know all the ways around the system.

Question:
What do you think of Carhee?
(By the way, her name is literally Car•hee or if you're lazy, it can also be Car•ree)

9.8.2020