72. THE 44 PANTHER
note: sometimes i write things that are so embarrassing that i literally blush while typing idk if this is just me tho
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AS
soon as you take a seat on that bench, your eyes are met with the bright green ones you've come to be so familiar with. She looks down at you with a raised brow, "Are you okay? Did that purple bun say something bad?"
Clearly, by purple bun, she was referring to Reo—but what you don't get is why she immediately makes such an assumption about him. You furrow your brows—to make sure she can visibly sense your confusion—"What? No. I'm okay. Reo didn't say anything."
Mariele seems pleased enough with your answer, nodding her head. "That's good. You just seemed a bit upset. Is it about that Rensuke orange again?"
Was it really that obvious? Perhaps you should start carrying a mirror around with you so that you're not so unaware of your own facial expressions. You had no idea you were so expressive—or maybe it's that Mariele is too intuitive for her own good. "Oh, no. I'm fine. I'm... I guess, a little bit. But... it's nothing big. It's just personal stuff."
She takes those words as her sign not to pry—you appreciate her societal awareness. She turns her gaze onto the field and you do the same—what you catch as soon as you turn your head is the full view of Isagi intercepting a pass between Grim and Kaiser.
Consequently, the possession of the ball is taken away by none other than Reo, who Isagi is completely unable to manoeuvre around. You think you know why. Chigiri and Nagi did feel a lot more built than I remember. Even looking at their stats now... I wonder what kind of training they were put through.
Reo twirls around Isagi and even when met with somebody like Alexis Ness—he pulls a move that is eerily similar to that of Itoshi Sae's—and he gets around him easily. In fact, Reo uses a variety of moves that look to be originated from completely different, unique styles to get around the entire line of defence all alone. It is magical to watch.
Reo rushes down towards the goal—and to your surprise, with Nagi right there waiting for him—he takes the shot. There is a certain spin towards the flying ball that gives you such a sense of familiarity—it's Rin's outside spin—and you were surely not the only one to get such a feeling, because Gagamaru reacts almost instantaneously.
He leaps up and stretches out his arm as far as it could possibly go—perhaps in a combination of both his long, lanky limbs and his jungle boy instincts, Gagamaru easily blocks the shot. You unconsciously let out a gasp of shock when the ball flies away and he tumbles to the ground—Mariele looks just as surprised as you are.
Another player from your team receives the rebounded ball and it's going Kaiser's way—it seems like today's just not his day, because leaping into the air and taking the ball away is Chigiri. He dribbles down the left side and is eventually matched up with Isagi.
Compared to the previous defenders, Isagi, though struggling, does a good job at keeping up with the speedy princess—at least until the redhead jukes him out in a motion not even he could expect. He gets past Menser and Isagi at the same time with a boost in acceleration that you don't quite remember him having—Chigiri breaks his way into the penalty area.
However, he still dribbles right outside of it, which begs the question that fills your mind—what is he truly after? Even Kunigami seems to know this answer—he reacts quickly, but not quickly enough. Nobody can react as quickly as Chigiri Hyoma, after all.
Around Isagi, over Kunigami and past Gagamaru's fingers—the ball flies into the goal with such precision you had never previously seen from Chigiri, and you can hardly remember to breathe when he regains his posture and grins wide.
"Burn this number 44 into your memory! Blue Lock's red speedster scored the first goal!"
The announcement rings out through your ears but all you can hear is Mariele's smooth voice, "It looked like a golden formula."
You blink. "What?"
"You know, those areas that players have where their scoring ability goes up exponentially. Some have larger areas but are less precise, and some have smaller areas with an almost one hundred per cent goal rate. That goal looked like the second one." She explains perfectly, without wasting a single breath and folding her leg over the other. The way she speaks makes it feel like it were the most obvious thing in the world.
Right. It's her whole job to pay attention to her tactics and players. It's your job, too.
"Oh, right! I know a few who have that sort of thing." Like Barou, with that 29 mentre thing, and Shidou, anywhere in the penalty area... it sounds almost ridiculous, but they really can almost guarantee a goal with that sort of thing.
"Really hard to find it out, though." She pushes a strand of golden hair behind her ear and it swoops around her cheek. "It takes a lot of time to even discover where you shoot the best, and to narrow it down to such a specific spot is very hard. Most players never even come close to having something like that. It's incredible that he's figured that out."
You press your lips tightly together and nod—even though Mariele is not looking at you, you do this as a sort of way to affirm yourself—your eyes find their way onto the swishing red hair that belongs to Chigiri. That's right. You are incredible.
Kaiser looks incredibly smug. Like, ridiculously so. A smirk that stretches out from ear to ear and squinted eyes directed right at Isagi. He must feel very good about himself too, because as soon as the whistle churns into your ears, he passes the ball to the Japanese striker.
Isagi looks particularly annoyed with the pass, but takes it anyway—he creates a one-two passing chain with Kurona when they're faced with Reo, a strategy you've seen them practice during off days quite frequently.
Kurona is a perfect passing option for Isagi—always at a perfect distance and there to allow the boy to look over the field. He is constantly orbiting around Isagi, like a planet.
It's super cool, you find yourself thinking as you watch them travel down the right side of the midfield.
Isagi uses the attention Kunigami draws to himself (you guess the other team is wary of the musclehead due to his goal in the previous game) to get into a perfect open position in front of the goal—it would've been, at least, if Kaiser had not come running in and intercepted the perfect pass Kurona had sent.
However, only seconds after Kaiser lands back down on the ground with a smirk—Chigiri's foot slams into the ball and sends it flying backwards, down the field and over to Reo. The purple-head doesn't waste a second to kick it over once again and the player who happens to receive this pass is none other than Nagi.
Even after being sandwiched by two defenders, Nagi's control skills are as precise as ever—the ball lands directly in the small space he leaves between his foot and the ground. He manages to push the two players behind him and slides the ball across the ground, moving past them and towards the goal.
I... didn't know he could do that. It's too bad this happened to be Manshine's first match because this new side of Nagi was something completely new and unpredictable. The only one in his vicinity at the moment was another player you did not recognise from his team—Nagi sends a pass over to the man, and for a second, you're truly convinced he is going to shoot.
He doesn't—he stretches his long leg up so high that the ball connects with his foot and is sent straight down to Nagi. The snow-haired boy slams his foot into the ball and it's sent flying forward in the goal's direction—it is stopped only by Yukimiya, who jumps forward at the last moment and blocks the shot.
His glasses are knocked off of his face by the force and he tumbles to the floor—even the ball flies out of bounds, but the goal was stopped and that is all that matters. Yukimiya collects himself and stands back up as the game restarts with a corner kick by Chigiri.
The redhead sends a low pass towards Agi—even though he is being marked by Menser and watched carefully by the others—his long limbs allow him to reach the ball before any of your teammates. Despite this, Agi does not even make the slightest attempt to shoot—it flicks off his foot and soars overhead behind him, practically falling right into Nagi's lap.
Kaiser comes out of nowhere and sends the ball flying down the midfield—you're sure he's going to crash into Nagi for a second, but there is nothing of the sort when the blue-dyed blonde lands—Nagi lands as well from how he tried to kick, but a lot less gracefully than the emperor.
"The Doctor."
Mariele's sudden comment makes you turn your head toward her in surprise, once more. You find yourself doing this often during games. "Huh???" It sounds like the title of a scary movie.
"That guy, number 9, Agi," She tilts her head downwards slightly so she has a chance to look at you. "His nickname is The Doctor. Because of how obsessed he is with analyzing players, and because of his logically sound playstyle—he was gifted that name. Though, I think the add-on suits him more."
"Add on?"
"Mad Doctor." She folds her arms under her chest and seems displeased as she looks back onto the field. "He's too strange for my liking. He only pursues things that interest him—I think your little snow-haired baby chick has become one of those things."
You blink froggishly. Huh. You did think that the dark-skinned man was being strangely accommodating (or even doting—if you'd rather put it that way) towards Nagi—especially since this was their first game. Perhaps Nagi just has a knack for attracting those types of people towards him—you can't say you're any exception.
The loud churn of a whistle brings you out of your thoughts. Your eyes instantaneously flit towards the field—the ball has fallen to the ground inside the opposing team's net and Kaiser looks predatory and smug while staring at it. It's easy to discern what had happened, even while you were not looking.
"Kaiser Impact..." You mumble, completely and utterly entranced. You do not realise what words are escaping your lips until you actually say them. "I've never seen a shot more beautiful."
Mariele raises a blonde brow, but other than that, she does not comment on your words.
The whistle blares into your ear and the kick-off restarts—Chigiri passes toward Agi, who slides it backwards to Reo once faced with Kunigami. Despite this, there is some sense of intensity that consumes the field whole and you aren't quite sure where it is coming from.
You squint your eyes and stare—Reo passes towards Nagi, and your eyes follow the spinning ball—then, your lids widen substantially. You know where such an intensity is coming from, now. It is Isagi—what else could you have expected? But something is different. He is different.
Between the span of Kaiser's goal and now—something has changed within Isagi Yoichi, and you're not sure what it could be. What could he have possibly realised in such a short span of time? Whatever it is—it is sure to be something incredible, because he's just stopped something as incredible as Nagi's trapping and is running down the midfield.
"Isagi?!" You gasp out but slap your hands over your mouth once you realise you've spoken. "What... how... ?? Huh...??" You can barely wrap your head around it, eyes flickering from place to place on the field and your vision is starting to spin.
"His aura is so different." Mariele places a finger on her chin and gives the striker an up-and-down look. "I wonder what he realised."
She turns to you, golden lashes flutter downwards to the point of only a slit of green peeking through and she places a hand on your shoulder. "[name], be sure to ask Yoichi about this after this game."
You jolt back in surprise. "Huh?? Why can't you do it?"
"Isn't it obvious? He likes you." Mariele says, in a matter-of-fact tone. Heat crawls up your neck from her loud and very-much-audible-to-everyone-around-you statement.
Isagi and Kurona have made their way towards the penalty area from their Planet Hotline strategy—it's impressive how much synergy they have together—Isagi even uses the fallen hero, Kunigami, as bait to lure the defenders away from him so there's a good spot in front of an almost fully open goal.
It's perfect. His positioning, his timing, his everything. It's too perfect, especially for somebody like Kaiser to not swoop in and stand in front of such a perfect position. You can practically feel the frustration radiating in waves off of Isagi from even where you sit—he shoots, anyway, between Kaiser's legs.
However, with the interruption and newfound obstacle that the German has become—the shot is off course. You realise this as soon as it moves forward. It is not going into the goal. It won't even hit the post—not until somebody else comes in and puts it back on course.
Kunigami—as if he is a hungry hyena—swoops in and leaps into the air, stretching out his leg and shooting the ball into the goal with such force that you deem it unnecessary for how close he is to the goal.
"Huh." Mariele looks pleased. "Rensuke is still forcing himself as a threat even when he is alone. Impressive. I like it."
Usually, with a quip like this coming from your dear friend, you would reply back with something along the lines of, "So you're that kind of person, huh?" But this is not just any normal situation—because Isagi looks like he's about to rip his hair out from anger. Similar to the frustrated look he sported when Ness tripped him over during training—Isagi's jaw is clenched shut tight, at least, until Kaiser opens his big mouth.
"I'll crush you... Kaiser... I'll fucking kill you if it's the last thing I do..." It's not loud by any means—the field is just so quiet you happen to hear it. Isagi looks completely and utterly consumed by rage. It's frightening, really—but you can't seem to pull your eyes away.
The German man does not seem to take him seriously by any means. He speaks, with a small snicker of laughter, "Oh wow. Is that a new way of saying I love you?"
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