The Birth of A Volleyball Legend

"Koji, you suck!"

"Kaede, I will steal your sister!"

"Go fuck yourself, Asahi!"

"Ogawa, your mom is mine!"

DRUM! DRUM! DRUM! DRUM!

It was a brand-new day for Tsunemori, and the first thing Megumi proposed for the training adjustment for the next game was how to stay calm when the crowd was against them. With her reputation, it didn't take a quite long time for Megumi to gather about twenty to thirty students to help with the training, especially when they were told to insult and became a menace to the volleyball team during their training.

While the training worked well, though, that didn't mean all the Tsunemori players liked to be insulted like this. They sometimes threw a glare or two to the crowd when the insult crossed the line, and fortunately, Megumi was there to reprimand them if the crowd went too far. Still, this training managed to give the players an idea of what they were going to face in the next game, and honestly, if their performance was as bad as what they showed today, it would be easy for Tsukiji High to handle them all.

"Man, this is so hard!" Koji moaned weakly. "They have the literal cheat code with them! This is so unfair!"

"That is probably what our opponents think when they play here too, Senpai," Yuki replied dryly, eliciting glares from the others.

"Oh, shut up, Yuki! Don't be a spoilsport like that!" Kaede glared at his kouhai. "Unlike you, most of us here are not a monk! There is no way we wouldn't get affected by the insult!"

"Hey, I am affected too, you know?!" Yuki raised his voice a bit, affronted. "Also, if you want to talk about a monk, should you be saying this to your friend?" His eyes turned into Ogawa who was chatting and laughing with the crowd brought by Megumi.

Honestly, this was probably the biggest surprise for everyone today. At first, all of them thought the ones who excelled in this training would be either Yuki, Riku, or Hirano. The first two were because of their experience playing at a higher level, and the last one was because of how stoic the middle blocker was. Unsurprisingly, while they could hold their own ground, those three were still bothered by the atmosphere around them, especially when the crowd started to hit the drum they borrowed from the former marching band club.

Ogawa though, to everyone's astonishment, managed to shrug all the insults off as if it was nothing. Hell, even the noise couldn't shake him off as the sophomore outside hitter always had all of his focus on the court. Ogawa's ability to stay calm under pressure was something that even Akira couldn't predict before. However, the coach was happy with this, knowing that the boy could be his secret weapon in the next game.

'Maybe, I have to think of the possibility of him going to start over Kaede.' The coach pondered thoughtfully.

The next few days passed quickly with the volleyball team spent it to prepare themselves for the next game. The players kept doing their arduous and annoying training under the insult from the crowd to get used to it while Megumi and Akira were responsible for forming the best strategy to deal with the opponent's players. Everyone did their job well until two days before the game, the announcement of who would get the home-court advantage was finally released.

"Come on, Jiisan! You are such a boomer, so slow with the current technology!" Riku complained as he saw Akira operating the laptop in front of him with only the index finger from both hands on its keyboard. Everyone had a sweat drop when they heard the complaint the blonde boy dared to throw. Only Riku who had a family relationship with Akira would be bold enough to do so. If it was anyone else, they would receive one week of detention instantly from the older man.

"Shut up, Riku, or I will have you clean all the bathrooms in the school!" Akira glared at his nephew. The threat was enough to force Riku to back down immediately, followed by the quiet chuckles from the others. "Anyway, wait for a moment. I have to log in to my email account first to see if the announcement has already arrived. And – AH! Here it is!" He exclaimed. All the players suddenly had their attention on him, surrounding the old man quickly to read the email.

It took only a few seconds before their face grew pale, knowing the result was not in their favor. Although they had already predicted and even practiced for something like this, when the announcement came, they couldn't help but feel disappointed.

"So, we have to play another away game, huh?" Megumi barely whispered.

"This is not fair!" Kaede whined, his shoulder dropped a little. "I mean, they have already had their chance to play home in the last round, right? How could they get two home games in a row while we are the opposite here, two away games in a row?! This is so rigged!"

Even though most of the players nodded in agreement, this was just a dissatisfied reaction to the announcement they had just received. None of them actually thought that this was rigged at all.

Still, the atmosphere turned gloomy out of a sudden, and no matter how many encouragements were thrown at the players, it couldn't quite reach them. Seeing this, Akira finally made a decision here. "Okay, let's end the training today. Use this chance to rest your body and gather your thoughts, and tomorrow, we will start the real preparation for the next game, alright?!"

"Yes, Sir!"

-0-

"I am home!" Yuki shouted as he entered his home. He didn't have to wait for too long before someone replied to his greet enthusiastically.

"Yuki-nii! Welcome back!" Hiko's head popped from the kitchen, looking at him with bright eyes before he rolled his wheelchair in his brother's direction. "Look at what Taro-nii and Kato-nee buy for me!" He showed a set of colorful highlighter pens proudly.

Yuki raised one of his eyebrows slightly, turning his attention to Taro who looked bashful and Kato who smiled fondly at the boy. "Taro-kun asks me to help him buy that for Hiko-kun since he saw Hiko-kun's apt in painting. Don't worry about the money, Taro-kun gathered it by himself a month ago from the pocket money Obaasan gave." The girl explained.

Yuki's gaze softened at the explanation. It seemed during his absence from the busy schedule with the volleyball club, Taro took his role as the big brother of the orphanage perfectly. Honestly, he felt a bit guilty for the boy. Fortunately, Kato promised to keep her eyes on him, which reassured the glasses boy that everything would be alright.

"Good for you, Kiddo. Have you said thank you to your brother already?" He said, ruffling the boy's hair fondly.
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"Of course, I have!" Hiko said, half offended. "I also make a thank you card for him! See!" He suddenly grabbed a small piece of paper out of nowhere, showing it to Yuki. There was a drawing of two boys who Yuki guessed should be Taro and Hiko there smiling with the word 'Thank You' placed big on top of it.

"Well, that is a nice card." Yuki complimented, making the boy beamed in delight. "Good for you, Kiddo. Don't forget to share with your siblings if they want to borrow it, okay?"

"I know!"

His gaze softened as he saw Hiko drive his wheelchair to where the other children gathered. He was so glad to see the cheerfulness on Hiko's face as the boy probably had the hardest time out of the children here, what with him losing his lower body mobility.

Yuki shook his head, then turned around to his friend who also watched the children fondly. "So, will you be here until Aiko-obaasan is back?" He asked.

"Yes, Aiko-baasan is still going out with Mai-chan and Hina-chan, looking out for dinner. She invites me to join, so why not?" She shrugged at the last part.

Since they got closer to each other after the astronomy camp a few months ago, Kato became a constant presence in the orphanage. While she might not introduce herself as anything more than Yuki's friend, everyone could see that something was going on between those two. Still, all the residents of the orphanage welcomed her presence with open hands as she helped Aiko and Yuki keep eyes on the children.

They spent the evening chatting together while also watching the other children doing whatever they did, waiting for Aiko to come back. When the sun was already below the horizon and the sky had turned dark, a little girl they were very familiar with shouted from the outside of the building. "We are home! Niichan, neechan, please, open the door! We have pizza for dinner!"

"Pizza?!" All the children inside jumped from their spot, scampering over the door instantly. Yuki followed from behind and couldn't help but smile when he saw the children surrounded by their youngest sister. Looking at the adorable sight, all the exhaustion and stress he felt from the training was gone instantly.

He knew he would have a tough game waiting in the future. But for now, Yuki allowed himself to relax as he was surrounded by people he loved the most.

His family.