Volume 2 - CH 1.6

Conveniently… or rather, because I was too lazy to bring them home before, my basketball shoes were still left in the literature club room. After getting it and getting myself ready, I stood on the court.

I had four teammates and five opponents. 

It was the first time in a little over a year that I had seen this scene, and it gave me a unique feeling.

“We’re teammates now. I’m counting on you, Izumi.” Sakuraba, who was assigned to the same team as me, pressured me with a cheerful expression.

“Don’t get your hopes up. Rather, always be ready to back me up.”

“Haha, got it.”

I reluctantly asked him with a grimace, but Sakuraba took it as a joke and smiled happily.

And so we all got into our positions.

“Let’s get started.” As soon as Hina, the referee, threw the ball upwards, the game began.

The centres1 of the two teams jumped high and flipped the ball.

The one who got the ball that was bounced was… Sakuraba. He took advantage of the fact that his opponent was not yet ready and dribbled to attack quickly.

“I won’t let you!” However, one of our opponents quickly reacted and went around in front of Sakuraba to protect their goal.

“Izumi!”

As soon as he called to me, Sakuraba made a pass to me, who was a little further away from him. I was outside the three-point line. So I received the pass and bent my knees to get into a shooting stance.

“Is he a shooter!?”

The other player came to stop me, amazed at my play, who he knew nothing about.

But that was a fake move. I dribbled past the guy who came to block my shot and passed the ball back to Sakuraba.

“Sakuraba!”

“Yes!” Sakuraba, who was shaking off the defence, took a light step as soon as he received my pass and took a layup shot to score the first goal.

“Nice pass, Izumi!”

“Yep!” Sakuraba gestured for a high five, and I responded with a light touch.

My position was the point guard—the commander. The job could be quite varied, but roughly speaking, it was to pass the ball to a teammate who was likely to score. Here, I had a scorer named Sakuraba, so I basically needed to just pass the ball to him.

Like that, for the first five minutes of the match, I continued to form our team’s attack pattern with Sakuraba as the main shooter.

“Stop Sakuraba! Get on the double team!” After a series of shots, the commander on the opponent’s side gave drastic instructions to his teammates.

It was a tactic that required two people to stop Sakuraba. This would certainly make it impossible for my team to use our current form of attack… However,  there was no such thing as a perfect formation or tactic in this world; if you focused on countering one person, there would leave gaps in other parts of the court.

“Let’s attack from the outside! Get the rebound!” I instructed my teammates and gathered the passes to the Shooting Guard (or SG) and switched to a 3-point shooting attack.

Leadership was vital for PGs. It’s a tough job for an introvert like me personally, but it couldn’t be helped.

So we continued to play the game, fighting fiercely as we dealt with our opponents’ schemes or vice versa, and soon the promised first quarter was over. The result was a win for us, thanks in part to Sakuraba’s strength.

“Haaa… That was backbreaking!”

However, for me, who hadn’t actively played for quite a long while, my stamina had completely run out and I slumped down on the spot.

“Izumi, thank you for your help. Thanks to you, we won,” Sakuraba, who was still so energetic, gave me praise.

“No, no, I was saved thanks to the buzzer that went off before I could mess up.”

If I continued on to the second quarter, my legs would fail me and I’d be a statue on the court.

“Haha, you didn’t seem like you hadn’t been actively playing for a long while. Come play with us again when you feel like it.”

“…I’ll do, when I feel like it.”

After talking for a while, I finally recovered, so I got up and left the court. Then Yuzu, who had been watching from the side, came up to me with shining eyes.

“Good job, Yamato-kun. Finally, I got to see you in action today, didn’t I?” Yuzu seemed to have forgotten her bad mood from earlier and seemed to be somewhat happy.

Now I thought about it, this was my first time winning a match in front of her.

“Well, I’m lucky to have a great teammate this time.”

When I had a strong scorer like Sakuraba, being the PG was a breeze.

“You kept instructing your teammates without fail; as I thought, your so-called introvertness is just something you wear like a fashion2.”

Somehow, I was being doubted by something really strange. Who was being introverted just for fashion?

“What’s that…? I tell you, an introvert does not equal a reticent person. I don’t know how to communicate with other people, which leads me to be quiet as a result. “

I was the type of introvert who could normally have a conversation with someone I was comfortable with, or in a situation where we had a common topic. Especially in basketball matches, I was used to giving instructions, so I could be more eloquent there than usual.

“Oh, I see. But didn’t you play better than last time, Yamato-kun?” Yuzu tilted her head curiously as she looked at the void as if thinking back on my earlier play.

“Well, I’ve been practising a bit lately to take a break now and then.”

Light exercise was a great way to take a break from RPGs.

“Heh. Maybe you were disappointed that Sota beat you?” Yuzu looked into my face with a mischievous tone.

“How can I… The other person is an active player too.”

As Hina said, it3 was a battle with little wins in the first place, and it was a game that had already been calculated to lose both times.

“I see. So you were frustrated not because you lost, but because you lost in front of me?”

“…No, of course not.”

“Oh, there was a pause.” Yuzu caught me with that pause.

“No, I’m telling you it’s not like that.”

Even when I denied it, Yuzu paid no heed and annoyingly made that smug face.

“Yeah, I got it. So, aren’t you glad you got to show off your good side in front of your pretty girlfriend today? You were so cool, Yamato-kun!”

“You’re annoying!”