Chapter 10: Deadly Dodgeball
"It's not as bad as you're making it out to be Saikawa-chan." I do my best to placate the crying girl as I walk Kanna home.
Saikawa, Kanna's friend, whom she tricked into friendship, had all but demanded to walk home with Kanna and myself. I didn't see a reason to deny her so I said it was Kanna's choice, the dragon girl didn't care either way.
Saikawa had offered to show Kanna to the local park, it also happened to be the one I had woken up in months ago, unfortunately there was also a group of teenagers playing dodgeball there at the time.
Suffice it to say that when I intercepted a ball aimed at Saikawa's head there was…
A difference in opinion as to whether or not an apology would be acceptable.
I had done my best to try and placate the group, telling them that they should be more careful in the future.
Saikawa was...less than diplomatic however when one of them had referred to her as 'squirt' at which point she challenged them to a game of dodgeball tomorrow, completely forgetting that it was only her and Kanna against a full group of teenagers.
I had no doubt in my mind who would win.
The poor teenagers wouldn't stand a chance, I had attempted smooth things over after her declaration.
At which point one of the teenagers called me a coward.
Which only spurred further insults, this time by Kanna.
Who called one of the black haired teenagers a 'waste of the most basic protozoa and if they refused to face her on the field tomorrow she would lay waste to him and his descendants.' the group took it as a joke.
I didn't, they were in serious danger but at that point the dodgeball duel was all but inevitable, I didn't even want to think about what Tohru would do when she inevitably found out, my only hope was Kobayashi.
"But Emiya-san…" Saikawa sniffled next to me "What if I can't gather enough people...what if we lose?"
'What if Kanna kills someone?' I bite back the response in my mind and crouch down to pat the crying girls head "Don't worry Saikawa-chan." I give her small smile as she wipes away her tears "I'll help you, besides I'm sure you'll find enough people."
"Saikawa's not popular enough for that." Kanna instantly responds to me, I swear I could see the moment the crying in front of me has her heart broken.
I shoot a look at Kanna, if anything she's looking strangely determined "That's not nice, Kanna-chan."
The girl shrugs at me before walking up to me and gripping my sleeve "How are you feeling, Shirou?"
"Eh?" I give her a small look of confusion, does she want me to be honest here? Right now I'm terrified for the group of kids who just challenged a phantasmal best to a game of physical skill.
"They said bad things about you, are you feeling okay?" She tilts her head and stares at me, if anything I'd say the girl is offended on my behalf.
I chuckle and pat her head "It's fine, Kanna-chan. What they think of me doesn't matter."
She tightens her grip on my sleeve "They were mean...I don't like that."
"Then that means you're a good person." I smile down at her as she stares up at me with some new found realisation "But that's besides the point right now, I'd best get you two home."
"Shirou? Can I bring Saikawa home?" She tilts her head and looks at me with a rather innocent expression.
'Cute' is the first thought that springs to mind before I shake it off and scratch my cheek "Well...I suppose the situation involves both of you…" I stare at the other girl, now looking at me with a pleading look of desperation "I don't see any harm in i-"
"YES!" Myself and Kanna turn and give a questioning stare at Saikawa, whose frozen with an expression of pure delight before realising we're staring at her and quickly composing herself "Um...I mean...thank you for inviting me Kanna-san." she then bowed, completely forgetting she was on the verge of tears earlier.
Well, I can only hope this will be resolved peacefully.
I hate my luck sometimes.
"We're not gutting them and their families, Fafnir-san." I pinch the bridge of my nose as I try to talk the dragon out of killing the teenagers.
As expected the discussion upon the children's return home went...less than ideal.
Myself, Kobayashi and Lucoa seemed to be the only voices of reason, which was quickly overshadowed by Tohru, Kanna and Fafnir's overzealous nature at being challenged.
Although Kanna seemed to be more angry about me being insulted than the actual challenge.
"I see no issues in killing them." Fafnir stated, as matter of factly "They foolishly challenged a dragon to combat. It would be insulting to our pride to not respond accordingly."
"I'm surrounded by delinquents…" Kobayashi sighed behind me "Do you even know the rules?"
"Of course I do." Fafnir scoffed "I've played hundreds of games of explosive dodgeball."
"By the Root…" I grumble out, this is taking a turn for the worse. I turn to Lucoa, she's reasonable, they'll listen to her "Can you talk them out of this?"
She waves me off with a smile "It'll work out."
Then again, she obviously won't even listen to me.
"Let's do this!" Tohru fist bumps the air, swiftly followed by Kanna and Saikawa.
"Shirou-san." Kobayashi's reassuring voice brings my attention over to her, I see only resignation in her eyes "I don't think we'll be able to talk them out of this…"
I let out a rather heavy sigh "No...I suppose we won't." I fix the group with a rather heated glare "If you're going to do this remember...No Killing."
"What abo-" Tohru begins before I cut her off.
"You can't cripple them either."
"Ummm...Emiya-san?" Saikawa's worried voice brings my attention over too her, she's looking at me rather confused "Why do we need to worry about...crippling them?"
I freeze slightly, she's the only one in the room who isn't aware about the insane physical skills of the rest of the occupants "...No reason. Just covering every base."
"Okay...We're going to win...right?" She fixes the rest of the room with a rather hopeful stare.
"Saikawa-chan…" I walk up to her and crouch down at her level, my hand on her shoulder and a reassuring smile on my face "I literally see no plausible future in which we lose." which is enough for the girl to break out in a giant grin.
"I'm surprised you even turned up, Shirou-san."
I turn to Kobayashi and shrug to her "Someone has to make sure nobody gets seriously injured in this." I say while gesturing to the dragons who are currently doing their level best to appear perfectly out of place in a playground.
"Well…" Kobayashi nervously chuckles while scratching the back of her head "I can see how things might...get a bit out of hand."
"Aren't you going to take part, Emiya-san?" I look down to see Saikawa staring up at me with a confused expression, I shake my head at her.
"This kind of stuff doesn't really interest me." I point over to Kanna, who is currently cracking her knuckles and staring menacingly off into the distance "I suspect Kanna-chan could do a better job than me."
"Yeah...she's great…" Saikawa blushes and fidgets on the spot before turning away from me and letting out a slight giggle. I turn to Kobayashi and raise an eyebrow, the woman simply stares at me and shrugs with a look of confusion to perfectly match my own.
"The fools approach." Fafnir calls out to us, we turn to see the same group of teens from yesterday enter the park from the other side "Tch, they look even more pathetic than I expected." he scoffs and frowns.
"What's this squirt? You called your friends to help you?" The tall square headed teen sneers at us while their group takes to the field, he then fixes a rather smug look at me "I figured you were too cowardly to fight us. Lettin girls and old men take over for you?"
I cringe as the dragons still at the insult to them, I see Kanna begin to manifest a rather dark aura around herself.
"Don't think we'll go easy on you!" With those final words to us, the game began.
It was barely a competition between the two groups, they were effortlessly destroyed.
"This is…" Kobayashi grimaces as Tohru threw a ball back into the gut of some kid and sent him to the floor.
"Well. At least they're going easy on them." I sigh out, I'm quickly alerted to the groan of pain as Kanna plants a ball into the kid who insulted me. I see his eyes roll into the back of his skull as he passes out.
"Okay...maybe not as easily as I would have liked." I shake my head "As long as no one gets seriously injured."
"They are pretty amazing, aren't they…" Saikawa gapes at the display next to us, from her perspective these are just some pretty strong people bullying children.
The reality is that these are pretty strong phantasmals bullying mortals.
The entire… massacre lasted less than a minute.
The teens dragged themselves and their injured away from the playground rather quickly after the match ended, sporting some rather nasty looking bruises but otherwise moderately unharmed.
A win in my books.
"Shirou. We won." Kanna waddles up to me and smiles with her eyes, although I do see the corner of her mouth tilt slightly upwards, which is about as expressive as I've ever seen her.
"Yep." I smile and pat her head "And you held back to avoid injuring them. I'm proud of you."
"Can I get food?" I let out a small chuckle at her.
"Sure. I'll make everyone lunch." She nods to herself and I turn to see Kobayashi staring at me with a knowing smile.
"She's got you wrapped round her finger you know." I shrug at her.
"She did well to avoid injuring anyone, besides I enjoy making food."
She sighs and shakes her head "You're unreasonable, you know that?"
"Yep." I smirk and nod to her, so what? I don't mind helping people.
"A pity that game was so lackluster." Tohru sighs out and rolls her shoulder "I'm not nearly satisfied enough yet."
I turn to see her with a slight frown, then Fafnir turns to her as well and smirks "Ho? What a coincidence. Neither am I."
'What?'
"Me neither." Lucoa chimes in as well, I see Kanna nodding along with them and I can feel a pit beginning to form in my stomach.
"That reminds me…" Tohru's face morphs into a rather wicked grin "I still haven't beaten you two yet, have I?"
"Are you going to surpass us today?" Fafnir narrows his eyes as he and Lucoa begin to exude a dark aura.
"Hey…" I turn to Kobayashi "They're not really gon-"
"They are." She answers immediately, her expression blank "We should probably back up a little."
"But we're in the middle of a playground! What if they miss and hit someone!?"
"You want to be here in case they miss and hit you?"
"...Fair enough." Running in there seems like a bad idea, at least I hope they hold back enough to not level the surrounding area and at the very least I can protect Kobayashi and Saikawa from any stray throws… hopefully.
"Saikawa, could you stay behind Kobayashi-san and myself?" I try to appear as reassuring as possible, even while the mana being leaked behind me is causing every single one of my instincts to scream at me to run as far away from here as possible.
A rather large explosion has me turn around, wide-eyed, to see Tohru with the ball in her hands and a rather large field of dust being kicked up around her. She tenses her arm and draws the ball back and throws it at Fafnir with such speed and power that it practically glows.
Fafnir, of course, easily catches it in his hand as if she merely flicked a stone in his direction and throws it back at her.
The ball impacts Tohrus arms and sends her skating back a few feet before she retaliates.
This little game of catch growing more destructive with each throw, I turn back to try and give reassurance to Saikawa. Only to see the girl turning a rather brilliant shade of white and her eyes the size of dinner plates.
I turn back around to see Lucoa throw the ball at Kanna, the girl unfortunately slips as the ball nears her and sails right over her head.
Directly at us.
Time slows down as several things happen at once.
Lucoa's eyes slowly open as she realises what just happened.
Kobayashi begins to panic and jump away from the oncoming missile.
Tohru just freezes and a look of horror slowly makes it's way onto her face.
I stick my arm out in front of me.
'I am the bone of my sword'
"Rho…" I begin as the ball is merely a few feet from us "Aias!" in the next instant the ball impacts the outer layer of a four petalled flower shaped shield.
I grip my right arm with my left to support myself.
This level of power is stupid, I can feel it beginning to crack the first layer.
The first layer breaks, as do a few of my fingers.
I bite back a scream as the ball continues onto the second layer, this is a Noble Phantasm which was designed to combat any projectile weapon.
And it's being bested by a common dodgeball thrown by a dragon.
This isn't even funny.
The second layer fractures, along with my wrist as my sleeve begins to tear away and my skin starts to split.
The ball slows down considerably by the time it gets to the third layer, the ball continues on before it grinds to a halt and drops to the ground.
I'm panting slightly as sweat begins to drip off my brow, I dismiss the Aias and immediately I am greeted with a few surprised looks.
Even the usually stoic Fafnir is staring at with with a slightly widened eye before composing himself.
My right hand drops limply to my side, I wince as I look at the rather nasty purple bruising and cuts which now cover about a third of my forearm.
"S-Shirou?" I turn to see a rather gobsmacked looking Kobayashi staring at me, in return I give her a rather weak smile.
"Told you I was a Magus."
AN: Well...sorry for not uploading for a while but we're back.
Also Shirou finally projected something! It was the dodgeball game and we all know how destructive that was so I figured it was a perfect opportunity for some Magecraft.
Also, I've seen a few comments about Shirou having 'Harem Protagonist Rank:EX'
Let's clear up some confusion.
I'm doing a light hearted fluffy story here damnit!
I mean...yeah… Elma is probably going to be a source of some craziness in the future. Especially with Shirou's cooking.