Chapter 2: Fierce war at the Plains

After a long explanation, Balto then asks "So there's a lot of other Friends in this island!?". I simply nod at her, then she grabs my hand and dashes down the mountain with Ezo Red Fox trying her best to follow us.

A few seconds later, I ask her to stop and then she obediently do as commanded. So after catching my breath and waiting for Ezo to catch up to us, I tell her "Let me lead the way or we might get lost at the forest at the bottom of the mountain.", that Balto nods happily.

When we finally arrive at the plains, we notice that the followers of Lion and Moose are playing this game suggested by Kaban, but Moose doesn't seen to be with them and Lion is taking a nap at the bench made for spectators to watch it. So we decide to watch them play for awhile by sitting next to White Rhinoceros, that by noticing Balto, asks me "Is that the new Friend from the recent eruption?", which I simply nod, so I let her sit next to Balto, so they could talk more easily and also making it easier for me to watch the game.

Crested Porcupine, which is the referee, finally announces the end of the match, which ended at a draw without no scores... a rather boring game, which I might add, and that even Lion seems to agree by yawning loudly. But then Balto, which I thought that she wasn't paying attention to the game, asked "Can I play? Can I? Please...?" that she does while also showing me and White Rhinoceros these big and cute blue puppy eyes, so I go talk with Shoebill.

"Shoebilll, hi...", no response, so I continue "Would it be ok if the new friend would join you guys in the game?"

No response, just her usual staring, but looking closely, her cheeks seems to be in a slightly pinkish color.

Since Panther Chameleon noticed that my talk with Shoebill seemed to not be going anywhere, she intervened by saying while waving her hand to me "Hey there, Silver Fox. It's ok, your friend can play in my place."

I smile and thank her, then I go tell Balto, which lick my face as her way of gratitude, then she goes meet the others to learn how to play, their strategies or maybe introduce herself to the other Friends, I think.

After a few minutes of planning, the second game finally begins with Shoebill passing the ball to Balto, that smiles for a second and the next she's already in front of her opponent's goal as if it was some sort of magic, everybody on the benches was surprised by that, so all she had to do was give a weak kick in the ball to score, since even Japanese Black Bear, that is defending the goal, was still surprised by Balto's speed.

But what ended up really drawing the most attention in this game wasn't her, but Lion that decided to enter the game, her fierce look that scared everybody else on Japari Park, except Moose, made everyone gulp in fear while Balto faced her while looking at Lion's glowing eyes and still showing a happy expression that somehow still intrigued me...a little...

The tension before the match that would resume was so heavy that everyone, myself included, was sweating a lot... Just then that I realized, that I completely forgot about Ezo, so I looked at my side to see how she feels about this heavy atmosphere, and to my surprise, she's playing her new "portable game" thing that the professor found at the library recently and gave her...that was a relaxing view to me, but when Crested Porcupine announced for the match to resume, my attention returned to it.

It was so impressive at how Lion could easily stay on par with Balto's speed and her better skills in this game was what helped her score two goals and end up winning the match.

After it finished, I took a deep breath to calm down a little and try to go congratulate the winners, but my legs was shaking so much that Balto and Lion ended up coming to talk to me before I could even get up of the bench...

"Wow...The new friend here is quite impressive." Lion said while giving a big smile, one that you would normally see her give only when with Moose.

"Congratulations on winning, it was a lot of fun." Balto said while shaking Lion's hand, "but we gotta go, since there's still a lot of Friends to meet up."

"Oh, make sure to come back another day so we can have a rematch, ok?" Balto nods while we wave goodbye to all of them and head in the direction of the lake.