I know I said a month but you see I have this great friend who is basically awesome. You see, I wanted to update faster but I have this cool app which allows me to read manga without having to search it up on the internet. Well she got me into assassination classroom, read the entire thing in 2 days then there were some other great manga which just happened to be recommended to me so I ended up reading them. At first I thought that if it takes me 2-3 days to read 200+ chapters (20 pages approximately per chapter) around on average during school days then I would be finished and writing after a week around. However, I think everyone knows and shares my pain when reading manga. You really cannot stop.
Then the school year ended, I went on holiday, the next school year started, I'm back in school and its been almost a third of the school year. Anyways no more 1 month promises since i basically cannot keep them.
So here is the sixth chapter, hope it's enjoyable. :)
"So... What happens now..?" A random person asked. (Not an important person therefore a name is not needed, or if that is harsh, call him Person A)
"Why're you asking us?" Another random person answered back. (Person B :)...)
"Shall we just leave 'em. Probably dead anyway" Dorgias called out.
"What's your problem? Can't you just keep that damned mouth of yours shut." Leon retorted.
"What'd you just say?" Dorgias whipped his head round to face the source of the insult.
"I said that morons like you should just keep their mouth shut."
Leon met Dorgias's glare with a glare of his own. "You jerk..."
Dorgias strode forward only to be stop by a member of his own team. "Leave it, there's no point in getting in trouble now. There are more pressing matters at hand."
"Che..." Dorgias retreated and the tension slowly decreased.
"At least that's over. Now getting back to the point. We have to confirm their safety, that takes priority at the moment." The head councillor (Should I give him a name its too long to say head councillor all the time.) said addressing the whole congregation of U-17s.
"Coach Phipps. Is there any way of confirming their safety first before conducting a search for them. It could decrease the tension and pressure by a lot if we are certain that no lasting harm has come to them." He continued, this time facing the subject of mention.
"Well I'm not sure. I'm not very familiar with this terrain. I mean everyone who worked here before is either dead or is never returning to this place. However I did hear a rumour that 3 years back, a few of the regulars of Ravers did fall in a pit of some sorts somewhere around here and they came out unscathed."
"So are you saying its the same place where those regulars fell 3 years back."
"Maybe... I'm not certain but it is quite a likely theory."
"Likely theory or not we've got to get everyone else to safety."
The head councillor turned to face the rest of the U-17. "Alright you lot..."
He was stopped abruptly when he notice something was wrong. He sighed and face-palmed "We're missing more aren't we..?"
The rest just nodded in the affirmative. He continued, "So who's missing apart from the four who just fell?"
"Coaches, Roll Call!" Coach Phipps called out.
"Ryoga, Kiko and Dodo..." Ralph sighed after his coach just found them to be missing.
He sighed again. "Those guys... All they do.."
Meanwhile the All-Japan coaches looked at all 26 of their remaining members (29 if you include Inui, Rengi and Akuto) who would have all been counted for if not more than half had somehow disappeared. "Oh, you have got to be kidding me..." Tsuge called out whilst the other remaining U-17s just looked at them with a look that said 'ain't our fault'
"Problem?"The head councillor asked them as he walked towards them.
"Oh, Okay, I see.." He said after taking a look at them before he exploded.
"Why the hell is more than half of your team missing? Can't you coaches look after your students properly. I can understand a few of them that could have gone missing to look for Tokugawa Kazuya but not half your entire team. What the hell is wrong with you people?"
"It's not Tokugawa Kazuya they're looking for?" Coach Kurobe responded.
Coach Phipps who had just joined them after the head councillor's outburst asked them what they meant after hearing Kurobe's response. "Most of the missing students are in fact middle schoolers. Tokugawa-kun is in high school. Some of our high schoolers have gone missing in order to look for him but the middle schoolers are not particularly close to Tokugawa-kun and so it would not make sense for them to be missing." Coach Saito continued.
"Then where the heck did they go?"
"Most likely to find Echizen Ryoma and Tezuka Kun'imitsu." Tsuge replied back.
"Why those two? There on different teams." Coach Phipps questioned.
"Both of them used to be All-Japan Reps and are particularly close to the middle schoolers." was the reply.
"Oh, okay. Wait, how is that even important?" Coach Phipps moaned.
The head councillor turned round to face the rest of the group. " Those whose students are missing please tell me now." He called, looking tired and slightly annoyed.
It turned out to be almost 20 who went missing mostly the Japanese as well as two of the three pros. Volk decided to stay behind and look after his team rather than going after one teammate. Medanoré and Camus basically abandoned their teams and went in search for the missing players.
"Okay, the rest of you are to go back to the camp and stay there." The head councillor emphasised the last two wards glaring at everyone and daring them to answer back.
Nobody did. They all silently nodded before Adrian Phipps ushered them in the direction of the camp. Meanwhile the head councillor stood there immobile offering a silent prayer. 'Merry hurry up and find them. Bring them back safely, all of them'
Meanwhile a few 10s of feet underground four bodies tried their best to make sense of their surrondings. Ryoma looked around, his head started to clear up as his eyes adjusted to the darkness. He looked around slowly turning his head from side to side, making a mental note of his surromdings. He looked up as he heard a voice call out to him. "You finally awake, Prince?"
Ryoma stared at the figure who spoke. The two others turned to face him as well. After a few moments, the figure noticed 3 pairs of eyes staring at him, uncomfortable he asked "What, why are you all staring?"
Ryoma spoke up first. " Ne... Tezuka-Buchou, Tokugawa-Senpai, did he just speak in Japanese or did i bang my head to hard in the fall?" turning to face the two mentioned whilst pointing at the figure in front of him.
"Nope, we heard it to." Kazuya replied.
Tezuka as usual just nodded in the affirmative. Medanoré face-palmed mentally. "Damn, did i just revert back to Japanese." he thought whilst racking his brains to find something to say, "What to do, they are going to kill me if this triggers any more of his memories."
However his train of thought was interrupted when he saw the other 3 Japanese starting to converse amongst themselves. " They don't even care... Why did they even look so shocked in the first place, making me use my brain." He groaned internally. "Ryoma doesn't seem to be affected as well. Well its better this way." He ended his thoughts and started to join the others who were actually discussing a way to get out of their predicament.
He smiled fondly as a wave of nostalgia hit him. His mind shifted to three years prior, he saw himself in the same place he was, underground. He saw three younger children all around the age of 10, one of which who was Ryoma. He saw them arguing amongst themselves whilst he himself was standing to the side chuckling to himself.
He was brought back from memory lane as he reached the other occupants underground. "So shall we get out of here?" Medanoré called out to the group.
Above ground, 20 or so teens were out looking for the 4 others. They had managed to bump into each other on the way and now they all stood surronded by bushery as they stopped to catch their breaths - well some of them. " You guys all came too." Kiko started in Japanese.
"Of course. Just because Koshimae left us doesn't mean we aren't still friends." Kintarou cried out.
"Koshimae?" Both Dodo and Kiko thought simultaneously.
"Anyway, forget this and look. We found some coal." Camus interrupted in English this tme.
"Coal!?" Fuji started to say before his eyes snapped open revealing icy blue eyes. "That's it. There must be a mine somewhere in this area, thats where the coal must have come from."
Camus just nodded. Moments later Amadeus came running to the others saying "Oi guys, I found the entrance to the mine?"
"Great, which direction?" Atobe quickly asked before setting off in the direction Amadeus pointed to. Everyone followed after.
Back in Raver's, the remaining teenagers and coaches all went in a did a roll count yet again to make sure no more had gone missing, you could never be so sure with teenagers. After confirming everyone who weren't missing to be there Coach Phipps addressed the group. "Okay, as we wait for the arrival of the other participants you will have self training—"
He was interrupted when a teen shouted out. "Didn't You say we could skip training?"
"Of course, but that was back then and not now, and my, did you truly believe the greatest training camp, no forget that, the greatest training regime would allow you to skip practice? I had something fun planned out but that will have to wait till tommorow due to unexpected circumstances. So no arguing and get back to work and no one is to leave this building unless approved and accepted by me. Understood?." Phipps replied a subtle smirk coming to his face.
The crowd dispersed with groans coming from everyone as they trudged to the indoor gyms dreading more workout.
Back underground, the 4 tennis fanatics started to move. As they were moving, Ryoma could not help but feel familar with the layout of the place. Looking around, Ryoma stopped when he heard Tokugawa call to him. "Echizen-kun, Is something the matter?" Kazuya could not help but ask. He had noticed the child's odd behavior for thenpast two days and was starting to feel a little concern for him.
This stopped the others in their tracks as they turned to face Ryoma, the object of all of their concerns. "Ah... no it's nothing, Tokugawa-Senpai. It's just this place feels a little familiar that's all." Ryoma finally admitted.
At this statement Medanoré visibly tensed up and his eyes narrowed. He quickly overrid this posture aware of the others. However this slight change did not go unnoticed by either Kazuya or Tezuka, however none made comment. They both decided to confront him about it another time as they had more pressing matters at hand.
Outside, the 20, give or take a few teenagers stood opposite a barred off mine. "Its barricaded." Oni said.
"Its blocked off." another said.
"So we just have to knock it down, easy!" Akaya called.
"Baka, it would be if there weren't any people inside." someone replied.
"How so?" Both Akaya and Kintaro asked at the same time, tilting their heads in confusion.
Everyone sighed and as soon as Fuji was to speak up someone replied before him. "It's due to the shock of the blow. The shock caused by knocking down the door could cause the whole entrance to collapse blocking our only way in. In a worse case scenario the entire mine would collapse, kiling or injuring the 4 inside" Merry said in fluent Japanese.
"Oh.." both said simultaneously.
"You can speak Japanese?" Sanada asked.
Merry nodded. "Then how are we supposed to enter. It would take too long to break this door apart." Akaya said pointing to the closed off mine.
"I don't know" Irie replied looking solemnly at Akaya.
"There might be a way." Ryoga spoke up for the first time.
All eyes foccused on him urging him to continue. He exclaimed that he didn't exactly know how to explain without confusing them all. Ryoga turned to Merry. Merry sighed before explaining. (A note to readers - From what is about to be displayed is not anything Logical, so please do not try this. As The New Prince Of Tennis is already illogical it will fit in. Thank You. I repet. The following is rubbish.) " So basically, the wood blocking us from the entrance, if hit will make the entrance collapse. To prevent that we need to make the door fall in inverse. However to do that we need to hit the underlay of the barrier which is protected by the earth which it sits upon."
She paused looking at majority's confused face. She signed before ignoring the rest and turning to those who were comprehending. "So in order to do that we have to hit a shot with a reverse grip whilst aiming for the point just parallel to the underlay. It has to rest on the ground with a spin for a minimum of 12 seconds."
At this, everyone's jaws dropped. "Wait, the ball has to continuously spin for 12 seconds on the ground before rebounding to the underlay. The most a ball can spin for after coming into contact is 5 seconds at most and that could ruin your arm. There's no way it can last for a full 12 seconds, even if someone could do that the burden on the arm would be enormous. It's impossible." Fuji called out.
Everyone else just stared blankly. "You wanna bet." said Merry, a smirk coming to her lips.
Merry reached into her bag and took out her silver-framed racquet, she positioned herself in her stance, ball in her right hand, racquet in left and she threw the ball into the air and sent it crashing down right towards the barricade. The ball landed and spun. Everyone counted 12 seconds mentally and prayed it would work. The ball continued spinning at the same time digging ferociously into the ground creating an opening to the foundation. ...3...2... 1! Each player held the breath as the ball lifted from the ground and hit the underlay causing the wooden door to fall backwards almost hitting Akaya who was a little too close. The barrier had fallen and everyone stared in awe. The awe lasted for let say 2 seconds before everyone started remembering their fallen comrades and rushed in.
Once they were in Camus went up to Merry. "You stupid show-off, do you want to never hold a racquet again?" he whispered gently but the seriousness as well as anger was displayed in his eyes.
Merry looked up, unsure of what to say then quickly replied she wouldn't do it again — well not too soon anyway. Camus just sighed and sped up. The other players were running forwards trying to make as less noise as possible whilst on lookout for the others.
The 4 whom everyone were looking for looked up when they heard a slight rumble. They looked forwards as Tezuka asked "Anyone knows what that sound was?"
"Cave in maybe?" Medanoré replied.
"There might be others who fell in or it might just be a dead end." Kazuya said as well.
"Oh well, Let's just go anyway" Medanoré answered back.
The 4 continued walking till Atobe almost crashed right into an unsuspecting Tezuka. "Te..Tezuka-san" Akaya said in place of Atobe as he was shocked still.
"Oh hello, you finally found us." Medanoré casually called out to the 20 or so teens in front of him.
"What do you mean by that?" Amadeus called out before reaching out and pitting him into a loose playful headlock.
The next couple of minutes went by with everyone greeting and glomping, only Ryoma had to suffer through that though. They managed to return to the hole which the 4 fell into where the Head Councillor stood there, annoyed and ticked off. "Oi,Oi. You lot have a lot of explaining to do."
The Head Councillor was seething. Although he didn't show it on his face, his voice was slow and dangerous. Audible gulps were heard as the Head Councillor touched the reciever near his ear and spoke into it, calling the search party off. He then glared at them and ordered they follow him back to the camp. They reached te camp and many more greetings were held before the Head Councillor began letting the accumulated stress out.
Amused, everyone watched as the Head Councillor spent the next five minutes screaming at the teenagers, however most if not all of them including Sanada chose to ignore him as they let him banter on. After releasing the stress he turned to Kazuya, Medanoré, Tezuka and Ryoma. "What the hell are you four still doing here, hurry up and get yourselves checked at the infirmary."
"Hai!" all 4 shouted before running off.
The evening passed with amusement before everyone settled to bed. Somewhere with the Tube Republicans a high schooler asked his captain. "Hey captain. Is this really the Brutal training from 3 years ago. I mean morning training was hard and all but everything else was pretty easy, don't you think?"
"Yeah i know, my muscles arent even aching that much. It just shows how much more superior to the other countries. Hahaha..."
The teens fell asleep as soon as the clock hit 12. When all was quiet in the dorms, two men walked through the halls. "Had a rough day, eh?" Phipps asked the Head Councillor.
"You're enjoying this aren't you?"
"Of course, Mr. Fake Head Councillor. You really are disgracing the role of Head Councillor. You actually started out pretty decent as well, though today it all went down the drain. Am i right? Anyway Mr. Fake, weren't you completely opposed to the idea of reopening Raver's as well as sending the U-17 participants here. I wonder why. Do enlighten me, I would so love to know." Coach Phipps smirked as he stared at the Head Councillor.
The Head Councillor stared blankly in front. He made no notion to speak so Phipps just sighed before walking off. He turned around before turning into a corridor and called out to him "Maybe you should think about doing a swap. There are loads of those back there who would kill to be able to pose as Head Councillor, you know." Phipps gave a small smile and walked away.
Left alone to his thoughts, the Head Councillor clenched his fist strongly till his fingernails left red scars on his palm. He then stalked off in the opposite direction from which Phipps went.
The next day came and the cafeteria was not in choas as there were hardly anyone there. "Where is everyone?" someone asked.
"They won't have time to eat if they don't hurry. Hey, Ryoma hurry up and eat as well." Kiko said.
"Hai..."
Meanwhile back in the dormitories, tennis players laid motionless on their beds and floors. "Damn, why is it so hard to move?" someone screamed out from one of the rooms.
"My arms or Legs won't move. Damn it hurts soo much" another cried.
Adrian Phipps chuckled before heading out to greet those at the cafeteria. Yay, anoter fun day!
Over.
Thanks for reading.
This time no promises. When it comes it comes.
The story has started to get a bit OOC. I know its not really Leon who has a thing against Dorgias and its actually Atobe but the story ended up like this so oh well.