V2C1 Part2

Parsed with an automated reader. The content accuracy is not guranteed.

2. SETBACKThis is kinda mean but this is what was in my head when I was translating the latter half

Translation Notes

1. Born early (早生まれ) here means that Mimura was born between January 1 and April 1, which is before the school entrance date. Since the school semester in Japan goes from April to March of next year, Mimura was born late in the academic year, meaning he’s about a year younger than the people born after April 1. For example, people born within April 1, 1996 to March 31, 1997 will be in the same grade, but anyone born on April 1, 1997 will have to wait to go to school next year.

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He wondered

how many had been blocked. Ochi had recorded them all in his scorebook, so he

could just take a look and know, but he didn’t even want to count anymore.

“Kakegawa,

it’s fine! Just bring it to me!”

Even so,

Mimura shouted and called for the ball to be set to him. With his fast attacks

and time difference attacks blocked entirely, even if a good receive came up,

the setter Kakegawa had already lost the courage to use the combination. He had

no choice but to set the ball to Mimura with a feeling like he was clinging to

him.

Their

coach, Hata, who had been standing and giving instructions from courtside, came

back to the bench.

“Sensei…”

Looking at

Hata’s profile as he plunked down on the bench next to him, Ochi couldn’t help

but speak.

“I want to

make them win this game…”

“Of

course.”

Although

he answered in a low voice, Hata only glared at the court with an expression

like he had swallowed a bitter bug while stroking the stubble on his chin. They

had already used their two timeouts. At this point, why was it that the biggest

thing the bench could do was to just believe in the players on the court…?

Feeling

impatient, Ochi also turned his attention back to the court. He unconsciously

put strength into his right hand and pressed the tip of his mechanical pencil

against the clipboard.

A set that

was like a tall mountain was entrusted to Mimura. Three blockers were gathered

in front of him. His spike was knocked down by that tall and solid wall. However,

of all things, Mimura kicked the ball up before he landed. The ball rose up on

the court, and Fukuho narrowly avoided danger. It was because of Mimura’s amazing

physical ability and reflexes that he was able to go from spiking to rebounding

the ball in midair. And above all, he had a strong heart. He called for the

ball he had hit and followed up on to be given to him again.

Even though

he was such a great player, he was struggling in the second round of the

Inter-High finals tournament. Their opponent was one of those strong Kyushu

schools that always left more than two schools in the top 8 of Japan every

year. Even Hokuriku’s star, Mimura Subaru, couldn’t break through.

Enough…just

stop it…Ochi

thought inwardly over and over again. Even if he attacked so many times in a

row, he couldn’t mark Mimura’s uniform number “1” in the scorebook as their

team’s score.

Fukuho

started fresh and attacked. However, Mimura made a mistake, which was unusual

for him, and caught the spike into the net. The two-meter and forty-three

centimeters net, which Mimura’s usual jumping ability could easily overcome,

suddenly began to show off its height and block his way. His legs must be at

their limit no matter how you look at it—Feeling a gripping pain in his

heart at the stunned look Mimura showed on his face for a moment, Ochi kept his

eyes down and wrote down Fukuho’s lost points in the scorebook. With a snap,

the lead of his mechanical pencil broke on the paper.

Fukuho Technical

High School, representing Fukui Prefecture in the Inter-High for the eighth

consecutive year, lost in the third round of the final tournament. They had to

return to Hokuriku from here.

The team

wasn’t in bad shape. However, the pace was controlled by the opponent from

start to finish. The team, which had always been in the top 8 of the nation,

didn’t give them any chance to grip the flow of the game. Even so, for the past

seven years until last year, before Mimura was appointed as captain, the team

lost without even reaching the third round. The fact that they had finally made

it to top 16 this year and advanced to the point of being contenders on the

final day, must have been the result of Coach Hata’s diligent training.

The

Inter-High, usually held in the middle of summer at the end of July or the

beginning of August, had a tough schedule of four consecutive days. Only the

two teams that made it to the finals after winning the qualifying group matches

on the first day, the first and second round of the deciding tournament on the

second day, the third and fourth round of the finals tournament on the third

day, and the semifinals on the fourth day, were given the honor of playing on

the center court. Unlike the matches on the multi-sided courts, which were

played simultaneously, only the teams that were currently playing on the single

court in the middle of the gym got the cheers and attention of the entire

venue. There were no whistles from the neighboring courts to be heard. The

whistle would only sound loudly for their own game.

Every team

that competed dreamed of putting up the placard of their school on center

court, but of course, most of them failed to reach that point and were

eliminated.

“Subaru.

Don’t forget about this.”

Three years

ago, in the summer of their third year of middle school, Mimura had jumped into

his teammates’s arms with a big smile on his face, holding up the “number one”

sign. But now he walked out of the court alone, somewhat unsteady on his feet.

Ochi pulled out the placard and held it out to him. The placard that was on the

bench during the game were to be held by the captains when they lined up.

“Ochi…”

Before

reaching for the placard, Mimura said in a hushed voice.

He didn’t

want to hear Mimura say he was sorry for losing. He had no right to ask him to

apologize. It wasn’t just him, no one on the team deserved it. You were the

one who tried the hardest. I don’t think there was anyone more obsessed with

winning than you. Who else can take your place?

“Spring

High’s coming up next.”

Ochi was

the first to speak, and Mimura raised his face and opened his mouth as though

to say something. I’m such a jerk, he thought. Not just for not

congratulating a player who just finished a game, but immediately urging him on

to the next tournament. After dozens of jumps and landings, his knees must

be in shambles.

“You said you

were going to take me to the center court, didn’t you?”

He tried

his best to keep his tone light. It was usually Mimura’s role to talk lightly,

and it wasn’t Ochi’s forte.

He expected

him to smile broadly, as he always did, however,

“…That’s

easy for you to say.”

Mimura

muttered, like he was complaining, so the source of frivolous talk was lost.

“Well, I’m

taking you with me, though.”

Mimura

immediately laughed, as though he had changed his mind. As expected, it was a

weak laugh, thick with fatigue.

It might

have been his imagination, or it might have really happened that the placard

was passed between the two of them in a careless manner. It was a placard

bearing their alma mater and the prefecture, with the word “Fukui” below the

name of their school, “Fukuho Tech.”

For these

past three years, he had been reminded over and over again that the name of

their school, which carried the pride and weight of being a regular winner in

their prefecture, was incredibly minor in the national scene.

Even though

the summer Inter-High was over, the third-years weren’t retiring yet. At the

end of September, the prefectural preliminary round of Spring High Volleyball

would begin. The main tournament would be held in Tokyo in January, and even

though it was a national tournament like Inter-High, it was filled with a

special kind of glamor. The dazzling orange court painted on a sky blue sheet,

a far cry from the wooden floor of the local public gym—standing on that center

court had a special meaning. You could see the view from that center court,

where Japan’s national team and other world-famous players stood during

international tournaments broadcasted on TV.

The

next Spring High would be the last chance for both of them.

The referee

blew their whistle. The winning team was already lined up on the end line of

their court with their placard in front of them.

“Line up!”

Mimura

looked back at his team and shouted. His Fukuho captain voice had returned, the

voice of someone who never showed weakness in front of others. He clapped the

sobbing second-year Tokura on the back and said, “You’ll be back here next

year, come on,” and led him. To the rest of his teammates, whose shoulders were

drooped in disappointment both on and off the court, he encouraged them, “Don’t

look so uncool. We’re gonna give it our all until the end and go home.” Everyone

ran to Mimura and lined up with their heads firmly raised.

Deep inside

his heart, Ochi clenched his teeth at the thought of himself not being at the

end of that line.

He had his

own job to do. He turned his back to the court and began to quickly collect the

bags on the bench.

For this

year’s Inter-High, Fukuho’s captain was third-year player Mimura Subaru. The

coach was Fukuho alumnus Hata, who had been leading Fukuho for eight years.

Ochi

Mitsuomi—was registered as a manager.

***

It was the summer of his freshman year when he had

to give up playing because of an injury. It was just before Inter-High, in

other words, just before Ochi’s first national tournament as a member of

Fukuho.

For the

club, or even for the future of volleyball in the prefecture—it wasn’t a big

loss. It was just a minor injury gotten by a freshman who wasn’t even a

candidate for a regular spot. It happened during the time when he was worry

about how he wasn’t getting much taller and realizing that he had reached the

end of his career as a player. In the end, it might have been that laxness that

led to his injury.

He was told

that he would be in rehab for four months. Whether four months was a long time

or short time was a matter of opinion, but even if he went that far, he didn’t think

he would ever be good enough to be a regular for Fukuho.

When he was

leaning towards quitting, he was called by Hata and asked if he wanted to be a

manager.

Although it

was in the form of an offer, it was more like a plea. After all, a team that

went to a national tournament would have a lot of chores that needed to be

done, so a manager was a must. The year Ochi joined the team, there was a

third-year male member named Honda, who was a great manager who took care of

the team very well, but Hata’s intention was to have him retire after

Inter-High and let him concentrate on his exams. Honda was also a case of a

player shifting to manager due to injury.

Needless

to say, many members of the team secretly wished for a female manager, but the

Fukuho boys’ volleyball team, or rather Fukuho sports teams in general, had a

policy of not having female managers. Fukuho was a co-ed school, but because it

was a technical high school, it was pretty much a boys’ school. Even if they

wanted a female manager, sadly, the overall number of female students was

small.

Although

Ochi admired Honda, at that time he still felt like a male manager would be

laughed at. The sports manga in shonen manga magazines were full of romantic

comedies with female managers. He just couldn’t imagine himself as a manager.

On the

pretext of frequenting the hospital for treatment (which was also true), he

felt like he was naturally beginning to drift away from the team.

It was

around that time that he ran into Mimura. They had been in the waiting room of

the orthopedic department of a general hospital.

“Oh, you’ve

been coming here too, Ochi? How are you feeling?”

As soon as

they recognized each other from their seats, Mimura moved over to sit next to

Ochi. He hadn’t had much interactions with Mimura since they were in different

classes at school and Mimura was always with the second- and third-year

students, so he was taken aback when he spoke to him in a friendly manner.

“Oh, well…”

His natural

shyness was in full force as he squirmed. It wasn’t like they didn’t know each

other, since they had played against each other many times before in middle

school in their small prefecture. But it didn’t feel like they were playing on

the same level.

It was

Saturday, a day with no classes, so Ochi was in casual clothes. But Mimura was

in sports clothes, wearing a T-shirt and shorts, with a bulky enamel bag

between his legs.

It was an

accident that happened during club activities, so it was only natural that

Mimura knew about Ochi’s injury. But, wait…

“Mimura-ku…n,

w-why are you here?”

He felt

like this was the first time they were talking to each other one-on-one.

“What’s

with the Mimura-kun? Subaru. Subaru. That’s how everyone calls me.”

Since he

joined the team, everyone familiarly called him by his first name. The fact

that his amiability seemed to be natural made him jealous…but his voice was so loud,

this was a waiting room…

“I also

hurt my knees in middle school. Two surgeries for both.”

Mimura said

plainly and lifted up the cuffs of his shorts.

Ochi gasped

when he saw the reddish-black stitch marks on his knees, looking like two large

worms that had crawled under his skin.

“When…did

you have the surgeries? You were in the tournament the whole time, right?”

“Mmm,

the second one was during the spring break before my third year, and the first

one was bigger, but it was a year before that. They let me be in games while

rehabilitating. They told me I could pull immediately if I couldn’t do it, but

in the end they had me play all the games.”

Looking

back on the past two spring and summer tournaments, it was hard to believe that

was Mimura’s play after a surgery on his knees.

“I wasn’t

that big in middle school, was I? Oh, Ochi, you’re from Matsumoto First Middle,

right? Do you remember me when I was in middle school?”

“Y-Yeah, I

do.”

There was

no one from Ochi’s middle school volleyball team who didn’t remember Mimura

Subaru. He was surprised Mimura was the one who remembered his middle school

without having to think about it.

In middle

school, Mimura certainly wasn’t blessed with height.

“You know,

to reach a higher place than others, you have to jump higher than others. So, it

seems that I’ve been pushing myself too hard without realizing it. I was born

early (1), so I guess I was too small? Ochi, what month’s your birthday?”

“Me? Um,

May…”

“Seriously?

You’re almost a year older than me.”

He wasn’t

very tall, but his jumping ability was incredible. The destructive power of his

spikes, which descended from far above the tall blockers, was a menace to

receivers. So much that someone started calling him the “Devil’s Bazooka” and

it became his nickname.

The

scars on both his knees were noticeable, showing the magnitude of the

surgery—now that it had been pointed out to him, he realized that Mimura always

wore supporters on both knees during practice. Now he knew the significance of

that. Or rather, why didn’t he know about that before? They had only been

teammates for three months, but they had been playing volleyball in the same

prefecture and in the same grade, so he had known Mimura for several years now.

If I was

Mimura’s teammate…even

though he had been longing for that, he was slightly shocked at himself,

wondering what he had been looking at until now. He had only been watching his

amazing strength from a distance, but he hadn’t seen anything. Even though they

were on the same team, he didn’t even try to get close to him, just watching

from afar as their senpais doted on Mimura.

“So…even

now? Even today?”

A shiver

ran down his spine as he thought that Mimura, who he thought would be selected

for the Japanese national team, was actually at his limit as a player.

“Oh, it’s

just a routine checkup today. I’ve been told that if I take care of it, it

won’t be a problem, and right now it’s basically fine.” He pulled back the

cuffs and tapped both of his knees lightly. “Thanks for asking,” Mimura added with a

laugh. “It’s…nothing,” Ochi said, fidgeting again.

“Putting me

aside, you have it worse than me right now. Everyone’s worried about you.”

Everyone’s worried about me? There’s no

way.

“I’m

told…that I’ll be in rehab for four months…”

“Four

months, huh. That’s long. But if everything goes well, you’ll make it in time

for the rookie tournament in November.”

“…Even if I

heal, I won’t be able to participate.”

The

optimistic tone of his voice made him complain despite himself. Mimura looked a

little surprised.

He

thought that looking at it from another perspective, friendly

people were insensitive. Ochi was always thinking about what the other person

would think if he said this, whether he would hurt them or offend them, so he

couldn’t even say half of what he thought.

“I think it’s

amazing that you overcame your injury, Mimura-kun, but the team was

waiting for you. I’m going to be on the bench either way, so I don’t know if

there’s any point in working hard in rehab and coming back…Your injuries might

have been more serious than mine, but it’s not like I have it easier…”

He muttered

as he looked down at his right knee, which was currently fixed in place with an

undyed supporter. He spoke in a gloomy way, the completely opposite of Mimura

if he said so himself. At first, he was bewildered but slightly excited to have

a chance to talk to Mimura, but now he was really hoping that one of them would

be called soon. The long waiting time at the orthopedic clinic was frustrating.

“When did I

say you have it easier? You’re the one pitying yourself all on your own. You’re

talking like you’re the main character in a tragedy or something. What a pain

in the ass.”

Mimura’s

voice, which had been endlessly bright, became low. He could have never

imagined that Mimura, who always seemed cheerful and didn’t seem to favor or hate

anyone, could become so blunt. …He could have never imagined that he would be

so easily hated.

“If

volleyball isn’t worth overcoming an injury to continue for you, then it must

be much more painful for you than for me. You know, having to overcome

something you don’t even like.”

His throat

tightened up at the harsh words. He had always been bad at arguing. He had a

lot of objections, but he couldn’t put them into words, so he ended up losing

the argument.

“…I didn’t

say I didn’t like it…”

Even so, today

he argued back in a small voice. Now that he had incurred Mimura Subaru’s

displeasure, there was no place for him on the team anymore anyways.

“You wouldn’t

understand, Mimura-kun. You’ll never be asked if you want to be a manager. It’s

not like I want to quit, but Sensei…”

“What’s

this, a fight? Let’s all be friends here—”

A jeering voice

came from the seat across Mimura. Even the other patients around him laughed

at him, and his face heated up with embarrassment. He immediately regretted

talking back. A fight? This wasn’t even that. It was just him complaining. He

didn’t care about his examinations today anymore, so he grabbed the straps of

his bag and stood up to leave.

“Wait, Ochi,

oi!”

However,

Mimura stood up and leapt over the bench in pursuit of him. Without thinking,

he got into the elevator as though to run away and pressed the “close doors”

button right in front of Mimura who was running at him with such force like he

was going to punch him. Mimura tried to stick the toe of his shoe into the gap,

but just missed. The doors closed on his angry face.

…Of

course he’d be angry. If something like that was done to him.

His knee

suddenly started to hurt from his supporter. He put his back against the back

wall and dropped his bag at his feet. Even though he wasn’t going to

participate in club activities, he was carrying his enamel bag that was used

for club activities. He didn’t have a bag for outings other than the bags he

had for school and club activities. For his three years in middle school, all

he had done was play volleyball. There was no way he could have done that if he

didn’t like it…

“Shit…”

The curse

he spat out at the floor were not directed at Mimura, but himself.

He wanted

to cry at his own pettiness. He had probably hit the nail on the head. That was

why his response was so out of character.

He didn’t

think he suffered as much as Mimura had from his own injury. He could choose to

quit volleyball rather than endure four months of rehab…

When he got

off the elevator on the first floor, the July afternoon sun was shining

brightly outside the glass door of the main entrance. He grimaced at the

brilliant light piercing his eyes and was reluctant to step out into the bright

light——

He

heard an earth tremor from above him. When he reflexively ran for cover, he

looked up and saw Mimura jumping down from the stairs next to him. In the

literal sense. He had jumped down from the landing. His tall body, arched like

the form of a spike jump, flew half a story into the air. The figure

disappeared for a moment between the streaks of light shining through the glass

door, and the next moment, he seemed to suddenly appear out of the light.

He bent his

body, lowered his knees and landed with a thud. The enamel bag that had been

slung over his shoulder was floating in the air, and a beat later, it was

pulled back by the straps and hit his back.

“Wait…your

knees…!?”

Aren’t

you supposed to take care of them!?

In front of

the stunned Ochi, Mimura straightened up. In middle school, Mimura’s weapons

were his jumping power and momentum, but now his height had steadily grew to

over 180cm, making him the strongest spiker with his height, jumping ability

and spiking power. His eye level was more than ten centimeters higher than

Ochi’s, who gave up on his growth potential just before reaching 170cm, so he

was stared down at from above.

“Why are

you leaving? We were in the middle of tal…hey, wait—”

Just

when Mimura was about to say something with an angry look while breathing hard,

he got startled. In a panic, Ochi turned his face away and said, “S-sor…”

Yikes,

I sound tearful. “Sorr…” When he tried to speak, more tears welled up. He

had truly reached the height of embarrassment now. I’m in high school now,

and I’m not gonna cry just because my teammate is mad at me…I felt like

a mess today. Not just today, I’ve been a mess for a while now.

“I…I think

you’re really amazing, Mimura-kun, and I’ve looked up to you since middle

school, s-so what I said earlier was just my inferiority complex…I-I have a

warped personality, I-I’m gloomy, negative, and plain. I can’t think like you. I

know I should do my best to rehabilitate and continue playing volleyball

without thinking about anything, but I just keep slowly thinking about all

kinds of things and find myself in a bind…”

What was he

making excuses for while talking about himself? He couldn’t stand his own

personality. On top of that, his appearance was plain and dull. He envied

Mimura’s talent, but even if he had it, he wouldn’t have been able to become a popular

ace like him. He had never been deemed as someone who was fun to be with.

Everything

about them was the opposite of each other.

“I-I’m

sorry, but seriously, don’t worry about me…”

More than

not wanting to be worried about, he wanted to be left alone. Why are you

chasing me? I’ve built a wall, so why don’t you leave me alone?

“…Do you

regret it? Going to Fukuho.”

The voice

came from above his head. It was a mature and quiet voice, different from the

air when he was laughing in the middle of everyone.

“Ochi,

I think you definitely would have been a regular if you went somewhere that was at a moderate level. Maybe you wouldn’t have gotten hurt. You’re not a bad player at

all. I still remember in my dreams how at the winter tournament in second year,

I thought I made a great spike, but you caught it flying.”

He looked

up at him, surprised. He hadn’t expected that his play in middle school would

have left such an impression on Mimura.

He

remembered the play himself. He thought it was the best fine play of his

volleyball career. Mimura’s spike was so powerful that his arm went numb. But

more than that, his heart was numbed by his own play in picking up that spike.

“Should you

not have come to Fukuho? Maybe, but other than Fukuho, what other teams in our

prefecture have national-level power right now? None of them. Ochi, if you

wanted to see that scenery, then you made the right choice…right?”

Forgetting

that he had a crying face, Ochi stared at Mimura’s tightened face, as though he

was sucked into it before he knew it. If he had to say, Mimura had sharp and

distinct looks, but it wasn’t a face that stood out…he thought so, even making

allowances for his own biases, but it was as though there was a layer of air

around his face that had a different density, and it strangely attracted the

eye. This was the kind of attraction only special people had.

Mimura

Subaru wasn’t just an airheaded and cheerful guy who was blessed with talent.

He played volleyball with a high level of calculation and awareness. If someone

were to whine to him about how he had it easy or not because the team was

waiting for him, he would get angry.

“Did the

coach tell you about the manager thing?”

“Eh…uh,

yeah. He asked me if I want to do it.”

He sniffled

and nodded.

“Why don’t

you give it a try?”

Mimura

said, returning to the same cheerful voice he always heard.

“If you’re

complaining about not being on the bench even if you make it through rehab, why

don’t you try being a manager? If you’re a manager, you’ll be on the bench for

sure. If you’re a player, you have to be chosen from all the players to be on

the regular team, but there’s only one manager, right? You’ll be on the bench

in no time.”

…What…?

What’s

with that nonsensical thought process?

He never

had such an idea. Ochi couldn’t close his open mouth for a while, wondering

just how positive this guy was.

“Most of

the time, when we go to national tournaments, it’s all male managers.”

“Huh,

really?”

He

reacted to that as though jumping at it. “So that’s what it is,” he was

given a self-satisfied look. He felt embarrassed that he could see that he was

worrying about something trivial, like whether he would be laughed at for being

a male manager.

“Don’t you

wanna go to Spring High’s center court, Ochi?”

Mimura’s

sudden conversation shift made him say, “Huh…?” He was at a loss for a response

as he instantly shrank back.

Even Ochi

didn’t shy away from mentioning Spring High. Fukuho was a regular participant

of Spring High. It was unlikely they would have any opponents in the prefecture

this year, so they would probably make it to the tournament again.

However, it

was a different story when it came to the center court. At Spring High, the

semifinals and above were held on the center court. Compared to Inter-High,

where you had to make it to the finals to play on the center court, you

theoretically had a better chance, but for Fukuho, whose best result was a second-round

loss, it was more a “dream” than “goal.” His senpais graduated without ever

being able to reach it.

But, if it

was Mimura—if they had Mimura Subaru, they might be able to go.

Their

generation, with Mimura Subaru, who was surely the best ace in the history of

the Fukuho volleyball team, or rather, the history of the prefecture, would

finally step onto that single orange court surrounded by the arena seats filled

with spectators. If he could become part of the net that caught Mimura, holding

up “number one,” as he jumped into the air…on that dazzling court…

“What do

you want to do? Do you want to go or not?”

As he was

having his imagination run wild with a vacant look on his face, Mimura’s

eyebrows knitted together, looking a little impatient.

“I-I

want to go, yes…of course, but…it’s not like I’m…”

He leaned

forward and was about to say something, but it ended weakly and Mimura sighed

at him. He wondered if he was going to get mad at him again soon.

“Stop

complaining, strengthen your resolve, and leave your three years in my hands.

I’ll make you the center court manager at Spring High. Just imagine, being the

bench staff at the center court of Spring High. You’ll definitely stand out and

look cool, you know?”

Mimura’s

face broke into a smile. It was as if a spotlight was shone on him.

Ever since

middle school, he had never felt like he was standing on the same level with

Mimura. The place where Mimura was enjoying himself and surrounded by everyone

seemed like it was high up in the sky with the sparkling lights. Thinking it

was too far away from him, he retreated into the darkness.

But this

absolute king and superhero of Ochi’s generation simply jumped off his throne

with his incredible jumping power and came to him.

“Leave

your three years in my hands.”

With

those slightly forceful, but irresistibly appealing words, Ochi’s three years of

high school volleyball started all over again.

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