At first, Reon thought Hinata had run into a ghost, because there really was no dorm for Ryosuke on Shiratorizawa's side. But then he thought about how Coach Washijō spoiled that kid, and suddenly it did not seem impossible.
Right. Coach Washijō would never let Ryosuke stay at school without a dorm. He must have secretly prepared one for Ryosuke, and Ryosuke had probably never stayed there before. According to that kid's logic, if he had never stayed in it, then it basically did not exist. Which meant there was no need to mention it.
Once Reon figured everything out, it all made sense, and he could hardly wait to see it for himself.
The floor Hinata led everyone to happened to be right below the volleyball club dorms. The lights in that hallway were not working at night, so it was pitch black. A group of grown guys walked down the corridor trembling, yet somehow could not scrape together even a single person's courage.
"Hinata… are you sure you didn't run into a ghost?"
Tsutomu Goshiki stared at the dark hallway, shivering so badly that he was practically glued to Hinata. He had always been terrified of supernatural things.
Hinata was a little scared too. The hallway lights had definitely been working in the afternoon. Thank goodness everyone had come with him to look at the dorm. Otherwise, if he had come back alone tonight, he would have been scared to death.
Tendo had very good eyesight. By the moonlight coming through the hallway window, he could see Tsutomu Goshiki and Hinata trembling in each other's arms.
Then a bad idea came to him, and he quietly crept closer to the two of them. Reon saw it, but he turned a blind eye and said nothing.
Tendo grinned and blew a soft breath against the backs of their necks.
Tsutomu Goshiki shuddered, raised a hand to scratch his neck, and whispered to Hinata while trembling,
"Hinata… I feel like someone's following me…"
Cold sweat broke out on Hinata's forehead. He forced himself to stay calm and gripped Tsutomu Goshiki's arm tightly.
"The seniors are all here. What are you scared of…?"
"Right, right, right. Tendo-senpai, are you there?! Reon-senpai! Shirabu-senpai!"
Once Tsutomu Goshiki reacted, he did not dare turn around either. He started calling everyone's names one by one, but the wicked-hearted seniors behind them refused to make a sound.
Shirabu stared speechlessly at these seniors teasing the kids. He opened his mouth, about to tell them not to be scared, but Eita Semi quickly covered his mouth.
Shirabu turned back and glared at Eita Semi. Eita Semi grinned, placed his index finger against his lips in a "shh" gesture, then stopped walking.
Only then did Shirabu realize that everyone had stopped following them at some point. One by one, they stood there secretly laughing, watching to see when the two people up ahead would finally notice.
Only Tendo, who loved watching chaos, had quietly followed them and was still scaring them.
When no one answered his calls, Tsutomu Goshiki panicked. With trembling hands, he clutched Hinata's arm tightly, his voice nearly breaking into tears.
"Hinata… there's only one person's footsteps behind us now."
Hinata sniffed.
"Don't… don't be scared! Once we get to the dorm, we'll be fine."
Then he grabbed Tsutomu Goshiki and silently counted in his heart before sprinting all the way down the hall.
"Huh? Wait. Why are you running?" Tendo had still been planning to scare them a little more, but who knew these two blockheads would just take off?
"What are you standing there for? What if they get lost?" Reon's brows furrowed sharply, and he ran after them, shouting as he went,
"Tsutomu Goshiki! Hinata! Stop running!"
Tsutomu Goshiki and Hinata ran even faster. Of course they had to run. It was terrifying. They had actually heard Reon-senpai's voice. It had to be an illusion.
And so Hinata and Tsutomu Goshiki ran ahead, while Reon led a group of people chasing after them from behind. The whole scene looked a little ridiculous.
Hinata stopped with Tsutomu Goshiki at the dorm door, then shakily dug out the key.
Tendo, who had finally caught up, was panting from exhaustion. These two little brats could really run. He reached out and put a hand on Tsutomu Goshiki's shoulder.
"I'm telling you, you two are way too timid…"
"Aaaaaah! A ghost!!"
Tsutomu Goshiki saw the hand on his shoulder and screamed at the top of his lungs.
"Aaaaaah!"
Hinata screamed while trembling, but still had to open the door. It was a truly difficult mission.
When Tendo saw that they were both screaming, he felt so exhausted that he simply joined in. He took a deep breath, opened his mouth, and shouted,
"Aaaaaah! What are you two screaming for, aaaaaah?!"
Reon and the others who had rushed over were instantly surrounded by screams. The hallway lights were even shouted on by the three of them. Only then did Hinata realize that the lights in the hallway were not broken after all. They were sound-activated.
Reon covered his ears and spoke.
"You two…"
"Aaaaaaaaah!"
"Wait a second…"
"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaah!"
"Stop screaming!!" Reon finally could not take it anymore and shouted at the top of his lungs.
"Aaaaaaaaah, gaaah?"
Only then did Hinata and Tsutomu Goshiki finally recover. So it was Reon-senpai.
"Pfft, hahahahaha!"
Tendo clutched his stomach, laughing so hard he could not straighten up. Hahahaha, this was way too funny. How were these two so timid?
"Alright, stop laughing!" Reon pretended to scold Tendo seriously, though he himself was secretly holding back laughter.
"Hurry up and open the door, hurry up and open the door."
Yamagata kept muttering, urging Hinata to open it.
Only then did Hinata continue turning the key. Everyone stared fixedly at the door, all of them convinced that something incredible was hidden behind it.
"Creeeak."
The sound of the door opening was exactly like something from an amusement park haunted house. Yamagata hugged his arms and followed behind, craning his neck to peek inside.
Everyone trailed behind Reon and went in one by one to look around.
Once they stepped inside, the space suddenly opened up before them. The dorm was more than big enough to fit several grown guys. Reon froze on the spot, and then Tendo was shocked too.
He circled around the dorm, looking everywhere.
"What is this?! Why is Ryosuke's dorm so big?! This is so unfair, aaaaaah!"
Tendo looked at Ryosuke's dorm. It was small, but it had everything it needed. There was even a microwave and a washing machine specifically for socks. His sense of balance completely collapsed.
Their dorm was packed like a pigsty, and there was always a faint smell of stinky socks drifting around all day. But look at Ryosuke's place. Bright windows, clean surfaces. Tendo instantly understood what it meant for people to be born on different levels.
"Ah… damn it! I'm so jealous, waaaah!" Yamagata climbed onto the bed, flopped onto the 1.8-meter mattress, and rolled back and forth.
"This bed is huge."
The beds in Yamagata's dorm were only 1.6 meters, so no one could really blame him for being this excited.
"There's actually a private treadmill in the dorm?" Eita Semi's voice rose as he stared at the treadmill on the balcony in complete disbelief.
The group wandered around the dorm several times like they had never seen the world before. After they finished touring it, they all sent Ryosuke complaint messages, as if they had planned it in advance.
They did not dare express their dissatisfaction to Coach Washijō, but they could still secretly complain to Ryosuke a little. Who told him to quietly take such a huge advantage without saying a word?
Meanwhile, after Ryosuke finished showering, he was bombarded with messages from everyone at Shiratorizawa.
Ushijima listened to Ryosuke's phone ding nonstop and frowned irritably. He did not even know what exactly was making him annoyed right now. But whenever he thought about tomorrow's match,
Ushijima felt his blood heat up, and he could not sleep at all.
It was the same in the other rooms. Hirugami was currently pressing Hoshiumi down in front of the desk, making him carefully learn just what kind of opponents they would be facing tomorrow.
Otherwise, this brat might get carried away on the court and do something completely out of line with Kamomedai's style.
Atsumu Miya, meanwhile, was whining into the phone as he called his twin brother.
"Osamu, I'm playing middle blocker tomorrow."
"Huh? The national team coach finally kicked you out of the setter position? Congratulations."
"You bastard, Osamu! What kind of nonsense are you talking about?!"
...
As noisy as always.
Over in Inarizaki, Hyogo, Osamu Miya sat beneath the gym entrance and looked up at the moon.
As Atsumu Miya's twin brother, he could always notice right away when Atsumu Miya was clearly acting strange, then quickly change the subject. Osamu Miya could tell very clearly that the idiot was a little nervous, and a little excited too.
He was exactly like he always got before a major tournament. If he did not calm down, that guy might not sleep all night.
"Alright, you idiot Tsumu. I'm going home to eat your favorite tuna onigiri. You can wait to reunite with it in your dreams. Hmph."
"Aaaaaah! Damn you, Osamu! Save me one! Just one is fine! When I get back, you're finished!"
Osamu Miya held the phone far away from his ear in disgust, then walked step by step toward home under the moonlight.
...
"Bokuto-senpai, Bokuto-senpai, Bokuto-senpai! Stop spacing out!"
Keiji Akaashi was a little confused. Ever since the meeting ended, Bokuto-senpai had crawled under the table again and started spacing out. According to Keiji Akaashi's Owl Training Manual, Bokuto-senpai had shut down.
But… it was only a meeting. It should not have been enough to make him shut down this badly, right?
Keiji Akaashi sighed and crawled under another table as well, hugging his knees as he faced Bokuto.
Only then did Bokuto's dazed expression ease a little. When he saw that Keiji Akaashi had come over, his golden eyes lit up, and he tried to stand.
"Bokuto-senpai!"
"Bang!"
Five minutes later.
Bokuto sat in the chair, pitifully holding his head. A huge bump had swollen on his handsome forehead, making him look both miserable and funny.
Keiji Akaashi rolled an egg over Bokuto's forehead, his shoulders shaking with laughter. He laughed so hard that Bokuto became embarrassed and angry.
"Aaaaaah! Keiji Akaashi, stop laughing! This is so embarrassing!"
"O-okay, Bokuto-senpai, pfft…"
Keiji Akaashi looked at the huge bump on Bokuto's forehead. He really was trying his best not to laugh. Normally, he would never laugh at Bokuto-senpai. Unless he truly could not hold it in.
"Sigh…"
After laughing until he was tired, Keiji Akaashi sighed, then tapped the egg against Bokuto's head. With a crack, the eggshell broke. Keiji Akaashi sat cross-legged on the bed and naturally ate the boiled egg.
"Now can Bokuto-senpai tell me what happened?"
Bokuto drooped and buried his head in Keiji Akaashi's jacket, his voice muffled.
"We have a practice match tomorrow. That Takahashi-senpai is really amazing… We're both outside hitters, but he's completely different from me."
That was why Bokuto was feeling down. Ran Takahashi had also come to last year's practice match.
But at that time, he had not gone on court. He had only sat below and observed everyone. When the match ended, Ran Takahashi came over and said something to Bokuto, and Bokuto's mood dropped on the spot.
"I heard from Coach Hosho that you're Fukurōdani's ace. From what I saw, you're nothing special. Do you know how many points were lost on offense because of your emotions? Do you know the entire team is accommodating you? If this were a world match, you would have lost long ago.
"You are an ace. You are an ordinary ace, not some big star. Do you understand what I mean by ordinary?"
That long speech had struck like thunder. Bokuto could no longer remember how he left the court back then. It seemed Hibarida had said he needed to calm down, and only then had he stepped off.
Afterward, Ran Takahashi had come over to apologize. He admitted that his words had gone too far, but he had been anxious. The national team urgently needed a batch of capable young players to rise up. On the surface, they looked endlessly glorious, bodies racing across the court, but inside, their joints were rusting, and their injuries were piling up.
The Volleyball Association had not seen promising seedlings in a long time, so at that moment, he had failed to hold himself back and had been a little too harsh.
And because among that group back then, only Ushijima and Kiryu looked somewhat reliable, while Bokuto was still not steady enough, the national team decided to hold him back for a year before letting him move up. They hoped that in that year, Bokuto would transform and become more mature.
Ran Takahashi truly had high hopes for this kid who would always keep working hard, no matter when it was.
"Pfft, so that's what this was about?"
Keiji Akaashi could not help laughing. Bokuto-senpai was really cute. So he had little worries like this too.
"Aaaaaah, Keiji Akaashi, you're still laughing at me!"
Bokuto pulled himself out of the jacket and lunged over to tickle Keiji Akaashi.
"Hahahaha! Bo, Bokuto-senpai! Hahaha, don't! Listen to me, hahaha!"
Keiji Akaashi rolled around from being tickled, his face flushed red from laughing. Seeing that Keiji Akaashi really did have something to say, Bokuto finally showed mercy and withdrew his hands.
Keiji Akaashi lay on the bed and let out a long sigh, wiping away the tears of laughter from the corners of his eyes.
"Bokuto-senpai and Takahashi-senpai are different. Everyone is different. Takahashi-senpai also reached where he is step by step, just like us. Maybe back then, he didn't even put in as much effort as you do.
"Maybe he just worked a little harder, had a little more talent, and was a little luckier. Bokuto-senpai, you're not bad at all."
Keiji Akaashi smiled, his eyes curving, then added,
"And Bokuto-senpai's Rebound Light Wave is super cool."
Bokuto froze for two seconds. Then his mouth suddenly turned down, and his eyes turned watery.
"Waaaah! Keiji Akaashi! How are you this nice? Waaaah! In the future… whoever gets to marry you will be so lucky, waaaah!"
Keiji Akaashi sighed helplessly and rubbed Bokuto's prickly hairstyle.
"Bokuto-senpai, I'm a boy. You can't use 'marry' for me like that."
Bokuto mumbled stubbornly,
"If I say you can, then you can."
"Bokuto-senpai…"
"You can!"
...
Next door to Bokuto and Keiji Akaashi were Komori and Sakusa.
Sakusa's trip to this training camp had not been very pleasant. He had originally wanted to get closer to Ryosuke, but no matter where he went, he was stopped as if people were guarding against a thief. It was truly depressing.
Not to mention that dead fox Atsumu Miya. Every day, his eyes were practically glued to Ryosuke. Just looking at him made Sakusa angry.
And right now, Sakusa was in the bathroom…
***
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