Yanagi Renji wouldn't dare ask Zerozaki Hajime to do chores around the Tennis Club; giving her the title was just a formality.
Putting aside her mysterious identity, simply knowing that Yukimura Seiichi harbored other intentions toward her was enough to keep Yanagi from ever making Zerozaki do odd jobs.
Unexpectedly, Zerozaki smiled at them and said, "This position is quite good, and it's convenient for what I need to do. Thank you for putting so much thought into this."
Yukimura was thoroughly pleased with Zerozaki's reaction. The smile in his eyes deepened, a brilliant light dancing across his hazel gaze. "Think nothing of it. As long as it helps you, Zerozaki-san. It's just... managers have quite a lot of duties to handle, so I'm afraid you'll have to trouble yourself with coming over here often from now on."
Zerozaki looked straight into Yukimura's eyes. For some reason, she felt as though she had just been targeted.
She frowned slightly, opening her mouth to say something.
However, noticing that the match on the court was still deadlocked, Yukimura stepped past Zerozaki. He walked onto the court, stopped the match between Sanada and the others, and instructed the regular players to begin their other physical conditioning drills.
*Hmm... Am I overthinking things?*
Reflecting on the fact that they were nothing more than teenagers in their mid-teens, Zerozaki let the matter go and began to wonder if she actually needed to fulfill any managerial duties.
Just as she stood up, she saw another club member walking over to record the training durations and set counts for the regular players.
Zerozaki's mind caught up with the reality of the situation: her position was entirely nominal, so what on earth was Yukimura talking about when he claimed a manager had a lot of work to do?
Still, she didn't want to waste time dwelling on Yukimura and spinning herself in circles.
Zerozaki opened her System interface. Ever since she discovered that the monsters were being released by a Ball Monster, she had noticed something. Even though all the newly spawned monsters still appeared scattered across the map, it was now obvious they were all clustering around the indoor tennis court.
However, none of those monsters had moved yet, leading Zerozaki to suspect they were still in the process of growing.
She needed to hurry over and eliminate them. Otherwise, once they scattered and started running around everywhere, it would not only disrupt the world, but also waste her precious time.
Zerozaki minimized the interface and stood up, intending to walk out of the tennis court. Remembering her new role as manager, she decided to go give Yukimura a quick heads-up, but as she turned around, she saw him watching her.
Zerozaki pointed toward the indoor tennis court. Yukimura nodded, smiling as he mouthed the words to her:
"Be careful out there."
With that, Zerozaki activated Stealth Mode and vanished, reappearing near the indoor tennis court.
Sure enough, small monsters were floating all through the air. The moment they caught sight of Zerozaki, they scrambled away in terror, only to be struck down one by one by her beams of light.
Realizing her energy was critically depleted, Zerozaki sighed. The second she closed her eyes, she was bounced right back in front of Yukimura.
Yukimura was in the middle of a rally with Yanagi, who had just smashed a ball directly toward Yukimura—straight on a collision course with the back of Zerozaki's head.
Reacting instantly, Yukimura pulled her behind him and swung his racket, executing a flawless return against Yanagi's shot.
The regular players standing outside the court froze for a second before instantly launching into a chorus of teasing commentary.
Niou Masaharu spoke first, showing off his astonishing knack for summing up a situation. "Puri! Looks like our captain finally saved the damsel in distress and scored a point."
"Ahhhhh! Why did the magician suddenly appear on the court?!" Kirihara Akaya yelled, gripping the wire fence with wide eyes.
"Too lax, Zerozaki-san!" Sanada Genichirou barked, crossing his arms as he remembered Zerozaki's reckless stunt from that morning, unable to stop himself from shouting at her.
"Zerozaki-san can teleport too! Can you take other people with you when you do that?!" Marui Bunta asked, staring at Zerozaki with burning excitement. He genuinely wanted to tag along on one of Zerozaki's adventures.
Jack Kuwahara made it clear that he completely agreed with Marui's sentiment.
Standing right beside Sanada, Yagyuu Hiroshi pushed up his glasses and let out an amazed sigh. "Zerozaki-san... what an incredible person!"
Yukimura turned around, looking down at Zerozaki with a faint smile. "Are you alright, Zerozaki-san?"
Truth be told, the moment Yukimura pulled her behind him and she watched him return that shot, her heart had skipped a beat, hadn't it?
She stared blankly at Yukimura. It hit her then just how long it had been since she last experienced the feeling of being shielded by someone else. Ever since she became an Order Officer, she was always the one putting herself in front of others, always the one doing the protecting.
Seeing that Zerozaki was staring at him in silence and unable to read what she was thinking, Yukimura was about to tell her to go sit in the spectator stands when he heard her say, "I'm fine. Sorry for interrupting your practice."
With that, she walked off toward the stands on her own.
Sensing that something was a bit off with Zerozaki, Yukimura watched her retreating figure with a trace of worry in his eyes. But seeing her flash a smile as she sat down in the front row of the stands, he turned his attention back to his match with Yanagi.
Marui and Kirihara hurried over to sit on either side of Zerozaki. Marui pulled out a small cake with a grin and held it out right in front of her. "Welcome gift! I heard Zerozaki-san is our new tennis club manager! We can hang out together from now on!"
Zerozaki blinked. She didn't actually need to eat food, but this was a kind gesture from someone else.
She smiled, took the small cake from Marui, and echoed his words, "Thank you for the welcome gift, Marui-san."
Everyone here knew that Zerozaki was considerably older than them, but they didn't mind being addressed by their given names in private. It was only when other people were around that Zerozaki needed to call them "Senior" so as not to appear impolite.
Seeing that their chat was over, Kirihara immediately grabbed Zerozaki's hand. "Zerozaki! Can you... can you shoot that beam of light again?!"
The moment their skin made contact, Zerozaki felt her energy beginning to recover, her mind and body relaxing in tandem.
"Yeah! Yeah, Zerozaki-san! Or at least show us the light show again!!" Marui chimed in, looking at her with eager anticipation.
Faced with the two of them looking like a pair of curious toddlers, Zerozaki nodded. She looked at Kirihara and said, "Don't let go of my hand yet."
As she spoke, Zerozaki freed her other hand and checked her surroundings. Seeing that only the regular players were nearby, she gathered her energy and manifested a beam of light.
First, she shaped the light into a white tennis ball, then formed a tiny white tennis racket, and finally shaped it into a miniature white cake.
"She really is a magician, Zerozaki!"
"So cool! I want to have superpowers just like Zerozaki-san too!"
Once her energy was fully replenished, Zerozaki stopped showing off. She effortlessly slipped her hand free from their grip and said to the two boys, "You should pay attention to your captain's match instead of wasting time on me."
Sanada had been just about to discipline Kirihara and Marui for failing to focus on the match, but hearing Zerozaki voice the exact reprimand he had in mind sent a ripple through his thoughts.
Still, he kept his stern tone as he looked at Zerozaki. "And you as well, Zerozaki-san. Don't go doing anything too dangerous."
Zerozaki knew Sanada was referring to the stunt she pulled that morning when she dropped Yukimura into mid-air. She smiled and nodded. "Understood, I'll be more careful next time."
To be honest, though, Zerozaki guessed that Yukimura probably enjoyed the thrill of it. At any rate, after what happened this morning, Yukimura hadn't shown any sign of resentment toward her. If he truly loathed her, he never would have invited her to be their manager—let alone engaged in this subtle game of wits with her.
Right, a game of wits. Though somehow it didn't quite feel like that either. Zerozaki felt a faint flutter of puzzlement in her heart.
Still, she didn't want to dwell on it for too long. Tracking down and destroying the source that was spawning those monsters was the real priority.
Before long, the two-plus hours of practice came to an end. To celebrate Zerozaki joining the tennis club, the group announced they were heading down to the beach to watch the sunset.
The sunset by the Kanagawa coastline was tranquil and warm. A sea breeze swept past, carrying a faint scent of sea salt blended with the vibrant vitality of blossoming spring.
Yet all the way there, Zerozaki kept her System interface open. The collective energy gathered by a group of regular players was far too likely to attract monster incursions, and she needed to stay vigilant at all times.
Even so, it seemed that apart from Yukimura—who was bound to her—none of the other regular players could see her System interface.
Noticing this as well, Yukimura's smile grew even warmer. "It seems... this is a secret that belongs only to Zerozaki-san and me."
...
Zerozaki glanced at him without a word, then turned her gaze toward the other regular players, who were currently bantering and shoving each other a short distance away.
Seeing that they hadn't noticed what was happening over here, she went back to operating her virtual interface, focusing primarily on searching for a method to destroy the source item.
"Zerozaki-san! Come on, join us!"
Marui walked up to Zerozaki and, seeing her hand hovering in mid-air, assumed she was waiting for someone to pull her along. He grabbed her hand and dragged her toward Kirihara and the rest of the gang.
Caught off guard while operating her System interface, Zerozaki stumbled forward, looking completely bewildered as she stared at Marui. "Hey... wait..."
Before she could finish, Kirihara's eyes widened with excitement as he pressed her, "Since Zerozaki's martial arts skills are so awesome, does that mean you can play tennis using magic too?!"
"Huh?!"
Zerozaki stared at Kirihara in utter incomprehension. *How on earth did he make the leap to tennis from that?!*
"Puri, Akaya, you really do have an incredible imagination, though I actually wouldn't mind seeing Zerozaki-san play tennis," Niou remarked.
In his opinion, Kirihara's train of thought was a bit too wild. But then again, he often played fighting games with Kirihara where the characters performed all sorts of gravity-defying parkour while battling.
Since Zerozaki could scale walls and move like that, her physical fitness was probably top-notch, meaning she'd likely be pretty decent at tennis.
"That's right, that's right! Just a while ago, Yanagi was saying that Zerozaki-san's racket-swinging form during PE class was textbook standard!" Marui chimed in from the side.
"PE class?"
Zerozaki froze for a moment. *So when I felt like someone was watching me during class earlier, I was right after all.*
*Was Yukimura there too?*
She turned her head to look at the "Big Three" of Rikkai standing together behind her.
Catching her gaze, Yukimura—who had been laughing and chatting with Yanagi and Sanada—flashed a smile back at her.
Zerozaki clicked her tongue inwardly. *Things are starting to get complicated.*