Pruned Trees Re-Sprout!! ~ Ragazza Volpe Magica ~

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP

“AAAUGH!” Pacifica immediately buried her head under one of the pillows as the morning alarms blared from the three tuners on the nightstands.

“Rebecca, turn it off please,” Shouri groaned.

Thud thud thud

It took a couple of tries, but Rebecca finally managed to find one of the tuners and silence it, despite her grogginess.

It was about 4 AM or so on the 14th of July. Shouri and his Resonators were in the lap of extreme luxury, but with that painfully annoying alarm, it was time for them to earn their stay.

The group of four shuffled about the room like a small horde of zombies, slowly getting dressed and ready for the long day ahead.

KNOCK KNOCK

“Master Tomoshibi, your ride to the stadium is here whenever you’re ready to go,” Alfred could be heard from the other side of the door.

Shouri paused, his brain halting everything else he was doing to process those words. After a moment the Maestro nodded. “At least we don’t have to take the bus, I guess,” he commented before continuing his morning preparations.

About an hour later the group was finally ready to go. “Master Klein has instructed me to inform you that there will be breakfast served at the stadium,” Alfred told the group as they made their way to the door. “Your staff badges were left in my care.” One by one the butler clipped the badges to each of the drowsy young adults, stepping back and allowing himself a thin smile at the now presentable group.

“Cibo…” Taika smiled groggily, her tail slowly swishing behind her.

“I’m doing it for the hot tub,” Pacifica giggled sleepily.

“Coffeee…” Rebecca mimicked her fellow fox.

“Thanks, Mr. Belvedere,” Shouri yawned, attempting to rub the sleep from his eyes.

“Of course, I shall await your return this evening. Pleasant travels.”

And with that, their first day of contract work began.

Arriving at the stadium a little after 5:30 in the morning, it was already packed. There were Maestros and their Resonators everywhere. The highest concentration were the members of the general public waiting to be admitted into their seats in the main stadium.

There were also several battle courts all around the gargantuan property where there were already spectators waiting as well.

Many tents dotted the landscape, some merchants, others filled with tournament staff. Taika spotted a couple of brightly labeled medical tents. “We’ll probably be in one of those Paci,” the healer pointed out to her partner in crime.

“Yeah… I wonder what they’ll have us do,” the otter pondered.

“What do you think that guy is gonna make us do Sho?” Rebecca questioned her Maestro.

“Good fucking question,” Shouri grunted. “I’m expecting hell, but honestly it’s probably worse than I can imagine,” he added, already feeling the exhaustion creep up.

Shouri could feel the glares on them as they cut through the line and made their way towards the entrance. He didn’t even have to say anything, the security personnel standing at the head of the line saw their badges and opened the gate to allow their passage.

“Damn, people are pissy,” Rebecca commented when they were out of earshot of the waiting spectators.

“Yeah, at least they’re not going to be working the event.” Pacifica glanced back at the rowdy crowd. “Never thought I’d be event staff myself though.” The otter flipped the badge clipped to her vest up to sneak a peek at it.

“This way.” Shouri motioned for his gaggle of girls to continue following him.

Even without the hordes of fans wandering around the stadium, there were still plenty of people out and about in this early hour. Naturally, it was all event staff, vendors, and even some of the competitors.

“Hey, some of those guys were duelists,” Rebecca noted as they passed by one such Maestro and their Resonators.

“Yeah, according to what Elijah texted me earlier they do check in for competitors super early so they can relax before round one,” Shouri explained.

“How does this even work anyway?” Taika questioned, the most unfamiliar with competitive battling.

Shouri lowered his head, recalling the actual tournament structure. He wasn’t the biggest fan of the Resonator battle scene, but he knew how it worked on a surface level. “The first couple of days are played in a ‘Swiss’ style where you battle in a certain number of one-on-one Resonator battles, typically based on total entrants. At the end of this period, your record is compared to everyone else’s, and the top one hundred and twenty-eight are arranged in a tournament bracket which is single elimination, but are played in three versus three single battles,” the Maestro lectured the group.

Rebecca nodded. “It’s like the battle we saw last night. You can use up to three Resonators, but only one is on the battlefield at a time. Substitutions can be made whenever you want, but the Resonator currently in battle has to exit the field before their replacement is allowed to move onto the field,” she told the uninitiated.

“Sounds complicated,” was what Taika decided on.

“It kinda is, but the Resonators themselves are trained on what they need to do,” Shouri said with a shrug.

“Swiss is the toughest part of the whole event. All competitive battles are played out to zero,” Pacifica added.

“That means their hair starts turning grey?” Taika raised a brow.

“You got it. It’s what makes Swiss so difficult – the Maestro has to juggle their own and their team’s natural rhythm recovery while knowing when to surrender to avoid taking unnecessary damage. They also have to win enough games to make top cut. Once in top cut you only play one battle a day, so the Maestro and their team have a chance to recover before their next battle.” Rebecca explained.

“Very complicated,” Taika mumbled.

It was at this point in their conversation they reached the staff room they had been summoned to. “At any rate, we’re not doing that – we’re here to make sure this thing goes off smoothly. Nationals are some of the most important events of the competitive year – there are only six of them after all,” Shouri advised his group. They each replied with a nod.

“Mister Tomoshibi! You made it!”

There was a voice they recognized amongst all the strangers. Yes, Elijah Klein was sitting at one of the tables, Zino next to him as always. “Grab yourself some food and join me!” The Klein heir motioned to the catered buffet laid out for them.

None of them were going to argue with free food, especially with the steam rising from them, a nice warm breakfast certainly would hit the spot. As they crossed through the room though, Shouri’s group could feel all eyes were on them.

“Who are they?”

“Mr. Klein specifically invited them?”

“Is that the Maestro Mr. Klein was talking about?”

“What a weird team composition.”

“A Lunar huh?”

“Hey, you think she’s a Renard?”

Taika and Rebecca flattened their ears, though cursed with their superior hearing the muttering of the masses may have well been shouting.

“Ignore them.” Pacifica patted her fellow Resonators on the back and urged them towards the food. She leaned in between the two foxes. “We’re the VIPs here, remember?” the otter tittered.

“R-right,” Taika whispered back.

“Jealous idiots,” Rebecca grumbled quietly.

Shouri cracked a smile, at least he could be confident that Pacifica was back to normal now. The quartet got themselves breakfast and joined Elijah and Zino at their table.

“Good morning, I hope the accommodations are to your taste?” Elijah greeted the group as they took their seats.

“Yeah?” Shouri raised a brow.

“My assistants insisted it was the best hotel in the city. I would hope they wouldn’t lead me astray with such a bold claim. Even with my family’s vast fortune I still would like to get my money’s worth,” Elijah chuckled.

This earned a grunt of annoyance from Shouri. “Yeah, I guess that’s fair,” he conceded without much effort.

“It must be at least better than staying at the Maestro Affairs Offices, those beds were too rough even for Zino,” Elijah added this time eliciting a snort of indignation from his own Resonator.

“I see,” Shouri mumbled, focusing on polishing off his breakfast.

“So let’s get to your task for today,” Elijah smirked.

“Well, I guess they didn’t skimp on the aesthetic.” Shouri looked himself over in the mirror in one of the locker rooms. He had changed into a collared shirt and shorts over what seemed to be a black jumpsuit underneath.

“Uhg… this feels weird.” Rebecca came from around the corner, sporting a similar outfit, though her top was a fiery red rather than the green Shouri was clad in.

“I’m just hoping we don’t need this body armor.” The Maestro leveled his arm out parallel to his body, studying the strange material. “I think it might even be better than the stuff that Aster guy wears, which says something,” he noted.

CLANG

“Way lighter too.” Rebecca had demonstrated this by spinning around and kicking the nearby lockers. “Good range of motion, I guess,” she commented, lowering her foot.

“Let’s get down to our assignment.” Shouri brushed his hand across his waist, noting the presence of two of his three tuners, notably he had his vixen’s tuners, Taika’s midnight black and Rebecca’s fiery red proudly by his side. Connections to two of his three Resonators confirmed they set off towards their job for the day.

Today’s assignment was a pretty mundane one all things considered: Shouri and Rebecca would be officiating preliminary matches in one of the battle courts surrounding the main stadium. There were hundreds of matches that needed to be completed before the main rounds of play started in a couple of days and these first couple of days always seemed to be short-staffed. In fact, Elijah himself was overseeing matches in the center field.

“At least we’re not in the stadium.” Shouri shot a glance at the massive building that towered over the property as a whole, and where the majority of the audience was concentrated. There were plenty of smaller bleachers scattered about and fans moved between the different battlefields, trying to decide where they were going to watch.

Shouri and Rebecca had been assigned to court thirty-one, on the west side of the stadium. Given how early it was still, they were in the shade provided by the main building, so the onlookers were greater in number on this side, attempting to avoid the rising heat of the morning sun.

Like any Resonator battle court, their assignment was surrounded by a chain-link fence, though threaded between the links was the mystical Vatonium. As Elijah had so helpfully informed them, the material was threaded into the fence in such a way as to minimize viewer obstruction, but thick enough to protect the general public from spells that may fly loose during a heated battle.

Due to their almost cheat-like nature, Ultimate level spells were very specifically banned from all competitive play. Things like the Fire Ultimate attack spell, which melts anything created by civilization, or the Earth Ultimate attack spell which drops an earth-rending stone trident from the sky could easily shred the Vatonium fencing and probably the stadium as a whole if they were thrown about willy-nilly.

Shouri took up his position on the ref’s box, Rebecca at his side. “You got this bossman,” Rebecca smirked at her Maestro.

“I don’t want to got this, but don’t really have a choice,” Shouri sighed. They did want to watch some competitive battles, and they had the absolute best seats in the house. Nothing beats being on the court with the battlers themselves.

His tuner beeped, stirring Shouri from his thoughts. Glancing to his left, he saw a Maestro and his three Resonators, and standing opposite was another male Maestro and their own selection of Resonators. Shouri pulled Taika’s black tuner from his side, needing the extra nudge of her willpower.

Keeping his gaze entirely on his tuner, Shouri read the script provided to him by Elijah.

“Maestros!” Shouri boomed. “This is a one-on-one battle with no substitutions! Goal is zero percent rhythm remaining!” He paused for a moment, his eyes quickly scanning the text before he continued. “Please make your selections, you have thirty seconds!”

There was always a tense standoff at this point. The six Resonators, standing behind their respective Maestros all stood at the ready – to move if their tuner was pulled. It was like old western movies, the two Maestros hovering their hands at their waists, considering their Resonator choice versus their opponents.

Finally, they drew.

With the tuner selections of each Maestro, the respective Resonator hopped onto the battlefield.

“You have fifteen minutes – Let the battle begin!” Shouri dropped his hand down as instructed in his script.

With that, the first round of battle started in earnest.

“Woah.” Rebecca grabbed Shouri’s shoulder to steady herself.

“Are you okay?” He wrapped his arm around hers, resting his hand on her shoulder.

“Yeah.” The Renard quickly shook it off. “That was just the most rhythm I’ve ever felt at one time, so many spells cast all at once.”

Looking at the battle they had to watch, it was intense. Fortissimo and Lento spells – the highest rank of attack and support spells being casually tossed around like they were nothing.

And these people were expected to maintain this level of power for two days? It was utter insanity.

However-

“Ref! I surrender!” the Maestro to the left called to Shouri.

With such a quick forfeit, Shouri was thrown for a loop, quickly scrolling through his script. “R-right! Game set!” he shouted, lifting a hand in favor of the right-side Maestro.

“That was fast…” Rebecca gasped.

“Lightning versus Water from what it looked like. Guess he didn’t want to take any unnecessary damage,” Shouri mused.

“That or maybe he’s hoping he gets some better match-ups with an 0-1 record?” Rebecca pondered quietly as she watched the round one combatants leave their field.

Thankfully the Klein Foundation knew how to treat their staff – every judge box had a shaded section and a cooler filled with drinks, snacks, and a place for them to sit while they waited for the next round.

“At least he’s not a total slave driver.” Shouri leaned back in his seat, taking the chance to check on Taika’s vitals with her tuner.

“Yeah, this is pretty nice.” Rebecca let out a pleasured breath, reclining in her chair. “Wonder what Taika and Pacifica are up to.”

“Dunno, haven’t gotten a call from Paci for spells, so probably pretty peaceful at the moment.”

“There you go, all better.” Pacifica smiled, having just finished applying a bandage to a child’s knee.

“Thank you Miss Otter!” the child exclaimed, before hopping off the chair they were sitting in and rushing out of the medical tent.

“Sono così annoiato,” Taika sighed.

“Cheer up Taika, we don’t want people to get hurt!” Pacifica sat next to her fellow fox.

They had been assigned to one of the medical tents on the west side of the stadium. Shouri and Rebecca were supposed to be at one of the battle courts nearby, but they couldn’t be sure of exactly where.

If Taika really focused, she got a general sense of the direction he was in, but nothing concrete. Either way, it didn’t resolve her current boredom.

“Don’t look so dead. The rush hasn’t begun yet,” the Maestro doctor assigned to their particular tent warned.

Dr. Jessica Miya was probably twice the age of the two Resonators she was working with, a world-weary woman who had seemingly seen it all in her unflinching, rough demeanor. Even so, she shortened her name to the less threatening sounding “Jess”, perhaps to not scare her patients, no one knew, and the woman herself refused to comment on such trivialities.

“The rush?” Taika perked up.

“Day one early morning, not much happens; people still have plenty of rhythm and their team is pretty healthy. Their record is straight zeros, they still have a run,” Jess began. “But you start getting into the later rounds, people get desperate, they start pushing themselves and their Resonators.” The doctor paused.

“They start making stupid choices,” her voice was low, grim. “Fortissimo spells aren’t to be trifled with, and yet these kids fling them around like they’re using Ethereals.” A pause. “There’s no honor in getting your Resonators crippled.”

Pacifica and Taika exchanged a concerned glance. “S-surely it’s not that bad,” Pacifica chuckled nervously.

“Just wait. I’m sure you’ll see a couple of retirements today,” Jess warned.

Another look of trepidation passed between the two Resonators – what had they signed themselves up for?