Check out advanced chapters on P@treon: [email protected]/CosmicKaminari
----------
Several days later, Kaito returned to Geminar.
He looked at the female students below, dressed in tournament attire that left rather little to the imagination, and swallowed quietly.
"The Martial Arts Tournament is finally beginning."
A great deal had happened in the time since he arrived. He had watched Kenshi get chased by girls across half the academy, exactly as the original story went. He had refereed the cooking duel between Aura and Kenshi, though he had skipped the pillow fight in Havoniwa. All in all, he felt he had lived rather well.
But the leisurely days were nearly over.
After the Martial Arts Tournament came the point in the story where Babalun's plan for the entire world of Geminar would be set in motion.
Though with Kaito present, could the Holy Land really fall the same way?
On the starting line, Lithia stood atop a hovercraft, signal flags in hand, looking out at the assembled contestants.
"Ready? Go!"
She swept the flags down. The competitors surged forward like a dam had broken.
Lithia watched them go with satisfaction until a peculiar sound reached her from somewhere nearby.
"Seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty, twenty-one..."
She turned. Kenshi was standing at the starting line, counting quietly to himself.
Lithia maneuvered the hovercraft to his side.
"Wild animal. What are you doing?"
Kenshi looked up with a genuinely puzzled expression.
"The rules said we had to count to ten thousand before starting."
Lithia's expression crumbled.
"There is no such rule! Go, now!"
Kenshi startled and began to move.
He moved extraordinarily slowly.
"What are you dragging behind you?!"
Lithia stared at the enormous iron weights chained to his back and pulled the hovercraft directly in front of him.
"The rules said—"
"Do you not find any of this the slightest bit suspicious, you idiotic wild animal?! Take it off immediately!"
"Yes! Ow, ow, ow!"
He struggled with the chains for some time without making progress. Lithia turned to the nearest competitor.
"You. Cut that off for him."
The greatsword came down and the chain snapped.
Kenshi bowed politely in thanks. Lithia was already pointing ahead.
"I did not tell you to thank anyone. Go!"
"Yes!"
Lithia watched Kenshi's figure shrink into the distance and let out a slow breath.
An explanation for anyone wondering why Lithia was so invested in Kenshi's performance.
Due to the large number of entrants, Lashara had, with characteristic instinct for opportunity, opened a betting pool on the tournament. Kenshi's daily performance had made him the heavy favourite for the championship. Naturally, a great many people had bet on him to win — and if he did, Lashara stood to lose a considerable sum.
So she had quietly filled his head with nonsense rules before the start.
Lithia had also bet on Kenshi to win. Hence the urgency.
"Hahaha. Lashara, you really go to extraordinary lengths to avoid paying out."
Kaito watched her from the side with an amused expression.
Lashara muttered darkly.
"That infuriating Lithia. Why not just tell Kenshi to use magic and be done with it?"
"This tournament explicitly prohibits magic. Discovery means immediate disqualification."
Kaito reached out and tapped her lightly on the head.
"Furthermore, I am right here as a supervising teacher for this very matter. You are being rather brazen."
"Ow! I was only saying it."
"Heh. If I do not watch you, you will absolutely do it."
He knew Lashara far too well. That girl would use any method available when money was on the line.
The tournament unfolded much as it had in the original story, eventually coming down to a duel between Kenshi and Aura.
Kenshi, pushed past his limit by Chiaia's provocation, went into full berserker mode and crossed the finish line with Aura well behind him.
Lashara watched him finish and sank slowly into her chair with an expression of someone watching their savings disappear.
"And there it is. Gambling is a dangerous habit, little girl. Better to stay well away from it."
Kaito offered this advice from the comfortable position of a man with experience.
He had, once upon a time, been something of a terror in pachinko parlours himself. The final accounting had not been pretty. But that was hardly relevant here. He was the senior, and seniors gave advice.
"It is too late for wisdom now. My money..."
The next day, the students of the Holy Land were going about their usual routines when something changed in the air.
Boom. Boom. Boom.
A series of violent explosions reached them in rapid succession. The tremors that followed knocked several female students off their feet.
"Ah!"
"What is happening?!"
"The security station is—"
The female students stared in shock at the sudden appearance of numerous Seikijin and the ruins of what had been defensive installations moments before.
A male student, piloting one of the attacking Seikijin, glanced toward the approaching flagship fortress and muttered to himself.
"Finally. Time to make myself useful."
These were the students Dagmyer had recruited.
Rather than accept the fate of male Seikishi as little more than breeding stock, they had chosen to join Babalun's plan to seize the Holy Land.
Under their sustained assault, the Holy Land's entire defence network began to collapse piece by piece.
Kaito stood on elevated ground at a distance and watched.
"A fortress is always breached from within. That saying really does hold up."
He glanced at the Shtrayu flagship fortress as it moved into position.
"The main attraction has arrived. Lashara must be going out of her mind right now."
Sakuya smiled and said nothing.
"We wait a little longer. The real show is about to start. This is not yet my moment to step in and..." He paused. "...make an entrance."
He turned to Sakuya.
"Aura and the others have made it to Swan by now, yes?"
"I called them over two hours ago under the pretext of an extra lesson."
"Good. They have learned some magic, but at their current level the best they could manage is a Great Fireball." He paused with a thoughtful expression. "Although I suppose that does put them ahead of a certain famous eye technique that somehow cannot manage to actually burn anyone."
"Master. Kenshi is heading this way."
Sakuya pointed. Kenshi was below them, moving fast, with Seikijin piloted by Dagmyer's recruits closing in from behind.
"The protagonist takes the stage. Things are about to get very messy down there."
Kaito produced the camera he kept on hand for exactly these occasions and trained it on Kenshi moving through the chaos below.