Chapter Ninety: The Proper Way to Play Football

“Teacher Ruby, please, I’m begging you.”

A boy with a close-cropped crew cut bowed deeply to Ruby, wearing a shameless grin as he made his request.

“Begging me for what?”

Ruby lifted his head and glanced at him, noticing that a whole cluster of boys had followed behind him. He was clearly their leader. If Ruby remembered correctly, his name was something like Sime. Seventeen, perhaps? To have been admitted at that age, he must be quite gifted. He was also the student who had once asked Ruby for a lighter in class.

“Could you make us something fun to do? I know you can do anything.”

Compared with the other students, Sime was especially quick-witted. It was obvious he was the ringleader of that little circle. At his signal, two boys immediately came around behind Ruby and began massaging his shoulders, while some snacks that students invariably liked were placed on the table. A brazen bribe.

“Who told you that?”

“Do I even need to hear it from someone? I won’t even mention the knowledge you taught in class, or the cooking that drove the cafeteria out of business. But last time, someone saw you helping the girls with those really pretty hairstyles, and even designing clothes for them. Isn’t that right?”

“There is such a thing.”

Ruby did not deny it. As his fame as a teacher grew, more and more students wanted to know just how much he could do, and often asked him about things beyond magic. In the end, they discovered he was skilled at everything. No one knew which bold girl had first asked him how to dress beautifully, but by the end of it all, he had brought Earth’s fashion to this place.

“That makes things easy, then. We don’t need hair or clothes or anything like that. Just give us something fun to play with.”

“Play?”

Ruby glanced at the boys around him and fell into thought. People in this other world had many bad habits, and one of them was disliking exercise. Since they could practice magic even while sitting down, physical activity had essentially been left behind. If not for the fact that expending magical power also counted as exertion, this world would have become a paradise for glorious couch potatoes.

Mournia was a perfect example. A mighty goddess of magic, she would puff just from running a few steps. “Helpless as a chick” was not just an expression. Back at the little wooden cottage, Ruby had once bought a magical beast that looked rather like a chicken. If one was not careful, one would see it chasing the goddess around. Since she did not want dinner to vanish from the world, Mournia did not dare use magic to kill it, and the whole incident became a lifelong humiliation that Ruby was strictly forbidden to mention.

“Life is movement. How about we play ball?”

“Ball?”

Though Sime did not understand what Ruby meant by playing ball, he somehow felt it would be a very interesting game, and one especially suited to him.

So, over the course of the next day, the students all saw a group of figures busily working on the broad school grounds. Ruby still had some steel left over for the goalposts, and the field itself was easy enough to prepare: a bit of plant magic to trim the grass on the ground would do. The main task was laying out the various zones of the pitch. After a day’s work, a field roughly a hundred meters long and seventy meters wide had been set into the lower right corner of the grounds. The academy’s training yard was simply enormous, easily large enough to hold several pitches.

“So this is where we’re going to play? It feels amazing.”

Two broad goals, neat white lines, and a lawn trimmed to perfect smoothness left Sime wide-eyed. That once unremarkable training ground had transformed in the blink of an eye, and his admiration for Ruby deepened still further. He stared at the pitch, eager to try it out. If Ruby gave the word, he and his friends would rush in at once, though none of them quite knew yet what they were supposed to do inside.

“It’s late now, so let me explain the rules first. This is a team sport. First, you need to gather your teammates...”

Ruby did not let Sime rush in immediately. Instead, he explained the rules of football to them. Young people understood quickly; before long they had grasped the basics, and, following Sime, they went off that very night to find teammates, planning to gather twenty-two players before anything else.

By the next day, two squads, one in red and one in blue, walked onto the pitch under Ruby’s guidance and faced each other. Whether it was only an illusion or not, Ruby kept feeling that the atmosphere between the two teams was strange, as though there were some old grudge between them.

In truth, it was because one of Sime’s teammates had let something slip the day before, and the upperclassmen had found out. How could such a fun-looking sport be left to the lower grades alone? The upperclassman leading them was the tall boy who had once gone to Ruby’s private kitchen to see what it was like. He quickly gathered a group of friends and came to seize the field from Sime. From now on, the ownership of the football pitch would be decided by the outcome of this match.

“Senior Rona, you’re already old enough. Better not try to compete with the youngsters. If you strain your back, that would be unfortunate.”

Sime was wholly unwilling to accept the tall boy’s claim. This was the field they had begged Ruby to make. It should have belonged to them. And yet Rona insisted the grounds belonged to all students, and that anyone had the right to play there. To such talk, Sime only wanted to say: go to hell. On ordinary days, this lousy training yard could not even be seen through the people on it!

“Don’t worry, Junior Sime. I rather think this game is too exciting for young people. It’s better for us upperclassmen to show you how it’s done.”

Rona was the tall boy’s real name. Sime’s taunts made the veins on his face nearly burst. He was only twenty-five—where was the old age in that? So he answered in kind, with a sarcastic jab of his own.

“Ready—begin!”

Ruby blew his whistle. As soon as the signal for the match rang out, Sime kicked the ball hard away from him, and the nine companions behind him immediately chased after it. Rona’s teammates naturally gave pursuit as well.

To an expert eye, the whole thing was an utter free-for-all. Their attacking rhythm and passing were a complete mess. But they had only just come into contact with the sport; no one was in the mood to remember all those tedious rules. They would have to fall in love with the game first before they could truly keep them in mind. For now, Ruby simply let the lively students do as they pleased.

At the start of the match, the pitch was a picture of harmony. Though the team coordination was rough, everyone was enjoying himself, and they were all very obedient about fighting over the ball according to the rules. But the good times did not last long. After a little more than ten minutes, the mages’ stamina was exhausted. One by one, they were breathing hard and could barely keep up with the ball. This sport was, after all, one of the most physically demanding on Earth. Ruby shook his head at the sight. With these students’ endurance, if they played a full match they would probably die on the field.

Yet while the others trudged after the ball like zombies, one agile shadow suddenly rose above the rest. With the bearing of a crane among chickens, he snatched the ball and prepared to attack.

“That flow of magic power... A Light Body Spell!”

When Sime dashed past Rona, Rona’s nose twitched and he cried out in sudden realization. He had thought Sime’s stamina was unnatural, and it turned out the fellow had used magic. The Light Body Spell was a useful technique that reduced one’s weight, and with less weight, running naturally cost less effort.

“It never said in the rules that we couldn’t use magic, you idiots.”

Having been caught using magic, Sime did not even blush. Instead, he stuck out his tongue at the upperclassmen in open mockery.

“Just you wait!”

At first, Rona had not intended to use magic. But since Sime had started it, he would not be polite about it. With a slight movement of his fingers, he condensed a thin sheet of ice beneath Sime’s feet. The unsuspecting Sime stepped on it and went crashing down flat on his face. At the same time, Rona stole the ball from under him.

Once the two captains had set the precedent, the others no longer held back either. In an instant, the field was covered with all manner of colorful magic. The students of the support-magic department simply sat down on the spot and began using their own power to restore their teammates’ stamina. After replenishing themselves at the supply point, the others charged the ball again, as lively as ever.

Under the plundering of countless spells, the football changed hands again and again. One upperclassman finally managed to wrest the ball from Sime and was about to kick it away when Sime shouted, “Gravity magic!” With magic reinforcing it, the ball suddenly became several times heavier than a shot put. The moment the man kicked it, he cried out in pain and fell clutching his foot.

After Sime dispelled the spell and reclaimed the ball, he was already only a dozen meters or so from the goal. He kicked. Yet the goalkeeper showed no reaction at all. Just as it seemed he was about to win the match, the goalkeeper sneered, pulled out his wand, and summoned a broad wall of earth that sealed the goalmouth completely and rebounded the ball.

“You’re cheating!”

Sime was furious enough to smoke from all seven orifices. They were only a hair’s breadth from victory, and now, with a wall like that, how were they supposed to play at all?

“The rules never said we couldn’t use magic,” said the goalkeeper, full of disdain.

The goalkeeper on Sime’s side copied him, and the result of the match became this: whenever the attacking side kicked the ball, they had two assistants at their flank—one to kick, and two others to smash the wall. The opposition quickly reacted as well, sending two men to use plant magic to resist the water magic that could collapse the earth wall. The battle escalated once more.

“Is football played like this?”

Mournia, who had been standing by Ruby’s side watching the whole time, asked curiously. Though the amusement in her eyes betrayed her—she simply wanted to see Ruby suffer a little.

“Absolutely not!”

Ruby’s face had gone black. This was practically a special-effects football match unfolding right before his eyes. Even the kung fu football from his old world had not been this fantastical. It was all his own fault for not writing magic into the rules.

With the support of magic, these mages finally completed the longest game of their lives. They were all elites of the academy, and as expected, no winner could be decided even by the end. Both sides had exhausted their stamina and magical power alike, and all of them lay on the ground, gasping for breath.

After a short rest, Sime and Rona looked at each other, stood up together, and led all their teammates to line up before Ruby one by one.

“Teacher Ruby, thank you for bringing us such a game!”

Just as Ruby was wondering what they intended to do, all twenty-two players bowed deeply to him and spoke in unison.

“...Mm.”

Their gesture seemed to drop a pebble into the still lake of Ruby’s heart, and a feeling of warmth slowly rose within him. He gave these lovely students a soft response.

“What is it? Are you happy?”

Once the students had left the grass, Ruby still remained where he was. Mournia poked his cheek with a finger and asked with a smile. At some point, she had come to understand what Ruby was thinking. Now, too.

“I feel as though, at that very moment, I found the meaning of being a teacher.”

A gentle smile appeared on Ruby’s face. Since coming to this other world, this was the first time he had experienced something so moving. As he recalled the students’ sincere smiles, he realized for the first time that perhaps the profession of teacher suited him very well.