The Struggles of a New Team

For a greenhorn team like the Valkyries, it was clear that facing the Leopards, the regional champions, was a recipe for disaster. It wasn't going to be a competition at all.

Fortunately, the Leopards had a big club, so there were members from all levels of skill. Thanks to that, Fernando was able to arrange an improvised "second-string" team for the Valkyries to tackle. He promised to compose a team that matched the Valkyries' level.

Unfortunately, this arrangement was met with resistance. ["Why should we play against the second-string?"] Fiona demanded. ["Let us start with their first-string. They will be our opponents at the regionals, so we have to understand the current skill gap between us."]

The girl strongly insisted on that point. What's worse, Karen and Cornelia also got gung-ho on the topic, fully supporting Fiona.

Obviously, Kei argued against this proposal as much as she could. However, Fiona refused to budge on this point. And, since Kei's beefy salary was practically in the hands of that rich girl, she had to compromise.

And so, in the first round, the Valkyries went up against the main force of the regional champions. In retrospect, Kei should have worked harder to prevent that, even at the risk of hurting her salary.

As expected, the game was a disaster. The Leopards dominated the flow of the game from start to end.

To make things worse, they dragged it out more than necessary in a very bad taste. Apparently, this sadistic strategy was the signature playstyle of their shot-caller.

They could've wrapped up the game early to teach Fiona and Co. a quick and efficient lesson. Instead, they chose to drag things out to the point of bullying.

Naturally, Fernando scolded the hooligans after the game but it was too late. The damage was already done.

This one drawn-out game sucked all the fighting spirit out of the Valkyries. No matter how hard Kei and Fiona tried to revitalize the team, it proved impossible to recover the initial vigor.

For the next four games, the Valkyries played against the second-string Fernando prepared. It was clear he was very forgiving with his assessment of the Valkyries' skill level. He chose some of the least experienced pupils from the club, all freshmen and juniors.

Nonetheless, these were still pupils who trained under Fernando. They proved themselves formidable opponents.

On his end, Fernando did a fine job picking players who should've posed a fair challenge to the Valkyries. Alas, the Valkyries underperformed that day, gravely so. As a result, what should've been an even match ended up being a one-sided steamroll.

Out of all the members, only Fiona had the necessary mental fortitude to recover from the crushing defeat of the first game. Karen also coped decently, but she obviously tried too hard to prove herself in the following games, leading to unnecessary overextensions that cost her dearly.

The other members crashed and burned much harder than that, though. For example, Cornelia became even more irritable than usual and got into unfavorable fights all the time. Needless to say, she died many times that day.

Meanwhile, Andria's motivation vanished without a trace, so she just kind of floated out there like a jellyfish without trying to achieve anything. And lastly, Lua played even more timidly than she usually did, too afraid to commit any mistakes.

A dysfunctional team like that had no hope of ever defeating anybody from the Leopards, not even the second or third string. In the end, the whole thing turned into a bitter memory. Instead of giving the team a productive first experience on the competitive stage, the whole thing turned into a nightmare that was likely haunting them to this day.

[That was partially my fault.] Kei admitted. [It's the first time I'm dealing with a team that has zero competitive experience. I didn't properly take that into account.]

Generally, the pupils who made it into the first-string in the Aces already came with prior competitive experience from middle school. As such, it was far less likely for the team to break down like this during their first competitive game. Not to mention, the Aces were always in the top 3 of the region, so there was never a case where they had to face an opponent who was far outside their league.

Compared to all that, the Valkyries were a completely different team. It was formed only recently and its members were largely newbies or former casuals. They were lightyears away from the top dogs of the region. Kei should have taken all of that into account when she decided to scrim with the Leopards this early.

[And, now Fiona wants to scrim with StormBlitz...] Kei had reservations about this idea. In fact, she was technically against it. But, she also had to consider the awkward circumstances of the team.

The Valkyries became an official team after the school year had already begun. At that point, it was already too late to register it as another official team for the regionals. Under normal circumstances, they would have been forced to skip this year. 

Frankly? Kei would've had no problem with that arrangement. Training a middle school team was a new type of challenge for her, so she was fine with postponing the real competition by a year until she got used to the job.

But, Fiona wasn't having any of it. She was dead set on joining the competition ASAP. And, since Kei's new beefy salary was largely at Fiona's mercy, there was no choice but to fight for the noble's cause.

And so, the two of them worked hard together to persuade the authorities. They also recruited Fernando for the cause, who gladly helped because he wanted to see the competition flourish.

Though, honestly, out of all of them, Fiona was the most persuasive. She came prepared to the meetings with charismatic speeches, even leveraging her reputation as the "Landberht Princess".

["I believe my participation is in your interests as well,"] Fiona claimed. ["To my humble understanding, Classmancers is not considered a popular sport in this region at present. However, if I participate at the regionals, then news reporters will surely jump on the opportunity to cover the games, and the esports as a whole."]

This wasn't the type of argument a regular middle schooler would be able to make. Heck, even an adult normally wouldn't think of such a sophisticated angle of attack.

Truly, Fiona Landberht was a force to be reckoned with. If she were to participate in competitive debating, she would've surely conquered that field as well.

In the end, the authorities bent the knee and let Fiona have her way. And so, the Valkyries turned into an official team that had the right to compete at this year's regionals.

That was a good start, but there was still one problem remaining. Namely, the fact the team was completely new and had never before arranged an official scrim with another school.

To qualify for the regionals, a team had to play at least three official scrims at ProCenter. The responsibility of arranging such scrims fell upon the teams and their respective schools.

In order to get this tedious topic out of the way ASAP, most schools made these arrangements at the very start of the year. What's more, they usually arranged scrims against the same schools every year as a convenient tradition.

As such, by the time the Valkyries joined the competition, all their competitors were already booked. And, since most schools around here didn't regard their Classmancers clubs too highly, they weren't too motivated to go out of their way to put in any extra effort.

And so, Kei and Fiona applied to multiple schools for an arrangement, only to get turned down. As hard as the Landberht Princess tried, she couldn't find a good angle of attack against these indifferent teachers. She even spoke directly with the principals but that didn't help either. There was nothing worse than pleading with somebody who didn't care about the topic in the slightest.

It was clear that all these "club advisors" only cared about doing the bare minimum for the protocol, which dictated that a club needed only three scrims to qualify for the regionals. Doing any more than that was too troublesome for them, apparently.

And so, many schools turned the Valkyries down. Even when Fiona spoke so passionately and convincingly as she applied for a scrim against Stratus, the principal of Skyline Junior High didn't even want to listen to her. It was clear the school regarded Stratus as nothing but a burden.

Honestly, that wasn't too surprising given the terrible reputation Stratus used to have. It was considered by far the worst team in the region. It hasn't won a single game in years.

Of course, this year's Stratus was a completely different beast, but only those who followed the results of the scrims could tell. As far as the school board was concerned, Stratus was still a black stain on the school's public image for now.

In the end, the negotiations were cut short and Fiona had to walk away defeated once again. It felt she had a great interest in challenging Stratus in particular but she denied the allegations.

Anyway, in a similar fashion, most schools turned Kei and Fiona down. It proved obnoxiously difficult to arrange scrims as a newcomer, especially because the team registered so late.

But of course, Fernando had no problem arranging them a scrim with the Leopards. That's how the Valkyries' first opponents ended up being none other than the regional champions, as silly as it sounded.

Sometime later, the much-anticipated scrim between StormBlitz and the Leopards went down. It was a clash of titans, a potential preview of the finals.

The match ended with StormBlitz's defeat. But, it wasn't just any regular defeat. For them, it was almost like losing the tournament before it even started. Surely, they were salty and frustrated to no end.

Taking advantage of their beaten-up state, Fiona used this opportunity to apply for a scrim against StormBlitz. Her reasoning was that a beaten-down StormBlitz would gladly welcome the opportunity to get a few "easy wins" against a newbie team.

Fighting against the region's second-best so soon wasn't exactly ideal, but Kei tentatively approved the idea. After all, the Valkyries survived getting trashed by the Leopards, so things couldn't get any worse at that point, right?

And so, Fiona contacted the school. Instead of dodging her request with lousy reasoning as most schools did, the club advisor at Riverstock Junior High willingly arranged a meeting with the club's captain. It was great to see an advisor for once who had the club's best interests in mind despite not being knowledgeable about Classmancers.

StormBlitz's club was running on a strict budget as most clubs in the region, but at least it had the school's respect. It was probably thanks to the impressive legacy of the team. After all, at one point in time, it was StormBlitz who was considered the strongest in the region.

Fiona's master plan was to coax StormBlitz's captain into the scrim arrangement, but it proved too easy. The boy agreed almost immediately and even brought up convincing arguments for the club advisor and the principal. 

["Unfortunately, we couldn't beat the Leopards in the last scrim,"] the captain said. ["This means we now have one defeat on our record, so it's in our best interests to challenge more teams and improve our seeding."]

The boy presented his argument in a very tactful way, but it was all too easy to tell what he really meant there: "This greenhorn team is no match for us, so it's going to be a free win."

Seriously, were smartass kids like Fiona and Howard common nowadays in middle school? They were far too crafty for their own good.

In the end, the club advisor approved of Fiona's appeal and so did the principal. And so, the Valkyries' next scrimmage was scheduled.

Considering how poorly the first scrim went down, this wasn't exactly the most desirable arrangement. The Valkyries were pretty much throwing themselves at the top dogs one after another.

[I'd like them to build up confidence by playing a weaker team first, but nobody has accepted the challenge so far…]

In the end, Kei had no choice but to go along with this unfavorable arrangement. All she could do now was to put the team through hellish training until this big match.

But, to not put a damper on the team's spirits, Kei and Fiona agreed to not reveal the news to the others just yet. It was best to let time heal the team's wounds. The Valkyries first needed to forget the horrors of the first scrim in order to move on with their lives.

So, until the time is right, the team will keep training without stressing about the imminent scrimmage.

But, time passed by in a blink of an eye. Two weeks later, it was time for the big reveal...