Just Another Day

Elian smiled brightly to himself as he stood under the sun, staring at the lush green and basking in the sun's rays.

A week prior to now, he had almost been losing hope, thinking that his football career was reaching rock bottom at such an early age.

He wasn't to be blamed for thinking that way, he had indeed experienced a setback like no other. The worst of it all was the sudden loss of focus.

For some unknown reason, he couldn't focus whenever he was on the pitch, no matter how hard he tried to do so. If he forced himself to concentrate for a few minutes, the moment he let his guard down a little, his mind would wander to something stupid and unnecessary, causing him to lose focus on the game. Most times, this resulted in him over hitting a crucial a pass or even failing to control an equally crucial pass.

But thankfully, that phase of his life was gone and he hoped it would never come back, he didn't miss it at all.

Elian stared at the scenery before him for a while, lost in thought. It was in this same environment that he had grown up, but somehow, he didn't ever grow bored of this place, that's what home felt like.

"Maybe you're leaving soon." Meta spoke.

Elian raised a brow, a bit taken aback. "What makes you say that?"

Meta sighed. "Nothing. It's just a gut feeling."

Elian smiled. "I hope I leave for somewhere better, maybe a top Spanish flight…?"

Meta read the expression on his face and he burst into a laughing spree. "Spanish top flight? How cocky that sounds!"

"It'll happen." Elian said confidently.

"Of course it will." Meta replied.

There was a brief silence before Meta spoke again. "Which one of them do you want to play for?"

Even though Meta hadn't been specific, Elian knew what he was talking about. After all they were discussing Spanish top flights, what else could he mean?

"Mm…let's see…" Elian said slowly, rubbing his chin in thought. After a while he spoke. "Barcelona maybe?"

Meta nodded. "Okay. It's not a bad choice."

Elian inhaled deeply and exhaled with a loud sigh. "Let's go! I've got to be the goat!" With that, he suddenly started running, heading in the direction of the field he usually trained in.

"Wait!" Meta shouted, his voice suddenly sounding very serious.

Elian stopped, his face looking a bit surprised and a little bit worried.

"What is the matter?" Elian asked in a steady tone, his voice low as if scared of attracting unwanted attention to himself from the unknown.

Meta paused for a while. "You're leaving me behind!" He suddenly shouted in a very serious manner.

Elian went silent, as if trying to understand what Meta meant. After a few seconds, he understood and then, a loud hiss escaped from his mouth.

Then suddenly, Meta broke off into a loud laughter.

"What is the matter?" Meta asked, imitating Elian. He broke off into another round of laughter, still imitating Elian.

Elian shook his head, cussing the bot inwardly.

"What were you so scared of, buddy?" Meta asked amidst laughter.

Elian sighed deeply, feeling completely fooled.

"Keep going! We don't have the whole day!" Meta shouted and Elian shook his head, laughing loudly as he ran along.

Elian arrived in front of the field. He didn't notice that it was already wide open with people inside of it, a match was seemingly going on between two street teams.

Elian walked into the field and on seeing the crowd of people cheering for the unprofessional match, he hissed silently to himself.

These people were obstructing his self discovery with the Awakening System.

Elian turned around, the joy leaving him. He didn't want to go to his team's stadium, but that seemed like the only option right now. He suddenly felt stupid for not knowing more football fields in his neighborhood. He had grown in this place, developing and nurturing his football dream and training personally, but he had never bothered to check out other fields in the area.

Elian stood behind the gate, contemplating on what step he was to take next.

"You could use body enhancement so you could run all the way to the stadium." Meta said, a hint of amusement in his voice.

Elian rolled his eyes, if Meta had a physical appearance he would have shot him a glare he would never forget.

Elian contacted the system in his mind, he went straight to his profile to view himself and the information the system had about him. He also wanted to view his skill set and stuff like that.