NIKE -Blue Lock-

301st

It was raining that night.

The endless drops of the weeping sky clashed aggressively and melodically against the dirt track. The night was silent, not even thunder dared to interrupt the droplets' orchestra. The night was dark, for there was not a single flash of lightning to illuminate the moonless, starless sky.

Two wheels whizzed over the water, and the sound of an engine interrupted the melodic song of the rain.

Since the sky had refused to release a bolt from the sky, she herself became it.

And at that moment, it seemed as if lightning had burst upon the earth.

"AND NICOLE VINCIGUERRA IS THIS YEAR'S WORLD GRAND PRIX CHAMPION."

The crowd erupted into a frenzy, with shouts and cheers from everywhere capable of overpowering nature's violent and powerful cry.

From behind the screens, people grew frustrated and others hugged their televisions in euphoria.

The team from inside the box indulged in violent and warm hugs, screams of excitement, cries of emotion, and stronger-than-normal pats on the back.

If the manager had taken off that pair of sunglasses, everyone would have been able to see in his irises the image of the piles of money he was about to make.

"UNBELIEVABLE, JUST UNBELIEVABLE. THE SEVENTEEN-YEAR-OLD NEW WORLD CHAMPION MADE A NEW SPEED RECORD OF 390KM/H, COMPLETELY DESTROYING JORGE MARTIN'S PRIMATE OF 363.6KM/H."

The figure removed her helmet, and a cascade of blood-red hair fell down her shoulders covered by the stiff black suit. Her crimson eyes shone in the darkness of the night, as the weeping of the gods bathed her face and weighed down her hair.

A big, mocking, seductive, bewitching smile made its way onto her lips as her gaze focused on the people willing to let the rain soak through to show her their applause.

She fed on their shouts, their smiles, their cries of joy, their mad scowls and their blind admiration. 

"THE YOUNG ITALIAN GAVE US ONE OF THE MOST BEAUTIFUL RACES WE HAD EVER WITNESSED BEFORE."

None of them mattered to her, but she mattered to all of them. She was the star of the lives of people who were just extras in hers.

"I wonder how it feel to be her."

Fuck, it felt so good.

Meanwhile...

The woman huffed, trying to use all the strength she possessed to hold onto the four plastic bags with which she was leaving the supermarket.

Bags full of instant food.

She grunted, wondering how much of a jinx she must have to have such a strange, childish, and paradoxically incompetent boss as her own.

Fortunately for her and her dignity, the woman managed to reach the trunk door without embarrassing herself further, stowing all the provisions (if we can call them that) inside it, and then re-entering the car, sitting on the driver's seat.

She didn't turn it on.
Instead she closed her eyes, taking deep breaths and trying to calm herself for a few moments.

If only the gods had granted her such a privilege.

"Did you choose the brand I told you?"

Anri Teieri, the woman who had just entered the car, had to restrain herself in order not to lose her wits at that precise moment.

She slowly opened her eyelids, pointing her brown eyes into the black ones of the man next to her.

Ego Jinpachi.
That was his name.
And if she had to describe him with a word, she would have saddled him with the noun paradox.