Go Wild, My Little Demon

chapter 3

Sae wasn't exactly sure what he'd expected when it came to this whole Neo-Egoist League thing.

He hadn't slept too well on the night leading up to their first official training session with the new Blue Lock additions. Sure, he was used to travelling around and migrating from hotel to hotel, from country to country. He was certainly used to waking up in different beds each morning, something that Blue Lock shouldn't have differed from, shouldn't have resulted in a cramped neck even with the surprisingly comfy pillows he'd been provided.

But even still, he'd tossed and turned, woken up several times in the night to scroll mindlessly through his phone in the hopes that bright blue light scorching at his eyes would knock some sleep into him.

It hadn't. He'd been forced to swallow down his precious melatonin pills, knocking him out cold and finally allowing him a few hours of peaceful rest.

The next morning was arguably one of the stranger ones he'd had. Blue Lock served their breakfasts in the cafeteria, and each stratum appeared to have its own one for the sake of this new League set-up. Sae had been informed that there were now cameras installed in all public spaces save from the bathrooms, bedrooms and medical bays. They were there to record player interactions for fans across the globe to gawk at, to discuss their theories on who had the best friendships and chemical reactions when it came to the games.

Sae couldn't exactly say he was a fan of eating in front of cameras. He wasn't really a fan of doing anything in front of them, unless it was playing football or the occasional magazine shoot he often had to partake in. He'd opted for a very western breakfast, a healthy blend of poached eggs and a green energy juice that would hopefully vitalise his tired body as much as possible. He was going to need all the fucking energy he could muster if he was to spend the next several hours of this day teaching amature kids how to play football like pros. If that was even possible.

But the cameras were definitely a problem. Many of the new PXG members spent their time dancing in front of them, waving and jumping as if the cameras couldn't already fucking see them. Ego had only just informed the Blue Lock boys of their instalment and it seemed the guys weren't exactly used to this much global attention. Although Sae supposed they weren't international celebrities like he was.

Sae reached across the table and took a sip out of Julian Loki's strange carrot juice protein drink. It tasted horrible, and even though it was probably incredibly healthy - something that Sae liked, considering he treated his body like a temple - he made the effort of wrinkling his nose regardless.

"This tastes like shit," he commented, tone dead like it always was. Sae was usually a morning person, but today was an exception. He could thank his rather sleepless night for that.

Julian raised a brow at him. "You think?" He took a sip of the concoction himself and gave Sae a small shrug, clearly unaffected by the horrid flavour. "Tastes fine to me. Don't like carrots, huh?"

Sae stabbed a fork into his poached egg and watched the runny yoke leak out of the sides. It reminded him of the way blood leaked from a wound, as weird as that was. Maybe Sae really was in a mood today.

"Carrots are fine," he replied tepidly. "That juice is just plain gross."

Sae and Julian were getting along oddly well. Sae wasn't a fan of many people, and his arrogance usually pissed most of his teammates off. They hated how talented he was and how he actually knew this fact, how he acted accordingly with it. People were so afraid of confidence these days. Humility was so old-fashioned; they needed to grow up and accept the fact that gifted people existed.

But Julian was different in a way. He was also very confident, perhaps a tad more humble than Sae was, but being French and all he had that snarky Parisian superiority down-pat. And Sae was honestly a fan of it - mostly because Julian actually had the skills to back up his mentality unlike some players did. Sae was all for self-confidence if it was deserved, properly earned. But that didn't apply to the stars who played like shit and still thought they had the right to brag simply due to the amount of money they possessed.