The Thought Process of Shu Kurenai

The Promise

The one thing people remember about Valt's Beyblading journey isn't the time when he was World Champion. It is his rivalry with me.

It all started one day when I was going home after appearing in a match on TV. I noticed Valt really training for the first time. He told me he was planning on winning the District Tournament.

At the time, I thought Valt was a bit wild to think he possibly stood a chance. I didn't know about his match with Rantaro earlier that day. Valt ended up telling me about it a few days after that. But I may have overstepped a little when I called Valt a novice.

Valt got annoyed by that and pointed out he started earlier than I did, I started telling him it wasn't about who started first, but then I remembered that I had gone from a amateur to a strong blader in a few months. I thought maybe Valt might be able to improve drastically too.

So I asked Valt about seeing him in the finals, and he agreed to it. Neither of us knew about the obstacles we would encounter in the next couple of months which would not only test our skills as bladers, but also our friendship.

I won't talk about that now. I am still not ready. I know I have to think about that eventually, but I still need more time.

Anyway, I was pleasantly surprised to see Valt defeat Rantaro in that first match. He did mess up a little before the match by getting nervous and falling forward. Unfortunately, that wasn't the last time he would trip in front of a large crowd.

The next day, Valt got in trouble for drawing Valtryek during Math. We shared many of our classes together, so I kept noticing similar incidents happen. I soon learnt that Valt's first victory kind of gave him a big head.

Well, I wish I had Valt's enthusiasm. But I couldn't stop thinking about the crushing defeat against Lui last year and how much I wanted to prevent that from happening again. So after school, I went to the rooftop to train.

This may not make a lot of sense to you, but when I am training with Spryzen, it feels like I am shutting the whole world out. I don't think about my parents, Valt, or anything at all. All that mattered was Spryzen.

So that day, I was concentrating on my training when Valt's voice suddenly screamed and I was startled out of my trance. I was annoyed with Valt for breaking my concentration and yelled for him to keep quiet.

I didn't even notice I was sweating through my clothes until Valt pointed it out. You should have seen his face when he learned how long I have been training.

Still, I took it as my cue to leave. For all I knew, Valt and Rantaro might have wanted to use the beydish. Besides, I didn't have a spare change of clothes and was exhausted from training. But Valt was still screaming his head off as I went down the stairs.

I wonder how Valt never got a sore throat from all the screaming he did. He must have a super powered voice. I may have been used to it, but that didn't make his screams any less grating to my ears. It's a miracle I'm not deaf.

When I arrived home, I was greeted by the emptiness of the apartment. It reminded me I was alone as usual. I tried my best not to think about it.

I didn't bother reminding my parents about my matches. They would never bother to watch them. Now that I think about it, it was really depressing.

In the next few days, I noticed Valt was taking the tournament a bit more seriously and managed to beat Ken. It was at that point I realized Valt actually had a lot of potential to become a strong blader and maybe we could actually meet in the finals. I was determined to uphold my promise as well and help him improve as much as I can.

Valt was ecstatic and said we were rivals. Rantaro got jealous and Valt said he could be his rival too. Valt even said we empowered each other.

That is still true today. Valt was the reason I started blading, and I was the reason Valt was able to become the blader he is today. We helped each other become stronger.