Best Wingman: Ryuuen Kakeru / They Came Charging In, Talking About Friendship and Bonds

"Teacher, I'm a substitute player from Class 1-C."

Under Ryuen Kakeru Yuanxiang's piercing gaze, a boy from Class C stepped out from the crowd and said this to the referee standing to the side.

As he walked past Ryuen Kakeru, he even glanced at him with disdain, knowing that in such a public setting, Ryuen Kakeru had no way of making a move against him.

"Oh, come over here and pay 100,000 Private Points."

The referee, of course, ignored these little incidents offstage. He simply collected the 100,000 Private Points that the other side had paid for the substitute to take the field, and then let him walk onto the track to take the place of the absent player, squatting down next to Kitagawa Ryo from Class 1-B.

"Damn it--"

Ryuen Kakeru, standing to the side, unusually showed a hint of anxiety.

He has never hesitated to assume the Malice about everyone.

What's more, this betrayal just happened right before his eyes.

He kept scanning the seven people on the field, excluding Kitagawa Ryo.

At this point, Ryuen Kakeru doesn't even know how many students are hiding there who want to harm Kitagawa Ryo.

But time will not stop for his urgent thoughts.

"Bang--"

The starting gun fired.

Chapter 310: Best Wingman Ryuen Kakeru

In fact, the atmosphere in the stadium became noticeably tense after the second half of the Sports Festival began. Most of the students who were able to watch the various competitions from a purely spectator's perspective in the morning became increasingly anxious as time went on and the Sports Festival drew to a close.

Although a near-fight had already broken out among the third-year students in the morning, with nearly ten students 'accidentally' injured in different events, it didn't cause much of a stir or attention, as it was nothing like the first and second-year students' games. After all, what Sports Festival doesn't have students injured for all sorts of bizarre reasons? Otherwise, the school wouldn't have introduced the rule for substitutes to supplement the event.

As second-year Kiryuin Fuka continues to dominate the girls' group and score points in large numbers, the number of students who want to stop her is expanding rapidly. If at first it was just some girls who actively targeted Nagumo because they had feelings for her and some who were instigated by Kiriyama, now it has expanded to every student who has placed a heavy bet on Nagumo.

Even if each of them wanted to travel back in time to a dozen days ago and slap their confident selves across the face, they were already on Nagumo 'Nagumo pirate ship. The only thing they could do now was to help Nagumo win, since they were all in the same boat.

Under such circumstances, the pressure on Kiryuin Fuka was unimaginable. Every match felt like a duel with everyone on the field, and many people's goal had long since changed from 'winning the match' to 'not letting Kiryuin win'.

Now, the same pressure is being applied to Kitagawa Ryo, who is racing towards becoming the all-time leading scorer in the entire grade.

In a sense, the Malice he is currently suffering is even greater than that of Kiryuin Fuka at this moment, because the other party is always aiming for the second-year scoring champion award, offending only the vast majority of second-year students and a very small number of students from other grades.

But Kitagawa Ryo has now offended all the students from the three grades who didn't bet on him for the overall score leader position, so he's become the first bird to stick its head out.

In essence, these students who are now gritting their teeth at him and wishing he would get injured and forced to quit all future projects don't actually have any deep-seated hatred or conflict with Kitagawa Ryo. In fact, they were complete strangers before. But that's the power of money.

Kitagawa Ryo believes that if Ken Sudō or Hirata Yosuke were currently leading the scoring charts instead of him, many of them would immediately turn their attention to him without hesitation.

With a 20% profit, capitalists become deliberately active; with a 50% profit, they dare to take risks; for a 100% profit, they will not hesitate to trample on all human laws; with a 300% profit, they dare to commit any crime, even risking being hanged.

As the most anticipated prediction game at this Sports Festival, with a total prize pool exceeding Twenty Million Personal Points, the profits they could extract from it had already exceeded 300%. After all, stripping away the veneer given to it by the school, it was practically no different from gambling.

On the other hand, if students can personally experience and learn something from this guessing game, then it can be considered as indirectly achieving the school's initial goal of 'cultivating students' healthy views on money and consumption,' because gambling itself is the most direct way to destroy these two aspects.

Just over two months ago during summer vacation, most of the First Year students were still enduring hardship and striving to break into the top 50% of the Uninhabited Island Special Exam, in order to obtain the reward of 50,000 Private Points per person.

But now, just over two months later, 50,000 points seem like a negligible amount. The daily discussions on the forum revolve around Private Points in the millions, with seven- or eight-figure prize pools right in front of everyone, like a flowing river of gold.

In fact, some students have indeed won big with small betting in various betting projects, successfully reaping eight to ten times the return with thousands of Private Points. They don't need to survive on deserted Uninhabited Island or participate in projects all over the place. They only need to click a button to place a bet, and their Private Points will flow into their personal accounts.

Throughout the lunch break, Kitagawa Ryo could hear similar boasts everywhere, and many students couldn't help but immerse themselves in this simple and brutal pleasure.

Compared to the readily available Private Points, no one cares about the school's rewards and punishments during the Sports Festival, not even the Written Exam score reward that had initially drawn cheers from students who were determined to get their hands on it.

Perhaps this is the biggest irony of this Sports Festival.

Because here, at Tokyo Advanced Nurturing High School.

Even the scores on the Written Exam can be bought.

Even before Ichinose Honami and Sakayanagi Arisu, Kitagawa Ryo had already realized his current situation immediately. Therefore, from the moment the starting gun fired, he had been on high alert, constantly paying attention to the movements of the students on the other tracks on both sides.

Perhaps feeling that making small moves in front of the referees near the starting line would be too conspicuous, everyone started without any problems and there were no false starts. They all rushed out of the starting line one after another with millisecond differences.

Since this was a 5,000-meter middle-distance race, everyone's speed was not too fast at the beginning; they were just moving forward at a steady pace along the track.

In this situation, Ryuen Kakeru, who was originally in the spectator crowd outside the track, suddenly gritted his teeth, pushed aside the other students blocking his way, shook his arms and legs, and quickly crossed the track, starting to run with the group of students on the inner lawn.

"Holy crap, what is Brother Ryuen doing? Is he just there to keep up with the pace? Like one of those guys who sits on the sidelines with a camera and filming?"

Almost no one expected Ryuen Kakeru to do such a thing. Even Ishizaki Daichi wiped his face in surprise, rubbed his eyes, and showed a completely confused expression.

As one of the few bookish students in Class 1-C, Kaneda Satoru, standing next to him, adjusted his glasses and quickly understood Ryuen Kakeru's meaning:

"They're keeping watch, or rather—"

"Convoy."

Chapter 311: They charged forward, talking about friendship and bonds (4k5)

Just as Kaneda Satoru said, the moment he broke through the crowd and started running alongside the other athletes, Ryuen Kakeru was already mentally prepared to forcefully intervene in the field to prevent a possible situation if necessary, even if it meant losing his qualification to participate in this Sports Festival.

After all, he had already poured all five million of his Private Points into Kitagawa Ryo, and for him, the entire Sports Festival was just a game to ensure that Kitagawa Ryo was not disturbed by the outside world.

Ryuen Kakeru no longer needs to think of or devise any underhanded tactics to target Kitagawa Ryo's rivals, because he has already implicitly accepted and believed in this fact:

If the competition is fair and square, Kitagawa Ryo will not lose to anyone and will definitely win the final victory in this Sports Festival.

The first 400-meter lap was relatively uneventful, but as the lap went on, the eight runners gradually pulled apart, splitting into two lines. Kitagawa Ryo remained firmly in the lead on the inner line, while another boy from his class was gradually pushed to the back.

Another circle.

All the students squeezed together into the innermost passage.

Every time they turned such a corner, Ryuen Kakeru's nerves would involuntarily tighten, because this was the moment when things were most likely to go wrong in this event. In order to seize the inside lane and take the lead, everyone could legitimately approach Kitagawa Ryo's back and side. Three or four people could form a temporary human wall by blocking each other, in order to carry out some covert actions.

However, this Christmas Eve was peaceful and uneventful.

Soon, the second lap of 400 meters was also completed smoothly.

But Ryuen Kakeru's already anxious heart was only heightened.

After running the 800 meters, he was almost certain that several people in this group had formed an alliance against Kitagawa Ryo; their running style had made their intentions crystal clear.

As a long track and field event, middle- and long-distance runners usually try to maintain a slower pace in the first half of the 5,000-meter race. However, those students seemed to be accelerating like crazy, and even temporarily overtook Kitagawa Ryo, who was leading, after the second lap, putting him in third or fourth place.

They had no intention of finishing the 5,000 meters; their entire focus was on physically eliminating Kitagawa Ryo from this Sports Festival.

Kitagawa Ryo, being in the thick of it, naturally noticed the situation immediately. In fact, being ganged up on by other opponents is quite normal in competitive sports. How to handle such unexpected situations is often the touchstone that reveals an athlete's talent.

With tears in his eyes, Kitagawa Ryo subconsciously thought of Farah, the United Kingdom long-distance runner who won gold in the 5,000-meter race at the London Olympics.

This world-renowned long-distance runner also faced a challenge from the Ethiopian national team in his world record-breaking race. His strategy was to simply follow the team, even maintaining last place for the entire first half of the race, until he began to accelerate in the middle and sprinted in the last 600 meters, overtaking the leader in the final 60 meters to win the 5,000-meter race at that year's World Championships.

However, this tactic is clearly not suitable for his current situation. After all, these people are no longer focused on winning the game. Even if Kitagawa Ryo slows down and places himself in the back row, they will definitely choose to slow down as well.

Since slowing down doesn't work, let's just speed up!

In a flash, Kitagawa Ryo changed his strategy, improvising and increasing his pace, hoping to break through the encirclement in one go.

To the students who surrounded him, this action was undoubtedly an overly hasty move by Kitagawa Ryo. After all, if he started accelerating in the first half of the race, or even at the one-fifth mark, his stamina might not even last until the end. Did Kitagawa Ryo really intend to give up halfway through like them?

Giving up will mean losing points.

Rather, the fact that they could eliminate Kitagawa Ryo in this bloodless way is exactly the situation that their anti-Kitagawa alliance is currently most pleased to see.

And so, as Kitagawa Ryo visibly began to accelerate, the two people who had been blocking his way tacitly moved aside, watching him lead the race and leave them far behind. They exchanged a glance and raised their eyebrows in unison.

But before long, their expressions turned serious again.

Because Kitagawa Ryo appeared behind them once again, then stood shoulder to shoulder with them, and finally overtook them again.

When they were a little over 1,000 meters into the 5,000-meter race, Kitagawa Ryo had already overtaken them by a full lap of 400 meters.

In the stands outside the stadium, Sotomura Hideo, the boy with the worst physical condition in Class B, was moved to tears by this scene.

Wow, I'm usually the one getting lapped in PE class, but now I can finally see these top athletes getting lapped too.

Since I'm going to get lapped anyway, I might as well do it myself!

"He doesn't have enough stamina!"

Although they were starting to panic a little, the group reassured themselves that they were just waiting for Kitagawa Ryo to run out of energy so he could at least manage to shout that the mission was complete. After all, there were still several projects to come, and they were determined to make him suffer.

But as time ticked by, the situation on the field became increasingly unexpected, causing everyone's faces to turn grim.

"Huh? I just came back from the restroom, how come Kitagawa is second to last? Wasn't he supposed to be really strong?"

"Uh, he's already lapped the last place twice."

"Ah?"

Amid the gasps and murmurs of the surrounding spectators, Kitagawa Ryo showed no signs of exhaustion. Instead, he maintained an incredibly high average pace, sprinting along the track and quickly overtaking the last-place runner by two laps.

"Let's see how long he can keep running like this?"

When Kitagawa Ryo once again overtook the front row, achieving the feat of lapping all the runners twice over the 800 meters, many students stood up from the stands, wanting to witness history and record with their own eyes just how far this record, unprecedented and likely to remain unbroken at Tokyo Advanced Nurturing High School, could be maintained or even expanded.

"Take him out when he comes back on the next lap; we can't let him keep running like this."

At this point, even the members of the anti-Kitagawa alliance were unwilling to believe that they could really overexert this monster's stamina, even if the other side was just bluffing. But the huge advantage of two laps had almost secured Kitagawa Ryo's victory in this event, no matter how much he slowed down in the second half.

Because their physical condition wasn't much better, the sudden acceleration in the first 800 meters had already disrupted their usual long-distance running rhythm, and now at the 2000-meter mark, they were already starting to feel the strain.

But just like a cat toying with a mouse, after maintaining a two-and-a-half-lap lead, Kitagawa Ryo slowed down again, stabilizing his pace and not continuing to lap as before.

In this situation, the awkward position suddenly fell to the members of the anti-Kitagawa alliance, who had always been half a circle away from Kitagawa Ryo.

Theoretically, they could now choose to accelerate for half a lap.

However, due to practical considerations, everyone unanimously chose to slow down, allowing Kitagawa Ryo to catch up with them at an almost halting pace.

After Kitagawa Ryo took the lead, Ryuen Kakeru had been leisurely following the main group, suddenly became more alert. He kept shifting his position to the right, almost squeezing into the track from the center of the field. The referee on the Matoba put his whistle in his mouth and blew it twice to warn anyone not involved in the race to stay away from the field and not interfere with the normal progress of the race.

At the same time, Kitagawa Ryo had already run headlong into the encirclement of three students in the front row, and the four of them were squeezed together again at the next corner.

Although they had planned various underhanded tactics such as tripping and elbowing, Kitagawa Ryo hadn't anticipated such a commotion. With almost all the audience's attention focused on them, these simpler and more direct attacks had to be temporarily shelved, and they had to resort to a more roundabout tactic:

Staged accident.

As a time-honored tactic, staged accidents are undoubtedly a skill that is easy to learn but difficult to master. It not only demands a high level of acting skills and resourcefulness from the person involved, but also puts their psychological qualities to the test. After all, if not handled properly, one can end up getting themselves into trouble as well.

The first student from Class C to perform started with a fake fall, intending to roll directly in front of Kitagawa Ryo and tug at his trouser leg, making sure Kitagawa Ryo tripped hard.

But just as his body swayed to the right, and he was about to fall towards Kitagawa Ryo, Ryuen Kakeru, standing to his left, swiftly reached out and pulled him back, shouting loudly as he righted him:

"Where's the referee? Where's the medical staff?! Our students are exhausted! They might not be able to keep running; they would have collapsed if I hadn't helped them up!"

Because the student from Class C had acted so realistically, and because Ryuen Kakeru had preemptively raised the student safety issue that the school was most concerned about, the medical team members swarmed over. Before the other person could even speak, they were already applying stethoscopes, pulling open eyelids, and raising two fingers:

"Hey! Are you alright? What number did I make?"

"Damn it—I didn't, hiss... cough cough!"

The student from Class C had just cursed and was about to stand up to ask to run again when he found that the sudden stop had made his legs incredibly weak. Even if he went back on the field now, it seemed like he wouldn't be of any help. He coughed violently twice in frustration, which startled the medical staff next to him. They quickly lifted him onto a stretcher and prepared to transport him to the medical tent for further detailed examination.

After the first team member was eliminated, the second team member was also stunned for a moment. But seeing that Kitagawa Ryo was about to break through the encirclement of the remaining two, he could only grit his teeth and step forward, pretending to squeeze into the innermost passage. In reality, he was going to use a solid iron lean to attack Kitagawa Ryo from two directions with the third team member who followed behind him, so as to cause some physical damage.

According to their plan, the person behind should have quickly tugged at the other's clothes to make Kitagawa Ryo lose his balance before he made his move. However, instead of doing so, two loud thuds came from behind him.

It turned out that because they slowed down, another boy from Class B, Minami Setsuya, who had caught up from the back, took the lead and stumbled, imitating the first student's fake fall technique, knocking the person in front of him down. The two of them fell face-first onto the track and couldn't get up, but they still smiled and raised their hands to give a thumbs up, which drew cheers from the students of Class 1-B. Then they followed their homeroom teacher Mashima Tomoya, to check on his condition.

Seeing his companions being eliminated one by one, the only remaining member of the Anti-Beichuan Alliance had no choice but to grit his teeth and crash into the enemy himself. After all, even if things went badly, he could fake a fall and shout, "You bumped into me!" to extort some money.

But just as he was about to touch Kitagawa Ryo, who had already accelerated halfway through the race, once again unleashed a speed that was beyond his reach, speeding past him as if leaving a blur behind him.

"No way--"

In the end, even the boy, whose movements had become distorted, openly reached out to grab something, but he couldn't even catch a glimpse of the clothes; all he held in his hand was a passing breeze.

The applause and cheers from all around reached their peak at this moment.

While many students were still preoccupied with Kitagawa Ryo's return to first place and his further advancement towards becoming the all-time leading scorer in the entire grade, the staff of other school facilities paid no attention and spontaneously applauded the miracle before their eyes.

As staff members of Tokyo Advanced Nurturing High School, they are regular spectators of the annual Sports Festival. They have watched at least three or five festivals over the years, but none of them can compare to the current situation. The atmosphere between events was naturally stirred up by these adults, and it continued until Kitagawa Ryo finished running the entire 5,000 meters and crossed the finish line.

Although he slowed down in the second half of the race after securing victory, Kitagawa Ryo was not as relaxed as he appeared on the field. After crossing the finish line, he was drenched in sweat, and his originally pure white sports uniform was stuck to his back, revealing a large patch of sweat.

However, Ichinose Honami was already waiting there.

Having just finished the girls' activity, she also looked somewhat tired, with a fine layer of sweat on her smooth forehead and her breathing a little rapid, as if she had just run over from there.

Although he had already received clean towels and drinking water from his classmates after crossing the finish line, Kitagawa Ryo still waited until Ichinose Honami squeezed through the crowd of congratulatory people around him. He stood there with his head slightly lowered, letting her wrap the towel in her hands around his neck, cheeks, forehead, and ears, gently wiping away the beads of sweat.

But at the same time, Kitagawa Ryo also subconsciously made the same movement.