The attack came during afternoon free time, when Kenichi was helping Mrs. Hayashi inventory supplies in the storage room.
Ryu was sitting in the common area, carefully cleaning his father's volleyball with a damp cloth - a ritual he'd developed to keep the leather supple and the memories fresh. The late afternoon sunlight streamed through the windows, casting long shadows across the worn carpet where other children played board games or worked on homework.
He should have seen it coming. Should have noticed the way Takeshi and Hiroto had been watching him all week, how their conversations stopped whenever he entered a room. Should have recognized the particular heaviness in the air that came before someone finally snapped under the weight of their own pain.
"Hey, Ryu," Takeshi said quietly, approaching with Hiroto trailing behind. His voice lacked its usual aggressive edge, replaced by something rawer, more desperate. "Can we... can we talk to you for a minute?"
Ryu looked up from the volleyball, noting the way both boys were avoiding eye contact. Takeshi's hands were shoved deep in his pockets, shoulders hunched like he was protecting himself from something. Hiroto kept glancing toward the hallway where Kenichi had disappeared, his jaw tight with the kind of tension that came from working up courage for something you knew was wrong.
"What about?" Ryu asked carefully.
"That," Hiroto said, nodding toward the volleyball. "We just... we want to understand why it's so important."
There was hurt in his voice, genuine confusion mixed with resentment. Like he was trying to solve an equation where someone else's pain somehow added up to more than his own.
"It was my dad's," Ryu said simply.
"Yeah, we know that." Takeshi's voice cracked slightly. "But like... my mom had things too. Before she decided I was too much trouble. Had this perfume that smelled like flowers, and she'd let me smell it sometimes when I was little."
He paused, swallowing hard. "Mrs. Hayashi threw it away when I got here. Said it was 'unhygienic' to keep personal items from previous placements."
The pain in his admission was so raw that Ryu felt his chest tighten. "That's... that sucks. I'm sorry."
"Are you?" Hiroto's voice was quiet but sharp. "Because it doesn't feel like you're sorry. It feels like you think you're the only one who lost something."
"I don't think that - "
"Then why do you get special treatment?" The words burst out of Takeshi like they'd been building pressure for weeks. "Why does Kenichi spend all his time with you? Why do you get volleyball lessons and manga discussions and someone who actually cares if you're okay?"
"He's just helping me - "
"He helped me too," Hiroto said, his voice getting smaller. "Before you came. Sometimes. When he had time. He taught me how to tie my shoes properly, remember Takeshi? And he showed us that card game, the one with the weird rules."
"But then you showed up," Takeshi continued, his hands starting to shake. "And suddenly there's no time for card games. No time for shoe-tying lessons. No time for anything except precious Ryu and his precious volleyball and his precious dead dad."
The venom in his voice wasn't malicious - it was desperate. The sound of someone drowning and angry at the person in the lifeboat.
"We all have dead parents!" Hiroto's voice cracked completely. "Or parents who might as well be dead! But somehow yours matter more!"
Ryu felt tears pricking at his eyes, not from anger but from the awful recognition of their pain. "It's not about mattering more - "
"Then prove it." Takeshi took a step closer, his face flushed and tear-streaked. "Let us hold it. Just for a minute. Show us that your loss isn't more special than ours."
"I can't - "
"Why not?" Hiroto's voice was breaking down completely now. "What makes you so different? What makes your sadness worth protecting when nobody protected ours?"
The worst part was that Ryu understood. Understood the terrible math they were doing in their heads, the way institutional care taught you that love was finite, that someone else getting attention meant less for you. He could see the abandonment in their faces, the years of being forgotten and overlooked crystallizing into this moment.
But understanding didn't make it hurt less when Takeshi reached for the volleyball.
"Please don't," Ryu whispered, pulling the ball closer to his chest. "It's all I have left of him."
"It's not fair," Takeshi said, but his voice was breaking too now. "None of this is fair. Why do you get to keep something when they took everything from us?"
"I didn't take anything from you - "
"You took Kenichi!" The words exploded out of Hiroto. "He was the only person here who was ever nice to us, and you took him away!"
"That's not - " Ryu started, but Takeshi was already reaching for the volleyball, desperation making his movements clumsy and frantic.
"Just let us hold it," he pleaded, his grip tightening on the leather. "Just for a second. Please. We just want to understand what it feels like to have something that matters."
Ryu jerked backward, but Hiroto was already moving to help, not because he wanted to hurt Ryu but because the pain of exclusion was too much to bear. For a moment they were locked in a grotesque tug-of-war, three broken children fighting over the physical representation of love and loss.
"Let go!" Ryu gasped, but his voice was full of tears now too. "Please, I can't lose this too!"
"We already lost everything!" Takeshi sobbed, his grip tightening. "Why can't you lose something for once?"
The tension was reaching a breaking point. Ryu could feel his grip on the volleyball weakening as both boys pulled at it, their desperation making them stronger. Tears were streaming down all their faces now - Ryu's from fear and heartbreak, Takeshi and Hiroto's from years of accumulated pain finally finding an outlet.
"Just let us have it!" Takeshi sobbed, his grip tightening. "Just this once, let us have something that matters!"
"I can't!" Ryu cried back, his voice breaking completely. "It's all I have left of him! Please don't take it away!"
"Why do you get to keep your dad when we lost everything?" Hiroto's voice was raw with anguish. "Why is your pain more important?"
The struggle was getting more frantic, more desperate, when a voice cut through the chaos like a blade.
"What the hell is going on here?"
All three boys froze. Kenichi stood in the doorway, his expression thunderous, taking in the scene of two boys trying to wrestle the volleyball away from a sobbing Ryu.
"Let go of him. Now." His voice was deadly quiet.
Takeshi and Hiroto immediately released the volleyball, stepping back with wide, frightened eyes. But instead of looking guilty or apologetic, something darker flickered across their faces - resentment, anger at being caught, fury at being made to feel like the villains when they were hurting too.
"Kenichi, we were just - " Hiroto started.
"You were just what? Attacking a younger kid? Trying to steal the only thing he has left of his father?" Kenichi's voice was getting louder, his protective instincts overwhelming his usual careful patience.
"It's not fair!" Takeshi burst out, his earlier desperation transforming into defiant rage. "He gets everything! Special treatment, extra attention, someone who actually cares about him!"
"So you decided to hurt him?" Kenichi stepped into the room, his presence filling the space like a storm front. "You decided that the way to deal with your pain was to cause more pain?"
"You used to care about us too," Hiroto said, his voice cracking with accusation. "Before he came along. Before precious Ryu needed so much help with his volleyball and his trauma and his special needs."
"Don't." Kenichi's voice dropped to a dangerous whisper. "Don't you dare make this about him. This is about you choosing to be cruel."
"We're not cruel!" Takeshi shouted, but his face was flushed with shame and anger. "We're just tired of being forgotten! Tired of watching him get everything we never had!"
"Get out," Kenichi said quietly.
"This is our room too - "
"GET OUT!" Kenichi roared, and both boys scrambled for the door, their earlier defiance crumbling under the force of his fury.
But as they reached the doorway, Takeshi turned back, his face twisted with hurt and resentment. "This isn't over," he said quietly. "You won't always be here to protect him."
The threat hung in the air as they disappeared down the hallway, leaving Kenichi and Ryu alone in the aftermath.
Ryu was still clutching the volleyball, his whole body shaking with leftover adrenaline and tears. Kenichi knelt beside him immediately, his anger melting into gentle concern.
"Hey," he said softly, "let me see. Are you hurt?"
Ryu shook his head, unable to speak past the tightness in his throat. Kenichi carefully examined the volleyball, checking for damage, then pulled Ryu into a protective hug.
"I'm sorry," Kenichi murmured into his hair. "I'm so sorry I wasn't here. I should have known they might try something."
"They hate me," Ryu whispered against Kenichi's shoulder. "They really hate me."
"They don't hate you. They hate their situation. They hate feeling forgotten and overlooked. But that doesn't excuse what they just did."
They sat together for a few minutes, Kenichi's presence slowly calming Ryu's racing heart. But there was something in the older boy's posture, a tension that suggested he had more to say.
"Ryu," Kenichi said carefully, "there's something I need to tell you. Something important."
The seriousness in his tone made Ryu pull back to look at his face. "What is it?"
Kenichi took a deep breath, and Ryu could see him struggling with how to say whatever he needed to say.
"I got accepted," he said finally. "To JRT Volleyball Academy with Full scholarship."
The words made Ryu's stomach drop. "You're leaving?"
"In three weeks." Kenichi's voice was gentle but firm. "Ryu, this is everything I've been working toward. Elite academics, one of the best volleyball programs in the country, a chance at a real future."
Ryu felt the room spinning around him. First the confrontation with Takeshi and Hiroto, now this. Everyone was leaving. Everyone always left.
"When?" he managed to ask.
"Spring semester starts in three weeks."
Three weeks. The same timeframe Takeshi had threatened him with. Three weeks until his protector disappeared and left him completely vulnerable.
"That's... that's great," Ryu said, trying to force enthusiasm into his voice even as his world crumbled around him. "Really great. You deserve it."
"Ryu - "
"No, I mean it. This is what you wanted, right? Your shot at the big time?"
Kenichi studied his face carefully, seeing through the forced smile to the terror underneath. "You know I wouldn't leave if I had a choice, right? If there was any way to take you with me - "
"But there isn't."
"No. There isn't."
That night, lying in his bunk while Takeshi and Hiroto whispered harsh words across the room—not apologies, but threats and bitter complaints about favoritism—Ryu felt the weight of how fragile everything was. How quickly protectors could disappear, how easily precious things could be threatened, how pain could make people do things they'd regret forever.
The scholarship revelation had hit harder than any volleyball to the face. As Kenichi held him in that small, empty room, Ryu had felt his world shift beneath his feet. Three weeks. Twenty-one days until his protector, his teacher, his closest thing to family disappeared forever.
"Why volleyball?" Ryu had asked quietly, still nestled against Kenichi's shoulder. "I mean, I know why I love it. But why do you?"
Kenichi had been quiet for so long that Ryu thought he wasn't going to answer. When he finally spoke, his voice was different—younger somehow, more vulnerable.
"My dad was supposed to be a professional player," Kenichi said slowly. "Libero for the national team. He was... he was incredible, Ryu. Fast as lightning, could read plays like he was psychic. Had offers from every top university in Japan."
"What happened?"
"Hit and run. Not the kind that kills you quickly." Kenichi's grip tightened slightly. "The kind that takes away everything you are, piece by piece. Broke his spine in three places. Doctors said he'd never walk normally again, let alone play volleyball."
Ryu felt his chest constrict. Another car accident. Another life destroyed by random chance and twisted metal.
"He tried to stay positive at first," Kenichi continued. "Said he'd coach instead, teach the next generation, live his dreams through other players. But watching volleyball on TV became torture. Seeing other liberos move the way he used to move... it broke something in him that never healed."
"Where is he now?"
"Gone. Both of them. Mom couldn't handle watching him destroy himself with alcohol and regret. She left when I was ten, said she couldn't save someone who didn't want to be saved. Dad followed her two years later, but not to wherever she went. Just... away from everything. Including me."
The words hung in the air between them, heavy with the particular grief of abandonment mixed with understanding.
"So volleyball is your way back to him?" Ryu asked.
"Volleyball is my way of proving that the dream didn't have to die with his accident," Kenichi said softly. "That maybe, if I'm good enough, I can carry a piece of what he lost into the future."
They sat in comfortable silence after that, two boys bonded by loss and the sport that had become their salvation. Finally, Kenichi had pulled back to look at Ryu seriously.
"That's why I have to take this scholarship," he said. "It's not just about my future—it's about honoring what he never got to become."
"I understand," Ryu had said, and meant it completely.
They stood in silence on their makeshift court, the morning air suddenly feeling colder. Around them, the orphanage was waking up—windows opening, voices calling, the start of another day in institutional care.
"What happens to me?" Ryu asked quietly.
"You keep practicing. You keep improving. You find other people who care about volleyball as much as you do."
"What if Takeshi and Hiroto—"
"They won't. Not anymore. Yesterday changed something for all of you." Kenichi's voice was gentle but certain. "They understand now what it costs to hurt someone. They won't want to pay that price again."
But they both knew that understanding and acting on understanding were different things. That three weeks from now, Ryu would be completely on his own.
"Besides," Kenichi added with forced brightness, "maybe by then you'll have figured out how to make a volleyball go where you actually aim it."
Despite everything, Ryu found himself laughing. "That might take more than three weeks."
"Well, we'd better get to work then."
As they returned to practice, Ryu tried to focus on serves and receives and all the technical details Kenichi was patiently explaining. But in the back of his mind, a clock had started ticking.
Twenty-one days until everything changed again.
Twenty-one days to become strong enough to survive without protection.
Twenty-one days to figure out how to make it in a world that seemed determined to take away everyone he cared about.
The volleyball hit him in the face again, but this time he barely noticed the pain.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
[Current Status:]
[Host: Yukitaka Izumi (Soul: Ryu Miyamoto)]
[Level: 1 (11/100 XP)]
[Skill Points Available: 0]
—
[Stats:]
- Serving: 2/100
- Receiving: 1/100
- Setting: 3/100
- Spiking: 0/100
- Blocking: 0/100
- Stamina: 15/100
- Jump Height: 28/100
- Game Sense: 15/100
—
[Abilities:]
- Empathic Connection (Level 1) - Active
- Critical Strike (Level 1) - Locked
—
[Active Quests:]
- Daily: Complete 1 hour of focused volleyball practice (Deadline: 8 hours)
- Tutorial: Successfully receive 10 serves in a row (No deadline)
- Main: Find Your Team (Deadline: 30 days)
—
[Status Effects:]
- Memory Integration (40% Completed) - (Processing orphanage training period)
- Identity Crisis - Severe guilt and emotional distress (10 hours)
- Family Bonding - Enhanced emotional connection, +10% XP gain from family activities (60 hours remaining)
- Emergency Sleep Mode - Forced rest for mental stability (4 hours remaining)