After Nakajima grilled ellia, it was now Karen’s turn to get roasted.

  “Your first major mistake was chasing Athena from the o the Jungle,” Nakajima said. “So, did you learn anything from that?”

  “Yep, I sure learned something alright,” Karen said. “I learhat Athena is a damn bitch, that’s what I learned.”

  “Karen, nguage,” Fiona scolded. Uhe others, who took the opportunity to get a breather, Fiona stayed to listen to this important versation.

  "In short," Nakajima tinued. "It sounds like you didn't learn your lesson."

  "Hey, I did learn that she's fake as hell," Karen said. "That damn fox acts like she's all weak and vulnerable, but theurns the tables on you outta nowhere. She’s gotta be an actress or something, word. I bet she and Andria would get along really well."

  "Yes. Sounds like you got the gist of it correctly, after all," Nakajima approved. "Athena is a crafty pyer. She'd go as far as downpying her own strengths to pull a surprise on her oppos."

  "Damn straight."

  "But, I believe this is something we've already covered when we had a meeting about StormBlitz's lineup, right?"

  "Yes, we did," Fiona answered quickly so Karen would not even try to wiggle her way out of this.

  "Yeaaaah, we did kinda talk about it, I guess." Karen shrugged. "But analyzing repys and seeing it live are too different things, you know?"

  Nakajima raised an eyebrow to that. "How do you mean?"

  "Well, when we analyzed the repys post-facto, it was clear when and how Athena id out her traps," Karen expined. "But iual game, in the heat of the moment, these things are hel hard to figure out, you know? Like, how am I supposed to tell when that damn fox is actually vulnerable and when she’s faking it? I just gotta trust my gut on that one."

  "Well, it looks like yut' failed you on that one."

  "Yeaaaah, it kinda did, haha."

  "No, not 'kinda'. You pletely fell for it."

  "Well, you bme me?” Karen pouted. “It looked hel ving! Even Lua thought it was a good opportunity. Right, Lua?"

  "Eh!?" Lua jumped when she heard her name from across the room. "Um, what?"

  "Back when we chased Athena into the jungle, you also thought it was a good ce to hit that bitch, right?"

  "Um, I..." Lua nervously adjusted her gsses. "I did say it might be a bad idea..." She whispered.

  "Hm? What was that?" Karen asked. "I didn't catch that."

  "Um, I-I said it really looked like a good opportunity, haha…" Lua forced herself to amend the story. She didn’t want to make Karen look bad here.

  "Well, you see?" Karen turned back to the accusers. "Even Lua didn't see that one ing, and you know she's a pretty damn cautious pyer."

  "Lua." Fiona turo the girl iion. "You say it looked like a 'good opportunity', but did you really think it was worth chasing?"

  "Well, I..." Lua fidgeted as she gnced from side to side as if searg for somebody to answer in her pce. In the end, her eyes fell on Karen.

  "What’s wrong?" Karen asked. "You totally said we should chase Athena, right?"

  Is that really how she remembers it...? Lua made a face. But, I guess I didn't put on much of a fight...

  Fiona noticed what was going on and interfered. "Karen, stop coaxing her into stig to your narrative.”

  "Coaxing? Me? No way," Karen said. "I'm just helping her remember how things went down."

  "Yes, how things went down acc to your narrative," Fiona corrected. "I am not so sure Lua had the same impression of that situation."

  "W-Well, it did look a bit suspicious," Lua admitted. "I mean, I thought the situation was too good to be true. And sidering the enemy was Athena, the goddess of tactics..."

  "hat the heck?" Karen excimed. "You gonna use hindsight to say it was a sus opportunity? Not cool, fam."

  "Well, I did say that maybe we shouldn't do it back then..."

  "You did? I don't remember that at all."

  I figured you don't... Lua sighed. Admittedly, she put on a weak resistance back then so it was very fettable. Karen's overflowing fidence overwhelmed her on the spot.

  "Let me guess," Fiona said. "Karen was very loud about going through with that py so you gave in. Something along those lines?"

  "Y-Yes, basically..."

  “I thought as much.” Fiona sighed. “I have told you many times: you must not be taken in by Karen’s baseless fidence.”

  “Hey! Rude, sis!” Karen pouted. “It wasn’t ‘baseless’. It was a great opportunity no matter how you look at it. If it happened against any other pyer, even you’d agree that attag is the right move.”

  “Perhaps,” Fiona said. “However, you were fag Athena, not ‘any other pyer’. The text is important.”

  “Blegh.” Karen made a face but she didn’t have a ter-argument to this one.

  “Anyway,” Fiona tinued. “Lua, just so you uand, you also share some of the bme here.”

  “Yes, I do…” Lua lowered her head in apology.

  “Then, it seems we uand the situation clearly now, master.” Fiourhe ball to Nakajima.

  “Yes, good job interrogating them,” Nakajima praised. She chose to stay put during the whole process. It was always best to let the pyers work things out on their own when possible.

  Ultimately, Nakajima’s job as the master was to guide the pyers down the right path, not to solve all their problems for them. It was important to let the kids bicker from time to time so they could sort things out on their own, that’s how they grew up as pyers.

  “So, to summarize,” Nakajima said. “Lua did suspect that opportunity was bait, but she wasn’t assertive enough. Meanwhile, Karen just totally fell for it. You both have things to work on, girls.”

  “Yes, master!” Lua nodded.

  “Yeah, I guess.” Karen shrugged. “I mean, I’ve ‘learned my lesson’, okay? That’s what you want to hear, right?”

  “Yes, that’s a good start,” Nakajima approved. “But, what did you ‘learly? How are you going to make sure you won’t make the same mistake again?”

  “Well, I be real here for a moment?” Karen asked. “I don’t think I gonna be able to see through ALL her schemes that easily. Bitch is crafty as fuck.”

  “Karen, nguage.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Karen shrugged. “Anyway, I figure the best I do is to not be hasty. Like, even if an opportunity looks hel good and I’d shoot for it 9 times outta 10, I’ll give it a sed thought when Athena is involved. Is that good enough for you?”

  “That’s acceptable.” Nakajima nodded. “Ultimately, there is no surefire way to deal with tricky pyers. Athena most likely adjusts her baiting strategy to work best against the specific oppo she’s fag, so even if you switch things up she might adapt to you anyway.”

  “Yeah, it’s hel scummy.”

  “My suggestion is to use Lua as a benchmark. If she has any reservations about the py, then it’s better to err on the side of caution.”

  “Well, not to be rude or anything, but Lua is the kind of gal who has reservations about almost every little thing, haha.” Karen ughed. “Like, even if she thinks a py is good, she still hesitates most of the time.”

  “T-That may be true…” Lua admitted as she hung her head. “Even if I think there’s a 99% ce of success, I still worry about that remaining 1%.,,”

  “You dang worrywart.” Karen shook her head. “I’mma be ho, it’s because of stuff like this that I kinda stopped taking Lua’s worries seriously. Girl is always worried about something.”

  “S-Sorry, I just ’t help it…”

  “You have to work on your fidence,” Nakajima said. “But, this is something you already knew. I believe you’ll build up fidence as you py more petitive games, so I’m not too worried about the future. But, for now, you’ll have to work with what you’ve got.”

  “But how, though?” Karen asked. “If I sed-guess myself every time Lua is ‘worried’ about something, I’ll be paralyzed the entire game. For real.”

  “This boils down to a unication issue, so it’s up to you two to find the right way to work it out,” Nakajima expined. “For example, you could try using ‘fidehresholds’. If Lua says she’s 99% fident, then ignore her worries about the remaining 1% si’s probably irrelevant.”

  “That sounds arbitrary as heck, but maybe it’ll work.” Karen shrugged. “I guess we try this out. Lua, feed me these ‘fidenumbers or whatever when you’re on the feh something.”

  “Alright, I’ll try.” Lua nodded. It sounds a bit stressful, though…

  In her head, the pertages Lua assigo these things were rather arbitrary. Like “70% we get this kill” or “90% this is bait”. Rough estimations like these.

  She didn’t mind throwing random numbers around because they only ever stayed in her head. It's not like she shared them with others or anything.

  But, if Karen starts basing her pys on these numbers, then I'll have to think long and hard about them. Lua shuddered. This is already giving me a stomachache...

  "Your face is telling me you're not a big fan of the idea," Nakajima said. "This is just a means to an end, you don't have to overthink it. The main goal here is to make sure Karen takes your opinion into at, that's all."

  "Yep," Karen said. "Like, if you think something is a bad py, then give it to me straight. I know I sometimes get carried away in the heat of the moment, so better tell me what’s up before that, haha."

  "Yes, you really do like getting carried away…" Lua ented without thinking.

  "Damn, what a burn! Haha."

  "A-Ah, I mean, it only happens every now and then, of course..."

  "Nah, o sugarcoat it," Karen said. "I know it's a bad habit."

  "Then please work on fixing it," Fiona requested.

  "Hey, it's easier said than done, sis." Karen shrugged. "That’s just how my personality is, you know?"

  "Personality be fixed through practice, just as anything else. It's all about putting in the effort."

  "Well, I'mma try."

  "Please do,” Fiona insisted.

  With that, this topic was a . "There's actually much more I wao discuss," Nakajima said. "But, your break is almost over so I'll let you rest for now."

  "Jeez, finally!" Karen sighed in relief. "I thought you gonna keep me here until tomorrow."

  "Believe it or not, that could really happen with the amount of tent that o be discussed regarding your performance."

  "Bejesus."

  "But, let's save it for another day," Nakajima said. "For now, I want you to focus on ironing out the issues we’ve just discussed."

  "Aye aye, coach!"

  "It's master."

  "Yeah, yeah, ‘master’." Karen tossed that out and slipped away. She had less than two minutes left for the break, so she didn't want even one millised of it to go to waste.

  I wonder, did she learn her lesson? Nakajima thought. And, did elia? Holy, it doesn't feel like I did a very good job here. She let out a small sigh after everybody left. All in all, the girls' morale is still in shambles. I doubt any of them will be able to work out their issues today.

  The st three games were brutally one-sided in StormBlitz's favor. They made the Valkyries' first victory look like a fluke, which it rgely was.

  Fiona single-handedly carried that game. Nakajima thought. If not for her strong opehings would’ve likely turned out like iher games. Holy, I don’t quite agree with that opening tactic, but I'm gd I trusted her judgment on that one.

  Apparently, it was a tech Fiona picked up from a legitimate pro pyer. At least, as “legitimate” as you could call Esmeralda.

  Fiona is the one pyer I trust to perform well no matter what. She barely needs any guidan situations like these. Nakajima thought. From the way she carries herself, nobody would ever believe she only started Cssmancers a year aght now, she's the only one oeam who’s keeping it together.

  Meanwhile, the rest of the Valkyries were in shambles. The tinuous defeats weighed down on them mentally.

  And, I don't think anything I’ve done or said during the break helped them in that department. Nakajima thought. Maybe I'm just much more used to dealing with boys…

  Even today, petitive esports were mostly the realm of men. As suakajima’s high school club only had a handful of female pyers join every year, if any.

  As a result, most of her coag experience came from dealing with boys. That's how she developed her spartahods, like troublemakers to do push-ups. It was a basic boot camp tactid a fairly effective one when scolding boys.

  But, firls, it didn't seem to work that well. Kare up without much problem because of her tomboyish personality, but elia saw it as nothing more than a disgrace. And, the irls didn't seem to care much when they watched that drill.

  Usually, when boys see somebody getting punished with push-ups, they’ll cheer h. It turns the whole thing into a social event. Nakajima thought. But here, it felt like the girls were only weirded out by it. But, I suppose that's to be expected.

  After all, St. Mary’s was a school for "dies". Thus, it was to be expected that the students would be a bit more tender and proper. In fact, girls who did sports there were probably an irregurity in the first pbsp;

  And, Karen is probably the biggest outlier out there. Nakajima thought. She almost acts like your typical brat. That's probably why it was so easy for her to ugh off the push-ups.

  Oher hand, the irls didn’t be from it. At best, it raised their fighting spirit a little bit by instilling dread, as they were now scared of finding themselves on that chopping block.

  Well, using terror is one way to and troops, but I don't think it's beneficial here. Nakajima reasoned. All in all, these girls are well-behaved for the most part. They just have quirks and morale issues, that's all.

  This was already the sed scrim in whiakajima ran into this issue. She tried many things but she couldn't find a good way the girls' morale after it hit ro.

  Maybe it's time to ask Fernando for adviakajima thought. He has been coag middle schoolers of both genders for a long time, so I'm sure I could use some of his methods.

  On this front, Nakajima was a “greenhorn” just like her team. The Valkyries were a newly formed club with no seniors to share their wisdom, and Nakajima was a newbie master when it came to coag middle schoolers.

  Just like them, I also have a lot to improve. Nakajima smiled wryly. Very well. I accept the challenge!

  And so, the Valkyries were headed to the fifth and final game of the day.

  Did Nakajima mao resolve any of their problems? Doubtful. At best, her scolding made Karen and elia think twice about getting carried away again. This was a start, but it won’t be enough to help the girls win this final game.

  Ultimately, their biggest issue was their crumbling morale, especially in Andria’s case. This issue will likely drag them down during the uping game as well…

  DarkestCymore