Divine Celebrity 138 (Patreon)

“So, coach, anything else you want to do before I start ‘helping’ you with the training,” I said as I walked toward the man who was doing her best to replicate the color of an eggplant with perfect fidelity after watching his players get demolished.  

Of course, even worse, he had allowed the training to be live-streamed, hoping that my defeat — forgone in his mind — would give him a chance to send me packing so he could focus on his efforts to undermine the new director of sports. 

It didn’t work as he wished. 

“Wait a minute,” he said. “Just because you’re a better player than the bunch of useless kids doesn’t make you a good coach,” he said. “It doesn’t matter just how good you play. I need to see you coach before letting you anywhere near my team.” 

“Of course,” I said with a chuckle as I looked at his players, who certainly didn’t appreciate the sudden insult. “You’re free to call the director and tell them about that,” I said with a chuckle as I walked forward. “Here, I’ll even call her for you,” I said with a chuckle. 

“No need to call,” he said hurriedly, clearly not willing to talk with her just after a public defeat. “We just need to have a competition where you show your playing abilities. Just pick whoever you want,” he said as he gestured to his team. “I’ll pick the rest of the players, and we’ll have a match.” He smirked. “You can even have the starters.” 

“No need,” I responded quickly. “I don’t want to deprive you of your amazing starters,” I said as I looked at the rest of the players, examining their expressions of anger at my presence, one that was shared by the starters, and most of the backups. 

Yet, some of the backups, along with the practice squad players, had a more hopeful expression. After all, I had reforged our football team from the backups and junior players, increasing their reputation significantly.

The basketball team didn’t have a practice squad in the same sense as the football team, but the great number of freshman candidates gave me enough of a pool to make a selection.  

Their hopeful gaze suggested that they were more than happy with that prospect. 

“You lot,” I gestured to eight of them, making sure to focus more on enthusiasm than pure ability — which was easier considering there didn’t have a huge gap between them — while I quickly called Marcus. 

“You don’t stop, do you?” he said immediately, showing that he was watching the show. Not too surprising. 

“A good way to spend our off day. Do you want to play some  basketball as well?” I asked, chuckling. “I need someone to herd my new players.” 

“Sure, I’m not half bad playing basketball,” Marcus answered. “And, since you’re the one calling, you are clearly confident about what are you doing.” 

“Excellent, pick up Arthur as well and come join me. Hurry up, we’ll start soon.” I wanted Marcuus to join because the additional prestige would be helpful to maintain his enthusiasm. However, the reason I called Arthur was a little trickier. 

I wanted him to be a part of it, so that he could confirm that I wasn’t using any kind of advanced magic to help the group. His spying was a convenient feature. 

After I ended the call, I looked at the coach. “You don’t mind if I bring a couple football players, right?” I asked. “I don’t want to deal with you crying foul and blaming me when your rich kids start to cry.” 

“Bring it on, you little bastard,” he growled. 

“Careful coach. Maybe you should visit a doctor. That color can’t be healthy.”  

The coach grumbled, but he didn’t bother replying, realizing that a battle of words would only drag him down. After all, not only I was still a student, but also my constant arguments were my biggest claim to fame. 

Even if he could get the edge word-wise, it would be his prestige that would get damaged — well, damaged further, as the earlier show hardly did him any favors. 

“What’s the plan, do you want to play this Friday?” Coach offered. “For a genius like you, four days should be enough,” he offered, giving me just enough time to look generous but short enough that it wouldn’t be truly useful. 

“No need,” I waved my hand dismissively. Let’s have an hour each to draw some tactics and prepare. That’s all I need. So, unless you need some extra time to put this sorry bunch into shape…” 

I let it linger, and he just turned his back angry. Still, he just gestured for his team to gather around. He clearly assumed that my repeated taunts were like the trick I pulled against Spencer, trying to make him punch me.

He was still confident in defeating me even after I ignored his earlier obvious trap of trying to get players that were clearly hostile to me. He still had his starters that he had been working with for two years, and for all intents and purposes, that should create an unbreakable advantage. 

Unfortunately for him, I didn’t play fair. 

“Now, before we start, I need an assistant to help me, someone that knows about both basketball and football,” I said, speaking loudly. For a moment, that surprised everyone, which changed once I pointed at Miriam.  

“You bastard—“ the poor boy who had just lost his girlfriend shouted, only for the others to hold him. The coach rapidly whispered several things, no doubt explaining to them that I was trying to trigger a fight that would give me an excuse to pull back from the bet. 

On the contrary, I just wanted to see just how far I could push my domain of lust…

I waved at him mockingly before I turned toward the stands, where Miriam was walking toward me with a sway on her hips. “I heard you need an assistant.” 

“I do, sweetie,” I said as I grabbed her waist, pulling her closer to me, feeling the flow of Intent getting even more intense as the several cameras, Kim’s included., continued to live to stream the show. 

Including a much stronger echo of Lust feeding into the Domain, coming from a distance. I smirked as I leaned forward. “Why don’t you go and lead me to a meeting room here, and after that, go and put something more interesting,” I whispered to her. Then, I turned to the team. “Follow me, boys,” I said. “We are going to have a talk about tactics, and we don’t need any eavesdroppers.” 

It was another evidence of my growing legend that they didn’t even bother arguing — or commented on the fact that I walked with my hand on Miriam’s ass. 

“That room should be enough,” Miriam said, pointing at a decent-sized room with a locked door. She walked away while I reached for my phone. “Do you guys have the number of the facility manager,” I said. One of them passed it, and I called them. 

“We will be there in five minutes,” the voice said, but I caught the mocking edge in his tone, clearly doing his best to make things harder for us. 

“You have fifteen seconds, or I open it myself.” 

“Go ahead, those locks are electronically locked and steel reinforced—“ he started, only for a crush to reach to their ear.  

I could have convinced them, of course, but noticing one of my new players was secretly recording the show, I decided to show off a bit more, and kicked the door open, its lock broken. “No worries, it’s already open,” I said as I chuckled, closing the door behind me. 

“Follow me, boys,” I said, leading them into the room. “Now, we don’t have much time, so we’re going to focus on some simple concepts, fast breaks, and simple isolation plays,” I started. 

“Are you sure, coach, we don’t have real runners to pull consistent fast breaks,” one of them asked. 

“Don’t worry about it, that’s why I called Arthur to play. He has the necessary speed for some surprise plays. When they arrive, we’ll talk more about our fast-break strategies. First, let’s focus on our isolation plays for the offense.” 

Isolation plays, or iso plays, were simple in concept. The attacking team spread around the court, leaving the ball in the hands of their best player, which aimed to create a matchup advantage. 

“Are you sure, coach?” one of them said. “It’s a good idea but, we don’t really have a skill advantage to justify that, especially if they try to add some double-teams. 

“Don’t worry, we’re going to mix in some pick and rolls and other tricks into the mix, and Marcus is skilled enough passer to defend against if that happens. Just pass the ball to him if you think that’s sustainable. But, I have a reason for doing so, can you guess why?” 

They thought for a moment before one of them clicked his fingers. “Because their pride won’t allow them to double-team us aggressively from the start,” he said. 

“Exactly,” I answered. “Using isolation plays is essentially a call for a duel, and it’s the fastest thing we can learn in less than an hour. You just need to prove that the only reason you’re the backup is because your family didn’t bribe that asshole.” 

I declared that aggressively, aware that the show was still being watched by the others. 

“Now, let’s start—“ I said, but before I could, Miriam knocked on the door and walked inside, wearing a cheerleader outfit…

And, just to add insult to injury, it was the outfit of our basketball team.