The beach volleyball match pitted Kuro and Sieg-san against Alice and me. It kicked off with Kuro’s serve. Aimed diagonally across the court at Alice, the serve was sharp and carried considerable momentum. It was fast, certainly, but the fact that I could track it clearly meant Kuro was holding back significantly.
Alice moved with poise, executing a clean receive that neutralized the ball's force. It floated softly toward me.
"Alice!"
"Leave it to me!"
There was no sense in trying anything fancy like a two-touch return, so I stuck to the basics and sent a high toss up to set Alice for a spike. It wasn't perfect, but it had plenty of height. If I do say so myself, it was a solid effort.
As Alice leaped into the air, Kuro and Sieg-san didn't move to block. Instead, they dropped into a crouch, ready to receive. They were clearly wary of Alice’s technical skill; if they jumped for a block, Alice would likely see it and adjust mid-air to spike around them. Jumping recklessly would only play into her hands.
It wasn't as though I’d reached the conclusion through deep deliberation, but looking at Alice’s posture, it seemed obvious she was targeting Sieg-san’s side—and at a punishingly sharp angle. Kuro and Sieg-san appeared to reach the same conclusion; Sieg-san’s expression grew focused, and Kuro shifted a step toward her to provide immediate backup.
But Alice lived up to her reputation. Maintaining her orientation toward Sieg-san until the last second, she whipped the spike in the opposite direction, toward Kuro.
"Kh!?"
Kuro reacted brilliantly to the feint, but even for her, digging out a spike aimed perfectly at the corner was impossible with restricted physical stats and a late start. She lunged sideways with one arm outstretched, managing to pop the ball back into the air. It arced toward me at a perfect height.
"Kaito-san! Now!"
"Got it!"
Kuro was still off-balance. Seizing the opportunity, I leaped at Alice’s command. My Physical Enhancement magic was nothing special—pathetic, really, compared to someone like Hina—but it wasn’t useless. While I couldn't break the limits of human capability like she could, I could at least perform at the level of a professional athlete.
I reached a decent height and swung. Lacking the finesse to aim for a specific spot, I simply poured all my strength into my arm. By sheer luck, the ball plummeted toward the dead center between Kuro and Sieg-san. They had both scrambled back to their feet, but they froze for a split second, hesitating over who should take it. The ball hit the sand right in that gap.
"Nice spike, Kaito-san!"
"Thanks. That first feint of yours was incredible, Alice. Just as I expected."
We’d only taken the first point, but scoring so cleanly felt fantastic. I gave Alice a light high-five as she jogged over.
"Aww, looks like we’re trailing," Kuro lamented playfully.
"My apologies, Chrome-sama. I hesitated..."
"No, no, I froze up too. Don't worry about it—let’s just take the next point back!"
"Yes!"
There was a great atmosphere on both sides of the net; it felt as though all four of us were genuinely enjoying ourselves. The match turned into a back-and-forth trade of points, but with our early momentum and Alice’s masterful support, we ultimately secured a 5-3 victory.
From a distance, Shallow Vernal and the real Alice watched Kaito celebrate with the kigurumi.
"...I suspected these conditions would put him at a disadvantage," Shallow Vernal remarked, "yet Kaito-san scored far more points than I anticipated."
"True," Alice agreed. "Every time he went for a hit, Kuro-san or Sieg-san seemed slightly off-kilter, or the ball just happened to land in the perfect spot."
"And yet, I sensed no interference with causality or any other manipulation," Shallow Vernal added. "If there were any, Kuro would have put a stop to it. Perhaps I am merely overthinking?"
Alice pondered the situation for a few moments. She knew exactly who was inside that costume.
"No, she’s using Omniscience," Alice concluded. "She knows exactly when to move and what to do to get a specific result. Since she isn’t technically changing the future, Kuro-san probably hasn't noticed."
"I see. What should we do? Should we confront her?"
"Nah, let’s leave it. It’s just a game, and there aren't any prizes. Looking at the way things played out, it seems she wasn't searching for a pattern where they win in a landslide, but rather a scenario where Kaito-san wins a close, exciting game. She’s being considerate of the mood in her own way. Better to let them win and leave on a high note than to start an argument."
Shallow Vernal nodded, accepting Alice’s logic. Then, a new thought occurred to her.
"Speaking of which, she is remarkably good at mimicking you. Had I not known beforehand, even I might not have caught on."
"She probably used Omniscience to study me," Alice replied. "I suspect it’s due to his Sympathy Magic, but Kaito-san is terrifyingly sharp when it comes to disguises. He can see through mine based on nothing but 'vibes.' She had to be that perfect, otherwise he would have smelled a rat."
In truth, Kaito often saw through Alice’s disguises—transformations that even the Six Kings struggled to penetrate—without any logical basis. When Alice had asked him about it later, Kaito had simply described it as "sensing a vague wrongness." The only reason Kaito still believed the person in the kigurumi was Alice was because an omniscient and omnipotent being was actively countering his intuition.
Still, Alice couldn't help but wonder.
(Setting that aside... she's being surprisingly well-behaved. She probably joined because she wanted a front-row seat to watch Kaito-san shine, so I expected her to go off the rails by now. But there's no sign of that. Wait... don't tell me that klutz has already forgotten why she’s there and is just enjoying her first game of beach volleyball?)
Serious-senpai: "Forgetting her original purpose and just having fun... Yeah, that sounds exactly like her."