Chương 22: Music Contest: Finale
Akane let Emilia alone in her room, so she could continue helping her out with the uniform. Akane walked to her stage in the seat, she really wanted to see the finalist, the person that could give her a run for her money, she wanted to confirm how good he was, after all she wanted someone that was at least on equal footing with her.
She arrived at was greeted by her teacher Angelo.
"Ah! Young Akane is here, did you perhaps come to scout out your competition?"
Akane nodded, after all he might be worth it. Angelo immediately understood Akanes' intent upon looking at her expression, she was excited that maybe there was someone worthy enough for her to call a rival.
"Young Akane you are going to watch the performance of Aoki Kazue, another Japanese pianist prodigy, he was a famous face in the scene, before you joined Akane, but one day he stopped performing whatsoever, never appearing on a stage again, until today that is, he decided to join the competition, maybe to prove something."
"He has an interesting gait, it looks like something was once weighing on his shoulders, but now it cleared, making him walk forward with pride and confidence, I would guess something happened the last two months or something, a life turning experience, just as I had."
The teacher nodded at his students' words, they were surprisingly accurate and it sounded plausible.
Kazue walked forward to the stage, sitting down, breathing calmly, he slowly rested his hands on the instrument, and then...
...he started to play.
(True Strength, OPM sad theme orchestration made by Rush Garcia, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=105e998i_oo)
It was a sad melody, full of longing, trying to fulfill a dream, trying to reach out, trying to get something back from inside of you, something that you lost a long time ago, yet this melody wasn't just completely filled with sadness and despair. It was also filled with hope, filled with acceptance, showing that even though you lost something, that there are always things left, and you build upon that hope, building higher and higher, until you are satisfied again, but that profound sadness never truly left, you just put it behind you, accepting it, like every part of you, you should accept yourself.
It was a theme of hope, hoping that what you waited for finally comes back for you, trying stand back up, even after falling down. It was a theme about accepting and overcoming your faults, your loneliness.
Akane started to tear up after the melody, as did everyone else in the room, even the normally emotion neutral Angelo shed a few tears.
"That is going to be a the most difficult opponent you have ever faced young Akane, do you think you can win."
Akane was about to walk downstairs.
"I don't know, probably? I mean there is a change that I will lose."
She said with a childish mix of innocence and joy, smiling to her teacher.
"Indeed Akane, you might lose this battle."
Akane walked down to the stage, hoping to find the boy, but he wasn't there, she asked some of the staff of the event, getting her question answered, she started to bolt to the corridor behind the stage, seeing the boy.
She saw his bag, but she wanted to make a proper entrance, not chasing after someone's back, but his front, she walked a big detour, calculating the way to the boy, so she can stand in his way. After a moment of running she was finally in the right position for her awesome entrance.
She slowly walked in front of the boy with a confident smile, seeing the girl standing in his way surprised the boy. Akane stretched her hand out, offering a handshake, the boy accepted.
"Nice to meet you Aoki Kazue, you probably don't know me, but I am Seigi Akane."
The boy looked at her with an incredulous look.
"Who wouldn't know you? You are the famous piano prodigy that stormed the world in two years!"
"Well, you are pretty famous yourself, but went out of business, before I even started playing, you can't blame me for thinking that you completely abandoned the pianist world, right?"
"Yeah, fair enough. You really are a five-year-old kid, huh."
"Well, to the main part, I am her to declare you as my rival! And don't dismiss it as a child's fantasy, I hereby declare you my rival, nobody could even bring me to play seriously, but you give me the hope of the crushing defeat of mine! So, Aoki, do you accept."
The boy didn't know what to say and looked at her with a confused gaze.
"Why should I?"
The girl sighed.
"Let me ask you something, did you use your everything just now?"
He shook his head.
"Then I am going to declare something, if you don't use your everything in your next piece, you are going to lose, and even if you don't lose, you would trample on my pride for daring to net give it your all, so you better perform at 100% in two days."
The boy just scoffed.
"You know nothing of me girl, now get out of my way, I want to rest."
The boy shoved Akane out of the way, making her a bit angry.
"So, what if your girlfriend died a couple of weeks ago! Do you think that her attempt to bring you back into the pianist scene was a joke? Because you are exactly doing that if you continue to just play half-assed!"
The boy turned around, giving her a murderous glare.
"How do you know of that? How much do you know?"
"I honestly just shot into the dark, but seeing your expression implies that I hit home. Now let me tell you something, even though it looks like you worked through all of your feelings from that time, I can see that you didn't, you are still denying reality, face it. I am sure that the girl you had feelings for loved your music over everything, probably cheered her up through her darkest times, but now she is dead and you aren't even trying to fulfill her last wish, she probably wanted you to be happy, be happy playing the piano, instead you sit on stage and still doubt yourself and your skill, even though you are a great pianist, probably the only one in this world that could rival me. Now brighten the fuck up and let go of the past, I am sure she wouldn't want you to cling onto her forever."
Akane said her piece and walked past the boy. He just clenched his teeth and fist, she was absolutely right and he couldn't say anything, but he was still angry, unaccepting.
"Oh, just as a little side advice, if you can't seem to work through all your thoughts and feelings, just try play the piano, it sometimes works wonders for me."
He turned around and couldn't see the girl anymore, she disappeared, but he is definitely going to heed her advice later.
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Two days later was the final competition day, the final moment before Akane can start to learn a new instrument.
Akane was late, her family and her teacher started to get very nervous after she still didn't appear yet. All were worried that something could have happed to her. Then they saw a certain for armed child.
"Emilia-san, did you see my daughter, you were the one that last saw her, right? Why isn't she still here."
"Ah! Ms. Seiki please calm down, I am sure your daughter is going to appear any minute now, you just have to wait for her!"
But the event already got delayed by a bit of time, if it's delayed again, she is going to get disqualified!"
"Don't worry I jump in for her."
"Young Aoki, you would really do that for her."
"Yeah, wouldn't be fun if I couldn't compete with my rival."
With these words he walked on stage, sat down to his seat and prepared to play. In this moment Akane appeared in her costume beside everyone.
"So, he thought about my words, huh."
Everyone present wanted to shout her name, but she stopped all of them, indicating to be quiet and pointing at the stage, she wanted to hear the boy's music.
Then the final fight started.
(Grand Battle remix from Fate/Grand Order, made by Zeroni, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0MoEeoVXQ4)
The final piece of the boy just screamed, grand finale at everyone, it was a piece fitting for a final battle, it was a theme declaring war on Akane, saying to her that he is the hero and she is the monster and that he as the hero will emerge victorious out this grand battle. The piece had some wielder and calmer moments, but all of them were followed by a line that firmly said that the action wasn't over, that the battle was still ongoing raging.
The boy put all of his body into the play, starting to sweat, starting to let everyone's blood boil, asking him to join the battle as his team, with the support of the audiences the theme just got stronger more intense, despite the loud cheers from the audience. He rallied the audience in with his piece, he played fiercely to defeat Akane, he played fiercely to appease the audience, he played fiercely trying to show that he is the better one of the two, after six minutes of intense playing Aoki finally finished his plays.
With a haggard breath, tired arms and a heavily sweaty body, but despite his unneatly appearance the audience cheered for him, as if he was the hero, and he indeed was for the moment, after a minute of loud ear deafening cheers the audience finally calmed down and Aoki could walk of the stage.
Akane had a crazed smile on her face, as she currently was she would definitely lose, but she wasn't scared, after Akio left the spotlight, Akane immediately entered it with her new outfit, she had donned a kind of military uniform that fitted her form tightly, it consisted of a short coat, only reaching to her hip, it had two rows of golden button, each being intricately decorated. The color scheme of the coat was white, while the line with the buttons was blue with golden decorations adorning it, she wore a pair of tight white pants and she had a pair of round, golden shoulder decorations on her shoulders, rounding the outfit up. On her face Akane wore a mask out of metal, the mask was built out of multiple metal stripes that were blue at the ends of them, and a hat fitting the theme of the mask.
(If you can't imagine her head decorations, it looks like what Mozart from Fate Grand/Order wears in his 3rd Ascension art, also a link to the mask, the only difference is are instead of the yellow ends, they are blue. https://fategrandorder.fandom.com/wiki/Mystery_Masks)
She sat down and started to rest her hands on the instrument, the audience was silent upon the sight of the painting in front of them. Akane lifted her hands and suddenly everything around her slows down, she is diving into her soul, trying to attempt to clear the big wall, finally she felt ready for it. In record speed she reached it and crashed into it, it resisted, but then Akane pushed it a little and it immediately shattered, finally giving her, her piece.
(https://soundcloud.com/dragonxvi/save-our-souls-undertale-hopes-dreamssave-the-world, yep no YouTube link, this remix in just not on the platform. You should be able to read the name of the remix from the link, if not you are a true degenerate)
That was the moment Akanes hands fell down, it immediately fell on the right notes and she started to play.
It started rather slowly, but you could already hear the hopes just from the build up from the piece, Akane played, she just played for herself, completely ignoring the audience, her rivals, her teacher, her family, know just she and the instrument existed, playing a tune of hopes and dreams, of illusions and ambitions, of finally getting to the final battle.
It was different from Aokis' final battle theme, her sounded more like she wanted to befriend her opponent instead of defeating it, she had a different goal, not defeating her opponent and emerge as victor, she wanted to spare her enemy get to know them, getting familiar with them, understanding them, trying to SAVE them.
It was the complete opposite to his piece, instead of winning she wanted to make a friend, a comrade in arms, other than in his piece the audience was completely silent, listening to the music, as if they listened to the words of the girl, instead of making their blood boil, her them calmed them down, it was the opposite in so many ways that he couldn't believe it.
It was a beautiful piece that nobody wanted to hear the end of , while his was more like an intense flame, burning brightly and fiercely for a moment, battle ready, but nobody liked to be in battle mode for an extended amount of time, her theme did the opposite of his, taking the will to fight away from them, getting friendly with them.
Kazue just stood there, looking at the girl in front of him, she still didn't finish her piece, but he already knew...
"Tscheh, I lost..."
SUY NGHĨ CỦA NGƯỜI SÁNG TẠO 
HopelessHikikomori
HopelessHikikomori I am proud of this chapter, even with the spelling mistakes.
Contest Arc is finally over, now lets deal with the aftermath in the next chapter.
If forever reason you scrolled down here without reading the chapter, (probably because you want to comment first) have fun reading the chapter~
It wasn't his theme, or hopes and dreams, or home, it was SAVE our Souls!
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