Chapter 83

Dan wanted Maddie’s words to be ironic. He wanted to make her eat them. However, he also knew he couldn’t go trashing his arm. Nor could he afford to spend the stamina this early on, to be reckless. Magic was one thing, but his body was still very much real, could very much get hurt and injured, and he very much, disliked pain.

Still, a 300 percent serve wasn’t something to laugh at. Had it been anyone on the tennis team, Peter aside of course, he was certain he’d be able to Ace them with such a serve. After all, best he could tell, the best player at his school, other than Peter, was roughly a 4.5. And that was with stats in the 40s and 50s range. Sixties and up, started getting into the semi pro and pro levels. Levels that normal people usually could only obtain through constant dedication, hard work, time, and sweat. Levels Dan was going to achieve just by playing tennis a bunch, thanks to his magic.

But hey, life wasn’t fair. That was a lesson Dan knew all too well. Plus, the only reason he even had these powers, was because some supernatural asshole had messed up in trying to actually murder him, to send him off to a demon infested world to try and save the people. So, Dan didn’t have much sympathy in that regard of his powers.

All that aside, everything culminated on this moment as he tossed the ball up, preparing his serve. As decided, it was going to be a slice serve. And the math on his magic powers put it somewhere in the 70s, with a good amount of strength and power behind it.

The world seemed to slow as he mentally adjusted his Auto-Battle skill, setting it at 300 percent, and preparing himself for the blowback. While it wouldn’t rip his muscles from the bone, he had no doubt, it was going to make his arm at least a little slow. If he had to guess, it would be akin to a slight twinge or pull. Something that was an inconvenience in practice, but no something that would stop you from actually practicing. And in Dan’s situation, something that wouldn’t cause any issue other than mild, momentary discomfort for a day, tops.

He felt the surreal feeling of sitting back and watching as the ‘magic’ system took control of his body. His muscles tensed, whatever force was running his body now calculating everything it needed to, for this moment. Like a cat preparing to leap, he felt his body almost coil, storing energy, preparing to transfer it. The ball climbed ever slowly up into the air, and as it reached the peak of its toss, his body sprang into action.

With a fluid motion his racquet rose from the side of his body, up above his head and over his shoulder, as his feet pushed off from the ground, and he was suddenly airborne. The jump height alone was impressive to Dan, but it didn’t stop there. His arm was still moving, having reached its stopping point back and over his head, it was now snapping forward, coming at the ball in a slicing motion. Normally with the slice serve, Dan got a lot of the ball with the slice portion, but not much forward momentum. He was still working hard to get the proper balance to actually give the serve power, and not just spin.

Auto-battle, had it perfectly. His racquet was both slicing into the ball, cutting into it from above and the side, while still pushing into it with forward pressure. In this slow motion state, Dan could practically see the ball meet the strings of the racquet, and watch as strings and tennis ball learned about friction, and Newton’s good ol laws. Then, with a blink, the world was moving properly again, the ball rocketing over the net, and a look of surprise, for a split second, on Maddie’s face.

Dan landed somewhat hard, having let go of Auto-Battle while he was still falling, but he watched Maddie, his eyes fixated on the club owner, as she reacted to his serve.

At 300 percent, Dan’s slice serve was flying at over 100 mph over the net, that much he could tell. The ball’s trajectory wasn’t a straight line, either. He’d hit it with enough spin that it actually seemed to curve through the air. It entered Maddie’s court just above the center of the court, seeming to straddle both service boxes. However, its curve drove it to Dan’s left, Maddie’s right, to direct it perfectly into the service box adjacent to Dan. There, deep and centered, it hit, and bounced even more to Dan’s left.

The positioning was perfect in his eyes. It’d come in on Maddie’s backhand side, but with the jump it did as it landed, it was perfectly even with her body. A difficult shot to return, especially at that speed.

Or, at least, that was how his mind was processing it, before things actually happened. The moment he’d served, she’d jumped ever so slightly. A move called a split step, meant to speed up reaction times and speed on the court. Done right, a player could save a precious second or two, and could change direction in record time.

Maddie had done just that, so even as Dan’s ball was curving over the net, connecting with the court, she’d prepared. She positioned herself in a way that ensured the shot was not going to her body. Instead, Dan watched as a smile crossed her face, her body, her positioning and movement, setting her up not for an awkward body shot, but an easy, forehand return.

Dan watched, dumbstruck, as the ball soared to his right, coming back over the net with a sharp angle. She’d cut into it with her block, using his force to prevent swing speed, and instead returning his serve with a forehand slice. The ball hit the ground, spinning dangerously, staying low thanks to the backspin Maddie had gotten on the return, and it was all Dan could do to scramble to it. His admiration of his own serve, and his surprise over how Maddie handled it, had slowed him. A normal player, no matter their skill and prime, shouldn’t have been able to return the ball Maddie had hit. She knew that, Dan knew that, and everyone watching, knew that.

But, Dan wasn’t a normal human. And while he’d failed in his Ace attempt, he was not about to have it backfire on him. Not only that, his mind was already racing, and an idea formed. Without pause he activated Auto-Battle at 150 percent, using it to push his body past its normal limits, draining his stamina, to rocket across the court towards Maddie’s return. At the same time, he thought a simple phrase, and grinned as his racquet seemed to heat up and vibrate in his hand in response.

Impossible Drop Shot.