My Ultimate Gacha System

Chapter 352 - 27: The Morning After I

The Lowry Hotel, Salford — 1:30 PM

The hotel was on the River Irwell with its glass-fronted facade catching the grey Manchester afternoon, and the river ran directly below the lower floors while the city skyline sat behind it, and the FA had used it enough times that check-in happened through the same brisk pre-registered process as every other team hotel on every other trip.

Room 412. Phillips this time — Eze had been moved to a different room.

Phillips was already inside with his bag open and his trainers by the door when Demien arrived, and he looked up once. "First time here?"

"Yeah," Demien said.

"Good hotel," Phillips said, going back to his unpacking. "Room service is quality. Recovery pool downstairs is cold but it works. We’ve got pool session at three, team meeting at five, dinner at seven."

Demien put his bag on the bed and pulled out the Malta match ball and set it on the desk beside his charger.

Phillips looked at it. "That from last night?"

"Kane made me take it," Demien said.

Phillips looked at it for another second. "Keep it somewhere it won’t get knocked. First senior goal. That’s not something you want in a bag."

Demien moved it to the windowsill where it sat against the glass with the Manchester skyline and the river behind it, and he unpacked the rest of his things and went to find the recovery pool.

Recovery Pool — 3:00 PM

The pool was cold — the specific cold of fifteen degrees that worked exactly as intended and wasn’t comfortable for any of the twenty minutes — and he did the laps and the resistance band work and the stretching without rushing because the protocol existed for a reason and his legs had covered more ground in the previous seventy-two hours than the calendar suggested.

He wasn’t sore. Thirty-three minutes at Malta hadn’t accumulated the debt that ninety minutes at a higher intensity would have, but the travel and the heat and the change in time zone had a weight of their own and the pool addressed all of it with the indifference of something that didn’t care about the scoreline.

Kane and Rice were talking to one of the physios at the far end of the pool and Southgate walked through once without stopping, just a look across the room before he continued toward the exit.

The system panel appeared while he was in the hydromassage chair afterward.

「RECOVERY SESSION COMPLETE」 「Physical Status: 100%」 「No Injuries Detected」 「Next Match: Monday, June 19 — Old Trafford」

He dismissed it and closed his eyes while the jets worked his lower back.

Conference Room — 5:00 PM

Southgate at the board with the projector and the same assistant coaches and the full squad arranged in the hotel conference room chairs, and the screen behind him showed the North Macedonia crest.

"Good result Friday," he said. "Now we reset." He clicked the remote and North Macedonia’s formation appeared. "Different proposition entirely. They beat Ukraine two-nil in their last qualifier. They press in coordinated patterns — their midfield triggers are specific and practised, not just high-energy pressing. They defend with a flat five when we enter the final third and their transitions are quick through Elmas." He pointed at the screen where the Napoli midfielder’s name appeared alongside a clip of him driving through space on the counter. "This isn’t Malta. The tempo in this match will be higher from the first minute and it will stay there."

He clicked through three more clips — North Macedonia’s pressing traps, their set piece routines, the way their block stayed compact when teams tried to play around it centrally.

"Training tomorrow at Carrington, ten AM. Tactical focus. Monday evening we finalise the lineup." He looked around the room. "Questions?"

Nobody had questions.

"Dinner at seven. Rest up." He closed his folder and the room cleared.

Demien stayed in his seat for a moment after most of the squad had filed out, studying the North Macedonia shape on the frozen screen where the projector was still running, and the pressing triggers Southgate had shown looked coordinated enough that the space he’d found against Malta — the give-and-go with Kane, the gap in their midfield that the Pirlo skill had threaded through — wouldn’t appear the same way on Monday.

Different problem. Needed different solutions.

He went to dinner.

Hotel Restaurant — 7:15 PM

He was halfway through the pasta when Southgate appeared at their table and stopped.

"Demien. Quick word after dinner."

"Yes, boss," Demien said.

Southgate moved to the next table and Eze raised his eyebrows from across the table without saying anything, and Gallagher kept eating and Phillips said nothing and that said everything.

They finished at eight and Demien waited near the restaurant entrance and Southgate came through and they walked together toward the quiet lounge off the main corridor, which was empty at this hour and had low chairs and the river visible through the full-length windows at the far end.

They sat.

"Friday was excellent," Southgate said. "You know that."

"Thank you," Demien said.

"Monday is different," Southgate said. "North Macedonia will press you harder and more specifically than Malta did. They’ll target the channels you used. They’ve watched the same footage we have." He held his gaze. "You’re in consideration for extended minutes Monday. Possibly starting second half, possibly earlier depending on how the match flows. But the expectation is higher now. You set a standard Friday and you’ll be judged against it." He paused. "Use tomorrow’s training to prepare. Study their pressing triggers. Understand where they’ll try to force the error."

"I understand," Demien said.

"Any questions?"

"No, boss."

"Get some rest." Southgate stood and walked back toward the restaurant and Demien sat in the quiet lounge for a moment with the river moving outside the window and the city lights reflecting off it before he went back upstairs.

Room 412 — 9:00 PM

Phillips was watching a British quiz show at a volume that filled the room without being intrusive, and Demien was on his bed with the laptop open and the North Macedonia tactical footage running from the team server when his phone buzzed with a FaceTime from Sophia.

He took it to the bathroom and closed the door and answered, and her face appeared on the screen — Milan apartment behind her, hair up, no makeup — and she looked at him the way she always looked at him when they’d been apart for longer than a few days, which was with the particular attention of someone checking that the version of him in front of them matched the one they’d been carrying around.

"Finally," she said. "I’ve been waiting all day."

"Sorry. Travel, recovery, team meeting," he said. "Full day."

"I know. I saw the England account posted you’re in Manchester." She smiled. "How does it feel?"

He thought about it. "Strange," he said. "Yesterday I scored on debut. Today I’m watching North Macedonia pressing patterns."

"That’s just football," she said.

"Yeah."

They talked for twelve minutes. She asked about the goal — what it felt like in the moment — and he described it the way it had actually happened rather than the way it would sound in a highlight package, which was that the goalkeeper’s positioning was wrong and his body identified the Dipping Power Shot was the right technique and he trusted it and it worked. She told him Milan had been showing his goal in bars, that Italian football Twitter was calling him the one who got away, that her father had called asking if he was really moving to England because Italy needed him.

"What did you tell him?" Demien said.

"That nothing was decided yet," she said.

A pause, and then she looked at him directly. "If you go to England — whatever you decide, wherever it is — we figure out the rest. Milan to Manchester or Liverpool is two hours. Don’t factor the distance into the decision."

"I wasn’t," he said.

"Good," she said. "Choose what’s right for your career. That’s it."

He held her gaze through the phone screen for a moment. "I love you," he said.

"I love you too." She smiled. "Now go back to your North Macedonia footage. Win on Monday. Then we talk properly after the meetings."

"Okay," he said.

"And Demien." She paused. "That goal was incredible. The whole world saw what I’ve known all along." She ended the call.

He stood in the bathroom for a moment with the blank screen in his hand and then went back to the main room and sat on the bed and reopened the laptop.

North Macedonia pressing patterns. Their midfield rotations. Where Elmas dropped and what that created.

Monday.

10:15 PM

He made the mistake of checking social media before sleep.

The goal was at 5.2 million views across platforms and Gary Neville had posted about the decision-making and Jamie Carragher had compared the Wilson assist to Steven Gerrard’s passing range at the same age and Rio Ferdinand had posted a single line — Welcome to international football, Demien Walter — with a clap emoji and 34,000 likes.

Both Liverpool and United had left emoji comments on England’s post of the goal, which was a form of public communication that cost nothing and said everything.

He scrolled the Italian coverage briefly. Gazzetta dello Sport: Walter incanta l’Inghilterra. Sky Sport Italia had posted a comparison video — his debut goal beside Bellingham’s debut goal, both nineteen, both playing abroad, both scored in thirty-odd minutes.

He put the phone on airplane mode and set it face-down on the nightstand.

From across the room Phillips turned off the quiz show and the room went dark except for the city lights coming through the gap in the curtains.

"Done torturing yourself?" Phillips said.

"Yeah," Demien said.

"Good," Phillips said. "Get some sleep. Tomorrow’s tactical work and your brain needs to be sharp for it."

Demien looked at the match ball on the windowsill with the Manchester skyline behind it and the river reflecting light below, and then he closed his eyes.