Back in the dugout, Zhang Han could not help himself. He caught Kawakami's eye and gave him a thumbs up.
"You're not leaving me any room, are you?"
At the rate Kawakami was pitching, if he could sustain this form, the ace position might not belong to Tanba for much longer.
Kawakami smiled, keeping it modest.
"I just got lucky."
He was genuinely excited inside, but he had not lost his head. His performance today did not yet earn him the right to show off in front of Zhang Han and Miyuki. He knew that clearly.
"There's no such thing as luck on a baseball field. You just put in the work where nobody could see it."
Zhang Han meant it. Kawakami was not the kind of natural genius who absorbed things without effort. That double play had not come from nowhere. Eight or nine tenths of everything Zhang Han himself could do was the direct result of training. Talent, in his honest assessment, accounted for less than ten percent.
Kawakami felt those words more deeply than any praise for his pitching. Someone had noticed the hours no one else had seen. And not just anyone — Zhang Han, of all people, had acknowledged it.
Coach Kataoka gave a short nod of encouragement in Kawakami's direction.
"Keep that rhythm going. Don't chase strikeouts. Make them hit off-balance and you've done your job."
Then Kataoka turned to face the rest of his players.
"The pitcher has held up his end. Now it's your turn."
The batters preparing to step up felt something ignite in their chests. He was right. It was time.
Bottom of the third inning. Seido on offense.
Before the first batter went up, Kataoka reminded them simply to play the way they practiced. No overthinking. Trust what they had built.
"First batter — shortstop, Kuramochi!"
Seido's offensive engine was up first. The lineup from here had real teeth. It would cycle back to Zhang Han, and with high probability it would reach Yuuki as well. Those two had already put Narumiya through a difficult lesson earlier in the game, and Seido's first run had come directly from their bats. If Narumiya chose to face them again rather than pitch around them, the chances of scoring were very real.
Kataoka believed in his players. Beyond Zhang Han and Yuuki, he also held genuine expectations for the top two spots in the order. They were not power hitters, but both Kuramochi and the second batter possessed skills of their own. When they worked together, Seido's chances of getting something on the board were far from slim.
Kuramochi stepped into the box with his jaw set.
He had been in the stands watching during the Summer Tournament semi-finals when Seido faced Inashiro. He had watched from the crowd and dreamed about it afterward — the same dream, over and over, with striking consistency. In the dream, he wore the Seido uniform and stood in against Narumiya Mei.
Now the dream was real.
The reality, however, was that Narumiya's pitching was faster and sharper than anything his imagination had produced. Hitting it out was not going to be simple.
But that was exactly what made it worth doing.
Kuramochi raised his bat and locked his eyes on Narumiya, his fighting spirit fully lit.
Behind the plate, Harada was doing his own reading.
Today's game had squeezed serious pressure onto Seido's pitching staff. They had already forced Tanba off the mound. But Kawakami had come in and immediately exceeded expectations — composed, sharp, and not rattled by the stage. It was now unclear how many more innings it would take to wear him down, or whether they could score off him at all.
Given that uncertainty, Inashiro's priority right now had to be defense. They could not afford to give up runs. Whatever it took, they needed to get through this inning cleanly.
Harada thought it over and sent the sign to Narumiya.
Use the changeup. Get him out. But keep an eye on the bunt — Kuramochi's speed made him dangerous if he reached first, and things would get complicated quickly from there.
Narumiya gave the faintest nod. He understood. He was not going to mess this up.
"Swish!"
A full-force delivery. Despite his height, the ball that left Narumiya's hand was heavy and fast. Even with full preparation, making clean contact was not a straightforward task.
Kuramochi had never expected it to be easy. That was fine. The harder it was, the more it meant when he came through.
He had heard the whispers around the team for a while now. That he had his starting shortstop position because of his speed and nothing else. That he had only kept it because Zhang Han had shifted toward pitching. That without that coincidence, the spot would not have been his even by his third year.
The old Kuramochi would have settled it with his fists. The person he was now settled it differently.
He was a baseball player. Resorting to violence when someone doubted you was the most useless response imaginable. The only answer that mattered was on the field.
The white ball came at him hard.
Kuramochi gritted his teeth and swung.
"Ping!"
Contact. The ball bounced sharply and skipped away at an awkward angle.
"Mine!"
Yoshizawa called it from third base and charged forward. The landing spot was tricky, but it was not outside his range. Inashiro's fielders drilled this kind of play constantly. Fielding had become reflex for them. He was confident he could collect it cleanly and still have time to retire Kuramochi at first.
He ran in, scooped the ball, and his technique was perfect. Under any other circumstance he might have wanted to pause and admire it himself.
He turned to make the throw to first base.
His eyes went wide.
Kuramochi was already seven or eight meters from the bag.
Yoshizawa's arm was already winding up when the realization hit him. It was too late. In the time it took him to prepare the throw, Kuramochi had covered another four or five meters. By the time the ball left his hand, Kuramochi was three or four meters out.
"Slap."
The ball landed cleanly in Yamaoka Riku's glove at first base.
It did not matter. A few tenths of a second before that, Kuramochi's foot had already come down on the bag.
"Safe!"
A single. Kuramochi pumped his fist at first base.
From the dugout, Zhang Han waved back at him, grinning. Getting to first on a ball like that — he could only shake his head and give him full credit. After they got back to school, he was going to strongly suggest to their biology teacher that a proper genetic analysis be conducted on Kuramochi. Something was not normal there. His overall speed was impressive, but his first step off the mark was something else entirely.
Even Carlos, the so-called African Leopard, did not have a starting burst like that.
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