"They scored! Seido High School Baseball Team scored!!"
Commentator Fujita, usually known for his calm and professional demeanor, spoke with an excited, slightly hoarse voice. It felt as if he had torn his vocal cords.
His heart was pounding.
Just when it seemed the game was about to end, Seido had produced a miracle at the last moment. They had gotten a run back.
The score was 6:5.
The gap was now one run.
But that wasn't even the most important part. The most important part was that Seido's fourth and fifth batters had kept the lineup moving. If nothing unexpected happened, the upper portion of the order would come up again in the ninth inning.
The hitting power of Seido's upper lineup was something everyone present had now seen for themselves. All five of Seido's runs so far had come from their top five batters. A string of hits from Zhang Han and Yuuki, Zhang Han's two-run home run, Kuramochi scoring on speed, and now the combination of Yuuki and Isashiki Jun.
Five runs. All of them from the top five.
As long as that group came up again, Seido would have another real chance.
Facing what had looked like a certain defeat, Seido had come back to life. The outcome of the game was unpredictable again.
The Inashiro players stared at their opponents with genuine discomfort.
They had pushed Seido to the brink three times. Three times, Seido had pulled through. Their spirit and willpower were almost incomprehensible. Was the goddess of luck truly standing entirely on Seido's side today?
Inashiro's players could not accept that. They refused to.
No matter the cost, no matter how much stamina it took or how many trump cards had to be used, they had to suppress Seido again.
"One out!!"
"Let him hit it. We'll stop it."
Inashiro's players rallied behind their pitcher in their own way.
Narumiya Mei, standing on the mound, had the most complicated feelings of anyone on the field. He had been so close to securing the win. He hadn't expected Seido to be this persistent.
Tokyo truly was a strange place.
Even pitching as well as he had, with nothing to criticize in his performance, he still might not come out on top.
"Even if it's written in the heavens, I will break those rules today."
He wasn't going to give up. He would push through in one go.
Then he got off to a bad start.
"Ping!"
Miyuki swung boldly on the very first pitch.
Both Harada and Narumiya Mei had assumed that Miyuki, with his sharp and calculating nature, would wait and look for a changeup. Instead, he swung at the first pitch, and swung at a fastball at that.
It wasn't a clean hit. The ball was quickly intercepted by an Inashiro infielder. A throw to first base would have gotten Miyuki out easily.
But Hirai, Inashiro's second baseman, didn't throw to first.
Isashiki Jun had gotten a step early and was already advancing to third. If Hirai threw to first and Seido recorded an out, Isashiki Jun would likely break straight for home. If he made it, the score would be tied.
With only one inning remaining, Inashiro could not accept that.
Hirai threw directly to home plate instead, cutting off Isashiki Jun's path.
"These guys are too gutless!"
Isashiki Jun was openly displeased. He had been ready to run, but Inashiro had covered home before he could commit.
One out, runners on first and third.
Seido's chances of scoring had increased considerably.
Even Fujio, the Baseball Kingdom Magazine reporter who had not been favoring Seido, was taken aback. The game had gone in a completely different direction from what he had originally imagined. Seido's players were hitting Narumiya Mei's pitches as if they had some advantage he couldn't account for. If this continued, the outcome truly would be open.
On the mound, the pitcher had now given up three consecutive hits.
What made it worse was that two of them had come without any clear explanation. Aside from the confrontation with Yuuki, where Narumiya Mei had put in full effort and still couldn't hold the result, the other two batters had somehow gotten hits before he even understood what had happened.
It was baffling.
Narumiya Mei felt unsettled. But his conviction hadn't wavered, not even slightly, from the first inning to this moment. He was going to win this game. No matter who stepped up. No matter how tenacious Seido's players turned out to be.
Back in Seido's dugout, the mood was electric. After Zhang Han had been struck out, no one had dared to imagine they would still find themselves in this position. Three consecutive hits. A run back. Runners on the corners.
Could they actually win this?
From a pure strength perspective, they didn't have the advantage. But that was what made a game like this worth watching. Outcomes weren't guaranteed. Maybe Seido's moment had truly arrived.
"Whoosh!"
While Seido's players were still caught up in that feeling, the white ball shot forward without warning. No one could react. The baseball was already in the catcher's mitt.
"Thwack!"
"Strike!!"
The stadium fell quiet.
The joking, loose-spirited Narumiya Mei had vanished somewhere along the way. The man now standing on the mound looked identical to him, but gave off an entirely different impression. He radiated something cold and immovable from head to toe. Like a prince who had set aside all pretense, looking down from somewhere unreachable.
"I will never give you a chance."
"Strike!"
"Strike!!"
"Strike!!!"
"Strikeout!!"
Narumiya Mei recorded his tenth strikeout of the game. Immediately after, he induced a ground ball from Sakai.
The inning was over. Seido had not scored again.
Score: 6:5. Seido trailing by one run.
The game moved to the ninth inning.
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