Chapter 124 - A Different Kind of Monster
"Thank you for the game."
Both teams shook hands at center court when the final buzzer settled.
"Well. We lost after all." Hino exhaled quietly, turning to Sendoh with something that managed to be both disappointed and composed. "I figured it would go this way. You're really something, though."
Chuuominal's first national tournament had ended in the first round. Pretending that didn't sting would have been dishonest. But they had given everything they had, and that was also true.
"Honestly, your team coordination was impressive." Sendoh smiled easily.
"You guys are one of those teams that's going for the championship, right?!" Kinaga had been fighting back tears and losing the fight, his voice rough with it. "You better keep winning! All the way! Win for us too! Uwaaah..."
"Hm?" Yagami looked at him with genuine confusion. Ryonan going for the championship was accurate, but what did that have to do with Chuuominal specifically?
"I don't think we were close enough friends for that kind of - mmph."
Sendoh's hand covered Yagami's mouth with practiced efficiency. This was not the moment for technically accurate but socially unfortunate observations.
The public address system cut through the noise.
"National High School Athletic Championship Basketball Competition, Round One winner - Ryonan High School."
And simultaneously: Chuuominal High School, eliminated in the Round of Sixteen.
Up in the stands, the Ryonan section was buzzing.
"Our basketball team is actually this good?"
"They really were something!" a boy nearby said with barely contained energy. "I'd heard Sendoh-senpai was Kanagawa's star player, but honestly Yagami looked even more outstanding out there."
"You wouldn't understand their style if you haven't been following -"
"I'm glad we came in person. If they keep winning, we get to stay in Tokyo longer."
The female contingent had its own priorities. "I heard the basketball team doesn't have a girl manager, so - does Sendoh-senpai have a girlfriend? And Yagami - I usually prefer older guys, but I'd make an exception."
"What's the point of just thinking about it? I saw some of the upperclassmen already moving toward the tunnel."
"What? No, I have to go -"
The winning side of the arena always had this quality. The losing school's supporters moved away quietly on the opposite side, the contrast between the two sections visible and sharp.
---
The Ryonan players had barely emerged from the players' tunnel when a cluster of bold first-year girls descended.
"Yagami! You were incredible today!" They held out snacks and water bottles with reddened faces. "Keep going in the next game!"
"Thanks, but I'm good." Yagami had already spotted Chinatsu Yuika waiting further back and moved toward her at a brisk walk.
The girls watched him collect a bento box from the first-year girl and fall immediately into easy conversation with her.
"He has a girlfriend?"
"I'm devastated. But - actually, I just realized I like Sendoh-senpai." The girl beside her had already recalibrated and was heading toward the second-year ace, who had been intercepted by a separate group and was handling it with his usual effortless good humor.
The rest followed. The previously crowded corridor settled into relative quiet.
"So, Ikegami-senpai," Hikoichi said with careful kindness, "everyone's left. You can drop the pose."
Ikegami detached himself from the wall he had been leaning against in a carefully composed position and resumed a normal stance. His expression moved through several stages before settling on aggrieved.
"I knew it. Girls at this age are too shallow to appreciate what actually matters about a person."
"Does that mean you're finally admitting you can't compete with Yagami and Sendoh on looks?" Koshino said, not bothering to suppress his grin.
"That is not what I -" Ikegami stopped, visibly reorganizing. "What I mean is, in the middle of a national tournament, how do those two have the focus to spare for anything other than basketball?!"
He turned to Uozumi for support.
"Yeah," Uozumi said, in the tone of someone who had been asked a question he wasn't really tracking.
"Right then." Yagami's voice came from ahead of them, already moving. "Stop standing around. We have the lunch break to review the game, and when this afternoon's results come in we'll need to start on the scouting. Let's go."
"The results from this morning's other games are in," Sendoh added, falling back into step from the direction of the girls. "More or less what we expected."
Ikegami opened his mouth. Looked at the two of them already walking. Closed it.
---
After lunch, Coach Taoka ran through the morning's other results before starting the game review.
Sannoh Industrial 126, Tsukubu 101.
Touou Academy 113, Hakata Shoudai Affiliated 110.
Aiwa Academy 98, Ropponmatsu 90.
All three had advanced as anticipated. But one scoreline stood out.
"Aomine only played half the game?" Ikegami said, a skeptical note in his voice.
"Aomine Daiki scored sixty-five points in the time he was on the floor," Coach Taoka said, his voice carrying the weight of someone delivering information he would prefer to be wrong about. "And they still didn't secure the win until the final seconds."
He paused to let that settle.
"Every team at this tournament earned their place here. Don't focus only on Sannoh and the Generation of Miracles players. If you go into the next round with that kind of selective attention, anything can happen."
"Understood!"
Yagami noted privately that in the original timeline he had studied, Hakata Shoudai had been the program that won the national championship. And indeed, before today nobody in Ryonan's circle had paid them particular attention. That oversight had nearly cost Touou the game.
"We'll celebrate the first win properly later," Coach Taoka said, closing his notebook. "Right now, we have work to do. This afternoon, Meiko Industrial plays their first-round game on our court. I want everyone in the stands watching. Specifically, I want you watching Morishige Hiroshi. Get a sense of what's actually in front of us before tomorrow."
"Yes, coach!"
---
Court A's second game: Meiko Industrial from Aichi prefecture versus Takamizawa Academy from Hokkaido.
When the Ryonan players found their seats in the stands, the game had just started, and their attention went immediately to the figure anchoring Meiko Industrial's interior.
Morishige Hiroshi. Center. 199 centimeters tall. 100 kilograms.
His height fell short of Uozumi and Murasakibara. His weight exceeded both.
Uozumi studied him with the focused, slightly unsettled expression of a player taking a genuine inventory. The bone structure, the density of the frame - the physical presence it projected was categorically different from Kawata Masashi. Not more or less imposing. Different in kind.
The game was not a contest.
Takamizawa was not a weak team. Their players were disciplined and determined and had won enough games to be standing on this floor. None of that appeared to register with Morishige in any meaningful way.
On offense, he received the ball in the post and didn't require complex footwork or elaborate positioning. His body simply moved through whatever resistance was in front of him, and at the end of that movement the ball went through the basket. Hard and certain and without decoration.
On defense, his presence alone reshaped what Takamizawa's players were willing to attempt. The blocks came in sequences rather than isolated moments - clean sweeping dismissals that sent the ball well out of the playing area. After the third or fourth, Takamizawa's interior players stopped driving altogether and began floating shots from outside rather than attacking a space that had effectively been declared off-limits.
Another possession. Morishige caught the entry pass, absorbed a double-team, and threw the ball back out over the top.
The pass reached Meiko Industrial's number four at the perimeter, who released the three-pointer without hesitation.
Clean.
The Ryonan section watched this sequence happen.
"Number four is Miyamoto Kenta," Hikoichi reported from his notes, filling the silence. "Third-year point guard, Meiko's captain. Accurate long passes, strong rhythm management. Gets the ball into Morishige's hands efficiently, and when Morishige is double-teamed he runs the ball-movement for the outside shooters."
"That's the difference." Coach Taoka picked up the thread, arms folded, attention entirely on the floor. "Morishige's offense is built around raw physical destruction. Simple and brutal. But he doesn't refuse to pass."
"So if they can't double-team him, it's just Uozumi-senpai versus him alone?" Koshino said, the concern audible.
The previous Ryonan-Yousen practice match had been the hardest moment in Uozumi's recent basketball memory.
"Not quite." Yagami leaned forward slightly, as though wanting to see the floor more clearly. "Morishige can pass, but he doesn't really read the floor when he does it. Watch where he passes."
Koshino looked back at the court. Several more possessions. Something gradually clarified.
"He passes to number four almost every time. Even when other options are more open."
"The left corner - number five - has been wide open twice," Yagami said. "Morishige didn't look at him either time. Someone told him that when the double-team comes, send it outside. He does that. But his court vision doesn't process the whole floor. He follows the instruction without reading the situation."
A pause around the group as the observation landed.
"That's actually it," Uekusa said quietly.
Uekusa had been watching with the specific attention of another point guard trying to understand an offensive system, and the observation clarified something that had felt slightly off without identifying itself.
Of the players watching, only Sendoh and Coach Taoka showed no visible surprise at what Yagami had just described - they had arrived at the same place independently before he said it.
Another Meiko Industrial possession. Morishige drew a triple-team this time, three bodies packing the paint. He didn't force it. The ball went overhead.
Number four received, released the three, and missed.
The rebound bounced away from the traffic around Morishige. A second Meiko player collected it.
"Number five - Shimizu Yohei," Hikoichi continued, "third-year center slash power forward. When Morishige is on the floor, he operates as the second big. When Morishige is resting, he runs the center position. Together they're the interior combination that controls every board in the game."
"Nobody messes with those two," Ikegami said, watching.
"That's why the outside players can shoot freely," Sendoh observed with genuine appreciation. "That pair owns the glass. If the outside shot misses, it almost doesn't matter."
"Correct," Coach Taoka said. "Meiko's system is not complicated. It's the two-tower interior plus three perimeter shooters, everything running through Morishige as the primary force. Simple. Extremely effective."
He looked at Uozumi.
"Which is why your individual matchup tomorrow becomes the central factor in this game. Your task is specific and demanding: I need you to use every tool you have - your weight, your experience, your positioning knowledge - to move Morishige out of his comfort zone. Don't let him receive the ball standing still in deep position. Make him work for every touch. Force him as far from the basket as possible before he gets the ball."
"Yes! I understand!" Uozumi's spine straightened involuntarily. Several people nearby in the stands turned to look.
Nobody on Ryonan's bench paid any attention to them. The game still had time left and there was strategy to finalize.
"Ikegami, Fukuda - the moment Morishige receives in the paint, both of you collapse immediately. Don't wait to see what he decides to do. The priorities are: prevent his easy scores, wear down his energy, and create foul trouble. Make him pay a cost every time he touches the ball in scoring position."
"Understood!" both answered at once.
"Ultimately, Meiko is still a team built entirely around one individual. If Morishige's performance falls below his standard, their entire structure comes apart."
Yagami looked at the floor. There was something almost coincidental about the sequence. Round one against Chuuominal, a program whose identity was built entirely around team basketball, no single player standing above the others. Round two against Meiko Industrial, a program whose identity was built entirely around one individual who carried everything.
The contrast felt designed. It wasn't, but it felt that way.
The final score came up on the display.
Meiko Industrial 102, Takamizawa 78.
Three quarters. Morishige had played three quarters. In those thirty minutes he had put up forty points and eighteen rebounds.
As the Meiko players left the court, Morishige's gaze drifted without apparent intent toward the Ryonan section of the stands. Something in his expression - a slight curl at the corner of his mouth that wasn't quite a smile - carried a specific quality.
"That arrogant -" Ikegami said under his breath.
"Let it go," Coach Taoka said, already getting to his feet. "Meiko is strong. And Ryonan is not weak. Get back to the hotel, get some rest, restore your energy." He looked at his team. "Tomorrow, we settle it."
"Yes, coach!"
---
That evening, the day's remaining results came in.
Naha Suisan 144, Toyotama 151. Three overtime periods. Toyotama's run-and-gun system had generated the highest-scoring game of the opening day, surviving through three extra periods on the strength of their offensive output.
Iwashimizu 71, Rakuzan High School 112. The largest margin of the day. Rakuzan from Kyoto had played with the untroubled authority of a program that had arrived expecting to win and found nothing to reconsider.
Yousen High School 86, Narimine 51. Yousen's defensive presence had produced the lowest-scoring losing total of the first round.
From Ryonan's perspective, the favorites had all advanced. No upsets, no surprises.
Round Two bracket:
Court A: Ryonan vs Meiko Industrial.
Court B: Sannoh Industrial vs Toyotama.
Court C: Touou vs Rakuzan High School.
Court D: Aiwa Academy vs Yousen High School.
Courts A and B in the morning simultaneously. Courts C and D in the afternoon simultaneously.
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