Kageyama wore a dark expression as he stared, perfectly calm, at Hank, who had just made that astonishing play. He kept replaying the scene from a moment ago in his mind.
At 185 centimeters tall, he still had that kind of vertical jump.
The other side's athletic talent was absurdly high. How could someone like that have been treated as a substitute?
"This has to be a dream!"
"That had to be pure luck just now."
After being shocked by the vertical Hank had just displayed, the players from Kitagawa Daiichi stood there in a daze for several seconds.
They had never expected the opposing team's substitute wing spiker to be this strong.
The match continued. After the referee announced North River's point, North River's server stepped all the way up to the service line and tossed the ball up.
The ball's path was obvious. It was aimed straight at Kitagawa Daiichi's libero in the back.
Once the ball was successfully dug up from the back row of Kitagawa Daiichi's court, Kageyama took it cleanly. In the instant before the ball left his hands, he shouted,
"Get up there! Hit from the three-meter line!"
As soon as his words fell, a set flew out in a near computer-perfect arc, drifting straight toward Kitagawa Daiichi's wing spiker.
The speed of that set looked almost unsolvable, and the precision behind it made the difficulty of receiving it reach a level ordinary people could hardly imagine. Just as everyone on Kitagawa Daiichi thought they were about to score this point—
A figure suddenly burst forward at top speed from North River's side of the court.
He accelerated into another approach, jumped, and drove both hands down in front of him. Under that overwhelming pressure,
the attack organized by Kitagawa Daiichi was stuffed by Hank's block.
"How is that possible?!"
Kitagawa Daiichi's wing spiker stared at the volleyball that had dropped beside him, his face turning blank with disbelief. Why was it that even though the other guy had jumped so much later than he did, he still managed to block his spike?
What kind of monster was that?
How could he jump that high?
Kageyama's talent as a setter was already considered extremely high. Even if their coordination wasn't especially good,
ordinary school teams still had no way of receiving that kind of ball.
But now Hank had once again shattered his understanding. North River was definitely not as simple as it looked.
When that scene once again fell into the eyes of all the people watching around the court,
it sent goosebumps racing all over them. Anyone could tell just how terrifying Hank's physical talent was.
With nothing more than a simple approach and jump, he could rise above the top of the net, with half his body showing over it.
If his technique were polished further, wouldn't he become completely unstoppable?
"This is insane, seriously insane. What exactly has North River been hiding this year? How could they make someone that talented sit on the bench?!"
"That substitute feels way stronger than the wing spiker they subbed out. Just by himself, he can already make Kitagawa Daiichi feel pressure."
"Blocking looks like a joke in front of him. When he can jump to that height, all he sees is open space. He can smash it anywhere he wants!"
"I bet even Kitagawa's coach is dumbfounded now. It was supposed to be a sure-win situation, and then this happened."
"Hank came out of nowhere halfway through. It felt like he was flying."
After seeing Hank jump to that shocking height again, all the spectators outside the court could no longer sit still.
With that level of vertical jump, he could practically leap over a person from a standing start.
And someone with that kind of talent had actually been used as a substitute by North River's school team from the very beginning?
What kind of joke was that?
It was an outrageous waste of talent. Even the world's top jumpers might not be any better than that.
"He can actually jump that high."
"In his eyes, is the court just one huge empty field?"
Standing in the spectator area and staring blankly at Hank, Shoyo spoke without even realizing it. The reason he had always struggled was because he couldn't jump high enough.
So most of his spikes would simply be blocked by Kitagawa Daiichi's school team.
But in Hank's case, that simply was not a problem at all.
Because the height of his jump had already decided it: blocking was almost completely useless against him.
With the sound of the whistle, the match continued. At this point, Hank had single-handedly narrowed the point gap between North River and Kitagawa Daiichi by two.
Although the overall score still hadn't been tied, it had at least brought some of North River Middle School's momentum back.
The eyes of every player on the court drifted toward Hank without them even noticing.
And one sentence unconsciously rose in everyone's hearts.
As long as they gave him the ball, they could win this match!
Thwack!
A crisp sound of contact rang out as the ball sent over by the North River school team dropped toward the player covering the back court.
After a diving save kept the ball alive,
the height came off slightly, so Kageyama had no choice but to adjust his body angle and send up a set almost flush with the net.
It had to be said that Kageyama's talent really was exceptional. He had forcefully brought back a ball that had nearly gone out.
And both the height and the angle were just right.
But unfortunately,
no one on the current Kitagawa Daiichi team could get to his ball.
His sets did not coordinate with others. He only wanted others to coordinate with him.
In the short term, he could rely on his own ability to keep everyone in line.
But in the long run, problems would definitely arise.
(End of Chapter)
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