Yukio Ishikari and Akemi Inoue saw Ryūma suddenly stop in place. Overjoyed, they sprinted at him, convinced he had given up.
Meanwhile, Shūhō Aoki was closing in fast from behind.
Every second was critical. Ryūma’s mind raced.
(What now? What move can I pull off here?)
(A triple Chop Feint? No—that won’t work. Even if I beat Inoue and Ishikari, Shūhō will recover in time. There won’t be a chance.)
(Forcing a shot is useless too. The penalty area is clogged with Murakami Haiichi and two other defenders.)
(If they even graze my shot, that fat bastard keeper will block it for sure!)
Ryūma looked toward Yo Hiori in the distance. Hiori’s gaze suggested he was ready for the pass.
(No! Passing to him would just mean scoring with someone else’s help again! How would that be any different from the goal I scored with Rin?)
(And even if I did pass to Hiori, it wouldn’t work. They know I use him for link-ups, so their focus would still stay on me.)
As Inoue and Ishikari closed in from the front, and Shūhō pressed from behind, Ryūma’s anxiety spiked.
(What do I do?! Should I try a Chop Feint to slip past them? No—that’s still a dead end!)
(Should I pass to Hiori and try to circle around? Rin scored like that, so why can’t I?)
(Damn it! Using that kind of roundabout trick... Rin’s method? What the hell am I thinking?!)
(That wouldn’t be me!)
(Hm? Wait a second...)
(This way... still me... skill... speed... timing... dribble...!)
With the inside of his left foot, Ryūma knocked the ball to the right and accelerated in the same direction.
That sudden burst let him shake off Inoue and Ishikari, who had been rushing to intercept.
“Huh? He thinks he can beat us like that?”
“No chance—we’ll cut him off first!”
The two defenders sprinted seven or eight meters toward his right side.
As the ball reached the center of Team Z’s backfield, Ryūma immediately launched it toward their penalty area.
“What? What’s he doing?”
“Hah, he’s basically passing to us!”
From their angle, it looked like Ryūma had passed the ball straight into their path.
(There are four defenders in the box, including the keeper. Inoue and Ishikari are right in front of me and about to reach the ball.)
(There’s no visible shot lane. Can I really score ?)
(Stop it, Ryūma! Quit overthinking! Drop the doubts!)
(Remember what you truly are!)
“Damn it! If technique won’t cut it...”
Ryūma clenched his teeth. His eyes turned completely purple, violet flames surging around his body. His legs exploded forward as he charged the ball. Follow current novels on novｅlfire.net
“I’ll use the rawest... most violent way...”
“To smash through you all!!!”
GOAL!! Team V 3:1 Team Z
The stadium fell silent. No cheers, no wails.
Even Rin Itoshi stood frozen, staring at Ryūma’s figure, lost in thought.
From everyone else’s view, Ryūma had simply knocked the ball forward. They assumed it was a mispass or another trick. But then—
a thunderous 【BOOM】 like a tank firing rang out, and the ball instantly slammed into Team Z’s net.
Yes—instantly. To them, it was as if the ball had teleported.
The ones who felt it most were Inoue and Ishikari.
They had just stretched out to reach the ball, when the deafening blast hit their ears. In the next instant, the ball was already in their goal.
The other defenders in the box were equally stunned. To them, it was just a noise, then the ball was in.
Yushu Furukawa was the most dumbfounded of all. Just moments before, he’d seen the ball 30 meters out.
In his eyes, Ryūma had only just reached the ball. Before Furukawa could even register what Ryūma intended—
the ball was already flying at him. By the time he realized it was a shot, it had already blasted into the net.
In Furukawa’s mind, Ryūma’s only option should’ve been a forced shot—something easily stopped by the packed defense.
But this time, not even he himself reacted before it was too late.
Ryūma stood still, eyes closed, head tilted back, basking in the sunlight. He seemed to feel his football evolve—his victory complete.
He savored the silence of turning the stadium into a library with his goal.
Yo Hiori watched that sunlit figure. In that instant, he felt something stir—no, not just liking football.
It was the desire to keep playing alongside that figure on the pitch.
Putian Daiwa was the first to snap out of it. He sprinted to Ryūma, shouting excitedly,
“Bro... Bro! That shot was insane! That’s gotta be a world-class screamer!”
His voice pulled Hiori back from his thoughts.
“Ryūma, I always believed you could do it!” Hiori said with a smile as he walked up beside him.
The triplet brothers chimed in noisily.
“Yeah, we always knew you could score on your own, Ryūma!”
“Putian Daiwa told us you couldn’t do it yourself.”
“Yeah, Dragon-bro, that kid’s 100 kilos, and 99 of them are pure rebellion!”
Flustered, Putian Daiwa grabbed the two loudest brothers in a headlock.
“You brats trying to stir trouble? Did I actually say that?!”
“Bro, don’t listen to them! I admit, I worried you couldn’t break through alone—”
“But I never said you couldn’t score by yourself!”
“What I said was the triplets should help you block or steal at key moments.”
“But Bro, you didn’t need anyone—you broke through and scored all by yourself!”
Listening to the noise around him, Ryūma slowly opened his eyes.
He didn’t speak to the others. Instead, he looked straight at Rin Itoshi nearby, smiling faintly.
“Well, Rin? I told you—I wouldn’t fail this time.”