Lincoln pushed forward, touches snapping in rhythm. Riku threaded a pass to Noah, who killed it with a velvet first touch before slinging it back inside. Blue and white shirts moved like sparks across the pitch, a surge of momentum building.
But the moment they crossed midfield—Victor was there.
Not chasing. Not lunging. Shadowing. A mirror to Julian’s presence, step for step.
Their shoulders brushed, their gazes locked over the rolling ball. Julian’s eyes widened. The strength radiating from Victor’s frame—raw, coiled power.
[Rule The Pitch – Lv.2: +10 To All Attributes]
Julian flooded his body with soul force, muscles tightening to meet the pressure. Only then could he hold his ground.
The air between them thickened, like iron scraping against iron. Julian felt the ghost of another battlefield—his past life, facing a rival cultivator whose aura bent the ground itself.
Victor’s aura wasn’t spiritual, but the sensation was the same: suffocating, unshakable.
For a heartbeat, the world slowed. He heard Victor’s breath—steady, unshaken. A calm inhale, as if this wasn’t a sprint, but a stroll.
The crowd felt it too. The chants faltered for an instant, voices colliding in uneven rhythm, as though tens of thousands had been caught in the same invisible grip.
Floodlights buzzed overhead, their glare painting sweat into silver streaks across faces. Every sound sharpened—the thud of boots, the rasp of breath, the faint squeak of studs pivoting on damp grass.
Lincoln switched the ball wide, trying to stretch the line. The tempo dipped—hesitation in their rhythm.
That was when San Dimas snapped shut the jaws.
Elijah surged forward, timing perfect, like a hunter who already knew the rabbit’s path. His foot cut across the lane, intercepting cleanly without a foul.
Lincoln’s shape staggered. A single line broken.
And just like that—the ball was San Dimas’s again.
"Back! Back!" Coach Owen’s roar cracked through the air, sharp as steel on stone.
His Blitz Run exploded alive, a detonation of pure speed. He ripped down the flank like thunder splitting the sky, every stride eating the turf in brutal chunks.
The crowd rose with him—cheers surging into a tidal wave, golden and silver banners shaking as if the storm itself had taken hold of the stands.
Julian’s perception flared white-hot. His mind mapped the angles, saw the danger blooming with each heartbeat. He launched into the chase, lungs tearing, soul burning.
[Rule The Pitch – Lv.2: +20 To Agility]
But even with that surge, even with his veins on fire—he couldn’t touch him.
Kai’s stride was beyond mortal rhythm. A machine-gun rhythm that shattered the ground, each bound hammering into Lincoln’s defense like artillery fire.
Julian’s pupils narrowed, the wind clawing his face as Kai surged ahead. His legs screamed for more, but his body knew the truth—this wasn’t a race of equals.
It was pursuit of a storm, chasing lightning across open sky. Every second stretched cruelly, the gap widening by inches that felt like miles.
The wind off Kai’s sprint slapped Julian’s cheek, hot and sharp as a whip.
Each footfall thundered like war drums—boom, boom, boom—a rhythm that declared to the stadium: this flank belongs to me.
Julian’s instincts screamed. His martial memory surged, begging him to activate—skill anything to cut the monster down.
But then his eyes caught Cael’s.
The keeper’s gaze burned steady, unflinching. Predator calm. Bandaged but unbroken.
Julian faltered for half a heartbeat. He knew those eyes.
His breath hissed out.
He let the martial impulse go.
One defender lunged. Beaten.
Another slid. Left behind in the dust.
Kai carved through them all, a blitzing soldier crashing straight into the frontline.
Julian felt the collective gasp ripple through Lincoln’s crowd, like a nation watching a wall crumble.
Each broken defender was more than a man—each was a brick, ripped away, leaving the fortress barer, thinner.
The penalty box loomed. Shadows and noise compressed into that one sacred space.
And there—waiting—Cael.
Bandage still fresh, scar burning like a crown, eyes sharpened to a killing edge.
He crouched low, every tendon drawn taut.
The last wall between Lincoln and ruin.
Kai wound up, body coiled like a cannon primed to fire.
Julian’s chest seized as Kai let the ball roll, heel flick snapping it into the blind lane. And there—like a ghost materializing from the dark—Victor.
Victor’s strike detonated off his boot, screaming toward the top corner. The net itself seemed to lean, hungry for the impact.
But Cael wasn’t just standing guard.
With a guttural roar, he launched skyward—bandage whipping, body stretched like a bow at full draw. Fingers straining, veins screaming—
The ball clipped his fingertips, skidding wide over the bar.
The stadium detonated.
Cheers. Screams. Groans. A thousand voices colliding in disbelief. ɪꜰ ʏᴏᴜ ᴡᴀɴᴛ ᴛᴏ ʀᴇᴀᴅ ᴍᴏʀᴇ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀs, ᴘʟᴇᴀsᴇ ᴠɪsɪᴛ novelꞁire.net
"CAEL! CAEL! CAEL! CAEL!"lincoln fans screaming in unison
"CAEL!" Noah’s shout split through the noise, fist pumping skyward.
But Julian didn’t cheer.
San Dimas weren’t probing anymore.
They were dismantling.
Every run, every pass, every feint—each attack stripped away another layer of Lincoln’s defense. Testing nerve. Testing bone.
Julian’s gaze darted across the field, catching snippets that twisted his gut—Miles grinning as he jogged back into position, Kai’s chest heaving but eyes burning for the next sprint, Victor barely winded as if his shot had been practice.
Their body language told the story: this wasn’t desperation, it was inevitability. Lincoln’s resistance was being measured, piece by piece.
The first wave had been a knock.
And the third—Julian’s eyes burned as he stared across the pitch—
He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, tasting salt, feeling the sting of sweat in his eyes. His heart pounded like a drum of war.
He’d faced stronger in his past life—but never on grass, never in this modern world. And yet the truth was clear: San Dimas weren’t playing soccer anymore. They were executing battle formations.
He wiped the sweat from his brow, jaw clenching like stone.
"Not on my watch," he whispered, eyes locked on Victor’s figure, haloed by floodlights.
The war had only just begun.