Chapter 61: The Final Offense and Defense
"Just one point left!!!"
In the hearts of the eight players on court, this was the only thought echoing at this moment. Though it was the same phrase, both sides had completely different meanings behind it.
Team A, leading by one point, thought: 'We need to take one more point to successfully claim victory.'
Team B thought: 'We absolutely must win this rally, then tie up the score.'
Meanwhile, those off the court were experiencing intense inner turmoil.
"Watching this match is killing my heart—it's just like watching the World Cup back in the day."
"Yeah, yeah."
"Me too. It's 33:32 now, how do both sides still have such strong momentum?"
"If it were me, I'd probably already be unable to get up from the floor."
The second and third-years were exchanging their thoughts with each other. Though their expressions varied slightly, they all indicated that this match was absolutely thrilling to watch.
Although Shimizu Kiyoko, who was responsible for the whistle, didn't join the conversation, her interlocked fingers betrayed that her heart wasn't as calm as her exterior appeared.
"Chance ball!"
Hinata Shoyo saw that Tsukishima Kei's set was a high ball and immediately called out to alert Kageyama Tobio.
"Damn it! I couldn't control the power!"
Tsukishima Kei gritted his teeth. Stamina had always been his weakness, and after his nutrition improved and his height shot up dramatically, his stamina hadn't grown along with his height.
At this late stage of the set, he completely couldn't control his strength anymore.
Both Hoshino Masaru and Kageyama Tobio, seeing this high ball, understood clearly.
'The opportunity has come!' x2
Having roughly figured out what kind of receive Kageyama Tobio preferred, Hoshino Masaru delivered a pass that even Kageyama would consider extremely excellent, even approaching perfect.
"Good ball!"
Not stingy with his praise, Kageyama Tobio had always been relatively respectful toward powerful players.
While verbally praising his team's libero's receive, his footwork and gaze didn't pause for it. During the time it took to run to where the ball would fall, Kageyama Tobio had already finished observing both teams' positioning and the situation.
'This time, I need to set an A-quick!'
Looking at Ichise Guren who, though exhausted, had completely adapted to Hinata Shoyo's movements, Kageyama Tobio knew that their freak quick attack had a high probability of being blocked directly.
While an A-quick couldn't display his tactical setting abilities to the fullest, facing a quick attack that might very well be blocked, he was still willing to try setting a ball that gave the attacker options.
Extremely discreetly, he made a hand signal to Hinata Shoyo, who was occasionally glancing his way. This was a code they had worked out during their mid-second-set discussion.
Hinata Shoyo understood exactly how to play this ball. He had no objections—he was even excited.
Because this decisive rally would be his aerial duel with Ichise Guren, the ultimate boss who he regarded as the Great Demon King of volleyball.
Thinking of this, Hinata Shoyo even trembled slightly with excitement.
'I'm going to defeat you right here, right now!'
The small beast who had grown strong under Ichise Guren's protective wings during middle school was now, with the help of his first official middle school match opponent, the 'Kitagawa Kings,' baring his newly sharpened fangs at the demon king who had led his training and growth.
'I'm very glad you found the courage to challenge me.'
'I'll personally deliver you a match-ending kill shot!'
Seeing Hinata Shoyo's aggressiveness, Ichise Guren felt very gratified, but he also couldn't possibly step down from his throne to build up the small beast's momentum.
When faced with a challenge, the beast king typically defeats the challenger directly and decisively to demonstrate his authority and position.
The two in the air, even as their stamina was about to collapse, still showed the watching crowd what it meant to fly.
"So high!"
These two words became everyone's only thought.
Hinata Shoyo, using the power from his approach, perfectly converted all his kinetic energy into jumping force, carrying his small frame soaring into the air.
Meanwhile, Ichise Guren on the other side, with his tall frame of nearly 190cm, displayed jumping ability that was in no way inferior to Hinata Shoyo's. With his height and long arms, his coverage area in the air was clearly much wider than Hinata Shoyo's hitting range.
This wasn't a gap in technique, nor a gap in jumping ability—taken to its purest form, this was simply a difference in physical specifications.
Using his long arms, Ichise Guren sealed off all of Hinata Shoyo's right-hand spiking routes. Realizing this, Hinata Shoyo couldn't think of a solution.
Acting on instinct to extend his thinking time, he quickly tensed his body in the air, using his core muscles to maintain his hang time.
Ichise Guren, who was on defense to begin with, also naturally extended his defensive duration as much as possible to completely shut down this attack.
The two competed in hang time like this in the air, and in this instant, everyone in the gymnasium felt like they were hallucinating—time seemed to stop, and these two people in the air seemed to have superpowers, floating in mid-air with nowhere to gain leverage.
But reality remained reality—no human could completely resist gravity through their own power alone.
After maintaining their position in the air for an extremely brief moment, both began falling rapidly.
Still unable to find an opening, Hinata Shoyo didn't give up. His eyes continued frantically searching for gaps in Ichise Guren's block.
Ichise Guren, wearing an expression as if he had Hinata Shoyo completely figured out, kept adjusting his defensive stance following Hinata Shoyo's gaze.
'Damn it! Worthy of being the Great Demon King!'
'Like I said, you're still too early to defeat me!'
Realizing he was about to land and lose his chance to attack, Hinata Shoyo had a flash of inspiration—his left hand delivered a stroke of genius. A left-handed spike wasn't within Ichise Guren's defensive awareness.
Even though Ichise Guren reacted the instant Hinata Shoyo's left hand moved, he couldn't guarantee that after such a large-scale hand movement, he could still completely seal off this attack.
But his hands still moved extremely quickly to block Hinata Shoyo's left-handed spike route. No matter what, he had to make contact, so that Yamaguchi Tadashi behind him could dig up the ball better.
Unfortunately, the goddess of victory seemed to be on Hinata Shoyo's side today. The volleyball hit by his completely unpracticed left-handed spike had a random trajectory and random angle—only the general direction was something Hinata Shoyo could control.
And this completely random volleyball just happened to—
The volleyball that grazed just a tiny bit of the net took an unexpected bounce that was completely outside everyone's expectations.
This change in trajectory increased the ball's arc and reduced its power. The volleyball slipped past the fingertips of the already-falling Ichise Guren and dropped straight toward the ground.
Yamaguchi Tadashi in the back row had predicted where the ball would land, but the net had played a trick on him, and the ball slipped just out of his reach.
'You've got to be kidding me!!!!'
Facing the prospect of losing to this kind of lucky ball, Ichise Guren felt nothing but pure, unwilling fury in his heart.
Drawing on the super-strong core strength from his various functional training exercises, he made one final desperate attempt. Disregarding the possibility of injury, he changed his two-foot landing posture to a single-foot landing.
In mid-air, he forcibly twisted his center of gravity, using his free foot to kick toward the volleyball's direction.
'Even if I just touch it!'
'Yamaguchi! Hyakuzawa! Tsukishima will all come to dig it up!'
'Let me touch it!!!'
***
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