On the tenth day of the camp, Coach Nakahara finally finds time to visit.
With Okabe and Ryohei still recovering from their last fight, the gym is filled mostly with high schoolers who trickle in after classes. Their punches echo off the walls, but the sound never satisfies him.
It's not like the heavy, full-bodied thuds Kenta and Aramaki used to make on the sandbags. Not like the soft, predatory whisper of Ryoma's footwork, the pendulum rhythm that lulled, tricked, and punished.
He's missed that. He wants to see them so badly.
Before he even reaches the lodge's old gym, he already hears the mitt work. But something's off. The sound is duller, softer, lacking the sharp bite he expects from his fighters.
His brow twitches. "Hiroshi better not be messing with their form…"
He quickens his pace. When he pushes open the old sliding door, Hiroshi is right there by the entrance, marker in hand, jotting something on the battered whiteboard.
