Chapter 67: The Great King Oikawa Toru's Entrance
The highly mature Aoba Johsai West, after being suppressed for a while, had already found countermeasures. But unfortunately, their system was built around an extremely strong attacking setter - Oikawa Toru - as the team's core.
Once they lacked Oikawa, the soul of the team, their overall strength could probably only display about eighty percent of each player's individual ability. Combined with missing Oikawa, one of the prefecture's top-tier players in terms of skill, the current Aoba Johsai was no match for Karasuno.
Additionally, because Aoba Johsai was unfamiliar with the Karasuno players' technical characteristics at the beginning, the hole they dug in the early stages was simply too deep. Even though they could trade blows later on, it was only enough to avoid being completely left behind.
25:18 - the first set was easily taken by Karasuno just like that.
The process naturally included Tanaka Ryunosuke's taunts and counterattacks against Kindaichi and Yahaba. After all, hearing opponents say he had a brainless-looking face before the match started would annoy even a hot-blooded, straightforward guy like Tanaka. Since they were leading with their strength in the match, it was natural to get revenge.
Ichise Guren stood quietly in the bench area. The current outcome had nothing to do with him. After all, he wasn't playing, and the other side was missing their absolute core player.
Unable to battle against interesting opponents, this kind of ordinary match held little interest for him.
Right now, he only wanted to see what expression Oikawa Toru would have when he arrived at the gymnasium only to discover his team had already lost.
Though he probably wouldn't show any particularly amusing expression anyway.
In the original story, the first time Oikawa Toru saw the freak quick attack by the freak duo of Kageyama Tobio and Hinata Shoyo was when they delivered the killing blow to Aoba Johsai.
Even after losing, all Oikawa Toru showed on his face was curiosity about the freak quick attack and that little bit of delight a child shows when seeing something fresh and new.
However, things didn't always progress as Ichise Guren expected.
Halfway through the second set, Oikawa Toru arrived at the gymnasium slightly out of breath. Seeing the match was still ongoing, Oikawa Toru's handsome features raised an eyebrow, then revealed a slightly frivolous smile.
"Well now~"
After greeting the coach, he spoke up.
"On my way here, I saw someone in the group chat saying we lost the first set and that our opponents seemed pretty strong."
"That got me jogging all the way here - didn't even have time to warm up properly."
Coach Irihata scolded him a couple times without any real anger, then said seriously: "Running around right after your ankle got better - go warm up properly right now! Be careful!"
Oikawa Toru elegantly waved his hand.
"It's fine, it's fine. It was just a minor sprain, and it's been several days already - it's completely healed."
"I'll just do some light stretching since I had to jog here anyway."
Coach Irihata wanted to say more, but seeing Oikawa Toru's serious expression, his words changed to:
"Fine, do whatever you want, just don't get injured again."
"Hai hai hai~ Don't worry, I know what I'm doing."
While responding to the coach's instructions, Oikawa Toru had already turned and walked some distance away. With his back to the coach, he waved and headed to the other side of the court for warm-up activities.
The female fans in the stands expressed their love with screams at Oikawa Toru's suave behavior.
Tanaka Ryunosuke, who was already annoyed by Oikawa Toru's entrance, was now even more irritated by this pretty boy who could easily accomplish what he'd always dreamed of doing.
Fortunately, they were still in the middle of a match, so Tanaka Ryunosuke didn't have much energy to glare at Oikawa. He could only stare daggers for the extremely limited time when others were retrieving balls.
After Aoba Johsai had countermeasures, the second set began with them still trailing, but without the overwhelming pressure they'd faced at the start of the previous set.
Just as the score reached Karasuno 19: Aoba Johsai West 15, Oikawa Toru, having finished warming up, took off his outer clothes to reveal the t-shirt and shorts underneath, then put on a practice jersey and entered the game.
He casually completed the substitution with Yahaba Shigeru, who had rotated to the serving position.
Before taking the court, he said with a smile to Yahaba Shigeru: "Leave the rest to your senpai~"
Yahaba Shigeru also smiled - he truly trusted Oikawa Toru from the bottom of his heart.
"Hai hai hai~"
"Then I'll gratefully head to the bench for a rest."
Accompanied by screams from the girls on the second-floor stands, Oikawa Toru entered gracefully and elegantly. And with a smile, he said that line: "Even if your attacking power is high, if you can't even reach the attacking stage, it's meaningless~"
After saying this, he grabbed the volleyball with one hand and pointed at Hyakuzawa Yudai.
"Although this two-meter student's receiving ability is indeed not weak, and his long arms provide a much larger defensive area than ordinary people."
"But you're simply too tall. Two meters of height is certainly a powerful weapon that's hard to come by when blocking and spiking."
"But when it comes to receiving, your massive frame and high center of gravity mean you can't move forward and backward that quickly!"
"Not substituting you out with a libero is Karasuno's biggest mistake today!"
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