"Their shot types are completely different," Goro observed, people said he was an actual genius "The short one, yellow hair_ehh...what's his name?".
"Aihara Haruto", Runa replied without even needing to check her note book.
"Right", Goro mused as his lazy eyes went back to the scene. "The blonde boy uses the snap shot technique. He makes up for his low release point with speed and rhythm. Pure three-point specialist. Built for volume shooting."
"Like Stephen Curry," Deevay added.
"Exactly. But the tall one..." Goro's gold brown eyes narrowed. "That's awkward. That release is wrong. It's too high, his jump height is unnecessary and should be taking away from his balance but....._what's this one's name?"
"Ari Toru." Runa answered with clear confidence. She remembered his name. She remembered it since she registered him into the tryouts.
" Slender man's mechanics look broken. But it works."
Yep. Goro didn't remember both their names even a second after hearing them.
" There's something else..."
"What?" Runa leaned in, while the other three turned instinctively.
"He's unsettling." Goro's voice dropped. "Something about him is... off. Like he's not quite what he appears to be."
Akihiko laughed. "You're overthinking it. He's just tall and can shoot when he's open."
But Runa was writing rapidly in her Spider-Man notebook, her interest was fully engaged now. Then it just wasn't a feeling because Goro said the exact same thing she did. The same thing she said yesterday when she met him. And Yori knew it.
Her attention shifted briefly to Group I, where Isami Nagi had just finished his CSRP drill. His partner had been average, serviceable but nothing special. Yet they'd scored 35 points.
A very very high score. Highest so far.
Isami stood at the sideline, wiping his face with a towel, those blood-red eyes were scanning the Pavilion with casual dominance.
Like he was saying, "None of you can touch me."
But then his proud basking in the awe of the people watching was cut short.
He'd heard the noise from Group J, a growing excitement and focus. His gaze drifted over, assessing.
His face remained neutral, but his blood eyes followed some tall pale first-year currently positioning for another shot.
35 points was Isami's score. The highest so far.
Whether these two broke it depended entirely on this next shot.
[TIME REMAINING: 0:47]
Ari rushed to get into position, waiting for Haruto to reach the basket and make the pass. Both of them were completely spent. Their legs were shaking, their lungs burning. Sweat got into Ari's eyes from his bangs. The crowd noise had become a physical presence, pressing in from all sides.
[TIME REMAINING: 0:39]
Haruto gestured. right wing, mid-range. Ari exploded toward it, his body was moving on autopilot, muscle memory taking over where conscious thought had failed.
Anyone watching Ari's eyes in that moment saw. A shift. The nervous gothic boy disappeared and left a thing. A thing that was voracious. His feline eyes tore open like an animals. And the iris itself expanded till it nearly filled his sclera. And he felt his entire being collapsing in on itself. Collapsing into one thing and one thing alone.
Fearsome
Even Haruto who stood beneath the basket hesitated. That look in Ari's eyes. It triggered something primal. A survival instinct.
The hesitation threw off his timing. The pass came late, slightly behind Ari, with less velocity than needed.
Ari caught it anyway...he caught everything with those long fingers—twisted his body mid-motion, adjusted his pale gargantuan hands on the balls seams.
The shot form was indeed lff-balance and his legs barely lifted him up. But his arms...the long extremities extended fully. Flicked at the height meant for monsters at not men.
The ball was shot.
It arced slowly, floating. Like it was defying gravity, taking its time, making everyone wait.
The coordinator glanced at his stopwatch. "Three... two... one
BASKET.
The ball dropped through cleanly, So clean the net barely felt a tremor..
36 POINTS
The crowd erupted. And Tomomi didn't know what to say....She just couldn't take her eyes off of Ari. No one could.
Group J students were screaming, jumping, completely losing their composure. Adjacent courts stopped their drills, students and coordinators turning to see what the commotion was about. The noise echoed throughout the Pavilion, bouncing off the high ceilings, amplifying into something almost overwhelming.
Like a raging coliseum.
Haruto was exhausted, depleted so completely.
He just sat down where he stood. It wasn't a conscious choice, his legs simply gave out. He collapsed onto the polished floor. His hands were sore..
The pale one walked toward him, his own legs were threatening to give out with each step. When he reached Haruto, they locked eyes.
Silence stretched between them. One above. One below.
Then simultaneously, they smiled. Wide, genuine grins that came from triumph. It was a deep Pride at what they'd just accomplished.
They high-fived—a solid, satisfying smack that echoed almost as loud as the crowd noise.
[CSRP COMPLETED. TRYOUT PERFORMANCE: STELLAR]
[REWARD: 10 SKILL POINTS]
[CLUTCH MOMENT]
[CLUTCH PERFORMANCE, DELIVERED AS UNEXPECTED]
[ADAPTIVE STAT INCREASES:]
[VERTICAL: 21 → 26]
[SHOOTING: 23 → 28]
The systems messages kept flooding his vision. With each message he felt the urge to shout in excitement. Buuut.... he'd just look weird again.
[NEW SKILL DISCOVERED: HEAVENLY SHOT]
[DESCRIPTION: EXTREMELY HIGH JUMP SHOT EXTREMELY HIGH FADEWAY]
[MAXIMIZES RELEASE POINT]
[DIFFICULT TO BLOCK OR CONTEST]
[HEAVENLY SHOT LETHALITY
= NEAR UNBLOCKABLE KILLER]
[SPECIAL SKILL LEVEL]
[HEAVENLY SHOT = LEVEL 1]
[SKILL POINTS AVAILABLE: 15.5]
Then a sharp pain rang in his legs... At first he thought it was tear. But it was the blessings of the gear. He felt his nerves being stretched thin. Like an electronic butterfly made to flow into him and connect all that had no true bridges.
It was....painful. And AriToru couldn't hide the discomfort completely. Haruto in his own exhaustion barely noticed and passed it up as fatigue.
AriTorus legs felt lighter, springier, like someone had upgraded the suspension in his joints. Yes. Yes.
It must be the electronic butterfly.
Ahh...but he was so tired.
"15.5 points."He had 15.5 skill points now. The CSRP drill alone had given him ten points, plus the original five from surviving the conditioning. This was massive. This was...
"Ari!"
Haruto's voice broke through his internal celebration
Haruto had finally calmed down his beating heart. Now he had the strength to express his excitement.
The blonde boy was beaming, his round face split by an enormous smile. "That final shot! Even with my terrible pass, you still made it! The adjustment, your focus...that was incredible!"
Ari blushed—actually blushed, his pale face turning red. He scratched the back of his head, trying to maintain some semblance of calm and humbleness but it felt like his stomach was on fire. "Your pass weren't that bad. And you hit, what, four threes? Your shooting form is top tier."
"Six threes," Haruto's smile got somehow wider. "But who's counting? We got 36 points! We beat" He glanced toward Court G, where Isami Nagi stood watching. "We beat that guy."
Ari didn't look. He nodded tiredly in a smile. They beat prince Cobra. It was by one point but they beat him.
They made their way to the bench, collapsing onto it like soldiers returning from war.
Ari's eyes trailed Haruto. He was so so wrong. Harutos three point shooting was what gave them such a gap. And it wasn't just that he was accurate....it was how fast he got the ball from a catching position to its release position. It was like a_lika a snap. As if he needed less frames to get his shot off.
AriToru had to ask.
"That snap shot. How long have you been working on that?"
"Since I was five." Haruto's smile was genuine, no false modesty at all. "My father played basketball. He was a coach in my middle school." Haruto's giddy voice took a pause...to pant. In fact he needed to chug down another whole bottle of water.
Some of it trickled down his chin to his chest.
" Sorry"_ He said looking in a sharp gasp after finishing the bottle empty.
He turned and threw it down right into a dust bin that was 30 feet away....without looking.
" D...don't sweat it". Ari replied completely shocked at how accurately he throws everything. Ball. Bottle. Didn't matter.
Haruto smirked suspiciously. "Don't sweat it?"
Ari raised a brow. "Yeah"
" Was that like a pun..."
Ari caught on and now held his mouth to stop his laughter. "I see why it came that way..."
" Cause...", Harutos voice had a hidden chuckle to it" Cause I'm sweating?"
" No No...", Ari replied trying not to laugh as he defended his intentions
" Relax...", Haruto finally said resting backwards." I was fucking with you Ari".
"Anyways....that's pretty much how I learned to shoot like this. My father taught me before I could ride a bicycle and now, now it's stuck forever," then his gaze grew self conscious.
"But that's the only thing I'm good at".
"'Only thing's an understatement."
Then silence. Both of their hearts looked like it could leap out their chest any second. They were too tired to keep talking. Until.
"You know Ari, you're very smart about it too. The way you moved slow"—Haruto paused. Thinking he sounded ridiculous. But he was sure Ari moved at a slower pace. And sometimes quickened. "like you could see the minutes passing by. Conscious of each second. Then there's how you didn't really miss....What type of training do you even do?"
Ari was shocked. 'Observant huh'. He didn't miss because the system put him through pressure moment shooting. And he could see the time... literally the system showed him 5:00 in his vision..
'Saying I have a sentient system that improves my basketball skills would be_well not the desired social response.'
"Just....just lots of practice. I do a lot of shooting in pressure training.." it didn't even sound convincing to himself.
But thank god, Haruto may be observant but he's very gullible.
"Hmm...you're going to have to show me later".
'Ahh.... dodged that bullet.'
"Haruto" Ari asked, grabbing a water bottle.
"Sup"
"What class are you?"
"1-C". He said as if begging to be given time to keep resting without talking."You?"
"Same! We're classmates." That's two people I know now.
"Perfect. Maybe we can practice together sometime. If we both make it past today." Haruto said it casually, but there was hope in his voice.
The second duo finished: 28 POINTS. Solid, but not exceptional.
Third duo: 30 POINTS. Actually quite good—both players were fast and coordinated.
Fourth duo: 32 POINTS. Very Impressive shooting.
Ari and Haruto watched together. "Guess nobody's beating us" Haruto said proudly nudging Ari with his elbow.
Then he laughed loudly like a villain.
"In CSRP at least. I pray we can do it again in whatever the next drill was." Ari replied trying and falling to not get too hopeful.
But Haruto was still observant... Ah. He was indeed observant. 'Just then...on that final shot. Why did I get goosebumps watching him shoot.'
When CSRP concluded, Ari and Haruto's duo held the highest score among the entire 100 duos: 36 POINTS.
Coach Sojima waddled forward—there was no other word for how he moved.
He had another Pepsi in hand, looking generally impressed. Which was funny considering he'd appeared to be asleep through most of the drill.
"Not bad, not bad," he said into the microphone, his tone clearly told he'd expected far worse. "Some of you are actually very skilled at basketball. Well done, but it's not over".
The duos were dismissed, Though Ari and Haruto naturally stayed together.
"Next, We test your physical abilities. Not endurance
.. we're done with that. But speed and raw athleticism".
Then coordinators began rolling out vertical jump measurement devices—professional Vertec equipment with adjustable plastic vanes.
Ari used the brief transition to grab another water bottle, downing it desperately. He knew he should project energy, show he wasn't tired, but his body was screaming for rest and hydration.
He sat on the bench, just for a moment.
[YOU NEED TO LEARN THE PENULTIMATE STEP]
"The what?"
[THE SECOND-TO-LAST STEP BEFORE YOUR JUMP]
[IT IS THE STEP THAT GENERATES YOUR MOST POWER]
[WHERE EXPLOSIVE LEAPERS CREATE FORCE]
[YOUR CURRENT TECHNIQUE IS ONE-LEG LUNGE FORWARD]
[AND IT'S NOT PRIME]
[THE PENULTIMATE STEP CONVERTS HORIZONTAL MOMENTUM INTO VERTICAL EXPLOSION]
[BUT THAT'S FOR LATER TRAINING]
[RIGHT NOW, JUST FOCUS ON NOT EMBARRASSING YOURSELF]
[BECAUSE AT THIS POINT...]
[LOTS OF EYES ARE ON YOU]
As if on cue, a boom of cheers erupted—mostly female voices screaming in a coordinated frenzy.
Of course: Isami Nagi was preparing for his vertical jump test. He didn't obey the alphabetical order of the Groups. whatsoever
Ari shoved through the crowd of fellow first year hopefuls. Fighting for a position to watch. But the press of muscular bodies was too thick—everyone wanted to see the Prince Cobra perform. And each of those everyone were 6'5 tall muscular sweaty dudes.
'Ughh'. But Ari has to watch. He had to. The prince Cobra was IT. How good he wanted to be.
And the crowd was raging.
Then Haruto appeared beside him and, with absolutely zero shame, just climbed onto Ari's shoulders.
"Haruto! What the—you're heavy!"
"I'm getting a good view" Haruto's voice came from above, completely unbothered.
"You're crushing my spine!"
"Stop being dramatic." He said tapping Ari's mop hair. "Oh wow, I can see everything from up here. This is great."
Ari knew Haruto wasn't getting off. So he adjusted underneath and decided that oxygen wasn't a necessity....so he watched.
The crowd fell silent as Isami began stretching....rolling his shoulders, rotating his ankles, extending his legs in a way that looked less like warming up and more like unlocking restraints. Like he was releasing invisible weights from his joints.
It was unreal indeed. Skin stretched on muscle. Muse stretched on bone. Bones being rolled down and up. Stretched like an elastic spring. Ripped to the bone....yes. the Prince Cobra was ripped to the bone.
In the stands, Deevay Murray leaned forward in an excited expression. He had the highest vertical in Yoshimuras team. 50 inches.
"No way he beats my vertical," Deevay announced loudly, his voice carrying. "Fifty inches is fucking professional level. This kid's a first-year. He's probably like a forty-five something, maybe forty-seven if he's good."
Akihiko Heishi snorted. "You sound scared."
"I'm not scared, I'm just stating facts_"
"You're definitely scared Deevy boy," Akihiko's beautiful face split into a teasing grin. "Worried a first-year's going to show you up in front of everyone. Steal your title as the highest jumper."
The words hit Deevay like arrows. His shoulders slumped slightly, his expression molded into something almost comically sad. "That.... Thats impossible", he hissed. "Stop lying."
Deevay was very sensitive. Something Akihiko loved to exploit. Even though they were best friends
Norikai Yori reached over and grabbed Akihiko's head playfully, "Leave him alone". his massive arms completely engulfing the point guard's skull. "Besides, you should be worried too."
"Why would I be worried?" Akihiko's voice was muffled by Yori's forearms.
"Because Isami's going to steal all your fangirls. You're going to lose your pretty-boy monopoly."
"N_No he's not!"
"Oh he will. And he's just a first year too", Deevay jabbed in a smug voice bringing his face close to Heishis to tease him even more. Poor 6'2 Heishi was fighting unsuccessfully to get out of Yoris grip.
Runa couldn't stop laughing. While Suzuha Goro watched Isami with intense focus, his drowsiness was completely gone. Goro was fully awake.
At least for now.
On the court, the cheers and screaming stopped in halt_it was abrupt.
COMPLETE SILENCE....
STRIKE
Then with a bounce step Isami moved...
He ran from an angle. And he exploded from the start.
His speed was aggressive, accelerating as he got closer and closer to the basket. Building momentum rapidly...Most people slowed down before jumping to convert momentum properly.
Isami sped up.
The sounds of his feet were rapid. Tap Tap Tap.
Ari watched carefully. At his feet. Trying to see just the steps he took.
Isami's footwork—
There.
The second-to-last step. Isami planted his right foot hard.. it was an IMPACT. His leg compressed like a spring, it was a larger stride. Like an angled lunge.
Then the final step with his left foot, and—
BOOM
The JUMP was violent. Pure Violence.
The force generated was so explosive that the Vertec's base shook. Isami's body rose like it had been launched from a cannon, reaching an apex that defied all expectations.
His hand slapped the measurement vanes with authority, sending them spinning. And he seemed to pause on air for an insane time. His head was already way past the rims height.
The distance between his feet and the floor looked like the height of a person.
Then he landed with a thud. Hoping off it, as if his legs were actual springs. He didn't even look back at the vertec.
The crowd held its breath as the coordinator checked the measurement.
"F-fifty-five inches."
55
Silence. Then chaos.
"FIFTY-FIVE?!"
"FIFTYYY FIVEE!!", You couldn't hear your own voice in the Pavilion. Everything was loud with cheers and gasps and declaration.
"The Prince Cobra is real!"