The Rise of the Iron Wall!-Chapter 69: Last Preparation!

A week passed by pretty quickly, with the exam period managing to torture the rest of the team during that time. Still, no one except for Makino and Kuroki, the two veteran players who were on the team last winter, knew the fight that Kumiko was in currently.

Higo had a suspicion about it, but unfortunately, the girl decided to be tight-lipped, not wanting to reveal anything to him.

Still, the atmosphere gradually changed into a cheerful one again, especially since this was the last day of the exam. Now, they didn’t have to go memorize words or formulas again, and the only thing they had to focus on was the game a week later.

As for the remedial class...

"No!" Hiroshi shook his head quickly, giving everyone a stern glare whenever someone mentioned it. "We have just done the exam painfully, no need to relieve it so quickly, you know? Let the future problem be dealt with by us in the future."

That was a pragmatic thought, one that everyone shared solemnly.

Of course, even with the exam running, they still didn’t neglect their training session. Fortunately, the exam shortened the school time by a lot, making the day that was usually over at around 4 PM turn into 1 PM. It allowed the team to have a training before going back to study, which also helped them ease their anxiety.

Now, with everything over, they were finally able to set their eyes on the semifinal, where their real fight for the national ticket finally began.

"You know what," Higo spoke during the team meeting. "Why is it that I am not nervous here? Is it because I don’t know how good Sappotani is, or is it because we are not that serious in preparing for our match?" He asked.

The room was quiet instantly, as they all felt the same way. Honestly, for all the talk about how monstrous the Sappotani team was, they sure hadn’t done a good job in their preparation time.

However, Kumiko seemed to figure this out, as she said, "I know some of you will feel that way, but I can assure you that we have already done a lot of preparations. Why do you think I introduced their team before our game against Ritsumeikan High?"

"Um?" This time, everyone turned to the girl, looking at her curiously.

In the end, Kumiko just sighed before explaining, "I know that after looking at Sappotani’s game, most of you will feel depressed, thinking that we don’t have a chance to win. It is alright, and it is a normal feeling, I tell you that. However, it will take time to recover from that shock, and we don’t have the luxury of our preparation time here, what with us having to deal with the exam as well. So, I cheated a bit, using Ritsumeikan High as a disguise to introduce you to them. It works, right?"

Higo didn’t know how the others reacted, but he could feel the corner of his lips twitching madly. This was the classic Kumiko move, disguising her future intention with the current action, and in the end, everything would work in her favor.

’A beauty with a dangerous mind, she is.’ He shook his head in admiration.

"So... You were not just trying to use Sappotani’s attacking style to inspire us to score more goals against Ritsumeikan High?" Jun, the innocent member of the team, asked.

"Of course, no! We are a defensive-minded team. Why would we try to emulate the offense of the best team in the prefecture? We don’t have the resource for that, you know?!" Kumiko sighed helplessly at her gullible player.

Jun just rubbed the back of his head sheepishly.

"Anyway, don’t think you are less prepared for the game, because I can assure you that you have been prepared a long time ago!" She clapped loudly, snapping them from their astonishment. "So, let’s get started again with our training! We still have five days left before we have to go back to Sapporo!"

Then, began another round of gruesome training that was planned by Kumiko for the team.

Well... It wasn’t that bad, per se. The girl clearly numbed things down, as the closer they got to the game day, the more they had to preserve their condition. Still, after spending the last few weeks burning their brain, it was understandable that they became quite rusty, so some of them were dead tired far quicker than usual.

Higo, especially, was also included in this weak-ass group of people. Not because he couldn’t handle the exam, of course, but because his training portion increased astronomically.

Yeah, after the last game against Ritsumeikan High, Kumiko realized that her best friend was still weak in a lot of areas that didn’t relate to goalkeeping, so she started to drill everything into his head quite violently.

Right now, he was in the middle of the training to get him used to having the ball at his feet, and the boy had to stay calm under the pressure coming from Yuji, who acted as the opponent, rushing into his direction the first time the ball arrived at him. 𝕗𝐫𝚎𝗲𝘄𝐞𝕓𝐧𝕠𝘃𝕖𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝚖

"Come on, Ryukkun! Not like that! Don’t keep your eyes on the feet! Trust your feeling!"

"No, no, don’t do that! It will just throw away our chance!"

"Kick it to the left! Left! Kuroki-kun will cover that side!"

"Good job! It is far more accurate compared to where you started!"

Higo shook his head helplessly while also wiping the sweat on his face. He didn’t believe a single word coming out of Kumiko’s mouth in the last part, knowing that he was still terrible at this ’ball distribution’ role.

He couldn’t be blamed for this, since Higo himself didn’t have any basics in football. It was a miracle that his goalkeeping talent was monstrous, and no one could ask him to do better in another aspect that quickly.

Still, that didn’t mean Higo was willing to be left behind, though.

’Kumiko-chan said that this is a basic operation for goalkeepers nowadays, right?’ He clenched his fist tightly, eyes burning in determination. ’Fuck! Even if I die, I have to be decent enough in this shit before we are going to Sapporo!’

-Author’s Note-

This is a special week for this novel, because we finally reached 100k viewers! Thank you for all of your support here. Without you guys, it would be impossible for us to reach this point.

Special shout-out to all the big spenders, all the readers who are willing to spend their golden ticket for this novel. Thank you for Reading_Gal_8, Blackbird71, Lewis_Anson_7657, and all of you who have been supporting the story since the beginning!

Tomorrow, we will have a 4-Chapter update! See you soon!

Federixo_01