Chapter 17 The Significance of the Opponent
When Kazama hurried to the scene, Tezuka was already surrounded by the boys on the sidelines.
Yuan came over, put a tissue in her palm, and said with a smile, "President Tezuka and the others are waiting for you. They're not waiting for you to cry, but for you to hold up the record book and tell them, 'This shot counts.'"
Fengjian looked up, and Yuan's fingertips touched the corners of her slightly red eyes. She raised her chin, with a hint of mischief in her expression, "Go quickly."
She didn't notice the teasing in her tone at all as she jumped over the fence of the stands and rushed into the field.
"Hey, Kazama, when did you come back?" Taocheng was the first to notice her, and everyone's eyes followed the path and saw the panting girl behind her.
Tezuka followed everyone's gaze, and when his eyes met the slightly red corners of her eyes, he was slightly startled, frowned slightly, and quickly avoided her sight.
"Feel sorry."
On the way out of the hospital, she had already learned about the situation of the game from Tao Cheng. The powerful opponent had long seen through their weaknesses and deliberately dragged out this game into a protracted battle.
As he wished, Tezuka's wrist injury relapsed.
Fengjian clenched her palms, said nothing, and turned to walk towards the edge of the Hyotei field. However, just as she took a step, someone grabbed her wrist. His palm was as hot as the sun after the rain, burning a hole in her heart.
Fengjian looked up at him and said nothing.
Her gaze was so hot that it reminded him of yesterday's training when Coach Ryuzaki said, "If you can't do it, just withdraw from the competition." He said, "I know," but he was calculating in his heart: There is still a month before the national competition, and the recovery period for the left shoulder is twenty days, which is enough.
Now that she was staring at him, his confidence that "enough" was enough suddenly wavered. When he looked away, he heard his voice tighten: "Kazama, there's no need." In fact, he wanted to say "Don't worry", but the dryness in his throat made it a stiff sentence.
No matter how much pain he felt, his voice was always so calm.
Everyone called him "Buyer," saying he was the pillar of Seigaku, carrying the hope of reaching the national level. But Kazama watched as the knuckles of his fingers, white as they gripped the racket, looked just like the last time he'd exhausted himself from training and hidden in the equipment room, rubbing his shoulders.
A seventeen-year-old boy should frown when he feels pain and ask for a rest when he is tired.
The sun is still shining brightly on the court and the game is still going on.
Fengjian stood on the sidelines, the record book in his hand was filled with densely packed track lines, which were completely invisible in the end.
The numbers on the scoreboard were still ticking. The seventeen-year-old boy stood in the middle of the field, his back straight, like the bamboo branches she had seen that were bent by heavy rain but refused to break.
When he hit the ball, his left arm suddenly stopped for a moment, and the ball hit the net and fell behind him.
"Tezuka's arm should no longer be able to be lifted." Gan's voice came calmly.
Kazama clenched the tip of his pen and stared at the field. Atobe's ball was tricky and powerful, always falling into Tezuka's blind spot due to his shoulder injury. He flew to save the ball but almost fell to the ground.
Fengjian looked up and met his gaze—the normally calm gray-blue eyes now trembled with a sting of pain. He quickly looked away, and in that moment of vulnerability, she suddenly tore up all the data she had just collected and wrote on the back of the record book:
"Stop it."
"Stop comparing."
The match on the court had concluded, and the boys raised their right hands high, their fingertips gleaming with dazzling light. The grounds of Seigaku were unusually quiet, until a low sob suddenly erupted from somewhere, adding to the gloom and dullness of the atmosphere.
"Qing Xue will win!"
"Qing Xue will win!"
Senior Kawamura's flag was still whistling in the strong wind.
"President Tezuka, you're the best!"
Someone in the crowd shouted, and the cheers became one, so loud that they even gradually overshadowed the cheerleaders of the Ice Emperor on the opposite side.
The chestnut-brown boy stood quietly on the court with a calm gaze. When he met the gazes of the people from Seigaku, everyone gave him a thumbs-up, and their tense lips curved into a very faint arc.
Seigaku won the subsequent playoffs 6:2.
"It seems Echizen's potential has been fully unleashed by watching Tezuka's matches... It looks like we can collect some good data again."
Kazama looked at Tezuka, then at Echizen on the field. His dark green eyes were as clear and bright as the sky after rain, filled with a high will to win.
The referee's expressionless voice announced the end of the preliminary and final matches, and the spectators and contestants on the sidelines gradually dispersed.
"Where's Kazama?" Momoshiro turned around and found that there was no one around.
"I haven't seen any human-meow since a while ago."
"There."
Everyone followed Gan's gaze and saw the girl's frail figure standing at the highest point of the audience, with her opponent standing in front of her.
"Atobe-kun, you already knew about President Tezuka's injury, right?"
Atobe, with his gray-purple team uniform draped over his shoulders and his arms half-crossed, exchanged glances with his teammates. The others understood and left first. He withdrew his gaze and then looked back at Kazama, "In my dictionary, there is no word for 'injury'—there is only 'victory'."
Feng Jian took a half step forward, his fingertips unconsciously wrinkling the hem of his school uniform. The wrinkles of the fabric pricked his palm, like the wrinkled diagnosis sheet at the hospital last night. "Attacking his shoulder injury, how can that be considered a victory?"
Atobe raised an eyebrow, his knuckles gleaming coldly in the sunlight. "A fellow who can't even stand the pain, are you worthy enough to be my opponent?"
"Do you know how much of a burden this will put on his hand injury?"
Her voice was low, like a taut string.
"Don't do anything unnecessary. Your captain doesn't need sympathy, but an opponent."
As they passed by, Atobe's gaze passed over her and fell on Tezuka who was looking at them not far away. "That's why I have to try my best and make sure he loses without any excuse."
Feng Jian stood still. When she turned back, the boy's fluttering clothes left a faint trace in the air on the tree-lined avenue, like a shadow trembling in the sun.
The next day, Kazama received the "Hyoutei Medical Report" from Atobe, with a note inside: "I've had professionals improve the 'shoulder injury recovery diet' you recorded. Don't let the president of Seigaku starve to death."
There was a piece of paper inside, which was the thing she accidentally left with them when she participated in the Hyotei Cultural Festival and was later invited by Atobe to meet him.
On the first page of the cookbook, there is a scrawled note in Tsuchiya's handwriting: "Victory should not be about risking everything, but about leaving your opponent with no regrets."
She suddenly remembered the scene she saw on the sidelines. Before each serve, Atobe would glance over Tezuka's left shoulder, but deliberately hit the ball to the extreme angle that he could catch it, as if to say, "I know it hurts, but I believe you can catch it."
Fengjian lowered his head to look at the medical report in his hand. Next to the revised diet plan, her handwriting was heavier than usual: "Three times a day, warm."
It turns out that the respect behind arrogance is not showing mercy, but "I will try my best so that you can also do your best."
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