The next morning, the junior high school students gathered in the woods, and Mifune stood in front of them, "all lined up in a single column."
"I want to be the first in line! I want to be the first to receive the reward~" Xiao Jin rushed to the first line, Ryoma lined up behind him, Kirihara lined up behind Ryoma, and Atobe lined up behind.
"From now on, line up in a single column and run forward as fast as you can. Don't slack off or stop. There will be a ball flying over and getting in the way, so the person at the front of the line must hit the ball back."
"That's me." Xiao Jin, who was at the front of the line, pointed at himself.
"After hitting the ball back, you will line up at the end of the line and the second person will become the first person in charge of hitting the ball. We will rotate in turn. If one person stops or a ball is not hit back, you will come back here and start again. Do you understand?"
"Could this be the reward?!"
"Ah? Where's my takoyaki?"
"The old man is so stingy!"
"Don't talk too much! Just shut up and finish your run!" Mifune shouted at them fiercely in a hoarse voice, "Everyone, take your positions."
When the junior high school students lined up and started to prepare, he called out to the last one, Atobe. Atobe turned around and Mifune threw him a key. "If you can complete the whole course in one go, then don't come back here. Go straight ahead."
"What is this?" Atobe looked at the key in his hand and listened to Mifune's words, making some guesses.
"Okay! Let's go! Run!" Sanchuan yelled.
"Okay!" The boys started running forward.
"How far is this road?"
“It is impossible to infer…”
"You're not going to ask us to run for dozens of kilometers at full speed, are you?"
"Maybe... only one kilometer."
"The chance that the coach would set the distance so short is...zero percent."
"Hey! Here it comes! Watch me!" A tennis ball flew in front of him, and Xiao Jin ran to hit it back, "Go ahead, the next one is up to you!"
Xiao Jin slowed down his pace but did not stop, and gradually reached the end of the team.
Two tennis balls flew in front of Longma, and one or several tennis balls flew continuously behind him.
They kept running forward, completing round after round.
Some of the flying tennis balls were curved like crabapple snake balls, while others curved upwards, but they were all hit back by the teenagers one by one.
"The road is at the end! Everybody... try harder!" Dashi encouraged everyone. Now Longma was in the lead and light could be seen ahead, which meant they were about to reach the end.
Ten balls flew towards him. When Ryoma was at Rikkai University, Karasuma Gaki, Yukimura and others had already trained them to play with multiple balls. After the national competition, Ryoma could play with seven balls.
"Fight back!" Kirihara shouted behind Ryoma.
Ryoma hit back ten balls, and the 27 junior high school students had reached the end of the race. It was a long road.
Lying on the ground, gasping for breath, he rested, "Speaking of which, those shots just now were really powerful."
"I wonder who hit me?"
"Look over there."
At the other end of the open space, high school students were each holding a racket, and those balls were hit by the high school students.
"You are not allowed to come back! Hurry up and keep moving forward!" The guy with the slicked-back hair, who used to be at odds with the middle school students in the training camp, told them to keep moving forward.
After nearly a month of training together, this group of teenagers who are not too different from each other have established a friendship, from initially disliking each other and playing tricks on the junior high school students to later training together and stealing alcohol together.
The junior high school students looked at each other and continued forward without looking back.
"It's so embarrassing that I ended up being a stepping stone for a junior high school student." Mifune came out from behind the high school student, drinking and walking unsteadily.
"But we have no intention of giving up just like that!"
"Let's start today's special training quickly."
"As much alcohol as you want, we'll bring it back for you."
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