‘Who the hell do you think you are?’
The thought crossed Nishioka’s mind as he returned to his side of the field, his steps carrying an irritation he had never given permission to exist, yet was there anyway — small, persistent, impossible to ignore.
He replayed the words in his head.
That tone.
That cold certainty that never needed volume to carry weight.
‘No one’s ever beaten me.’ His fingers ran through his hair automatically, fidgeting with it through an old nervous habit, older than he liked admitting.
‘Some people thought they could.
But those were just stupid fantasies.
Nothing more.’
His eyes locked onto Haise on the opposite side of the field.
‘I’ll destroy every single one of your fantasies, you Tokyo Ghoul emo.’
On Team Z’s side, the mirror fragments orbiting Haise began moving differently.
No longer scattered around his body, they started converging, gradually gathering above his head, arranging themselves into a wheel suspended in the air with a quiet, almost solemn presence, like something waiting for the right moment to be used.
Haise cracked his neck with a slow motion, took a deep breath, and allowed his thoughts to organize themselves with the clarity that only came when he stopped fighting himself and simply let his mind work.
‘According to the Legend Prospect results Ego shared with me, my Adaptability is 100 points.
The maximum possible.’
‘Then let’s put that Adaptation to the test.’
Restart!
The Team X player on the wing sent the ball toward Nishioka with precision, and Nishioka received it without breaking rhythm, already in motion, already reading the field, already constructing the next moment before the others had even finished processing the previous one.
Hiori was the first to try.
And he dropped to his knees before fully understanding how.
‘Damn it.’ He was on the ground, the cold turf beneath his hands, yet his mind never stopped moving.
‘Haise was right.
It’s difficult to fight against your own reflexes.’
From the ground, he watched Nishioka advance, and for the first time he saw the mechanism with a clarity the speed of the previous moment had prevented.
‘He manipulates field awareness by shifting his center of gravity first, creating an expectation inside the opponent’s body, and then moves in the exact opposite direction of what was suggested.
The body reacts before the mind can correct itself.
He’s turning reflexes into a trap.’
Nishioka advanced toward the goal.
And then Hiori saw it.
A figure stepped in front of Nishioka with a speed that should not have been possible for someone who had been on the opposite side of the field only moments earlier, positioning himself between the Ankle Breaker and the goal with a naturalness that seemed to defy any reasonable explanation.
Haise Sasaki.
Hiori remained frozen on the ground for a second, eyes locked onto the confrontation about to unfold, and felt something tighten inside his chest.
‘Come on, you anomaly.’ The thought emerged from within him with an inexplicable intensity.
‘Show me just how much of a genius you really are.’
With Haise, the situation became unexpected.
Even for himself.
Kacha!
The wheel of mirrors spun violently and irregularly, and Haise fell.
The ground received him without ceremony, and for a second there was only the silence of that moment — his body on the turf, the wheel still hovering above him in motion.
Three seconds were enough.
Then he stood back up.
Nishioka saw that and wasted no time, resuming the Ankle Breaks with the same fluidity as always, the same weight shifts, the same precise mechanics that had dropped every player who had tried to follow him in this match.
But Haise rose again the very next second.
He ran, caught up, and before Nishioka could create enough distance, a shoulder block slammed into him with dry, direct force, interrupting his advance mid-motion.
Baam!
He stayed upright — but barely.
‘What lets him overcome me is that body of his!’
The realization came with irritating clarity.
Nishioka stopped, allowing Haise to approach, drawing him in through stillness alone while his mind was already constructing the next play.
‘If that’s the case, then I’ll push him to the limit.’
He moved left.
Drew him in.
Then shifted right with that same signature precision that had left everyone else on the ground.
But—
Tap.
Haise followed him without falling, without the hesitation in his knees, without the delay the body imposes when reflexes are turned against themselves.
The wheel of mirrors spun wildly above his head, and his eyes were fixed on Nishioka with a different quality now — not merely observing, but learning every micro-movement Nishioka made, feeding on that information and adapting.
‘Distribute the weight evenly.
Follow him precisely.
Keep your footing firm.’
Foosh!
Haise’s arm slipped beneath Nishioka’s armpit before he could create distance — not a shove, not an obvious foul, merely a physical presence interrupting the flow of movement through the simple fact that it existed there.
With that forced stop creating the instant he needed, Haise extended his left leg, sweeping it behind his right with surgical precision.
The ball passed between Nishioka’s legs.
「Rabona Steal」
Nishioka gritted his teeth.
He tried to reach the ball before the moment could fully settle into reality, but Haise was faster, keeping it at his feet with that firmness that never seemed to require visible effort.
The wheel stopped spinning.
“Ufff…”
White vapor escaped Haise’s mouth with the exhale, faint and nearly invisible, as though his body were releasing the excess of something accumulated over the past few seconds.
Then the wheel began spinning again.
Haise looked left.
And moved his foot.
Tap!
Whoosh!
To the opposite side.
His body rotated with it, complete and fluid, turning in a motion that carried the ball into a direction Nishioka had not processed as possible until it was already too late.
「Cruyff Turn」
Nishioka fell for it.
His body reacted to the false read before his mind could correct itself, forcing him to shift directions to keep up, his feet working against the very rhythm he himself had established.
When Haise got close enough, he slowed the ball almost to a complete stop with the outside of his foot, turning the speed of the moment into an absence of speed, before gliding left with a smoothness that felt like deliberate mockery.
「Marseille Turn」
‘That’s…’
An image surfaced in Nishioka’s mind.
Something he recognized — a reference, a style, a memory of something he had seen before in a completely different context.
The recognition came with such clarity that, for a brief instant, it pulled him entirely out of the present moment.
It was enough time.
BAAM!
But Haise’s possession did not last long.
Two sliding tackles came almost simultaneously, low and direct, with intentions that were anything but subtle.
The target was obvious, and it wasn’t the ball.
It was his shin.
Haise jumped before contact could happen, his body reacting before the decision became conscious, and while airborne there was nothing he could do for the ball.
It rolled out of bounds before his feet had even touched the ground again.
“Tsk!”
Crack!
The wheel of mirrors shattered above his head, fragments scattering in every direction before vanishing, and Haise landed on both feet, standing still for a moment as he stared at the empty space where the ball had been.
“Damn it! He got away.”
“We’ll get him next time.”
The two Team X players exchanged those words with the natural ease of people who believed the outcome was still undecided, that the play had been a partial success, that the next tackle would finish what this one had started.
Haise heard them.
He looked at them with an expression that wasn’t anger.
It was something beneath anger — colder, more distant.
The kind of look someone gives to something they don’t consider worthy of a genuine emotional reaction.
“What disgusting desperation.” he said, his voice carrying a boredom that sounded completely genuine.
“This stage was never on your level, trash.”
He looked away immediately after, completely, as though the two of them had ceased to exist as relevant variables.
The insults thrown back at him arrived and were ignored with the same ease as background noise in a crowded room.
Footsteps approached.
It was Nishioka.
“You saying that?” Nishioka walked up to him, his tone carrying the sound of someone trying to appear superior while being far too occupied with making sure his legs didn’t visibly shake.
“That’s hilarious. You just got lucky.”
Haise let out a short laugh through his nose.
It wasn’t forced.
It wasn’t performative.
It was small, genuine, and entirely devoid of warmth.
“Luck?” The crooked smile that formed on his face wasn’t friendly.
It never had been.
It was the kind of smile that existed solely to communicate mockery as efficiently as possible.
“Things like that were never on my side.”
His eyes slowly drifted downward with a deliberateness that made the gesture crueler than any words could have been on their own.
Nishioka’s legs were still trembling.
Subtly, but trembling nonetheless.
“But have you looked at your own situation?”
The silence following that question seemed to tighten around the entire field, compressing the air between the two of them until it became impossible to ignore the weight of the moment.
Haise tilted his head slightly to the side, the smile deepening into a cruelty that required no effort to exist.
“With shaky legs like those, you should’ve been benched a long time ago… Mister Messi of Aomori.”
Time remaining: 30 minutes.
…
Before him, there is no failure.
The talent that once slept now slowly rises before adversity!
NEXT CHAPTER → End Game