The terms BLUE LOCK refer to the facility itself, while Blue Lock refers to the project.
However, there are cases in the story where the terms can refer to either the project or the facility depending on the context.
Just clarifying that.
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Chapter 5 – Garden of Eden
Inside a black car calmly moving through the city’s illuminated streets, the atmosphere was strangely silent.
The only constant sounds came from the engine and the faint noise of the tires cutting across the asphalt dampened by the night air.
In the back seat, Haise sat beside the window while watching the urban lights rapidly pass by outside.
Now without the Shotoku uniform, his presence felt completely different.
He wore a black high-collared coat that covered part of his neck, along with dark pants and black boots.
The somber appearance suited him strangely well, especially with his white hair rooted in dark shades and his naturally cold violet eyes.
In the front, Jinpachi Ego calmly drove with that strange smile fixed on his face, while Anri sat beside him continuously working on a laptop.
Occasionally, she cast discreet glances at Haise through the rearview mirror.
After all…
The entire situation still felt absurd.
Just a few hours ago, that boy had been completely destroying a national elimination match.
Then he was expelled from both his school and team.
And now, he was inside a car with Jinpachi Ego.
The silence inside the vehicle felt heavy—not exactly uncomfortable, but… strange.
As if something was about to happen at any moment.
Haise lightly rested his head against the window while letting out a small tired sigh.
Then his eyes closed for a few seconds.
And inevitably, his mind drifted back to a few hours earlier.
…
“You…”
Anri watched Haise anxiously, waiting for some kind of reaction after that entire absurd explanation about the Blue Lock Project.
Meanwhile, Ego continued wearing that strange smile on his face.
But Haise only looked at him as if he were a complete lunatic.
“…Did you drink too much or something to be saying all this?”
The atmosphere fell silent for a moment.
Then Ego’s smile slowly disappeared.
He calmly adjusted his glasses while the air around them seemed to grow heavier.
“Ah…” Ego spoke in a low tone.
“You’re in denial, aren’t you?”
Haise remained silent.
“I don’t blame you,” Ego continued while slowly walking through the stadium corridor.
“After all, you were just used as a tool and then had everything ripped away from you.”
Haise’s eyes trembled slightly upon hearing that.
“All of this almost sounds like the story of a manga protagonist living in Tokyo surrounded by flesh-eating monsters,” Ego commented calmly.
Haise immediately clenched his fists.
The coach’s words resurfaced in his mind.
The way they had treated him like something disposable.
Then Ego looked back at Haise.
“Trusting someone like me…” he began while his eyes grew strangely dark, “…would be like walking down the exact same path that left you like this.”
Anri remained silent beside him, observing the conversation without interrupting.
But then Ego’s eyes changed.
Black spirals appeared within his pupils as he stared directly at Haise.
“But even so…” Ego raised his hand toward him.
“I ask you to entrust your dream to me.”
Haise’s heart seemed to skip a beat.
There was something strange about the pressure behind that man’s words.
Heavy… and almost hypnotic.
Then Ego slowly opened his arms as if standing before the heavens themselves.
“I want to create the world’s most selfish and unstoppable striker,” his voice echoed through the empty corridor.
“A solitary hero who will lead Japan to World Cup victory using my methods and my own theory.”
That monstrous smile returned to his face.
“For that…” Ego continued while his eyes shined with madness, “I am willing to cast 299 dreams directly into hell.”
Anri looked away for a brief moment.
Even after hearing those words so many times… they were still terrifying.
“That is why the BLUE LOCK Project exists,” Ego declared.
“A Garden of Eden created for this hero.”
His smile widened even further.
“A place where someone will trample over everyone else in order to fulfill their own dream.”
And then Ego extended his hand directly toward Haise.
Those spiraled eyes remained fixed on him.
“So tell me…” his voice lowered.
“Shattered masterpiece…”
“What is your dream?”
?!
‘What is my dream…?’
Haise became trapped in his own thoughts.
His dream?
He had never truly thought about it.
After all, he never played football for glory or recognition.
He played so the orphanage he lived in wouldn’t be shut down.
If that happened, he would be thrown straight onto the streets.
The other children?
They were all younger, five years old or less.
Small children were adopted all the time.
They received gentle looks, affection, families.
So he never worried about them.
But in his case?
At seventeen years old, his chance of being adopted had ended years ago.
Nobody looked at someone his age and thought about giving them a home.
In reality, most people simply looked away, as if he were an inconvenient weight reminding them that the world was unfair.
So Haise fought alone.
He fought to continue surviving in that world.
And even so, despite the miserable situation he lived in, he rejected every look of pity people gave him.
Pity fed no one.
Pity didn’t keep someone warm in the cold.
Pity didn’t save anyone from hunger.
If pity truly had value, beggars wouldn’t exist.
That was why Haise fought.
He earned the right to study at Shotoku Academy through his own efforts.
He endured humiliation, absurd training, pressure, and endless matches just to remain there.
He played football because he had loved the sport from the very beginning—because for the first time in his life, something had made his heart genuinely race.
On the field, he wasn’t an orphan.
He was simply Haise Sasaki.
Then, the sport itself was turned into business.
Money, contracts, deals, sponsors.
And because of his performances, he received compensation, benefits, and everything he had earned the right to have.
Obviously, none of it came easily.
It was match after match, training session after training session.
Days when his muscles burned, and nights when he could barely sleep from the pain.
His talent was Technique, and he polished it to the very limit of what he was allowed to reach.
He refined that talent until it became something terrifying to others.
However…
All of it was taken from him.
His studies.
His education.
His money.
His chance to live like a normal person.
His chance to exist as someone real in that world.
Everything disappeared.
The only thing he had left was football…
‘There’s no answer… Was I mistaken about you?’ Ego thought while watching Haise stare silently at the ground.
The atmosphere felt heavy.
For a few seconds, even the sound of the screens around them seemed nonexistent.
But then, as if completely betraying his own thoughts, Haise slowly raised his head.
His eyes burned.
A violet fire emerged within them while small mirror fragments seemed to float around him, reflecting distorted pieces of the surroundings.
There was no hesitation there.
No room for doubt.
Only ambition.
“My dream is to stand at the top,” Haise said while slowly walking toward Ego until they stood face-to-face.
The difference in height between them was almost nonexistent, leaving Ego with no need to even look down.
Their eyes collided like two blades.
“I want to conquer the top of the world…” Haise’s voice grew firmer.
“And if, for that, I have to trample over countless dreams and send people directly into hell… then I accept your offer.”
The mirror fragments around him trembled lightly.
His gaze never wavered.
“Place me inside this Garden of Eden…” A small smile formed on his face.
“And I will devour its fruits on my way toward my dream.”
Haise took another step forward.
Now close enough to feel Ego’s overwhelming presence.
“You CAN do this, Jinpachi Ego.”
Ego stared at Haise in silence.
Then a black aura seemed to leak from his eyes—heavy, suffocating, monstrous.
The corners of his mouth slowly curled upward.
“Who do you think I am?”
…
Back in the present, Haise saw an enormous blue building slowly enter his field of vision.
His eyes reflected the gigantic structure stretching across the edge of a massive cliff somewhere in the mountains of Japan.
The place looked as though it had been torn straight out of another world.
It was colossal.
As tall as a skyscraper.
The building possessed a perfect pentagonal shape, divided into five distinct sections connected like parts of a single monstrous machine.
Cold lights glowed throughout the bluish metallic structure while enormous walls completely surrounded the facility, giving off a suffocating sense of isolation.
It didn’t look like a training center.
It looked like a prison built specifically for monsters.
The car continued slowly down the road while Haise silently observed everything.
Even from a distance, he could feel the pressure of that place.
As if hundreds of egos were trapped inside, constantly colliding against one another.
“Welcome to your Garden of Eden, Haise Sasaki,” Ego said calmly while driving.
“This… is BLUE LOCK.”
Haise’s eyes trembled slightly.
Blue Lock.
The name echoed inside his mind like something almost sacred.
His heart immediately began to race.
An intense excitement made his blood feel as though it were boiling through his veins.
The place where football would be pushed to its absolute extreme…
Where dreams would be destroyed…
And where only one striker would stand at the top…
Was right in front of him.
Haise slowly formed a small smile.
His violet eyes reflected the gigantic blue structure while tiny mirror fragments seemed to quietly appear around him once again.
“So this is it…” Haise murmured softly, the smile on his face widening.
“…Where hell begins.”
Inside BLUE LOCK, Haise caught the bag Ego tossed toward him.
He quickly grabbed the object before it hit the floor, realizing it contained BLUE LOCK training clothes.
“Put those on,” Ego said while continuing down the long white corridor lined with blue stripes.
His footsteps echoed throughout the silent hall.
“Let’s begin your Project.”
Haise walked behind him while observing the place around them.
The walls were far too clean.
Everything about that place felt artificial, as if every centimeter had been designed to mentally crush people—reminding them that they were not home, nor in a friendly environment, but rather in the most hostile environment imaginable.
There were no windows.
There was no sense of freedom.
It created discomfort, but also the feeling of entering a facility built exclusively for creatures that were never meant to be seen by the outside world.
“Ah, before I forget,” Ego continued without even turning his head.
“Since you don’t have any legal guardians, I had to adopt you so you could actively participate in Blue Lock over the next few months.”
“…What?”
Haise stopped for a moment, staring at Ego with a genuinely incredulous expression.
He got adopted after all these years?
By this lunatic out of all people?!
“Don’t look so surprised,” Ego replied calmly.
“I would’ve done it one way or another.”
His glasses reflected the corridor’s cold lights.
“And even if you hadn’t found the answer I needed…” his voice grew heavier, “…I still would’ve brought you here and thrown you into the lions’ den just to see whether you could survive.”
Haise stayed silent for a few seconds.
That sounded completely insane.
But at the same time…
It was exactly the kind of thing Jinpachi Ego would do.
The two continued walking until they stopped in front of an enormous metallic door.
SHIIIIIIK.
The door slowly opened.
Haise’s eyes widened slightly as an enormous indoor football field appeared before him.
The flawless grass seemed to stretch endlessly beneath the artificial lights embedded in the gigantic ceiling.
Advanced equipment was scattered throughout the facility while massive digital screens displayed statistics and information in real time.
This was far more advanced than any training center Haise had ever seen.
It was a laboratory built to manufacture perfect strikers.
“Among all the selected players…” Ego began while picking up a tablet, “I personally chose only you.”
He turned the screen toward Haise.
Numerous names were displayed across it.
“The rest were selected by Anri.”
Haise briefly scanned the list while Ego continued explaining.
“There are three hundred players including you,” Ego said.
“However, there are still a few days left before Blue Lock officially begins.”
Ego’s eyes then focused entirely on Haise.
Until that moment, his expression had seemed merely analytical.
But now…
It looked like genuine interest.
“Until then…” Ego began while adjusting his glasses, “I will personally train you to strengthen a few things you still lack.”
Haise felt his heart pound harder.
Being trained directly by Jinpachi Ego…
This place had already seemed absurd, but with that realization, it felt as though everything had risen to an entirely different level.
At the same time, however…
He could feel it.
He could feel that, from this moment onward, he was stepping into completely different territory.
Ego then revealed a small smile.
“Let’s polish you…” His aura seemed to grow heavier.
“…rough diamond.”
NEXT CHAPTER → Data