The little bobtail cat was clearly quite shocked when she saw this badge.
Seeing her reaction, Aizen was almost certain that he’d gotten extremely lucky and pulled something incredible.
“Did I just get an SSR?” Aizen asked, licking his lips eagerly.
“Yeah, you did.
Ridiculous luck.” The little bobtail sounded somewhat annoyed.
“Well, this means you now have the qualifications to go up against the Generation of Miracles.”
‘Generation of Miracles?
What the hell was that?’
“Those are going to be your future teammates—Aomine Daiki, Midorima Shintaro, Murasakibara Atsushi, Kise Ryota, and Akashi Seijuro.”
“You mean that dark-skinned guy?” Aizen scoffed.
Truth be told, he’d just beaten Aomine with one hand tied behind his back.
“Don’t underestimate them.
Their talents are beyond your imagination.
I suggest you don’t judge them by normal standards—those guys are true monsters.” The little bobtail said with obvious exasperation.
‘Monsters, huh?’
‘If this little bobtail was using the word ‘monster’ to describe them, they definitely weren’t going to be pushovers.’
“Let’s talk about this badge for a moment.
Why did all my fundamentals improve to national level, but my shooting stats are still so low?”
“The badge can improve your technical skills, but it can’t fix your abysmal base attributes.”
‘Abysmal?’
‘Was I really that bad?’
It didn’t matter though—since the little bobtail herself said he now had the qualifications to compete with the Generation of Miracles, that meant he was definitely going to become strong.
“And what about this proficiency thing?”
“Exactly what it says on the tin.” The little bobtail’s tone was somewhat mysterious.
“This is a valuable growth-type badge.
Once you’ve successfully used feints to defeat opponents 30,000 times, this badge will reveal its true form.”
“What form?”
“Kyoka Suigetsu.”
‘That sounds so incredibly chuuni!
‘
Aizen immediately thought of that character who stood above the heavens—also named Aizen, coincidentally enough.
‘Why am I suddenly starting to feel excited about all of this?’
“Is there any way to quickly increase my base attributes?
I’m talking about shooting, layups—that kind of stuff.”
“Yes.
Every time you level up, you’ll receive 10 free attribute points to distribute.”
“How do I level up?”
“Just keep winning.
Every game you win will give you experience points.
The higher the level of the competition, the more experience you’ll earn.”
“Additionally, your in-game stats will also give you experience—1 point equals 10 experience, rebounds and assists are 50 each, steals and blocks are 100 each.”
‘So basically, I need to grind.’
A grin spread across Aizen’s face. This chapter was copied from g.com without permission.
Now that he understood the rules, Aizen walked out of the restroom and headed to a local streetball court to test out this Feint Master badge and get familiar with his new body at the same time.
…
About half an hour later, Aizen appeared at a streetball court in Tokyo.
Japan’s basketball culture wasn’t as thriving as China’s—people here preferred soccer and baseball.
Finding this court had already taken him quite a while.
“Thank you for liking me, but I’m not looking to date right now—I need to fully focus on making it to the national tournament.”
As Aizen walked onto the court, he saw a boy around fifteen years old talking to a girl.
Then he watched as the girl ran off the court crying.
“What the hell?
You can make someone cry just by playing ball?”
Aizen tossed his bag aside and walked over, calling out, “Hey, you look pretty strong.
How about we play a game?”
“Sorry, I need to train.” The boy rejected him outright.
“Don’t be so cold!
Training by yourself isn’t as good as actual competition, is it?”
Aizen ignored the rejection entirely, cracking his neck as he walked straight to the free-throw line.
“Let’s play to 11.
You know the rules for one-on-one, right?”
“I said I’m not—wait, you’re from the Teiko basketball club?” The boy was about to refuse again, but when he saw Aizen’s school uniform, he stopped and asked instead, “First string?
Second string?
Or third string?”
Teiko—one of the national powerhouses, a regular at the national tournament, and the perennial top seed in the Tokyo district.
Every year at the district preliminaries, Teiko would claim one of the qualifying spots.
‘First string, second string, third string?
What were those?’
“You’re a freshman, aren’t you?” The boy immediately deduced.
“If you want to get playing time at Teiko, you have to make it into the first string.
What’s your jersey number from Coach Shirogane?”
“Wait, that’s a thing?” Aizen scratched his head.
He’d only joined the club that day—how was he supposed to know all that?
So he answered honestly, “Number 10.”
‘Number 10?
A first-stringer?’
The boy immediately became serious.
He concluded that Aizen must be one of Teiko’s newly recruited geniuses this year.
How else could someone know nothing about Teiko and still get a number 10 jersey?
“So, wanna play?”
“Let’s do it.”
‘Perfect.
I could use this chance to size up Teiko’s new talent.’
He’d been aiming for the national tournament all along, and deep down, he always had the desire to beat Teiko.
“Where’s your gear?”
“Oh, I don’t have any of that stuff yet.
Let’s just go straight in.”
‘Arrogant.
Showing up in his school uniform to challenge me—don’t underestimate me, you Teiko brat.’
Aizen couldn’t be bothered to explain.
He’d only been in this world for a day, and had just joined the Teiko basketball club recently.
He didn’t have any of that fancy gear.
If anything, he had a full judo uniform somewhere…
“You take the first possession.” Since he wanted to gauge his opponent’s skill level, letting Aizen attack first was the best approach.
Aizen didn’t refuse.
He caught the ball, dribbled a few times to find his rhythm, then grinned and said, “Here I come.”
His opponent was fully on guard, and then he saw Aizen charge toward his right side at incredible speed.
‘So fast?’
His eyes widened in shock—he was caught off guard by Aizen’s explosive burst of speed.
Fortunately, he had plenty of experience.
As a third-year junior high student, he’d played in many games and faced plenty of talented players.
He wasn’t going to get completely embarrassed.
He quickly shifted his position, watching Aizen’s shoulder movements carefully, and thought to himself, ‘Just as I expected!’
Based on the tilt of Aizen’s shoulders, he predicted Aizen was about to do a crossover into a between-the-legs change of direction.
This was exactly within his expectations.
His left foot planted hard, and his entire body shifted from right to left in an instant.
Perfect defensive read.
‘I’ve got this one.’
Full of confidence, he was shocked to see that during his body’s movement, he’d somehow drifted away from Aizen.
‘Did he see through my defensive read?’
‘Or was that change of direction a feint from the very beginning?’
‘Impossible!’
‘A feint of this caliber!’
He couldn’t believe it.
He felt a breeze blow past him, and his center of gravity, completely deceived, couldn’t support any further pursuit.
All he could do was watch helplessly as Aizen rose up with a perfect, flawless pull-up jumper.
‘What a beautiful shooting form.’
He marveled at how flawless Aizen’s shooting form was—not a single imperfection to be found.
It was like a sword refined through a thousand strikes, completely natural and harmonious.
Except for one thing—
Clang!
The ball slammed harshly against the rim and bounced back out.
“DAMN IT!
How did that not go in?
This hoop is out to get me!”
Aizen was furious.
Under his opponent’s dumbfounded gaze, he charged to the basket, grabbed his own rebound, and threw down a put-back dunk.