Sunday morning in West Delhi was usually a lazy affair, but for Rohan Roy, the day started at 4:30 AM with a tube of bitter, grey Basic Nutrient Paste.
He sat on his bed, swallowing the sludge and washing it down with a glass of water. He had 8 SP left. He had spent 1 SP last night to buy this tube, knowing today was going to be a grueling test of endurance.
[Nutrient Paste Consumed. Stamina locked at 100% capacity for the next 12 hours.]
Rohan quietly opened his math textbook, studying intensely for three hours to ensure his mother saw him working hard when she woke up. By 8:00 AM, when he told her he was going to Kabir’s house for a "group study and a little bit of gully cricket to relax," she didn’t object. She just handed him twenty rupees ($ 0.20) for a samosa and told him to be back by evening.
Back in his room, Rohan packed his cheap canvas kit bag. He didn’t put on Monu Bhaiya’s blue turf shoes yet; he didn’t want to wear down the studs on the asphalt walk to the grounds. He carried them carefully, wrapped in an old newspaper.
As he walked out the door, his cracked smartphone buzzed in his pocket. It was a WhatsApp message from Ananya.
Ananya: "Don’t forget the quadratic equations test on Tuesday. Also, you looked half-dead yesterday. Don’t overdo your ’workout’. Good luck with whatever you’re hiding from me. 😊"
Rohan smiled faintly, typing back a quick "Thanks, I’ll be fine," before slipping the phone back into his pocket. He had to focus. The Underworld of Gully Cricket was waiting.
The DDA Grounds were absolute chaos.
It wasn’t a pristine green stadium. It was a massive expanse of dusty, barren land divided into four rough fields. Makeshift tents with plastic chairs were set up at the boundaries. A cheap PA system was blaring Punjabi music, only occasionally interrupted by a local commentator shouting into a crackling microphone.
The air was thick with the smell of dust, sweat, frying samosas, and raw testosterone. There were hundreds of people—players, local gamblers, shouting spectators, and vendors. This was tape-ball cricket. It was loud, fast, and aggressively Indian.
Rohan found his team under a makeshift blue tarp. Kabir was already wearing his keeping pads, nervously bouncing on his toes. Monu Bhaiya sat on a plastic chair, intensely wrapping a fresh layer of black electrical tape tightly around a bright yellow tennis ball.
Monu looked up as Rohan approached. "Shoes fit?"
"Perfectly, Monu Bhaiya," Rohan said, pulling the blue turf shoes out of his bag and lacing them up.
The moment he stood up and dug his feet into the dirt, he gasped. The difference was night and day. His cheap canvas sneakers used to slide and shift, making him feel like he was walking on ice. These turf shoes gripped the uneven, dusty ground like tiger claws. He felt rooted. Stable.
[Equipment Calibrated: Professional Turf Shoes (Worn)]
[Grip +40%, Ankle Stability +50%]
[System Notice: The Host can now fully execute the ’Core Brace’ technique without fear of joint failure.]
"Good," Monu said, tossing the freshly taped ball into the air and catching it. "Because we’ve got a problem. Look who just rolled in."
Rohan followed Monu’s gaze. A sleek white SUV pulled up near the main pavilion tent. Out stepped Aryan Singhania, flanked by four other boys from the St. Peter’s school team. They looked completely out of place in the dusty grounds. They were wearing matching, custom-printed jerseys that read ’Royal Strikers ’ in gold lettering, complete with branded sunglasses and imported kit bags.
Aryan scanned the crowd, a look of utter disdain on his face until his eyes locked onto Rohan. The smirk immediately returned. Aryan walked over, kicking up a small cloud of dust.
"Well, well, well," Aryan sneered, looking at Rohan’s faded track pants and old t-shirt. "If it isn’t St. Peter’s most famous waterboy. Didn’t Coach Sharma banish you? I didn’t think you’d sink to playing with street thugs just to get a game."
Kabir took a step forward, his fists clenched, but Monu Bhaiya simply stood up.
Monu was nearly six-foot-two, with broad shoulders and the rugged look of a man who had seen the ugly side of life. He didn’t raise his voice. He just looked down at Aryan and took the matchstick out of his mouth.
"This is street cricket, rich boy," Monu said, his voice a low, dangerous rumble. "Out here, nobody cares who your daddy sponsored. The ball comes at your head just the same. Keep your mouth shut and go warm up, before I decide to bat first and snap your favorite English willow in half."
Aryan’s bravado faltered. He took a nervous step back from Monu, recovering his composure with a scoff. "Whatever. I hope you make it to the finals, Rohan. I want the pleasure of hitting you for six sixes in an over myself."
Aryan turned and walked away with his entourage.
"Ignore him," Monu told Rohan, tossing the heavy tape-ball to him. "Anger makes a fast bowler lose his line. Keep your fire, but freeze your brain. We are up first. Match 1 is against the Paharganj Smashers."
Ten minutes later, the umpire—a local uncle in a white hat—flipped a coin. Monu won the toss and elected to bowl first. It was an 8-over-a-side match.
The Paharganj Smashers sent out two heavily built men as their openers. They weren’t using proper cricketing technique; they were holding their heavy wooden bats like baseball bats, intent on slogging every single delivery into the neighboring streets.
"Rohan," Monu called out, pointing to the ball in Rohan’s hand. "You’re opening the bowling. Three overs. Don’t worry about the runs. Just shatter their stumps. Show them what real pace looks like."
Rohan nodded. He walked back to his mark, counting out his fifteen paces on the dusty ground. He turned around and looked down the pitch. The concrete strip in the middle of the dust was cracked and uneven.
The batsman at the striker’s end, a burly guy with a thick beard, tapped his bat mockingly. "Come on, kid! Bowl gently, I don’t want to make you cry!"
Rohan took a deep breath. He shut out the blaring Punjabi music. He shut out the shouting crowd. He shut out Aryan, who was watching from the sidelines with a smirk.
He pulled up the System interface in his mind.
[Active Quest: The Underworld of Gully Cricket]
Objective 2: Take at least 3 wickets across the tournament (0/3).
"System," Rohan thought. "Track my pace."
[Tracking Activated. Awaiting Delivery.]
Rohan started his run-up. The blue turf shoes dug fiercely into the dirt, propelling him forward with explosive traction he had never felt before.
One, two, three, four...
His strides were perfectly measured. As he hit the popping crease, he leaped into his delivery stride.
He remembered the 500 shadow reps from yesterday. He slammed his left foot down onto the solid concrete. The turf shoes gripped flawlessly, completely absorbing the shock. He violently flexed his core muscles, transferring every ounce of kinetic energy from his sprint, through his torso, and into his right shoulder.
His arm whipped over in a dark, terrifying blur.
WHOOSH.
The heavy, tape-wrapped ball slammed into a crack on a good length. Because of the electrical tape and the raw speed, the ball didn’t bounce to the waist as it normally would. It skidded, keeping ankle-high, moving faster than the eye could track.
The burly batsman swung his bat with all his might, expecting to launch it for a six.
He swung entirely at empty air.
CRACK!
The sound was like a gunshot. The middle stump—a thick wooden pole driven into the dirt—was violently uprooted, cartwheeling backward through the air before crashing to the ground three feet away.
The batsman stood frozen, his bat still completing its arc, staring blankly at the destroyed stumps behind him.
The entire ground fell dead silent. Even the commentator forgot to speak into the microphone.
Aryan Singhania, standing at the boundary, dropped his bottle of energy drink in pure shock.
A glowing blue screen materialized in front of Rohan’s eyes, visible only to him.
[Delivery Analyzed.]
[Pace: 116.2 km/h]
[Result: Clean Bowled. Wicket 1/3 secured.]
Rohan stood in the middle of the pitch, the Delhi sun beating down on him. He didn’t celebrate wildly. He didn’t scream. He simply looked at the shattered stump, then turned to Monu Bhaiya and Kabir, who were both staring at him with wide, manic grins.
The Bench-Warmer was dead. The Pace Demon had just arrived.