Chapter 16

On the evening one day after the interview, I was laying flat on my back across the wooden floorboards, staring at the white ceiling. 

I turned Coach Sawada's words over in my head, picking apart the conversation like match footage. 

Putting aside the fact that I was actually just honey bait, he hadn’t explicitly written off myself as incompatible with his scheme. Whether that was a hopeful deduction or a misguided conclusion on my part, I didn’t know. Either way, I had to earn my place on the team.

But it was just as he said, my weaknesses were too much of a liability.

Musashi High did not play patient soccer. They ran an aggressive Gegenpress that demanded ninety minutes of relentless pressing, where every single player was an interlocking gear in a machine. 

If one forward failed to close down his man, the trap broke. If the attacking midfielder lagged three steps behind the play, the opposing pivot could turn and pick out a long pass into the empty space behind our center backs. 

And to plug me along with my weaknesses to this system would only end up in catastrophe.

I rolled onto my stomach, resting my chin on my crossed forearms. 

I had been building my stamina so far and had gained some progress, but it was still too slow. Now that I understood I had to really fight for my spot, the next obvious step was to ramp up everything. Yet the obvious solution carried its own traps. 

If I started pounding thirty kilometers a week on frozen dirt or hard asphalt, my shins would splinter before the cherry blossoms bloomed. My knees were not built for reckless mileage like Mom's or Yuri's, and breaking my body before preseason was pure stupidity.

I needed better training with less damage. 

I needed an environment that forced my lungs to expand while keeping my joints safe from repetitive pounding. 

Then, I remembered my mother talking about cross-training during her racing years. 

The water, I thought, pushing myself up to sit against the bed frame.

"Alright, let's do this."

I picked up my smartphone from the desk and opened the browser.

I navigated to the official portal for the Fuchu Municipal Sports Center Aquatic Pavilion. 

I selected the student membership section, entered my details, and purchased an annual pass using the funds from my New Year's envelope. 

Shortly after, the confirmation screen lit up with a green barcode.

---

Saturday morning was freezing.

I pushed through the double glass doors of the municipal sports center at eight o'clock, shaking the frost from my coat collar. 

The air inside the lobby hit me at once, humid and heavy with the sharp smell of chlorine. Beyond the turnstiles, the sound of rhythmic splashing echoed off the high ceiling.

I changed into my swim shorts in the locker room, adjusted the rubber strap of my goggles, and walked out onto the tiled deck.

The fifty-meter pool stretched out before me, its surface rippling under the bright lights. 

Lane four was completely empty. 

I stepped up to the edge of the blue tile, feeling the cool air raise goosebumps along my arms. 

I took a deep breath, bent my knees, and dived into the water.

The cold hit my skin with a sudden shock that snapped my senses awake. 

I pushed off the wall with both feet, gliding three meters beneath the surface before breaking into an easy breaststroke. 

The initial glide felt pleasant enough. 

Then came the second lap and third.

By the fourth lap, my throat was burning from the chlorinated mist. My neck muscles ached from turning to breathe, my triceps trembled with every pull, and my chest felt like an accordion squeezed flat beneath a heavy weight.

I touched the wall at the end of the two-hundred-meter mark, panting hard as I clung to the plastic lane divider.

My lungs and muscles burned far worse than during my usual conditioning on a dirt field. 

I rested my forehead against my wet forearms, coughing once into the water.

This is rough, I thought, feeling the furious pounding of my pulse against my temples. But this might be exactly what I need.

I pushed off the wall and began another lap.

---

The routine took root over the final two weeks of February.

School ended at three in the afternoon. 

After homeroom, our trio met at the local park for our usual technical drills. 

Something had shifted between the three of us since the recommendation interview at Musashi High. 

None of us spoke about what the interviewers had said behind closed doors. We had kept our individual interviews entirely private, but the unspoken result was obvious in the way we worked.

Yuuki stayed behind after our passing drills to run ladder footwork. 

Shizuo packed a set of resistance bands in his bag, heading straight to the gym next to his home to grind out his muscles until dinner. 

I watched them push themselves with quiet admiration. We had played together for three years; I more or less could read their mentality without needing them to explain it.

They were preparing for the meat grinder of high school soccer in their own way. 

I had to do the same.

At five o'clock sharp every afternoon, I walked through the doors of the aquatic center.

The days blurred into steady sets of freestyle, backstroke, and timed intervals. 

At first, I had to rest for two full minutes between every hundred meters just to keep my vision from blurring. 

By the end of the second week, that recovery window shrank to forty-five seconds. 

My body adapted with the quiet efficiency it had always possessed. 

I felt my lung volume expanded, allowing me to take four full strokes between breaths instead of two. My resting pulse slowed down, and the constant shortness of breath that had plagued me after intense workout began to fade bit by bit.

One evening at the dinner table, Dad looked up from his newspaper, his sharp eyes taking in the line of my shoulders.

"Your posture is changing, Yama," Dad remarked in his steady voice. "Your lats are sitting wider."

"He smells like chlorine every single night," Mom laughed, setting a plate of grilled salmon between us. "Are you actually washing with soap after you swim?"

"I use soap," I muttered, scooping rice into my bowl. "The smell just lingers."

Dad smiled into his tea, giving a small nod that carried his own quiet approval.

---

Sunday, February 28th.

Outside, a cold rain washed over the concrete streets of the city.

I sat slumped on a wooden bench in the municipal locker room, breathing slowly through my nose. 

A white towel hung over my shoulders, and water dripped from my wet hair onto the gray floor tiles. My arms felt heavy, my legs trembled with fatigue, and my shoulders burned after a hefty two-kilometer workout.

There were no other people around. I found today to be an unusually quiet day in the pool for a weekend.

Then, a soft vibration rattled against the wooden slats beside my thigh.

I turned my head. 

The screen of my smartphone was lit up with a green notification banner.

Narita Top Road.

I picked up the device with damp fingers, unlocking the display.

The message contained an image attachment.

I tapped the screen, and the photograph expanded to fill the display.

Resting on the concrete floor beside a wooden bench were a pair of running cleats. The white leather was caked with dark turf, dried mud, and shredded grass from a clearly intense training session. 

Beneath the image was a short string of text:

*Top Road: My legs feel like lead. But I gave it everything I had today too. How was your training, Shimazu-kun?*

I stared down at the screen, looking from her muddy shoes to my own tired and lightly trembling hands around my phone.

A slow smile pulled at the corner of my mouth. 

I know it's silly to compare us. She's always been like this and I'm only at the beginning. Still, I couldn't help but feel just a little bit proud. I finally feel like I'm giving it my everything, just like her.

I rested my thumbs over the glass, typing out my reply:

*Yama: Smells like chlorine over here. But I'm improving bit by bit. Don't you forget to properly rest too.*

The status switched to read almost instantly. 

A second later, a cartoon sticker popped into the chat: a carrot character nodding firmly with a thumbs-up.

I let out a soft breath, feeling a steady warmth spread through my tightened chest.

I stayed on the wooden bench, resting my elbows on my knees. 

Instead of locking the phone, I opened the mobile browser and navigated to the official URA portal.

I clicked on the racecards for the weekend, scrolling down to the card for Sunday, March seventh.

Nakayama Racecourse, Race Eleven: The 36th Running of the Hochi Hai Yayoi Sho. Grade 2, 2000m on turf.

The field was loaded with the elite talent of this year's classic generation. 

The top three finishers would earn guaranteed priority tickets for the Satsuki Sho in April, removing all reliance on prize money cutoffs. 

Sitting at the top of the board as the undisputed first favorite was a runner named Admire Vega.

She was a generational prospect whose closing speed had secured her first G1 crown in the Hopeful Stakes back in December. The racing press spoke of her with hushed reverence, treating her like a future champion waiting to claim more crowns.

Right behind her, listed firmly as the second favorite, was Narita Top Road.

The rematch with the elite was locked in.

I tapped the navigation app on my phone, bringing up the regional train map.

I typed in the route from my station to Nakayama Racecourse.

The screen refreshed, displaying a single blue line.

The JR Musashino Line ran directly from Fuchu-Honmachi Station straight across the prefecture to Funabashi-Hoten Station in Chiba. 

It was a single train ride. No complicated transfers, no confusing connections. 

The app noted that Funabashi-Hoten had an underground walkway that led directly into the main entrance of Nakayama Racecourse in less than an hour and a half.

I stared at the route map for a long moment.

Up until now, I had only ever watched her starts through the screen. 

But..

I reached down into the side pocket of my sports bag.

My fingers brushed against the smooth silk of the purple victory amulet, feeling the woven threads resting safely in the lining.

Should I go watch her run in person?

The question rose in my mind, quiet and clear.

She was stepping into a premier trial against one of the best runners in her generation. 

She was carrying the hopes of her fans, chasing her priority ticket to the Triple Crown, and fighting for every inch of turf with everything she had.

With her racing a mere one and a half hour away, staying on the couch felt like a wasted chance.

"Next sunday, huh?" I murmured to the empty locker room.

I stood up from the bench, tossed my damp towel into my bag, and zipped the canvas shut. 

I pulled my windbreaker on against the evening chill, pushed through the glass doors of the facility, and stepped out into the cool rain with a decision already made.