After the match ended, Akashi started organizing everyone for a group meal. He had arranged a restaurant reservation early that morning, and he even asked Butler Tanaka to bring Mitsuya and Irie over.
Even though Seigaku had been eliminated, Fuji and the others decided to stay to keep watching the Nationals. Atobe didn't mind continuing to provide lodging for Seigaku's players—after all, the hotel rooms were already booked until the day of the finals.
In the largest private room of the restaurant, the regulars from the four semifinalist schools and Seigaku gathered together. Irie and Mitsuya were there too. The members of Fudomine and Hyōtei ate at tables outside.
Unfortunately, the players from Yamabuki and Rokkaku had already returned to their schools on the day they were eliminated, since Banji and Ojii, being older, weren't suited to staying away for long.
Because it was summer vacation, the Nationals didn't need to wait for weekends like earlier tournaments. The matches progressed according to the organizer's schedule: the two teams that won all three matches in the first three days would move to the finals, which were usually held four or five days after the semifinals.
Everyone was happy Mitsuya came, especially Yanagi Renji and Inui Sadaharu. As for Irie, thanks to Akashi's introduction, nobody thought too much about it, and everyone enjoyed the feast together.
The Shitenhōji players devoured the food ravenously. It was rare to have so many delicious dishes, so of course they went all out—forget flowing somen noodles!
Yamato was so overwhelmed he started crying at the table—not because the food was bad, but because he was so emotional. His three-year dream had finally come true: Seigaku not only made it to Nationals but also the top eight. Even though they lost today, Yamato was already completely satisfied.
Gradually, the Shitenhōji players got comfortable with everyone else, especially the comedy duo of Hara Tetsuya and Taira Yoshiyuki, who had everyone laughing nonstop.
By the end of the dinner, the two adults present were completely drunk. Everyone looked speechlessly at Ryūzaki Sumire and Watanabe Osamu—both coaches, yet their players had to carry them back to the hotel. Ishida Gin slung one over each shoulder, refusing all offers to help, saying it was "a kind of training."
When everyone returned to the hotel, they started focusing on recovering and regaining their strength. The semifinals were tomorrow: Fudomine's opponent, just as Akashi expected, was Shitenhōji, while Hyōtei would face Rikkai again.
The next day, the Nationals semifinals officially began. The players from the four semifinal schools arrived at the venue. Fudomine and Shitenhōji's regulars entered the court together. Even though everyone already knew the routine, Watanabe still approached Akashi for a handshake.
"I hope we'll have a great match today, don't you think~ Akashi-kun?" Watanabe said with a toothpick in his mouth, smiling.
"That's what I'm looking forward to," Akashi replied with a smile.
Soon, the umpire announced the official start of the match and called for the Singles Three players to take the court. Shitenhōji sent Shiraishi Kuranosuke as usual—but instead of Akutsu, Fudomine's player was Tezuka Kunimitsu!
Akashi was eager to see how Shiraishi would handle facing Tezuka, the pinnacle of spin control. Just sticking to textbook tennis wouldn't be enough to break through Tezuka Zone.
The two walked to the net, bowed, then started the coin toss. Shiraishi won the right to serve. Akashi was already used to it—maybe because he'd changed destiny, Tezuka always seemed to lose the coin toss.
"First game! Shitenhōji to serve!"
Standing at the baseline, Shiraishi looked across at the stern Tezuka, feeling nervous. After these past days, he had a pretty good idea of how strong Tezuka really was—rumor said he'd even unlocked the legendary Ten'i Muhō. But Shiraishi didn't fully believe it.
He tossed the ball high and served with textbook-perfect form; both the speed and angle were excellent. But for Tezuka, it meant nothing.
Tezuka moved swiftly to the ball's landing point, swung, and infused the shot with the spin of the Zone. Shiraishi didn't notice anything different and returned the ball with another flawless, textbook stroke.
As the ball crossed the net, a huge white cyclone formed around Tezuka, pulling the ball straight toward him. Tezuka calmly adjusted his stance and smashed the ball back.
"So this is the legendary Tezuka Zone? It's unbelievable~" Shiraishi wasn't surprised, but even more determined. He wanted to experience the Zone's full power himself.
Without hesitating, Shiraishi stepped into the ball's path and swung, trying his best to neutralize the spin. But once the ball crossed the net again, it was still sucked straight back toward Tezuka.
Tezuka didn't rush to score. He wanted to see how far Shiraishi could go. They rallied back and forth multiple times, but Shiraishi couldn't break the Zone. Finally, Tezuka seized an opening and scored cleanly.
"0-15!"
Shiraishi didn't look discouraged at all. He calmly served again with textbook precision. Tezuka answered with the Zone exactly like before. Shiraishi kept trying to break it, but this time Tezuka didn't prolong the rally and took the point decisively.
"0-30!"
"0-40!"
"Game! Fudomine! 1-0!"
Tezuka quickly broke serve with ease. Shiraishi tried everything but couldn't crack Tezuka Zone head-on, completely exposing his weakness.
A player like Shiraishi, with perfectly balanced five attributes and rock-solid fundamentals, had an advantage against opponents of similar strength since he had no obvious weak points.
But once he faced a stronger opponent, he had no way to resist. His lack of a weak point also meant he had no standout feature to overcome a gap in power.
In the original story, Tokugawa was the same as Shiraishi with perfectly balanced attributes, but at least he had special moves like Rainbow Serve, and later Irie and Oni taught him Black Hole and Shura Path.
The second game was Tezuka's serve. He gave Shiraishi no chance, firing off four Zero Shiki Serves in a row that left Shiraishi frozen on the spot. Compared to Fuji, Shiraishi was getting even harsher treatment.
"Game! Fudomine! 2-0!"
The third game was almost identical to the first—Tezuka relied solely on the Zone to keep Shiraishi completely pinned down, leaving him utterly helpless no matter how much he persisted.
"Game! Fudomine! 3-0! Change courts!"
Shiraishi walked to his bench and took a drink. He'd spent a lot of stamina trying to break the Zone but hadn't made any progress at all. At that moment, Watanabe spoke up:
"Shiraishi, if you want to counter something like the Zone, you can't just try to reduce the ball's spin. You have to give it reverse spin, too!"
Shiraishi listened seriously, nodding as he started thinking about how to add reverse spin to the ball. He had to find a way to break the Zone in this match.
Meanwhile, on Fudomine's bench, Akashi glanced at the barely sweating Tezuka and asked quietly,
"Tezuka, what do you think of Shiraishi's skill?"
"His fundamentals are excellent, and his movements are textbook perfect. He's also very familiar with all kinds of tennis techniques. But I don't see anything unique to him," Tezuka replied earnestly after thinking.
"Exactly. Shiraishi's devotion to the basics stifles his potential. But if he can push this path to the extreme, he might create something entirely new," Akashi agreed.
In the original timeline's world tournament, Shiraishi perfected his fundamentals and developed Star Bible, which let him instantly shift his five attributes into one, achieving true all-round capability without weaknesses.
Kimijima once evaluated Shiraishi as originally having 4 in each attribute, but when using Star Bible, all his attributes reached 7—and 7 in any attribute meant world-class level.
When the timeout ended, the match resumed with Tezuka's serve. Unsurprisingly, he kept using Zero Shiki Serve, and Shiraishi could only watch helplessly—this serve was simply unreturnable.
"Game! Fudomine! 4-0!"
In the fifth game, Shiraishi tried again to break the Zone. This time, he followed Watanabe's advice and applied reverse spin to the ball. But on the first two shots, it had no effect at all. Worse, focusing too much on this let Tezuka exploit openings and take points.
"0-15!"
"0-30!"
On the third shot, Shiraishi's return finally caused slight distortion in the Zone, and lines began to appear in the circular area under Tezuka's feet.
After another return, Tezuka stepped to the right—a sign that Shiraishi had partially broken the Zone. But then seven-colored light rose around Tezuka's body, and the ball flew past Shiraishi at double its original speed, smashing into the baseline and bouncing out.
"0-40!"
"I can't believe it's real… a first-year using Hyaku Ren Jitoku no Kiwami already. What a monster~" Watanabe muttered from the coach's chair.
Against Tezuka, who had entered the base state of Hyaku Ren Jitoku, Shiraishi didn't even get another chance to try. After just two more rallies, his racket was blasted from his hand.
"Game! Fudomine! 5-0!"
Next was Tezuka's serve again. Shiraishi had lost all hope. But this time, Tezuka didn't use Zero Shiki Serve. Akashi had determined through Emperor Eye that using it eight times or fewer wouldn't harm Tezuka's arm, but exceeding eight times could cause slight damage.
Of course, this limit would increase as Tezuka aged and his arm fully developed. Eventually, it wouldn't pose much risk.
Even with a normal serve, the combination of Hyaku Ren Jitoku and the Zone let Tezuka easily blast Shiraishi's racket away over and over.
"Game! 6-0! Match over! Winner, Fudomine!"
In the end, Shiraishi lost without taking a single point. The gap between him and Tezuka was just too big. If Tezuka hadn't wanted to end things quickly, he wouldn't even have needed to use Zero Shiki Serve or Hyaku Ren Jitoku to win easily.
Watanabe looked at the disappointed Shiraishi and shook his head helplessly. Their levels were completely different, and all he could do was try to comfort Shiraishi so his confidence wouldn't be shattered.
Next was the Doubles Two match. Akashi sent Akutsu and Kite, while Shitenhōji had Ishida Gin and Oshitari Kenya.
Akashi looked at the pair across from them, smiled faintly, and whispered, "Power and speed combo, huh? But right now, you're both way too weak."
The coin toss went to Shitenhōji's Oshitari Kenya again, giving him serve. But Akutsu and Kite didn't care at all, just turning to walk calmly to their side of the court.
Oshitari served quickly and charged the net. He was confident in his speed—he hadn't been called Osaka's Speed Star for nothing.
But Kite was even faster. With a flicker, he appeared at the landing spot and ripped a cross-court shot that Ishida couldn't react to, the ball slamming into the corner and flying out.
"0-15!"
Watching Kite, Oshitari was shocked. He hadn't even seen how Kite got there—just a blur and he was at the ball.
But there was no time to think. Oshitari served again, but Akutsu and Kite were simply too strong. They overwhelmed their opponents and broke the serve effortlessly.
"Game! Fudomine! 1-0!"
It was Kite's turn to serve. He unleashed a Big Bang Serve. This time, the expected shattered racket didn't happen— Ishida gritted his teeth, barely holding on, then roared and sent the serve back.
But Akutsu was waiting at the net, smashing it past Ishida before Oshitari could react.
"15-0!"
And so it continued: even when Ishida barely returned Kite's Big Bang Serve, Akutsu and Kite always finished the point with a shot the other two couldn't touch.
"Game! Fudomine! 2-0!"
"Game! Fudomine! 3-0! Change courts!"
"Game! Fudomine! 4-0!"
"Game! Fudomine! 5-0!"
In no time, Akutsu and Kite had taken five games. Ishida and Oshitari felt an overwhelming sense of helplessness.
In the final game, the situation didn't change—until Ishida finally found a chance to hit a Hadoukyuu, their last hope.
But reality was cruel. Akutsu intercepted the Hadoukyuu instantly. Feeling its power, Akutsu smiled. 'At least this one's got some bite,' he thought, then smashed it right back.
The Shitenhōji team looked stunned seeing Akutsu easily return Ishida's Hadoukyuu. Even Watanabe couldn't hide his shock.
Ishida himself stood there dumbfounded—his trump card had no effect at all. The match was hopeless.
"Game! 6-0! Match over! Winner, Fudomine!"
Fudomine easily secured their second victory. With just one more win, they'd be in the finals—and no one from Fudomine looked worried, because Singles Two was Akashi's match.
Shitenhōji's Singles Two was again their captain Taira Yoshiyuki, but by now, a regular national-level player was no different than a background character to Akashi.
This time, Akashi finally won the coin toss. As soon as the match started, he fired an ultra-fast serve, giving Taira no chance to react.
"Game! Fudomine! 1-0!"
On the sidelines, Watanabe had already closed his eyes. He knew they were completely finished—there was no chance left. Fudomine's captain couldn't even be called a monster anymore.
From there, the match was entirely under Akashi's control. Even when Taira used Bakyuun, it had zero effect. It couldn't break Akashi's racket or even make him pause for an instant.
"Game! 6-0! Match over! Winner, Fudomine!"
Soon the entire match was over. Shitenhōji had been completely crushed—no one scored a single point. They'd been unlucky to face Fudomine in the semifinals. But even if they'd met Rikkai instead, the result wouldn't have been much better—at best they might've managed a few points.