Julien ultimately wasn't his former self.
He had planned to complete all 20 kilometers of recovery training today, but he clearly overestimated his current body's fitness level.
After long-term neglect, lack of training, and a month in prison, his current fitness was terrible. Not to mention the high-intensity interval running—he simply couldn't handle it.
He had only managed an extra three kilometers, reaching five kilometers total, before becoming somewhat exhausted.
He couldn't run anymore.
This performance was naturally observed by Tavenot, whose eyes couldn't hide his disappointment.
De Rocca hadn't expected this body's fitness to decline so rapidly.
While others hadn't finished training, he was already done. Although this was partly due to poor pacing, it proved he was no longer suitable for football.
The only thing that hadn't declined was his natural ball sense.
But only ball sense remained.
Without fitness and technical support, ball sense was just like water without roots.
When his teammates finished training, some whispered as they passed De Rocca: "Well, someone still has to go back to prison tonight."
De Rocca just frowned slightly without paying much attention.
In fact, he didn't return to prison, just to a separately monitored room—a single room. It was sufficient.
After dinner that evening, De Rocca returned to his room for reflection and future planning.
With the system, his previous plans needed complete overhaul.
Now he planned to build everything around the system.
The first step was completing the three basic attribute tasks.
He'd see what the panel was about before making further plans.
As for playing football, he didn't fantasize about getting match opportunities now. He'd train earnestly and leave the rest to fate.
Over the next week, De Rocca earnestly completed system tasks. He also discovered that not all training counted—only training meeting certain standards was calculated.
This prevented him from being perfunctory with himself and his training.
For youth team matches, Tavenot never included De Rocca in the squad—not even as a substitute.
Even in regular internal scrimmages, he wasn't allowed to play.
He had become a fringe player.
This made Bastia's sporting director, Châtaigner, somewhat anxious. He had been the one insisting on signing De Rocca.
This former fringe French international was something of a fellow countryman to De Rocca.
When De Rocca was rising to fame, Châtaigner had already been paying attention to him. Now that De Rocca was nearly retired, Châtaigner wanted to help his fellow countryman.
Tavenot was very clear: "He's not ready yet."
Although Châtaigner had considerable authority at Bastia, he didn't want De Rocca to play matches before recovering to a certain level.
This would completely destroy his confidence.
Châtaigner still hoped De Rocca could pull himself together. Bastia had won the Championnat National last season and been promoted to Ligue 2. This season they were also showing strong momentum with good hopes of reaching Ligue 1.
If De Rocca could return to peak form, he'd have a chance to play Ligue 1 with Bastia.
Châtaigner specifically came to watch De Rocca's training.
He was alone, quietly conducting monotonous shooting practice.
Beside Châtaigner, Tavenot said: "He's changed a lot, but he might never be able to go back."
Châtaigner understood De Rocca.
He possessed that absolute arrogance of genius. On the pitch, he excelled at using various feints, nutmegs, and no-look passes to humiliate opponents.
But he also had an extremely eccentric personality.
When De Rocca was still in Lille's academy, if he was dissatisfied with anything, he would threaten the head coach by saying he wouldn't play.
This personality continued at Chelsea, where he beat up one of Abramovich's compatriots.
But now, he would quietly train alone without complaints, even though he hadn't had any playing opportunities.
Châtaigner felt that perhaps those past setbacks were good for De Rocca—they had made him grow.
Seventeen years old. There was still time.
Châtaigner patted Tavenot's shoulder: "Pay more attention to him and report De Rocca's recovery to me promptly. If he continues like this, he's Bastia's future."
"Got it."
De Rocca was completely unaware that Châtaigner and others were quietly observing him.
At the moment, he was getting somewhat excited. He placed five balls on the penalty area line, then powerfully kicked the first one.
"996!"
Bang! The second: "997!"
"1000!!"
When the final shot went out, De Rocca excitedly dropped to his knees, pounding the ground hard.
Complete!
An entire week of nothing but dedicated training had finally paid off today with all three tasks completed.
The moment of completion, he felt a force return to his body—absolute control over his physical form.
It was back!
Now he was once again that genius player who had once shocked France.
De Rocca had no time for too much sentiment.
He immediately focused his consciousness on the panel that appeared in his mind.
[Julien De Rocca
Age: 17
Height: 183cm Weight: 67kg
Dribbling: 82 (89); Passing: 78 (85)
Shooting: 74 (88); Heading: 45 (63)
Speed: 64 (76); Strength: 55 (70)
Jumping: 55 (72); Stamina: 71 (82)
Defense: 28 (40); Tackling: 17 (33)
Flexibility: 59 (70); Ball Sense: 89 (95)
]
The dense display of data nearly made De Rocca dizzy, but after carefully reading through it and the system's annotations, he understood.
Twelve basic attributes—the numbers after each represented his current ability, while the numbers in parentheses represented his upper limit.
This meant he could improve himself through training up to the limit, but couldn't exceed it.
This was the restriction of talent.
De Rocca studied it carefully. This body's talent was truly excellent—dribbling, shooting, passing, and ball sense were all first-class. Normal development into a semi-core main player at a top club would be completely feasible.
According to the system, exceeding ninety meant that individual ability was already top-tier.
Those superstar players everyone knew had one or two attributes exceeding ninety.
Exceeding eighty was the level of most top-league main players.
At his current level, De Rocca felt playing Ligue 2 wouldn't be a problem. His biggest issue now was his small build and lack of explosive power.
But this wasn't really a problem—these were De Rocca's attributes from when he was fourteen or fifteen!
The past two or three years had been spent coasting on past achievements without growth. One could imagine how amazing De Rocca had been initially, especially attributes like speed where people don't differ absolutely.
Even between 50 and 80 attributes, the 100-meter time difference would be at most one or two seconds.
As long as it wasn't long-distance sprinting, for attacking players, the difference between 50 and 80 speed wasn't huge.
Dribbling ability, acceleration, and step frequency were key.
Was Messi fast? Definitely not as fast as Bale, but whose dribbling left a deeper impression on fans—Messi's or Bale's?
If speed alone determined football ability, Usain Bolt should have the highest level in football.
Additionally, the panel had the most important content!
[In matches of second division level or above leagues or cups, playing time exceeding 10 minutes in winning matches will earn Victory Points.
Victory Points are awarded based on comprehensive factors including match intensity and performance.
Every 10 Victory Points can be exchanged for 1 Free Attribute Limit Point.
Every 100 Victory Points can be exchanged for 1 Random Victory Chest, which when opened grants one enhancement ability.]