The ten-minute halftime break was a funeral. The San Fernando walked off the court not like a team, but like a collection of defeated individuals, their shoulders slumped, their eyes hollow. Their star, Carlo Bedia, didn't even go to the locker room. He just sat at the end of the bench, a towel over his head, a lonely, isolated figure. He had been so comprehensively dismantled, his "hero ball" so thoroughly exposed as flawed and emotional, that he had simply given up. The score was a brutal 42-20, in favor of Cebu.
In the Dasmariñas war room, the mood was just as grim, but for different reasons. The cold, leftover food on the table was forgotten. Twelve notebooks were open, but the pens had stopped moving. The players were just staring, absorbing the sheer, terrifying brilliance of what they had just witnessed.
Emon Jacob. The "Cebu Machine."
"So," Marco said, his voice a hollow, broken whisper that seemed to echo in the chilled room. "He's a 6'6" two-way superstar. He's a lockdown defender who can put a fellow Mythical Five player in a mental prison. And on offense, he... he just... he doesn't miss. And he doesn't get tired. And his basketball IQ is... it's... it's not human. Did I... did I miss anything?"
"His passing," Tristan added, his own voice quiet, his throat dry. "That last-second pass in the second quarter... that wasn't just skill. He was playing a different game. He's... he's a general. Like... a perfect one."
"He's what you would be, Captain," Gab rumbled, his voice a low, gravelly vibration, "if you were eight inches taller and could jump out of the gym."
It was a blunt, honest, and devastating assessment. The fear in the room was no longer the electric, manageable anxiety they'd felt before their own game. This was a deeper, colder dread. This was the feeling of a team of mortals who had just watched a god at work.
"Alright," Coach Gutierrez said, his voice cutting through the despair. He stood up and walked to the whiteboard, erasing the score. "He's good. He's better than good. He's the best high school player in the country. We've established that. So now, we stop being fans, and we start being surgeons. We just watched him for 20 minutes. What did you see?"
"I saw perfection," Ian Veneracion said, his voice flat.
"There is no such thing," Coach G snapped. "Look closer. What did you see? Tristan. You saw it. The airball."
Tristan nodded, his mind re-engaging. "His teammates. When Jacob created the play, when he drew three defenders and made the perfect pass... his teammate, Abella, airballed a wide-open shot. The machine... it's top-heavy. It's all built around one, perfect, central gear. If that gear can't engage the other pieces, the machine stalls."
"Exactly!" Coach G said, a fierce, hungry light in his eyes. "Cebu is a beautiful, perfect, precision-engineered machine... that only has one engine. Emon Jacob is the engine, the transmission, the steering wheel, and the driver. The other four guys on the court are just passengers. They are not creators. They are not shooters. They are just 'guys' who are good at running to the right spot. In the first half, Bedia was so arrogant, he let Jacob get those 'guys' involved. But this half... Bedia is broken. He's given up. Now watch what a true machine does when it has no resistance."
He pointed to the screen. The teams were coming back out. "This quarter isn't a game. It's an execution. And we are going to study it."
Start of the Third Quarter: San Fernando 20 — Cebu 42
Carlo Bedia did not start the third quarter. He was still on the bench, the towel over his head, a white flag of surrender. The San Fernando coach had put in his reserves. They were a lineup of kids who looked terrified, just happy to be on the Palaro court.
They inbounded the ball, and their backup point guard was immediately trapped by Cebu's still-in-place, first-string defense. He panicked and threw the ball away. Turnover.
Emon Jacob didn't even run. He walked the ball up. He looked at the terrified kid guarding him, then at the basket. He didn't run a play. He didn't call a screen. He just... rose up. A calm, easy, 25-foot three-pointer.
Swish.
Score: San Fernando 20 — Cebu 45
"He didn't even... he didn't even try," Marco whispered, horrified. "That was... that was just target practice. He's toying with them."
The San Fernando reserves, desperate, tried to force a pass inside. Cebu's 6'7" center, K. Ramos, who had been overshadowed all game, stepped into the lane and stole it. He fired an outlet to Jacob.
Fast break. 2-on-1. Jacob had his point guard, Abella, with him. The lone defender, the San Fernando backup, made the impossible choice: stop the 6'6" superstar, or stop the pass. He chose to stop Jacob.
Jacob, without even looking, flicked a perfect, one-handed bounce pass to Abella.
Abella, with no one within ten feet, went up for the easy, wide-open layup...
And he missed it. He laid it up too hard. It bounced off the backboard.
"THERE!" Coach Gutierrez yelled, stabbing a finger at the screen, his voice triumphant. "DID YOU SEE IT?! DID YOU ALL SEE THAT?!"
The Dasmariñas players were stunned.
"He... he missed," Daewoo said. "He missed a... a layup. A wide-open layup."
"He's a role player!" Coach G boomed, his eyes blazing. "He's not a star! He's not a killer! He's just a guy who knows how to run a play. Jacob gave him a perfect, beautiful, 10-out-of-10 pass... and the 'machine' broke. He's human! They're all human! Except for him."
On the screen, Emon Jacob just sighed, a look of profound, weary disappointment on his face. He got back on defense.
The San Fernando reserves, energized by the miss, actually ran a good play. They got an open shot for their backup forward. It missed.
Jacob got the rebound. He walked the ball up. He looked at his point guard, Abella, who had just missed the layup. He looked at his center. He looked at the basket. And he just... decided.
He waved them all away. Isolation.
He was 30 feet out. He was being guarded by a kid who looked like he was 16.
Jacob dribbled. Left. Right. Crossover. He drove the lane. The entire San Fernando defense collapsed on him. Three players.
He rose up, surrounded, and hit a double-clutch, contested, spinning layup. It was an impossible shot. A shot of pure, arrogant brilliance.
Score: San Fernando 20 — Cebu 47
"He's not passing to them anymore," Tristan said, his blood running cold. "He... he doesn't trust them. He just... he's decided to win the game by himself."
"And he can," Gab said, his voice a grim statement of fact.
The next five minutes were a basketball horror film. It was Emon Jacob versus the San Fernando High School for the Criminally Overmatched.
He hit another pull-up jumper in transition.
Score: 20-49.
He got a steal at half-court and finished with a smooth, effortless, two-handed dunk.
Score: 20-51.
He was fouled on a three-point attempt. He calmly sank all three free throws.
Score: 20-54.
With three minutes left in the third quarter, the lead was 34 points. Emon Jacob had scored 12 straight points for his team, all on his own, without a single pass.
The Cebu coach finally, mercifully, subbed him out.
As Jacob walked to the bench, the entire Davao arena gave him a standing ovation. He didn't wave. He didn't smile. He just grabbed a towel, sat down, and took a sip of water, his face as impassive as if he'd just finished a light warm-up.
In the Dasmariñas conference room, Marco just dropped his pen. It clattered onto the floor.
"He's... he's not human," Marco whispered. "He's a... he's a demon. He's a basketball demon sent from the future to destroy us all. What... what is the plan now, Coach? You said we should let his teammates beat us! He just showed us that if his teammates can't, he'll just... he'll just score 50. He just... he just decided to stop passing. We can't... we can't guard that."
The room was a vacuum of hope. The team that had been so high on their own victory was now utterly, completely terrified. They had to play a 6'9" monster tomorrow, just for the chance to be publicly executed by this... machine.
Coach Gutierrez stood there, watching his team crumble. He saw the color drain from their faces. He saw the confidence he had just built shatter into a million pieces.
He let the silence stretch, thick and painful.
"You're right, Marco," he finally said, his voice quiet.
The team looked up, shocked.
"You're right," the coach repeated. "You can't guard that. We can't guard that. No high school team in this country can guard that. If we let Emon Jacob play his game, he will beat us, by himself, by 30 points. It's that simple."
He walked to the whiteboard, his face a mask of stone.
"So," he said, uncapping a red marker. "We're not going to let him play his game."
He looked at his team, his eyes burning with a cold, almost insane, tactical fire.
"We're not going to 'guard' him. We're not going to 'defend' him. We," he said, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial, dangerous whisper, "are going to annoy him. We are going to frustrate him. We are going to deny him. We are going to make him hate the 40 minutes he is on the court with us."
He turned to his team. "What did we just learn? We learned two things. One: His teammates cannot score unless he creates a perfect, wide-open look for them. Two: He knows his teammates cannot score, and he would rather do it all himself. He is an arrogant, one-man army. And you never, ever, fight a one-man army head-on. You cut off his supply lines."
He drew a diagram on the board. A single "X" (Jacob) at the top.
"From the second he steps on the court," Coach G said, "he is not a basketball player. He is a target."
He pointed at Daewoo Kim. "Daewoo. You are our starter. You will guard him. But you will not guard him for 40 minutes. You will guard him until you cannot stand up."
He pointed at John Manalo. "John. The second Daewoo takes a breath, you are in. And you will guard him until you cannot stand up."
He pointed at Joseph Rubio. "Joseph. The second John needs a rest, you are in. And you will guard him until you are puking on the sideline.
"We are going to throw three... three... of our fastest, toughest, most relentless 'dogs' at him, in waves, for the entire game. This is not a man-to-man defense. This is a full-time, 40-minute, 94-foot denial. He will not touch the ball. He will not breathe without one of you in his shorts. You will face-guard him. You will shadow him. You will bump him. You will foul him. I don't care if all three of you foul out. You will make him run a marathon just to get an inbound pass."
The three defenders—Daewoo, John, and Joseph—looked at each other, a new, terrifying, and exhilarating purpose dawning in their eyes.
"And the rest of you," the coach said to Tristan, Marco, Ian, and Gab. "You will be playing 4-on-4. We are abandoning Emon Jacob. We are taking him completely out of the game. We are telling the other four players on the 'Cebu Machine'—the ones who airball open shots and miss layups—'Go ahead. Beat us.' And I am betting my career... they can't."
It was a plan. It was an insane, desperate, and beautiful plan. It was a strategy of such disrespect, such focused, tactical arrogance, that it just... it just might work.
"It's a box-and-one," Tristan said, his mind racing, seeing the strategy. "No... it's... it's a 'Man-and-Four' zone. We just... we just erase him from the game."
"We erase him," Coach G confirmed. "And we force the 'passengers' to suddenly learn how to drive. And they will crash."
A new, fragile, and borderline-psychotic energy began to fill the room. The fear was still there, but now it had a direction.
"But Coach," Marco said, his voice still shaky. "What if... what if he beats it? What if he's just... too good?"
Coach Gutierrez looked at the TV, where the fourth quarter was playing out, a meaningless, 40-point blowout. He turned back to his team.
"Then he beats us. Then he's the best high school player we've ever seen, and we go home. But we do not go home... until we have thrown everything, including the kitchen sink, at his head. We do not go home... until he knows he was in a fight."
He looked at the clock. "Now, we have 24 hours to prepare for Emon Jacob. And I want Daewoo, John, and Joseph to spend all 24 of those hours dreaming about Emon Jacob. Because your Palaro... your entire season... just found its purpose."