Every eye in the room was fixed on Yoru Ryoshu, the "monster" who had just ended a career with a single strike. For a long moment, the pitch-black training room was heavy with a suffocating silence.
Aki, however, wasn't looking at the boy he had just crushed. His attention was focused on the rapid-fire notifications echoing in his mind.
[Emotion Points +100] [Emotion Points +666] [Emotion Points +1,000...]
In an instant, his points were skyrocketing. The bullet comments were scrolling so fast they were a dizzying blur of white text.
[Holy crap... that was spectacular. Absolute cinema.] [To the guy I insulted earlier for taking the ball... I apologize. I wasn't familiar with your game.] [He really cooked him. Total destruction.]
A sea of "apology" comments flooded Aki's vision. When he had first seized control of the ball, the audience had dismissed him as a show-off. Now, in the wake of that volley, they were left in a state of collective shock.
Aki's lips curled into a faint, satisfied smile. He leaned into the thrill of it—the cold, intoxicating pleasure of dismantling someone else's future to pave his own path.
As the "Game Over" signal faded, Bachira's predatory intensity vanished as quickly as it had appeared. He scratched the back of his head, looking back at Aki.
"Aww... and here I thought you were gonna shoot at me." Bachira stepped closer, his eyes narrowing slightly. "But hey... was that shot on purpose?"
Bachira had seen it. That volley wasn't just a lucky hit born of panic; it was a calculated execution. Aki had intended to eliminate that specific person from the very start.
Aki looked at him. "You caught that?"
Bachira nodded.
To the others, it might have looked like a fluke. A high-altitude volley is hard enough to keep on target for a massive goal, let alone a moving human target. The goal doesn't move; a person does. In that split second, Aki could have picked anyone—Bachira was the closest and easiest target.
But he hadn't kicked it back to Bachira.
He had chosen the man at the furthest edge of the room. Yuuda Imamura had been at least fifteen meters away, positioned in the most difficult quadrant to hit. Yet, Aki had specifically targeted him.
"Aki, weren't you afraid of missing?" Bachira asked with a grin.
Aki's gaze turned sharp. "If I had missed, I wouldn't deserve to be here."
"To become the strongest, you have to dance on the edge of your own limits."
Bachira rolled his eyes. "Yeah, yeah... always with the dramatic stuff."
Bachira knew he would never have taken such an absurd gamble with his future. But Aki was different. Aki looked at the floating comments, his understanding of the "Audience" deepening.
The viewers didn't want safety. They wanted the adrenaline of a high-stakes gamble. If you don't dare to bet your life on a single moment, how can you expect to entertain the masses? Only by refining your skill until you can execute the "perfect strike" can you earn their absolute recognition.
On the floor, Yuuda Imamura finally processed what had happened. Clinging to his bleeding nose, he looked from the ball to Aki, his eyes glazed with shock.
"I'm... I'm out?"
His world had collapsed in the time it took to blink. His football career—the thing he had built his life around—was dead.
Anger flared in his chest. He tightened his fists, preparing to scream, to protest, to demand why—but a voice cut him off.
"Aren't you leaving yet?"
Aki walked toward him, his voice devoid of a single shred of sympathy. "Are you going to interrogate me? Or are you going to ask this facility why they're allowed to kill your dream? Or do you still have some scrap of 'pride' left in you?"
"I—" Imamura's anger sputtered out. When he locked eyes with Aki's crimson gaze, his throat tightened, making him stammer.
Aki didn't stop. "You had a chance to stay. When I kicked that ball, there were five seconds left."
"By the time the 'it' status transferred to you, there were still three seconds on the clock."
Aki's tone turned ice-cold. "Three seconds. For a striker, that is an eternity. You had every opportunity in those three seconds to make a second shot... a second 'tag.' But instead, you stood there like a statue. You gave up."
"Tell me... if we were on a real pitch, and I passed you the ball with three seconds left on the clock... would you just stand there and watch the timer hit zero?"
Imamura went silent.
From start to finish, he had treated this as a game of Tag—not a battle for survival.
Aki's logic was ironclad. In those final seconds, when the ball hit him, his first instinct had been despair, not attack. If he had done that in a match, his teammates would have crucified him.
The others in the room listened to Aki's cold dissection, and a wave of realization hit them. If the ball had been aimed at them, would they have reacted any differently? Every single one of them had been running away from the ball.
They were strikers. If a striker is afraid to touch the ball, what use are they?
The atmosphere in the room grew even more oppressive. Imamura's eyes welled with tears. He didn't say another word. He gave Aki one last, lingering look—perhaps realizing he truly didn't belong in a place like this—and walked out.
The monitor flickered to life again.
Ego's punchable face appeared, his unsettling eyes scanning the remaining players. After a few seconds of silence, he spoke.
"Well said. I heard everything."
His gaze seemed to pierce through the screen, locking onto Aki. It was clear he had been watching the entire time, waiting for Aki to finish his sermon before interrupting.
"Football is an inherently selfish game. Only the one who scores the goal receives the glory."
"This room is the exact size of a standard penalty area," Ego explained. "Almost every decisive goal is made within this space. A player's coordination, their vision, and their hunger for the goal... it all manifests perfectly within this box."
"The time limit was set based on the average data of a high school player. This game wasn't just about 'ego.' It was about judgment."
"The person with the ball is the attacker; everyone else is the defender. The value of that ball is determined entirely by the holder's ability. If you're too afraid to even touch it, you don't deserve the title of 'Striker'."
The members of Team Z looked down, finally seeing the cowardice in their own actions.
Ego's voice paused for emphasis. "And above all that... Yoru Ryoshu. I saw everything. From the way you held the ball to that high-altitude volley in the final seconds."
"You are exactly the kind of extreme egoist I envisioned for this project."
"Selfish. Ruthless. Willing to showcase your most powerful weapon even if the cost is someone else's life. That is the quality I demand."
The bullet comments erupted.
[That's it. I'm going all-in on Aki! Investing all my points here!] [This guy is the MC. Future World's Number One Striker right here!] [Shut up! My little Bachira is the one with the real potential!]
While the "audience" bickered, Aki just watched the screen, amused. It was a good way to kill time.