The Path to Master (3)
Behind the plate, mask on, Pi Anta had been barking orders across the field all game. Unlike most catchers, whose bats tended to go quiet, she brought serious firepower to the box as well.
"Let's go!"
CRACK!!
With a bright, ringing shout she uncorked a gorgeous swing. The ball shot through the infield like a bullet, rolled all the way to the wall, and every baserunner already on base strolled home at their leisure.
Settling in at second, Pi Anta turned toward the dugout, fist clenched and raised high.
"Told you I'd carry!!"
She didn't get a hit every time she stepped in.
But with runners in scoring position—whenever the team needed a run—she somehow always found a way to lace one, and the dugout's energy surged with her.
Final score: 6–0. A complete thrashing.
MVP was Pi Anta, no contest.
At the plate: 2-for-4 with a home run, four RBI and two runs scored for good measure.
Behind the plate: unpredictable pitch sequencing, pickoffs that caught everyone flat-footed, and defensive shifts that read the other team's plays a full step ahead.
A total takeover on both sides of the ball. Pi Anta's one-man show—no, one-woman show.
"Whew."
After the game she logged out, stood up, and stretched with a long, satisfying roll of her shoulders.
"Body doesn't feel as wrecked as I expected."
A full-dive VR game run through a Connector mapped a player's real physical ability straight into their in-game stats—but running a game didn't shred ligaments or grind down shoulder joints. You couldn't actually get hurt that way.
Which also meant there was no need to manage workload the way a real pro had to across a full season just to stay healthy.
Of course, once you signed as an actual professional, a real schedule would kick in and conditioning would matter. But for now—
Conditioning for a game? Please. Free time means you play until you drop.
Baseball, right now, was literally a game she played from home.
No matter how many innings she ran, there was no muscle soreness, no wear on joints or ligaments. And with a goal in front of her, she needed to push a little harder anyway.
"First game felt good."
Still—what moved in the virtual world was only her linked consciousness. Her real body stayed sitting or lying somewhere the whole time. Skip the physical work long enough and the muscle would atrophy, the balance would go, and she'd be in no shape to play as a pro.
"Better go for a run."
Sensing that, she didn't dive straight back in. She decided to get a run in first. For a baseball player, running was never wrong.
It had been over a month since she'd become a woman, and Pi Anta still felt a little mortified every time she went jogging.
These things are way too tight, aren't they?
It was the only athletic wear she owned, and back in her old world she'd seen women dress like this all the time, so intellectually she knew it was fine. Still—leggings and a jersey somehow still felt like being half-naked.
And under the jersey she was wearing nothing but sports base-layer that was basically a strappy tank, so she couldn't just peel the jersey off when she got hot, either.
Most people didn't care about the stares and stripped it off anyway. Pi Anta still needed a little more time on that front.
"Hah… hah…"
"……"
The men who glanced at her as she ran past. The women who eyed her legs in the leggings and muttered with something like envy. All of it was something she'd have to get used to.
"Whew."
She'd already half-admitted it to herself.
Pi Anta—no, I—
was pretty good-looking.
The healthy, athletic appeal rolling off that slender frame was hard to ignore, too. Honestly, it was stranger that a face and body like this had never made the rounds as a topic of conversation.
Which just means she was an absolute disaster at baseball.
And just like that, the thought looped right back to baseball again.
To clear her head of the noise, Pi Anta started running once more.
As she ran she replayed the last game, picking at the rough spots. Cold, honest self-feedback—finding what to fix and grinding it out—had been her habit since the day she first picked up a bat.
Catcher really does give you a lot to think about.
Trying to organize it while running only made the scenes pile up without end.
People weren't stupid. They knew that if two players put up the same offensive numbers, catching was the position that stacked the most WAR. And yet, in real baseball and in BoL alike, catcher was the position everyone avoided.
For good reason. Every single pitch meant standing up and squatting back down. How many pitches had this hitter seen last time up? If you'd beaten him, what was the putaway pitch—and if you'd lost him, what pitch and location had he squared up? Was the runner on base fast? What play were they trying to run? Had the pitcher tipped anything?
There was too much to track, and if you let any of it slide, a hitter who came up hunting a pitch would eat you alive.
Then there was the stress of chasing down wild pitches—or worse, taking them off the body so they didn't get past you. Not many people signed up for a game just to get beaten up for fun.
And the whole "if the bat is the same" premise was basically meaningless anyway. Carrying all that stress into the box and still hitting well was a miracle.
That was why catchers were always scarce compared to shortstops, second basemen, and center fielders—queue up for a match and you filled almost instantly.
"Still fun, though."
For this baseball addict, every single one of those exceptions applied.
Replaying every duel, prepping for the next game—each step of it was part of the game to her.
A genius who enjoyed the work.
With every hard stride, Pi Anta was peeling off another layer and evolving again.
After a solid run, she logged into her second game of the day.
A game ran about three hours, so after personal training and sleep, she could realistically squeeze in roughly three games a day.
"Alright. Let's see if this one's more interesting."
The starter this time was a right-handed submarine pitcher. To lower-tier hitters, a submariner's ball really did look like it was skimming the dirt, which made it a nightmare to square up—and the low arm slot made the movement wild on top of that.
This pitcher had been rolling, retiring every batter he faced right up until he got to the eight-hole: Pi Anta.
What kind of username is Pi Anta…?
Odd name, but the pitcher remembered seeing it recently in an article while scrolling his phone.
The hitter Goraniz is watching for a possible signing?
Even if Goraniz was stuck in an endless dark age, they were still a pro franchise. How good did you have to be for them to make that much noise?
He wanted to find out.
So he threw the first pitch—a fastball aimed down the middle for a free strike…
Tok!
"Huh?"
A soft little knock, like someone tapping on a door, and the ball started rolling.
Only when he saw Pi Anta already flying down the line did the situation click.
"First-pitch bunt…?"
A perfect line between the third baseman and the pitcher. Charge it and you risk colliding with the pitcher; reach for it as the pitcher and you risk interfering with the third baseman. Dead in the middle.
"Ah—!"
In the half-second both of them hesitated, Pi Anta was already gliding through first and casually peeling off her elbow and shin guards.
Just a little trickster, huh.
The pitcher clicked his tongue and worked the ball inside his glove.
An unexpected infield hit could rattle a whole defense—but cleaning up that kind of mess was also part of being a good pitcher.
Fine. Just retire the rest of them.
He'd originally been a classic overhand guy. Not long ago he'd switched to a submarine delivery and started winning everything in sight—after stumbling across a OneTube video titled Know This One Thing and YOU Can Be a Pro Pitcher! Everyone Else Was Farming Easy Wins Without Me?! and flipping his arm slot on the spot.
Since the day before yesterday he'd already stacked five straight wins. Forty innings across the streak, six runs allowed total. ERA sitting at a ridiculous 1.35.
Small sample, sure—but anyone who understood what a sub-2.00 ERA meant in modern baseball could forgive him for getting a little full of himself.
And then this. A bunt single.
Plus she was out there stomping the dirt like she was advertising she was going to run.
There was a limit to how little respect you could show.
Still, he decided not to flinch.
Lower-tier pitchers shouldn't overthink the runner. Focus on the hitter. That's what they said.
Solid advice. Give a runner too much free rein and you paid for it—but obsess over the runner and you either hung a meatball for extra bases or airmailed a pickoff into the outfield. Even full-time pros botched that stuff. Amateurs didn't stand a chance.
So the pitcher decided to ignore runner Pi Anta entirely.
One out. Runner on first. Facing the eight-hole.
First pitch: a curve peeling away from the right-handed batter.
"Strike!"
While he stole a strike with the soft breaker, Pi Anta broke for second. She'd completely stolen the jump—the catcher never had a chance.
Second pitch: another curve, same as before.
The batter swung through it—and by then Pi Anta was already flying into third.
Nobody had expected her to go that far. The catcher yanked the ball out to gun third, panicked, and bobbled it clean out of his hand.
"Kh…!"
"It's fine. Just focus on the hitter."
The pitcher even had the composure to reassure his catcher, who was looking at him with apologetic eyes.
A steal only got you to third, anyway.
If the batter couldn't drive her in, how was she scoring?
Relaxed, he chose a fastball for pitch three.
To make matters worse, the hitter looked locked onto the slow curve and never caught up—whiffed for strike three and walked back to the dugout.
"Nice!!"
Two outs.
Runner on third.
Even the sacrifice fly was off the table now. Absolute pitcher-friendly situation.
See? You really do have to watch the lecture videos.
Feeling good about himself, he started working a curve grip inside the glove for the next first pitch—
"Hey! Here—here!!"
"Wha…?"
His catcher was on his feet, waving frantically. The pitcher snapped his head up—
and Pi Anta was running.
From third.
Home.