The Season's Last Game (1)
The momentum of four straight wins burned hot and fierce, yet before that fire could blaze any higher, the end of the season had already drawn near.
With the remaining schedule nearly finished, our Wonju Flyers had only one game left.
“Hup!”
— Thwack!
“Nice ball!”
On the off day before the season’s final game, I carved out time for a bullpen session to check my condition. During the season I normally kept bullpen work to a minimum, but thanks to Diamond Body I had no injury worries, and more than anything, because it was the last game, I wanted to leave the fans with the strongest possible impression.
“Hyaap!”
— Pop!
I threw ten each of my fastball, slider, and cutter. Catching them was O Daesik, who had somehow become my personal bullpen catcher. After the last pitch, Daesik peeled off his mitt and mask and scrunched up his face.
“Whew… hyung, that cutter’s nasty. The movement is just…”
“That bad?”
“It breaks at the very end—tick!—so getting the mitt on it is brutal.”
Daesik waved his hand through the air, tracing the sharp late break of the cutter and making a big show of it.
For all that complaining, he caught every single one clean in the center of the mitt…
Even while he carried on like that, O Daesik never once missed my cutter; every pitch landed dead center. Watching him, I was sure he was just exaggerating a little to pump me up. Still, it felt good.
Daesik might have oversold it a bit, but even to my own eye today’s stuff was more than satisfying.
Last place was already locked in, yet this was still the final game of the season. The desire to put on a real show for the fans lit a fire under me.
Before the season’s last game I double-checked the opposing lineup.
Most of the Suwon Storms’ lineup today were veterans—plenty of experience, but their bat speed and power against fastballs were no longer what they used to be. My velocity was more than enough to overpower them.
That didn’t mean there were no dangerous hitters.
Specifically, the number-two hitter Kim Dohyeon and the number-three Park Taewon.
These two were the Storms’ only young blood, and both were rated top-tier not just on their team but across the entire league. How we handled them would be the first key to today’s game.
Preparation was finished.
Resolve was set.
I grabbed my glove and headed for the mound.
The moment I appeared, the Flyers’ home crowd poured out a roaring welcome. Thanks to the complete turnaround the Flyers had staged at the end of the season, even a last-place team still drew expectant faces in the stands.
On the opposite side, Storms fans cheered for their leadoff hitter as he walked out. Their expressions, though, were nothing like the Flyers’ fans. They sat two places higher in the standings, yet bitterness outweighed confidence on their faces.
A team that had clearly been in playoff contention had collapsed into a brutal slump starting in August and tumbled all the way to eighth; the atmosphere couldn’t help but sink.
The recent form of both clubs created a clear temperature difference even in the stands. One side was boiling over; the other was trying to rekindle a fire that had already gone cold.
Feeling that contrast, I walked slowly to the mound—ready to open the first page of this final game.
The first batter went down easily, as expected.
First pitch: outside fastball, swing and miss.
Second: inside cutter, fouled off.
Third: high inside fastball, ball.
Fourth: low outside slider, bat cutting empty air for an easy strikeout.
Good. Body and stuff both felt perfect.
Then the number-two hitter, Kim Dohyeon, stepped into the box.
The first of the two hitters I had to conquer today.
Kim Dohyeon walked up and slowly rotated the bat. Even that simple motion made the muscle packing his entire frame radiate intimidation.
— Four-seam.
Kim Gyeongmo’s sign called for a low outside pitch.
Given Kim Dohyeon’s massive power, low and away was a sensible choice.
Full Effort / Full Power Pitching
Forces maximum velocity. Stamina consumption doubled.
I activated Full Effort. Stamina drain would double, but against one of the Storms’ only two real threats, it was a price I was more than willing to pay.
I wound up and threw calmly. Kim Dohyeon’s bat came flying out as if it had been waiting.
— Crack!
The ball met the bat, yet it overpowered the wood and drove straight back into the netting.
— “Ah, Han Doyoon looks like he came out with serious intent today. One-fifty-seven kilometers already in the first inning.”
— “That four-seamer is just… ha. Words fail me. Kim Dohyeon almost never loses a pure power battle. That’s a truly outstanding fastball.”
Kim Dohyeon smacked his lips in frustration and glared my way. Sharp, rough eyes. Depending on who was looking, that face alone could crush a pitcher’s spirit.
He was trying to start a war of nerves, no doubt.
Should I just bury one inside and shut him up…?
That threatening posture made me want to answer in kind and drive a pitch deep into his hands. Last week’s me would have rejected the sign a hundred times out of a hundred and thrown inside.
But—
No. Nothing good comes from answering with emotion.
The me of today chose differently.
In the last duel with Moon Sanghyeon I had learned something important. Flushed with the return of my velocity, I had approached hitters with the simple idea that overpowering them was enough.
Just like the hot-blooded high-school kid I used to be.
But I was different now. For the two years I had lost my velocity, I had been forced to find ways to beat hitters without raw power. The velocity was back, yet the approach I had forged then had not vanished.
— Slider.
Kim Gyeongmo immediately put down the slider sign. I steadied my breath and threw.
— Whoosh!
The ball left my hand on almost the exact same path as the first pitch. Naturally Kim Dohyeon’s bat came out the same way.
The will not to lose the power battle this time was packed into every fiber of the swing. But the ball, as if mocking that will, gently dropped and broke—
— Swish!
Kim Dohyeon’s bat sliced nothing but air.
— “Ah, Han Doyoon is really relentless. He just won’t give him a good pitch to hit.”
— “Considering it’s the top of the first, he could easily challenge him, yet he keeps working that outside edge—in and out, over and over.”
There are many ways to hunt herbivores.
The cheetah’s method: explosive speed that snatches the throat in a single burst. The leopard’s: lying in wait for a sudden ambush that ends it at once. Or the wolf’s: hunting in coordinated packs.
But the most merciless method of all belongs to our human ancestors—the endless pursuit that harries the prey until it collapses from pure exhaustion.
That was exactly what I was doing now. Only instead of stamina, the battle was against willpower.
Pitch after pitch just on the edge of the zone, the same outside location repeated, slowly gnawing away at Kim Dohyeon’s mental edge.
And as I kept luring him outside, the effect showed at once.
“Huff… huff… huff…”
Kim Dohyeon’s breathing grew noticeably ragged. He wasn’t tired. He simply couldn’t contain the rising excitement. I knew all too well what that tiny change meant for a hitter.
Over-concentration on making contact, the urge to jump at the next pitch right now—
That was the moment a hitter became most vulnerable.
Now.
The timing to plant the finishing pitch.
— Four-seam.
“Hoo…”
I drew one deep breath and lifted my leg high.
Kim Dohyeon’s eyes locked onto my fingertips. The resolve to hit this one no matter what was written plain across his face.
With Full Effort still active, I gathered every ounce of strength in my body and whipped my arm through.
— Whoosh!
High and inside.
A location no instinct-driven hitter could possibly lay off.
Kim Dohyeon’s shoulder twitched mid-swing. Only then did he realize and try desperately to check the bat—
— Swish!
It was already far too late to stop. The ball had already arrived high above the bat, right in the clearest part of his vision.
— Smack!
“Strike! Out!”
The ball crashed into the catcher’s mitt with a shockwave, the umpire’s right arm shot skyward, and Kim Dohyeon simply froze.
The bat that had cut empty air hung pitifully from his right hand.
From the mound I waggled my index finger in quiet celebration of the win.
First prey of the day—captured alive.