The Hooded Woman
I stepped inside, planted my foot on the pitching rubber, and stood ready. Taeseong-hyung settled into his crouch and held out his mitt.
From the set position I casually swung my arm and threw a four-seamer.
Thwack!
"Huh? Nice ball! But hey! Take it easy. Why are you putting everything into it right from the start!"
"What are you talking about? I threw that lightly."
"…Throw it lightly. Lightly."
What was with him and all this "throw it lightly" stuff?
I gripped the ball again and fired it toward the mitt.
Thwack!
"!!!!!"
This time I felt it too.
A ball I had clearly thrown lightly was carrying far farther than I expected.
"I get that you're pissed, but is this really the time to empty the tank? You trying to rack up ten earned runs for real?"
"Uh… hyung… that pitch just now was good, right?"
"Of course the pitch was good."
"Th-the velocity?"
"Same as usual. Why? You trying to juice the radar gun?"
"S-same as usual?"
"Yeah. What's wrong with you?"
"…Hyung. Let me throw just one more properly. Don't say anything—just catch it. Okay?"
"What are you on about?"
"Just catch the ball. No 'nice pitch' or any of that. Can you do that for me?"
"……I have no idea what you're talking about. Fine, whatever."
Even though my words might have sounded a little cocky, Taeseong-hyung went back to his spot without another word.
I glanced around. The pitching coach and the catching coach were focused on something else; they weren't paying me any attention at all. Same with the other players.
With no one watching, I carefully wound up and put every ounce of strength I had into the pitch.
BOOM!
"Huk!"
"……"
Startled, I looked around and found the pitching coach staring straight at me.
I quickly grabbed my right shoulder with my left hand and dropped into a crouch.
"Ugh… hyung, hold on a second. I think I overdid it."
"I told you to throw it lightly!"
Taeseong-hyung scolded me as he came over.
"Come with me."
He led me out of the indoor facility, glanced around, then grabbed me and asked,
"Shoulder?"
"Doesn't hurt at all."
"…What the hell just happened?"
"What do you mean?"
"That pitch just now. Had to be at least 150 km/h."
"……Really?"
"Yeah. What was that all of a sudden? How? Wait—don't tell me—"
"Huh? Don't tell you what?"
"Never mind. You didn't eat anything weird or…"
"Ah, what do you mean never— damn it. No! In my situation, what would I even take something for?"
"Then what was that pitch?"
Yeah.
I was wondering the same thing.
"Don't tell me… you've been hiding it? You were holding back on purpose?"
"…What?"
"Makes sense. If you get traded out of here and start throwing 150s, you could really stick it to the manager. Wow~ you scary little bastard."
What was this guy even saying?
He was almost forty and suddenly decided he wanted to be a novelist? He was writing fiction right in front of me.
"Hmm… so, how many of those can you throw? You could keep it up for a full inning, right?"
"W-well…?"
How was I supposed to know? I didn't even know how I'd thrown it.
"Hmm… call it a day for now. I'll tell them your shoulder's acting up."
"Huh? Uh… okay. Thanks."
I watched Taeseong-hyung head back inside, then trudged away myself.
I walked forward aimlessly, still trying to figure out what the hell had just happened, when her words floated back into my head.
"If your velocity goes up?"
"Throw tomorrow and we'll talk. Same time, same place tomorrow. Okay?"
The words of the woman who'd forced that strange thing into my mouth kept circling through my mind.
"No way…"
Today's game went exactly the way the pitching coach had predicted—it was decided early.
Our emergency starter didn't even make it out of the first inning, and by the end of the third the score was already 9–1.
When the third inning ended, our manager looked at me and smacked his lips.
He probably wanted to put me in.
But because Taeseong-hyung had passed along the word that my shoulder wasn't right, the manager just turned his head and clicked his tongue, letting go of any further interest.
"A pitcher who can't even manage his own shoulder… tsk."
Of course I still had to listen to the lecture.
After thoroughly tanking the game and just leaving the stadium, someone came running up and grabbed my arm.
"Who— hyung?"
"Yeah. You. Come with me for a bit."
"Where?"
"Just a little while. Thirty minutes. That okay?"
"Uh… sure, I guess…"
The place Taeseong-hyung led me to was an indoor practice facility.
It was a place that taught elementary and middle school kids; he said a senior he knew ran it.
"Just thirty pitches. You good with that?"
"Huh? Ah… that much is fine…"
"Good. Ten easy ones, ten full-effort, ten off-speed. Okay?"
"Okay."
Honestly, thirty was just the number he'd set. I'd been a starter all the way through high school.
Sure, it had been a long time since I'd started a game, so I couldn't go out and throw a hundred right this second, but thirty full-effort pitches? Anytime.
After a light warm-up with Taeseong-hyung I climbed the mound.
I stepped onto the platform built to feel like a real mound and threw ten easy ones.
"Good. Next—ten four-seamers with everything you've got."
"Got it. Here we go."
THWACK!
THWACK!
THWACK!
With every pitch I could feel the power in the ball.
And I could feel how much farther it was carrying compared to my usual fastball.
"Nice! Whoa… shit, that ball is filthy."
"Huh?"
"The ball is dirty as hell."
"Is it?"
For a pitcher, being told your fastball is "dirty" is the highest praise. I grinned, but Taeseong-hyung still had more to say.
"And it doesn't drop as much as I expected?"
"What?"
"This thing… if they swing, it's all fly balls. Feels like the ball is rising."
"…For real?"
"Yeah. Ha… I just don't get it. You've been hiding a pitch like this?"
I told you it wasn't like that.
"No matter how much of a piece of trash our manager is, if he saw you throw this he'd stick you in the rotation tomorrow."
"Forget it. What's the point now?"
I hadn't been holding back—I simply couldn't throw it before.
"You're not going to show the manager this pitch, right?"
"No."
Why would I?
If I walked up now and said, "Hey, I've always been able to throw like this," what would that old man think?
Would he be happy that the team suddenly had a good pitcher? Not a chance.
He'd just invent some story about how I'd made a fool of him and leave it at that—if I was lucky.
"Alright. Got it. Five sliders, five changeups, and we're done."
"Yes sir~ coming right up~"
Slider.
My slider used to come in around the low 130s with a big horizontal break.
It had been a solid strikeout pitch for me…
"Whoa, shit! What the hell is this!"
"How is it?"
"That's definitely over 140. With this velocity and this break… you're national-team material, you bastard!"
"……"
National team… I'd never even thought about those words before.
"If I make it, maybe I can get out of military service…"
I was muttering to myself when Taeseong-hyung called for the changeup.
Thud!
Thud!
Thud!
"Hmm… good. Definitely better. Velocity and movement both improved."
After I finished the thirty pitches, Taeseong-hyung walked over and everything he said was pure praise.
"Hoo… you're really wasted rotting on this team."
"Tch. Not much I can do about it."
"Hmm… let's go. Good work today."
"Yes! Thank you for your hard work~"
I parted ways with Taeseong-hyung and headed home.
Only after leaving the practice facility did I remember the appointment I'd made with that woman yesterday.
"I'm gonna be a little late…"
If I was late and she left, it would be a disaster.
The change in my pitches had clearly come from that unidentifiable something she'd forced into my mouth.
I needed to know what it was, who she was, and why she'd made me take it.
"If I'd never thrown it I wouldn't care, but now that I have… going back to the old stuff would be…"
Too disappointing. Way too disappointing.
I still didn't know what would happen on this team, but I wanted to throw that pitch I'd felt at the practice facility against real hitters.
"Never thought I'd actually start wanting something out of baseball again…"
Looks like even I was still a baseball player after all.
Heart pounding, I stepped into the alley.
"Ah… I'm late."
She was nowhere in sight.
A deep sigh escaped me without thinking—then,
"You're late!"
"Huh?"
Behind me, the woman with the hood pulled up over her head was glaring at me.
"S-sorry. Practice came up all of a sudden."
"I know. That's why I'm letting it slide."
"Huh? You… know?"
"Whatever! You threw, right? How was it?"
"Ah! What the hell was that? How could I suddenly throw like that? What did you actually feed me?"
The moment the pill came up I got excited. Words poured out of me, and the woman frowned and took a step back.
"Stop! That's far enough."
"That pill! Ah… s-sorry."
"So? You feel like giving it a real shot now?"
"Huh? Ah… y-yeah, of course."
"Even the majors?"
"……If they'll take me?"
"Still a long way to go. Tsk."
"That's not what I—"
She didn't seem to like my answer. She shook her head, then suddenly flashed a bright smile and looked at me.
"Want to start throwing properly from now on?"
"Huh? Ah… well…"
"What? Is there a problem?"
"It's not that… it's just…"
"I know you're holding back on purpose because of the manager. I know, but… haah…"
How the hell do you know that?
While I was thinking that, she seemed to wrestle with something for a moment, then spoke again.
"Fine. I'll let it slide for now. But when the time comes that you can throw for real, you throw your best. Deal?"
What was she "letting slide"? She was talking like I'd done something wrong…
"……Yeah, sure."
"Don't worry. An opportunity will come soon."
"Ah, okay… wait, what?"
"And here! Take this."
She held out a wooden box about the size of her palm.
"What is this?"
"Open it."
I opened the wooden box. Inside were four suspicious-looking dark pills.
Four dark, ominous-looking pills nestled in a small wooden box.
Effect:Dramatically boosts physical recovery, sleep quality, and muscle growth
Duration:One week per pill
(Official version — stronger than the sample)
"Each one lasts a week. So… Mondays. Take one every Monday and you'll be fine."
"Ah… so this is what you fed me yesterday."
"Similar. What you took yesterday was a weaker version. Think of it as a sample. These are the full-release ones."
"R-release? You sell these?"
"It's just a figure of speech! A figure of speech! Ugh, so dense! I'm not taking money for them, so stop worrying."
"N-no, I wasn't worried about that. More importantly—this isn't something that would get me in trouble, right?"
"Of course not! You think I'd give you that kind of garbage? What do you take me for?"
What did I take her for? We'd only met twice.
Honestly, all I saw was a cute girl with a rotten personality. Looking purely at her face, she even seemed younger than me.
"Tomorrow's Monday, so take one when you wake up. Got it? Then I'll see you here in a month, same time."
"…Okay."
She spun around, waved once, and disappeared down the alley.
I hurriedly chased after her, but just like yesterday she was gone without a trace.
"What the hell is she?"
It was enough to make you think a ghost was playing tricks.
No presence when she appeared, no presence when she vanished.
"Is she actually a ghost?"
I gave up looking for her, carefully tucked the wooden box against my chest, and headed home.