The President's Cup Bracket Is Out
Choi Seungtaek threw himself into batting practice with the same unflagging intensity as always. Blisters had risen on his palms, and he paid them no mind. Hitting was a matter of lower-body power, and by pairing his swings with strength work, he was gradually locking a finished stance into place.
Crack.
"Hoo..."
Crack.
"That's it!"
Crack.
"Nice form, Choi Seungtaek!"
"I can't even swing. You're making me laugh."
"Hey! Don't break the rhythm in the middle of batting practice! Again!"
Crack.
"Good. Nice."
Synchronization Rate: 80%
Proficiency +0.5% acquired.
Cumulative: 30%
Thanks to the steady work, Choi Seungtaek had fully adapted to his returned body.
Crack.
Synchronization Rate: 20%
Damn it!
I was barreling them for a second, then one hitch and it tanks right back down.
At first the Synchronization Rate had barely cracked single digits, but now that he'd gotten reasonably used to the swing, he was posting numbers that were actually respectable.
A clatter of footsteps cut through the indoor facility.
"Our President's Cup bracket is out!"
Han Bang-man, the captain, burst into the indoor training hall and bellowed it loud enough for everyone working out inside to hear.
"Should we go check it out too?"
"Let's."
Choi Seungtaek packed up with Kim Minjae, who'd been helping him with his Special Batting Practice, and they headed over to look at the bracket. By the time they'd cleaned up and arrived, word had already spread—players crowded around the sheet.
"Seungtaek and Minjae, you made it?"
"Bang-man, how's our draw this time?"
"Our bracket's actually pretty good. If nothing goes sideways, we should roll into the semis without much trouble."
"Yeah?"
Choi Seungtaek checked the bracket himself.
"Yeah. Nothing much even through the semis."
The draw luck was genuinely excellent. Suseok High had landed in Group A, and the strongest team in the field, Buma High, was over in Group B. The only club in Group A with anything close to Suseok High's firepower was Gwangju Hana High. Most of the other powerhouses had been dumped into Group B.
Good. This works out. Makes everything a lot easier.
With the bracket posted, Choi Seungtaek now had to lay the board to win the President's Cup.
"Hmm... I'm gonna head out first."
"Already? Practice isn't over."
"I'll come back."
He left the crowd at the bracket and headed for the dorm. The notebooks where he'd finished his scouting work were waiting there.
I need this to convince the coach.
From there he went straight to the head coach's office.
Knock knock.
"Hmm? What is it?"
"Coach, it's Choi Seungtaek."
"Come in."
It was called the head coach's office, but Coach Kim Ik-hyun and the assistants shared the room, and the other coaches were outside running practice. A reasonably sized sofa sat off to one side for receiving visitors from outside. The coach looked at him as if to ask what this was about.
"Coach, I have a few requests."
Choi Seungtaek almost never asked for anything, and the sudden demand left Kim Ik-hyun a little taken aback.
"What's this about?"
"From now on, during practice hours, I want to do batting practice only."
"Just batting practice?"
"Yes. After the game against Buma High last time, I decided I needed to change my form. I need time to adapt to the new swing."
"Well, your defense is solid, so that's fine—but will you still be able to stay in sync with the other guys?"
"Yes. I'm confident."
"Hmm..."
Kim Ik-hyun looked like he couldn't quite figure out what Choi Seungtaek was thinking.
"I've never had a case like yours. I'm not sure how to handle it."
But Choi Seungtaek knew Kim Ik-hyun's style well enough. When the man hesitated like this, it was essentially permission.
Good. Now comes the real problem...
"There's actually one more thing I'd like to ask."
"What now?"
"I'd like you to let me choose the pitcher who throws in the finals."
"What? Do you think that even makes sense?"
Kim Ik-hyun startled. This was a player inserting himself into a decision that belonged to the manager. But the string of unexpected moves coming out of Choi Seungtaek left him no choice but to think it over.
"You really want everything your way, don't you. So who do you want to play with? Taepoong's the best pitcher we've got anyway, isn't he?"
"I won't know until I confirm it. Knowing the numbers and actually having that ability are two different things—you have to play together to find out. I think San has what it takes, too."
This kid... after all the games he's already caught with Taepoong and San...
Kim Ik-hyun knew about Lee San. They'd already played plenty of games together—he couldn't understand why Seungtaek was making an issue of it now. The only guess he could make was friction with Taepoong, and private grudges like that had no business bleeding onto the field.
"What if Taepoong says he wants to pitch the finals?"
"If he's qualified, I'll play with him."
"And if he's below your standard?"
"I'll talk him around. I'm confident I can."
"That so? All right. I'll think about it. Go on, get out."
He's actually considering it. That's a huge win by itself. Normally he would've backed Taepoong no matter what.
The board was set. He had to put players to the test in the early rounds of the President's Cup and send the ones who could carry them to a title into the finals.
"Yes. Understood."
"Why are you still standing there?"
Choi Seungtaek went outside.
Good. This is where it starts. From tomorrow I'll gather intel on the opposing players and show overwhelming skill—build enough clout that it actually matters.
The round of thirty-two started on August 11, so he still had about five days of room.
Back in class, Choi Seungtaek felt as if he'd been doing well—and still, something about it lacked hunger. So he wrote down the goal The System had given him.
Be Selected in the Early Rounds
On the surface it looked like a call to be recognized—something beyond merely signing with a pro club. But the gap between a late-round draftee and an early-round one was enormous, and that gap had a name.
Money.
The more he sat with it, the more he understood how much being picked in the early rounds actually mattered. Choi Seungtaek's family was poor. In a cramped little room in a forgotten corner of Seoul, his mother had raised him alone. If he wanted out of that life, he had to be named in the early rounds. In other words, the goal The System had handed him was also a concrete target that would change his future.
Right. Getting picked in a late round is still a huge success—but the money itself isn't that high.
The Busan Seagulls had made him a professional. But a signing bonus of twenty million won and a salary of twenty million more—forty million all told—had never been enough to live comfortably with his mother. An early-round selection meant a hundred million won at the very least.
With a regional club, I could get us an apartment. Even if I landed with a capital-area team, we could live in a proper townhouse on a jeonse lease instead of a hole-in-the-wall room. Mom would have a much better place to live.
He thought back to Busan. Unfortunately he'd only ever made between twenty and forty million, so he had never found a decent house there either—but the feeling of living with his mother, versus without her, had been an entirely different thing.
Once the goal came into focus and the reason he had to reach it took hold, the notebook under his hand filled up, line after dense line.
No matter how I run the best-case scenario, the answer comes out the same.
He needed impact. Putting up impressive numbers in the remaining President's Cup games was the baseline. Park Wangyu, the Cranes' second-team manager, had given him a shout-out, but that was still one man's opinion. To convince the majority, Choi Seungtaek had to show them his skill. Everything he'd done so far was barely enough to scrape into the pros. He had to wreck the President's Cup and drive his name value through the roof.
The best scenario of all, in the end, was taking down Buma High. And if he could beat their prize prospect—Go Tae-san—that would be perfect.
Choi Seungtaek quietly closed the notebook. Now it was time to prove it in real games.
Having steeled himself like that, he felt a gaze and lifted his head. Park Gayeong was looking at him, a little embarrassed.
"Hmm? What?"
"Ah... it's nothing."
Park Gayeong flushed slightly and turned back around.
The bus rumbled toward the President's Cup, and a certain evil spirit occupied the seat beside Choi Seungtaek.
"Lucky bastard."
"What?"
"Lucky bastard."
"Hey... I didn't even do anything."
"Lucky bastard."
"Aigoo, cut it out."
Choi Seungtaek was getting a little tired of the evil spirit's looping refrain.
"What's going on with you two?"
Han Bang-man twisted around in his seat to mediate.
"Well, this bastard Choi Seungtaek—ngh."
Choi Seungtaek clamped a hand over the evil spirit's mouth and got him by the throat.
"That's far enough. You gonna shut it? People are going to get the wrong idea."
"It's loud back there. You planning to keep up the pointless chatter?"
"Sorry."
Thanks to the coach's bark from the front of the bus, Choi Seungtaek was spared.
"Hoo..."
Before they knew it, the bus pulled up at Mokdong Baseball Stadium.
"Everyone off, unpack, and get ready!"
"Yes, Coach!"
Getting off the bus felt different this time, and Choi Seungtaek found himself with room to breathe. The memory of last time's frantic scramble had been washed away, and as a merciful senior he carried one bag into the stadium himself.
"We've got that, sunbae."
"No. I'll take this one. Grab the rest."
"Yes, sir."
Unlike last time, they had about thirty minutes to loosen up, and the opponent wasn't a tough club. Suwon Information and Communications High—a team with a long name and a not-so-long history. So this one ought to be manageable.
"All right, I'll call the lineup."
"Batting first, Seo Gi-hyun. Second, Kim Minjae. Third, Kang Taepoong. Fourth, Han Bang-man. Fifth, Choi Seungtaek..."
Huh?
Choi Seungtaek froze. The coach called him over.
"This isn't a strong team, so I packed the lineup to give you third-years a run. So you'd better perform."
"Yes, sir!"
"And especially you, Choi Seungtaek—you'd better show us what all that batting practice has been for, right?"
"Yes, sir!"
Choi Seungtaek started warming up.
Crack.
Synchronization Rate: 50%
Crack.
Synchronization Rate: 60%
He loosened up by taking consecutive cuts of Special Batting Practice. Then he picked up his catcher's mask, ready to go in.
Inside the stadium, he could feel eyes on him for reasons he couldn't quite name. A strange sense of being watched. It had been like this ever since Park Wangyu, the Cranes' second-team manager, had mentioned his name.
"Huh..."
Was this a good thing?
Choi Seungtaek quietly savored every bit of the heat.