On the green rectangle, sitting on the bench, I watched the scoreboard.

My team was down—three to zero.

I wanted to breathe the grass. To run. To feel the pitch under my feet.

The coach knew—he knew I could turn this around.

I kept my eyes fixed on him, waiting for any signal, any gesture that might mean now.

My body burned with anticipation. My legs twitched. My chest rose with fast, silent breaths.

Our players were under pressure. I could see it in the way they moved—slow, shaky, uncertain.

So I waited.

And waited.

And waited…

Then it came.

His voice finally broke the wall of silence in my head:

"Rin! Get ready—you’re going in!"

Suddenly, something shifted inside me.

Time slowed. My heart pounded like a drum of war.

Yes. I’ll get ready.

Finally—this is it.

Let’s go. Let’s go…

(The commentator's voice roared across the stadium:)

"Look who’s coming in! It’s Rin! The Lion-Hearted Finisher!

Will he make a difference under the eyes of thousands watching?"

(From the crowd, a surprised fan shouted:)

"What’s that coach thinking, bringing Rin in this late?"

(Someone beside him replied, calm and sure:)

"Just watch. You’ll see why he did it."

I stood up, chest full of fire.

At last… the moment I longed for has come.

I’m going in.

I stepped onto the field, bursting with energy.

The cold air kissed my cheeks, the roar of the crowd faded behind the pulse in my ears.

My boots touched the pitch—and for a moment, it felt like the entire stadium tilted forward, waiting to see what I would do.

I inhaled.

Grass, sweat, tension.

I was home.

(The commentator’s voice thundered through the speakers, as if sensing the shift in momentum:)

“And now, the match continues—with Rin, perfectly positioned to strike! The predator has entered the field!”

A sharp pass comes from Yan.

The ball glides across the turf like a whisper of fate.

FC is launching a desperate attack, clinging to hope like a thread.

Every movement feels heavier now—charged with purpose.

Sparrow receives the ball.

He tries to turn, but defenders swarm around him like wolves.

They're pressing. Fast. Aggressive.

But just before they collapse on him, he spots me—and with a swift, low pass, sends the ball in my direction.

My heartbeat skips.

Here it comes.

I feel the shift in gravity, like the world pulling the moment toward me.

"Come then… defenders… Let’s daaaance."

(The commentator nearly explodes as he narrates the play unfolding:)

“Rin is sprinting down the right flank—his speed is unreal!”

“He dribbles past the first—easily! As if the defender wasn't even there!”

I feel the turf slide beneath my boots as I cut to the left.

"He dances around the second!"

A spin. A shoulder feint. The second defender bites—he’s gone.

The third charges in with a reckless lunge.

I glide past him like wind through tall grass.

“He breeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaks through the third!”

Now it’s just me…

and the goal.

A breath. A blink.

The goalkeeper locks eyes with me—but I’ve already made the decision.

My leg swings.

I shoot—for the prey.

The ball blazes forward like a comet unleashed.

GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAL!

The first goal! The first goal for team FC!

Only a few minutes remain.

(The commentator’s voice rises, cracking with urgency):

“Just minutes left—can they hold? Can they push on? To glory, FC, to glory!”

I whirl toward my teammates, lungs aflame.

“Come on—let’s score the other goals! Come on!”

A roar answers me.

“C’mooooooooooon!”—a single, thunder-deep cry that rolls down the line of blue shirts and rattles the hearts of everyone still daring to hope.

(The commentator, breathless now):

“FC press forward—look, look, dear fans, at Rin. He’s waiting, coiled, ready to strike!”

We surge down the right flank.

Boots drum the turf in relentless cadence; sweat flings from hair and brows; every heartbeat seems to echo in the floodlights.

“Now!” I bark—only a word, but it cuts the air like steel.

“Now!"

“Ya FC!” another voice bellows, somewhere behind, a vow and a promise fused in a single shout.

The ball reaches Leo by the sideline.

He lifts his head, spots the sliver of sky between defenders—

He tries a cross.

The arc is too high, too wild. The stadium gasps.

“Impossible!” the commentator howls, half-in disbelief, half-in awe.

I’m already moving.

Muscles spring. The world tilts backward.

Suddenly I’m weightless, launching past the thrashing hands of gravity itself.

For one breath I feel nothing beneath me—only wind and a thin veil of cloud-gray night.

I see the clouds, or swear I do, brushing my shoulders as I rise.

“Riiiiiiiiin!” The name rings like a drawn sword.

I twist.

Time slows.

My body folds, then snaps open—

an overhead kick, a scissor in the sky.

(The commentator breaks, half-scream, half-song):

“An exquisite… beautiful… OOOO-VER-HEAD!”

The ball detonates off my boot, spinning end over end, slicing through the floodlit dark.

It clips a fingertip, kisses the inside of the post—

—and vanishes into the net.

The crowd collapses into delirium; the ground itself seems to quake beneath us.

THE SECOND GOOOOOOOOOAL!

THE SECOND GOAL FOR FC!

I let it out.

A roar—not a scream, not a cheer—

but the guttural, thunderous cry of a lion claiming the hunt.

“AaaAAARRRRRGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”

It shook my lungs.

It shook the grass.

It shook the stadium.

I could hear it now—

the crowd answering me.

Their voices rose like a crashing wave, swelling, building,

lifting the roof from this place.

The field trembled beneath my boots.

Even the opposing players—

they paused, wide-eyed.

The sound.

It was everywhere.

It rose—and rose—

until it felt like the sky itself might split.

(The commentator cried out over the deafening surge of noise:)

“Team Z is rattled!

Frightened by this storm!

Look at them—they’re shaking from the roar!”

The referee’s whistle pierced the chaos.

The match resumed.

Scoreboard: 3–2.

But in that moment, the numbers didn’t matter.

There was only the fire inside me.

Then—

Oh no.

The commentator gasped.

“Riiiiiiiiiin!”

The ball moved.

No—

it cut through the pitch.

Slicing the field in half like a blade through shadow.

From midfield.

My foot connected clean, my eyes locked on the flight.

The net trembled.

THE THIRD GOOOOOOOOOOAL!

Rin strikes… from the center line.

It’s in. It’s IN!

Team FC… has come back from the dead.

I roared—

“I have come for youuuuuuuu! AaaAAARRRGGHHH!”

The crowd ignited, a living firestorm.

Stands shook. Seats rattled. Every throat belted my name until the stadium trembled.

The commentator’s voice cracked, overwhelmed:

He all but collapsed under the weight of the noise.

On the touch-line the coach screamed with raw exhilaration, fists pumping the air.

Then—darkness.

The floodlights died in a gasp of static.

A black curtain dropped over forty thousand hearts.

(The commentator, voice echoing through sudden night):

“What—what is happening?!”

A collective gasp rippled across the arena.

Every eye searched the void, confused, anxious.

Someone—anyone—find out what’s gone wrong!

And just as abruptly as they’d vanished, the lights surged back to life.

(The commentator again, breathless):

“Wh-… What is that? It’s—Rin!”

I lay sprawled on the pitch, a lone figure beneath the harsh white glare, pain surging like molten iron through every nerve.

My chest heaved. My hands clawed at the grass. I could barely draw breath.

The medical team sprinted onto the field—white kits flashing—

I screamed, the sound torn from me by agony so sharp it bent the world out of shape.

I clung to consciousness by a fraying thread.

They rushed me off in the final seconds; pain hammered, unrelenting, indescribable.

An ambulance.

Sirens.

White ceilings flashing past.

At the hospital I lay in a haze of disinfectant and fluorescent light, a prisoner in a body no longer mine.

Somewhere far away, the final whistle blew.

We lost the match—

lost the Cup I’d dreamed of my entire life.

Tears slipped free, raw and scalding.

My voice cracked into the sterile room.

The doctor entered, chart in hand, eyes grave.

He exhaled—one slow, sorrow-laden breath—then said the words that shattered the universe:

“You will not be able to play football again.”

I screamed—

“H-o-w?!”

The word tore itself from my throat, raw and ragged.

I tried to rise, to fight the weight of shock, but my legs folded uselessly beneath me.

Panic hammered at every gate of sense; the room spun, ceiling lights blurring into streaks.

The doctor hurried closer, hands outstretched to steady me.

I seized the front of his coat, knuckles white, and roared again:

“How—HOW?!”

My voice echoed off sterile walls, off cold metal, off the trembling air itself.

Everything is over— the thought crashed through me like iron.

I would not—could not—forget the one who did this.

The doctor spoke gently, yet firmly, almost pleading:

“Calm down. All this shouting won’t help you.”

But calm was a language I no longer understood.

“My career is finished. Is my story finished here? Truly ended—as though I’m some fool?”

Nights passed—endless, suffocating.

I sat alone, sunk into a darkness that felt deeper than any injury, each hour scraping at hope.

Then, one day—

relentless knocking broke the silence.

At last, I allowed the door to open.

A stranger stepped in, coat flecked with rain from a world I’d stopped noticing.

He had insisted for days, the nurses said, until finally I yielded.

“Hello, Mister Rin.”

I glared.

“Is this the condition for conversation?” My voice was ice over shattered glass.

“I’ve come to save you,” he said.

“Are you an idiot?” I spat.

He grinned—wild, reckless.

“Perhaps I’m insane… because I’m going to return you to your former glory.”

“…Huh?”

“You’re crazy,” I muttered, turning away. “I don’t want to talk about anything right now.”

He leaned closer, eyes glittering.

“Even if I could make you play football again?”

My heart thudded—but I kept my face stone-hard.

He slipped a small card onto the bedside table.

“If you ever think it over,” he said, voice lowering to a dare, “go to the address written there.”

He tapped the card once, lightly.

“Otherwise,” he added with a crooked laugh, “you’ll end up… like a fool. Ha-ha.”

I turned the idea over and over inside my skull, but willpower alone couldn’t mend torn ligaments or shattered dreams.

There was nothing left except the address on that card.

So I went—hobbling on a crutch that squeaked with every step.

“Ugh… stupid crutch,” I muttered—once crowds saw me as the ball’s master; now I leaned on a stick like a cracked statue.

At the appointed hour I reached the place.

A nondescript door.

I pushed inside—

and the world collapsed into pitch-black silence.

Black.

Blacker than the inside of closed eyes.

No echo, no air, only a vast, weightless void.

Then—light seared across my vision.

I blinked—once—twice—

and froze.

I was standing. No crutch.

Both feet planted firm, as though bone and tendon had never failed me.

But something felt… wrong.

My body hummed, almost vibrating—like a suit two sizes too tight, stitched from unfamiliar muscle.

I looked around.

Figures surrounded me—dozens, maybe more—athletic silhouettes in training kits, eyes flicking left and right.

Players?

Someone’s voice broke the hush:

“Isn’t that Rin—the guy who got injured recently? In the dark?”

A wall of monitors blazed to life, hanging in mid-air like windows cut from light.

On every screen, the same familiar grin appeared:

The stranger who had visited my hospital room.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” he declared, arms spread, voice amplified through hidden speakers, “welcome to one of the greatest digital inventions of the century!”

His smile sharpened.

“The invention that will destroy traditional football.”

A murmur rippled across the crowd.

Someone snapped, “What kind of joke is this? Where have you brought us?”

He lifted a hand, palm outward, as if conducting an orchestra of disbelief.

“Welcome,” he said, savoring the pause, “to The Final Pitch.”

“Ha? Final Pitch?” I echoed, frowning.

“What are you talking about, you fool?” another voice spat.

The man only laughed—light, manic.

“This is a place,” he said, eyes glittering, “where you’ll face insane challenges, riddles, matches rewritten in code—a future that will erase natural football.”

He swept a hand toward the glowing screens.

“Out there, the world is already watching. They’ll cheer for you from behind the glass.”

Shock silenced every throat.

“You are here,” he went on, “to rebuild your careers in ways wilder and more brilliant than ever before. And this invention—ha-ha-ha—will reign supreme.”

The stranger’s grin widened, teeth glinting in the glow of the screens.

“You will all now submit to a test,” he announced, voice echoing like a drum across the hall.

“On the backs of your suits, every one of you will see the number 00. That number will rise or fall according to the trial.”

He lifted a slim remote—clicked once. A ripple of light coursed over our training kits.

I felt a faint vibration at my spine, and when I glanced over my shoulder, the digits 00 shimmered there, pale and waiting.

“The rules are simple,” he continued, pacing the high platform.

“If your number climbs only to the 50–60 range, you’re out—removed from this place entirely.

If it lands between 60 and 70, you might stay, but further tests await, harsh and uncompromising.

70 to 80? You’re qualified, but not guaranteed a starting spot.

Anything 80 and above—you’re a starter.

And above 90… you’re legendary.”

Murmurs swept the room like wind through dry grass.

Legendary. The word pulsed behind my eyes.

“Keep that in mind,” he finished, lifting his gaze to meet each of ours.

“The Final Pitch is your next destination. Only those worthy will earn the right to stand on it.”

The hall fell silent, every heartbeat syncing to the electric hush—as if the very air waited to see which of us would rise, and which would fade.

I kindly ask for your support and reviews so I can publish more chapters of the novel.