JSWGAS Chapter 90

90.

Bullets and shells are different.

Well, it’s like a bulletproof vest can stop bullets but not shells.

Monday, the night of the getsuyoubi (Monday), is usually a rest day for Aoba Johsai. Kokonoe Taka, holding a soda, sat in front of the computer, his arm faintly aching, as if reminding him of the fatigue from the two consecutive matches the day before.

A 2-0 win against Date Tech and a 1-2 loss against Shiratorizawa – the results of the practice matches. The intensity of both matches exceeded everyone’s expectations, especially the match against Shiratorizawa, which was purely a battle of willpower until the very end.

“In the IH qualifiers, the schedule will basically be similar to our two practice matches today,” Coach Irihata said calmly at the post-match debriefing. “Stamina is one issue. Although we have a seeded position this year, we can’t rule out encountering a dark horse along the way. Considering such a situation, how to allocate energy reasonably is important.”

First, the upperclassmen: “Saijō, your stamina is still a weakness. Especially in the morning, you expend too much energy, and in the afternoon, after playing the first set, you become powerless. Arawata, you’re better than Saijō, but later when serving, you always aimed at Shiratorizawa’s Sonomura – not that it’s wrong, but a power serve is originally a way to score points or disrupt the receive; Furuie, I was originally thinking that you’ve been a bit impetuous lately, but your receives from Ushijima were good.”

Saijō sighed and admitted, “I will strengthen my physical training, but the concentration issue can’t be completely solved. After all, I’m not the type of player who can sustain endurance; I can only try to allocate energy to more important areas.”

Arawata immediately reflected: “Well, sorry, Oikawa reminded me, but I couldn’t resist… I should have aimed the last few serves at the opposing libero; his receives were already starting to fail then.”

Furuie was silent for a moment. “I have problems too,” he glanced at Kokonoe Taka and smiled helplessly. “I didn’t do well enough in ground defense. Kokonoe got a touch on several spikes, but I still couldn’t save them… Ushijima’s spikes are really hard to receive; we haven’t had much contact with left-handed hitters, so we can only get used to it through actual combat.”

Coach Irihata nodded. “It’s good that you’re aware of your own issues.” He turned to the first-year students. “Iwaizumi did well in receiving this afternoon, his spikes were stable, and his quick attacks and feints were somewhat effective, but he could pay more attention to the course of cross-court shots.”

Iwaizumi Hajime was a little depressed. “But I still can’t break through the block.” He glanced at Oikawa and muttered softly, “Even though the sets are so comfortable.”

Oikawa Tōru, separated by Kokonoe Taka in the middle, quietly peeked his head over, his tone strange. “Is Koiwa feeling down? That’s rare.”

Iwaizumi didn’t hear him. Kokonoe Taka quickly pushed his head back. “…If you keep gloating, I won’t stop A-Ichi from punching you later.”

Coach Irihata thought for a moment and suggested: “I noticed your posture when you jump to spike. Your shoulders and chest cavity can be stretched out more, and the power-generating technique needs to be adjusted slightly…”

Then he looked at Oikawa Tōru, who was pouting and standing straight.

“As for Oikawa, he didn’t make any major mistakes, the distribution of attacking points was very reasonable, and he did well with Kokonoe’s switch-up sets, which proves that this attacking method can be effective in actual combat.”

“After all, the opponents in the actual combat were Date Tech and Shiratorizawa, and they also found it difficult to deal with.”

Coach Irihata nodded, affirming this statement. “The diversity of scoring methods can help us quickly establish an advantage – but there are also problems. You became a little impatient later, and they seized the opportunity; you also had more service errors later. Were you affected?” “Yes,” Oikawa Tōru breathed out softly. “Although I’m very reluctant to admit it, there is indeed a considerable gap between our current level and Shiratorizawa’s.”

…How to minimize this gap as much as possible in the time to come is the focus for the following period.

He was slightly distracted, and Coach Irihata’s voice continued in his ears.

“Finally, Kokonoe.”

Kokonoe Taka’s performance can be described as remarkable.

His extremely fast reaction speed allowed him to keep up with most of Ushijima Wakatoshi’s jumps. He had a good grasp of the entire court when the setter needed to cover, and his serves also created a certain deterrent. In the second half of the match, he and Oikawa almost collapsed the opposing libero’s mentality – one of them used a charging method to increase the power of his serves, while the other’s movements were smooth and flowing, and the rhythm was even faster than it appeared. The interaction of these two different serving methods could easily confuse the receiver.

…But the most important thing was his terrifying stamina and the unchanging mentality, I suppose.

The longer the match lasted, the more the players’ conditions declined to varying degrees. But at the end of the match, only Ushijima Wakatoshi and Kokonoe Taka maintained the good condition they had at the beginning – and even Ushijima was faintly showing some fatigue on the last ball. But Kokonoe Taka was still able to maintain relatively stable breathing, following him to jump.

However, his mistakes were not few either.

This was also his second frightening aspect: he was able to face each of his mistakes with a calm mindset and attempt to correct them the next time, and the results proved to be effective.

This faintly visible progress was, frankly, a little chilling. The opponents on the other side of the net probably felt it most clearly: the originally full-of-holes block gradually managed to get a touch, and the originally loosely defended areas were gradually filled completely.

After the match, Ushijima Wakatoshi and Kokonoe Taka stared at each other across the net. He had a playful showdown with the other party before, when Kokonoe Taka was a complete novice, a stark contrast to what he was now.

If he was given more time…

He couldn’t help but look forward to it.

“After all, the weakest area is still the blocking,” Coach Irihata was also thinking, touching his chin, and looking around at the students gathered around. “In short, we’ve gained a lot, and next we need to overcome these problems and enhance our strengths…”

“…And then take revenge in the IH qualifiers.”

– What I lack is not just blocking.

Kokonoe Taka thought.

He caressed the smooth surface of the glass, watching the bubbles inside rise, the faint light of the computer screen passing through the dark liquid, reaching the center of his somewhat scattered pupils.

The angle of receiving is not well mastered, the blocking is a mess, the serving can only be described as barely passable, the setting is also not like Toru who can cooperate with everyone… No, only Toru can do that.

Spiking, on the other hand, because he had seen Ushijima, he understood a little: if his current spike is a “bullet,” then Ushijima Wakatoshi’s is a solid “shell.” Although both can kill, the latter is much more difficult to defend against than the former.

Speaking of Ushiwaka… that guy is a lot like I used to be.

Like a much older version of myself. It’s just that the other party clearly found something he cared about from the beginning, and has been chasing it for decades since, so his footsteps will no longer stop for anything on the road.

He leaned back relaxedly in his chair, staring at the ceiling, but his eyes were not actually focused.

What was I like before?

A faint static came from the computer’s speakers, and a female voice appeared on the other end of the network connection. Kokonoe Taka straightened up and inconspicuously pushed the glass of soda away from the camera’s range before the screen fully lit up. A few seconds later, a gentle face appeared in the center of the screen.

The jumbled thoughts and inexplicable anxiety that had just been born in the dim air seemed to disappear into the water at this moment.

Kokonoe Taka smiled softly.

“…Mom.”

……

…………

His mother’s appearance had changed a lot. Kokonoe Taka stared at her, but then realized that her appearance hadn’t changed much: what made her so completely different was perhaps the completely relaxed eyebrows, the exquisitely styled long hair, and the shallow smile at the corner of her mouth. Even though there were fine wrinkles at the corners of her eyes when she smiled, she felt even younger.

Tsurumi Sumiko solemnly held the phone away and looked at it for a while. “You’ve lost weight,” she evaluated sternly. “There’s no meat on your face at all! Are you eating properly?”

Kokonoe Taka smiled, his eyebrows curving in relaxation. “Of course I am. Occasionally, I go to Mrs. Oikawa next door for a meal.”

“Miwako’s place?” Tsurumi Sumiko took a breath. “I really want to eat her cookies… Ah, but you can’t eat too much sweets right now, okay? You can’t be as gluttonous as before. You don’t want to be this old and still have to squeeze into the waiting room with the little kids to see the dentist, do you?”

Perhaps this is a common problem that every mother has – no matter how proud and beautiful she is, or how tired and weary. When facing their children, they will regain those trivial nagging and complaints.

“I’m not a child anymore,” Kokonoe Taka said softly. “And I won’t eat sweet things as much as I used to.”

“…Then I still wish you were a child,” Tsurumi Sumiko said softly. She paused and raised her smile again. “Are you having fun in Miyagi?”

“From the point of view of being able to see Toru’s amusement from time to time, it’s quite fun,” he replied. “Some time ago, he was punished by the teacher for sleeping in class, and then he was caught standing and falling asleep and scolded… Well, but more time is spent playing volleyball.” He paused for a moment. “Playing volleyball with them is quite interesting. Each ball represents not only me, but the entire team… This feeling is very good.”

He couldn’t help but say more: “There are many skilled people, but the most important is still Ushijima of Shiratorizawa. Ah, the one that Toru and A-Ichi keep talking about, although Toru always calls him ‘Little Ushiwaka’… I’ve wanted to say this for a long time, why does he always like to give people strange nicknames?” He sighed. “I used to feel uncomfortable when he called me that, but now I don’t feel anything.”

Tsurumi Sumiko listened quietly to her son’s rare chatter. From the fact that he had come up with a new dish recently, to complaining about his friends, the faucet at home was broken, so he found a way to fix it, to his studies at school and the training for club activities. They were all trivial things, but they made her feel like she was in another world. So her eyes welled up with tears, but she couldn’t lose face and cry in front of her child, so she could only clench her hands in a place where the camera couldn’t see.

“Mom, how are you doing out there?” Kokonoe Taka finished his report and glanced at the soda that wasn’t in the picture, propping up his chin. “You’re in Vienna now, right?”

Taking a deep breath, blinking her eyes, her tone didn’t change much. Tsurumi Sumiko affirmed with a smile, “Yes, in Vienna. It’s very beautiful here. Would you like to come and play during the holidays?”

“…There’s training,” Kokonoe Taka hesitated. “The volleyball club usually arranges training camps and expeditions during the holidays…”

“Is that so?” Tsurumi Sumiko looked at the handsome young man on the other side of the screen, feeling a little at a loss, and interrupted what he wanted to say. “Then when you’re free, Mom will take you to visit all the places I’ve been to these past few years, okay?”

“Okay.” Without hesitation.

“I’ve written another piece of music recently. Do you want to listen?”

“Yes.”

So Tsurumi Sumiko stood up and briefly disappeared from the camera. When she reappeared, she was holding a violin in her hand. Sunlight poured down from the tall floor-to-ceiling windows. She stood in a warm light, her silhouette edged with a dazzling golden glow.

She stood barefoot on the ground, relaxed, chest out, abdomen in, back straight, shoulders down. Her head tilted slightly, and she gently placed the violin on her left collarbone. The whole process was quiet, pious, and elegant, like a Madonna statue in a church.

The first note slipped out of the strings, and after a few vibratos, the notes gradually doubled.

This was the fourteenth piece she had written.

At first, the tune was low and monotonous, like a person running in the dark; then the changes increased, and the gentle tone was like the stars watching the person running in the dark, gradually becoming light and cheerful, as if the stars fell into the person’s palm, becoming a beacon. But the night is capricious, with wind and rain. The fire of the stars disappeared, and the storm came, bringing with it rapid and intense tremolos; the person was submerged in the darkness, and a prolonged, continuous long note rang out – only the night remained.

Then, slowly, gradually, the stars appeared. The stars were made of fire, made of the person who disappeared in the night. It moved forward, it ran, it was no longer escaping, but searching –

Tearful, far-reaching, and long-lasting.

Tsurumi Sumiko gently stroked her friend. She looked again at the other end of the world across the screen, across more than 5,000 miles of land and sea, across an eight-hour time difference. There, there was the continuation of her life, the fire of her life, her star, her eagle.

Kokonoe Taka was also looking at her.

The bubbles in the glass gradually decreased, and small droplets of water condensed into rivers on the wall of the glass, dripping onto the table in the next blink of an eye.

“Beautiful,” he said. “What’s the name of this piece?”

Tsurumi Sumiko replied.

“The same as before.”

“Only, this is the fourteenth piece of music for Taka (Eagle).”

– A knock on the door sounded at this moment.