Pitches travelling anywhere between 110 and 150 kilometres per hour had always been well within Sawamura's hitting range in his previous life.
After all, that was the range in which professional baseball pitchers most frequently operated.
CRACK!
As Sawamura swung, his entire body moved with effortless coordination.
Not a single muscle was unnecessarily tense.
Using his left foot as the pivot, he rotated his body smoothly, allowing the rest of his movements to flow naturally into the swing.
The bat connected with the baseball.
And before everyone's astonished eyes, the ball went soaring into the distance!
So fast!
So high!
So far!
The faces of Nagata's players turned deathly pale.
An ominous feeling crept into their hearts.
Surely not…
That can't be possible, can it?
He's only a first-year student!
Don't tell me he's actually going to hit a home run!
THUD!
Unfortunately for Sawamura, the baseball ultimately failed to clear the outfield fence.
It landed approximately five metres short of the wall.
However, at that distance, none of Nagata's outfielders was anywhere near the ball.
Sawamura took advantage of the situation and began jogging around the bases.
First base.
Second base.
Third base.
And finally…
Home plate!
It wasn't that Sawamura had run particularly quickly.
Rather, Nagata's outfielders had taken an absurdly long time to retrieve the baseball.
By the time they finally managed to return it to the infield, nearly half a minute had passed.
With that much time available, Sawamura could practically have walked around the bases and still made it home safely!
"HOME RUN!"
Although it was only an inside-the-park home run, Sawamura was nevertheless delighted.
After all, this was his very first home run since being reborn!
A moment worth remembering!
However…
My physical conditioning still isn't good enough.
And my fundamentals aren't as solid as they should be, either.
That single swing had revealed quite a few shortcomings in his current abilities.
Ultimately, Sawamura wasn't naturally built like a powerful slugger.
He didn't possess the enormous physique or exceptional raw strength of a born power hitter.
Furthermore, he'd devoted almost all his attention to pitching practice recently.
As a result, he'd inevitably neglected his batting training.
When it came to swinging a bat, experience was certainly important.
However, muscle memory was equally essential.
In that respect, batting was remarkably similar to practising martial arts.
If you neglected your training for even three days, your movements would begin to lose their sharpness.
Your hands would become clumsy, and your footwork would slow.
If Sawamura wanted to maintain a consistently high standard, he would have to devote considerably more time to batting practice.
The match continued.
And once again, Sawamura pitched the entire game.
Seven innings.
No hits allowed.
No runs conceded.
Akagi had won!
We won!
We actually won?!
When the match finally ended, the people most astonished by the result weren't Nagata's players.
They were the members of Akagi themselves!
They'd actually won a baseball match!
"WOOHOO!"
Wakana leapt into the air with excitement.
She was absolutely overjoyed!
As expected, that Sawamura fellow wasn't merely someone who enjoyed making outrageous boasts.
They really could win!
And they'd won so convincingly, too!
Well…
Perhaps convincingly was a slightly generous description.
Nevertheless, their opponents hadn't managed to score a single run.
Surely that was impressive enough!
Faced with Sawamura's fastballs, which regularly reached 120 kilometres per hour and were now approaching 125, Nagata's batters had been utterly helpless.
After all, they were accustomed to practising against pitches travelling at approximately 110 kilometres per hour.
Fastballs exceeding 120 kilometres per hour were practically unknown territory to them!
In fact, that was one of the main reasons Nagata had been so eager to arrange a practice match against Sawamura in the first place.
They'd hoped to use his pitching as a free training opportunity, allowing their players to become accustomed to faster pitches.
After all, not every junior high school could afford the luxury of using pitching machines during batting practice.
Following seven fiercely contested innings, Akagi Junior High emerged victorious.
Akagi Junior High: 1
Nagata Junior High: 0
Throughout the seven innings, Sawamura recorded an astonishing nineteen strikeouts.
Even more remarkably, he didn't issue a single walk.
After Akagi's players had departed, two members of Nagata's team began whispering amongst themselves.
"That guy… He wasn't pitching at full strength just now, was he?"
"Probably not. He looked completely comfortable out there. And his pitch locations weren't particularly difficult, either…"
The two players exchanged glances.
A chill suddenly ran down their spines.
Only now had they realised something truly terrifying.
Throughout the twenty-one plate appearances he'd faced, Sawamura didn't seem to have thrown even a single ball outside the strike zone!
He'd been relying almost entirely on his pitching velocity to overpower them.
"Are we really just that hopeless, or…?"
Neither player finished the thought.
Meanwhile, the members of Akagi's baseball team had returned to their school.
Even now, they were so excited that they could barely contain themselves.
Most of them had hardly any experience playing baseball.
Who could possibly have imagined that they would defeat their opponents in only their second-ever match?
Naturally, Sawamura had plenty of thoughts about their performance.
There were numerous things he wanted to discuss with his teammates.
However, he had no intention of interrupting their celebration at a moment like this.
Let them enjoy themselves for a while.
We can deal with everything else later.
For now, let's simply enjoy this victory.
During his previous life as a professional baseball player, Sawamura had always felt as though he were racing against the clock.
If he wasn't playing in a match, he was training.
If he wasn't training, he was preparing for the next match.
Come to think of it, it had been a very long time since he'd allowed himself to relax and simply celebrate a victory.
Perhaps enjoying the moment without worrying about what came next wasn't such a bad thing.
…
"Hey, did you hear? Apparently, the baseball team won their practice match!"
Inside a second-year classroom at Akagi Junior High School, several students had gathered together.
They were enthusiastically discussing the latest piece of exciting news spreading throughout the school.
Although Sawamura had been the one to propose establishing the baseball club, and most of its current members were first-year students, that didn't mean there were no baseball enthusiasts amongst the older students.
In fact, according to some rumours, Akagi had previously possessed a baseball enthusiasts' circle.
Two of the students gathered in the classroom had once belonged to that very group.
Unfortunately, after the older students graduated, the baseball circle, which had briefly enjoyed considerable popularity, gradually ceased its activities.
However, that didn't mean the group had officially disbanded.
Even now, Oda and Hōshō were technically still members of the baseball circle.
In fact, Hōshō was still its president.
"Those little brats certainly know how to stir things up, don't they?"
Oda adjusted the glasses resting on the bridge of his nose and chuckled.
After speaking, he deliberately glanced towards Hōshō.
He was rather curious about what his friend thought of the situation.
Oda and Hōshō had originally been teammates in the same Little League team.
Naturally, after graduating from primary school and entering junior high, they'd left Little League behind.
However, enrolling at Akagi hadn't meant abandoning baseball completely.
Together with several older students, they'd formed a small baseball enthusiasts' circle consisting of six members.
Oda still remembered that Hōshō had once talked about establishing a proper baseball team.
Unfortunately, their upperclassmen eventually graduated.
The circle was reduced to just Oda and Hōshō.
And the dream of establishing a baseball team quietly faded away.
Now, however, a first-year student who was a year younger than them had successfully established an official baseball club.
Oda couldn't help wondering how Hōshō felt about that.
"Oda, come to think of it, shouldn't you two be considered the original members and leaders of the baseball team?"
One of the other students suddenly raised the question.
"Why are you letting some little brat called Sawamura take all the attention?"
Oda gave an awkward smile.
He genuinely didn't know how to respond.
Snap!
Hōshō closed the book lying in front of him.
His expression remained cold as he spoke.
"Sawamura was never a member of our baseball circle."
He paused briefly.
"The baseball club and our circle are two completely separate organisations."
In fact, Hōshō had noticed Sawamura much earlier than most people.
Back when Hōshō was preparing to put up recruitment posters for the baseball circle, he'd spotted Sawamura swaggering around the school grounds with a sign, openly recruiting members for a brand-new baseball club.
The incident had caught him completely off guard.
He'd even gone to the headmaster personally to ask about it.
Why had Sawamura been allowed to establish a baseball club without first joining their existing circle?
"Ah, well, haven't you always been short of members?"
Headmaster Takada had offered his explanation with his usual kindly smile.
"Sawamura was so enthusiastic about establishing a baseball club that I simply approved his application."
Then, as though suggesting the most obvious solution in the world, he'd added:
"Why don't you youngsters discuss it amongst yourselves and merge the two groups?"
And just like that, Akagi Junior High ended up with two separate baseball-related organisations.
The official baseball club.
And the original baseball enthusiasts' circle.
As for Sawamura, he genuinely had no idea that any of this had happened.
In his previous life, he'd only gathered his childhood friends and established the baseball team during his second year of junior high school.
By that point, Hōshō and Oda had already been approaching graduation.
Naturally, they hadn't been particularly interested in getting involved.
But things were different this time.
Hōshō and Oda were still second-year students.
They were still ambitious young baseball enthusiasts.
And they were still hoping to establish a proper baseball team of their own.
In other words…
The small flame of their passion for baseball was still burning brightly.
End of Chapter 010