Kei didn't sleep much the night after the loss.His body was still but his mind was sprinting faster than ever
The footage was already on his tablet.Three angles.Multiple replays
He paused on one frame
A defender moving two seconds before Kei made his decision
It wasn't luck
It was memory
Someone had fed that team with past data of Crownless tactics player habits and individual quirks
Kei's passes
Ren's dribbles
Even Amano's temper
"They weren't learning in real time," Kei muttered."They were remembering"
He rewound again
Frame by frame
Until he caught a face on the bench
Someone with a hoodie pulled tight
Filming
Not cheering
Filming
Later that morning at school Coach Isagi slammed a whiteboard with more force than usual
"Someone leaked our data," he growled."Not tactics.Intuition.Variables you can't teach but you can memorize if given enough time"
Silence followed
Amano leaned against the wall arms crossed
"So what now?Cancel the next match?"
Kei stood up slowly
"No.We play it anyway"
Everyone turned to him
"We change the data," Kei said."Erase the pattern.Create new shadows"
Amano smirked
"You want us to fake our style?"
"No.I want us to be unreadable"
They practiced differently that week
Kei swapped positions randomly.Ren played right wing instead of left.Dazai crossed with his left foot for the first time ever
Nothing made sense
Everything was noise
But Kei knew what he was doing
If their enemy lived on memory
Then they'd feed them a lie
A ghost team
A shadow version
Something they couldn't prepare for