After the game, the Seidou High School Baseball Team returned to their hotel.
"It's just not satisfying! That Arayashiki High School team was way too—"
Isashiki Jun, sporting his signature small mustache and mature look, grumbled in frustration.
"You little brat, you only got one lucky hit. Don't get too full of yourself!"
Uekusa, the ace pitcher of Arayashiki High School, had an excellent pitching style.
Several of Seidou's third-year regulars struggled against him.
Even Azuma Kiyokuni and Yuki Tetsuya, the team's strongest batters, had made mistakes facing his pitches.
Meanwhile, Isashiki Jun—who hadn't made much of an impact so far and earned his regular position mainly through defense—managed to get a hit this time.
Naturally, his teammates had a few things to say about that.
"He just got lucky."
"Yeah, pure luck."
That was the general consensus among most of the Seidou players.
Of course, not everyone shared that opinion.
Zhou Hao, the team's true ace, sat deep in thought while the others teased Isashiki Jun.
"What's wrong? Didn't get enough time on the mound either?"
Miyuki, who had caught for Zhou Hao in the game, couldn't help but ask, his tone teasing yet knowing.
The word "either" was deliberate.
Even though Miyuki had played all nine innings, he had only worked with Zhou Hao for two of them.
He clearly hadn't gotten his fill either.
It wasn't their fault—the opponent was just too weak.
Because of that, Coach Kataoka hadn't even considered sending Zhou Hao back to the mound.
"No, not at all," Zhou Hao replied, shaking his head. "We still have a long way to go. Conserving energy is important. I'm just thinking about how fast the second-years have grown."
When the Summer Tournament first began, Zhou Hao remembered clearly that—aside from Yuki Tetsuya, the batting core, and Chris, the star catcher—most of the second-years were still immature.
Even when they got playing time, their performance was average at best.
He could understand why seniors like Azuma Kiyokuni often felt sentimental.
This current batch of second-years was once considered Seidou's weakest.
Only Yuki and Chris truly stood out.
How could the seniors see hope in that?
But reality proved otherwise.
While many of the second-years still lacked polish, they had begun to display their own strengths and potential.
Take Isashiki Jun, for example—call him reckless or unpredictable if you like, but early in the Summer Tournament, he would never have managed to hit Uekusa's pitch.
Yet he did it now.
Even if there was some luck involved, the fact that he pulled it off already proved his growth.
Zhou Hao knew firsthand how tough Arayashiki's pitching was.
Even he had been deceived once during the game.
And from what he saw in daily practices, the other second-years were also improving rapidly.
Their growth was undeniable.
"Is Coach avoiding media interviews again?"
"It's not the time for that yet. What's there to brag about for just making the Top 16?"
"The real games start now."
"The group finals are about to begin. Our next goal is to advance past the group stage."
The Koshien tournament was divided into two parts—the group stage before the quarterfinals and the knockout rounds after.
Around fifty teams were split into eight groups, and only the winner of each group would move on to the quarterfinals.
With two straight wins, Seidou now needed just one more victory to advance.
"Have we found out who we're facing next?"
"Yeah, they've already been decided—"
"—Ikeda High School."
Hearing that name, the Seidou players exchanged confused looks.
Was it that Ikeda?
"Of course not!" someone clarified. "This is the representative from Shizuoka Prefecture—the biggest dark horse in this year's Koshien besides us."
Before this, if anyone had called Seidou the strongest dark horse of the tournament, the players would've hated it.
After all, though they hadn't qualified for Koshien in years, their reputation as a national powerhouse had never truly faded.
How could such a school be called a dark horse?
But after two straight wins, their mentality had shifted.
Now, they could even joke about it themselves.
"So they're that strong, huh?"
The title of "strongest dark horse" immediately piqued everyone's interest.
Dark horses weren't rare in tournaments.
Seidou had faced plenty of them in the West Tokyo preliminaries.
Still, meeting another one at Koshien was intriguing.
"Shizuoka's known for strong teams," Chris explained, already having gathered information. "For them to secure a Koshien spot, they must be formidable."
"What kind of team are they?"
"They're full of passion, and their fundamentals are solid," Chris continued.
"They've appeared at Koshien four times, though it's been a while—their last time was eleven years ago. But their facilities and baseball tradition are excellent."
In baseball, strong dark horses weren't uncommon.
But a team that could make it to Koshien and perform well there?
That required more than luck—it needed foundation and discipline.
Grassroots teams, no matter how passionate, rarely reached the national stage.
They simply lacked the base to do so.
Ikeda High School was different.
Despite sharing a name with another school Seidou had faced before, they were an entirely different team.
"This summer's been perfect," Azuma Kiyokuni said with a hearty laugh.
They had finally fulfilled Seidou's long-held dream—not just reaching Koshien, but winning there, with real momentum.
Outside, the summer sun blazed at over thirty degrees Celsius.
Sweat poured down Azuma's face as he took two steps forward, yet he couldn't help but grin.
He was deeply satisfied.
And he wasn't the only one.
Every Seidou player felt it too.
They all wished this summer could last forever.