Genius

Yuuma managed to hit the ball. Just barely — and it was a weak grounder at that. In a real game, it would've been a terrible hit, but that didn't matter. Yuuma had hit the ball. And Raiki made sure to remind him of that:

"Wooow! You hit it! You actually hit it on your first try! Are you sure you've never played before?!" Raiki shouted excitedly from behind Yuuma, standing in the observation area.

"I just followed your advice, hehe!" Yuuma turned around and replied a bit shyly, but it was clear the young otaku was proud of his accomplishment. Especially after seeing how hyped Raiki was about him making contact.

"I'm serious, man! It's really hard to hit on your first try — hell, even after a hundred swings it's still tough! You're a genius! A batting genius!" Raiki couldn't hold back the praise, and he wasn't lying. It was rare for someone to make contact with the ball their very first time swinging a baseball bat.

"Hehe, maybe you're right." Yuuma said with a smile, scratching the back of his head. He knew Raiki was probably exaggerating a bit, but for a young otaku like him, being called a genius was anything but unpleasant.

To be honest, discovering he was a baseball genius right after transferring to a new school made Yuuma start to feel like he was the protagonist of a baseball anime. Even though he would've much preferred something like an isekai filled with hot elves and busty milfs, this wasn't so bad either.

Of course, reality didn't take long to snap him out of his daydreams. The pitching machine launched a ball after a short interval, and as it spat out the second pitch, Yuuma happened to be right where he shouldn't have been — turned around, with his butt directly in the line of fire. A white laser came flying at 100 km/h and nailed him squarely in the right butt cheek.

"Ahh!" Yuuma yelped in shock. The horrible sensation of being hit by something as hard as a brick was a bit too much for the poor otaku to handle. 'At least it hit my butt.' Yuuma thought logically — the butt had enough fat to cushion the blow and keep him from getting seriously hurt.

"Pft!" Raiki had to hold back a loud laugh, but he didn't forget to warn his friend. "You might wanna move your butt — more balls coming."

Yuuma quickly shuffled back into the batter's box. He noticed Raiki clutching his stomach from laughing so hard but didn't say anything. At the moment, he was far more concerned with the pain in his backside.

After letting the third pitch go by, Yuuma decided to try hitting the ball again. He was still a genius, after all. A genius with a sore butt — but a genius nonetheless.

And when the fourth pitch came flying toward him, he followed his friend's advice. Eyes on the ball. Try to hit it with the bat. Once again, he swung the bat, aiming to do exactly that.

Ding!

Another weak hit. But that didn't matter. The joy of making contact again almost made him forget the pain in his butt.

Raiki praised Yuuma once more, which gave the young otaku enough motivation to keep swinging. In the end, the machine threw 20 pitches, and aside from the one that struck his backside and the other he let pass, Yuuma made contact with all the remaining 18. Raiki gave a few more tips here and there, but nothing particularly useful. The truth was, Yuuma was the one who deserved all the credit — the young otaku was born for this.

Raiki then decided it was his turn to take some swings too. He left a handful of tokens with Yuuma and told him he was heading to another batting zone.

Yuuma simply nodded — his friend looked genuinely excited to take his turn. He planned to hit a bit more before going to watch Raiki, so he inserted another token into the machine.

After a quick round of 10 pitches, Yuuma was ready to put in another. He had managed to hit all 10 pitches again, and he couldn't deny that he was having fun. For the first time in his life — during his long, sedentary 14 years — he was actually enjoying a sport. But just as he was about to insert another token, a loud metallic sound caught his attention.

Dong!

It sounded like the noise his own bat made when hitting the ball, but this one was different. Louder. More... powerful. It was a unique sound, and yet, it felt right to Yuuma's ears.

Dong!

After hearing the sound again, Yuuma's curiosity was fully piqued. He grabbed the tokens Raiki had left on the machine and stepped out of the 100 km/h batting zone, searching for the source of the noise. Of course, Yuuma already had a pretty good idea of who was causing it.

He glanced at the second batting zone — empty. The third and fourth — also empty. But as he approached the final batting zone, he saw the scene that would be etched into his memory for a long time.

The ball looked like a small white missile, flying straight toward Raiki. But Raiki didn't seem scared — not even tense or worried. He was smiling. A wild, yet genuine smile. The kind of smile someone wears when they're swinging their bat with everything they've got, with the sole purpose of obliterating that tiny white missile.

Dong!

There it was — just as Yuuma had expected. That powerful sound was the result of Raiki demolishing the ball with his metal bat.

Yuuma instinctively followed the ball's path, only to see it stop abruptly against the netting of the batting zone. A small desire sparked in his heart — Yuuma wanted to see how far that ball could've flown if there had been nothing in its way. And then another desire appeared — he wanted to make a ball fly like that one day, with his own bat.

But all those thoughts were cut off when Yuuma's eyes landed on the small sign above the pitching machine in Raiki's zone. 140km/h. 140km/h... One hundred and forty kilometers per hour! And Raiki crushed that ball. What the hell?!

Dong!

Before Yuuma could even process it, Raiki did it again. Yuuma had a feeling Raiki hit it even harder this time — and his smile looked just a bit more unhinged. But the ball was smashed just the same.

Dong!

Yuuma was speechless. All he could do was watch as his friend hit 140 km/h fastballs like they were nothing.

Dong!

Again.

Dong!

And again. Raiki didn't seem to get tired. The only brief pauses he took were to insert more tokens into the machine — then he'd go right back to swinging, the same smile still plastered across his face.

To be honest, Yuuma had no idea how many pitches he had seen Raiki hit. He didn't even know how many hours had passed. But he stayed. It was simply impossible to look away.

At some point, the pretty girl left the counter and began watching too, amazed. She had never seen anything like it. No one had. A while later, her grandfather — the owner of the batting center — also came out to watch in silence. And after even more time, another elderly man, tall and imposing, arrived and stood silently by, observing.

But Yuuma didn't notice any of these people. He didn't even know what he was feeling at that moment, only that he couldn't take his eyes off that scene. Raiki's intensity hadn't faded one bit compared to when he first started hitting — in fact, it seemed to have increased. And his smile was definitely wider now. To Yuuma, Raiki looked like he was in pure bliss.

Raiki looked happy playing baseball. At least, that's what Yuuma felt.

Dong!

And in the middle of that powerful sound he never seemed to tire of hearing, Yuuma found himself wondering. If he was a batting genius… Then what kind of monster was Raiki?