The bell for the seventh round rings, sounding like a death knell in Ryohei’s ears. He settles into his pendulum rhythm, but it’s a fragile, ghost-like imitation of its forr self.
I can’t keep this up for much longer...
This is going to be the last round...
Umoto storms forward, sensing the finish. He doesn’t see a challenger anymore. He sees a broken wall ready to be toppled.
He hamrs at Ryohei’s guard, his predatory focus narrowing. He’s waiting for that one shot again, so that he can break Ryohei along with his weapon.
Go ahead with that lucky counter. Throw it.
I’ll walk right through it and take your head.
Ryohei is backed into the ropes. And as he endures the barrage, that tunnel vision returns, thick and suffocating. The world is nothing but Umoto’s massive shoulders and the glint of sweat.
"Yamada is trapped!" the lead comntator bellows. "He’s back against the ropes, and Umoto is loading up the execution! There’s nowhere left to run!"
Ryohei sees a window for a counter, but he hesitates. It isn’t the perfect opening he’s hunting for. He knows the grim math of this fight: even if he lands, Umoto will simply absorb the impact and force a devastating dual exchange.
To trade blows now is to invite an execution.
So he waits, endures the hamring pressure, his focus narrowing as he searches for that one rare, near-mythical mont, an angle where he can launch a strike from outside Umoto’s peripheral vision.
"Endure..."
"That chance will co..."
"It will co..."
He’s looking for a punch the champion cannot see, the only kind of blow that can truly bypass that monstrous resilience. But sadly, that opening never arrives.
Ryohei’s legs feels weakened the more blows landing on his body and upper arms. And Umoto keeps hamring at him, while expecting for that counter to co.
"Co on..."
"Throw it..."
Eventually, Ryohei stops trying to escape, and stops looking for that perfect counter.
He anchors his right foot into the canvas, ignoring the massive right hook Umoto is winding up. He doesn’t look for the angle Umoto won’t see.
He just aims for the one Umoto will see, and hope for luck it would really breaks his balance.
There. The base of the jaw.
Umoto sees the compact hook coming. He doesn’t even try to slip it. He stiffens his neck muscles, his jaw locked in a grimace of absolute confidence.
You can have it. But this is your end.
Dsh!
Bugh!
By a stroke of desperate luck, Ryohei’s hook doesn’t just hit the base of the jaw. It actually lands flush in the nerve-rich pocket directly beneath the ear.
It’s not a power punch, but the shockwaves bypass the bone and strike the vestibular system with the precision of a lightning bolt.
In the sa millisecond, Umoto’s right hook lands on Ryohei’s exposed side, just below the ribs. The impact is significant; a visible ripple travels across Ryohei’s midsection as the blow lands.
Ryohei collapses to his knees, his face twisted in a silent, agonizing gasp for air. Umoto stands over Ryohei, his eyes wide and clear. He felt the punch, but he is awake.
"DOWN! IT’S OVER!" the lead comntator screams. "The champion has delivered the final blow! Ryohei Yamada is down for the third ti tonight!"
The referee steps in, his hand raised to announce the knockdown.
"I’ve got him," Umoto thinks, a smirk forming on his bloodied lips. "Now, just walk to the neutral corner and..."
Suddenly, his lead leg turns to jelly. He tries to plant his foot, but the floor feels like it’s made of water. To his vision, the entire EDION Arena tilts violently forty-five degrees to the side.
"Eh? What’s happening to ?"
Umoto’s mind is screaming, but his body isn’t listening.
"Why is the ceiling on the left?"
A confused, deathly silence swallowed the arena as Umoto lurches and falls, his movents slack and unsteady, like drunkenness without the drink.
"WAIT! DOUBLE DOWN!" the co-comntator explodes, his voice hitting a glass-shattering pitch. "Umoto is stumbling! The champion has lost his legs! He’s falling!"
Umoto’s arms flail at the air, his balance completely severed. He tips over awkwardly, his knees hitting the canvas with a heavy thud, just inches away from the man he thought he had destroyed.
"TOTAL CHAOS IN OSAKA!" the lead comntator yells over the deafening roar of disbelief. "Yamada is down from the pain, but Umoto... Umoto looks like he’s forgotten how to stand! We have a double count in the seventh! I have never seen anything like this!"
The referee, stunned for a micro-second, begins the count for both n. In the blue corner, Ryoma grips the ropes, his eyes wide with a cold brilliant realization.
"The monster isn’t broken," Ryoma thinks, a chill running down his spine. "Ryohei just unplugged the machine."
Ryohei is down, but fate has placed him within arm’s reach of the ropes. Unlike him, Umoto had already begun his victory walk to the neutral corner, and now he lies stranded near the center of the ring, far from any support.
"This is your chance, Ryohei!" Ryoma’s voice cuts through the roar, sharp and impatient. "The ropes! Reach for the ropes and get up! Forget the pain, forget about breathing! Just get up first!"
Ryohei groans a primal sound of agony, and drags his body toward the hemp.
His lungs are locked, his side feels like it’s been hit by a train. But he forces his trembling hands to grip the bottom rope. His face turns a terrifying shade of crimson as he hauls himself upward, inch by excruciating inch.
Finally, he stands, leaning his entire weight against the ropes, finally allowing himself a jagged shallow breath.
Across the canvas, Umoto is battling a different demon. He manages to push himself up, but the mont he stands, his head swings violently.
The floor feels like the deck of a ship in a storm. He falls, tries again, but the world tilts again, and he crashes back down.
"Umoto is struggling! He can’t find his legs!" the lead comntator screams. "The champion is fighting his own nervous system!"
The referee’s count reaches seven. Ryoma steps back from the apron, his hands clenched as he watches Ryohei stabilize, leaving the ropes and lifting his gloves.
"Hold your ground, Ryohei!" Sera bellows, his voice straining against the roar of the crowd. "Stay still and breathe! He might find his legs again. Don’t waste a single drop of energy. This is your only chance to end him!"
The count hits eight. With a roar of pure will, Umoto finally surges to his feet, standing tall for a heartbeat.
"He’s up! The Champion is up at eight!" the lead comntator screams. "I don’t believe it! The Osaka King refuses to stay down! He’s back on his... feet."
"Wait... look!" the co-comntator yells. "He’s standing, but..."
But as the referee’s hand sweeps down for ten, Umoto’s balance betrays him one last ti.
He swings, his center of gravity vanishing like water through his fingers, and he drops heavily onto his hips.
Thud.
"HE’S DOWN AGAIN! HE’S DOWN AT THE COUNT OF TEN!"
The lead comntator bellows, the sound of his voice nearly drowned out by the collective gasp of the EDION Arena.
"The referee is waving it off! It’s over! It’s over!"
"Unbelievable tragedy for Umoto! He had the will. He had the consciousness. But his legs just... quit."
"He fought the count, he fought the pain, but he couldn’t fight his own equilibrium."
"We have a new champion, and the arena is in absolute shock!"
The arena explodes into a deafening mix of shock and confusion. But Ryohei doesn’t hear it. The mont the fight is waved off, he lets himself collapse back onto the canvas.
The deep red of his face drains into a deathly pale, his lips trembling in a state of pure raw disbelief.
As the bell rings, signaling the official end, Ryohei doesn’t strike a victory pose. He simply lies there and starts crying; a pathetic, beautiful release of every ounce of fear and pain he had carried.
Umoto is finally able to stand. His jelly legs have stabilized, and he looks as if he could fight for ten more rounds.
He glares at the referee, ready to protest, but the realization hits him like a cold wave.
It’s aningless.
The fight is over. And the king has been dethroned by a glitch in his own crown.
***
The blue corner explodes. Sera and Kenta vault over the ropes with reckless abandon, their faces masks of pure, unadulterated triumph.
They scramble toward Ryohei’s prone body, shouting his na over the deafening din of the arena.
"Ryohei! You did it!" Sera screams, his eyes wet with tears as he throws his arms up. "You crazy bastard, you actually did it!"
"Ryohei! Get up, champion!" Kenta bellows, pounding the canvas in a frenzy of joy.
"Kenta... I... I win... I win Kenta. I’m the champion."
"Look at your face. Stop crying already, you moron."
anwhile, Nakahara climb the ring with a composed professional manner.
Ryoma follows, but his expression is a quiet mask of observation. As he watches Ryohei broken like that, an odd jealousy crawls through his heart.
He has his own belt, the OPBF championship, a tier far above the national title. But he has no mory of his own victory. The night he beat Jade McConnel is a void in his mind, a blank space erased by trauma and concussion.
Ryoma can only watch Ryohei and wonder: What does it actually feel like to know you’ve earned it?
For the genius Ryoma, seeing Ryohei’s pathetic release of joy makes his own championship feel like a ghost, a trophy he holds but never truly experienced winning.
As Ryohei kneels on the canvas, the old order of Nakahara Gym shatters. The hierarchy that held him in the shadows is gone.
By taking the belt, he hasn’t just broken Umoto’s balance. He has broken the equilibrium of his own life.
Tomorrow, Japan will wake up to a new reality: Nakahara Gym no longer has a prodigy and his shadow. It has two Champions.
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