They were going crazy.
The entire Jingu Stadium was filled with a frenzied atmosphere. The supporters of the Seido High School Baseball Team stood up one after another, moving like a chaotic dance.
It wasn't the first time they had seen Zhang Han hit a home run. In fact, earlier in this very game, Zhang Han had hit a beautiful base hit. But the significance of this home run was different.
They had watched Zhang Han's entire at-bat play out on the big screen. His previous tactics were profound, and while those involved may have been confused in the moment, the fans, as bystanders, quickly pieced together the cause and effect with a little thought and the commentator's help.
To put it simply, it was a combination of hitting and intimidation.
When it was impossible to guess whether Manaka would pitch a fastball or a slider, Zhang Han adopted a stance that made it look like he was relentlessly chasing the fastball.
"Zhang Han had previously hit Manaka's fastball, and now he's clearly going after it again. Because of that, neither Manaka nor Takami would find it easy to use a fastball as their final decisive pitch against him. Once they even considered it, they felt timid. Zhang Han exploited that psychology, locked onto a low-angle slider for the last pitch, and blasted the ball out of the park."
Commentator Kameshima was a little exaggerated in his delivery, adding some of his own imagination, but he still restored the facts to a reasonable degree. Takami and Manaka had been intimidated. They never seriously considered throwing a fastball in the end.
All of this was the result of Zhang Han's earlier groundwork.
After the ball flew out, Zhang Han was very pleased with himself.
This wasn't his first home run. It was, in fact, his thirty-first in official high school games. But this time was different from before.
This time, it wasn't due to his talent alone, nor was it simply the result of diligent hitting practice. Although practice was one of the important reasons, it was not the decisive factor.
This home run was a combination of skill, power, and wisdom, with wisdom playing the biggest role. In that single at-bat, Zhang Han had integrated all of his abilities into one swing.
As he became more famous, and as the team rose with him, the opponents they faced would only get harder. Powerful pitchers like Manaka and Narumiya Mei would become more and more common.
Against top pitchers with both excellent natural talent and relentless training, it would be difficult for Zhang Han to keep hitting home runs and maintaining his high batting average on raw ability and hard work alone.
To reach the next level, he had to learn to play with his mind.
Great players rely on talent and hard work. Truly great players use their brains.
Zhang Han was now subtly finding that feeling. He had only touched the threshold, but he was incredibly happy about it.
Ever since Seido reached the top eight at Koshien last summer, his progress in areas outside of pitching speed had seemed to slow. In hitting especially, he appeared to have quietly hit a ceiling. His home run count was still high and his batting average still climbed, but Zhang Han was troubled by it all the same.
A player like that could dominate in high school. But if he wanted to go further, his path would narrow fast. To widen it, he needed a direction to keep moving in.
Since the Spring Tournament began, Zhang Han had been in excellent form, and he had vaguely started to find directions for a breakthrough. Now he could finally confirm it. He had found a way forward, and he no longer had to fly around aimlessly.
Zhang Han didn't know that the smile he showed after hitting the home run had been captured by the camera and displayed to tens of thousands of fans on site.
On the massive LCD screen at Jingu Stadium, his smile was frozen there for more than ten seconds.
At that moment, tens of thousands of girls learned what it felt like to have their hearts flutter.
Just a short while ago, they had firmly believed that a man focused on his work was the most handsome thing there was. Now they realized they were wrong.
A man's smile after successfully doing something he was wholly focused on. That was the most handsome.
Just like Zhang Han, right now.
Seeing the female assistant he had brought with him staring with a dazed look, Fujio recognized this as an opportunity. While other reporters were still cheering and taking photos, he stepped aside and called his chief editor directly, asking him to contact Tokyo Television and Zhang Han himself separately.
This photo would be the cover for the next issue of Baseball Kingdom magazine. Issues featuring Zhang Han always sold well, but Fujio firmly believed this one would be the best yet.
It wasn't just the fans at the stadium who had seen the photo. Millions of people watching the broadcast through Tokyo Television had seen it too. The reaction this time might genuinely surpass Koshien. The broadcast audience was smaller, but in this era of rampant social media, Zhang Han's video clip and this photo would trigger a chain reaction.
While Fujio was turning all of this over in his head, Zhang Han had already returned to the dugout to receive his teammates' congratulations.
Out on the field, the game continued.
The audience reaction had been enormous, but the impact of the home run on the game itself was not as significant as one might expect. Takami and Manaka had lost under those circumstances, and because they understood exactly how it had happened, they were not rattled by it. Their focus held.
Manaka's subsequent pitching remained excellent. He tried to contain the damage and hold the score at 6 to 3.
Seido had other ideas.
First, Yuuki, the fourth batter, powerfully swept the ball out and reached second base. Immediately after, Isashiki Jun used a hit-and-run to advance Yuuki Tetsuya to third.
One out, runner on third.
Isashiki Jun was retired on the play, but the overall offensive rhythm of the Seido team was not disrupted. Under Kataoka's direction, Seido showed a remarkably composed side. Even with Ichidai San's fielders working hard and Manaka pitching better with each inning, when Seido wanted to score, no one could stop them.
Stepping into the batter's box next was the sixth batter, the man who had hit the four-run home run not long ago.
Miyuki Kazuya.
Standing in the box, Miyuki felt so good he could fly. He had just hit a four-run home run, and now there was a runner on third. If he didn't seize the opportunity to score the fifth run, he had no idea when a setup like this would come around again.
After all, even someone as strong as Zhang Han had only seemed to score a maximum of five runs in a single game during the Spring Tournament.
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