Amidst the cheers and encouragement, accompanied by the sound of the contestants from Japan fans singing and playing 'Abarenbo Shogun'.
Sawamura emanates an extremely dangerous aura, as if he could swallow his opponent alive at any moment.
Compared to the terrifying momentum of the Demon King, the Cuban players seem rather pitiful.
Can they withstand it?
Honestly, it seems unlikely.
Just facing Sawamura head-on, they are already in a dreadful situation.
What makes it worse is that there is a runner on base.
At this point, as long as Sawamura can get a hit, Japan will almost certainly increase their lead.
A score of 3:0 is already outrageous!
If Japan manages to expand their score further from here,
then Cuba would likely have to pack up and leave early.
Once the score extends to a four-point lead or more, even if Cuba's players don't give up, it would be too late to recover.
They have already faced the Demon King Sawamura before.
The best players from Cuba have already faced Sawamura's pitches.
At first, they had only heard of Sawamura's pitches or seen them in game footage.
They had never actually seen his pitches in person, and while they knew about his match against Allen,
they only had a vague understanding of the situation.
But this time was different. This time, they truly experienced Sawamura's pitching power.
It's incredible!
This isn't to belittle Cuba's players, but anyone who has watched Sawamura play would come to the same conclusion.
Is this person really just an ordinary high school student?
The Cuban players found it difficult to accept.
Sawamura was so incredible that it left them with a frightening impression.
In fact, just Sawamura's strange pitching form was enough to make the Cuban players dizzy.
But the Cuban players knew very well that the man called the Demon King had more than just that bizarre pitching style. When Sawamura first became famous, the most talked-about aspect of his game was the terrifying number of breaking balls he could throw.
Most pitchers only have one or two types of breaking balls, just enough to differentiate them from their fastballs.
The better pitchers might practice a few more, three or four types of breaking balls.
That's already considered a very impressive breaking ball pitcher.
But compared to the Demon King Sawamura, such pitchers are probably not even worth mentioning.
In his previous match against the "Son of Baseball" Allen, Sawamura used a total of 11 different types of breaking balls.
This is just an estimate by outsiders, not a recount from Sawamura himself.
That means, according to outside estimates, Sawamura has 11 types of breaking balls.
Even the subtle ones, which are used to bait the batter, aren't even counted here.
Is this scary?
It's terrifying!
Even if you count professional players in Major League Baseball, there's probably only Sawamura in the world who has this many types of breaking balls, and who has perfected them all.
Sawamura's abilities are not limited to just pitching.
Though that alone is already astonishing, his prowess extends to hitting as well. He's the player with the highest batting average in all entire Japan.
With such an opponent standing on the field, the pressure on the Cuban players is immense.
This is something everyone can easily imagine.
The showdown began.
Under the watchful eyes of everyone, the Cuban players didn't seem to want to avoid the confrontation.
On the pitcher's mound was Katro.
He assumed a stance ready for a head-to-head duel.
Of course, people would make that assumption not so much because of the pitcher's stance but because of the catcher's actions.
The catcher squatted down and positioned his mitt in the strike zone. This was a clear signal, a very obvious one.
This meant that Katro needed to pitch a good Strike. At least that's what he was thinking, especially when facing Sawamura, particularly with a runner on second base.
Katro showed no fear in the face of the Demon King's reputation. Instead, he stood tall, ready to face Sawamura directly.
Whrroosh!
The baseball whizzed out.
Seeing the ball leave the pitcher's hand, Sawamura's eyes lit up.
The time interval felt so long!
He had already entered that mysterious state, fully prepared.
He hadn't expected the ball to be delayed for so long.
The delay was so long that Sawamura began to feel impatient.
This intense concentration was very exhausting for him.
The longer the delay, the more energy and stamina he had to expend.
After much anticipation,
Katro, Cuba's ace pitcher, finally threw the ball. Had he waited any longer, Sawamura felt like his anxious heart would have burned him up. Now that the ball was coming, Sawamura just had to judge its trajectory and hit it.
Sawamura was completely ready, watching the ball with extreme focus.
He had made up his mind that once he saw the ball coming, he would swing.
'It's here!'
The baseball was almost upon him in the blink of an eye.
Sawamura really wanted to swing. He was eager to hit the ball as it came toward him.
But in that mysterious state, he saw everything too clearly.
Although he wanted to swing, he couldn't hit this pitch since it was way outside the strike zone.
This pitch was way off!
It was at least 10 centimeters away from the outside edge of the strike zone.
A ball that far outside, even with Sawamura's intense desire to swing, he couldn't make contact.
So he had no choice but to watch the ball whiz past him.
Snap!
"Ball!"
Katro on the mound had a painful and conflicted expression on his face.
The spectators, seeing this, understood right away.
No outs, runners on first and second.
This situation clearly put a lot of psychological pressure on the Cuban players.
As a result, they were hesitant in the confrontation.
To put it simply, they were holding back.
If Sawamura could just get a hit, even a simple one, they would expand their lead to four runs.
If the score became 4:0,
Cuba's players, even if they tried to hang on, wouldn't be able to come back.
As mentioned earlier, most of their best players have already faced Sawamura.
At this point, they have a clear understanding of his abilities.
Being three runs behind was already tantamount to a death sentence.
But there was still a chance to fight back.
Even if the odds were slim, they would still grasp at the last straw, fighting until the end.
However, if the score expanded to four runs, the Cuban players would know that, barring any major surprises, they would never catch up.
There would be no hope at all.
Thus, the next phase of the game was crucial.
In such a critical situation, under such harsh conditions, facing someone as terrifying as Sawamura,
It was understandable that Cuba's ace pitcher would be nervous and lose.
The previous pitch was proof of that.
It looked like Cuba's ace pitcher was so nervous he could hardly control himself. This meant that in the upcoming confrontations, or perhaps in his future pitching attempts, he might throw many more bad pitches.
When a pitcher gets nervous, it's very common for them to miss the strike zone repeatedly. It looked like Katro was no exception.
As the spectators guessed, Katro's next few pitches were all off. One pitch almost hit Sawamura in the head.
The next two pitches were high as well!
"BALL!"
"BALL!!"
"BALL!!"
"Walk To Base!"
And just like that, Sawamura was walked to first base.
The situation became: no Outs, runners on first and second.
Standing on first base, Sawamura showed no trace of a smile.
Now, Cuba was on the edge of losing.
If nothing unexpected happened during the game, Cuba's team would certainly be defeated.
To avoid that dreadful outcome, Cuba would have no choice but to fight with everything they had, taking the battle to Sawamura.
Such a showdown between aces was an excellent way to boost the team's morale.
In Sawamura's mind, if Cuba had any chance to turn things around, it would be by facing him head-on.
Then, if they managed to take him out cleanly, the spectators would see that Cuba's Ace pitcher was that good, and the game would still be worth watching.
But if they walked him, the result would be the opposite. It would be a disaster.
So from the start, Sawamura had never thought that he would be Walked.
In his mind, that was simply impossible.
But now it had happened.
And it was because of Katro's mistake.
Sawamura furrowed his brow, thinking about everything that had just transpired.
It all felt so unfamiliar, so incredibly strange.
It was like something was amiss, like there was some kind of conspiracy.
In the Batter's Box, Mima also felt that something was off.
But he didn't dwell on it too much and instead stood ready to bat.
Now, with no Outs and runners on first and second, as long as he hit the ball well, scoring was a sure thing. He might even score two runs in one swing.
Though the score wasn't as important now as it had been earlier,
if he hit the ball well, he could still change the momentum of the game.
Despite Cuba's efforts to hang on, it was clear they were running out of steam. According to Mima, just one or two more runs would break them.
Once Cuba's players collapsed, victory would naturally fall to them.
It would happen—he was sure of it!
Carlos, Sawamura.
These guys had already made their presence known. Mima felt that he couldn't stay silent any longer.
In the previous round, he hadn't shown much of a performance.
But this time, he wouldn't let history repeat itself.
Mima stood at the front of the lineup. Even though the pitcher's condition was clearly poor, he showed no sign of backing down.
This was clearly an attempt to force the opponent to submit.
Whrroosh!
The baseball came hurtling toward Mima's head.
This terrifying scene had become almost routine, even for the umpire.
It was clear to everyone that Katro's condition wasn't right.
Though Cuba hadn't collapsed entirely, their pitcher seemed to have lost control and was throwing wildly.
This pitch, just like the previous one, would have been easy for Mima to avoid.
Almost everyone thought so.
But then, something strange happened: Mima didn't step back. He stayed right there in the Batter's Box.
Was he crazy?
Everyone's hearts raced.
The next moment was so intense that no one could take their eyes off it.
Crash!
The baseball struck Mima directly in the head.
And then, he collapsed.
The entire stadium fell into chaos. The stretcher was brought onto the field to carry Mima off.
Everyone stood there, speechless.
Many still didn't even understand what had happened.
What just happened?
...