3rd POV:
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Rain pattered softly on the futsal shed's tin roof, drumming out a lazy rhythm that matched the beat in Isagi's head.
Inside, the fluorescent lights flickered like they were too tired to care. But Isagi cared. He always did.
He was alone, as usual. The ball rolled to a stop against his worn sneakers.
He stood just under 181cm — taller than average for fifteen, sharp-angled with messy, dark hair that stayed damp from sweat and drizzle. His shoulders had started to broaden, finally catching up to his frame, but he still moved light, like he didn't carry any weight at all.
He let the ball drift past.
'Centre-back leans left… keeper too slow on his drop step… there.'
His eyes flicked up. One stride. One swing.
The ball cracked off the far board, dead-center.
---
Isagi didn't fall in love with football because of the roar of crowds or the flash of stars.
He fell for the silence.
The kind of silence that came with 3AM replays on his dad's old CRT. No audio, no replays, no glamour. Just static and decision-making.
At nine, he watched grainy J-League reruns and pointed at every mistake like it offended him personally.
"Why doesn't the winger cut in there?"
His dad glanced over from his half-assembled toaster.
"You even know the offside rule, Yo-chan?"
"Yeah, they don't seem to though."
His mom laughed. His dad didn't. He looked at his son's eyes and saw something odd in them.
Not wonder.
Correction.
---
By age ten, he was chalking fake sidelines behind the convenience store before sunrise. His mom caught him once in the rain and thought he was doing geometry homework on the pavement.
"Yoichi, is that… triangles?"
"Yeah," he said, scribbling 4–3–3 press trigger across a corner of concrete. "Advanced algebra."
She didn't get it. Neither did his classmates. But his dad? His dad started saving for better boots.
---
Isagi didn't like being the conductor. Midfield was too… polite.
He wanted to end plays, not guide them.
He didn't orchestrate. He finished.
So when a local academy opened a weekend camp, he showed up in rain boots and a plastic poncho. No invite. No gear.
Just a fire in his eyes and a football under his arm.
They laughed.
Until he stepped onto the pitch, nutmegged their captain, and curled in a screamer from 30.
They stopped laughing.
The coach wrote his name down.
Isagi threw the paper away.
"Too predictable," he muttered. "They pass like robots."
---
He called it Pathfinding.
When he played under pressure, when it mattered, faint threads appeared across the pitch — moving outlines of people's next actions.
Gaps that hadn't opened yet.
Blind spots that didn't exist until they did.
Threads.
To everyone else, it looked like instinct.
To him? It was just... knowing.
---
Flashback — Regional U-15 Semifinal: Tetsusaka Middle vs. Kurasawa Academy
Rain turned the grass into mud. Passes stuck. Runs slipped.
Tetsusaka trailed 0–2. Midfield in shambles. No energy. No belief.
The coach stared at the field like it betrayed him.
Isagi stood from the bench and rolled his shoulders.
"Coach," he said.
"You're not a striker," the man said automatically.
"I'm not asking to be one."
That got his attention.
"What're you asking, then?"
Isagi stared past him, eyes locked on the soaked pitch.
"For the win."
The coach didn't say anything for a moment.
"…You've got twelve minutes. Pull a miracle — or sit down and shut up."
---
Minute 68
Kurasawa didn't mark him.
They didn't even notice.
He ghosted past their midfield, waited on the edge of the line, and let the ball roll by him untouched.
The centre-back bit. Isagi let him.
Quick pivot. In behind. Thread pass from midfield — almost too slow.
But he was already gone.
'Left foot. Bottom corner. Keeper's weight's on the wrong leg.'
1–2.
---
Minute 70
Kick-off. Kurasawa panicked. Pressed high.
Isagi drifted. Didn't retreat — baited.
Midfielder fumbled a lazy square pass.
Interception.
He sprinted. Defender closing.
He looked up.
'Keeper shifted left early… wind adds curl… fade the strike.'
One bounce.
Crack.
Shot from 35 metres.
Bar-down. Goal.
2–2.
The stadium buzzed. Not loud — confused. Like they were asking what just happened.
Isagi didn't even look up.
---
Minute 76
Kurasawa adjusted. Five at the back. Too late.
Cross came in. Tetsusaka's keeper punched. Ball popped high.
Everyone watched it fall like it was made of glass.
Isagi moved first.
Chest trap. Flicked over the captain. Let it bounce.
Another defender lunged.
He stepped around.
Triple nutmeg.
Toe-poke.
3–2.
The rain paused — or maybe no one noticed it anymore.
---
Minute 80 +1
Desperation. Sloppy fouls.
One defender shoulder-checked him.
He staggered — then kept running.
Another tried to shove him off the ball.
He stopped dead.
The defender slid past, helpless.
Isagi turned, flicked it through his legs.
"Where you going?" he asked, half-smile cracking through.
Curl. Left foot. Edge of the box.
4–2.
Hat-trick? No. Four.
---
The ref blew the whistle.
The scoreboard blinked.
TETSUSAKA 4 – 2 KURASAWA
Four goals. Twelve minutes.
Isagi didn't raise his hands.
Didn't smile.
He just looked up — through the rain.
The threads were gone. For now.
---
In the Stands…
Anri Teieri sat beneath a cheap black umbrella, the kind handed out by the school hosting the regional tournament. It did little against the sideways rain.
Her university windbreaker was soaked through, her clipboard water-streaked, and her hair stuck to her cheeks — but she didn't notice.
She wasn't here as a fan.
As a newly placed assistant under the JFA's youth development program, she'd been tasked with scouting overlooked regions and gathering talent data. Her superior called it "a formality."
She didn't think so anymore.
"Who the hell is that?" she asked the man beside her — an older scout from the local federation.
"Isagi Yoichi," he replied. "Tetsusaka Middle School. Forward. Ghost file."
"Ghost?"
"No academy. No regional invite. Just plays for a regular school. We've got barely any tape on him."
Anri stared down at the field, still catching her breath.
"…He didn't just play."
The man glanced over.
"He didn't just read the match," she said softly, scribbling the name into her drenched notes.
"…He rewrote it."
---
Author's Note –
I wanted to reimagine Isagi as something other, not just a tactical genius but a silent storm — someone who sees football in threads and rewrites fate through motion. This isn't canon Isagi. This is Alternate No.11 — a striker who finishes, rewrites, and walks alone.