Alex pulled off his suit jacket and threw it down in the dirt like it was nothing.

Then he rolled his shirtsleeves back and walked over to Suho.

“Stop. That’s enough.”

Suho had been swinging the axe like a machine, and the movement stopped.

He was covered in sweat, and he looked at Alex with puzzled eyes.

“From here on, quit thinking. You just do exactly what I tell you.”

Alex got behind Suho and forced his stance into a different shape.

“Your stance is too wide. It’s stable, but it locks your hips up. Bring it in a little.”

When Suho moved his feet, Alex’s hand came down on his pelvis.

“And don’t hit with your arms. Your engine isn’t up there. It’s here.”

Alex tapped at Suho’s stomach and his back with the edge of his hand.

“Now again. And this time don’t think about swinging an axe. Just think about shoving my hand away with your hips. Go!”

Suho hesitated and put force into it, and Alex bellowed at him.

“No! Take the strength out of your arms! Push with your hips, idiot!”

Suho set his back teeth, let his arms go slack, and shoved Alex’s hand away with nothing but the rotation of his core and his hips.

The axe came flying at the tree as though the rotation had dragged it out with it.

Crack!

It was a clear, deep sound, nothing like anything he had produced all day.

Suho’s eyes went wide.

He had put almost no strength into his arms, and the axe was buried far deeper than before.

Alex clicked his tongue, satisfied.

There it is. The raw power on this kid is insane. The way to go is to use it, not hold it down.

Then he tore down the sensation Suho had only just managed to get hold of.

“Good. Forget that one. Next.”

“What? Wh— why?”

Alex ignored the question.

“This time take the axe all the way up over your head. Then draw the whole of your back like a bow and drive it down into the trunk.”

Suho was confused, but he followed the instruction without a word of complaint.

He brought the axe down with the feeling of his entire back being pulled taut.

Crunch!

This one was duller than the last, but it was the sound of heavy force going into something.

It sounded like the tree screaming.

“Whoa…”

The exclamation broke out of Suho on its own.

He had been given a few sentences of advice and the results of his swing were changing in real time.

But the one who was actually shocked was Alex.

This is insane… what the hell is this kid’s talent made of?

It wasn’t simply that he soaked things up like a sponge.

That second swing tears a man’s lower back apart if the mobility in his thoracic spine and the flexibility in his lats aren’t there to support it. That’s true of most major leaguers.

Alex had spent decades analyzing thousands of bodies.

Ninety-nine percent of players had a clear ceiling.

One had strength like an ox but was too stiff, so his rotation was blocked.

Another was flexible but had no core to generate force with.

So his job had always been to find them a set of mechanics that compromised sensibly inside those limits.

But this one was different.

The muscular endurance to survive five hours of axe work. Natural strength he was born with. And on top of that, the flexibility to carry out the movement he just carried out.

Alex swallowed dryly.

Suho’s body was not a body with a limit on it.

It was a perfect vessel, one that could hold anything you poured into it.

Don’t tell me. Could this kid take on full-body rotational mechanics? The kind even MVP-level major leaguers can’t fully handle?

What had started as a lesson had turned into an experiment.

Alex’s eyes were shining.

The truth was that what he wanted Suho to do now belonged to the realm of creation.

His heart was going like a scientist’s who had finally found the perfect subject to prove his theory on.

“Hey. You’ve got a game to play, so let’s do one more and get out of here.”

“Ah! That’s right.”

Suho was a minor leaguer now.

A professional with games he had to play in.

He had been so far inside the training that he’d forgotten the most important thing there was.

Alex didn’t lay a hand on Suho’s body this time.

Instead he went straight into explanation.

No. Into description.

“From here you throw thought away. Your body is one giant rubber band.”

“…”

“Drive your feet into the ground. Then twist through the waist as far as it goes. Right up to the moment before it bursts.”

Alex’s voice came low.

“And then just let it go.”

Suho closed his eyes.

The sensation of five hours of axe work repeated like a madman.

And the understanding Alex had been trying to force into him a moment ago.

All of it came together into one thing inside his head.

Suho opened his eyes again.

Then he carried out Alex’s instruction and swung the axe.

Starting from the soles of his feet driving off the ground.

Riding the pelvis where the force turned explosively.

Passing through a spine that bent like a bow.

And finally out to the arm that broke loose like a whip.

It moved like one continuous thing.

The result.

Craaaack!

Nothing before it had made a sound like that.

It rang through the whole forest like a bomb going off.

He had swung the axe exactly once at a fresh tree.

And the center of the trunk was crushed past all recognition, like something enormous had taken a bite out of it.

Suho stood frozen where he was, the axe still in his hands, dragging in rough breaths.

He could not begin to believe what had just happened.

“Wh— what was that…”

But Alex gave him no time to be amazed.

“We need to go!”

“Ah! Yes! Yes!”

Suho lifted his sweat-soaked shirt to wipe his face, then stopped short as he was about to get into Alex’s car.

“Um…”

“Just get in. I’ll have it washed.”

Later, in the car on the way back, it was Alex who broke the silence.

“How was it?”

How was it?

It had simply been the best.

He had never in his life had a swing come off that clean.

There are dozens of different kinds of mechanics.

But everything up to now had felt unnatural somehow, like clothes that didn’t fit his body.

The mechanics Alex had given him at the end were on another level entirely.

Alex raised one eyebrow, pleased with himself.

“You’ve studied mechanics a lot, haven’t you? I could see it while you were swinging that axe.”

“Yes. That’s right.”

“But that last one was new, wasn’t it?”

Suho nodded.

He had studied mechanics a great deal.

He had been proud of knowing every set of mechanics in the world.

But that last one he hadn’t known at all.

Somehow or other, it hadn’t been in the data.

And there was a reason for that.

As it happens, the two players in the majors right now who execute hitting mechanics like these are Shohei Ohtani and Mike Trout.

And those two are as good as anyone the major leagues have.

Which was exactly the point.

Not just anybody could copy it.

So nobody had ever thought to teach it.

“So here’s a question. You knew that many different mechanics. How were you still such a mess?”

Suho gave a bitter smile.

“I think it’s because I never got a chance.”

Alex stroked his chin, interested.

“Hey now. You can even diagnose yourself properly. That’s right. If you’d been given chances steadily, you might have become a better player than you are now.”

Alex didn’t know Suho’s past.

But even so, he could tell easily enough that Suho hadn’t been given his chances.

Because it was a tragedy that happened all the time in America too, not only in Korea.

The famous example is the Yankees.

Yankees pitching coaches, chasing results, had pitchers throw sliders that didn’t suit them.

Several of those men had their arms ruined.

The particulars are different, but it comes to the same thing in the end — nobody has the room to invest years in one player’s potential.

If it was like that in America, what could Korea possibly be like?

The pool is narrow enough that not getting a chance at all is the ordinary course of things.

“It’s all right.”

“What?”

“I think I’m lucky to have found what fits me, even now.”

Ha…

Alex barely swallowed the laugh trying to get out of him.

Where the hell does a makeup like that come from?

If you judged him on makeup alone, he was probably far above the men currently in the major leagues.

Alex had not looked at Suho’s scouting report.

So he didn’t know that Suho had been given full marks in exactly that category.

Reports were simply outside his interest.

This kid. He might make it sooner than I figured.

Suho was plainly going to produce, starting today.

He had found mechanics that fit him, for one thing.

They call baseball a mental game.

And he had better makeup than the men already in the majors.

Which meant Suho now had the hitting and the makeup at the same time.

So before long a stage as small as Low-A wasn’t going to be enough to hold him.

Not that he’s a finished article, of course. There’s a pile of growing left in him.

All that had happened was that a frame had finally gone up on an empty lot.

Still, with anything at all, the frame is what matters most.

And this is the most important stretch of it.

Men who overrate themselves off one small success, lose the road they were meant to walk, and fall apart — this business is full of them.

Judging by his character, Suho wasn’t the type you commonly saw in America.

Even so, I came out here to help, and I’m not going to stand in front of potential like that and let it rot.

Alex made up his mind to give him a warning.

“You’ve still got a long way to go. It’s another thousand miles to the summit they call the major leagues.”

The voice was as arrogant as ever, and there was a sharp warning inside it.

“That rush you just felt — enjoy it as far as the car door and no further. The moment you step out of this thing, forget every bit of it. This business is stacked with geniuses who got drunk on that feeling, got lazy about the work, and disappeared. Your swing is still a mess. Stance, weight transfer, the angle of your wrists at impact. You’ve got a mountain of things to fix.”

It was only to be expected.

The frame was up, so now the old had to be thrown out completely and new flesh built onto it.

Suho bowed his head at once at the warning.

There wasn’t a trace of complaint anywhere in his face, and no resentment either.

There was only the seriousness of a student carving a teacher’s lesson into himself.

“Yes. Thank you. I’ll hold on to that. What I felt today is only the start, and I won’t forget it.”

The answer pulled a laugh out of Alex before he knew it was coming.

This guy really is something.

Alex had liked the grit with the madness in it that he’d shown swinging the axe.

But the thing that actually moved him was what he had just seen.

Talent held without arrogance, and the humility to take a warning.

And above all, the cold clarity to know exactly where he stood.

A prospect with that kind of character was a real rarity here in America.

If he ever became a star—

No. He doesn’t even need that.

Alex shook his head inwardly.

A kid like this is going to be loved anywhere he goes, starting now.

Suho and Alex went straight to Taylor’s office.

The moment the door opened and they stepped in, Taylor looked up from the paperwork he had his nose in, and his brow came down.

His eyes went past Alex and fixed on Suho standing behind him.

The state of Suho was a sight.

His whole body was caked with sweat and dirt, and his training gear was scratched here and there as though he’d been dragged through branches.

His face was worn down with exhaustion, and yet, strangely, his eyes alone were burning brighter than they ever had.

He looked like a monk who had come down from deep in the mountains with enlightenment on him.

Taylor opened his mouth like a man at the end of his patience.

“…What in God’s name have you been doing out there?”

He had sent the boy off to be taught mechanics.

What was standing in front of him was some wild animal that had rolled down a mountainside.

Alex only shrugged and answered like none of it was his business.

“Don’t tell me you don’t trust me now.”

“It isn’t that, but…”

“Then what’s the problem?”

What’s the problem?

Taylor barely swallowed the words that wanted out.

The problem was standing right in front of him.

But he kept it to himself.

Alex Rivera.

In this field, arguing with the man’s methods was a waste of breath.

So Taylor changed the question instead.

“Is the kid in any condition to play today?”

“Search me. Why are you asking me?”

Alex jerked his chin toward Suho, and Taylor’s eyes went back to him.

“Can you play today?”

Suho gave a short nod.

“Yes. I can play.”

“Fine. But you’re not taking the field in that state, so go wash up and get into your uniform. Quickly.”

Suho bowed and left the office.

The door shut behind him, and Taylor got to the point.

He had no interest in the process at all.

“So? Do you think he can produce? You know as well as I do that our playoff fight is tight right now.”

“Search me. Baseball’s a sport nobody can predict, isn’t it?”

“That’s true enough.”

“But this much I’m sure of.”

A thin smile settled at the corner of Alex’s mouth.

“Whatever you saw on that video, you won’t be seeing it again.”

Taylor’s eyes went wide.

“What? He’s got mechanics installed? Already? In one day?”

“Honestly, that part throws me too. I’ve never seen a kid pick things up that fast. If I had to guess — he’s a blank page, but he’s played the game before. And he knows the principles. Looks like he studied hard to get mechanics installed.”

Alex broke off for a moment and settled back deep into the chair.

His eyes had a mischievous shine to them.

“Anyway, you need him right now yourself. Otherwise would you have given a thought to putting a kid who turned up looking like a beggar into a ballgame? If I’d told you no. Would you have kept him out of it?”

“Th— that’s… no.”

The bunt from yesterday, and the life that one play had put into the team, was still lodged in his mind.

The major leagues go wild for superstars.

Because a superstar is a player who changes the whole feel of a game in one stroke.

And Suho plainly had that potential in him.

Which was why even these two couldn’t help being curious about how far he had come in a single day.

End of Chapter 24