Bab 158: Sixth Round (7)

Shun took the mound again to pitch the bottom of the third inning. Kasuga's offense started with their seventh batter in the box, and Shun intended to continue his streak of outs.

This inning, it seemed the batters had been instructed to take a more cautious approach against Shun, letting him pitch not only to observe his pitches but also to wear out his arm.

However, even with the batters swinging less, Shun didn't lose his momentum, pitching with everything he had into Daigo's glove. After all, he had visualized many ways Kasuga's batters might try to handle him, and waiting for pitches was certainly something he'd anticipated, as Kasuga wasn't the first team to adopt this strategy against him.

Shun faced the seventh batter with a mix of his vertical and horizontal sliders, and though he allowed two balls and one foul, he managed to strike out the batter in six pitches.