Lin Wansheng jogged the whole way. Before he had even stepped onto the turf of East River High’s football field, he heard a familiar roar like the bellow of a wild beast.
He quickened his pace, rounded the bleachers, and the scene before him made him stop in his tracks.
Every member of the first team, wearing full training pads, had formed an airtight human wall at the center of the field.
Outside the circle stood the second- and third-team players, each craning his neck, their faces a mixture of excitement and relief.
At the center of the human circle was head coach Martin Bob. Like an enraged lion, he paced back and forth, spittle flying everywhere with his roars.
“Do you know who’s coming to our home field in one week?!” he bellowed at a swaying figure inside the circle.
“It’s our sworn enemy! They’re coming here for one reason and one reason only—to tear you apart! From your body to your soul, they’ll stomp your dignity underfoot and grind it to dust!”
“How many fucking times do I have to say it before you understand, Danny?!”
Coach Bob suddenly stopped, raised a finger, and pointed at a burly man in the human wall like a general calling out a soldier.
“Number 32!”
At his command, the linebacker wearing number 32 charged toward the center of the circle like a bull released from its pen, head lowered.
“Bang!”
A dull, teeth-gritting collision rang out.
Through the gaps in the human wall, Lin Wansheng finally saw who was standing in the middle taking the hit.
It was one of the team’s starting wide receivers.
Danny Perkins.
Danny flew backward like a puppet with its strings cut, crashing hard to the ground and failing to get up for a long while.
“GET THE FUCK UP, DANNY!” Bob’s roar sounded again.
Danny’s teammate, number 89, Blair Kent, couldn’t bear to watch and reached out to pull him up.
“Get off!” Danny flung his hand away, staggered back to his feet,
and stubbornly walked back into the center of the circle, his bloodshot eyes filled with defiance.
“Look at the state of you!” Bob cursed, pointing at his nose. “Your opponents will use every means possible to break you on the field! And you? What the hell are you doing? Drinking! In the fifty-minute break during training, you fucking dared to sneak out and drink!”
“Number 72!”
Another hulking figure rushed out. This time, Danny didn’t even have time to react before he was sent flying again.
“I have had fucking enough!”
Bob’s fury reached its peak. “Get your ass back together, or else!”
“Number 42!”
The third hit.
This time, Danny collapsed to the ground like a pile of mud, completely stunned.
The entire field fell into dead silence.
Coach Bob slowly parted the crowd, walked to Danny’s side, and crouched down.
He leaned straight to Danny’s ear and, with every ounce of strength in his body, unleashed a deafening roar.
“Or else fucking go back home!”
The sound was so loud that even Lin Wansheng, standing at the outermost edge, instinctively shrank his neck.
Let alone Danny lying on the ground.
He was forcibly shaken awake from his daze by that roar.
“You awake now?!”
Bob stood up and looked down at him.
“Can you fucking train properly or not?!”
Danny struggled, propping himself up with his arms, and roared hoarsely.
“Yes!”
“I can’t fucking hear you!” Bob said, even digging at his ear with a finger.
“That voice of yours is quieter than my little daughter’s in kindergarten!”
“Even they’ve got more balls than you!”
Danny’s face instantly swelled into the color of pig liver.
Using every bit of strength in his body, he tore his throat open and roared.
“I can!!!”
“Then get your ass back there and train properly! Stand up!!”
With that, Bob stopped looking at him.
He turned, his gaze sweeping over several of Danny’s friends.
Including the captain, Mark.
“And you lot!”
“Think you’re hot shit? Think I can’t tell when you’ve been drinking?! Huh??”
“Go with him!”
“Run shuttle runs for me!”
“From the goal line to the 20-yard line!”
“Twenty sets!”
“Now! Right now! Immediately!”
“And you, Kevin!” His finger suddenly shot toward Kevin, the anger on his face rising again.
“What the fuck are you even doing here?! Was an entire summer not enough for you to pass your damn algebra?! Tell me, what the hell are you still doing here?!”
“You don’t even have eligibility to play anymore, do you know that?!”
Amid Bob’s furious roars, Kevin’s face alternated between red and pale. He lowered his head, not daring to say a word.
The coach ignored him and instead turned his gaze toward the second-team formation outside the circle, scanning them like a hawk.
“David!” he suddenly shouted.
The second-team wide receiver, David Tucker, jolted all over and instinctively straightened his body.
“You! Get over here!”
David practically sprinted in like he was running the hundred meters.
He rushed into the circle and stood before Bob.
Bob walked up to him, his finger pointed straight at David’s nose.
In a voice filled with pressure, he asked, “Do you dare start?”
A trace of astonishment first flashed through David’s eyes, then was replaced by wild joy and determination. He puffed out his chest and roared with all his strength, “I dare!”
“Can you win?!”
“Of course I can win!!”
“Good!” Bob nodded in satisfaction, then turned and pointed at the dazed, despondent Kevin inside the circle, ordering him in a tone like he was driving away trash.
“You, Kevin, get the fuck out! Go back and read your damn books!”
“When you pass, then you can fucking come back!”
“Your brain’s grown into your ass!”
“Stupid as hell!”
Standing outside the circle and watching all this, Lin Wansheng instantly understood.
A wave of lingering fear passed through his heart. Fuck, good thing he hadn’t agreed to anything Hank said on the spot.
After all that fuss, Kevin had failed summer school.
He had already lost his eligibility to play, so that wide receiver position had been vacant long ago.
Hank’s so-called “helping you get onto the second team” was nothing more than a favor done at no cost!
He had almost sold himself off because of what looked like an enormous favor.
Fortunately, he had thought one step further.
Just as Lin Wansheng was secretly rejoicing,
Coach Bob’s hawk-like gaze suddenly swept across the crowd and locked onto him with precision.
“Jimmy Lin!” the coach roared again. “Get your ass down here!”
Lin Wansheng’s heart skipped a beat. Under everyone’s eyes, he slowly walked into that circle thick with gunpowder.
Coach Bob looked him up and down, his gaze filled with scrutiny and suspicion.
“That old bastard Hank told me you want to play wide receiver?”
Lin Wansheng nodded.
“Do you understand our playbook? Do you know what routes a wide receiver has to run on the field?”
Bob’s tone was full of pressure, as if the moment Lin Wansheng showed even the slightest hesitation, he would be blasted out on the spot.
“I do!” Lin Wansheng answered without the slightest pause.
A trace of surprise flashed across Coach Bob’s face.
He stared into Lin Wansheng’s eyes for several seconds, trying to find even a hint of guilt.
Unfortunately, he found nothing.
“Good!” Bob couldn’t be bothered to waste any more words on Lin Wansheng.
“Get your ass to the second team and report in!”
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