School Begins

A week later, Miuradai's new semester began.

Already thoroughly familiar with the place, Wu Yufei's first stop after entering the school was not his classroom, but the basketball gym.

Inside the gym, Murasame Kengo and Naito Tetsuya had already arrived early to practice.

Ever since Wu Yufei had joined the basketball team, he had been a tremendous source of motivation for the two of them.

"Yo! Captain Murasame, A-Tetsu, you're here so early!"

Wu Yufei entered the gym, set down his backpack, then grabbed a basketball from the sidelines and walked onto the court.

"You're not late either. It's not even seven yet, right?"

Murasame Kengo replied as he shot the ball in his hands.

"Well, my routine's just too regular. I naturally wake up at six and can't fall asleep again, so I figured I'd come practice."

There was still a full hour before classes officially began, making it the perfect time to get in some practice.

"A-Tetsu, let's practice our pick-and-roll plays again!"

"Okay!"

"Then I'll be your practice opponent."

Over the past week, Wu Yufei had often dragged Murasame and Naito into running drills with him. His goal was to help the two build chemistry with him as quickly as possible.

According to Wu Yufei's plan, whether Miuradai could break out of Kanagawa Prefecture this year, make the national tournament, and create new school history would depend on himself and the two men before him!

Murasame had skill, Naito had the physique, and Wu Yufei could organize the offense. As long as the three of them could work together seamlessly on offense, the other two teammates only needed to handle blue-collar duties.

On defense, they would mainly rely on Naito anchoring the paint. His height and bulk spoke for themselves; most centers in the prefecture, even in the country, could not move him. If he sharpened his shot-blocking and rebounding, with the support of blue-collar player Kawasaki Akio, this interior duo would have nothing to fear from Shohoku's Gorilla Brothers. Even against Sanno's strongest pairing of Ohwada and Nobe, they at least had to ensure they would not get crushed!

As long as this plan came together perfectly, forget merely making the national tournament—even if they faced Sanno, Wu Yufei would have the confidence to play with them!

An hour sounded like plenty of time, but once the three of them threw themselves into practice, it passed in a flash.

"Alright, it's the first day of school. Yufei, don't be late—head to class first. Team practice starts at four this afternoon, so make sure you're not late. You can come to the gym and eat lunch with us at noon."

"Okay, I'll head over now."

After packing up and picking up his bag, Wu Yufei left the basketball gym and headed toward the school building.

"Huh? Isn't that Wu Yufei? The one from X Middle School last year?"

"Yeah, yeah! Our middle school played them last year and got utterly destroyed. Our captain cried for hours after going back."

"He actually came to Miuradai this year? I thought Kainan or Shoyo would definitely recruit him."

"Isn't that great? That means we'll be teammates with him for the next three years!"

On the way to the school building, quite a few freshmen who followed or loved basketball recognized Wu Yufei, who had shone brilliantly in last year's middle school basketball scene, and began discussing him.

After arriving at his classroom and finding his seat, Wu Yufei sat down and sprawled across his desk, staring boredly out at the sky.

"Yo! Isn't this Wu Yufei? Long time no see!"

Suddenly, someone Wu Yufei did not recognize at all walked up to him and greeted him with great excitement.

"Uh... and you are?"

Wu Yufei truly did not recognize the person in front of him.

Whenever he had free time lately, Wu Yufei had been digging through the memories in his mind, gradually recovering many of the original owner's memories.

But he genuinely did not know this person.

"That's so cruel!! It's me! Ishiyama Jun! We played each other at last year's middle school prefectural tournament! Toen Middle School!"

Ishiyama Jun's voice was filled with grievance.

"We even shook hands after the game!"

[Toen Middle School...? Hmm...]

Wu Yufei searched his memories as hard as he could for anything related to those four words.

"Oh! I remember now! Toen, the school we beat in the first round last year!"

Wu Yufei finally vaguely remembered something. During his third year of middle school, Toen Middle School had been the first-round opponent for Wu Yufei's school in the prefectural tournament.

He seemed to have posted a perfect stat line of 40+15+15 in that game, while his school had defeated them by a score twice as large as theirs.

The captain of Toen Middle School's team at the time seemed to have been named Ishiyama Jun.

"You've really... changed a lot this past year..."

Wu Yufei looked Ishiyama Jun over a couple of times, unable to reconcile the person before him with the image in his memories.

Compared to the person in his memories, Ishiyama Jun was taller now—by around five centimeters—and his limbs were much more muscular, while his skin had grown darker.

It looked like Ishiyama Jun had put in some serious work over the past year.

"Hehe! Ever since you beat me last time, Yufei, I took the lesson to heart. I didn't waste a single minute over the next half year! During vacation, I even went to Tokyo for a basketball training camp run by former national players. I'm ten times stronger than before now!"

Ishiyama Jun spoke with great pride.

A smile appeared on Wu Yufei's face as well. "Really? That's great. We'll be teammates for the next three years, so let's work hard together. My goal is to dominate the nation!"

"Dominate... the nation? That's quite an impressive goal..."

Looking at Wu Yufei's outstretched hand, Ishiyama Jun froze for a moment. Once he came back to his senses, he immediately smiled and shook it.

"But if it's you, it should be possible. Please take care of me!"

Swish!

The classroom door slid open, and a middle-aged man walked in.

"Good morning, everyone. I'm happy to meet you all. For the next three years, I'll be your homeroom teacher. My name is Yamada. Next..."

First came introductions between classmates. Everyone was already very familiar with this part. Following their seat numbers, they stood one by one to introduce their names, hobbies, and so on.

"My name is Wu Yufei. I'm an exchange student from China. My specialties are singing, dancing, ra... uh, no, no. My specialty is basketball—only basketball! I hope we can get along over the next three years. Thank you."

Wu Yufei did not mention anything about dominating the nation. This was merely a self-introduction among classmates, not a rallying cry for the basketball team. There was no need to talk himself up so much.

Next came the familiar freshman orientation process: gathering in the auditorium, then listening to a lecture by a white-haired old man.

It seemed that leaders loved long-winded speeches no matter what country they were in.

Wu Yufei was nearly about to collapse and fall asleep on the spot before the opening ceremony finally came to a successful end.

After all, it was the first day of school. Every teacher who came afterward basically just gave a simple introduction, then explained the broad outline of their subject in high school.

Soon, the morning came to an end.

"Yufei, let's go eat together!"

Ishiyama Jun approached Wu Yufei with his lunchbox.

"Oh, I'll pass. I promised to have lunch with my basketball teammates, and we can practice a little at noon too..."

Just as Wu Yufei finished declining, he suddenly thought of something.

"Right! Ishiyama, aren't you joining the basketball team too? Why don't you come with me now?"

"Really?! I thought I'd have to wait until the afternoon to go to the gym! I didn't expect you to have already gotten along so well with the basketball team seniors, Yufei! I'm going, I'm going!"

With Ishiyama Jun's face full of excitement, the two left the school building together and arrived at the basketball gym.

"Excuse us!... Huh? Why is no one here?"

Seeing the empty gym, Ishiyama Jun asked in confusion.

"Of course there's no one here. They must all be eating in the lounge. Come with me."

Miuradai was, after all, a somewhat well-known private high school within the prefecture, so its basketball facilities were naturally quite standard. Besides the court and locker rooms, it also had a lounge and a dedicated recording room.

Leading Ishiyama Jun through the building with ease, Wu Yufei arrived at the lounge and, sure enough, heard voices coming from inside.

Knock, knock, knock...

"Oh! Looks like Yufei's here. I'll get the door!"

Creak...

"Yo! Yufei, you finally made it! And who's he?"

The one who came to open the door was the team's friendly veteran, Takatsu Hiroshi. Seeing Ishiyama Jun standing beside Wu Yufei with an excited expression, he asked curiously.

"Hello, senpai! I'm Ishiyama Jun from Class 1-A. I want to join Miuradai's basketball team too!"

Ishiyama Jun immediately introduced himself.

Everyone had gathered because they loved basketball, and with Ishiyama Jun's cheerful, easygoing personality, he naturally got along with the second- and third-year seniors very quickly.

After everyone finished lunch and rested briefly, they began practicing in the basketball gym.

The coach had made no special arrangements for noon practice. Everyone had simply come voluntarily, so naturally it was nothing especially formal.

They just ran plays, played one-on-one, or found a hoop to practice by themselves—whatever they felt like doing.

They kept practicing until twenty minutes before afternoon classes. Only then did Wu Yufei change clothes and pack up. After arranging to meet his teammates for team practice that afternoon, he left the gym with Ishiyama Jun.

The afternoon classes were just as boring for Wu Yufei.

After all, in his previous life, Wu Yufei had gotten into a top university and consistently earned scholarships. He could barely be considered half a top student, so high school classes now felt like a high schooler sitting through first-grade math. If all of you had to go back and listen to lessons on one plus one, could you still stay alert? It would be impressive if you did not fall asleep on the spot.

Once afternoon classes ended, Miuradai High officially entered club activity time.

Wu Yufei and Ishiyama Jun headed straight for the basketball gym.

"Yo! Yufei and A-Jun, you're here. Perfect timing—we're holding rookie tryouts right now. You two should go through the process too."

Murasame Kengo smiled as he explained to the two at the gym entrance.

Right! He had forgotten about that part.

Only then did Wu Yufei remember that he and Ishiyama Jun were first-year freshmen who had officially enrolled only today. By rights, they really did need to go through this formality.