CHAPTER 89: HORIZON VS SEIRYUU : LINES OF CODE, BEATS OF CHAOS 3

Pass.

Catch.

One step.

Rise.

Dirga’s form twisted in the air.

Perfect. Effortless.

THREE.

BOOM.

35 – 23.

Coach Renjirō’s laptop beeped.

The code window flickered. His hands hovered over the keys—but froze.

On-screen, Dirga’s movement string rendered as:

[ NULL ]

UNDEFINED INPUT

ERROR: PREDICTION FAILURE

"...We can’t track him," Renjirō whispered.

Back on the court, the world still slowed.

The Godframe—still active.

Dirga scanned again.

Hiroki flared to the corner—his arc stiff. He’s a decoy.

Taiga’s post-up looked solid—but his shoulder dipped. He’s baiting a double.

The ball rotated. Horizon moved like liquid, sculpted by Dirga’s invisible baton.

He wasn’t calling plays.

He was conducting.

A Maestro way.

Then—he saw it.

A pressure line forming on Seiryuu’s weak side. A miscommunication. A mismatch.

Thread locked.

Timer: 12 seconds left.

Godframe: 14 seconds remaining.

"Now."

Dirga cut diagonally—ruthless, perfect.

Caught the ball mid-stride.

Spun between Seta and Mikami.

Two hands rose—late.

Finger roll.

Whistle.

And one.

37 – 23.

And in the last seconds of his Godframe, as the world began to return to normal time...

Dirga turned to the Seiryuu bench.

He didn’t smirk.

Didn’t taunt.

He just raised a single finger—pointed at Renjirō’s glowing laptop.

Then tapped his temple once.

"This... can’t solve me."

The gym didn’t know how to breathe.

That’s how it felt. Like the entire arena had forgotten to inhale. After Dirga’s steal, triple, and the and-one layup, the crowd was suspended in a collective silence—too stunned to cheer, too shaken to blink.

Dirga stood at the free-throw line. His chest rose slowly, his eyes half-lidded, posture relaxed, yet something in his presence made the whole court feel full. Like he was pulling gravity.

He bounced the ball once.

Twice.

And shot.

Swish.

38 – 23.

But he wasn’t done.

He couldn’t be.

The Godframe was gone—but Flow State still surged through his blood like a divine rhythm. His vision narrowed, not in focus, but in clarity. The noise of the crowd became pressure in his lungs. The scent of varnished hardwood, sweat, and chalk clung to his skin like armor.

Seiryuu inbounded quickly, trying to push the pace before Horizon could set.

Seta Naoto sprinted up the sideline—determined, surgical. He called for "Beta Flow," a temporary routine designed to bypass Dirga’s coverage by overloading the weak side. It worked in simulations.

But Dirga?

Dirga didn’t care about simulations.

He moved before the play even launched, cutting off an angle he shouldn’t have known was coming. His feet weren’t sprinting—they were gliding. Like he was skating across lines of invisible script only he could read.

Seta passed crosscourt—

And Dirga tipped it.

The ball fluttered midair.

Hiroki snatched it.

One touch. Over to Taiga.

Dirga was already ahead.

He called for the ball with just a glance.

Caught it in stride. Didn’t even bother gathering.

He rose from the right wing—fadeaway three, off-balance, contested.

Swish.

41 – 23.

The gym exploded.

Not just in cheers—but in shock. In disbelief. In awe.

Even the Seiryuu fans, ever-calm and analytical, were now looking at each other with furrowed brows.

"Is this really high school basketball?" someone whispered in the stands.

No.

It wasn’t.

It was Dirga basketball.

On Seiryuu’s bench, Renjirō Tsukinomiya’s laptop buzzed again. Data stream corrupted. Predictive charts desynced. Error codes climbed like vines on the screen.

UNSTABLE VARIABLE DETECTED

TEMPORAL ANOMALY — RESYNCING REQUIRED

"...He’s bending the game," Renjirō whispered. "He’s... breaking it."

Seiryuu tried to answer. Teshima powered in with a bruising drive, forcing contact. Foul. Free throws. Clean. Clinical.

41 – 25.

But Horizon didn’t slow.

Dirga inbounded fast—no delay. The moment the ball touched his palms, he exploded forward. 200% power surging through his limbs, through his breath, through his will.

One dribble past half-court.

He didn’t wait.

Didn’t call for a screen.

Just slammed on the brakes.

Pulled back.

Step-back three.

High arc.

Defender’s hand grazing his elbow.

Didn’t matter.

Splash.

44 – 25.

A heat check

The Seiryuu coach didn’t move.

He couldn’t.

They’d built a fortress of data, of certainty.

And Dirga had kicked in the front door.

Seiryuu knew they needed a clean finish. A morale-saving final word. So they ran their sharpest routine—every player touching the ball, screens firing like pistons in a machine.

Mikami faked right. Flared left. Naoto passed through a backdoor. Jinbo sealed under the rim.

Layup.

44 – 27.

Clean. Executed.

But not enough.

With 6 seconds left, Dirga grabbed the ball from the baseline.

Most would dribble it out.

But Dirga?

He ran.

The air split around him as he dashed up the court—each stride a thunderclap.

Five seconds.

Crossed half-court.

Four.

Zigzag. He dodged a defender like a shadow slipping through fog.

Three.

Pulled up just past the logo.

Two.

He rose.

Silence.

One.

BOOM.

47 – 27.

Buzzer-beater. From the heavens.

The entire stadium was tilted.

The bench screamed. Taiga threw a towel in the air. Ayaka that watch dropped a water bottle. Coach Tsugawa didn’t even move—just folded his arms and said, under his breath:

"Let’s see them predict that."

As the buzzer echoed through the arena and Dirga Renji walked off the court like a storm just passing through the court exhaled like it had just survived a typhoon.

The crowd—still standing.

Players—still catching their breath.

And in the commentary booth, the veteran announcer leaned back in his chair, headset slightly askew, as if unsure whether he’d just witnessed a high school match... or something else.

His co-commentator finally broke the silence.

"You see a kid like that once in a generation."

The older man nodded slowly, eyes still fixed on Dirga walking calmly toward the bench.

Then, with a quiet breath, he leaned into the mic.

"It’s 2009. Most teams are still figuring out how to use stat sheets."

"Wakayama’s running numbers like a Profesional program."

"Ladies and gentlemen... we came to watch data vs instinct. But what we’re witnessing—what Dirga is doing out there... it’s not instinct anymore."

He paused. Swallowed.

"That’s what genius looks like... when it stops waiting for permission."

Fade to halftime.