Seokjin and the Heirs of the Korean Miracle - BOOK 1 ✔

Chapter 8 : Breathless

Seeing that the second half of the match was about to begin, Seokjin gave his ventolin back to his coach, who absentmindedly stuffed it into his pocket, and went to replace himself on the field. The ball was at Choseon but at the referee's whistle, the first pass was intercepted by a player who had stung like lightning. Seokjin. He wanted to immediately regain control in this second half by burying Choseok's hopes with a third goal.

"Dae-ho!" he shouted to his captain, telling him to get on.

But he suddenly found himself surrounded by the opposition midfielders and had to dribble past them one after the other with agility. He got away with being faster than them but he was so out of breath that he was delighted to get rid of his ball and sent it to another of his teammates who quickly passed it to Dae-Ho... who scored.

Gugbo's camp roars with delight. Their team had just scored after a few seconds thanks to the speed of action of Seokjin. The Choseon players were upset that they let Seokjin through and allowed his team to dig in the score 3 to 0. It now seemed impossible for them to catch Gugbo in this final which seemed to designate them as the winner of the tournament.

"Keep pressing, it's only been a few seconds since we started," Jungkook encouraged them as he saw Seokjin, panting, praising his captain from afar instead of going up to him, in a desire to preserve his energy.

Unlike Seokjin who did not celebrate his goals in a bombastic way but walked away from the goal in all humility, Dae-Ho swaggered across the field, did not hesitate to taunt his adversaries in passing, and took so long to recover his position to allow the match to resume that the referee administered him a yellow card which annoyed Seokjin. Jungkook approached him:

"If he takes a second yellow card and he goes off the fields, you'll be the one to become captain I hope. But it will be hard to manage a ten-man final match."

"I can do it, don't fear for us, you can continue to fear our attack," Seokjin affirmed with a tired smile. "We will beat you at 11 or 10 player if we have to."

But not if the missing player is you, silly, Jungkook thought, smiling at him nonetheless.

"If you say so!" He said.

Jungkook went on the next attack, eager to show that he too was dangerous in this match. However, he frustratedly felt Seokjin stalking him behind him. So you never give up, Jin?! No doubt, this boy was definitely too fast and persevering for his own good. But he had a disability that was becoming more and more obvious to Jungkook's ears hearing just behind him his inconstant and noisy breathing. It was almost as if he had no control over his breath. Weird for a sportsman, thought Jungkook. So then, at that moment, he understood.

I know your biggest weak point Kim Seokjin, that means my strategy was the right one, Jungkook jubilant.

"Jae!" he shouted to one of his teammates.

He passed the ball to his teammates to continue the attack and as for himself, stopped abruptly. Seokjin, carried away by his too fast running and not expecting to see him stop so suddenly, hit him head on. He felt like he had hit a wall as Jungkook was so physically imposing and was thrown back onto the lawn with a groan of pain. He was so stunned that he didn't get up right away.

"Oh sorry, Jin!" Jungkook said, turning around and seeing Seokjin on the ground, and reaching out a hand to help him up. "Do you want me to call the medical team?"

Seokjin shook his head as he grabbed Jungkook's hand and standing up, gestured to the referee that everything was fine to save Jungkook from receiving a yellow card like Dae-Ho. He didn't realize his nose had started bleeding.