chsdbacks Chapter 316: Heroes vs Monsters(5)
Chapter 316: Heroes vs Monsters(5)
The sharp, annoying sound of the referee’s whistle blasted through the Sector Central arena. That was the signal for the fourth quarter to start. Suddenly, the whole place felt heavy, like the air was pushing down on everyone. For the first time that night, the crowd actually shut up. Even the metal beams of the stadium seemed to shake just from the vibe coming off Nash.Blacklist 78 - 70 Falcons
Nia and Jaz were getting ready to jump back into the game. But the second their shoes touched the wooden floor, they both stopped dead. They were staring at Nash’s back. His shoulders and the veins in his arms looked like they were about to pop through his skin, and his green eyes were glowing with this scary, predator-like rage. Jaz let out a shaky breath, and Nia looked over at the Falcons’ bench with a look that basically said, "Poor things."
"Man..." Jaz muttered, rubbing her throat. "Why did you have to make him mad?"
"Yup, they are dead," Nia added. She looked straight at Shane, who was getting ready to enter the game. "You have no idea what you just woke up."
Right in front of Nash’s eyes, a blood-red screen from the System popped up.
[Special Rare Quest: The One-Man Army]
Objective: Defeat the Falcons while maintaining a team offensive participation rate under 50% for your teammates.
Rewards: [Hidden]
Failure: -15% Stamina Recovery for 48 hours.
Nash did not even notice the quest, all his focus and attention was on a single task: Demolish Griffin and the entirety of the Falcons.
Across from him, Griffin was frozen. The red-haired guy was in a defensive stance, but his legs were shaking. He was sweating buckets, and it felt like there was a giant weight crushing his chest every time Nash took a step toward him. Griffin thought he was a main character in a show, believing in courage and breaking limits, but he could not understand this feeling.
Fear.
This was not just a sports rivalry. This was not just another tense game.
It was pure terror. It was the feeling an animal gets when it realizes it just locked itself in a cage with a furious beast. Not an hungry beast that would just eat you, but one mad creature that would use everything just to destroy you.
"Form a wall! Do not let him breathe!" Erica was screaming from the bench, her hands cupped around her mouth like she was trying to shout across a canyon.
The Falcons didn’t need to be told twice. They went into full survival mode. The very second Fred passed the ball in, Griffin, Ryan, and John basically threw their entire bodies at Nash, swarming his huge body.
He feels like a fucking wall, John thought. He was starting to freak out, and his hands were actually shaking as he gripped Nash. We are throwing three guys at this one dude and he has not even moved an inch!
Move, damn it! Just move! Griffin’s brain was screaming, grinding his teeth. He was giving it everything, but it felt like he was trying to push a mountain.
Nash slowly looked down with those glowing green eyes of his. He saw the three pairs of hands clutching his clothes and blocking his way. He gave their defense a quick, cold look. His face was just... blank. It was kind of terrifying how unbothered he looked.
Fred, the point guard, tried to move the ball around the edge to get around the "mountain," but Nash’s presence was so scary that the passing lanes felt blocked. Panicking because the clock was ticking, Fred threw a risky pass toward John.
Big mistake.
S-shit...! John gasped, because he already knew.
Nash exploded forward with terrifying speed. He slammed into the three defenders with one big body check, sending them flying back two meters. It was like they had all run into a garbage truck. He snatched the ball out of the air with one hand.
"Damn it! Get back on defense!" Shane screamed from the bench, jumping up.
The Falcons tried to react, but Nash did not pass the ball. He dribbled it himself, sprinting down the court at a speed that made no sense for a guy that big. Griffin refused to give up and threw himself in the way, spreading his arms and gritting his teeth.
"I am not letting you pass!" Griffin yelled.
Nash drove straight at him, staring right through the rookie. The second he reached Griffin, Nash did a lightning-fast crossover. He shifted his weight so quickly it was almost impossible, and Griffin lost his balance completely. His sneakers screeched on the floor, and his ankles just gave out.
The rookie fell hard on his ass, his legs splayed out. He looked up with wide eyes, totally shocked, as Nash zoomed past him without even looking back.
Ryan, the other big guy, tried to stop him under the rim. Nash did not even try to trick him. He took two steps from the free-throw line and launched himself into the air like a missile. He jumped so high that his chest was actually above the rim. Ryan just stood there, pinned to the floor by how explosive the jump was. Nash slammed both hands down on the rim, smashing the ball through the net with so much force that the glass backboard bent.
BOOM!
The whole arena shook. Nash landed perfectly on his feet, the net still swinging wildly. He looked down at Griffin, who was trying to push himself up from the floor.
"Stand up, I’m not done wiping the floor with your ass," Nash said.
Griffin’s body froze. For a split second, his breath caught in his throat, his amber eyes dilating in a volatile mixture of pure shock and blinding humiliation. He couldn’t handle humiliation, but disrespect? Nah, that one would be on him.
But it was far from being over, sadly for him. For the next three minutes, everyone in the arena just watched as Nash basically destroyed the Falcons. It was a one-sided massacre. He was not even following a game plan anymore; he was just hunting down every single player on the court like they were targets.
"Shane, cut the lane! Don’t let him push you out!" Erica screamed from the sidelines. Her eyes were wide open, staring at Nash’s huge body as he brought the ball up the court by himself again. Usually, she was the calm one, but that was gone. Now, she just felt a deep fear. "John, double him! Do it now!"
Shane and John rushed in from the middle of the court, trying to trap Nash at the top of the key. On paper, it was a perfect defensive move to choke him off.
But Nash didn’t slow down. He kept the ball low, pounding it hard against the floor, and attacked the gap between them without hesitation. At the last second, he shifted his weight and whipped the ball behind his back in one powerful motion.
The orange leather rocketed right between Shane’s legs, so close it nearly brushed the inside of his thigh. Shane snapped his knees together too late, the move left him off-balance and exposed.
The behind-the-back dribble split the trap cleanly.
Nash then exploded forward. He used his massive frame and shoulder to seal the lane, not a reckless charge, but a controlled bump that used his size and momentum to hold his path. John, already lunging desperately to recover, got spun around and stumbled backward, nearly colliding with the referee as he tried to regain his footing.
Nash was already gone.
"Fucking...!" Shane hissed. He rolled over on his hip, gasping for air, while Nash exploded toward the middle of the paint.
Ryan jumped up from the low block, stretching his arms out to act like a human wall, but Nash didn’t even look at him. He did this high-speed move, a euro-step that looked like it defied physics, shifting his body from left to right in a split second. Ryan’s knees locked up. He lost his balance completely and just fell sideways into the dust. Nash finished it off with a soft, almost mocking finger-roll that kissed the glass and dropped right through the net.
Blacklist 82 - 72 Falcons.
Griffin was finally back on his feet. His jersey was torn at the collar and he was breathing like he had just run a marathon. He chased Nash down the floor, looking desperate.
"You think you can just walk through us?! Face me, damn you! Face me!" he yelled, his voice cracking.
Nash did not even look back at him. He just kept going with the annihilation. The demolition on the court was just getting worse. It felt like a psychological meat grinder, and for the Falcons, every single play felt like a desperate struggle just to get the less humiliation.
Erica looked at Fred and Shane and realized they were completely out of their league. They couldn’t keep up with how fast Nash was moving. In a panic, she called for a substitution. She waved Alex onto the court to play small forward, praying that having a veteran on the floor would stop the team from falling apart.
On the next play, Rain tried to do his thing. He wanted to use his "magic" to get the Falcons back in the game and give their dying offense some life. He glided like a ghost through the blind spots of the other players. He slipped through the shadows and managed to steal a loose ball from one of the Blacklist NPCs.
He kept it smooth, going for his signature move: a lightning-fast touch-pass backward right through his own legs, aiming it perfectly for Griffin. It was a beautiful move, and it happened in total silence.
But Nash was already there.
Before the ball could even leave Rain’s fingertips, Nash’s giant right hand flashed out of nowhere. He plucked the ball right out of the air.
"...!" Rain let out a sharp, choked gasp. His dull blue eyes, which usually don’t show any emotion at all, went wide with shock.
He could feel the heavy wind from the giant’s reach. He had done everything right to hide and slide into a spot where he should have been invisible, but it was like the 6’3" colossus had a radar in his head that mapped out everything in the arena. Nash had tracked his every move and read the play in an instant.
"Try harder," Nash whispered right into Rain’s ear as he snatched the ball away.
Nash did not even bother to slow down or reset the offense. He kept the ball and drove the break himself, charging hard toward the left corner where Alex had rushed to stop him. Alex planted her feet and clamped her jaw shut, bracing herself for a violent crash that would reward them a foul.
She had spent years watching the best athletes in the Upperworld, and expected this kind of behavior with the adrenaline he was building, but as Nash got closer, she saw his green eyes glowing under his hood, and her body just froze.
There was this heavy, suffocating feeling coming off him, like an apex predator. It was an aura she had never felt from anyone on a breakball court before.
Nash did not just ram into her or commit a stupid foul that would give the ball back. Instead, he started with a low, rapid-fire dribble, the ball hitting the floor boards in a crazy, fast rhythm. Just as he reached Alex, he dropped his hips and pulled off a wicked in-and-out move. He swayed his body in a way that completely messed up her balance.
Alex did not even try to reach for the ball; she just stood there like a statue. Her muscles were paralyzed by how fast and perfect the move was.
Nash blew past her like she wasn’t even there. But instead of just dunking it, he stopped dead in his tracks right under the hoop. He spun around to face Griffin, who was sprinting back with a face full of desperate rage.
"Is this your ball?" Nash asked.
Griffin lunged at him like a desperate animal, arms outstretched to grab the ball. Nash waited until the very last millisecond before whipping the ball back below his waist. He did a behind-the-back crossover so sharp that it made Griffin’s ankles buckle.
Griffin actually had to put a hand on the floor just to keep from falling on his butt again. Nash looked totally bored as he casually spun the basketball on his index finger, staring right through the rookie.
"You spend all your time barking, but you are completely useless the second things get serious. All bark, no bite."
Then, Nash jumped into the air with an effortless leap and gently kissed the ball off the glass for a disrespectful right-handed layup.
Over on the Falcons’ bench, Erica felt cold sweat dripping down the back of her neck. She was staring at the court, but all her plans were ruined. She had to watch Griffin get humiliated over and over again. His "main character" energy was being shattered by Nash, who didn’t even seem to care.
Meanwhile, Rain, who was supposed to be their secret weapon, couldn’t even get past Nash’s radar. Her carefully planned strategy had turned into a total slaughterhouse.
Blacklist 88 - 70 Falcons.