After that tournament, for almost a year he didn’t participate in any official match. It wasn’t because he didn’t want to play but more like he couldn’t.
He was too young to participate in official matches. And only from elementary level, he’d be able to participate in the inter-school tournaments for elementary level.
Though he’d still have to wait for few years to participate in the middle school and high school level inter-school national tournament held in all over Japan. National tournaments are held every year between the regional champions of Japan.
National tournament as the name suggested is a tournament held between the different schools in Japan to compete for the glory of being the strongest footballing school in all over Japan. The tournament is held for all levels of school i.e elementary school, middle school and high school level.
As Japan is divided into 47 prefectures and 8 regions, there are countless schools who participate in the tournament just to make it to the national.
And making into the national isn’t an easy feat. Countless schools from different prefectures compete among themselves to come out as victor of their respective prefectures. And just becoming a prefectural champion won’t guarantee the spot for the nationals.
As they would still need to defeat other prefectural champions to represent their region. And finally after defeating other prefectural champions, the respective school would be able to participate in the national tournament.
For example, Hiro who resides in Tokushima prefecture is a part of the Shikoku region. And in his region alone there are 4 prefectures which is one of the lowest in Japan.
For his school to make it to the national, firstly they would need to become the prefectural champions by defeating several schools from his prefecture. And after that, they would need to defeat three more teams to make it to the nationals.
Similarly Tokyo prefecture which lies in Kanto region has 7 prefecture. So if any school from Tokyo want to make it to the nationals, they would need to defeat 6 more schools from other prefectures in order to reach the national.
Well technically they wouldn’t need to compete against all the teams in the region, as a draw would take place and they would play matches in knockout format to become the regional champions.
The system does seem kinda flawed and unfair for the region where there are a lot of prefectures. But nobody can say or do anything about it. That’s how the system goes afterall.
There’s also other tournaments beside national tournament. However national tournament is regarded as the supreme among any other tournament for school level tournaments.
Winning the national tournament or even making it to the nationals is a huge achievement for any school. The school’s who have won the tournament or made it to the national multiple times are very reputed school.
Just by winning or making it to the nationals, the reputation of the respective school would soar to heavens. Thus, the schools in Japan would go crazy over talented players.
They would send their scouts in almost every tournament held in the prefecture to scout the most talented individuals. And after scouting they would offer ridiculous scholarship for the player, if the player met their standards.
The system in Japan is similar to that of the business module followed by professional football teams.
“What school should I attend?”
Hiro wondered.
After graduating from the kindergarten, while lying in his bed, he was wondering about the elementary school he wanted to attend. To avoid his past mistakes, he wanted to choose a different school than his previous life.
“Let’s think about that after a while.”
“I haven’t observed my stats for a while. Shall we see what progress I’ve made after tirelessly completing the daily mission given by that freaking system.”
He contemplated.
For almost a whole year without any breaks he completed the task given by the system. Even though he failed miserably during his early days, he got a hang of it after repeating the same actions everyday.
“Damn!! I don’t want to remember that.” 𝘦𝘯.𝘰𝘳𝘨
He stuttered as he remembered the hardships he had to endure during his earlier days.
A shiver ran down his spine as he remembered about the moment when he got electrocuted. Because of the shock, he would return home completely tattered.
Seeing his miserable condition, his mother couldn’t help but worry about him. For the past year, he got scolded countless times by his mother. There were even moments when she banned him from going outside. However due to his father’s effort, he could still train properly.
Somehow after training for a while, he noticed a loophole in the system. Since he had school at 8, he needed to wake up early in the morning to complete half of the sets given by the system. And later in the evening, he could complete the other half and finally complete the daily mission given by the system.
Making use of the loophole, he avoided electrocution and also his mother’s wrath.
“Status window”
[Basic information]
Name: Takahashi Hiro
Age: 6 years old
Weight: 21 kg
Height: 4 feet
Potential: SSS
Attribute point: 10.05
Roulette tickets: 0
Skills: Focus
Title: Master of the Talent Copying System, Regressor, One who possess ethereal talent.
[Attributes]
Physical: 31/100 ( Grade: D)
Dribbling: 69/100 (Grade: B)
Pace: 44/100 ( Grade: C)
Passing: 55/100 ( Grade: C+)
Shooting: 57/100 (Grade: C+)
Defending: 29/100 (Grade: D)
Mentality: 49/100 ( Grade: C)
IQ: 74/100 (Grade: B+)
Overall grade: C-
“Hmmm… I still have a lot of unallocated attribute points. But I’ll save it for later.”
Hiro mumbled.
After training hard for almost a year, he had increased his stats tremendously with the help of system. By now he could have easily made it to under 13 national team, if he tried for it. However he was still very young for that. To play in under 13 national team, the minimum requirement was that the player needed to be at least 8 years old. However he was only 6 years old.
As he was wondering about the elementary school he could attend. His mind wandered somewhere else.
“Should I actually apply for a youth club instead?”
He wondered.
“May be joining La masia wouldn’t be a dream if I could attend a trial.”
He started to dwell in his fantasies.
“The dinner’s ready!! Come down Hiro”
He heard his mother calling his name.
And that voice brought him back to reality. And the reality was that he was still poor.
His family couldn’t afford a trip to Europe and the European scouts didn’t come to Japan around that time. It would still require a lot of time before the world would take notice of Japan.
Although Japan was considered a powerhouse football team in Asia. It was nowhere near world level. It was just an another average team in the world.
And european scouts rarely made their way towards Japan to scout the player.
“May be I should try to win the nationals first. And we’ll think of the future afterwards. For now let’s focus on the nationals.”
He mumbled as he left his room.
“Thank you for the food”
He prayed as he prepared to eat the dinner prepared by his mother.
It was plain dinner with rice and few side dishes made up of fish and potato. As he stuffed the food in his mouth, his mother questioned him;
“Which school do you want to attend Hiro?”
Nom!! Nom!!
“I yam nout sure yet!!”
He replied while chewing.
“Let him complete his dinner first and we’ll talk about that later.”
His father interrupted.
And finally after completing dinner all three of them sat at the dinning table to talk about his decision.
“Tokushima elementary school is the nearest one so why don’t you attend that school.”
His mother exclaimed.
It was the same school, he had attended in his previous life. So he was somewhat hesitant of attending the same school once again. Plus there was no football team in Tokushima elementary school. And it would take another 2 years for the school to gather players required to form a football team. Thus, he was somewhat hesitant of joining Tokushima elementary school.
“Honey!! Don’t pressure him. Let him decide on the school that he want to attend.”
His father spoke in a soft tone.
“But it’s the closest school in the neighborhood. So I think it’d be better for him to attend it. And how can a kid who’s barely six years old even decide for himself?”
His mother argued.
Seeing her irritated face, his father went silent. Even if he was the man of the house, his mother was the one who made the decisions.
“But mom the school doesn’t even have a football team.”
Hiro tried to resist his mother’s decision.
“So what about it? You are going to school for studies not for football.”
His mother yelled.
Seeing her response, he knew that he wouldn’t be able to convince her. She was adamant about her decisions. But even so he didn’t want to waste his 6 precious years in a school with no football team.
Even though he could still play football and train in the park. But that wouldn’t help him develop as a player. What he needed was practical experience and he wouldn’t gain experience by playing disorganised friendly matches.
“So it’s final. You’re going to Tokushima elementary school.”
As she was about to finish the conversation, his father interrupted;
“Actually Hiro has received scouting offers from Ronden elementary school, Karasuno elementary school and Ookami elementary school.”
“Huh!! Why didn’t you tell me dad?”