The Genius Pitcher Dad Throws for His Daughter - Chapter 108

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 108
#108.
From Busan to Gwangju.
From Gwangju toward Seoul, then back to Incheon.
Nine consecutive away games wore the team down with exhaustion.
At least there was one saving grace—a single rest day wedged in between. Monday morning remained quiet, the players still lost in sleep.
Since we’d arrived at dawn, I knew the team wouldn’t wake until late afternoon, so I slipped out alone into the silence.
It wasn’t far from the hotel in Seoul to my Daughter’s hospital, and stepping into the Hospital Room I hadn’t visited in so long, I quietly took her hand in mine.
“Are you sleeping well?”
Only the faint, rasping sound of shallow breathing filled the Hospital Room.
Today, the Hospital Room felt especially quiet.
Normally there would be other children or Parents here, but save for one patient, there was no one else.
Thanks to that, I could spend intimate time with my Daughter, sharing all the stories that had accumulated, and when my throat grew dry, I rose with the thought of getting some water.
“Oh!”
Just then, a man entered the Hospital Room.
Startled upon seeing me, he shifted the box he’d been holding in both hands to one hand and extended his other respectfully.
“My goodness, to meet player Kang Ho-jin in person—it’s an honor. I’ve always been supporting you.”
“Thank you for your support.”
We exchanged a light handshake, and he pulled a bottle of juice from the box and handed it to me, which I accepted.
Then he went to the bedside of another child across from my Daughter’s bed and set the box down.
He tenderly stroked his sleeping Daughter’s hair, then turned to me with a bittersweet expression.
“It’s difficult, isn’t it?”
….
Those few words pierced straight through my heart.
It was different from Myung-hwan.
He had been a reflection of my past self, and we shared empathy watching each other struggle without escape from that pain and sorrow.
What was projected onto him spanned from past to present, but what was projected onto me came from the shared understanding between present and future.
Yet the emotion I shared with the man before me now was reality itself.
Our children lay in Hospital Rooms before us, each day extending their lives through medical devices.
All we could do was endure with hope for that day when they might wake—a day we didn’t know would come. And as parents who could do nothing, we simply fell into despair at the cold reality.
“Yes, still, we must endure with hope.”
That’s all we can do.
No matter how science advances, how medical facilities and equipment improve, how medicine develops—I know all too well the harsh reality that we cannot predict when a comatose patient will wake.
“And when they do wake, we must greet them with brightness.”
“Ah….”
The man’s face showed he’d gained some profound realization.
The me from before I returned to the past wouldn’t have thought this way.
Back then, I was just struggling to get through each day, playing baseball with only my Daughter in mind. I paid no attention to others or team matters, caring only for performance and results.
But now it’s different.
I’m not simply holding onto hope—I’ve begun preparing, one step at a time, for my Daughter’s future awakening.
I wanted to prepare for the future as well, so that when I woke up again, I wouldn’t be confused by the immediate reality.
“I learned something today.”
“We have to stay strong together.”
Though he was an Unknown Man whose name I didn’t know, we shared much understanding in that brief conversation.
The juice he handed me seemed to radiate a gentle warmth.
Like a glimpse of the warm future that awaited me.
* * *
That evening.
When I visited my Family Home, my Parents welcomed me with joy.
As I ate the meal my Mother had prepared for the first time in a while, my Father suddenly spoke up.
“Kid, can’t you do something about the bat?”
“Pardon?”
“You pitched nine innings but didn’t even get the win….”
He was referring to the game where I had shared the Mound with Myung-hwan not long ago.
He said he watched that game at the Meat Restaurant.
By now, Busan Dolphins fans had begun flooding to the restaurant in Gwanak-gu on game days, and business was so good that there weren’t enough seats.
In any case, while watching the game there, the first wave of anger erupted at the Batters who couldn’t score a single run in nine innings, and when the game went into extra innings and we lost, a second wave of anger exploded, causing quite a commotion.
When a losing streak followed, the atmosphere in the restaurant grew increasingly tense, and by Friday when five consecutive losses were confirmed, all the soju in the refrigerator was gone, so they had to borrow from another establishment.
“Ha ha….”
The restaurant’s mood finally improved when we won the weekend game.
Today was Monday, a day without baseball games.
The Restaurant Owner, who normally worked without days off, noticed that business was slow on Mondays when there were no games, so he decided to make it a day off.
That’s why our family was eating at home for the first time in a while.
‘Really, the people of Busan….’
Their passion for baseball is extraordinary.
They don’t visit even their favorite restaurants on days without baseball, and their spending habits—which fluctuate the regional economy based on baseball performance—are truly remarkable.
Before returning to the past, I didn’t care about others, so I didn’t know, but I can’t even imagine how grand it must have been the day I brought them a championship.
The only thing I can guess is that while staying at the Dormitory, the surroundings were so noisy that I couldn’t sleep.
‘It seemed to go on for several days.’
Well, in this life, I’m planning to move that period up a bit, so I’ll see for myself when it happens.
“Both of you look much more at ease than before.”
After arranging a 24-hour live-in care service for my Daughter, my Mother reduced the time she spent at the Hospital. Thanks to that, she looked less fatigued than before, and my Father also seemed much better, seeing that my Mother was taking good care of herself.
And the health check results showed that both of them were in good condition.
There was nothing we could do about the aging that comes with age, but instead I bought various supplements for them to maintain their health and made sure they took them daily.
“How is Ye-jin doing?”
“Yes, she’s sleeping beautifully today as well.”
“That’s a relief.”
My Mother smiled gently at the news that her only Granddaughter was doing well.
She said she hadn’t seen her in a few days and planned to visit tomorrow, so I also told her about the child in the bed across from mine.
“Oh my… how could that be….”
My Mother sank into sorrow right there.
She was already grieved whenever she saw other children suffering because of Ye-jin, and learning that there was another patient lying in a coma state just like her made her even sadder.
My Mother was so tender-hearted that I sensed she would subtly worry about the other patient if she visited the Hospital Room.
My Father spoke about the Dolphins, while my Mother worried about Ye-jin and me—through our family conversation, I felt the warmth of familial bonds.
After finishing our meal and chatting for a while, I returned to my room.
I lay in bed, gazed at the desk beside me, and shook my head.
‘I’ll hold back today.’
I had stopped myself from sifting through memories with my Wife to find clues about her disappearance, leaving Ye-jin and me behind.
I simply wanted to rest as I was today.
I suppose I was tired too.
Not physically, but mentally—living while thinking of baseball, my Daughter, and my Wife all at once was becoming a bit overwhelming.
Still, this is all I can do, so there’s no helping it.
But there is hope.
Unlike before I returned to the past, I’m not helpless anymore.
I closed my eyes peacefully and rested without thinking of anything.
Perhaps because I truly wanted to rest deeply, I slept soundly without dreaming until the next morning.
It was a comfortable sleep I hadn’t experienced in a long time.
* * *
The Seoul Dragons.
They were the team that finished first in last year’s Regular League and advanced directly to the Korean Series, only to finish disappointingly in second place.
This year, they were a team determined to claim the championship at all costs—the Front Office, players, coaching staff, and Manager all proclaimed they would absolutely win the title.
They maintained all their existing roster intact while discovering new talent through the Spring Camp.
With Byun Hee-su, who shined brilliantly in last year’s Korean Series and carried them to Game Seven, building his body and stamina through Spring Training, they had gained the strength to soar once more.
This week, they held a meeting to prepare for a three-game series.
The scheduled starting rotation was Choi Jin-ha, Kang Ho-jin, and Kevin, while the Dragons had Bae Ki-sung, James, and Hunt lined up.
Expert predictions favored the Dragons with a 2-1 series outcome.
Of course, the Dragons players thought differently.
“A clean sweep, that’s what it’ll be.”
They came with their own strategy against Choi Jin-ha first.
It was simple.
If they used the pitch clock to steal his tempo, then conversely, the batters could call time before the pitcher threw to disrupt his breathing rhythm.
The Scouting/Analysis Team thoroughly checked exactly when, at what count, and with how many seconds remaining Choi Jin-ha threw. While there was no fixed pattern, at minimum they found an average that he took slightly longer breaths in one-strike situations.
So they devised a strategy to keep calling time in one-strike situations before he threw to disrupt his rhythm, and they judged it would work sufficiently.
As for Kang Ho-jin, they actually didn’t prepare much.
With his aggressive pitching and less than 5 out of 100 pitches landing outside the Strike Zone, they decided to face his brute-force pitching head-on.
But then Byun Hee-su suddenly spoke up.
“I don’t think so… I think he’ll throw changeups constantly that day.”
At that, not only the Scouting/Analysis Team but also the Manager and Coach joined in, looking at Byun Hee-su.
“Based on Kang Ho-jin’s usual pitching style, he throws four-seam fastballs 40%, curveballs 37%, sliders 12%, splitters 10%, and changeups about 1%.”
Someone then spoke up.
“Damn, he’s got a ridiculous arsenal of pitches.”
“That’s not even all of it—he throws his slider both vertically and horizontally.”
“His splitter isn’t high-velocity?”
“He throws two different types of curveballs too.”
“He’s a vicious pitcher.”
The Dolphins and Dragons hadn’t faced each other during Spring Camp either.
Instead, I’d only heard secondhand reports from the sidelines, and since this was our first matchup of the season, I had no direct experience against him. Even the scouting reports from the Scouting/Analysis Team alone were enough to make me whistle in admiration at Kang Ho-jin’s abilities.
But Byun Hee-su had said something different.
“For some reason, I have a feeling he’ll throw mostly changeups that day.”
But no one agreed with that assessment.
Still, I could see several batters trying to cram information about changeups into their heads, and the meeting continued on that way.
‘Hmm… if Jin-heo’s right, it really does seem like he’ll throw changeups that day….’
It wasn’t just an offhand comment.
During the Spring Camp practice game between the Dolphins and Elephants, he’d shown slider-heavy pitching in front of Jin-heo and demonstrated growth in a short span of time.
Looking at recent games, that slider had improved significantly compared to Spring Training, and thinking about it, it felt like he’d use this matchup against my team as a stage to showcase how much his changeup had developed.
I wanted to tell everyone to train specifically for changeups, but the Scouting/Analysis Team and Manager were wrapping up the meeting with the direction of targeting either the slider or curveball as our primary focus.
Byun Hee-su couldn’t shake an inexplicable sense of unease.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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