Loser's Crossroads

Kunigami bears down on Baro as he holds the ball. Sensing the pitch now glows for Isagi, Baro is unsettled to feel no frustration and guesses it is because he has lost the starring role. Nagi calls for a pass but is screened off by Chigiri.

Baro sees that both Nagi and Isagi are opening routes to goal, and the thought that a pass could make him part of the winning strike excites him. He realizes the supporting players he once dismissed must have felt this same pull when serving him, and that surrendering the finish to another striker could spare him the sting of defeat. Thrilled by the notion of true teamwork, he still senses that passing would be the end of him. He pictures a future slumped at home with a beer, watching Isagi on television carry Japan past Spain.

Refusing that fate, Baro attacks Kunigami's challenge and slips by with a chop feint. Isagi begs for the ball, and Reo reads Baro's body as a windup to pass. Instead, Baro uses Isagi as a screen, chaining chop moves into a lightning dribble that snaps between sharp angles. Kunigami calls Chigiri over since no pass is coming, but Chigiri realizes Baro is hiding his next move behind Isagi, an awakening born from the players devouring one another. Casting Isagi and Nagi as heroes, Baro decides to triumph as the villain who swallows their light, curling the ball into the top right corner. He claims the dark road as his own path to true kingship and roars in triumph.

Baro weighs passing to Isagi or Nagi, then rejects the future it implies and awakens a villainous style. He chop-feints past Kunigami and lightning-dribbles clear of Reo and Chigiri, even using Isagi as a screen, before scoring the goal that wins the match.

This is the 66th chapter and the eighth of Volume 8 in the Second Selection Arc, adapted as part of Episode 18.