01x05 - 100% Fake

[bunniefuu]

This is the Champions Carnival, the Japanese lightweight title match.

What kind of outcome will await us at the end of this momentous battle?

Facing the champion, Imae Katsutaka, is the challenger, Aoki Masaru!

We’re now one minute into the round, and they are still staring each other down!

The match is literally at a standstill!

Now there’s a stance. And it’s intimidating to boot.

I can’t find an opening.

So where should I attack? The right? The left?

That stance is right outta the textbook.

If I can’t go left or right, then the middle it is!

The challenger rushes straight ahead!

He couldn’t stand the tension anymore?

Made you look!

Wait, he circles around! What a mavericky move!

That's our Aoki-san!

Yeah, get him!

Gotcha! Here’s the opening hit!

A left!

It’s like the champion saw that move coming all along!

Dammit!

The champion’s lefts are on the mark! They put a real hurting on the challenger!

And a right!

That blow came at just the right distance!

Masaru!

I really felt that right.

Good, he still has his footing.

He’s now throwing huge punches.

He’s about to get into his rhythm!

That’s the champion for you. He knows how to pace himself.

He’s not going to KO him here.

He’ll continue pounding him up until the later stage.

Aoki! You need to shift the currents, or else you’ll be sucked into the undertow!

Those pinpoint lefts are the champion’s lifeline.

Will the challenger be able to counter them?

Thanks to that heavy blow, now I know!

After you throw those small lefts...

you come with a right!

Whoa! He’s in position to...

Frog Punch!

Frog Punch!

But no! The Frog barely misses him!

God! I thought he had him!

If he can avoid that move, he has nothing left!

The move everyone came to see was a dud!

But the Frog did leave a huge claw mark on the champion’s cheek!

You can see how much his face stiffened!

His entire body weight rode on that uppercut.

That punch wasn’t merely for show.

If he had connected, he might have snapped my neck bone!

He’s afraid!

Go get him!

Listen to that excitement over a missed punch!

Frog him some more!

He certainly is the star of this match! He’s making the fans go wild from the get-go!

He freaking dodged it.

He’s definitely done his homework.

My signature move ain’t gonna take him down that easy.

So I might as well make him fight on my terms!

Whoa! The challenger closes in!

He’s confusing the champion with his oddball moves!

Which one?

Both?

Now he’s down below?

He’s nearly touching the ground!

How am I supposed to hit him?!

He’s below me, but his punches come from above!

Cool it! Don’t fight on his terms!

The champion throws his textbook-perfect lefts, but he’s clearly being toyed with!

You can’t find this brand of boxing in any textbook!

Damn it! I can’t connect!

Yeah, Aoki!

You got the champion harried!

Give us more oddball moves!

Let’s go, Aoki!

Even though he missed, that Frog Punch left a huge mark.

He managed to reverse the flow that was running against him.

Imae, quit trying to shadow him!

Step away and control your breathing!

The champion is now shying away from the fistfight and stepping back!

I’m not giving you any breathers!

My goodness! There are no words to describe these moves!

The challenger is definitely creating his own peculiar rhythm.

Calm down.

We’re still boxing, despite all the random moves he’s making.

We still have rules!

Now!

Yes! You finally took the bait, Imae!

Oh! The champion whiffs his one-two punch!

The challenger crouches below!

Hell yeah!

Yes!

I-It’s a counter!

The Frog has been completely squashed!

The champion has flattened the Frog, just as he promised!

G-Gosh.

Aoki-san’s timing couldn’t have been more perfect. But he got taken down by a counter!

Imae wasn’t using his head at all.

He beat that counter into his body so that he could do it on reflex!

That Frog Punch gave you no chance to think.

But the hours of practice you put in have paid off, Imae!

You even knocked him down.

Even if he gets up, you still took away his signature move!

You’ve now regained the momentum in this match.

Four!

The challenger is still on the mat!

Five!

And what a powerful knockdown it was! Can he get up?!

Masaru!

Wait, Tomiko!

Takamura-san.

Don’t run to him just yet.

Six!

Seven!

And he’s up!

Can he continue?

He’s stretching to see if he’s all in one piece.

He’s really composed.

That’s because he’s used to being knocked down.

Still...

His Frog Punch was ineffective.

It’s a huge blow knowing your signature move won’t work.

There’s his fighting pose!

He’s ready to rumble!

It wasn’t a coincidence when he dodged my first Frog!

That son of a b*tch studied my Frog inside and out!

He has a strong glint in his eyes.

So he still has some fight left in him?

This is his big chance in this rollercoaster first round!

But the champion doesn’t take it!

He’s as cool as a cucumber as he inches closer to the challenger!

That’s why people call Imae a consummate professional.

Even knocking someone down doesn’t excite him.

He goes at his own pace.

So he won’t KO him in the first round?

As long as Imae doesn’t feel the need to do it.

He’s not as light on his feet as before.

But did that really hit him where it hurts?

Now he’s within reach!

Will we see a KO in the first round? Things are getting tense!

Thirty seconds left?

He’s down!

The challenger gets taken down in a flash!

You’re kidding me!

That was a light jab!

He only lost his balance!

But look at him!

He’s really hurting!

He managed to get upright, but both his hips and feet are wobbly!

But he still takes up a fighting pose, so the match is still on!

That Frog counter really took a lot out of him!

Now any punch can take him down!

I can do it!

The champion throws punch after punch!

He’s betting it all on this rush!

If he takes him down a third time, that’s the match!

The challenger puts up a guard, desperately trying to avoid a 1st-round KO!

But the deluge of lefts and rights keep coming!

Go down! Go down!

Go down!

That’s the end of the first round!

The challenger is barely saved by the bell!

However, although he didn’t get a 1st-round KO,

the champion still proved his prowess by knocking him down twice!

The match is still young, right?

He’s probably done for.

You've got the momentum! You can do it!

Yes, my punches were effective. It won’t be long.

Don’t give him a chance to recover!

You keep hitting him, you hear me?!

Of course.

This time I will knock him out.

You okay, Aoki?

You able to keep going?

I’m not through.

Round two!

He can’t take anymore!

Something's off.

Really?

He’s getting punched left and right, but none of them are clean hits.

Yeah, I can see the desperation on Imae’s face.

He doesn’t look good. It’s like he’s on the receiving end.

Something's definitely off with this match.

That’s the bell!

The challenger is once again saved by the bell!

Damn it! I almost had him!

Will I have to KO him in the next round?

Why is he so light on his feet?

Wasn’t he supposed to be groggy?

I thought he was barely even able to stand!

What’s with that look?

It’s like he’s checking me out.

Is he checking to see how worn out I am?!

Damn you!

So everything that happened up until now...

was a lie?!

That strategy really blew us out of the water.

That down was just an act?

I don’t believe it!

I’m too tired to use my footwork.

The only thing left for me...

is a slugfest!

I fell for his trap hook, line, and sinker!

I see it, but I still don’t believe it.

You veterans scare me sometimes.

You dumb jerk!

I’ve boxed just as long as he has, yet I’ve never hit on that idea!

Aoki’s the only boxer in the world
who’d pull a stunt like that!

So Aoki-san can pull it off just because of who he is?

I’m really, really glad he’s on our side.

Round five!

Fine! You want a slugfest, you got it!

Let’s punch it out!

Whoa! What a clean jab, followed by some nimble footwork!

It’s now the challenger who makes use of his legs!

I-Impossible!

He won’t come and hit me?

What’s going on here?!

His feet are really stuck in the bog now.

You’ll be in over your head by the time I’m done with you.

Way over your head.

So you’re going to punch me from a distance while I’m too tired to move?

Damn you!

The champion charges and throws a huge punch!

But he completely whiffs it!

The challenger moves around light as a feather!

Dammit! Come at me! Take me on like a man!

The challenger’s darting around nimbly,

putting a lie to the last few rounds!

Imae, don’t get frustrated!

All he’s doing is tiring you out!

Dammit. He’s too hot-blooded to hear me!

That Aoki is such a kidder.

I don’t understand. I thought he was being pummeled just a while ago.

An amateur like you might see it that way.

He was playing possum.

Imae continued punching thinking he had a chance, all through the past three rounds.

He kept trying to break through his guard.

But Aoki used that to his advantage to tire Imae out.

Knowing that he’s been failing to
connect for the last nine minutes

must have exhausted him both physically and mentally.

He shoots a left across the bow!

Connecting directly on the champion’s face!

He can do it!

Now’s our turn to deliver a flurry of blows!

Not yet!

Aoki’s not staking everything on this round!

You must give Aoki his due, Yagi-san!

You have to realize that the champion’s furious attacks also wore out Aoki.

He might look like he’s taken a turn for the better, but he’s keeping his distance in order to recover!

So that’s why he’s not engaging in one of his slugfests?

So after playing possum, he’s playing phoenix?

Right now his brain is in full throttle.

He's putting everything he has in this match, and I mean everything!

He’s throwing lefts every time I take a breather?!

Do the words “fight like a man” mean anything to him?!

Again he darts away!

Aoki Masaru, you damned coward!

Don’t get so angry.

If anyone should get royally pissed off, it's me!

You squashed my Frog!

The champion loses his footing! That must’ve hurt!

There’s the bell!

This time it’s the champion who’s saved by the bell!

That one little left made him stagger.

He’s too tired to even maintain his footing.

He’s finally sunk to the bottom of the marsh.

The time is now. It’s time to end it in the next round!

And I’ll do it by using my new secret weapon I’ve been saving!

How could this happen?

Imae has never once been behind on stamina.

Don’t look down!

You’re the champion, remember?!

Don’t go for the KO, just keep getting those points!

R-Right.

But I can barely think, let alone move.

I can’t focus on anything.

Yes, you did great!

But you must be tired after all that, so take those deep breaths!

The next round is the final showdown, isn’t it?

I can tell by that grim look on your face.

I don’t know what you’re trying to pull, but do it with everything you got!

The belt’s right within reach!

Don’t lose focus!

You better concentrate!

Got it!

You picked the right time to encourage me.

My new secret weapon has a high risk-return ratio.

And it’s the first time I'll be using it in a match.

I’m not all that confident that it’ll work.

Hell, this will be a huge gamble!

But I’m betting all my chips.

Pray for me, Tomiko.

Please...

give me strength!

I know that expression anywhere.

That guy’s in for a final showdown.

Good luck, Masaru!

Round six!

Don’t blink, you two.

He’s about to pull something.

Relax.

Believe in yourself. You can do this!

I must get back my rhythm!

They stare each other down!

Now, who will be the one to strike first?

My rhythm!

Left!

The challenger charges in!

They’ll be trading blows!

He’s taking me on now?!

I can’t move! I can’t get away!

Let’s do this!

What?

Why’s he stopping?

The champion is down!

He got knocked down the moment we averted our eyes!

The crowd looks on confused while the challenger pumps his fists!

All right! I did it!

Just what the heck happened here?

You did it Masaru! You rock!

So how did he knock him down?

Shut up!

He made it look like he was distracted by something.

What in God’s name did he pull?!

D-Did you see that?

I sure did!

Thank goodness we’re here in the nosebleeds.

It was the Frog Punch!

He got him with the same punch that was rendered useless.

In any case, the whole process was amazing!

Yes! It went perfect!

I only threw one punch, but I’ve never felt this spent.

The champion lifts his body!

But he’s still in pain!

Four!

Will he get up in ten?

I’ve rarely seen a move like that in all my years at the ringside.

Imae! Get up! Stand up!

Wh-What the hell did he do?

He looked away, and I looked right with him!

After that, everything went blank!

He’s up!

The champion’s in his fighting pose!

The match isn’t over!

Get him, Aoki, and his belt!

You’re almost the champion!

Fine, I’ll just knock you down again!

Oh, he's clinching!

He grabs on to the challenger to stop him!

The champion is desperate!

Break it up, you two!

Let go of me!

He’s still clinching him, trying to buy some precious time!

Was that surprise move even possible?

Do boxers get distracted during matches?

Does that really happen?

Here, in this ring, where you put your life on the line,

you take your eyes off your opponent?

Nobody could do that!

I thought he was just a clown who does his stupid clown tricks, but now there’s no mistaking it.

This man is good.

I’ve never seen a boxer who possesses his mental strength!

He threads the needle and lands an uppercut!

Now there’s some space between them!

Crap!

N-No!

Don’t do it!

Gotcha!

He’s gone.

He Frogs him good!

This was how he knocked him down the first time!

The champion is on the mat again.

The Frog Punch is back in action!

Hell yeah!

Was that the finishing blow?!

Will the belt change hands?!

Masaru, you rock!

W-We looked away again.