Shin Prince of Tennis Chapter 91 Discussion/Predictions

[Kaoz]

Chapter 91 RAW

Page 1
Ryoma: Eh, are you really going to the bathroom?
Ryoga: That's what I said, little one.
Ryoma (aside/think): I was sure it's going to be an unofficial match.

Page 2:
(Akutsu appears)
Unknown: Looks like someone wants to play you more than I do.
It's not clear who the speaker or 'you' refers to due to a lack of information. You can actually argue 'you' is Ryoga here and Ryoma is the speaker). Of course the more reasonable interpretation is that the speaker is Ryoga and 'you' refers to Ryoma but there's no way to tell based on this frame.

Page 3:
Spectator: Where did Akutsu go? He was just there a moment ago?
Oni: Fool!
Oni (thinking): I prepared a burial ground for you, but he's not the type to get scared.
Kawamura: Where did Akutsu go? I'll go look for him.
Kintaro: That...

Page 4:
Kintaro: Oni's spot on 1st string is mine!
Oni (thinking): Kintaro is...

Page 5:
Oni (thinking): Still the same as before.
Oni: Fine, I"ll go along with you once more.
Kintaro: Thanks!
Oni (thinking): But you can't beat me right now
Caption: 4th match: Oni versus Kintaro. 3 set match. Kintaro serves

Page 6:
Kintaro: Eh? Has the game started?
Kintaro: Alright, let's go!
Kintaro: (super long name serve move)

Page 7:
Oni: You'll get hurt if you don't play seriously!
Kintaro: Oni, why are you staying still?

Page 8:
(Kintaro does a drop shot)
Spectators: Kintaro made a fake move and used a drop shot?

Page 9:
Oni (thinking): Power, speed, technique, rally strength... didn't think he can improve so fast in just a few weeks. Is this the result of the training atop the cliff that Tokugawa talked about?
Announcer: Game second string, 1-0.
Specatator: Alright! Got a game off Oni!

Page 10:
Oni (thinking): This kid... he's been hiding his true power until the rematch.
Announcer: Game second string, 3-0.

Page 11:
Oni (thinking): I see...
Kintaro: A capable (some kind of bird, not famliar with what type it is so I don't know its English equivlaent) hides its talons!
Oni: That's a hawk!
"A capable hawk hides its talons" is a Japanese idiom that basically means exactly what it sounds like (the powerful does not show their power easily). Kintaro is doing his usual misspelling of Kanji.

Page 12:
Kintaro (battle cry)
Oni (thinking): Looks like the one who is too careless is me!

Page 13:
Spectator: Look! Oni's 5 ball tech!
Spectator: That kid hit all 5 balls back!

Page 14:
Duke: A middle schooler can easily do 5 ball tech sure is surprising.
Byodouin: Oh

Page 15:
Kintaro: This is nothing!
Oni: You passed! Try to keep up!
Oni: 6 ball!
Kintaro: This is getting exciting!

Page 16:
Otori: Shishido-sempai, there's clearly only one ball, but it looks like they're hitting 6 balls separately?
Shishido: Look, Chotaro, this time it's 7 balls!

Page 17:
Ohmagari: Oni is too impatient
Byodouin (presumably, thinking): Oni, do you wish to destroy the person you trained?

Page 18:
Unknown (probably spectator): 8 balls! He's at his limit!

Page 19:
Coach A: Still continuing, Oni?
Coach B: Oni?
Oni (battle cry)

Page 20:
Oni: Embrace an eternal slumber in 10 balls!

Page 21:
Spectator: 10 balls! Kintaro, run away!

Page 22:
Spectator: Kintaro?
Kintaro: Second (ball)! Third (ball)!

Page 23:
Kintaro: Fourth! Fifth! Sixth! Seventh! Eighth! Ninth!

Page 24:
no text

Page 25:
Kintaro: I'm going to become the number one tennis player in Japan!

Page 26-28
No text

Page 29
Oni: Finally, your training is complete.

Note that the summary is based on the Chinese scans and may differ from the original as a result.

[Airgrimes]

As they were hitting multiple balls with each other, The following were shown to be clearly unphased:
Tokugawa, Byoudouin, Duke, Ohmagari, Yukimura and of course Oni.

It is now likely that Ohmagari and Oni are just Singes Players.

So Tooyama Kintaro has only just mastered hitting 10 at once meaning he and Ryoma improved at different rates who would have to have been able to hit 10 at once as he was doing it effortlessly with Tokugawa.

Ryoga actually just wanted to use the toilet.
In Ryoma's mind, overhearing the person you want to surpass say "I'm going to the toilet" means time to have an Unofficial match.

Akutsu really did waste all this time in the camp just to challenge Ryoma. He was better off staying in America dammit.
Even when the story has perfectly shown those who got to train in the mountain and then the camp have improved much better than the winners who only got Camp training.

Thanks to Phantron for TLN

[LetalHawk]

It's really impressive that Oni's able to increase the number of balls when there's really one of them, I see that when he went to 10 he was serious, and I probably know that he wasn't expecting Kintarou to return them, destroy his racket and burn the net.

Akutsu only wanted to face Ryoma, if that's the case, it's useless to be in the U-17 Camp just for that and Ryoma will beat him again but I don't think they'll play as Ryoma has to play against Ryoga in the official match.

I think Oni's going to display some new technique, and Kintarou will open Tenimuhou.

It's amazing that Yukimura was unphased, like Tokugawa, Duke, Omagari and Byodouin,. But with Kintarou's MASSIVE improvement, he should go really up in the tier, as of now, he would destroy every G20 all the way to Oni, Oomagari, Tohno, Kimijima, Ochi... they would be killed by Kintarou.

[-Ken-]

To Yukimura response to Abare Dame, "The number of ball actually increased" XD. Wel'll just need to wait until Yukimura is fully restored to gain back his former glory.

[Brandnewkid]

Kintaro opened a new Door as confirmed by the end of the chapter.

[LetalHawk]

Kintaro opened a new Door as confirmed by the end of the chapter.

What says at the end?

[Brandnewkid]

What says at the end?

The blurb at the end that reads, "Hirakakeru ... Aratanaru tobira ... !!" / "The hinges to a new door ... have been unlocked ... !!"

[LetalHawk]

The blurb at the end that reads, "Hirakakeru ... Aratanaru tobira ... !!" / "The hinges to a new door ... have been unlocked ... !!"

It might be a reference to a new door being the 10 balls, surpassing his previous limit

But probably is a new door as the shot burned the net

[Airgrimes]

The ball began to burn as it brushed against the cord due to PoT friction.
Prior to the ball passing the net, the ball was not on fire.

That ball going on fire was not intentional by anyone.

The blurb at the end of chapters are by JUMP staff and not the author.

[-Ken-]

The ball began to burn as it brushed against the cord due to PoT friction.
Prior to the ball passing the net, the ball was not on fire.

That ball going on fire was not intentional by anyone.

The blurb at the end of chapters are by JUMP staff and not the author.

Sometimes Jump staff "blurb" could be accurate, though. I remember seeing that in Bleach at least couples of time. Such as "who is the person speaking from HM" or something along that line.

[Demon Roronoa Zoro]

I feel sorry for the winners compared to the BJ loser it seems like haven't improved at all.

[Phantron]

The 'end of chapter blurb' is usually accurate because it's not very hard to guess what's supposed to happen, and the guy who wrote it probably has some heads-up by the author, but it's also not definitive. At any rate I assume a new door just means 'next level', and honestly setting the net on fire seems more potent than even TnK. I mean, what the heck are you going to do when your racket is on fire even if you use TnK?

The X-ball is just an extension of Samurai Drive. We know in the original version of Samurai Drive both balls are real (Yukimura had to return both of them). Given people in NPOT are unfathomably more powerful than their POT counterparts, there's nothing stopping every top tier characters having improved version of Samurai Drive. Instead of splitting the ball in halves they can easily do it in thirds, fifths, or tenths. But this creates a problem, namely after every point you'd need a new ball, and then someone would have to bring a cart of extra tennis balls. Therefore we simply have the X-ball tech where by using sufficient power/tech, extra real balls appear out of thin air so that we don't have an unreasonable pause in action after every point. You wouldn't expect Kintaro to continously use his fire move either, because otherwise they'd have to replace a racket or possibly the net after every point, and that'd just be dumb.

Unlike the common 'illusion' type techs, all the balls here are real, same the way both of the balls in Samurai Drive are real. Therefore Yukimura's ability to see the 'truth', so to speak, is useless, because all X balls are real. There isn't a 'real' one because they are all 'real'. We specifically see Kintaro hitting all 10 balls to return Oni's 10 ball shot. If they're illusions, then hitting just one of them should be sufficient.

If you want an explanation for this technique you can go with quantum mechanics, namely the ball you attempt to 'observe' (hit) does not exist by the action of attempting to observe the ball, but if you don't observe it then the ball is real. Note that if you just sit there and do nothign, you'll only get hit by one ball, but looking at the strength required to hit the 10 ball, obviously getting hit by that one ball is likely to knock you out (Oni told Kintaro to embrace an eternal slumber in 10 balls, that's pretty serious stuff even in POT).

I think practicing with 10 real balls is not the same as being able to hit 10 balls at once. Tokugawa and Ryoma were practicing with 10 balls fairly casually while Oni using the 10 ball tech (with one ball) is viewed as a significant event. I'd say that using X real balls is only a training method to defend against X ball tech. It'd appear the extra power/speed/side effects of the 10 ball tech comes from the fact that you somehow created 9 more balls in thin air, which does not happen when you use 10 real balls. Duke mentioned it's impressive that a middle schooler can do the 5 ball tech so easily, so there might be a matter of proficiency too. Just because you can hit 10 real balls in practice doesn't mean you can hit a 10 ball tech in the actual game, but certainly you'd have to be able to hit 10 real balls in practice before you can even attempt to return a 10 ball tech. We know Kintaro's limit was 8 ball and you can see at the 8 ball frame he's straining to return those balls, so I think it definitely indicates that even if you're an X baller there might be different levels of mastery of the tech.

As a side note, I think Kintaro even at the 8-ball level would utterly crush anyone who's played so far, not including Irie.

[LetalHawk]

As a side note, I think Kintaro even at the 8-ball level would utterly crush anyone who's played so far, not including Irie.

Well, if Kintarou manages to win against Oni right now, then he is above Irie for sure, just look how much the guy improved, even Irie's full power, fast shots wouldn't work as Kintarou probably has speed, technique, and power in 7 right now. Power because that shot was probably more stronger than 108th Hadoukyuu and even Duke Homerun, and to make a big hole in Oni's racket, his power must be crazy. Speed because just look how damn fast he is right now and how Oni said that he improved beastly in practically evertyhing. Kintarou right now is probably Irie level or beyond that.


Why Yukimura wasn't surprised is strange, maybe because he still thinks he could kick Kintarou's ass?

This shows how the mountain training is way more better than the U-17 Camp. Winners like Atobe and Marui/Kite showed improvement, but little difference can be appreciated. However, with Kintarou, you can see the improvement is beastly. Oni crushed him and Kintarou couldn't do anything with serious Oni, but now manages to win 3 games in a row and return a 10 ball tech from serious Oni.

I can't believe also how much Ryoma improved. If Ryoma's supossed to be the loser who improved the most, I'm expecting probably a new aura or crazy shot like Kintarou's.

[Phantron]

Well, if Kintarou manages to win against Oni right now, then he is above Irie for sure, just look how much the guy improved, even Irie's full power, fast shots wouldn't work as Kintarou probably has speed, technique, and power in 7 right now. Power because that shot was probably more stronger than 108th Hadoukyuu and even Duke Homerun, and to make a big hole in Oni's racket, his power must be crazy. Speed because just look how damn fast he is right now and how Oni said that he improved beastly in practically evertyhing. Kintarou right now is probably Irie level or beyond that.

This shows how the mountain training is way more better than the U-17 Camp. Winners like Atobe and Marui/Kite showed improvement, but little difference can be felt. However, with Kintarou, you can see the improvement is beastly. Oni crushed him and Kintarou couldn't do anything with serious Oni, but now manages to win 3 games in a row and return a 10 ball tech from serious Oni.

I can't believe also how much Ryoma improved.

Well Oni presumably stayed at the U17 camp the whole time and even he was impressed by how good the cliff top training is. So yeah, I'd say people who didn't get to go to the mountain totally missed out on a great opportunity. I didn't include Irie just because he's never shown his true power yet, but in the second string team Oni is #2 while Irie is #3 so yeah if Kintaro ends up beating Oni he'd have to be placed higher than Irie as well.

---------- Post added at 03:12 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:08 PM ----------

While POT rarely has anything to do with reality, one thing of note is that it does everything to avoid continous damage on any equipment. That is, we see Byodouin can leave a crater in the wall, so why doesn't his serve leave a crater on the court itself? But then after a few serves you'd need to contact the cement team to fill in those holes. The top tier isn't surprised by Kintaro setting the net on fire, but I can guaranteed you they're not going to replace the net each time Kinatro's shot touched the net either. If you assume people carry a limited number of rackets, you can simply use techs like Rai to destroy enough rackets so that the other guy would be forced to forfeit (I believe the game versions of POT even have a limit on the number of rackets you have and you lose if you run out of rackets). These things are simply never done, so a move that essentially destroys the ball (Samurai Drive) cannot be used because it'd require a cart of tennis balls to replace the ball after every point (and it is certainly a good technique to warrant using it every point if you can pull it off). There's absolutely no reason why Oni can't just use Samurai Drive 10 but that'd destroy way too many balls over a 3 set match so instead we've the 10 ball tech.

[FrostyMouse]

It is better for realism's sake that they're not actually playing with 10 balls, but in a way, I'd prefer 10 real balls as opposed to magically splitting the ball. If you miss a real ball, clearly you lose the point because you were unable to return one of them, but if you miss one of the magically split portions, the ball should seemingly magically reform and land behind.