Chapter 35: Dagger through the heart
Sam felt the stadium tilt, like a carousel slowing. The panic had bled from Barca’s limbs, and in its place, that terrible calm you only see in killers and kings settled.
And so, Samba started in Lisbon.
Sam checked his shoulder twice, then drifted left, dragging both center backs with him. Frankie winked and split Benfica with a dead-eyed vertical into the vacuum.
Gavi, of course, was already there.
Gavi didn’t settle; he whipped an early ball across the six. Trubin came, but he hesitated. Raphinha did not.
He arrived like thunder, hammering a one-time volley into the far side netting.
2-4 Barcelona.
Raphinha slid on his knees into the away fans, head back, fists clenched. Two goals, one assist, and the look of a man who had shrugged off a season’s worth of almosts.
The Luz finally, finally dimmed.
DING!
~----~
[Combo Chain Achieved: Triangulation Mastery]
Gavi ~ De Jong ~ Sam ~ Raphinha
[Team Tempo: +3% for 10 minutes]
[Stamina Efficiency: +2% (Sam only)]
~----~
It was 2-4 already, and yet it was not over yet. The system was looking for some excitement, and Sam loved the sentiment.
He blinked away the translucent glyph.
Bonus or not, the night was theirs to carve.
Between the 79th to 90th minute, FC Barcelona wrote a story.
Now Barcelona glowed. Not just control, glow... that incandescent, inevitable tide that drowns resistance.
Ferran’s fresh legs tore at Jurasek until the fullback’s lungs turned to ash. Pedri began to dance, those weightless touches turning red shirts into cones.
De Jong ran a conductor’s baton through the match, floating like a butterfly in his traditional box to box stile, drawing crescendos, cutting rests.
In the 82nd minute, Frankie peeled right under Kounde, overlapped, and pulled the ball back to the penalty spot with cruel restraint.
Sam, like a statue, let it roll behind his plant foot and used his heel to flick it into his own stride, executing the El taconazo, leaving Antonio Silva swatting ghosts in one of the most humiliating moments of the match.
Sam opened his body, waited for Trubin to blink, and passed it low inside the far upright.
2-5.
FC Barcelona was high flying.
Sam didn’t celebrate with noise. He pointed to the badge, then to the away end, then to Raphinha, who sprinted to leap onto his back anyway.
"Don’t get humble now," the Brazilian laughed. "We’re not finished".
"Then finish it," Sam shot back, eyes bright.
They did just that.
Three minutes later, in the 85th minute, Ferran won a throw high. Kounde took it quick to Gavi, who one touched it inside to Pedri. Pedri threw a no-look scoop over a flat-footed back line, leaving the Benfica defenders chasing ghosts.
Raphinha ghosted in from the blind side and cushioned a header across Trubin and in off the far post.
Hattrick!
2-6.
The Brazilian blew a kiss to the sky, then thumped his chest at the traveling culers. The Luz had thinned to loyalists and the implacable; even some in red stood to clap, unable not to.
This was not just a win, this was an unforgettable lesson in football.
Benfica, to their credit, refused to die quietly. Even at this stage, they stayed defiant as Di Maria found one last glimmer, wriggling past two and lashing a knuckler that Jose Garcia had to tip onto the bar, fingertips screaming.
Christensen bulldozed the rebound into the cheap seats.
The Barca fans in the away stands roared in euphoria at the clearance.
On the bench, Hansi Flick lifted two fingers, indicating two more minutes of cruelty. And when the head coach spoke, who dared defy him?
The team happily obliged.
In stoppage time, Barca spun a final pattern, triangle after triangle until the pitch looked like embroidery. Frandie to Pedri, Pedri to Sam, Sam to Ferran, shot saved... but the rebound pounced on by Balde of all people.
The left back’s grin widened as he lashed home the scraps to also add his name to the scoresheet in classic Balde style.
2-7.
It was a route carved from fire in Lisbon.
FWEEEE!
The last whistle cut the night at last.
For a few heartbeats, there was no sound, just steam rising off bodies, the white noise of 55,000 synapses trying to categorize what they’d just witnessed, and failing with style.
Then the applause came...
Clap! Clap!
Layered and complex, they clapped. The boos were drowned by the claps, respect threaded through heartbreak.
Lisbon knows football; and tonight, Lisbon knew that it had been shown something true and legendary.
At the end of the game, players embraced even as Joao Mario, the Benfica midfielder approached Sam for a shirt swap.
"I’m a big fan," the midfielder said with a smile on his face.
"Thanks". Sam responded with a smile and an embrace.
He didn’t win the man of the match award. For a second consecutive game, Raphinha won the man of the match award.
The Brazilian was in electric form. As his teammate, Sam didn’t feel jealous at all. His teammate being in such form meant the whole team would perform better, and he loved it.
Under the floodlights, the players reveled in the aftermath of the game.
Gavi thumped Araujo’s chest; Araujo thumped him back twice as hard. De Jong and Pedri exchanged a tired laugh. Ferran raised both hands to the sky in gratitude.
Raphinha, hat trick and an assist, walked alone for a moment across the center circle, turning slowly, taking it in, eyes wet at the corners.
Sam jogged to him, wrapped an arm around his shoulders, and pulled him toward the away end.
Then together, they clapped to the traveling fans, soaking in that small, fierce square of blaugrana noise.
DING!
~----~
[Daily Quest: Complete]
Reward Unlocked: [High-grade Physical Conditioning Elixir]
Temporary Buff (24h): Muscle Recovery +6%, Sprint Repeatability +4%
[Trait Progress: "Relentless Press Aura" – 73%]
~----~
Sam smiled privately.
Not because of the numbers, but because the numbers meant he could do it again. Tomorrow. And the next day. And the day after that.
At midfield, the fourth official lifted a small card for the official broadcast.
[MAN OF THE MATCH: RAPHINHA]
[Hat-trick, 1 assist, 7 take-ons, 3 chances created]
Raphinha raised both hands modestly when the announcement boomed over the PA, then jabbed a thumb at Sam and Pedri in turn.
Hansi Flick hugged him tight near the touchline and murmured something only he heard. Whatever it was, Raphinha’s shoulders eased; he finally looked like a man who had arrived.
In the press room, they would talk about the storm and the stillness, about Benfica’s fury and Barcelona’s answer, about how a match balanced on a knife’s edge could flip so completely.
They would reach for the old words... ruthless, clinical, inevitable, and none would quite fit, because nights like this are felt, not cataloged.
As the team disappeared down the tunnel, Sam glanced back once more at the field, at the goalmouths that had swallowed red hope and regurgitated blaugrana certainty.
Kayla’s message buzzed his phone in the dressing room: ["Lisbon remembers."]
With a grin, he typed back. ["And we’re not done."]
He was about to keep his phone away when a cheeky thought entered his head. Grinning, he typed. ["Hope I have a reward for the performance."]