Seiji Iwaki vs Thunder Fire

The battle between Seiji Iwaki and Thunder Fire is the first battle of Initial D: Second Stage. This is an anime-only battle.

Prior to the Battle
After Takumi Fujiwara's victory over Ryosuke Takahashi, a new threat alerted racers throughout Gunma. A band of Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution drivers. They call themselves Team Emperor whom crush every team and decorate their team stickers on their spoilers each time they win.

During the Battle
At an unknown pass, a driver from Thunder Fire was under pressure from an Evo IV tailing behind him closely. After desperately trying to shake him off, the Evo IV driver overtakes him from outside with ease in the final corners. The Evo IV drives into the finish line, shocking other Thunder Fire members on how fast the Lan Evos are. The Evo IV driver is revealed to be Seiji Iwaki.

After the Battle
The Thunder Fire driver gave his team sticker to Seiji, who cuts in half and sticks it upside down on his spoiler. Seiji then taunts the defeated driver, stating that cutting out the sticker in the Evo is like "pilots marking kill marks after downing enemy planes". Kyoichi Sudo, the leader of the team then tells the defeated Thunder Fire team that they are going to see Emperor rule over Gunma, as they claim themselves as "king of the mountains".

Trivia

 * When Seiji attaches the rival team sticker into his car, what he was referring to is more well known as Victory marking. It is a symbol applied in stencil or decal to the side of a military aircraft to denote an aerial victory achieved by the aircraft's pilot or crew. The use of victory markings originated during World War I, burgeoned during World War II and frequently took the form of the roundel or national flag of the nationality of the aircraft defeated.