I sped through shallows and hardly even noticed it. I liked to imagine that the water flung from my heels was flying directly into Chora’s face, feeding her rage.

She wouldn’t be able to beat me in this race. Not unless she pulled out all the magical stops.

I was having the time of my life out here. The savannah that was the Drippy Flats wasn’t quite barren at night, but just gray and empty enough to be ghostly. Even now there were animals drinking at the watering holes, a few ducks and geese making lazy circles on the water.

Naturally, I circled around a bank and dashed past them far from lazily, and a couple of honks trailed behind me.

In my heart, I cackled.

Next I wove around a couple of old grazing insomniac goats, rounding the turn with ease. But then my heart lurched. A truly terrifying sound clipped my ear.

Chora was using her wind techniques to boost herself along—but that wasn’t the problem. The problem was how close she was.

How’d that even happen?! Looking over my shoulder, I spotted her a mere three meters away, dashing along the flats with bounds far longer than any Earth humans could achieve. Miraculously, she hadn’t twisted her ankles either!

Soon I would discover the answer.

I zigzagged around an upcoming goat. Right afterward, behind me came a sound like a fist against a drum.

When I looked over my shoulder again, that goat had been sent flying.

I was going around physical obstacles and Chora was going through them.

There was no soft heart for the animal kingdom there. Chora was in it to win it, just like I’d wanted her to be. And evidently it’d require some strategic thinking on my part.

My attention blinked back to the path ahead of me. A goat casually walked into my path. With a tiny yelp, I made a split-second change, got low—

Baseball-skidded underneath the goat’s legs, then got right back up and kept dashing.

Another drumbeat sounded behind me. “Me-e-eh!” cried the poor goat. They thudded onto the ground.

Darnit. I had gained no ground, only held my position.

In case you’re wondering, yes, I was holding back on my Leaps for the final stretch. It didn’t seem fair to pull them out now…well, it hadn’t seemed fair until Chora convinced me she could actually win this. But now I recalculated, consulting my Map and my Stats.

image [https://imgur.com/yxYlml0.png]

We had about a third of this journey left to go.

SP 54% (158/293)

Skills Leap

SP Cost: 45

Each Leap carried me several meters forward. I had enough SP in me to use it three times. But…if I took off from a run on flat land, that would only give me an advantage for so long. My ear twitched—the chopping swish of Chora’s pumping arms was getting a little closer. I had not held my position after all. She was gaining.

And we still had a third of this sprint to clear!

Good thing we didn’t bet anything on this.

But instead of giving up, or having mere fun, I decided to work at it—have fun with real plotting and determination. Because victory was sweet.

My first thought: why make a run for it in a straight line?

No flat plain was completely level. Most of the trees, boulders, and other obstacles that I otherwise might’ve stumbled across hadn’t been in my path, but instead to the sides. In fact, a stubby bush passed in my peripheral vision just as that realization hit me.

Without hesitation, I veered off toward the nearest tree. It was far enough off my path that once I reached it, Chora would be just a hair away from a tie with me.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Once I reached the base of it, I almost turned right back. A spark of primal fear—there was an anthill at the base.

…Nah, whatever, those ants weren’t red and we were like a half-hour away from the hotel. I stomped through the anthill, then skittered onto the tree bark, where several lines of ants were squashed mid-march.

EXP: 6% (134/2250)

Aw, darnit, now I had another thing to feel guilty about! I kept forgetting that most insects didn’t provide enough Experience to be worth it! Now I was the murderer of a whole civilization, and for what?!

—Oh yeah, here I was at the top of the tree.

Not far off to my right, Chora continued dashing, not missing a beat. So neither would I.

I jumped to the highest branch that was sturdy enough to support my Leap-off. This was a young tree, and I couldn’t have been more than four meters off the ground, but the difference was noticeable, and it was about to get exponential.

Feeling like the whole tree was wavering below me, I took a brief moment to get my legs in position, and—Leap!

I flew.

For an incredibly long moment, I was a flying streak in the dim starlight. I was airborne for long enough that part of me wanted to paddle my limbs—my brain halfway convinced I had to be underwater.

Then my senses began to return to me. Quickly my mind alighted on the next part of the strategy. After all, I hadn’t won yet, not even close. We had a quarter’s worth of distance left. The tree-lined western edge of the flats had only just appeared on the horizon.

I wasn’t about to focus on Chora. All I needed was my own speed and distance, and to secure that, I needed to decide where I was going to land next.

Any trees down there? Okay, I had to stop looking straight down because everything there would obviously just whiz past me. My eyes roved across the sights ahead, had trouble figuring out which ones would actually be underfoot. Sadly (or happily) no trees were upcoming to break my fall (or have me crashing into them).

Maybe that rock? No, it was too far—

(At this point, I was less than a second away from landing.)

Ah! Another goat! Not as cool or stable as a tree or a rock! But maybe workable!

I landed feet-first on the goat’s back. My claws briefly, indulgently dug in as I prepared another Leap. But it was alright. The goat would have neat battle scars to show to their friends.

“M-m-e-e-e-e-eh!” followed me out. I Leaped and felt the body of the beast stagger behind me.

Now, that was how you harassed animals.

EXP: 11% (244/2250)

The Experience yield wasn’t amazing. The distance increase the goat-boost gave me wasn’t amazing either. But as I completed the second Leap and landed full-gallop, I realized that no trees or rocks were incoming. But a bull at a watering hole was.

With a brief splash into the shallows, I jumped onto the hind leg of the massive bovine. Immediately he roused, stamped. I didn’t slow down, and as the bull began to back up and shake me off, I was already up on his back, racing toward the pair of horns pointing coincidentally and symbolically toward my goal…

Leap!

HP 81% (287/353)

OW! I shouldn’t have done that on the pointy parts.

The bull harrumphed behind me, but no EXP gain meant I’d served him nothing like a defeat. Still, I took off, so I was happy.

And in midflight, I spared a look behind me.

Hoho. I knew Chora was still back there marathon-running, wasn’t she? Gunning it like that was gonna—

Where the heck was Chora?

My head swiveled sideways in a moment of panic, and then I caught sight of her.

She was still keeping up with me!

But her technique had changed, and she was sweating bullets. Her arms had gone slack, and instead of surrounding herself with gusts of air, she seemed to be jetting it from her heels, leaving dust and torn grass hovering in the air behind her.

…Well, I guessed this was what I’d wanted. Evidently Chora had totally exhausted herself and pushed her body and skills to the limit, just to win this thing. She deserved a gold star! But also probably a hospital visit.

I landed, and my legs rolled right back into my stride. With only enough SP remaining to shoot off a Guard or Meditate, I had no more tricks up my sleeve. All I could do now was keep darting towards the exit in a straight line.

Actually, in my moment of surprise, I’d slightly miscalculated where Chora was in relation to me. She was slightly ahead, and her speed was ticking up faster.

I made a mild diversion to the left, raced up a boulder, and jumped off. It did not help me at all.

Now I knew for sure that Chora had locked in the win, and my frustration at losing was starting to be overshadowed by…pride? Pride in my liege, was that what this was?

Chora disappeared into the trees. I was two seconds behind her, but two seconds was too long.

We were on the home stretch: a dirt path well maintained by whoever lived in this upcoming village. And we were only speeding down the path for mere seconds until—

We broke through the trees, and I stopped myself right on the edge of a stone stair.

A very very long staircase, next to a very very long ramp, stretched and waved down and down into a village dotted with lights the color of the fireflies.

Chora stood next to me, panting the heaviest pants I had ever heard. I turned to her, and she collapsed onto her back. Thankfully, her back hit some fairly soft grass and mulch.

Half a minute later, as I was wondering whether she’d just fallen asleep, she ever-so-slowly pulled her arms up, anchored the hands underneath her, and pushed her body, shaking with exhaustion, into an upright sitting position. Her legs, like slugs, slithered until she was cross-legged.

The sweat was sliding off of her. She still looked as tired as anything, but now she was returning to a state of calm. And she gazed down into the village with what I assumed was a kind of pride of her own.

We didn’t say anything, just sat in silence like comrades.